Monday, December 29, 2014

XinNian KuaiLe!!

Happy New Year everyone!! Hope Christmas was good for everything, it was wonderful for me. Wasn't the same of course because no one here hardly knows what Christmas even is hahah but it was still special none the less.

Some quick things. A funny observation. I live in the midst on a bunch of high-rise apartments which is super rad, but I've always wondered how people get all their furniture up to their apartments without any trouble and I found out the other morning. At 630 am there was a crane outside one of the high rises parked right in the middle of a huge road there to lift a mattress up 30 or so floors to someone's deck where they were standing ready to receive it haha. a bit different than what i'm used to in America.

We set up an appointment with a very very casually dressed woman who approached us curious about the church on the street, she was wearing like a sweatshirt and glasses, nothing special. But when we show up to our appointment thinking she is really golden because she was so excited to hear about the church, we meet a woman who is done up almost exactly like a barbie doll with SOOOO much makeup and a super super short skirt and puffy shirt. I for one didn't recognize her at first and then almost busted up laughing when I realized it was her! Girls here drive me nuts. I am going to stick to my American girls when i get home that don't freak the heck out of me.

We got to go to Taipei on Christmas Eve for an awesome Christmas party. I found out the reason I hadn't gotten any of my Christmas packages was because they were hording them all from us at the office and gave them out as our Santa presents at the end of the huge party. it was fun. Thank you for everyone that send me stuff!!! Loved it all

On Christmas Day we had a less active take us to this huge 5 star buffet that was straight up the most amazing thing of my life, although I ate waaayyyy too much hahah. My list of crazy things I've eaten just continues to grow haha:

-rose petal lemonade which was to die for.
-aloe vera leaves chilling as part of the salad bar haha
-raw cuttlefish (look one up online)
-RAW beef!! japanese style! like what the???
-beef jelly stuff
-and more pig intestine which i dont think i could ever grow to like that…

raw beef, cuttlefish, and swordfish sashimi, not bad!!

here is our crazy Brother Chen who loves taking us to the most expensive restaurants in town and then telling the waiters it's our birthday when it isn't!! So happy unbirthday to Elder Willes!!!
seriously this restaurant was like wolfgang puck status with 7 courses from heaven!!


Last of all, I had my first baptism on Christmas night that I'll actually count as one of mine. It was cool because Elder Willes and I found her together on the street during my very first week on island. She was Jehovah's Witness!!! And yes, we taught her all the way down until she was baptized this past week. And I got to help her do it, but because her body condition is terrible, Elder Willes was in the font alongside me for her balance. So we found her together, taught her together, and then baptized her together. It was really cute haha. She is so wonderful, she taught me so much more than I taught her. I love that I have been privileged to meet the people that I've met out here.



The mission is amazing. On every level you could imagine. It's pretty crazy. Love it everyday.

Love you all! Happy 2015!!


this woman is named Jin Wei.  Which is me (Elder Jin) and Elder Willes (Elder Wei) so of course we had to take a picture with her :-) 

for you dad. haha I'll try to remember and take more pictures of the Chinglish signs here!

Tuesday, December 23, 2014

ShengDanJie KuaiLe!

Merry Christmas!!!!

Don't have tons of time today, so I'll be short.

Last week we treated ourselves to some delicious barbeque, Asian style!! It was delicious! Some of the stuff we ate, in short included:

-Chicken heart
-venison
-ostrich
-tiny squids
-pig intestine
-chicken cartilege
-pregnant fish

I have this chicken's heart now

Asian style BBQ!

We have a stud investigator from Haiti here in Taiwan studying that is fluent in Haitian Creole, French, English, and Chinese. Everyone loves him.

My man Jimmy from Haiti!

We got taken to an all-you-can-eat Hotpot this week. It was literally to die for. But it was a LOT of food for me hahaha. The time came when we had to start winding down a bit and get ready to leave so then i start pounding all my food down super fast so we could leave but Brother Chen must have took it as I was super hungry because then he started putting everything on my plate and I was too sorry to waste any of it so that was the most full I have ever stuffed myself in my life. And then had to get on my bike to bike 10 miles in 14 minutes. So that was nuts hahaha.

