Delicious Dinner

Not many pictures for the past couple of days, they are actually all from last night during Brooke's and my dinner.

This first picture is of my dinner, my coffin bread. I don't think that I could really find a picture earlier to show it to you the first time that I had it, so this time I remembered to take a picture of it. This flavor is barbecue pork- it was really yummy. I really like this stuff and it only costs $40NT but the bad part is that it is really greasy.

This is Brooke preparing her dinner, she wasn't too happy with me for taking this picture or the other that I took.

Here Brooke is eating her dinner, she wasn't happy with me as I had my camera ready and took the picture right after she finished saying her prayer.

Yummy, yummy ice cream. The other ice cream that I tried I didn't like too much, but this tasted really good- just like soft serve ice cream with chocolate sauce. I tried taking a picture of Brooke eating her ice cream but she yelled at me and took me to take hers and take a picture with it (the one on the left is obviously mine :D)

The World Be A-Trembling

Tuesday, August 12, 2008
Tomorrow I will have been in Taiwan for two weeks! What a crazy thought, in some ways it has gone by so quickly and I feel like I have been here almost forever, but in other ways I am still learning tons and feel like I just arrived yesterday.
Sunday’s dinner was quite good. It was vegetables and I actually liked most of them, the only one that wasn’t my favorite was Taro, Luke told me not to totally give up trying it, he said if it had been cooked a little different it would have been better. It was a quite delicious dinner also with chicken and some watermelon; it has been fun having dinner together each week together (though it feels like we have to spend a lot on it). After we had dinner we decided that we wanted to play some card games, it was nice having Luke, Kaylene, and Brooke like to play card games; but it was sad as Natalie and Amy decided to go and do friendship bracelets together in the other room- we were wishing that everyone would be together in the same room.
So I am excited to say that on Sunday Natalie and I sat down and we talked together and we were able to make the list of the themes for every week for the rest of our time that we are here….that is a BIG DEAL!! Last week we were scrounging for our theme at the last minute. It took a huge stress off my shoulders. I was still kind of disappointed as Natalie had the idea for what we were doing this week and she had 10 ideas about what we could do, but she once again took the best ideas. I guess that I should be happy that we are getting better at working together. Besides getting the weekly themes done for the rest of the 5 months I also made a list of daily lesson ideas for me, I think that I have close to 60 or so, so that will be able to cover me for awhile.
Yuling came back yesterday!!! It was exciting to finally meet her. She seems like such a nice lady, she told me that if I need anything just to tell her and she will try and find it/ get it for me. She said that they don’t want us to have to spend our own money on things so if we can give them a heads-up they will do it. I can’t believe that she just had a baby a month ago; she doesn’t even look like she was just pregnant. She seems a little older, but not exactly really old. I think that everyone is relieved to have her back, especially Teacher Stephanie (who has been doing all of Yuling’s work and her own while she has been gone). I have had a weird beginning; I guess generally Yuling is more involved with the new interns helping them find places and showing them the good businesses to go to. It has been an interesting beginning.
Yesterday my lessons went pretty well I thought, in my morning class we talked about pushing and pulling, we first looked all around the class and talked about which things we have to push or to pull to make them work and about how there are many things that can be pushed and pulled, depending on whether you needed to open or close it, etc. We then played a game where one person held my left hand another person held my right hand, the class then told each person whether they were supposed to pull or push, at one point the kids kept on going rather than the straight line that everyone had been doing and they went in a continuous circle, needless to say, by the end of the three classes I was quite dizzy. On Monday’s for my middle class I am supposed to do a lesson on some concept of safety or health, so yesterday I decided to talk about crossing the road safely and what the different lights mean. So of course we had to play red light, green light :D The classroom that we are in is not very long and they are quite fast so they have to ride these plastic horses, it is one of the funniest things that I have ever seen, seeing these kids bounce up and down across the room on these plastic horses. This week for the afternoon classes our theme is Transportation, so yesterday I talked about Bikes. My afternoon class is the hardest one that I have to deal with as it is 45 minutes long, and sometimes it is pretty hard to find information to fill those 45 minutes. So yesterday my lesson was a little bit stretched, at the end we were just stretching out coloring a picture.
I was so proud of myself last night; Brooke had invited me to go to the night market with her to get some juice. I went with her and was able to give directions the whole way there and I even did all of the corners without getting off my bike or completely stopping. I am starting to get even more confident on my bike. When we got to the night market I decided that I would also get a coffin bread for my dinner while we were there, I went with a new flavor and got barbeque pork, it was really good too- I think that I will like all of their flavors except the shrimp and pineapple and whatever the one with the mushrooms are. I also got a mango/kiwi juice (it wasn’t bad but it wasn’t my favorite flavor that I have tried).We also stopped at the fruit stand on the way home, Brooke wanted to point out a fruit to me that she had tried in Thailand that she had really liked, so next time I go to the fruit stand I think that I will buy one and try it (I think that it looks like an asparagus though), she also got some kiwis for us to try, as most of our kiwis are green inside these ones are yellow, I still have yet to try them but I will try them soon. I safely made my way back, even at one point Brooke made a turn before a car came and I couldn’t make it, I told her to go on- I knew the way home and I rode the rest of the way by myself. When we got home I decided that I needed to run to the grocery store and the bakery to grab some things I was pretty confident that I knew where I was going but I kind of wanted someone to go with me one more time, Brooke said that she would go with me just I would lead the way, so that is what I did- I led the way and got us safely there and back (Wahoo!!). When we got back she and I ate our dinner (delicious!) and just talked again for awhile, it is crazy tomorrow she is leaving for Hong Kong for the rest of the week and then when she gets back she is only going to be here for one more week (that kind of makes me sad as I really like her and get along with her really well).
It was kind of funny last night, when I was coming up the stairs from putting a load of laundry in the washer when I looked across the way and saw this beautiful building that was all lit up with lights, it looked like a palace to me; I went inside and asked Brooke if she knew what it was. She came outside to look at it with me and she didn’t know what it was. I let go of it, but I guess it kind of bugged Brooke because like 10 minutes later she came and told me that she would be back in awhile, she was riding to go and find out what it was. So after all of our hopes and building it up to be a palace of some kind she came back like 30 minutes later to tell me that all it was, was a hotel- she said the best view was actually from our apartment. She had tried to take some pictures of the hotel from down there, but she said that it was surrounded by buildings; she tried to turn off the flash so that you could see the hotel but she was shaky so the pictures weren’t very good. I still would like to see my “palace” up close and so will probably still ride out there one of these days, but not today.
Today I feel that my lessons went a lot better! In my morning classes we were talking about sorting, I first started out with a book called “Three Jars,” and it is just some kids who have a bunch of buttons and them talking about the different ways they could sort their buttons. After the story I had a bunch of magnets that came in 4 colors and 3 shapes, the kids got to take turns coming up and sorting one magnet into the appropriate jar. After the magnets I also had a big trash bag of the plastic colored balls like they put in the ball pit at fast food restaurants. I felt that it went really well as even the 3 year olds were able to get involved, I sat down in front of them and placed two balls in each basket (to show them what color went in each basket) and then asked them if they would be willing to help me sort them, of course they all got up and started to help me (it was even cool as Leo was crying again this morning and I was able to get him to stop crying and to help me sort, at first I would just hold up a ball and he would point to which basket it went into, towards the end he would even take a ball from me and put it in the basket). The topic that we cover today in the middle class is music or literature. I decided to talk about drums today. It was cool, first I showed a video on YouTube of a guy playing drums and we all tried to see if we could pretend play as fast as he could. Then we went to the tables and pretended that the tabletop was our drums. It was such a fun class as I also had like 12 real drums that each kid got to play with, I guess at one point during the class there was an earthquake but the kids were playing so hard and loud that we didn’t even feel it happen (though I did feel the other two that happened after class)… I guess that Taiwan is right on a fault and that is what created the island and we actually have earthquakes quite often here (they say though that, that is better that we have small earthquakes quite often rather than a big one every now and then), in my apartment we actually don’t feel them that often as I guess they built our house especially to be earthquake proof. Anyway then my afternoon class today was again continuing on about Transportation but today I was talking about airplanes. We first looked through different pictures of different types of planes, then we talked about the stewardess and the different things that she tells us at the beginning of the flight and how she gives us a snack (and of course I had to have a snack to give them as we were learning about airplanes ;D). After they had finished their snack (which took a really long time it felt like) we played pretending to be airplanes, first they started walking and I picked them off to help them “take-off,” once every kid had taken off we all flew around for awhile and then of course they had to land, so I helped them land their planes (once again picking them up and bringing them down to the ground as I was running forward), I picked up each kid at least twice (some of them snuck in for more than once before I caught them), so I figured that I got my weights in for the day (they are not all light kids).
I think that I am starting to get more used to the heat. I don’t think that my body is all the way used to it as I still sweat like crazy :D. I feel better about my not liking the heat though, as all of the people who live here still sweat like crazy every day too!
Today Brooke and Amy went to a stone museum somewhere in Hualien, I guess Hualien is supposed to be well known for this museum. Natalie and I talked about it and we decided that we want to go sometime also, so stay tuned for when I hope that we soon go there.
I mentioned earlier that we have been having a lot of earthquakes today, not only did we have at least the three earlier during the school day, but I think that we have had probably 10 more small ones tonight, they just keep going and going. I know that they say it is better to have lots of small ones and not a large one but all of these small ones are getting quite annoying.

