I lift my eyes up...

to the heavens, where does my help come from. My help comes from You, Maker of heaven... I hope you remember that worship song from the 90's, that proclaims the truth of Psalm 121. If you don't remember it, no worries, but that's the song that came to my mind as I came back into my empty apartment a few minutes ago after sending Claudia off to the airport in the taxi. She's been here for two weeks, and we've had a great time, even if it's been mainly focused around work and the 25 minute scooter commute I take each way every day. In the last 9 working days ('cause today is a working day, but she's gone now..uh), we had one day off (New Year's Day), and she came to work with me 6 of the other 7 days. She filed my lesson plans that had been gathering dust in my drawer for a month, she entered my test scores for all my classes which will make my future work lighter in that area, she assisted my co-workers with all kinds of things, and she made some cool bulletin boards to decorate my sad, drab classroom. All the kids loved her and my co-workers now like me better because of her. (They never expressed interest in coming to America to visit me, but they're all looking at flights now so they can go visit Claudia.) My roommates loved her and want to come visit her too, and my friend, Julie was wanting to give her a last minute tour of the city this morning before her flight, so clearly she won her over as well. I told Claudia that she made me look good, but also gave a good impression of Christians and of Americans, which is not easy to do these days in many places. All this to say, we had a great time together, and although I know I'll be in SF in 3 short weeks, I got sad to see her go this morning. It's just a reminder that I'm here without my San Francisco community, and that reality is still often hard for me to swallow, even after 21 weeks (but who's counting). I came in the door, and immediately started singing that song, "I lift my eyes up, to the heavens, where does my help come from..." because I know I cannot face even one of these next weeks in my own strength. My own strength was pretty much gone here within the first few weeks, and I've been mostly exhausted ever since (thank God for caffeine!) Yet today, I have to face four classes and begin packing for us to move this weekend. My roommates and I are getting a fourth, we're moving across the road in our huge apartment complex, and I'll save about half the rent I've been paying the last several months. This is an answer to prayer, even if the timing is rushed for me. I go to church with these great South African folks who are here teaching (you've seen their pictures before) and we'll all be living together for the next season of my life in Taiwan. So, we're packing and moving this weekend since two of them leave for home next weekend and won't return for 3-4 weeks (luckies).

So, today is Friday, and I'm ready for the weekend. I've included some photos and a couple of video's. One of the video's is from my A8 class this week. It's not great but I hope you can make out the sentences they are reading. I couldn't resist writing them out of the choices of their predetermined spelling words. (I don't choose their spelling, it comes from a phonics book. You can't make these things up!) They get five words each class session and they are usually related in some way. This list included words with "nk" endings like sink, think, junk, trunk, and skunk. How would you write sentences with these words? Check it out. There's also a video of me, Claudia and Julie, meeting up for a late dinner after work last night. Just a local dive that serves Japanese style food for cheap.

I'm looking forward to being back in the states for a few days the first two weeks of February. One of the reasons is for the great joy of getting to meet Olivia Anne Tafao, born February 8th in San Francisco to my friends Stacey and Elijah. I haven't seen a picture of her yet (hint, hint) but I'm betting she's a beauty! Congratulations to the Tafaos!

I hope this finds you all well and taking on the new year with a sense of excitement and purpose. If the purpose part hasn't dawned on you quite yet, take a moment to look at Saddleback Church's website. God is really working within that church and through their leadership, and it's always fun to watch God work. You might even get inspired.

Gotta get on the scoot for the commute, so I'll close.

Until next time, LC from TW

Psalm 121 (NIV)

1 I lift up my eyes to the hills— where does my help come from?

2 My help comes from the LORD,
the Maker of heaven and earth.

3 He will not let your foot slip—
he who watches over you will not slumber;

4 indeed, he who watches over Israel
will neither slumber nor sleep.

5 The LORD watches over you—
the LORD is your shade at your right hand;

6 the sun will not harm you by day,
nor the moon by night.

7 The LORD will keep you from all harm—
he will watch over your life;

8 the LORD will watch over your coming and going
both now and forevermore.