Chen Family taking good care of us at Hotpot.  SO GOOD!!!!


This week was full of the most spiritual lessons of my life. I have met some really great people here. One lesson in particular, with one of our wonderful sister investigators. We were reading in Alma about prayer. And I asked her what she liked the most out of that. She points to the next verse that we did not read together and points out that she agreed with how it said that if you pray but do not be Christlike in your actions, then your prayer is in vain. That was one of my special mission moments. This woman has brought us missionaries food every week and bought us extra clothing every week for a month now. She is the most Christlike person I've ever met. It was a humbling moment because I realized I am not worthy to be teaching her. She is teaching me. And if one day I can be as Christlike as she is then I will be satisfied with my efforts. This has got to be God's work, because there's no way I could do it otherwise.

I love my mission.

And all of you.

Merry Christmas,




Best Thai of my life.  Hands down. 

Sunday, December 14, 2014

ShengDanJie KuaiLe!

GeWei DiXiong JieMeimen, Zao'An!!

This week has been awesome!! Unfortunately I don't remember it very well hahahaha days all blur together too much now.

But there were some highlights don't worry.

Yingge!!

Yingge!! Family when you come to pick me up we are taking an afternoon trip to Yingge so you can see how COOL it is!! Right on the outskirts of Taipei is this well preserved strip of ancient China and lots of artisans and pottery. It is beautiful. And super fun. I got to practice my pot throwing for the first time in nearly 3 years. And i haven't lost my touch yet! I was very excited to see I was still capable of throwing a pretty decent pot! Unfortunately I did not get to keep it...


the master potsman back at it!! 

so fun!

But like all other tourist traps in the world I got sucked into buying a crap load of stuff I don't need so I'm going to be sending all of that home in my next package haha so it can just wait there for me to get home. And the other devils of Yingge is it has these special pastry things from heaven so of course I had to spend a couple hundred kuai on these delicacies. I need more self control hahaha..

I also got taken out to Pizza Hut this week. Back home I wouldn't eat Pizza Hut even if you paid me but now being here in Taiwan I realize its the best place on earth. Especially since it is buffet style here and man i can eat a lot. it surprises me so much haha I ate like 30 or so slices of pizza last time. (Willes will tell you thats a lie though so just don't ask him) They have these egg tart things which is straight up a blended egg with a crap load of sugar blended into it and then chilled till its like jello and oh my it makes my mouth water just thinking about it. SO tasty! All the pizza has squid on it too here. hahah funny observation. except the pepporoni of course. Korean Kimchee is my personal favorite.

We had another few golden lessons this week. But we also learned a good lesson about bringing members to lessons with us. Make sure they know before hand that their role is not to talk. Like at all. "Only speak when spoken to" kind of thing. because man we brought a talker to one lesson and I almost died because she wanted to teach the whole thing and hardly took any breaths for us to interrupt. Even when we tried to interrupt she just talked louder so she would drown out our voices. She will never peike for me again. (peike=accompany lesson)

I'm to the point with the language that I know just about everything I need to know to get myself around and teach the lessons, so in my head I'm solid. But then I get in lessons and when I don't understand the really advanced Chinese it irritates the heck out of me. I expect too much of myself, I've only been speaking for 6 months, how could anyone expect to understand someone describing their doctor's diagnosis on their chronic back pain. So I am trying to be patient with myself still but its difficult when you just want to be perfect hahaha

One funny thing. We have a crazy member who whenever he sees us, he reasks us the same question every week. It is the "Declaration of Independence" not the "Decoration of Independence" hahahaha and then he precedes to quote the Preamble to us. But neither Willes nor I can check him because we don't know it!! hahahaha getting showed up by the Taiwanese in American history left and right..

Love you all. Merry Christmas. Have a special one for me. Know that I miss you all. Hope you're having the times of your lives!!

