Mid-Autumn Festival and the TYPHOON!

These are the "before eating" faces, which reflect the built-up anticipation of
waiting 2 DAYS to devour these babies!

This weekend has been one of Taiwan's most popular holidays, Mid-Autumn Festival. Do your own research on this holiday. The origin-story is a fun one. Like most holidays, it's celebration is reduced to activities whose connection to the origin seem a bit random. "On the ground" the holiday is eating youzi (a dry, bland grapefruit), mooncakes (right), and barbecuing. Only there ALSO happens to be a typhoon in town, so most folks today, who might have had more fun plans, are likely doing what WE are doing today (Monday): surviving on the utter edge of sheer BOREDOM!

I took the "before eating" picture at the top of this post anticipating there would be a funny, contrasting "after" picture when the kids actually ATE the cakes they have been wanting for DAYS. I wasn't disappointed in their faces. Needless to say THEY WERE disappointed in the cakes. Ha!

Yes, there is a typhoon in the neighborhood AS I TYPE. I know TYPHOON sounds exciting and a little scary, but all the typhoons I've experienced amount to a very large (or insignificant) rain storm with a lot of wind. Right now the rain is impressive, and we have an 8th floor view of it all! The rain is coming down in sheets! I'm glad we aren't out in it because we would be DRENCHED.

In fact, the rain started in earnest yesterday (Sunday) about the time we were supposed to be on our 20 minute walk to church. It didn't turn out all bad. I had wanted to head out at 8:30 since we weren't exactly sure where we were going and had never been to the church before. We didn't get to the front doors of our apartment building until 8:55, however, and when we walked up to them we noticed the rain was dumping. Unlike rain in Utah, it falls in very fine drops, almost a mist, but at this moment it was falling fast enough the mist would have drenched us in about 20 seconds, even with our 2 umbrellas.

So we asked our door man to call us 2 cabs instead. They drove up from the MRT station and we loaded up and were off, except for me not remembering the exact address for the second cab which I was in. Both drivers figured it out and we made it for the sacrament hymn, in better time than we could have walking, and arrived mostly dry!

The ward, by the way, was very kind. Q was sufficiently impressed he decided to request our records to be moved. I thought he had ruled that option out, but it's nice to think we will be a little better rooted here. I think there is a great opportunity to serve! The ward only has one set of missionaries serving in it. (Generally there are a total of 4-6 missionaries per ward.) From what we could gather, some of the reduction is due to local leadership preferring a smaller missionary force. But we also learned the Taiwan government has recently tightened down on missionary visas, so the mission doesn't quite have the numbers it wants anyway. Of the two missionaries, one is a Taiwan native from Tainan, Elder Dong, who introduced himself Sunday and has been a missionary for 4 days. Having just one foreign missionary has crippled their English class offerings, and we hear they have lost a lot of regular attendees.

This picture of Tamsui ward members and missionaries was taken the following Sunday at the monthly ward FHE.
The game was a mix of elevator, truth or dare, and gospel trivia. 

I never was a huge English class fan, and felt MOST often they weren't a great source for people interested in the gospel. HOWEVER, for US they should produce people interested in a language share, and who have time and are open to meeting people which is exactly what we are looking for. So we are thinking we will go as a family to the classes to help where we can. Korean also happens to be fairly fashionable here, so Q is thinking he may offer a class on how to read Korean, which he thinks can be mastered in about 10 minutes. We shall see if all our scheming produces meaningful experiences for any of us, but we are hopeful at this time.

Otherwise, Arthur lucked out and did great in nursery with a fairly fluent English-speaking nursery leader. There were just 3 Chinese kids in Eloise's Junior Primary class, and another 3 in EV's Senior Primary class, but they both reported their teachers were very kind and they had a lot of fun. I think the super yummy looking cake they were all served as a snack went a long way in their love for their day at church. None of them reported any problems, or even boredom with being around Chinese for 3 hours, so so far, so good.

If they weren't impressed by his Chinese on the first Sunday,
 THIS moment the following week of him doing
push ups while reciting the 13th Article of Faith (the longest)
had to make an impression!