A8 trying to say the sentences I wrote for them.

At Teppanyaki Thursday night.

Erin and Claudia acting up at TGI Fridays.

Me and Sharon at Fridays.

Annaloe, me, Mari and Claudia.

Me and Claudia in front of my apartment.

New Year's Day in Taiwan! and Happy Birthday Jesus!

Happy New Year, 1997, everybody! (In the Chinese calendar, it's only 1997. Guess we can't sell them any Y2K software, eh?)

If you're reading this I hope it's because you're procrastinating on all your New Year's resolutions (I know I am)...but here in a minute, you're going to have to go to the gym, or clean out the garage, or whatever else you promised to do.

I'm on day three of 2008, and for the first time in my life, I've worked 2 of the 3 days so far this year! There's no rest for the workers in Chinese culture.

It's a good year, so far. My friend, Claudia, from San Francisco, arrived late Friday night (the 28th) and promptly had to get up for a work commitment I had on Saturday morning. She arrived in the coldest spell of the year and we've been experiencing the rigors of scooter riding in the freezing cold wind for the past 5 days. On top of that, there is no heat in the apartments here, so the other night when I said to Claudia, "I can turn the heater on if you want me to," and her eyes lit up with excitement, I had to let her down and say, "Just kidding! There's no heat in China. These people are hardcore!" I thought she was going to cry, but instead she found a space heater in my roommates room and it has become her new best friend. I think she may survive her visit. (IF she could just find a way to have that heater on the scooter, she'd be happy!)

I've included a video of my A7 class from Friday night singing, "Happy Birthday, Jesus" with one of my students, Cosmo, doing interpretive movement. Just so you can hear them sing (sorry you can hear me coaching them too.)

I've also included a video of one of the 300+ participants in the Kang Ning English School Reading Contest (for which I served as a judge, "certified foreign teacher judge", all day Saturday). This little boy is probably 6 years old, he read with the paper covering his face the whole time, but what a cute voice. His topic is "Owen and his pet python, Lucky". Try to listen to the whole thing and watch him walk off the stage. This was in a huge convention hall full of people.

On Sunday, we went to church, then ate Teppanyaki (Japanese style cooking on a grill in front of your table), which we both enjoyed, and spent the rest of the day holed up in the apartment trying to stay warm.

Monday, we went to work, and spent the New Year's Eve-ning chilling (literally) in the apartment with an American friend, Julie, playing a cool game called Imaginiff. We were asleep by 1:00, which meant my roommates were locked out at 3:10 when they came home from their New Year's Eve party. Claudia and I never heard them, and slept right through til I woke up and discovered their text message at 5:15. Too late, they had already gone back to sleep at their friends house. Oops!

Tuesday, New Year's Day, was a full one! We took the train into Taipei to see the worlds tallest building (o.k., now it's the 2nd tallest, but don't tell the Taiwanese since they haven't updated their displays or their audio tour). It's the Taipei 101 and it is really impressive. When we got out of the train station, we took a taxi to the 101 and it's surrounding shopping areas, complete with a Chili's, a Macaroni Grill, and a Cold Stone Creamery. (Go America!) (Shout out to my sister from the food court where we found another Teppanyaki restaurant named "Karen". Hey sis!) We ate a yummy Italian meal at Macaroni Grill and then went up in the tower for the tour. It was awesome to see the city from the sky. Claudia graduated from Cal Berkeley with a degree in Architecture so she was more impressed than I was. But, I found all the grammar mistakes in the signs...see the picture below of Claudia and the "World Fastest Elevator".

After we finished at the tower, we stopped in at Marks and Spencers to see what they had (I used to shop there in the UK and wanted to check it out), then we picked up some Cold Stone to go, both of us clinging to our old favorites, and being sorely disappointed when the girl behind the counter didn't mix it the way they do in DC (that's Daly City, not Washington). We jumped into a taxi, tried in vain to communicate "train station" to the taxi driver, complete with "choo choo" and "chug a chug a chug a chug a" and finally we got out our tickets from the earlier train to show the guy. He LOOKED like he understood and off he went. After a bit, when I didn't recognize anything, I called my friend and had her say it to him on the phone. He had understood but was just taking a different way to get there. We arrived at the station shortly after, bought a ticket and only had the option of standing on the train for the hour and fifteen minute ride back to Hsinchu, so we were tired puppies when we got off. And fearing the public toilets on the train, I was needing to get home quickly. No such luck.