Ai Nimen!

Sister Lai! she treats us so well.  Love her to death!

this guy is 91 years old and still going strong!! such a strong testimony.  what a golden guy! love him to death as well

home :-) loving the city life! 7th floor swag

TiaoZhan

my view every morning


So from the sounds of the fam I don't elaborate on my struggles here enough hahaha so imma just share typical Taiwanese struggles since this week wasn't overly-exciting.

We taught 24 lessons this week. We friggin slaughtered them streets! That is exciting. But as for struggles with teaching the Taiwanese:

Missionary work is friggin tiring for one. It is hard to always be your sharpest on the streets and in lessons because sometimes you wanna just close your eyes for 30 seconds haha. So sometimes I'll slaughter a contact because I'm just tired as I'll get out for one..

The Taiwanese people do not think deeply. Like they don't ponder life questions at all. It's because they flat out just don't have time. They work from 6am to 10pm and get 5 or so days off a month. Total. Haha sounds pretty similar to us missionaries, so we don't have any sympathy here. But regardless they don't think about any deep questions. When we ask them about their beliefs, they often times don't even know. Hahah. Lots of people believe there's a God but they know nothing about him. No concept of God. So that is sometimes frustrating I'll be honest. But it makes us teach very very simply which is the idea, what PMG wants of us.

Then theres the nice people we'll talk to that are not super devout Buddhist (devout Buddhists won't talk to us "amens") and willing to talk to us, but we start asking them about their beliefs and they say things along the lines of "Jesus, Buddha, they're both good." "When I need Jesus he's in my heart. When I need Buddha he can be there too." "Jesus was a good guy, but doesn't fit us over here in Asia." etc......

Elsewhere in the world I would imagine people being very proud about their religion and not willing to listen because they are pretty convinced of their own beliefs, however in Taiwan it's often totally different. These people are so humble and so accepting of others' beliefs that it becomes impossible to tell them there's only one true church. Haha they'll be loving our message and then we pop the baptism question and they suddenly turn "bu yong!" (no use) "Jesus, Buddha, both are good. I don't need to be baptized."

Typical struggles.

I do want to delve in a bit and tell you about one of our investigators, Lai JieMei (Sister Lai). She straight up cracks me up. For one she doesn't stop talking and she speaks faster than the speed of light hahah. But she's super solid. We found her on the street in my first week and we didn't meet hardly ever, so we almost dropped her. Then by a funny miracle we met with her and she LOVES us now. this morning we get a call during studies to come outside because she bought us three bags full of food!! Gotta love those calls :-) She's one of those investigators that is already a Mormon mom. She's gonna be baptized. We love her.

Mission life is happening, regardless of the clueless Taiwanese. They're fun. Except the girls here make me mad, I don't like talking to them because they just giggle and don't say anything. I've been asked a few times what I think of the girls here and every time its the same answer!! "Ehhh.... All girls are beautiful in their own way." hahaha this one isn't larrying thats for sure!

Love you all!!

the ward mission crew!

this is ostrich meat, in Taiwan

still making it to concerts out here don't worry my sisters haha

Sunday, November 30, 2014

Tamsui

Straight up had thee best P-day of my life up in the taibei area last monday. Our RC's took us to Tamsui (dan shui) and it was beautiful and super nice to just go relax a bit. And eat some good quality food, sooooo good. (Fish ball soup bahahah and this bean curd something?) delicious!
selfie!



she reminds me so much of Tessa

birth place of Taiwanese romance bahaha

Tamsui Taiwan



You'll all be proud to hear I offered a prayer in a baptismal service yesterday and it was all English. Bhahaha it was hilarious I don't remember how to do it. My grammar has gotten super bad. And I kept wanting to start every sentence in chinese. So that was fun to see how bad I suck at english now :-)

This week on the way home we "accidentally" went through the yeshi (nightmarket). It was such a crazy experience!! they have some some really delicious/friggin nasty looking stuffs for sell. Yep, I saw the snake head liquor stuff again, ill include that pick for you. haha the chinese... always looking for ways to eat absolutely everything they possibly can. including the head of the snake.. its gross looking, i bet that would get you wasted pretty fast.

