A New Year 一個新的年

(And it's been a good one so far!)

We start this post long ago, in the far-away time of 2014. It was a Taiwanese winter night, and excitement was in the air- for very soon, it would not be 2014, but 2015! The future was upon us, and we were about to commemorate it by watching explosives being launched off a tall building. Last year, I was able to watch this show from Br. Liang's roof with about twenty other brothers and sisters, but he's been called to Bethel, so this year I called a few friends up and we headed over to XinYi street to watch the show up close and personal.

So many people!

Despite all the people, it was actually pretty sedate. There was a band playing on our street corner, traffic had been stopped, but there wasn't any drinking or fighting, like you might expect- Taiwanese people are really polite! We managed to get pretty close to 101, considering we headed out at 11pm and the show started at midnight, eventually ending up only three blocks away from its base. Someone in 101 messed up, because this year there was no countdown, but suddenly-

Fireworks!!

It was a nice show, too! Even the band stopped playing to watch. The show got bigger and bigger as smoke began to fill the air...

Still going!

And many nice pictures were taken...

The one common unifying factor...

...but during the show, I happened to see a camera drone silhouetted against the glare of the fireworks. Whoever owns that drone has got to win the award for "best fireworks picture", definitely.

We eventually went home to greet the new year properly with sleep. The next day was awesome, because it was a rare vacation! The Taiwanese don't really do vacations from work- there might be federal holidays, sure, but you've still gotta go in to work. It's true that January 1st was a day off, but we had to make up for it the previous week by going into work on Saturday- you wouldn't want productivity to be impacted, would you? The only real time off everyone gets is for Chinese New Year- although I will say, everyone gets a solid month off for CNY, and that's on top of the traditional extra month's salary worth of bonus everyone gets paid! So they do make up for it.

In any case, the weather reacted to our defining time with a new number by becoming hot again.

Beautiful sky!

It was really nice, actually- even though the sun was very strong, the air was still quite cool, and it was a very pleasant day to be at our witnessing stand.

Although the sisters worried about getting a tan...

Even the dogs got out for some air!

Happily for the sisters, the weather was only bright and sunny for that one day, and as soon as the cloud rolled in with their rain we were back to our usual winter temperatures of about 55-60 degrees. Speaking of, I hear parts of Canada and northern America are colder than Mars right now! (Seriously, Google it, it's crazy!)

Service group, all bundled up

Standing next to me in the picture above is our brother David Berube, from Boston Chinese. He was only out here for a couple weeks, taking a tour of Asia and scouting the place out... but who knows what the future holds? It was cool getting a chance to know him, to meet more members of our worldwide brotherhood.

A little later, Brandy had a great idea to go up to Danshui to see the sunset, so we gathered up some friends and headed off!

:-D

I hadn't been up to Danshui in close to six months. It's a nice place, a little crowded, but in a slower way than the crowds in the center of the city... if that makes any sense. Although it was the same  sunset, we all had different reactions to it. I thought it was very relaxing...

Brandy thought it was amusing...

Joe was inspired...

Ginger was annoyed. But maybe it was just me.

Right as the sun began to dip beneath the horizon, a fisherman realized his chance and quickly posed for the cameras!

Well done sir!

Looking back at our group

 After the sun went down, we all went into the night market for some delicious squid... among other things.

Why yes, that is fried pregnant fish for sale, why do you ask?

We also convinced Jenny to get ice cream from this Turkish ice cream stand. I think I've put a video of this on the blog before- basically it's these two overweight Turkish guys who dance and mess with you, almost but not quite giving you your ice cream, pretending to drop it... the more fun you are the more ice cream they give you. I have no idea how they got the idea to come to Taipei and do this, but it's hilarious!

No, really... you can take it... trust him...

After we'd wandered around, bought a few things, drank some beer, we eventually decided to head back and caught one of the last trains back into town.

Joe was plum tuckered out.