As we got on the scooter and turned out of the train station parking lot, we were seconds later, met head on by a taxi whose driver was clearly not wearing his glasses. The dude just rolled right into us. It was like bizarre slow motion. The bike fell over, Claudia got her leg caught under it, the back of my leg scraped on something, my Marks and Spencers bag fell into the street and I pounded the guys hood trying to make sure he didn't keep rolling. He got out and made some motion that he'd HAD his blinker on...as if that makes it o.k. to cross traffic and roll right into a two-wheeled vehicle. I immediately called my friend and let her talk to him in Chinese. Long story shorter, he gave her his name and number, the bike was not hurt so we could drive home and get out of the cold, our "injuries" were mainly just bruises which are still with us but nothing major, and the old taxi guy made sure we were out of the street and said a number times in his broken Chinese accent, "Surry!" Sincerely offered and apology accepted, we scooted on home to the comfort of hot shower, clean clothes and leftovers from Macaroni Grill. It was a big day filled with excitement, discovery, adventure, and surprises. What more can we ask for in 2008, er uh, I mean 1997? (Prince, tonight we're gonna party like it's 19-90-9!" They still have two years before that song is old. Buy stock in Prince's music.)

We're having a great time, so far, although I'm already getting really tired of being at work all day and not being able to enjoy the visit with Claudia like I want to. Alas, as always, work really gets in the way of life doesn't it?

Have a great one. Until next time, LC (and CB) from the TW!

Taipei 101 at dusk!

Claudia pointing out an error.

Hey there, Karen! You're big in Taiwan.

The inconsiderate Taxi Man!
Ran right into us!

Happy Birthday, Jesus!
A7 singing with Cosmo as the star!

The Reading Contest at Kang Ning
(note the backwards "N" on the curtain...oops!)

Christmas Day in TW

What a great few days we've had here! I have three sets of friends here...my co-workers, which includes Sam and Erin, my teacher friends from Canada...my South African friends, which includes my roommates and their extended circle of friends...and my church friend, Julie, who is American and has been in Taiwan for nine years! Over the last few days, beginning on Sunday morning and finishing late Tuesday night, I got to spend some quality time with each of these folks and enjoyed it so much! It made being away from family a little easier to bear and the necessity of working on Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, and today Boxing Day (hey, I lived in the UK for three Christmas's) a little less of a bummer. I miss my family, but thankfully I will see them and my friends in SF in just 5 and a half weeks. Woo hoo!

I've included a video (sorry it's on it's side) and some party pics of our Christmas "Dinner" at school yesterday, which our boss put on for us in lieu of our weekly staff meeting. ("Dinner" was a turkey, a plate of french bread slices and two pizzas from Domino's. This, of course, was better than the funky combo of foods they would have put on if we had asked them to prepare their food in a traditional feast, so we didn't complain, we just ate pizza for Christmas Dinner.) She made my heart skip a beat when near the end of lunch she made a big "announcement". I thought she was going to say we could take the rest of the day off, but I guess I've been watching too many movies. She said, "I have a big announcement to make! I want to give you all a very special gift for Christmas, so I've decided that next year on Christmas Day the school will be closed!" We all cheered raucously, but were of course thinking, "Ugh! What about today? 365 days away? That's a special gift? I got your special gift over here. Where I come from we call this a knuckle sandwich!" And on and on my sad mind went with my thoughts on her announcement, but you get the gist.

My three classes passed without too much fanfare and I scooted after work at almost 10:00 over to Julie's house where she had spent the day preparing a real Christmas Dinner. Roasted lamb, scalloped potatoes, corn casserole, green beans, rolls, and homemade blueberry cheesecake. I had made a box of stove top stuffing so we also had that. It was awesome.

