As Emily and I read in A Farewell To Arms this evening we came across the line above and I knew I should get on here and write something…even though it seems there is nothing to write…even though I know that isn’t true.

It’s been just shy of two months since my last post. Since then Emily has been tutoring and teaching up a storm all over Taipei. She’s constantly going to this person’s house and that coffee shop to meet up with kids, adults, everyone, to give them a first rate hour of English instruction, and then on to the next place. I’ve been teaching as well. I’m working at two different cram schools now. It was three nights a week, but I just picked up some more hours so it will be every night of the week, which is good!!! I was also taking Chinese classes at the MLC, or Mandarin Language Center. I had a great teacher and a class with only six other students with three hours of instruction, five days a week, plus homework. I was learning a lot and moving fast. Unfortunately, I stopped going to try and find a morning teaching job and then when I didn’t find a morning teaching job I was too far behind to go back….oh, the regrets we rack up in this life….oh, well….I can console myself with the fact that I am still looking for a morning job….moving on.

The MLC was great and I thoroughly recommend it. It is cheaper than the other popular place to learn Chinese, NTNU’s MTC. Plus, I had heard ho hum stories about how at the MTC sometimes the teachers care and teach well and sometimes they aren’t so good. My short stint at the MLC now makes me an expert and I steer everyone that way!!! So remember don’t go to the MTC, go to the MLC.

I also finished another video since my last post. This one was for Our Friends Orphanage (OFO) in Takeo, Cambodia as a way to show the world what they are doing with their free after-school English classes. You can see it here: http://youtu.be/dM4NTCUX49A

A couple of months ago I posted an email from Samnang about all the flooding there in Cambodia. The water has receded now, thankfully, and lots of the farmers are scrambling to replant and get everything back to normal. I’ve also been contacting Samnang recently regarding concerns raised by Jen, another OFO volunteer who commented on one of my other posts. It is difficult sometimes to know how to communicate clearly with Samnang…and people from very different backgrounds from myself in general. We have such differing ideas about so much and that doesn’t even include the whole language difficulty. It makes me realize just how much simpler it is to communicate countryman to countryman.

Okay so I’ll make the last bit quick. Emily’s mother’s visit has inspired others and we are excited to hear that Emily’s brother is planning on coming for a few weeks in March! We are hoping for another great time with family! We also recently got to visit with our old friend Jonathan Williams and his beautiful fiance Katia Chen who were in town on a tour of Asia. Great times!

Lastly, if you know us on facebook you already know this part: After lots of thought and prayer, Emily and I have come to the conclusion that it is time to move back to the USA for a while. We’re going to miss all our friends here in Taiwan, but following Jesus is always the best. We haven’t bought tickets yet, but most likely it will be around the end of March when our lease is up. We’re still getting used to the idea, even though it has been a while in the making. Oi vei…sweet and sour my thoughts they wander.

Before reading on, press the play button of this video and listen to it as you read. It will be a scrumptrulescent experience, I promise.

Last week I finished my last final, turned in my last term paper and started winter break! Last Thursday Emily and I hosted a “No More School” party here at our house with truly fantastic people joining us in our celebration. This week I’ve lazed about, began using Pimsleur in my quest to become a real speaker of 普通話 (Mandarin), hiked with Emily in the hills just south of 台北市 (Taipei City), spent an evening at the club with foreign exchange classmates for one last whoopla before they bid Taiwan adieu, and said goodbye forever to being a twenty-five year old. What a wonderful world we have been given.

After checking my grades and speaking with classmates it seems that there is consensus in my class that many of our professors felt that they were too kind to us during the midterms and have tried to make up for it in grading our final exams. It seems like all of us have 5-10 points less on our finals than were on our midterms….maybe the administration gave one of their crack-down decrees or something. Maybe we all just slacked off. Whatev’, we should all become Montessori advocates anyways.