 All of this was very fun! Even while out in the door to door ministry, we made sure to keep some time open for fun!

Just for kids you say?

Besides all of these activities, we've had some pretty cool announcements. The first, and most awaited, is that we will finally be splitting into two congregations! We've been talking about it for years, but it's official- on March 1st, Taipei Daan Congregation will split off from Taipei South and have their own arrangements. Not only that, but also Taipei South is getting a new name- Taipei Zhongzheng! See, Taipei South was originally the only congregation in all of Taipei- so then it was just called Taipei. Eventually it split, and then we had Taipei North and Taipei South, then East, then West, and as we started dividing more and more we had to pick smaller, more detailed names... basically, although we're called Taipei South, there are more southerly congregations than us and it doesn't make sense for us to hold on to the name anymore.

At least we're still Taipei!

We also had four new elders appointed, and five servants! Some of them already had these privileges before and were simply confirmed here, but to others this is a new privilege of service. We're really doing great!

And new people are taking an interest every day!

Sorry this post took so long, and in the end isn't very descriptive. I've gotten sick in the last couple days- nothing serious, but it's annoying and makes putting big posts like this together a little difficult. I'll do better next time! :-)

Keep Changing 持續更動

(It's a good thing, life is change!)

Change is a hard thing to get used to, sometimes. Many people fear change; anything that could change their lifestyle, or habits, or environment, or anything- is immediately bad, and must be avoided. Others love change; they bounce around from place to place, getting restless if they stay still for too long.

I think I'm somewhere in the middle. I do enjoy an adventure, which of course needs to have new experiences and encounters in it; at the same time, this is definitely a learned ability. It's always sad to see friends leave especially, even if you know they're going off to new and potentially better things. Still, as my little tiny superscript above said, life is change. If nothing changed, that wouldn't really be life, would it? Even memories change every time we access them, being updated with new connections and information. The real key is making sure you're changing in the right way, and the only way to be sure of that is to have some sort of guideline, a model to follow. Happily for us, Jehovah knows we need these things, and many examples are laid out in the Bible for us to follow. 

One couple that recently left us here in Taipei are following those examples quite well. Cameron and Michelle took off to Myanmar a few days ago, going to their new assignment of Mandalay. This city has somewhere around 750,000 to 1 million Chinese people, but previously only had one Witness who could speak Chinese. So, now there are three!

The day before they left, Cameron had a public talk in the Taipei English congregation, so naturally many of us went to attend. This was actually the first time I have ever gone to the English here in Taiwan- I kept meaning to, but I've been busy enough with work and pioneering and my responsibilities in Chinese that I just hadn't made time to before.

English!!!

They don't have their own standalone building like Taipei South does; instead, we've bought the fifth floor of a building in the north part of the city and fitted it out to be a Kingdom Hall. The English congregation is much smaller than Taipei South, with only about 80 people. The majority of the publishers are originally from the Philippines, but they've got brothers and sisters from all over- I even met a family from Zimbabwe who regularly attends Taipei English!

Cameron's talk was very good, all about technology and its proper place in our lives. The branch, as always, has a very balanced position- technology is good, and a very powerful tool, but it can't control you. I've gotta say, it was nice listening to the meeting in English. My Chinese is such that I can usually understand about 90% of what is said at meetings; however, when I want to comment, say, during the Watchtower study, it takes a decent amount of preparation and focus, which distracts me from the material being discussed. It was amazing being able to listen and think at the same time!

Cameron, teaching like a boss

A little while afterwards, a bunch of us went over to their house and help them get stuff moved. They put most of their possessions up for sale, since Myanmar only lets them take one bag each with them. (side note: Myanmar has crazy rules, and they're very serious about them. You can't bring playing cards into the country on pain of imprisonment. Bikinis either. Foreigners are not allowed to stay in the same house as locals, under any circumstances. This last one was especially a headache!) Some of their stuff is pretty cool, so I asked about buying some- only to find that within minutes of it being posted, all but about three things were bought by the same sister, Alix from Minnesota. So we basically moved things from Cameron and Michelle's place to Alix's place for a few hours- happily, she lives nearby.