I came home around midnight, gave my folks a call to wish them a Merry Christmas. My dad had just come in from hunting (and killing) ducks and he was happy. Mom sounded really good, which was great for me to hear. I think she feels a little better in the mornings. Anyway, I went to sleep late, very tired but very happy.

It's Wednesday morning here, I have much to do to prepare for teaching in a few hours, so I'm off. Hope your Christmas was memorable, and if it wasn't, perhaps you can think of ways to make it so next year. As for me, I'm already looking forward to next year, when I won't have to work, 'cause my boss declared it yesterday! ;)

Merry Christmas from TW, until next time, Larissa



This video is not great, but it's a slice of life here for me, if you can stand to have your head tilted to watch it for less than a minute, and hear me trying desperately to coach all the Chinese staff to say Merry Christmas, when most of them thought I was taking a photo and just freeze framed their smiles. Alas, it is what it is!

This is the group of young women that work
for our school as Teacher's Assistants.
Left to right is Annie, Cara, Joyce, and Debby.
I work with Cara mainly.

Below is the motley crew of "foreign teachers" that teach at Kang Ning. There are a few missing, but back row is Ben from New Zealand, Erin from Canada, Hendri and Stephen both from South Africa; front row, Sam from Canada, me, and Candice from South Africa. I only teach with Erin but I go to staff meeting with all of the rest of these except for Stephen. (He looks like a happy fellow, eh?)

Here I am pictured between my boss,
Serena, and her brother, Alex, who works
for the school. (I think they were having
a dispute over our upcoming Reading
Competition and I made them take this
picture with me. Rather Kittlitz of me I
think, don't you?)

Finally, here is a classic kitchen shot
of all the ladies that happened to be
standing nearby when I wanted a picture
with only one or two of them. They love
the pics (note the poses on both of the
bookends.) The only new people in this
shot are the two ladies in glasses. I work
with Lizann, next to me and Sharon,
in the front looking very uncomfortable.

Another week and all is well in the ROC...

(which stands for Republic of China) of Taiwan. I've had a pretty good week, except for the melt down I "enjoyed" with my B5 class late on Thursday.

Here's the short version. Thursdays are my longest day, (which I believe I've mentioned before but apparently can't say enough), and by my last class I'm flagging on energy I can tell you. I teach a class of 7 boys, 13 and 14 years old, and they are tired too so we're not great to begin with in that state. Usually we manage o.k., without making a big deal about our mutual lack of interest, but Thursday night I found my edge. Not only did I find it, I fell off it and walked out of the classroom. After my co-worker explained to them that they cannot just keep talking when I've told them a dozen times to stop, we finished class with a decidedly more somber mood. I was moved to tears when the two boys responsible for my frustration approached me after class to apologize. They said, with such sincere expressions on their faces, "Sorry teacher. Sorry teacher. Never again. Never again." At that moment I really hated the language barrier, a feeling I have every day, but particularly in this situation. I could not say anything back to them except, "O.K., thank you." But, of course body language is universal to some extent and they saw that I was moved by their words. I wanted to give them a hug and tell them I'm sorry that I'm a crappy teacher at that time of the day, that my patience is gone by 8:45 at night no matter what I've done that day, but especially when I've been on my feet for three classes straight before theirs. I'm still trying to understand the Chinese psyche and probably will never get it, but it seems like the fun is squeezed out of these kids pretty early on, and I don't want to teach them without having fun. They have to work so hard in Chinese school and then they have an endless list of lessons and activities, including English, and I want this part of their lives to be something they enjoy and want to do. It's hard to know how to make that happen, but I was so proud of my co-worker, who has a reputation for being hard and making the kids scared of her, because she just told them that the teacher has feelings too, and they need to pay attention when the teacher is trying to help them learn. (Truthfully, I was so frustrated because they were stuck on the distinction between all the "wh" words - where, when, why, what, who - and they were not listening to try to understand it. Thus, they were answering questions in their grammar books with sentences like "Why do you live?" - technically o.k., but not correct really - and "Where are you wearing a sweater?" - also o.k., but not the best choice.) It was an exhausting evening and I came home very ready for the weekend, although I still had another day to teach.

