Day 4 - Thursday

Today began with breakfast, some of the students have found a place that serves a peice of Texas toast with peanut butter on it along with fresh squeezed orange juice. Others return to the little sidewalk buffet we went to at first for eggs, and other Chinese delights, including a nice little donut.

Carol, Corey & I (Todd) took a walk through a little market that is right down the street and got to see all kinds of things we don't see much in the states. Fresh fish (still flopping in the bins) including some flying fish. Huge hunks of tuna and other types that we had no idea what they were. Several meat counters where you could buy just about any piece of a pig, cow, chicken or duck from the head to the feet and those looked pretty fresh also. All types of produce, some we can't get in the states. We bought and ate a fresh pineapple. There were carrots that would have made bug's bunny envious. It was really fun and the local people laughed a lot trying to help us understand what some of the items were.

After breakfast we broke into two groups and prayer walked this neighborhood around and in the college campus. This is one of the most important things we do because of the spiritual bondage the people are in. We found in the middle of the college campus an active temple and at another place a "sacred" tree where people believed some spirit from the past lived and they would come and offer it sacrifices and pray for its blessing. We prayed for it to die. Around lunchtime, our two groups met at a streetcorner and we had been passing through groups of students all day, some recognized us and most know we are coming to their class at some point in the next week, so almost all will say hi. We say a team practicing a game called handball which is a combinatino of soccer and basketball that we don't play at home. We walked onto the court to watch for a few minutes and soon struck up some conversations with the players. The players who weren't playing asked us if we wanted to try on an empty court so we invited them to help us make a couple of teams and we were off. The coach let the other players stop practicing and they all came over to watch and cheer us on, so for about 15 minutes we were worn ragged playing with them. They and we had a blast and built another bridge. I got to speak to the coach and he was very excited that we came by.

We had lunch at a Korean BBQ and then back to the campus for three classes back to back where we were meeting with students and sharing our testimonies in small groups. At about 3:30, 7 of us split off and went to a ping-pong class. Yes, you can major in ping pong in Taiwan. We got to see some world class play and even attempt it ourselves. Needless to say, we didn't score so well. But we had a great time. We'll get to spend some more time with this group today.

The group that broke off (Daniel, Sally, Landon, Carol, Jed, Henry, Todd) went to dinner together near the WanDe building with Angela (one of our Chinese friends - who also helped us order) and then took taxis across town to the GanEn church. There were just a few people there, but we had a great time teaching them with drama how to use the chronological bible stories. Afterwards, they treated us to some candy and a special drink we'll call "Black Jelly". It was a unique texture and flavor.

The other group went to eat at the same place where they get the peanut butter toast in the mornings for dinner and then went back to the college to Gavin's English class. They broke into groups and were able to share their testimonies. A couple were able to give away Bibles. Corey gave a Bible to a girl who was wearing a cross because she liked the shape of it, but had no idea what it meant.

We all met back at the apartments and quickly fell asleep after some practice for leading worship and story sharing.

Today is another full day with a meeting this morning and back to the college this afternoon where we'll get to learn another martial art - Kando. Then tonight we'll split up again with the group going back to the church and a group going to an English Bible study.

From the far side of the world.