A Mission Statement

If the Christmas holidays seems to lose their meaning at the shopping malls, maybe it's because one has lost sight of the main mission. We have a local neighborhood mission called the "San Gabriel Mission" or "Mission San Gabriel Arcángel". It's part of the famous chain of missions founded by Junípero Serra in (Upper) California. This Sunday afternoon, we took a family stroll in the area.



The original mission was found in 1771 (in Montebello), but it got wiped out in a flood in 1776, so it moved to this location five miles away. We wondered why this particular place was chosen. Could it be that San Gabriel has better Chinese food than Montebello?



The photo below is a Christmas tree on the mission grounds that was decorated with what appears to be aluminum pie pans. Quite fascinating. At least it will scare all the pigeons away.



Hikaru gets very excited. Here he points to the sights and the lights.





We also discovered this mysterious "map" imbedded in the sidewalk which might unlock the secret route of how the Spanish came to California. Could this be from the Piri Reis or Zheng He? Please note: Just kidding here. All the tiles were created by local school kids and placed in the walkway around the mission.