Now, it's Saturday night and I've got to crash so I can jump up for worship in the morning. I hope you're enjoying the frenzy that Christmas often becomes and are finding some time to be with those you love. I miss mine, so I encourage you to make an extra effort to enjoy yours. One of my favorite people is having a birthday today, so I want to give a shout out to Lisa. Happy Birthday, Lisa! Hope you have a great visit with the family.

I will post again soon, but let me assure you my back looks a lot better now and my cough is also much better this week. I don't know if the two are related, and still have my doubts, but that's where I am on the health front. Thanks to all of you who sent in creative expressions of your concern for me.

Take care until next time. LC

Yet another Chinese cultural experience..

was enjoyed this weekend by me here in TW.

As you know if you've been reading my blog, I've had a cold again for the past ten days or so. This one developed into a bronchial thing with me sounding like I was going to bark up a lung at any minute, so many of my friends have expressed concern for me. Well, yesterday after church, my American friend, Julie, asked me to go for a massage with her. Having no idea what she was intending, but lovin' me some massage (being a massage therapist and all...), I agreed to meet her at the place at 5. When we arrived and she ordered the "scraping" for both her and me, I got a little curious. But she assured me, having lived here for 9 years and gotten this done many times, that it was great to get rid of a cold. She had a cold too, and I was fed up with being sick, so I agreed to it. I asked her what kind of scraping we were talking about, and she said, "It's like they're using the back of a comb to stimulate the blood in your back. It's a little uncomfortable but it really helps."

O.K., so off I go to the room, which by the way, I shared with Julie and her uncle (who's here on business from the states and was also getting a massage). In Asia you wear loose fitting clothes for your massage so there's no modesty issues. I gotta tell you, the three therapists chattering away in Chinese was not contributing to me going to my happy place, but I strangely grew used to it and sort of even drowned it out. Of course, I was coughing quite a bit at the beginning as my girl was really working my lungs from the back.

You've probably already seen the picture of my back, but let me assure you, it doesn't hurt, now! (When the gal was doing it, I was thinking, "What kind of comb does Julie use? A metal comb? A really mean comb? If this lady goes much deeper she's going to hit bone! Ouch! Stop, please stop!!") It doesn't hurt, but it looks really bad. I took the picture about 6 hours after she did it, and it was getting deeper purple by the minute I think. But, I woke up this morning and feel A LOT better! So, do I argue with this? I don't know, the jury's out. Weigh in and let me know what you think if you have any thoughts about these kinds of unconventional remedies.

I have to run, but hope to post again in the next few days. It's Monday morning and I have to get to work, just like the rest of the human race. (Speaking of human race... I saw "I Am Legend" at the theater here on Saturday night...ugh! Pretty creepy creatures I must say, but an interesting thought about what "could" cause humans to become almost extinct. Have you seen it? I don't necessarily recommend it, but Will Smith's "guns" are huge. In one scene they're almost as big as his head.)


Until next time, LC

Praising God tonight...

for safety on the scooter. I often talk about the craziness of driving here, and I've had some very close calls (that I know of and probably many others I wasn't even aware of), but tonight was the closest, I think. Erin was not as fortunate, but thankfully she's o.k. Her scooter doesn't look so good and she's got some bruises but at least she's got no broken bones.