snake head liquor???

night market


Saturday we made it out to the very outskirt of our area, called Guanyin. Right on the coast, except i didn't see the ocean which i was super sad about, so its straight farm land and rural area (rural as in this is taiwan and there aren't any real rural areas haha) It was SO beautiful and peaceful. I was just riding my bike looking off to the side watching the rice farmers doing their thing out in their fields. It was quiet. Such an awesome experience. Spiritual.

don't be jealous haha

GuanYin!!


I debated whether i would share this part or not... Mom, don't flip I'M COMPLETELY FINE! BUT hahah I did get hit on my bike for the first time last night. Side swiped by this mad scooter driver and straight up ninja rolled and popped right back up on my feet hahah it was hollywood worthy material. Willes looked like a deer in the headlights hahaha it was perfect! Good news is I didn't even really get a scratch ( don't ask me how that worked out) and my clothes weren't damaged in any way. I landed on a pillow I swear haha. BUT the exciting this now I'm a veteran! I have survived a bike wreck at full speed and left the scene without a scratch! Thank you Heaven!!! 

Taiwan is still beautiful. Slowly getting colder and colder. But still humid as heck.

My Taiwanese family.  Meet the Chen's!!!


Love you all!

--
金長老
Jīn ZhǎngLǎo
Elder Jensen

Tuesday, November 25, 2014

DiYu

"Hell"

Not because this week was Hell or anything, but because Hell won a lot of battles against us this week. It was sad, but those xingku (no english equivalent, but like rough life in a positive way haha) moments are good for every missionary to go through. Without going into too much detail, we only had 2 set appts this entire week. total. so LOTS of finding time, which is still good just xingku. Still managed to get 19 lessons and like 4 member visits so we still got to work hahah Willes and I don't stop!

Unfortunately I don't have much to share from this week.. We did have stake conference this weekend and it was hilarious we had Elder Wong from the 70, that guy that gave the fully Cantonese talk in Conference, and he spoke at both sessions. He speaks ok mandarin but english and cantonese are his best so he'd be trying to say something in mandarin and it would eventually just turn into Chinglish as he mixed in english words and then he'd saying "whoops Yingwen Laile!" (english came). It was cracking me up. At the end he gave up and had some english speaking RM come up to translate for him hahaha it was cool. Elder Wong is a stud.

I'm getting rice cheeks. They are real. My face is slowly inflating bahahaha actually its slightly sad but i aint trying to impress any taiwanese chicks so i'm not too concerned about it. until i go home at least hahah! maybe bubble cheeks will be in style when i'm back who knows?

I changed my mind. I will share one experience. We were in a lesson with a kid about our age. He was liking it though I'm not sure how interested he was or not but it was going well. we're like getting towards the end and then his dad, who had been watching us all along, comes out with a huge smile on his face but starts asking about polygamy and saying we should go back to those days cuz polygamy was so much better or something.. so Willes asks if he just came out because he doesn't want us talking to his son. The guy denies it, calms down a bit and leaves for a sec so we continue. But 10 min later he's right back there and this time goes off for about 45 straight min about how great missionaries are and how cool Christianity is but that we missionaries need to know that Christianity doesn't belong in Taiwan because it goes completely against their culture and their ChuanTong (traditions) and that we missionaries are fine to teach other people but if we want to do that then we need to be willing to listen to other people as well and learn a little about Buddism/Daoism. 

I agree. But while we're missionaries, our time really is always so pressed. We just don't really have time to sit and learn about Buddhism. So we respectfully said well we just dont have time for this and left. It was rough, probably the harshest rejection we've gotten.. But no worries we didn't let it affect us. But maybe some of you RM's will remember, its not easy going on a mission. Some days you get home and just laugh because you wonder "how the 'Hell' (it means the place when its capitalized!) did today turn out the way it did??"

