Scooter Accident

We are OK now, but Phil and I were in an accident this morning (2/26/13).

We were headed to school for finals, Phil was driving the scooter and I was holding on behind him. We were about to enter an intersection going straight, when a car shot in front of us and turned right, directly in front of us. We hit it and fell over. Phil hit his shoulder, and scraped his knee, but he hopped up pretty quickly. The scooter pinned my leg until Phil pulled it off of me. We were in shock, I was in tears. It was one of the scariest things that's happened to us. The man in the car ran up to us to make sure we were OK  We were in so much shock we told him we were OK and let him leave. Then I realized I couldn't put my weight on my leg all the way. It was extremely painful. I didn't think it was broken, but when we called a sister that was a nurse she told us to go to the hospital. I got X-rays, and it checked out OK. Nothing is broken. While they checked me out, they kindly cleaned Phil's scrapes. We were so thankful a sister in our hall went with us to the hospital. I was having a hard time keeping it together, and could not for the life of me communicate with any of the staff. The sister was so sweet, and tried to cheer us up. She told us now that we had been in a scooter accident, we are Taiwanese.  Apparently a brother told Phil that with scooter accidents, its not an if, but a when. They are extremely common here.

Obviously we wished we could have avoided it, but we are extremely fortunate that it wasn't more serious. I have a temporary limp, and was told to rest. The doctor gave me a prescription for a muscle relaxant and pain killer. Phil is very sore, and has to get by on ibuprofen. But it could have been much much worse.

Even the scooter runs ok.

My bandaged knee

Phil's bandaged hand

Phil's scraped up knee

Well that is the update. Hopefully tomorrows finals go better than today. We are both very homesick and a little down. But we are counting our blessings just being alive.

We love and miss you all!

Field Service and English Assembly

(Hannah's Study with Children)
Last week I had my second study at the cram school with the kids. I was really nervous since I couldn't find another sister to go with me. But Rena went with me and helped me translate. This time I was prepared to study with several children. Jw.org has the most beautiful tools for studying with kids. I downloaded the first video for kids and played it for them on my tablet. They loved it! They were completely absorbed in it, gasping and giggling along with it the whole time. After we read a couple lessons from the Bible story book i gave them the picture activity, also from jw.org, so they colored and talked about the Bible story. It was so much fun! After the study several of them individually came up and told me "謝謝 老師!" "Thank you teacher!" It was a neat experience. :)

Back to Phil
On Friday (Feb 15th) Before Hannah's talk she went with several sisters to get a massage. This was nice for her since she has had a lot of pain in her back lately. I decided to be brave and go and work in our personal territory. I worked all the way around a block the territories here are a complete mix of residential and business. With Jehovah's help I was able to do it, it was exactly what I needed too to place my self in Jehovah's hands and see how he would help me. Although many of them were busy or not interested most were very nice. Several of the buildings only had intercoms (my worst nightmare since it is hard to understand them and it is hard for them to understand me). So I said a prayer to Jehovah and rang the buzzer.  The first building had 6 buzzers (not to bad). then the next 3 buildings had 12. Then I came to a building with 30 buzzers! One by one I buzzed them all. Most were nice and a few took literature  It took me about 2 hours to work the entire block, during which time I probably took about 100 doors. Apartments back in the States don't seem to bad to me now :) Jehovah always gives us what we need and only what we can take.



Friday Feb 22nd we got to attend the annual circuit Pioneer meeting (In English). It was so nice to see all of the English pioneers. Since Taiwan English is relatively small the meeting covered the entire island. There were  120 there are only 7 English congregations in Taiwan. Not all in attendance were part of the English congregations here, several were like us foreigners who need to get the information in our mother tongue to understand.

The theme was 2 Tim 4:5 "Keep your senses in all things". The program helped us to evaluate our situations and make sure that we are keeping our priorities in the proper place. It also had good reminders about Family worship, and Daily Bible reading and study with some nice suggestions if you have not yet formed a yearning for it. When talking about Family worship the brother made a joke that this was not to be confused with ancestor worship, which is very common here. One point that I really appreciated was part that was tailored to those in foreign language, Since English is a Foreign language here. The point was simply this "Don't be so quick to assume that Jehovah doesn't want you in this field just because things don't seem to be working out right now." I felt that was really good advice because I have felt that lots of times in with Chinese that "I just cant do this and I would be more useful somewhere else". But after the meeting we left refreshed and with an even stronger zeal to keep doing what we are doing.