True Excitement...Pictures :D

Once again here is bunch of photos that kind of apply to the past week....

This is what a toilet here in Taiwan looks like... Ok so not ALL toilets here look like that, but quite a few of them do (and I have yet to use one :D). This was at Carrefour, we went into the bathroom and all of them were like this so we went and used the handicapped one :D.

I don't know if you can really tell what this is but it is a bruise on my leg. I somehow got it when I first got here and then it began to heal a little bit, but then when I came home the other night and looked at my leg I noticed that it was worse again and it looked like more blood cells had been broken open. Yeah! (not)

This is my tablecloth!! Isn't it pretty? Brooke did it for me, somehow she folded it and then placed chopsticks on it and then rubber banded (she admitted that some other lady did most of it for her). You are only seeing one half, but the other half is the same thing.

This is me eating my dinner at Carrefour (the mall/ big store that we went to if you haven't read my previous post)..notice I am using the chopsticks :D!!! (not very well)

So this was my cup that I got my drink in. I thought it rather interesting that the words were in French (at least I think that they are French) and then all of the little boxes or whatever are in English.

Yummy! Doesn't that just look delish? When we were going up and down the aisles looking at things we found these next two pictures. Can't tell what they are? Let me hlep, they are a snack food of peanuts and almonds with sardines! Just makes you hungry don't it?



This is the sign of what you will see outside the bathroom stall to tell you what kind of toilet it is. Exciting ain't it?

This past week our theme in class was Gardens, on Thursday we traced our hands and made sunflowers. Charlie decided that he didn't want his and he gave me his. So here is a pretty picture to remember it by. And to show you the cool things that I am doing in class :D

I guess this past Thursday was Valentines Day in Taiwan. It is not a very big thing but Natalie was very sweet and bought chocolate for Brooke and I, these two pictures are of the chocolate sucker that she got us. I woke up with it taped to my apartment door.



Here is a picture of my dinner from when we went to Carrefour. I actually got quite a bit for my little over $3 or $115NT.

I wasn't quite sure if I had posted a picture of Natalie or not. So here is Natalie eating her dinner at Carrefour on Friday night.

My pizza. I don't remember if I mentioned my shopping trip to the grocery store on Wednesday. I was so proud of myself as Natalie followed behind me and I lead the way. I remembered the whole way and she never had to help once :D Anyway we were making fun of each other as we bought things that were very normal American food, here is one of them (I bought frozen pizza). I thought that it was interesting though as they put corn on all of their pizzas.

Here is another thing that I got at the grocery store when we went shopping on Wednesday. It is a cloth bag that has one of the Olympic characters on it, it came with some soda in it.

And here is the package of the soda (Sprite) that came in the cloth bag.