Erin is my Canadian friend I work with and we were riding together tonight after work to try to see a late movie. We've never done this but decided to try it because I had an unexpected class cancellation from my adult 3 on 1 class. This means I got finished at 7:45, which is the same time Erin finishes on Wednesdays. We were riding on a very busy street and had just taken off from a red light (which always resembles a race amongst all the scooters) when a taxi van pulled a u-turn right in front of us and stopped without any warning or indicator. I was in front and just barely managed to swerve to miss him at the back, but Erin couldn't do it without hitting me, so she braced herself and went broad-side into his car. She's a tall girl and the impact made her come over the scooter to smack her helmet on his car, then she and the scooter fell over on the left side. I was past the car when I heard a very loud thud and a slight scream from a girl, which of course when I turned around I knew was Erin's voice. I got to her in seconds and she looked up at me and said, "I'm alright." The taxi guy was standing there by then too, and the first words out of my mouth were, "You shouldn't have done that." He actually spoke English and understood what I said and frustrated he said, "I do it all the time." To which I quickly said back, "It doesn't matter if you do it all the time, it was wrong and you shouldn't have done it. You cannot make a u-turn without any warning." Erin managed to hobble off the road, leaving her bike there in the middle of it, and someone phoned the police. They arrived and asked if we could speak Chinese, which of course we can't. We phoned our office and our friend Sharon came within a few minutes, but meanwhile a very kind gentleman and his wife (angels?) who both spoke great English stopped to help us. To make a long story short, we ended up in the hospital for about an hour and a half, Erin getting the ambulance escort, and me following behind on my scooter, going much slower and notably shaken by it all.

I have to give a shout out to Erin, who saved my hide tonight, and handled the quick decision to hang on and go straight into the taxi very responsibly. If you've ever been in a wreck, you know that you can make it worse or better depending on your reactions to the situation with which you're presented. Erin could have tried to swerve in either direction and really done a lot more damage to her body, or she could have slid out and ended up under his car, or any number of other very unpleasant things that could have happened but thankfully didn't. So she was cool under pressure and that is commendable! Way to go Erin!!

I also want to give a shout out to the Kang Ning gang, particularly Erchong, but also Chutung, for showing up when we needed them. First, Sharon, one of our Erchong co-workers, came and talked to the police for us...thanks, Sharon, you're awesome! Then, when we were at the hospital, Sam and Serena showed up (from Chutung, Erin's roommate and our boss, the founder and director of the school) followed closely by Alex, who also works at Chutung school. Then, Teacher Hendri (the stellar teacher from my Saturday evening experience, see previous post for details) arrived followed by Cara and Scarlet, our co-workers from Erchong. By this time, I had registered to see a doctor myself and get my cough/cold seen to, and Erin was pretty much finished. We both left, able to walk unassisted, with medicine in hand, and neither of us spent more than $20! (Even though Erin's right knee is swollen and her face hurts, no broken bones, thank the Lord!)

You know, I often feel that God is protecting me, and tonight I really feel so blessed that He would cause it all to be so much better than I thought it was going to be when I first heard that thud. I really pray that I'll forget that sound soon, but that I won't soon forget how good He is to me. Thanks so much for all your prayers when you think of me here amongst the crazy drivers. (Let's face it, taxi drivers are crazy everywhere!! Sorry, if you drive a taxi, on a number of levels.)

Now, I'm off to bed to try to sleep...if only the mosquito that's been feasting on my flesh the last few nights would somehow choke out from the cough medicine they gave me. (I think there's liquor in it!) I'm probably pushing it, eh?

Until next time, LC

Cultures colliding (parts one and two)

...is the theme of this past weekend for me here in Taiwan.

Part One
Saturday morning I relaxed at home for a few hours before heading out to meet my boss. Several of us followed her to her farm about 20 minutes from the Chudung school, where her 74 year old mother has planted a huge field of vegetables that are now ready for picking. Serena, my boss, is using many of these to feed the children at school everyday (this is customary since it's an all day school and serving hot nutritious meals is a selling point). Of course this is only provided in the school at Chudung and I teach in Erchong so I don't eat this food everyday...which is actually o.k. with me. Anyway, Serena is very health conscious and earth friendly so she's growing these veggies organically to feed the kids better food and to lower her food costs. So, we were invited to pick some veggies for our own personal use and off we went. What an experience. It was a beautiful day and we each picked a big bag of veggies, mostly unidentifiable, but still I'm sure healthy. The funny part of the afternoon was realizing that I was never going to know what these veggies were called, as each time I asked "What's this?" the reply was "Uh, uh, Chinese vegetable." To which I just nodded and thanked God once again for the internet. (Although honestly that didn't really help me either when I was deciding what to do with these huge peppery flavored green leaves, not really lettuce but not really mustard greens. Something else. Oh, yea, Chinese vegetable!)