The Beitun Kingdom Hall where the pioneer meeting was held (kingdom hall is in the basement of the building)

On Saturday we went to the first day of the English "Safeguard Your Mind Circuit Assembly". We enjoyed the information and the encouragement both from the program and the association. There were some sisters there who had to work from 4pm to 7am the night before, after the assembly they had to go and work the same shift with plans to attend Sunday as well. Another sister that sat next to us on Sunday had been awake for 36 hours. It was so encouraging to see such wonderful examples. There was an average attendance of 485. There were 10 baptized, 1 brother and 9 sisters. Here are some pictures from the assembly.

There was a small Thai group also in attendance. Jehovah makes sure everyone is take care of.

We loved the assembly, it was just the spiritual treat that we needed.

We will blog again soon. Love Phil and Hannah

Phil's First Reading & Hannah's First Talk

Hello all! Sorry we have been neglecting the blog lately the past two weeks have been busy and yet somewhat uneventful :) however we did both have talks so we can tell you about that.

On Feb 8th I had my first bible reading in Chinese here in Taiwan. And even though I have had several bible readings in Chinese back home, this one made me extra nervous. I think it was because I knew that everyone there was going to instantly know when I made a mistake and how my mistake probably completely changed the meaning of the entire reading. I was also nervous too because back home I have never been able to read the material in the allotted 4 mins, in fact the last reading I gave in the states my time was over 6 min! This time, even right before the meeting as I was practicing I couldn't do it in less than 5 mins 30 sec.  But after allot of practice and a lot of prayer, the time had come to give my reading.

Brother Gao introduced me and I went up fulling expecting to have the bell rung on me. I did my reading Matthew 23:25-39. I made several mistakes and had a few pauses that were too long but over all it went ok. (you can decide for yourself though it is posted below). Afterwards the congregation clapped and brother Gao thanked me and said something about it takes lots of practice. He also told the congregation that if you have ever had to give a talk in another language you know how hard and scary it is. After the meeting I had allot of people come up to me and thank me for my talk and say that they couldn't have done the same thing in English.

The Following Friday (Feb 15th) Hannah has her first talk with Jamie. Her theme was: "How Does God’s Patience Lead to Salvation? (2 Pet. 3:9, 15)". First she wrote the talk out completely in English then using Watchtower library and the sync features included in it she translated what she could on her own. After that she asked one of the Taiwanese sisters to help her translate the rest. They made arrangements to do so on Monday after field service since Hannah had about half of the talk translated already it didn't take too long. Although I think She would have gladly spent a little more time on it if the sister helping her would have slowed down. They were still doing door to door (at night) when the sister started reading what she had on her tablet. She then translated it and dictated it to Hannah. Hannah had to write what she was dictating as fast as she could. Hannah has learned that there is a downside to sounding good when speaking Chinese when you don't know a lot. That is as soon as they hear you talk they assume you must know more than you do and they will not slow down. :) long story short though she was able to get it all down and type it up at home. It was nice too that we had that week off of school for Chinese new years, so Hannah had lots of time to practice. As you will see from the video below she did great!  Afterwards brother Gao commend her on doing a good and her effort. He also said he couldn't understand why two Americans would be talking about this topic in fluent Chinese. Everyone laughed. :)

Most of the week we spent either working on our talks or in field service. I will talk about that more in the next post. 

Love Phil and Hannah

Bethel and a day trip to Taipei

Thursday we got to go to Bethel with some sisters from our hall and 2 of their Bible studies.We started the day early meeting Sioux at 7:40 am at McDonald's, and then went to the train station. It took about 2 hours  to get there by train and taking a taxi. 

The Train Station

At the train station by the tracks

Phil, Souix, her 2 studies and Rebecca 

Entrance to Taiwan's Branch Office

Our guide told us that when they were building the branch a man came by and asked what was going on because of all of the foreigners who had come to help build it. They explained to him that they were all volunteers building the branch. He was very impressed, and gave them his business card. He told them that when it was finished to call him. So two years later when the branch was finished they called him and he gave them the furniture seen below at a very very discounted rate. That was in 1991. So the guide said that it was very special furniture.  