Here in Taiwan they have a fruit called Dragon Fruit. Brooke and I have made friends with a girl named June, who is the only member in her family. She is going to BYU. Tuesday afternoon Brooke and her hung out. That night June's father sent home some Dragon Fruit for Brooke and I to share (I thought that it was sweet of him- he doesn't speak any English but when we were there he wanted to make sure that we were really comfortable and had enough food). Anyway this is what the fruit looks like on the outside, quite a beautiful fruit if you ask me.

This is the Dragon Fruit cut in half. They can come in both white in the middle or purple. I was looking at some other pictures of it, and that fruit is amazing.

Again here is the dragon fruit cut into pieces.

And here I am trying the Dragon Fruit. I wasn't that impressed with the flavor. It had a texture of Kiwi. I am glad that I tried it but I don't think that it would be a fruit that I would seek out on my own- I wouldn't say No to it though probably.

The Week That Ended

Sunday, August 10, 2008
It has been several days since I have last written, sadly there has not been very much to write about, hence it being several days since I last wrote :D I guess that my biggest news is that I have finished my first week of teaching at the preschool, alive and with no injuries to speak of.
This week went pretty well, I think that most of the kids have opened up to me, there are many that when see me they will call “Teacher Beth” and wave to me. Most of my lessons went pretty well but there were a couple where I didn’t have enough information or things planned to take up the time and so I had to improvise, I hope that as time goes on I will get better at having more things to cover the time, I do notice that generally I start off the first lesson pretty shaky but by the 3rd one I am doing pretty good-a couple of times though we had to play a game at the end of the lesson (of course the kids loved that :D). The first few days there were two kids, Leo and Rennie that came every day and all they did were cry, they obviously didn’t want to be there and there was not much that people could do about it. It was so nice though, Thursday morning when the 3 year olds came into class (both of which Rennie and Leo are in), Rennie came running up to me with a big smile on her face and gave me a hug, it was so nice to see a smile instead of tears. The 4 and 5 year olds are pretty easy to work with, sometimes they are pretty rambunctious and don’t want to sit and listen to me talking (which I understand), but the 3 year olds can be hard- I have them first for a 20 minute class, then a 30 minute class and then a combined 45 minute class. The things I plan don’t often work for their class, so I have begun to get better at being able to tweak my lesson from the older class to one simple thing that I can do with the class for the whole period. It is sometimes frustrating though as I feel that I am not doing anything for the 3 year olds if all we do is place pass the ball for twenty minutes or sing The Wheels On The Bus, but obviously they feel that we are doing something for them or they would not make the preschool for such a young age. I definitely think that the kids are opening up to me more, the other day when I was coming down the stairs they came running up and grabbed my hand to pull and show me a dead snail that was on the ground, Brooke said that they have some fascination with showing us dead bugs on the sidewalk.
Friday night I was reading some of my book when Natalie came to my window asking me if I wanted to go to Carrefour (the big store) with her, I didn’t really feel like it but feel like I say no to her a lot, so I asked her if I could read my book for 20 more minutes and then we could go, she said that, that was fine- we were supposed to leave at about 5:30 but probably didn’t end up leaving until closer till 5:40ish. We set off and I was feeling ok, she had told me that it wasn’t too far so I wasn’t worried about doing it. I recognized where we were at the beginning and I was able to find our way, when we hadn’t gone very far she told me when we came to a light that we were going to have to turn left, that kind of freaked me out- we had to walk our bikes to the front of the line and be ready to pedal, pedal, pedal as fast as we could as soon as the light turned green so as not to get hit by the cars coming from behind us and those coming from the other direction. I made it!!! When we had made that corner Natalie asked me if I was ok, I told her maybe, she asked how about half ok, and when she got down to 1/8 ok I told her that she was getting closer :D We were going along when all of a sudden I looked up and saw a sign, I was like hey I recognize that logo, it was Melaueca, I thought that it was the funniest thing. I just started laughing and Natalie was like what is it, I explained it to her but she didn’t know what the company was so it wasn’t as funny to her (I tried to get a picture of the sign on the way back but I was on the other side of the street, it was dark, and my zoom could not get close enough- I will try next time I am over there). Anyway we were going when I asked her how much further she thought it was, she told me we just had to go over the bridge and then we would have a little more after that, I hadn’t been looking up, but when I did I didn’t see just this nice little bridge to go over, oh no I saw a hill (and when I had asked Natalie she told me that most of it was flat—yeah the key word MOST), it wasn’t a little hill either, I asked if I could stop and take a breather really fast, so we pulled over in a parking lot that was conveniently placed a couple of blocks before the base of the hill. I got off my bike and took a little time to just walk around and to rest of my hands (I was clenching the handlebars with nerves—I am not very steady with the bike and so kind of scare myself), after I had taken my break we set off again, we took off going really fast so that we could make it to the top. I was able to make the bike at a pretty steady rate, though at the very end I slowed down a bit (on the way up we passed this guy that was barely peddling- I don’t know how he thought that we was going to make it up at that rate, as I was going full speed and barely made it up), I got a couple of looks on the way up by people passing me on scooters (I was proud of myself for making it to the top so their looks didn’t do anything for me). As soon as we made it to the hump of the bridge it started going down, Natalie told me that we again had to turn left, it kind of scared me as we were going to have to go from the right side and cross over 3 lanes (and it was a pretty busy road), but we made it to the front of the line again on a red light and we were ready to go. We turned at the light and got straight over to the right side, where it all of a sudden split into two little highways, one for cars with 3 lanes and another one for bikes and scooters (we went up on like a paved sidewalk and rode above the cars), at the end of the little sidewalk thing we pulled over to the right at a light and turned our bikes so that when the light changed we could “turn” (but really going straight because we had turned our bikes), we did that and turned into the parking lot, we had made it (with me in one piece no less :D), we parked our bikes and locked them up and went inside.
It was kind of interesting walking in, where we walked in was the grocery store level, but we were on the side where people who had already checked out were. We were both hungry so we decided to go downstairs first to the food court level. Oh, before I forget there was this thing that was right inside the door as you walked in that I thought was pretty cool, it was a umbrella bagger, you placed in and then a bag went on it, so that you would not drip water everywhere throughout the store (I thought that it was pretty ingenious). A restaurant that we passed that was not downstairs that I thought was pretty interesting (though I will never try it), was a sushi place called “I (heart) Sushi,” the part that I thought was interesting was that you sat down and then there was a conveyor belt that went by each seat and you would just grab all of the little plates that you want and then later they would come by and check what you had gotten and then you pay—I guess that, that is how their buffets work here, you go through and fill up your plate and then you go to the cashier and pay for what you got. Interesting! Anyway we went downstairs and looked at each of the little food places, we passed up the first place as it was also sushi and it cost something around $200NT (which is expensive for food here, even if it is only like $6), it was interesting each food place had a little display of their foods, all of the foods were plastic