Also, Nikolai can play the didgeridoo.

Maybe you can tell from Nikolai's coat in the above picture- it's gotten cold in Taipei! Well, colder than usual anyway. It's about 50 degrees Fahrenheit outside right now, around 12 degrees Celsius, which doesn't seem all that cold... but no one has heaters in any of the houses, so you're stuck with that temperature all the time.

Of course, there are ways to solve this problem.

Two of our sisters were in no mood to complain, though- Angelica and Anica, the Swedish sisters, have also gone back home within the last couple weeks, and compared to Sweden Taiwan is downright balmy!

Sad happy face?

We will miss them all. They're all going off to more service, of course- the great thing about change is that it keeps happening. No change is ever truly permanent. So if you don't like your current situation, just have faith that change will happen! Cameron and Michelle will do well in Myanmar- they've sent us some pictures, actually, and they are already doing well from the looks of things- and Angelica and Anica will do well in Sweden, assuming they don't freeze. The two sisters have plans to come back to Taiwan next year, once they've saved up some money. 加油!

It works both ways, of course. Some people leave, and others arrive. And when they do, we celebrate by eating!

吃到飽喔!

The sister on the left is just recently arrived, also from Minnesota- she and Alix knew each other back home, apparently. Not hard when your state only has like twenty people in it. Anyway, her name is Avery, and she's already having a good time!

Speaking of Averys, Joe appears to have good taste in cardigans:

Yeah, sure Joe, of course it wasn't on purpose

Because he keeps matching with various sisters, who of course have good taste themselves.

Not fooling anyone, man

At the very least, he makes up for it by being brave/crazy enough to walk out into traffic and preach to people sitting at a red light!

He took the tract, too!

As opposed to Alix, who of course is just crazy.

I'd make fun of her raincoat/trash bag, but I totally have one too.

While Cameron and Michelle, while they were here, dealt with the colder temperatures by adorably sharing a blanket while they walked down the road, that method isn't available to everyone.

Poor Jenice!

When you're moving around on a bike, the cold is actually nice; but once you've been standing in one place for a few hours, it starts to get really cold!

This is, of course, at Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall; our ministry there is still going strong, with an average of ten books and twenty-thirty brochures placed every three-hour shift, and actually recently more and more people are signing up for a free Bible study! It really seems to help that we agree to use Skype or some form of video chat to study; many people are a little wary of random people just walking up to their door and talking to them, even if they signed up for that very thing. Having an alternate means of communication makes them feel a little safer, so more people agree to the study.

Of course, the regular ministry doesn't stop just because of a little cold or rain, either. A good umbrella is very important, though!

Look at them go!

And of course, the cold makes it even more important that we do fun things together. (That's our excuse at least.) We haven't been able to play soccer lately because of the weather, so instead a few of us went over to Terry's house and cooked things!

Master chefs!

Terry and I made handmade pizza, right down to the bread;

Master baker!

Alix made amazingly good cookies;

Master taster!

And Joe didn't make anything, but brought drinks and boosted our egos by complimenting the food a lot.

Oh, and here's a shot of the finished pizza, courtesy of Brandy:

It tasted as good as it looks. Seriously, why don't we do this more often?

It was a fun night! Afterwards, we meant to play nerdy board games, but watched movies instead. If we did this instead of soccer more, we'd probably get fat, but every once in a while is fun!

...is Alix okay?

A few days after that, I gave my very first public talk in Chinese! And then I gave it again the next day! The topic was 行事忠義, Walk the Path of Righteousness, and although it undoubtedly wasn't the best talk anyone had ever heard, I think I did okay!

Taking pictures of people while they're speaking is funny.

At the very least, no one died. I think. That's success right there!