Missions are still great though, this week is shaping up, we have a billion people taking us out to eat this week and were going to TAIPEI today for some quality fun!!!

Love you all!!

--
金長老
Jīn ZhǎngLǎo
Elder Jensen
they got some Christmas spirit here after all!

I went to France for a day, just for kicks

bunch of shuaige's right here
Elder Jensen, Elder Westover, Elder Willes and Elder Bennion

spreading the good word while watching an impressive water show

thats a pig bone btw.  genuine meat right-off-the-bone right there!!

Another random shuaige. haha I decided I need to take more pictures!

My Taiwanese family :-) hotpot restaurants make my life!

Monday, November 17, 2014

Haipa de Mao!

I don't know if that subject translates well or not, hope it does. Supposed to mean "Scaredy Cat" nonetheless. Because freak I have become one all right!!

Dogs have rabies here. I have never been scared of dogs in my life but I am TERRIFIED here!! If you get bit that means 6 syringes to the belly for you! Not gonna happen to me, super terrified of that. hahah I've had a few encounters this past week where I have flipped out. soooo scared now hahaha.

Also terrified of the rain I decided now. Apparently because it is acid rain it will make you go bald. And everyone conveniently forgot to tell me until recently. SO rain is good, as long as I have reinforced and durable head cover. Do not want that TuTou syndrome that happens to a lot of missionaries here.

Me and Heaps, we got it all under control haha

just chuanjiao-ing a bit
People here are ridiculous sometimes. I got to go on exchanges with Elder Heaps for the day in a tough area to chuanjiao a bit. It was a good time!! Two brand new trainies totally clueless wandering the ghetto streets of Taiwan together hahah. I stopped and talked to this woman in a park for a good 15 minutes. Conversation. Then she asks who we are and we say missionaries and immediately she says "sorry, I can't understand what youre saying. Your chinese isn't very good!" hahahaha I busted up laughing and called her out on the spot "You're a liar! You've understood me just fine the past 15 minutes! Don't lie to me!" to which she also started laughing at because she had no where to go with that one. She just says "I'm buddhist, no interest, goodbye." But still SOOOO politely!!! Like I don't even know how to describe it... People here hahaha

We got to Bible bash with some Jehovah Witnesses out on the street a bit. That was a good time. Luckily my knowledge of the Bible is pretty dang good because I study out of it everyday and we straight up owned them. Like got them all flustered and having no way to counter us. Again, SUPER politely, but it still felt pretty good to own them as hard core as we did. He tried to say that Ezekiel 37:19 meant two actually sticks off a tree. Wooden sticks. So then I ask so was Christ on Earth to gather his lost "sheep" or his lost people?? Got him with that one :-)

Taiwanese do not understand sarcasm at all. Yesterday in Priesthood Willes tells everyone I was moving areas tomorrow (today) as a joke, with a smile on his face, and everyone was SO shocked!! You should've seen their faces they were sooo concerned that I had only been there for not quite 6 weeks hahahaha!! Willes tells them all he was just kidding. But even after that I still had 5 or so people come up to me after to make sure I wasn't really moving. bahhahaha so hilarious!!

kottbular in Taiwan!! HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!
This week I had the worst and the best meal of my mission. The worst was a $1 bowl of noodles that I was told had veges in it but no it was these salty tasting boogers of some sort. Like sea sponge or I don't even know what. So gross!! But then my best was we had a family invite us over for Thanksgiving and you wouldn't believe what they had!! Kottbular with Lingon berries!!!!! I was soooooo surprised I probably acted like a little kid in a candy shop hahahahah.
pancakes in a wok! and they tasted DANG GOOD thank you! pretty much the pro-chef around here

Keep living it up everyone!! One thing I've figured can make any and every bad situation brighter is filling your thoughts full of thoughts of gratitude. Whether it be that although I'm getting soaked by this rain from Satan, at least I have a rain coat to keep my hair dry! (tehe) Or when we chuanjiao to where our feet and backs hurt, at least I can walk...and such etc. I haven't had a major downer moment once out here. Maintaining my happy optimistic attitude just fine all right!! 