but they were still covered in plastic wrap (I thought that, that was a little weird), I didn’t really know what I wanted but I decided on the last place as they had fountain machine and I really needed something cold to drink ( I had my water bottle but there was no way that the water was cold anymore and so it wouldn’t have helped me any), it was kind of nice anyway as the lady at the place I went to spoke some English (though she kept on telling me that she didn’t speak very much- though her English was perfect), I looked at one of the pictures and decided that, that was what I wanted. While I was ordering Natalie had gone to another place to order her dinner, I filled my drink and waited for my food. It wasn’t very long until she the lady was coming back with my tray, I went to take it but she said that she would carry it for me, she asked where I wanted to eat and I chose the nearest table (I felt bad having her carry it for me). While I was waiting for Natalie I kind of realized that besides the sushi place where I had gotten my food was probably the most expensive (mine cost $115NT whereas many of the other places that I was looking at cost $45NT-$75NT, even at my price my dinner did not cost very much ($100NT is about $3, so a little over $3)). I had a drink (obviously), a rice bowl with some pork and onion mix on it (I didn’t really like whatever the sauce was on it), a dish of what the lady said was meat skin (it was mixed with vegetables, I didn’t really like it), and it also came with a bowl of seaweed soup (yeah that obviously did not get touched by me.. :D). We finished dinner and then headed upstairs.
We decided to start at the top floor, which houses the electronics, books, movies, sports equipment, and clothing. Natalie’s computer is broke and she misses having music, so she wanted to look at CD players, while she debated back and forth with herself I explored around a bit, it was really quite a cool store, with many things of interest. I think that the Ipods were cheaper than if you were to buy them brand new in the US, there were some pretty cheap printers, but if you wanted a camcorder they would actually be cheaper to buy in the US (in case anyone was interested ;D), the cheapest one that they had was $12,000NT. They had some really cool refrigerators (Brooke thought that I was really funny, that I had gone to Carrefour and looked at refrigerators, but oh well I like appliances). They had the Star Wars Trilogy for less than $20, I think that I might go back and get that sometime before I leave. We looked at scooters, considering them to buy (:D), but the cheapest were like $500,000NT (or something like that), and of course Beth wouldn’t want the cheapest one, she would want the one that was almost the most expensive, so we said “NO.” Natalie finally decided on which CD player we wanted (after we had looked for awhile and then walked around the level again and then came back that is) and so she had to pay for that upstairs. It was funny, we went up to the counter and one of the cashiers saw us and pointed to us to another cashier and she looked, saw us and stood up starting to yell someone’s name, it was interesting to see as I guess we make them nervous or something, but this guy came up and I guess that he speaks some English as he was the one to check us out. It was really weird as he stamped her receipt and then before we could leave the floor this other lady stamped it and then on our way out the store at the very end another person had to come and stamp it for Natalie, it was like her passport for her purchase or something.
After the electronics floor we went down to the grocery store level, Natalie had been telling me about how they have free samples like costco and sam’s club (the couple of samples that I tried I was not that interested in). We wandered up and down the aisles looking at things, we saw some very interesting things (some of which you will have to see in the next post of the pictures). It was very interesting to see what things got a lot of area, one of which was tea and coffee (should that be surprising?) but the other one that kind of made me laugh was instant noodles (yeah like top ramen and stuff), it had a whole aisle and a half or something like that, I never even knew that there were that many different kinds of instant noodles! Anyway what I ended up getting there (not all that interesting) was a bottle of ketchup (they don’t really have salt and so when I had made potatoes and eggs the other day it had lacked any flavor to them), body wash, and a box of cream puffs- they were interesting, they are kept on the shelf and are not cold, they weren’t bad but they weren’t my favorite either, they kind of had a hard crunchy shell. Anyway we paid and then headed out (I still do not have a fixed basket and so I put my bag inside my “basket” and then tied it around my handles).
My leg had been cramping up a little bit on the way there at the end and it started again after we started out again, so I asked Natalie if it would be ok if we walked up the bridge (I know, I know… WIMP), anyway we walked to the top (again probably with many looks, but it was dark and we could not see them—but I still say hey, you’re in your car and scooter and we are biking!) and then we biked the rest of the way home. We were going fine until right when we were in front of the college my flip flop slipped off (my feet were a bit sweaty :D (Natalie said that if we get some flip flops that are not made out of plastic then I will not have such a bad time dealing with sweat- so we are going to look for some other ones for me)), I had to go back several feet and grab my shoe and then we were off again. We made it home alright, I was feeling a little overheated and drank quite a bit of water, I wasn’t feeling well and so I did a my laundry, hung them to dry and then went to bed.
I woke up yesterday not feeling well at all, I knew that I had overdone on Friday and that it was going to be a very long day for me. I asked Natalie and Brooke if they would be willing to take my tablecloth to the Relief Society activity for me and do it, as I was not feeling well. I had not finished sewing everything and so they ended up changing my tablecloth completely and did it with chopsticks (which is ok as I really like how it ended up), after they left I went back to sleep. I ended up sleeping part of the day and then just kind of relaxing the rest of it, I also ended up missing the baptism. I was sad to miss it, but instead of getting better throughout the day I continued to get worse, at one point I was feeling really really hot and clammy, I had considered taking a shower just to try and cool off but I just laid down in front of the fan instead. I did end up finishing Harry Potter #7 though yesterday :D. Natalie was kind enough to go and get me some fruit at the end of the day yesterday so I had some this morning.
I was feeling a lot better this morning, still a little blah but definitely a lot better. Church was pretty uneventful (as uneventful as it can be with it being in Chinese and having it translated by missionaries). There is one of the elders (Pendleton) who thinks that he is really funny (he is the one that generally translates Sacrament meeting for us), today when they were saying the announcements he told us that there is going to be a priesthood meeting on Saturday that we don’t have to go to…and then he was like and neither do I and then he started laughing). I am starting to get used to everything being Chinese around me, I think that it will still be awhile before I am used to singing in Chinese though, I am not very good at guessing the sounds of the words. It is very comforting though as I don’t think that the kids really see that there is a difference or if they do they don’t care as they will smile at you all of the time and some of the ones that know English will pass me and just say “Hi” and keep walking, it is really quite cute to hear this little 3 year old walk by and say Hi to you.
As I have been writing this Luke, Kaylene, and Brooke have been preparing dinner, the other night I asked Brooke if she knew how far away Carrefour was but she did not so I wondered if maybe Luke and Kaylene knew, so I asked them. They figure that it is at least 4 miles one way (so a total of 8 miles)! Not quite your 100 miles Sallee, but considering that I have not been biking more than 5 blocks since I have been here (and a lot less at home) that was quite a lot for me, I now know that it will be quite awhile until I ride to Carrefour again (at least on bike), until I am in a lot better shape and don’t totally kill myself overdoing it.
Dinner is almost ready so I suppose that I will sign off, as after dinner I have much other stuff to do. Love you all and hope that you have a wonderful Sunday (that is when you wake up :D)