Our party was great. A ton of people had told Emily and I that they would be coming but as it turned out there were not too many but plenty enough to have fun! I estimate thirty to forty but Emily insists there were at least fifty people. We had an awesome mix of my classmates, Emily’s classmates, and friends of friends creating an atmosphere of diversity, conversation, beer-pong, Soul Caliber II (Playstation for the rest of you), and Texas Hold’em. Phil, one of our roommates headed up the beer-pong effort and it was a true hit. While the fact that the Asians did not know the game wasn’t surprising, I was flabbergasted in learning that the Europeans hadn’t played. Just think, because of our party beer-pong will be spreading the world over. Can a man leave a better legacy is the question that now haunts my moments of cogitation. Last year we had our party at the end of Spring semester in June and it was way too hot. Now, having done both I can say with authority that having the party at the end of Fall semester is a much better way to go.

The lazing about has been great for me but a little nerve-racking for Emily. I think that might be a reflection of our upbringing. What do you think?

Pimsleur’s Mandarin learning curriculum has been recommended to me a few times now. It was apparently developed by Dr. Pimsleur to simulate the way a baby learns language. So far I’ve really enjoyed it and I’m hopeful that I will soon be speaking pǔ tōng huà like a zhōng guó rén. Right now, though, I need to remain hopeful and consistently exercise my nǎo. Diligence is my Achilles’ heel but this time…this time will be different.

The lazing about came to a head this past Wednesday with Emily suggesting we go hiking. We chose a trail out of our Taipei Day Trips book that started just south of Xindian and went up over a mountain (or big hill if you prefer) and ended down the other side in Muzha. On the way up we stopped in to see a little temple cut into the side of the mountain behind a waterfall. It was pretty rad. If I were going to be a monk that place would be a contender. Upon reaching the top of the hill Emily and I came upon a few criss-crosses in the paths that we weren’t too sure about and ended up a little off-track. No matter though as we decided we had had enough hiking for the day. Finding ourselves in the Tea House area of the mountains surrounding Muzha we popped into one, bought some tea, enjoyed the view, talked, and sipped to our hearts content. I should teach you all how to properly drink tea; it is quite a procedure. Once we’d had our fill we hopped on the bus for the winding ride back down into the city.

Emily and I joined some of my classmates, who were only here for this past semester as exchange students, at 9 percent, a club that is luckily within walking distance from our house. Emily and I had never been there before and the evening was a nice bit of Long Island ice-teas, dancing, and saying goodbye to Julia and Fendi who are leaving to head back to Germany.

As I write this I am celebrating my first day as a twenty-six year old. I knew it was coming up but since break began I’ve completely lost track of dates. Consequently I didn’t realize until yesterday that my birthday was looming so near. I’m not even thirty and I’ve already become that guy who forgets about his own birthday. This very moment Emily is preparing a wonderful birthday dinner for me so I had better go.

If you are a praying person you can pray for Emily. She is incredibly challenged by this semester’s workload and doing her utmost to measure up. I, on the other hand, have one of the lightest loads of my academic career right now. With that in mind I’ve been trying to work on becoming more in tune with the housework and meal needs and all the jobs that Emily remembers so naturally but that I just don’t even think about. I want to be better at having all that stuff in my head constantly and being able to remember that the bathroom needs cleaning, or the roommate needs to be reminded to do their cleaning job, or the groceries need buying. And then once I get that stuff in my head on a constant basis I want to do those things.

I’ve been having fun building my Mandarin vocabulary. It is a constant challenge but I’m hoping the consistency of lessons and such will help solidify all these new words into my brain so that I can actually benefit from them in real situations. Our good friend Sandy has agreed to do some language exchange with me and she is a really, really good teacher. We are so blessed!

Oh, I just remembered there is something I can talk about. Last Saturday Emily and I went to Guang-hua Market electronics district and bought a new desktop computer. Both of our laptops are 4 plus years old and are getting quite temperamental. We have high hopes for our new computer! Guang-hua Market seemed like a geek’s paradise. Picture a billion little stores that had all these menus of computer components. You could buy each component individually or put them together to create a new computer. Emily and I ended up at this store and the guy had this order sheet and basically filled in what type of each computer component we wanted. He told us to come back in thirty minutes and the computer would be built. Great way to buy computers as far as I’m concerned because I could choose how good/expensive I want our computer to be!!