Then, after picking my bag full, Saturday evening had been prearranged by the secretary at the school for a few of the teachers to go to an aboriginal restaurant with three of the students, who are siblings, and their parents. This is always a sacrifice since our down time is precious, but it is one of the reasons I believe I'm here, so I agreed to do it. We met at 5:30 at the school and followed the father to the restaurant. Their Vietnamese servant had arranged the table at the restaurant with these thimble sized drinking glasses and had filled up a pouring pot with this clear liquor. We each had one of these drinking glasses and thankfully one of the teachers who has been here for 13 years (he's from South Africa and married a Taiwanese woman) told us not to drink it too fast, or at all since he would keep filling the glass every time it was empty. I managed to pour mine into another cup after a while and never had to drink it, but smelling it seared a hole in my nostril. Whoa! Strong does not describe.

After making it through many courses of various animals with bones or eyeballs looking at me (not only was the usual fish eyes on the menu, but yes, we ate fried bee...my first time, not too bad, but honestly...bee?), we finished the meal around 8 and were invited back to his home for tea. This was something we couldn't get out of, so we all went, hoping and praying it wouldn't last too long. Well, by 9:30 he was brewing the third kind of tea and the best, of course, so we were pretty stuck. I drank more tea than I've ever had in my life and don't know that I've felt any benefit from it, but alas it was about building the relationship so it was not a complete loss of an evening. I learned a lot about Chinese culture and how this man feels that he must send his four children to English school because it is part of the expectation for the future in Taiwan and internationally. He sacrifices his own pleasures (except for the tea) to make it possible for the children to have English classes, and he's very proud that he can do it. They live in a big house that he built, that has traditional Chinese concrete floors.

It was a good evening, but just long and I was frustrated to come home after 10 with a bag of dirty veggies to wash and put up, plus the need to prepare for Sunday. I had to confess my bad attitude and ask for forgiveness. When I did I felt really honored that I had gotten to spend the evening with Alec and Susan and their four children, Victor, Vincent, Eva, and Wayne. You can pray for them too when you think about it. They have probably heard the gospel before because Alec mentioned having tea once a week with a guy who goes to my church here, so I can only assume that was for evangelical purposes. But, I don't really know much more. No doubt I will have another opportunity if I want it.

More later about my Sunday with the South Africans.

Part Two
Sunday afternoon was lazy for the most part, which was just what I needed after such a crazy Saturday. Our home now has three living in it, with Mari here recovering from her scooter accident, and we'll soon be moving to a four bedroom place where we'll welcome a fourth roommate. We were all four here on Sunday afternoon just relaxing and eating lunch and for some reason the topic of teaching me Afrikaans came up. If you don't know, Afrikaans is the language spoken most often by white South Africans (which all these folks are), and I believe it was brought by the Dutch settlers who "colonized" South Africa many hundred years ago. (Wow, if you're South African and you're reading my blog, forgive my pathetic explanation of your mother tongue!) So, it sort of sounds Dutch and German with a British lilt to it. Anyway, my roommate, Annaloe often tries to teach me a few words, and she gets very excited when I speak the odd Afrikaans word here and there, so she of course was really into this. Again, for some reason, only known to the highest level PhD's in Psychology (or maybe Psychiatry) we started talking about words that we really shouldn't be talking about, and I found out that when you want to say "I need to go #2" in Afrikaans, you say "I need to go poof" or something like that. Those kinds of conversations can only continue downhill (there's that saying again) and of course this one did, until we had all embarrassed ourselves and laughed til we were crying. This was a great feeling. You know you're amongst friends when you laugh until you cry. Round two of this started later in the day when another (South African) friend came over and we re-enacted the whole thing for him. It's the little things that keep us going, eh? Just had to share it with you. And with that I'm off...

Until next time, LC