Love you all!!!

Best Paint Crew on Island
some mainlanders that were so cool!! love their accent too haha

 謝謝韋長老、金長老 蒞臨寒舍 開啟聖恩

下回再來一起吃飯

林注強(Javon)   陳毓秀(Sherry)  林群弼(Jimmy)

This family is my favorite family on Taiwan easily!! We're gonna get them baptized someday!!

Monday, November 10, 2014

KuaZhang

Title means ridiculous. the one word I would use to describe Taiwan. Ridiculous. It is so backwards here. I'll describe to you my typical (or atypical however you look at it) ride from the house to the chapel. Get on the bikes and immediately pedal out into the middle of the street which is often packed with cars and ride between all of them to get to the sidewalk where theres not so much traffic. Bicycles have no laws here, they count as both pedestrian and vehicle so we literally ride everywhere and anywhere. Get on to this super fast road and just start pedalling like a mad man as all these crazy scooter drivers fly past you on both sides hahah. stop at street lights and cross onto the sidewalk and continue on. Red lights don't stop no one here haha. proceed to ride with the cars and then onto some of the these crazy sidewalks and alley ways until it finally opens up into where our chapel is. DaBuFen of lights here (most) are like the light panguitch utah where all four just flash red and its just a right of way thing. but in a city more dense than NYC. its fun because it somehow totally works out. I have never seen anyone get hit!!

So biking is literally the biggest thrill of my life. But to further illustrate the kuazhang-ness of this place this morning on our way to get breakfast and supplies and such, we see this stopped car in the middle of the intersection not moving anywhere. haha and its super busy right? well after breakfast we see the cops come pick up this guy who was the driver and take him away in the car. and they just leave the car sitting out there in the middle of the intersection!!! like 30 min has passed in the time that we first saw the car sitting out there till when we saw him get taken away. and all the while none of the traffic has slowed down one bit hahahha everyone just carries on dodging the car somehow always missing it. It's nuts. The cops didn't do anything about the car. thats what I find the most hilarious. It could still be out there for all I know too.. Taiwann.......

Food this week has been interesting and funny again. we tried this good looking pork place, but turns out the ONLY thing they had on the menu was pig foot, which really isn't all that super good hahah. But we stuck it out and I straight up ate the fattiest meal of my life which was terrible but an experience none the less!!! Found roubao, for those who know, it is manna from heaven. for those who don't, go get some so you know what I'm talking about. I burned a whole in my stomach this week eating dumplings and hot and sour soup. I told them I wanted them to make everything as absolutely hot as they could. It made me cry to say the least hahah and I LOVE SPICY FOOD, so the fact that I admit it made me cry should tell you just how friggin hot those dumplings from hell were hahaha! 

our biggest fail yet hahaha

We attempted to make cookies in our apartment this week. major, major fail. Turns out Taiwanese people havent invented the oven yet there are only friggin woks and rice cookers so Elder Willes thinks itd be a great idea to try cooking only big cookie cake in the rice cooker and I didnt have any better ideas so we just went for it. It was like those cookies that are not even half way through baked so they're like in that nasty in between. And also all the oil unseparated itself for some reason so it was straight up in olive oil all messy and gross and such. But I stuck it to the man and ate it like a champ. It may have made me slightly sick but Im not crying about that!!

I may have also thrown up in my sleep :-) but not your average throw up. I guess I caught it and kept my mouth closed so it just went up into my sinuses and burned those bad since my stomach was still chuck full of all those hot peppers from the dumplings earlier that day hahaha. couldn't win for losing.

Mom everyone here thinks you look too young to be my mom. they always guess sister haha.

I got to go up to Taibei for another meeting with everyone from my generation of missionaries. It was fun to see everyone again. Everyone is still doing super well!

this is the train I stood in for an hour straight going up to Taipei! and I LOVED it!!

Shi Zheyang. ("Is this way" meaning thats all for now!!)