I'll end this post with an amazing discovery I made recently. I was doing some return visits with my Taiwanese roommate, Cary, which of course means we were riding his motorcycle around the city. One of the things I like about motorcycles (and bicycles too) is that you get a chance to experience the things you pass- if it's cold, you're cold, if it's hot, you're hot, and if there's a delicious smell, you smell it. While driving past a new restaurant on the way to a call, I smelled an amazing smell: Chicken and waffles.

With sweet potato fries!

Who would have thought Taipei had a chicken and waffle restaurant, of all things? But it does, at least, now it does. I didn't exactly eat chicken and waffles a whole lot back in America, but it suddenly sounded perfect, so after we had finished our ministry Cary and I drove back and ate some chicken on top of some waffles. Cary was bewildered by the combination, but had to admit it was pretty good!

Isn't it beautiful?

So there we go! People left, people came, we all did new things, Joe can't cook apparently, and I found some soul food in Taipei. A pretty good time! It'll be the 1st of January pretty soon, and that means another great fireworks show from Taipei 101; I'll see what I can do to get some shots! Until next time...

Too much fun 太多玩

(Is there such a thing?)

These last couple weeks have been really busy, but in a really fun way- mostly, every bit of free time has been devoted to hanging out with people and doing fun things! It's not all happy, though (depending on who you are)- the reason we've been so frantically playing is because there's been a batch of people who have left, or will leave soon.

Of course, Mason was only here for a couple weeks, so we wanted to make the most of the time he was here and do lots of things together. Even before he had arrived in Taiwan, he was planning a game night based off of a Korean variety show really popular here, called "Running Man"- it's stupid but really funny. One of the things they do is play hide-and-seek in a large area, but with weird rules, and all of the seekers have to wear bells on their feet. Don't knock hide-and-seek, it's fun! Anyway, we got our group of 14 people together one evening in Da'an Park, assembled the teams, and got to it!

Fearsome!

I'm told it was a lot of fun! I would've been able to tell you myself, but there was a little problem...

So, my team was the first to hide. The rules were, if 5 of the 7 people on our team were found, we lost; if 30 minutes went by, we won. We had the entire park to hide in, but we also had quite a few people looking for us and only a short head start, so we had to be quick about finding a place to hide. I found an awesome tree and promptly used the vines hanging down from it to climb about 15 feet into it. I had it all figured out; it was near very bright lights, but they didn't shine into it, so people looking for me would have dazzled eyes from the lights and be unable to see me. I was pretty high up, and people usually don't look up, so I had that going for me; also, because the tree was full of vines, I could use them to move around inside the canopy to put more tree between me and people looking for me. I was set!

Time passed. I saw a few people come near me, clearly looking for people, and I evaded them all. Even when several people came at once, I remained undetected. I felt like I had been up there for a while, but that was fine; I got some nice thinking done. The only downside was that the tree was full of large brown spiders, but they all stayed away from me, so we were cool.

Did I mention my phone had broken? Yeah, a few days before it had bricked itself installing an update, so I had no phone (and by association, no clock). Eventually, I heard Cary calling my name, so I hopped down... yeah, I was up there for like two hours and people thought I got kidnapped. Apparently I'm really good at hiding. Good to know, I guess?

Anyway, everyone was mad at me, but then we went and ate food and we were all cool again. 

Food makes everything better!

A few days later, we all went to a different park for a music party! Music, friends, food, beautiful weather...

We even had a shark kite!

This one was really for two sets of people leaving soon; the first set is Ashleigh's mom and dad, who have been visiting Taiwan and studying Chinese for the past month or so. They've been really encouraging to all of us here, and we'll miss them; but I'm sure they'll go back to the UK full of Chinese and enthusiasm, and really help the congregations back home.

Ashleigh, rocking that guitar!