Love Beth!

Picture Hodgepodge

I haven't been very good at putting up pictures of the past week. I was just able to get some pictures today from Luke and Kaylene so I figured that I should probably put it all up while I still remember what things are :D

This is Sister Nee, one of the sisters that was in our branch, she got transferred this past Monday. The like two days that I knew her, she seemed like an amazing person.

This was from Sunday night at the Children Art Camp, this violin and flute player were both amazing, the music that they played were beautiful.

This is the same group that does the Sign Language Opera, they have wonderful voices. I loved how they were always in such synchronization.

They did this song where they went through 3 different parts. The first one was where Luke came in and he wrote Chinese calligraphy, the next one was actually the guy coming in and doing the tea service, it was amazing how much detail each person had to pay attention to. And the third person that came out was actually Kaylene and she set the flower arrangement. She only had a chance to practice once before the actual performance and they were very particular about how she did it.



The next three pictures are of the Sign Language Opera. These are of the first dance, unfortunately I didn't get my camera out in time to take pictures of it, but Kaylene let me steal pictures off of her camera so that I could have some.



These two are of the Children drama play that was after the Sign Language Opera, they were really funny as they were doing a version of Snow White.


This first picture is of just a view that I saw from Tzu Chi College, I just thought that it was gorgeous.

The next three pictures are from Saturday at the opening ceremonies. They are of Kaylene, Natalie, Brooke, and I (plus all of the kids in the background) doing the dances, it was quite fun and entertaining.





This was taken on Saturday at the Elementary school, the courtyard is behind us. In order it is Kaylene, Luke, Natalie, Doctor Tsai (I just realized that I had been saying Director but I am pretty sure that it is actually Doctor), Me, and then Brooke.

This is a picture of outside our washer, notice that it is outside. It is downstairs (underneath our stairs actually) and we share it with the preschool- so we cannot forget and leave our clothes in there for very long.

This is a picture of my clothes inside the washer (oh yeah I almost forgot, why I mentioned above that it was outside was the first time I went to get my clothes out it was raining!! Quite an adventure :D)

This of course is my clothes hang drying outside (they didn't dry very quickly as it has been raining quite a lot the last two or three days or so), don't worry I hung my underwear to dry inside and did not take a picture of them, so you do not have to be privy to them :D.

These two pictures are really cool. At the elementary school in their recycling area all of their posts were like this, made up of recycled glass bottles.

The Weekend Catch-Up

(Covering) Saturday, August 02, 2008-Monday, August 04, 2008
So I have much to catch up on from yesterday, I was much too tired when I came home to write. I took a shower and then went straight to bed. It is strange that I was so tired as it didn’t seem like we did that much, but I guess that it was a very long day.
Actually before I go any further I realized that I haven’t really told who all the people that I am interacting are, and I probably should write it down so that I will later remember who people are.
Natalie: from Utah (parents living in Australia for summer) other teacher that will be here until December with me.
Brooke: is here till the end of August, she came for the summer, only to “help,” someone left and so she ended up teaching every day until I came here. She is in the other apartment until she leaves with Brooke.
Luke and Kaylene: Newlywed couple, (7 months!!) that has been here since April and they also leave at the end of August. They were staying in my apartment but because I came they had to leave, they are now staying at a members home until they leave. Luke is here studying Chinese at the Buddhist College.
Yuling: “My boss,” she is the director of the preschool. I have not yet met her as she has a baby two weeks ago and in the Taiwan culture when a woman has a baby she does not leave her home for a month.
Teachers- Stephanie, Jane, and Michelle: pretty much describes itself :D
Dennis: I doubt that I will ever mention him again, but I never know. He is the guy that picked me up at the Taipei airport; he is a friend of Yuling’s that works at another English school in Taipei. I guess they have been friends for nearly 10 years.

