What I have been up to...
Where to begin?
Obviously, I haven't been posting here much recently. I guess I'll back up and brief y'all on what I have been up to in the past few weeks. =)
A couple of weekends ago I went to Tainan to visit the Ardrons and Rachelle. I was able to catch a ride with a teacher here who was also heading down there for the weekend, but I had to take the train back all by myself! It turned out to be rather easy - you just get on the train and then get off at your stop. It is really fast too - less than an hour from Chiayi to Tainan. Anyway, I had a wonderfully refreshing weekend there in the Ardron's home though I was a little tired from staying up and sharing with Rachelle till who knows how late?! Here's a picture of Rachelle & me.
A month or so ago, I agreed to teach at a Junior High camp on November 11, which happened to be last weekend. Although a lot of work, it turned out to be quite fun! I and two other English teachers put together a Thanksgiving theme for the morning and a Christmas theme for the afternoon. Hence, we were able to have a whole "giving" theme for all day. We were able to make clay bowls, fudge, teach Christmas songs, make thank-you cards, have a short Thanksgiving play, and teach some English in there as well. Junior High students are quite different to teach than elementary-age kids; they're much more reticent. One has to think of more ways to try to get them to actually speak. I brought my camera with me, but forgot to take pictures all day. :(
The day before the camp some of us went up to Alishan, a famous mountain for its tea. In the morning we taught one period in a mountain school. They gathered all the kids together and we did the "Musical Chairs" skit. I think they liked it. =) After a yummy lunch (including deep fried tea leaves), we went to see the manufacturing process of Alishan Oolong tea. I found it quite interesting. The time for harvesting winter tea is only about 2 weeks long and it takes 60 hours of processing time to prepare the tea for sale. The tea is hand-picked to very precise specifications and then put through a whole system of drying, compression, tossing, more drying, more compression for 60 hours non-stop. Although they have machines, much of the work still requires a lot of manual labour.
On the Sunday following, Myra & I went up to the mountains with a family who is really into hiking. The mountains here are beautiful! They remind me of home! At the bottom of the mountains the trees are palms and it's neat to see the change in foliage as one goes higher. We hiked at around 3000 meters (or 10,000 feet). Up there, the trees are very much like the ones at home. The highest mountain in Taiwan is around 14,000 feet - I wonder if I'll have a chance to try hiking it sometime! They actually do get snow on that mountain sometimes in winter. Anyway, it was so lovely to have a day outside in the quietness and beauty of God's creation.
In between the weekends, I have been busy teaching school. It's going well. I've also enjoyed attending a small church plant on Monday evenings and an "English" Bible Study on Wednesday evenings. It's good to meet some people from the community!
Looking ahead, in less than two weeks all of us Taiwan teachers here are planning on a trip up to Taipei for a bit of a retreat. It should be fun to see everyone here and share our experiences! I'm looking forward to possibly attending a Taipei Symphony concert - I'm just waiting to see if I can get tickets.
AND, my big, exciting, wonderful news is that in about 2 weeks my mom and Melody are coming to visit!!!!!! Whoooo hoooo! This will be SO special!!!
So, I think that's it for now! Various other things have happened in the last few weeks, but I'll maybe post them later.
Love you all! Thank you for keeping me in your prayers.
Love
Christy
Obviously, I haven't been posting here much recently. I guess I'll back up and brief y'all on what I have been up to in the past few weeks. =)
A couple of weekends ago I went to Tainan to visit the Ardrons and Rachelle. I was able to catch a ride with a teacher here who was also heading down there for the weekend, but I had to take the train back all by myself! It turned out to be rather easy - you just get on the train and then get off at your stop. It is really fast too - less than an hour from Chiayi to Tainan. Anyway, I had a wonderfully refreshing weekend there in the Ardron's home though I was a little tired from staying up and sharing with Rachelle till who knows how late?! Here's a picture of Rachelle & me.A month or so ago, I agreed to teach at a Junior High camp on November 11, which happened to be last weekend. Although a lot of work, it turned out to be quite fun! I and two other English teachers put together a Thanksgiving theme for the morning and a Christmas theme for the afternoon. Hence, we were able to have a whole "giving" theme for all day. We were able to make clay bowls, fudge, teach Christmas songs, make thank-you cards, have a short Thanksgiving play, and teach some English in there as well. Junior High students are quite different to teach than elementary-age kids; they're much more reticent. One has to think of more ways to try to get them to actually speak. I brought my camera with me, but forgot to take pictures all day. :(
The day before the camp some of us went up to Alishan, a famous mountain for its tea. In the morning we taught one period in a mountain school. They gathered all the kids together and we did the "Musical Chairs" skit. I think they liked it. =) After a yummy lunch (including deep fried tea leaves), we went to see the manufacturing process of Alishan Oolong tea. I found it quite interesting. The time for harvesting winter tea is only about 2 weeks long and it takes 60 hours of processing time to prepare the tea for sale. The tea is hand-picked to very precise specifications and then put through a whole system of drying, compression, tossing, more drying, more compression for 60 hours non-stop. Although they have machines, much of the work still requires a lot of manual labour.
On the Sunday following, Myra & I went up to the mountains with a family who is really into hiking. The mountains here are beautiful! They remind me of home! At the bottom of the mountains the trees are palms and it's neat to see the change in foliage as one goes higher. We hiked at around 3000 meters (or 10,000 feet). Up there, the trees are very much like the ones at home. The highest mountain in Taiwan is around 14,000 feet - I wonder if I'll have a chance to try hiking it sometime! They actually do get snow on that mountain sometimes in winter. Anyway, it was so lovely to have a day outside in the quietness and beauty of God's creation.
In between the weekends, I have been busy teaching school. It's going well. I've also enjoyed attending a small church plant on Monday evenings and an "English" Bible Study on Wednesday evenings. It's good to meet some people from the community!
Looking ahead, in less than two weeks all of us Taiwan teachers here are planning on a trip up to Taipei for a bit of a retreat. It should be fun to see everyone here and share our experiences! I'm looking forward to possibly attending a Taipei Symphony concert - I'm just waiting to see if I can get tickets.
AND, my big, exciting, wonderful news is that in about 2 weeks my mom and Melody are coming to visit!!!!!! Whoooo hoooo! This will be SO special!!!
So, I think that's it for now! Various other things have happened in the last few weeks, but I'll maybe post them later.
Love you all! Thank you for keeping me in your prayers.
Love
Christy
posted by Christy | 7:05 PM
5 Comments:
Deep fried tea leaves?????? Wow! What was it like?
How exciting about your mom and Melody coming to visit you! I hope you have a great time together. Miss you! -Erika
They dip the leaves in batter and fry them. They're pretty yummy. I'm told that the extreme healthiness of the leaves balances out the extreme unhealthiness of the frying - I'm not sure about that though!! =)
Have a good day!
Christy
Sounds really, really good! Can you make me some when you get back? :)
Don't trains in other countries make you realize how bad some transit here is? The train in Australia was also a great way to get around - fast, comfortable, and I loved the get-on, get-off part - much quicker and easier than flying!
Wow, making tea sounds complicated! I didn't realize there was that much involved. And Dad was teasing us that coffee was unhealthy because it was so processed! :)
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