Birthday, Alicia and Earthquake

Ok… so it has been a while since I made a post. So this will include a lot of information. 

- My 25^th Birthday. My birthday was very enjoyeable. I got to Skype with my parents and Cassie in the morning before heading to work. I worked a little bit there and was presented with a cake by my precious 11^th grade PE class. They are seriously the sweetest kids ever. Then the students had an assembly. After the assembly all the PE students surrounded me and sang to me. Then of course they rushed at me, picked me up and threw me into the air. I’m not sure why they think this is so much fun, but they do. After the assembly, I got a little work done before all of the faculty and staff went to Cigu for a  great lunch. I guess it was a kind of “thank you” lunch. It was very yummy. Then we went back to the school and went home. I went to Bus-7 and did some work for the next day of school. Then I went to Teddy and Vanessa’s house for dinner and fun. Vanessa made me a cake and we sat around and had fun. It was very enjoyable.

-          School has been very interesting. The school has changed the way I teach so I now have all of the junior high with a translator instead of with the English teachers. While this is an improvement in some ways, it is also rather difficult because the students are not as well behaved without their teacher in the room. The first week, we talked about Valentine’s Day and made Valentines for friends and family. The second week, we made dictionaries and ID nametags. Last week, we read a part of the story of Mulan. That didn’t go very well. This week, we are playing BINGO with vocabulary words. And that is just the junior high. The high school is wonderful as always. This week with the 11^th grade, we are teaching how to read a recipe. And next week we will actually bake cookies… We’ll see how it goes. 

-          I have been leading small group now while our leader Kevin is away on a mission trip to South Africa. It has gone very well, but I am realizing how much work it is to prepare for every week. Soon I will be leading my own group so it will be a longtime thing.

-          I am moving! God has really answered my prayers this time in a way I never would have expected. Kevin got me in contact with a girl named Amanda Shu-Hua Wang a few weeks back. She wanted to move back to Tainan but wasn’t sure when. We discussed living together but I we both assumed it would be much later before that could possibly happen. Well last week I got a message from her. She had given notice and would be moving in April. Also  she found a house through a friend that is free. FREE!! It is farther away from my school than I had originally wanted and the house is for sale, so we might not be there too long, but still… free… I am so excited. We went and checked it out this past weekend. It is lovely and I am very excited about having a godly housemate and a great house to live in. We will probably move around the end of March.

-          Alicia came to visit me this weekend. It was so nice to see her and get to show her around my city. Although it was VERY cold and not the best weather, at least it didn’t rain. We shared several cold scooter rides (her first), hot drinks and much laughter. It was so great to show her my church and experience life with her. On Sunday while she was here, I experienced my first earthquake! During our baptism service, a 5.1 earthquake shook the building. We were on the 10^th floor and it was a bir scary. The building just felt like it was moving around – dancing a little jig. I was so happy she was there cause I grabbed her hand and just held on. Having her was such a blessing.