Yesterday our day started out pretty early for a Saturday, we were picked up at 8:30am by General Wong and Director Tsai. We had thought that Kaylene and Luke were going to come to the preschool but when they were not there when they arrived to pick us up Director Tsai called them to find out where they were, they had thought that we were going to pick them up where they were staying so we headed over there. It was kind of funny, when Kaylene got in the car, the first thing that she said to me was “you smell good,” (I had been chewing gum), then Brooke spoke up saying that she was funny as she had gotten in the car and smelled the gum but hadn’t known what it was so she had been just enjoying, but the first thing Kaylene says is that (once again it is one of those things that is funnier when you are there :D). They then drove us to the Buddhist College (Tzu Chi College of Technology—founded by Master Cheng Yen) where they were having a Elementary aged Children’s Art Festival. We first went to the college where we picked up our lunch boxes and then were given breakfast, I had eaten before we left but everyone else ate, there was these donut like things that had jam in the middle and then these pizza like things that had hot dogs on them and corn, Natalie said that she wasn’t that impressed with it but Luke must have liked them as he ate four of them. We then sat and waited for Venerable Yin (Yin Shifu (one of the nuns)) to arrive, it was kind of funny as when they had picked us up they kept on telling us that we were late and that we must hurry, but then we got there and had to wait for like 20 minutes waiting. After Venerable Yin had arrived she told us about the plans for the weekend and asked us what we were able to commit to, next we followed them to the opening ceremonies. It was really cool, since we were with the nun when we walked in everyone stood up and waiting until we got to our seats and then we had to wait for permission to be seated. We just had barely sat down when everyone stood up again to pray, I didn’t realize at first that they were praying to their three Gods and so I bowed with them on the first one but then I looked at Luke (which I would be doing a lot of during the day as he knew what he was doing and I really didn’t want to disrespect them) and saw that he wasn’t bowing, so I stopped, on the fourth bow they bowed to the nun and we did that as it was a respect thing. Again we sat down. The opening ceremonies were really cool, this group of ladies came up on the stage and they taught us all how to do this dance, it was funny as they kept on saying that look even our friends can do it. After the dance part the nun went up on stage and talked for a little bit. She had us stand up and introduced us as American friends, she told them how we come from BYU and that besides Luke none of us know any Chinese, but we came to spend the day with them and we all know how to use chopsticks (which at the time was SOOO not true for me) and even how to hold the bowl during mealtimes or something like that. She had us stand up and wave to them many times, at the very end of her talking she had everyone stand up, and then they bowed to us and we bowed to them all of us saying “It’s nice to meet you” (all in English- it is kind of cool, they are more than willing to say English words but they will all say them rather slowly) After the opening ceremonies the children were dismissed. We stood up and were waiting to find out what we were going to do when the nun again started to try and convince us to stay for the whole weekend (she had planned on us staying for the whole weekend, she had even made rooms for us in the dormitories), Luke and her had been talking back and forth when he asked Director Tsai how to ask if the nun had been a sales person before she became a nun, everyone thought that it was really funny (as that is how she was trying to convince us to stay). We then got into the cars and drove over to the Elementary School where they were having most of the activities for the children; Natalie, Brooke, and I were in the car with Director Tsai to the elementary school. While we were driving she asked us questions about our Sundays and why we could not participate in the activities that were planned for today. We explained as much as we could, I like to think that she was impressed with that we were willing to stand with our beliefs. She also kept on telling us that if they had known further in advance they would have moved different activities to be on Saturday so that we could have been more involved, Brooke felt that they should have known as they have been working closely with Luke and Kaylene for the past several months.
(Sorry Kyle I meant to end that past paragraph sooner than I did :D)
I almost forgot, while we were waiting for the nun’s car to be driven up she actually told Luke that his Chinese was terrible, I found that kind of funny but rather insulting at the same time, as I had always believed that people were quite impressed when others were willing to try and speak their language, I guess not.
We all felt kind of frustrated for the kids as when we got there they were again sitting in a auditorium watching another presentation, this one on hygiene and how we should keep our rooms clean, wash our hands, go to bed, etc. They probably sat in that auditorium for 2-3 more hours (and we along with them), most of us were falling asleep at least once during this time, if not more and at one point I looked to the back corner where there was a group of leaders and there was probably 15 people fully asleep, I kind of found it entertaining but didn’t understand how those kids were doing so well and sitting quietly. We talked about the earthquake during this time (it is crazy to think that it was only yesterday morning- that seems so far away), I guess Kaylene is a heavy sleeper but it woke her right up and she sat straight up and grabbed Lukes arm in a death grip, asking what it was: Luke told her it was just a earthquake and rolled over and went back to sleep. I thought it was kind of funny when they told us, but I had to disagree, in my everyday life the earth does not just start shaking so it was not “JUST” a earthquake (oh and I did find out that there was an aftershock about an hour later, not very big but I was back out by then and didn’t feel it- poor Brooke first got woken up by my phone at midnight, then the earthquake at 3, the aftershock an hour later, and then she got up at 6 to go running- she had a very long day by the time we got home at 8).
I felt kind of silly the whole time as they have “uniforms” for whoever volunteers or works for them, what we were supposed to wear was white pants and a grey shirt (they provide both, and are huge on everyone I guess), but as I had just gotten permission to come Friday night I did not have a uniform so I was just wearing whatever was the closest: a white skirt ( I didn’t bring any pants) and a light green shirt (it wasn’t until later in the day that I realized that I was the only one with my shirt not tucked in :D). I guess that the Buddhist like the color grey as all of their buildings were the color grey, they believe that you should not show tons of emotion (getting too excited, etc.) and they believe that grey does that or something.
After sitting for what seemed like forever we all left the auditorium for lunch, Director Tsai gave us a quick tour of the courtyard area of the school and then we went to line up to go into lunch. All of the kids were already standing at the tables but we were coming in with Venerable Yin, we had to walk in, in a single line and we could not talk. We walked in and walked around the table and then everyone faced the front and prayed to their God’s again, we then sat down and we were allowed to pray and then we set out our bowls. (With the bowl to the left of the plate and then chopsticks set down below them), we then waited while the elders served us. This was my first time ever using chopsticks so I was quite worried, I had a lot of trouble but meddled my way through it, I did get in trouble at one time though as I was talking and was told not to. By the time I had finished my one bowl of food I do believe that Luke was on this 3rd or 4th. I did ok with most of the food except the last dish of food that I had to eat, it was a soup…made of seaweed!  They tell me that I will get used to it, but I think that there are going to be some things that I will never get used to. When I go back to the Buddhist College I will try and eat it, but it is definitely not something that I will seek out on my own (I gagged about 6 times just eating a couple of bites).
After lunch we again went back to the auditorium, we walked in later then everyone else and right when we were outside the door we were told to be quite and then we walked in, all of the lights were off and everyone was “sleeping,” they were having a nap (yeah about 5 minutes!), as we were walking up the stairs the lights came back on and everyone “woke up.” As we were sitting down they introduced this lady, I guess she is amazing at music and was like one of the first TV people in Taiwan or something like that (I was not right next to the person that was translating so I didn’t catch everything). She told us that she was going to teach 3 songs to these kids in one hour!! (we didn’t think that she could do it), but succeed she did. After that hour all of the kids were dismissed, they were going to go and do these rotation things. As we were walking out, the Nun came up to us with the music lady- I guess before she had become a nun she had majored in Music and gone to Japan and stuff, anyway this lady was her teacher and she was very excited to introduce us.
Brooke had been asked to do this recycling class as part of the kids rotation thing, the rest of us didn’t have anything to do so we decided to go and watch her. She was supposed to be doing the mini class 4 times so she asked if we would be willing to help her and each take a time (there were 5 of us so I didn’t have to do :D), we first told them that there are many things that can be recycled rather than thrown away and we showed them the things (with a translator the whole time) and then we played a game where each group was given a bucket of recycling and they had to separate it the quickest, it was kind of cool as we went along we got better each time and were able to figure out the best way to do things. They videotaped the first group, we kind of wished that they had done the last group.
After all of the groups were done it was time for dinner, again we went into the room in a line, this time though we were sitting at the table with the nun (I am not sure but I believe that it is kind of cool thing to be able to sit at the same table as the nun). I was quite impressed with myself, I was still a little slow at eating but I kept up with most of the white people ( I doubt that I have any chance of keeping up with the Buddhists). Again most of the meal wasn’t that bad and I was able to eat it all, the only thing that made me pause were the peanuts, they were cooked and like a purple color, really dry and had a weird taste- that did not agree with my taste buds.