Q reported that Kai was asked several questions at the beginning of the priesthood meeting and his answers in Chinese impressed everyone. MY Chinese impressed everyone too, apparently, but I take that with a depressed grain of salt. I am painfully aware of how much I don't understand and ALL that I can't read or write and am in NO danger of getting a big head.

Case in point, I didn't remember to grab the address of where we now live, nor have I committed it to memory, so we had to ask members help us after church to call the cab, and then I went in the lead cab while the rest followed in a member's car, as I guessed our way back home. (Several times on this trip I have reflected on what a blessing my good sense of direction is. Because I don't read, it truly saves me by at least keeping me going in the right direction. We would be so crazy-lost without it!)

So the welcome at church was warm, but not overwhelming, perhaps because WE are. We are a big family of 7, making up almost 50% of primary, apparently, and so we should not have been surprised that we left without an invite to dinner or holiday celebrations later in the day or week.

The kids in Tamsui on Saturday night.

Thankfully for us, and most blessedly, Sammi and Alan once again delivered a mighty blessing. We got home from church at about 1pm and I made a large batch of fried rice which was devoured. Sammi and Alan said they would come get us around 3pm. I told everyone to take a nap, and only laid down myself around 3:15. At 3:30 we got a call that there was a delay and it would be another 30 minutes. We then got another 2 phone calls with the same 30 minute delay about every 30 minutes, so the kids, who hadn't napped, got to watch a bunch of stuff, and I got to sleep. THAT was a great blessing because on Saturday night, Sammi, Alan, and Sophia had come to our place and we had gone on to Tamsui for dinner. They didn't leave for home and so the kids weren't in bed 'til after 11pm.

The littles at the little kids table.

Anyway, Sammi, Alan, and Sophia all came finally on Sunday at about 5 pm and we crammed all 10 of us in their car for a 30 minute drive across Taipei to their home. We spent a lovely evening chatting with them. They cooked meat and prepped a lot of veggies for the sake of Q. I made a salad with what they had, which was a hit with Alan and hit the spot for us salad-deprived foreigners. Mostly, it was just so lovely to be with friends. Sophia was darling to share all her things with Arthur and the girls. They all painted their nails later in the evening and with Alan's help, we tried to find Chinese names for the kids.

(Below: The spread prepared by Sammi and Alan's input because, as he explained, while he doesn't often cook, his dad IS a chef! They crack us up! The table below is a butterfly table (both side fold out) which they apparently keep for occasions just such as this night when they are entertaining 7 guests!)

We had some success too! Our family name is Jin, which means gold. We got that because Q's Korean name, Kim, translates to Jin here. We liked gold just fine. And we are a golden family! :)

Kai's name is Kai, meaning triumphant.
EV's name is Juan. Her English name pertains to a source of life. Her Chinese name (so far - we may add another syllable) means brook or small stream. I liked that water was also a giver and keeper of life.
Eloise's name is Chun Jing. We never found a reliable translation for her English name, so I assigned it the meaning, "Peace from God." In Chinese, Chun means simple, uncomplicated, or pure, and Jing is an even, undisturbed stillness. Sammi and Alan thought her name was a little odd, or old sounding, which I also thought was perfect because her English name is a grandma-era name too. So both the girl names relate somewhat to their English names.

We still have Arthur yet to go. His English name only pertains to the literary and historical figure and has no meaning in itself, so we are hunting for a name that might reflect that he is the boy of my dreams! (Not only did I dream of him before he was born, but I always wanted a clever, naughty little handful to make me laugh and love me best!

Anyway, we stayed with our friends until after 11pm and finally got home, thanks to Alan, just before midnight! We all slept in this morning, and because there isn't much to do today, have had a rather restful day today as well. Q and I went with plastic ponchos to score us all some food for lunch and timed things just right - we were out for perhaps the only relatively dry 40 minutes all day. Otherwise I have cleaned and done countless tiny batches of laundry and the kids have played, played in the bally room, taken a bath (in lieu of swimming) in our huge, balcony bathtub, and are now watching stuff on youtube. Q has been able to work to his heart's content!

Typhoon feast of guotie's!