This is the main auditorium it has seating for 150 people. There is a congregation that meets here and they also have the Bethel's Family Worship here, the Bethel Family at this Branch is only 35 people.

This is the Dining Room, most of the time they don't need the space but they have  the graduations for Bible School for Single Brothers here. During the special occasions it is full.

 All of the Paintings in the dining room were painted by a brother who is paralyzed from the neck down. He paints only using his mouth to hold the brush. They were so beautiful and detailed, it was so amazing to see. The guide told us that despite his disability he also serves as an elder in his congregation. Truly an inspiration to all of us to give Jehovah all that we can no matter what our circumstances.

The Kitchen

The Kitchen

The Grounds of Bethel. They are taken care of by only one brother. There is a lot more land than building since they thought the Hong Kong branch might need to merge with the Taiwan branch when control of Hong Kong went back to China in 1997 but that hasn't been necessary.    

Our guide told us that these were their many big Nemo's :)

When they built the branch they tried to save as many of the trees as they could .  This is one that is over a hundred years old as it grows the tree sends roots down to the ground to stabilize it. If we understood correctly brother Samsel actually used to take care of it.

Guest rooms

Guest rooms

Towel Closet, The Guide said he doesn't know how to make the different shapes  only how to mess them up. But his wife works as a house keeper there and she knows how. He said she was his Cinderella. 

These were some paintings donated by a sister. She was famous for her paintings with big eyes that were sad. But after she got the Truth her paintings changed from big sad eyes to big happy eyes.

The work shop where they repair things. No one was there though the guide said it must be time for a coffee break. 

The laundry room

The laundry room

The laundry room

The Lounge area

The Lounge area

Picture of the International convention in 1992 the attendance was 6000 ,  at that time only 2000 of which were from Taiwan  this year they are having the district convention at the same location and they will fill it with publishers only from Taiwan.

The Pool / Emergency Fire water supply

The  Progression of the branch office in Taiwan.

The Warehouse

Map of the Circuits in Taiwan. The red areas are unassigned territory.

This is a small printing press that they use to print in the tribal languages for the area . Jehovah is a wonderful God who wants all to be able to learn about him in their own language.

40% of the publishers in Taiwan are Pioneers

The Taiwan branch handles all of the recordings in Chinese and in Taiwanese Sign Language. 

After the Tour ended we got to eat lunch with the Bethel family it was really nice very different food than I am used too but it was still pretty good and a great privilege. The brothers were so kind we sat at the table with the brother taking the lead that day and at the end of lunch he made an announcement about us, and sending their love to our congregation back in the states. After we finished eating the Brother who gave us the tour (who was formally the CO for our circuit and thus knew Souix) invited us back to their room. It was very nice we enjoyed some cookies and nice conversation. About 1:30 the brothers called our taxi,  and we headed to the train station again, this time headed for Taipei.

  

Rebecca being umm well Rebecca

The Train ride to Taipei was a little over an hour. During which we all fell asleep :). Upon arriving we then got on to the metro which is a local train kinda like a subway but only part of it is underground most of it has a great view.

Entering Taipei from the Train

On Board the Metro

The Metro is fairly new and they really want to keep it nice. That said there is no eating drinking or smoking allowed on the metro, if they catch you there is a $7500 NT fine (approx $268 USD) even chewing gum is not allowed all though the fine for that is only a few hundred NT  or approx $15 USD.

Here are a few shots of Taipei from the metro :

Once We arrived at the area we were headed to our first stop was of course Starbucks :)  

A Five floor Starbucks, can you imagine anything more beautiful? :)

Check out this dog he has shoes and sunglasses :)

Hannah and I in the market we did a little shopping here

 

We took the ferry across the bay

oyster "pancakes" actually more like an omelette

Hannah had one I tried a bite but I thought it was pretty gross

 Beached boats in the bay

We saw this on the menu at a shop we walked past and had to take a picture of it. "pork brain soup". And big surprise, no we didn't try it :)

Strawberry's dipped in a hard candy glaze, it was really good until we got to the end and instead of a strawberry it was a tomato... WEIRD! 

 After some more looking around we got on the metro and took it to the bus station. Riding the bus is cheaper than the train and both are a lot cheaper than the high speed rail. however they are much slower. It was about 2:30AM when we finally got home. a very long but fun day.

Well that was our trip.  Until next time.

Love Phil & Hannah