Love you all! Keep smiling!!

金長老
Jīn ZhǎngLǎo
Elder Jensen

bakeries are the greatest thing in heaven but I always wonder where the bread balls are coming from when shipped in on these trucks.

just your typical Miao (temple, shrine) around these parts

this pic is supposed to look much cooler with Taipei 101 chilling in the background but because of lighting I was very disappointed.  None the less check out those 15 or so of the 100 billion scooters here!

Monday, November 3, 2014

AI NI O!!

So.. I've heard there's been some sad occurences back home recently... I hope everyone is ok. I'm praying for everyone!!

Taipei 101!!!!! What a friggin monster of a building!! Mom you thought the Willes tower was tall... hahaha you are ridiculously high up there in the sky. Taipei is beautiful. Not very tall except the tower so its kinda funny but still super super sick!

friggin tallest building ever

some quality taipei right there

from the 91st floor

This jazz is the wind damper, or the reason the 101 doesn't fall over.  Look it up - super interesting!

We haven't had that eventful of a week since I sent out my last letter, mostly been digging through records books and finding 1000s of less actives and former investigators to call. So lots of apartment time. But also lots of finding time. Talked to lots of people. And the streets have been especially fun lately because Taiwan is having their Presidential elections this week or next not totally sure but theres been a lot of fun rallies to go find at around here in ZhongLi. People take these elections seriously around here. And to think Taiwan is so tiny hahah. Its fun to listen to angry Asians screaming in front of a wild crowd! But these arent scary at all. Taiwanese people wouldn't hurt a fly. Things are nothing here like they've been in Hong Kong recently I've heard.

One funny experience I will share however, we got taken to dinner by a crazy LA the other day at this super super nice and crazy expensive steak place (which means $10 a plate here lol). In this guys record it said he liked to pick one in the companionship he liked and one he did not like. This turned out to be true as 2 minutes into our dinner, he tells us that Willes looks a lot more Shuai (basically means handsome) than me. Then proceeds to say I look like a bad guy on a movie, or like a bad guy from Germany or Russia bahahah. I laughed. Then as the dinner went on he kept telling me he couldn't understand my Chinese because it was so ugly, so started using English with him and asked him why he couldn't understand that and set him in his place haha. But we get into our spiritual share time and Willes turns the time to me to share my thoughts and scripture and this guy started whiny like a 5 yr old that he can't understand me and i speak like a little kid. So told him "You can too understand me and I'm going to share this with you regardless" so I did my spiel and he didn't have anything to say after. I felt like shouting HA after but that wouldn't have brought the Spirit. But I was straight up laughing throughout. It was fun bickering with this guy a little. I miss having people I can have friendly arguments with. So it was a good time for me trying to impress this guy and put him in his place like I used to always try to do at Acceleration with Dayna or at school with mrs. parker. Plus the food was to die for so I was a happy camper.

The last funny experience happened when we were contacting in the square outside our house. We started talking to the man when the little kid comes up to me and starts pulling my hand to come play with him and I'm thinking what the heck, look down, and its this same kid whose mom we talked to in that same square on my very first night in Taiwan. I was so surprised we both remembered each other! Anyways, this guy laughs and tells me its his SON so then I reply, thinking he made a mistake cuz this kid was definitely a girl, super long hair and high voice, "Oh thats your DAUGHTER? I played with her a few weeks ago." He busts up, calls his son over and tells the son I thought he was the dad's daughter. The little kid gets this super mad face on and tells me "Wo shi NANSHENG!" Which means I'm a BOY! He was ticked. And my comp/peike was laughing super hard at me and I was laughing too because I straight up thought it was a girl. NOPE! My bad ahahha!! super funny stuff out here in taiwan.

Other than that not much. Love you all! keep on keeping on!!

yeah I straight up had a burrito with chips and salsa on Saturday.  All of which is NOWHERE to be found here.

temple is lovely stuff here

the most expensive coral ever

the crew!
金長老
Jīn ZhǎngLǎo
Elder Jensen