"My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever"
Psalm 73:26
The boys on the MRT:
This is Shihlin Night Market. Super crowded and crazy:
This is our whole group waiting to go up to the top of Taipei 101:
This is the view from the top of Taipei 101. So pretty:
This is Taipei 101:
Some of us with a few of our TAs crammed on the MRT:
Wednesday was another long day. We met at 8am and traveled by MRT to the NTPU campus that is in the central part of Taipei City (we are in the "Taipei County"campus) where we had "business class" which consisted of a Chiropractor who studied in California for a while who spoke to us for about 2 hours. It was very interesting. He was very open and honest about everything that we asked. His topic was how one profession can affect(effect?) the economy. So he started off telling the amount of Chiropractors in the States which was about 52,000. He then gave the average income of a Chiropractor and other statistics. In the end, it showed how significant one profession adds to the total income of a country. It was actually very interesting. He said that there are about 200 top Chiropractors in the world and that many of them make as much as 10 million dollars a year. These are the people who attend to pro atheletes such as Tiger Woods, Lebron, and Andre Agassi and people like George Bush. He also talked about trading and neogotiations with other countries as well as bribery in the business world.
After that we went to a place called Taipei Neihu Technology Park. This is an area where many businesses have their headquarters. We listened to a speech telling about the Tech Park. We also visited a sports center which was AMAZING. I wish we had one like it. Sanderson (MSU's gym) is awesome, but this place consisted of about 11 levels: workout machines, a huge rock wall, a pool, basketball court, raquetball courts, badminton, archery, golf simulator, and several other sports areas. It was very cool. After that we went to a large mall with lots of food and many stores. We decided to go to Taipei 101, which is the largest building in Taiwan and is visible from basically every place in Taiwan it seems like. It just towers over every other building. They refer to it as their landmark. We made our way to the building and rode up the 80 something floors in about 30 seconds it seemed like. It has the worlds fastest elevator. We went at night so the city was beautifully lit up. After spending a while looking around we went to the outside part. There is something magical about looking down on a city from its highest point. We met a guy from North Carolina who is a college student. We also met a couple from Canada. Rob made the comment that they were "my people" haha (I was born in Canada). It was late so we headed back home.
The next day we had Chinese class. Then lunch. Then we went to National Palace Museum which had a bunch of old artifacts from China during the cultral revolution. We spent about an hour and a half walking around with our English tour guide but since I am not a fan of history I can't tell you anything about it. There were some ancient pots there and some stones like jade and stuff like that. After, we headed to Shihlin Night Market which has so many clothing stands and tshirts and jewelry and anything you could want like shoes. I have been waiting to go to Shihlin all week because I have had my eye on some Nike shoes. I searched around for the best price and BOUGHT THEM. They are so awesome. I cannot wait to wear them! We stayed there for a while and then decided to split up for dinner.
The next day was Friday and we went to the zoo!! There, we met the two exchange students from NTPU who will be attending MSU in the fall! Their English names are Tina and Kyle. They are both very nice! I am excited for them to come to MSU! I spent most of my time at the zoo talking to them. We took a cable car to the top of a mountain to see the view of the city. The cable car took us to a place where we walked to tea garden. Here, we learned how Chinese Tea is made. We picked the tea leaves and then we went through the process of drying the leaves out. It is very interesting how it is done. We had a tea ceremony where we tried different hot and cold teas and had little snacks with seasame seeds and little green tea cookies.
After a very long ride back home, Jovy and Ting, some of our TAs took us to a Japanese little hole in the wall place to eat. It was delish but the food was SO spicy that I wanted to cry haha
On Saturday, we moved dorm rooms to the Graduate Students dorm where there is no curfew (our other dorm had a 12:30 curfew) and the rooms are 2 to a room instead of 4 to a room. Since there are 3 girls, I got the one by myself which is nice to have time by myself. We wanted a lazy day since we were all so tired. Lydia took some of us to a very nice cafe style resturant that was very good. After that, I took a nap and did some laundry and then we decided to go out. Jovy took us to a restaurant that is an all you can eat place where you can order how ever much you want of whatever you want for a flat fee. When we were done eating, Tiffany, Jeremy, Jovy, Ting, KoChia(Kyle), and myself decided to go to Shihlin Night Market for a little more shopping. It was a good way to end the night!!
Today is Sunday. I slept until about 11:30 and boy did I need it! I think we all did. Jeremy, Daniel Spencer and I went to go eat beef noodle for lunch. When we came back, the others woke up. Today we spent the day sleeping, studying, doing laundry, cleaning our rooms, trying to get the wet towel smell out of our rooms, and trying to kill the ants that have decided to take over our rooms. Now that we are all settled into our new dorms, feel comfortable with Sansia(the city we are living in), and feel like we are able to go out on our own, I think we are all ready to make the most out of the rest of our 4 weeks here. I feel like we know the MRT and bus routes like the back of our hand. The boys have started "having fun" with the MRT. When we were all trying to pack into the MRT, Lily got left out and we left without her so we had to meet her at one of the next few stops. It was pretty funny. Then the next day, Daniel thought it would be funny if he got on with me and then jumped off at the last second when the doors were closing. I guess it was bound to happen sooner or later. Anyways, tomorrow we all have tests. Pray that we do well. We have about 90 characters to memorize and learn before tomorrow as well as a 2 to 3 minutes speech in Chinese to make by ourselves. Exciting, huh? As excited as I am about fall classes starting, that is one thing that I am not looking forward to.
Please pray for energy for all of us. I think that we are all to the point of exhaustion.
This week wehave several things planned. 3 Chinese classes, one Business class, Wind Surfing!! and water skiing, Chinese Kong Fu, a trip to the Ceramics museum, and a few other things! I'll keep you posted! Thanks for reading!! :)
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