When dinner was over we were asked if we wanted to walk with the children back to the college or if we wanted to ride in the car, they told us it was about a 15 minute walk, we decided to walk with the kids in hopes of having a chance to interact with them better. The children have to walk to two perfect lines and so I had gotten pushed back a little, away from the rest of my group, but it was kind of nice to walk and hear Chinese, I didn’t know what they were saying but I could definitely tell that it was children chatter—it was kind of neat to see that, that can be understood through the languages. When we arrived back at the college we all went to the auditorium where the Sign Language Opera was set to begin. So when I heard Sign Language Opera I thought that it sounded really funny, but actually it had to be one of the most beautiful things that I have ever seen. It was Chinese music danced to by a group of “ambassadors (that is what they call them),” they use Chinese sign language and move so gracefully like a swan. I am sad, right as they were finishing the first dance I was pulling out my camera, so I did not get any pictures of it or it recorded (it was my favorite), but I did take some pictures of the second one and recorded a little bit of it (will post them in another one). (*This group will be coming to BYU in September—I believe the first weekend, everyone should take a opportunity to see it if they can (look for the Taiwan Sign Language Opera from Hualien, Taiwan- Tzu Chi College of Technology), if you can go it is an opportunity worth seeing). When they were done some of the children from the camp did a short play (a version of Cinderella), though I couldn’t understand what was going on the whole time (Luke was at the other end of me) it was entertaining and quite funny.
I am not sure whether or not I mentioned it or not, but a lot of the public bathrooms are basically like guys urinals tipped onto the ground (a whole in the floor). I know that I will eventually have to use one of those but I would like to sustain as long as possible from using one of those, so anyway Saturday night I had to go to the bathroom and asked Kaylene where one was, she showed me and I walked in there and checked every stall, when I realized that they were all the urinal floor toilets I realized that I didn’t have to go to bathroom as bad as I had thought (:D!!!)
After the plays were over, Luke and Kaylene had to stay and practice some for Sunday night but we did not so Director Tsai took Brooke, Natalie, and I home. We arranged when they would pick us up the next evening. I was quite exhausted when I got home, I took a shower and went straight to bed (which is why I am just getting to writing now :D).
Now, I am sure all are sitting in anticipation of how my Sunday went :D. I am sorry to inform you, but, I didn’t go to church yesterday….. just kidding :D ( it’s ok mom, stay sitting in your seat). It was actually a very interesting experience. I was quite worried about having to ride a bike in a skirt to church (yes, I know that people do it all the time, but that doesn’t make it any easier for me), but it actually wasn’t that bad (except those couple of times that I flashed people, hehe). It wasn’t very far away to our branch building (ha branch my foot, it’s bigger than our ward building at home and it’s 3 stories!!!), we parked our bikes in the “underground” parking garage and then walked inside. In this ward they have Relief Society first, than Sunday School, and finally Sacrament meeting. We walked upstairs to the Relief Society room and sat down, at the very beginning I had to introduce myself and write my name on the board (I find it funny that somehow my name more times than never ends up sounding like Bhet), we sang a opening hymn (they have a couple of hymnals that at least have the “words” in Chinese, Brooke said that it will come time when I will be able to read those perfectly), I am considering buying a hymnal in English and then singing along with them. The very beginning of Relief Society was spent discussing the activity that will be this next Saturday and what size material people should be buying. After that we had a lesson on a General Conference talk, about how we should be member missionaries and befriend those who are investigating the church and those who have recently been baptized. Sister Wood (one of the sister missionaries) translated for us most of the time, it was kind of funny at one point this lady was talking Sister Wood told us that she was basically not saying anything, she was just rambling and she was not going to translate it.
Next was Sunday School, we actually stayed in the same room and stayed for the Gospel Doctrine class, as that is where the missionaries go and for some reason we like to have them to translate for us (:D). The class was about lesson #23 (I think :}) about service. Something that I noticed is that all of the classes are shorter than normal, they all end about 10 minutes early to allow for moving time (maybe that is what all wards should have, then maybe you wouldn’t have as many people late to class or skipping class). Again I had to introduce myself and have my name written on the board. The guy that opened the class actually was white and spoke English, it was kind of funny at one point he was looking to the missionaries to translate a question to us, when he realized that he could just speak English to us himself ( I guess he married a Taiwanese girl and moved back here as he liked it so much). Also another funny, Sister Wood was translating for us again when at the end Elder Pendleton asked if she wanted him to translate, she said sure and he then translated one sentence and the class ended.
Last (but not least) was Sacrament meeting. I am definitely used to a normal ward and not a branch, it was quite smaller than I am used to (oh and I almost forgot to mention, the Sacrament room was on the third floor). We began normally, this time with Elder Pendleton translating for us. It was fast and testimony meeting so he had a lot of different things to translate. There were two kind of funny things that happened during sacrament meeting. The first one I missed but Brooke told me about it later, the first part Elder Pendleton was translating, something about how the lady felt that no one loves her, etc. but I guess after awhile he stopped translating as he said that the lady was basically speaking blasphemy and he felt that it wasn’t something that needed to be translated for us. The other one was the same lady from Relief Society whom Sister Wood had said had been just rambling not saying anything, she was part way through her testimony when Elder Pendleton said the same thing, that she was rambling, he told us what he was telling us was not really what she was saying but what she should have been saying. I kind of thought that, that was funny.
After church we came home, I tried getting caught up on journal but a nap sounded much more appetizing at the moment, so I wrote a couple of pages and then took a nap. When I woke up, Brooke, Kaylene, and Luke were making dinner..(I guess they started this thing where Luke, Brooke, Kaylene, Natalie, Amy (a investor who is getting baptized this Saturday), and now I! have dinner every Sunday together).. they made a really yummy dinner of rice (of course), breaded shrimp (not so yummy), a sauce with pineapple and then fresh uncooked pineapple to put on top of that. When we were done eating dinner Natalie and Amy came home (Amy goes to the 1pm branch and so Natalie has been going then too so that she has a friend), they ate dinner and then it was time for us to go. At about 6:10 General Wong picked us up to take us back to the College for last night’s musical performance.
The musical performance last night was beautiful, there were many different selections of singing, piano, violin, cello, and the best was of the kids singing the three songs that they had learned the day before. After the performance we came home, I was feeling kind of panicky as we had not prepared our lessons for the week yet and I knew that they were due this morning. As soon as we got home last night Brooke came in and helped explain a little bit but she didn’t help me completely with it all. I called Mom and was basically in tears as I didn’t know what I was doing and it was already midnight my time. I was exhausted and didn’t know what I was doing. Mom helped me a little bit get things planned and then I went to bed on a prayer. I woke up this morning feeling a little better but still a bit panicky. I started my first class not really sure what I was doing, but it got better by the time I had finished the 3rd rotation. I quickly ran upstairs in order to finish preparing for my next class and to try to join in on the family phone call (sadly it didn’t happen ), but I got it all planned and I went down to teach how to brush my teeth, it was quite fun actually- I got to pretend that I didn’t know how to brush my teeth and do silly things and they corrected me to do the right thing (all in all I believe that I brushed my teeth 6+ times in a hour and a half). I also taught them a song, strangely the last class was the one where I had the most time a the end. I came upstairs to prepare for my last class of the day during my break, those couple hours went very very quickly it felt like. I was teaching on a what a garden was. The first group did not go very well, I sped through the talking very quickly and was done in 15 minutes (the class was 45), Brooke stood up and helped a little and then we played a game. So I took some breathers and prepared to do the second group, this time I did a lot better, I slowed myself down and spread out what I was saying and we made it exactly to the end of the time. I am still feeling very nervous about all of this but am feeling a little better. I don’t like this planning the minute before I start the class and so this week I hope to have my lessons done by Wednesday, and Thursday at the latest (we will see how that goes).
As I have been finishing this journal entry it has been raining like crazy (of course we have plastic roofing so it sounded a lot worse), but it was going for like 45 minutes and there was also thunder and lightning. It is still raining, but not as hard. Oh and I have washed my first load of laundry here today, I actually need to go downstairs and grab it and bring it up to hang (will certainly take a picture ;D).
Tonight for “FHE” Brooke and I have been invited over to June’s house (a girl from the Branch who is actually going to BYU and speaks English fairly well), I guess she is fairly bored and has invited us over to her house to watch a movie. Brooke is being nice and making us dinner and we will be leaving soon. So I guess thankfully I am all caught up. I hope that I do not get this far behind again, as that was a lot to type at one time and because I was doing so much I probably missed details too! But that is all for now and this is Betherd, signing off!