The second set of people leaving soon are Angelica and Anica, the Swedish sisters who have been here for about six months now. Their plan was always to come for just a short while, learn good Chinese, then go back home to Sweden. They're pretty sad about leaving (comparatively) warm and sunny Taiwan for (objectively) freezing Sweden, but at the same time optimistic about being able to help their friends back home. Their home congregation has a story familiar to many of us serving in Chinese congregations abroad; many Chinese students come, study for one or two years, then go back home to China. That means there is a ministry, a productive one even; but before these students can get very far in their studies, they go back to China, so the local congregation is perpetually small and needing help. Anica and Angelica will definitely contribute to that help.

This is neither of them, but 欣如 (Joise), rocking that Ukulele!

Mason, of course, had to be part of this; he's unnaturally skilled at all forms of music, and although he obviously didn't bring a guitar with him from America, he managed to borrow Ashleigh's guitar and belt out a few tunes for us. 

He really is very good!

Afterwards, I played a couple songs on my mandolin, but I've just started learning it, so I wasn't nearly as good as the others. I also haven't learned any songs I could sing along to yet, unlike them. I know, patience, I will get better. Unfortunately I don't have any pictures of myself, since I couldn't manage a selfie during a song!

Afterwards, we went over to Cameron and Michelle's house to play a game or two of Settlers of Catan, a surprisingly fun board game about trading resources and building up a colonial empire. Naturally, Nikolai, the Dutchman, is really good at it. Cameron and Michelle are yet another couple who will leave us soon- they're originally from Reno, NV of all places, and will soon (Next week! Man!) be leaving to Myanmar. There's a city in Myanmar with over 750,000 Chinese people in it, but only one Witness who can speak Chinese... so soon there will be three! That's a 300% increase! They have a noble cause, but we'll still miss them here in Taiwan.

That didn't make us go easy on them, of course!

The ministry was fun, too. We got to enjoy the last of the good weather while Mason was around; he left on the 1st of December, and that same week our warm, sunny blue skies became gray and rainy. Taiwan misses you man! He graduates in May of 2015, and once he's saved up enough money after that he'll come back, hopefully for good this time. 加油!

Saturday morning fun!

A bit of good new on the ministry side; in eight days (!!), I'll be giving a Chinese public talk here in Taipei South. One of my bible studies agreed to come to the Kingdom Hall to hear it! That'll be his first time to a Kingdom Hall, and I'm sure the brothers and sisters will make him feel welcome. Who knows, he might like it enough to come back; now that would be cool!

A few days later, Paul Gouriet had another get-together for everyone still left in Taiwan, kind of a pot luck thing. Almost everyone there was a foreigner; I think I've only been to two or three events like that since being in Taiwan! It was an odd feeling, but it in no way ruined the fun of the night.

In other news, Joe is very tall.

Actually, these kinds of parties are nice, because it's an opportunity for people of various congregations all get together and make friends. Taipei South is so big, sometimes we can get a little isolated from the other halls; happily, Paul was there to rescue us!

Jason, Esther, Anica, Marco and Leah

And then I started getting fancy with my camera and began taking art shots.

Which, of course, means black and white.

Tunmise, a new sister from the UK, and Ashleigh

Sisters Qi and Mi, looking fierce!

And we finished this crazy week with a night of Karaoke, naturally! There's a place up at Ximending, a very popular part of Taipei, that will rent out a Karaoke room for four hours for about $15 per person... they throw in free food and drinks too!

KTV! 哇!

They didn't really have any new songs, but that's okay- we spent the night singing the top hits of the 90's. I can think of worse things to do! Joise even showed off a little and gave us all an introduction to a couple really cool/weird Chinese songs; if you want to listen to one, copy and paste 公公偏頭痛 into Youtube.

Alix took this pictures, then she took a picture of a dead rat. I thought this one was better.

All of these cool people are leaving soon! It's a little sad, but not the end of the world for us or for them; mostly, they're going on to new, exciting experiences, and they'll use the time they had here in Taiwan to further accomplish Jehovah's ministry in even farther parts of the world.