Taiwaneers

Strangers on My Couch

Dec 142009

Well my workload is finally up. It seems like all semester long I haven’t had too much to do or study but that is just because it was all delayed. I guess the stars aligned this semester or whatever ’cause most of my classes have end-of-semester projects but not really stuff that I could do until after I learned it. So between now and mid-January I’ll be busy, busy, busy with papers and presentations.

My university had a blood drive last week and I donated so sometime soon some Taiwanese dude, or dudess, will be walking around with 250cc of Michael Jefferies coursing through their veins…pretty cool huh? They even gave me a pair of socks with hearts on them for donating! Not too mention the added benefit of finally discovering my blood type…B+ thank you very much.

In other news I finally got up enough courage to ask the homeless guy who sleeps on the bus stop bench across the street from our house if he wanted some food. Why do I always go back to worrying about doing stuff like that? I’ll go through times where fear about that sort of thing really doesn’t bother me and then other times where I hesitate. But every time I overcome the fear I remember that it is no big deal at all and I kick myself for waiting so long over nothing. In any case the guy said he’d love some food so we gave him some leftovers.

I’m playing guitar at church pretty regularly now or at least playing what I know and fumbling through the rest. It’s fun and I’m excited to be playing an instrument more regularly again. Our new roommate, Phil who took Darren’s place, has a keyboard and the other night we “jammed” for a bit.

Lately I’ve been missing work. Studying is nice but going so long without an honest day’s work has been getting to me. I keep on going back and forth between doing that accelerated Masters program I’ve mentioned before and getting a job after I graduate. Right now I think getting a job is winning in my mind.

Last week we had an British guy stay with us for a few nights who has moved to Taiwan from mainland China and needed a place to stay for a few days before moving into his apartment. Ken, our other roommate, is signed up at www.couchsurfing.org and this dude connected to our house through that. It’s a really cool idea and I’m becoming more and more intrigued with the idea of using couchsurfing for vacationing and traveling myself. Lodging is such a big expense and being able to stay on nice people’s couches for free is so appealing. Everyone should check out the website!

Left to right: Phil from Michigan, our newest roomie; Ken from Taiwan, our faithful roomie; Jim from England, couch-guest for a few days. They’re all painting over the leftover weird wall drawings and scribblings in Phil’s room.
Professional(?) painters

Chinese, Prayer, Culture

Christianity, Michael's Posts, Our Taipei Life 1 Response »

Mar 302009

A huge step was taken last night in my Chinese abilities. I got out Emily’s beginner texbook from last year and, with a little help from my beautiful bride, taught myself how to write 我 (pronounced “wo”) which means I/me. Until now I have focused solely on listening and speaking and basically only knew how to write my Chinese name, 鄭明哲. Reading & writing Chinese has always seemed daunting to me but last night was incredibly fun. I think I’ll incorporate it into my studies from now on.

One weird thing that I’ve noticed lately is that whenever I read, listen, or even think about Scripture my mind wanders and its hard for me to concentrate. A part of me thinks its because I have too many things on my mind and need to properly decelerate. Another part of me feels like its an attack on my relationship with God from a third party. I can’t really tell but the mere fact that I think it might be an attack is strange because I don’t normally think of these things as being very spiritual warfare-esqe when they happen to me. For those of you who feel inclined please pray that I can focus on the Holy Scriptures.

For the past year and a half I’ve had classes every day with the same group of 43 students. As you can imagine our friendships have been deepening. Another prayer request would be that God uses these relationships for my classmates and I to ‘sharpen each other’ and ‘draw (each other) closer to Him.’

Today four of my classmates and I gave a culture presentation on the United States for one of our classes. Teachers love having us do these things even when the class has nothing to do with culture. I guess I can’t blame them though as many of them only teach one or two classes in the International College (IC). We’re used to being in a very diverse classroom every day but for them its still a novelty. Anyways I presented on the South. I used a very hammed-up southern accent and taught them how to say “ya’ll” and about grits, sweet tea, southern-style BBQ, and how the confederate flag is a symbol not only of racism but also of states’ rights. It was really fun and you’ve got to love fluff assignments.

A Kid with a New Toy

Michael's Posts No Responses »

Mar 242009

As our regulars will have noticed we have a new feature up on the menu. Ladies & Genleman…drum roll please…I give you the Nonsense Shirts Store!!! Its official, we’ve launched our first internet-based business selling t-shirts that don’t make any sense.

I’ve been thinking about doing this for a long time now. I’ve always thought the nonsense shirts here in Asia, also known as engrish shirts, were hilarious and I own several myself. I’ve used them on various occasions as gifts to friends and family. Needless to say I think they are spectacular and most of the time people agree with me….except for my Asian friends here in Taiwan who just consider them plain old shirts with bits of English on them.

My very first nonsense shirt was one I bought back in 2001 on my first trip to Taiwan with IBLP’s Children Institute Team! It had one of those stick people going through an exit door (you know the sort of drawing style that is used on bathroom signs and exit signs) with text that said “Reality From Escape”.

Since discovering engrish shirts its always been my dream to spread the merriment and earn a little bank while I’m at it. And its finally reality. Within 48 hours of the store’s launch we’ve had one person try and buy one only to discover a gliche and another person actually make a purchase right after the gliche was fixed. Several other people have been saying to look for their order soon!

I’m like a kid with a new toy. I can’t focus. I just keep on checking my email, and facebook, and Nonsense Shirts Store, and everything else looking for something new to feast my eyes on and think how great it is that Emily and I are now entrepreneurs!!!! I’m seriously out-of-control. I just got done bouncing around our apartment telling Emily how great this is as she tried to calm me down so she could do her homework.

My mind is working feverishly trying to figure out new ways to bring shipping (a huge portion of the cost) down and new ways to get the word out and blah blah blah. I catch myself thinking of all the work I’m creating for myself going to the post office all the time and sending emails and dealing with paypal and then I think: “yeah! Isn’t it great I’m creating all this work for myself!!!” God is so good to me to give me this idea and then give me nice people who are generous enough to think the idea’s good enough to fork over some of their hard-earned money.

I’m so grateful to my dad for establishing in me an entrepreneurial spirit early in life. He helped me start my own business when I was really young setting me up with a snack honor-box at his place of work. He’d take me to Sam’s Club, get me stocked up on candy-bars and salty-snacks and get me down to the office on a regular basis to re-stock and count the dough. He even taught me about keeping records and monitoring shrinkage. Thanks dad for all your training and love!

There you have it! A few days ago there was no such thing as the Nonsense Shirts Store and now it not only exists, it has customers!!!