*Some things that I learned today about Buddhist:
-They don’t believe in killing animals (even bugs- Kaylene told us how once she started to squish a bug when she looked up and everyone in the room had physically flinched when they saw her do it)
-They pray to 3 Gods
-There are both nuns and priests and they both shave their heads.
-Elders are very important to their community.
-They don’t believe in food waste, they will try and get you to eat everything (which was frustrating, as they thought just because I am larger I must want tons of food so they kept on trying to shove more and more food at me—poor Luke got the most of it, during Dinner he rushed through his food and then washed his dishes so that they would know that he was done).
-You must try at a least a little of everything at each meal.
-Buddhists do not eat meat, but they make some very good replacements that look like meat.
-They like the color grey.
-Do not talk at meals!
-You should bow as you look at people or are meeting new people.
-Do not cross your legs.
-They have great respect for their elders.
-There are 12 million members in the Buddhist sect.

The Uneventful Day....

Nothing much new to report today, except that earlier this morning I broke a chair in the preschool, I was sitting in one of the little kid chairs when all of a sudden I started to sink in the back and then fell into some tables that were folded up leaning against the wall, luckily Teacher Jane saved me and later during another class Teacher Michelle sent over a better chair for me.

I did encounter my first “bug,” tonight, as I was coming out of the bathroom I threw my towel down on top of my clothes to dry my feet and a bug came scuttling out of underneath them. I was not too impressed to see him, he went under my door, I quickly grabbed my shoe and followed him. He didn’t stand much of a chance coming into my apartment, (PICTURE). I don’t know what he was and don’t really care to know either, I would be just fine if I don’t have to encounter any of him again (but I doubt that, that will happen). I have also been told to expect lizards, they like to visit us on the wall- have yet to see one but I am sure that you will know when I do. I told Natalie that she would be sure to “hear” when I see one :D. Now after seeing that bug and talking about the bugs I feel like there are creepy crawlies all over me.....

Well it was GOING TO BE a uneventful day but this morning at 3am we had an earthquake! It wasn't big, 5.0 but it kind of shook me up for a moment as I hadn't heard of Taiwan having earthquakes. When it first happened I thought that maybe I had been dreaming so I just laid there for awhile but then I soon heard the other two teachers talking and I asked them if we had just had a earthquake, they told me that we had. So the adventures have definitely begun!!
If you are interested more in the earthquake, here is a link about it- it was actually centered only 10 miles outside of Hualien, pretty darn close if you ask me!
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/eqcenter/recenteqsww/Quakes/us2008veb7.php