Turned out to be an awesome weekend!

So everyone! You remember how depressed I was that my friends couldn't come visit? Well, this dude named Travis ended up coming to visit my co-workers Flor and Stasha. He's awesome! He ended up hanging out with me all weekend! We went to some places on saturday night and danced and met people and had a blast! Travis is from Australia and he served him mission in Italy. On Sunday night, we were walking around on the streets lo0king at shops and ran into a foreigner. We stopped and talked to her and it turned out she was from Italy! Travis talked to her in Italian and I talked to her friend in Chinese! It was hilarious to see the both of us use the languages we learned on our missions at the same time. anyway, it was a blast and I had great fun!
I can't beleive that only two months are left before I go home! Time is definitely going by so fast, it's nuts! I hope you're all ok and enjoying life as much as I am! Catch ya later!

latest bad news...

Hey peeps! Well, this weekend was supposed to be so cool because my friends were going to come to Hualien to hang out, maybe go white water rafting with me. But, the punks cancelled out because they couldn't find seats on the train here! I was like, trash! Just stand the whole way! I have done it three times since I've been here because I promised them I would go to Changhua, but now that they have to do it, they chicken out! I'm just bummed that this weekend I now have nothing to do. We have the day off on Monday because its theTaiwanese Patriotism day and all that, so it's going to be an extra long and boring weekend. This sucks!
Other than that, school is going well. I need to get out and take a break this weekend, but I don't know what I should do. Blah blah blah.
Well, hope you guys are doing well and happy! Catch ya later!

funny stuff...

Some pretty funny stuff has been happening around the school lately and I thought I'd just write 'em down. Hope it's as funny to read as it was to see! So today we're playing a game involving a beach ball. Well, one of the kids was running across the wood floor in socks and happened to slip. He would've just landed on his bum if the ball didn't happen to be rolling across the floor at that very moment. His bum came down right on top of the beach ball and, due to his forward momentum and the roundness of the ball, his whole body rolled forward until he was flat on his back a few feet from his original position! haha, it was definitely funnier to see than anything, even the other kids were laughing as hard as I was! Yesterday we were playing that race where you have to place an egg on a spoon and run back and forth without letting it break. Well, one of the kids, David, made it all the way there and back! He was so proud of himself that he picked the egg from the spoon and clapped his hands together! The egg simply exploded and got all over his hands, face, and shirt! I saw the entire thing happen from the expression of joy on his face, to the instant change to surprise and disbelief written all over! hahaha, I just could not stop laughing! I'm sure if any one of you were here, you would think they're so adorable. They are really smart, even though they do dumb kid stuff sometimes. Thats what makes it excited I guess! :) Catch y'all later!

Happy Mid-Autumn Festival!

Wow, you guys I had such a great time this last weekend!!! It was the Mid-Autumn Festival that the Taiwanese celebrate every year on the first full moon of the autumn season. Everyone gets together and has a barbecue outside and spends time with their friends and family looking at the moon and laughing and generally having a good time. I went to Changhua on friday afternoon on a train that took me almost 7 hours to get there! Usually it only takes 5, but it was a holiday weekend so it was delayed alot by how many people there were. It was nuts. I was too late to go with my friends to Sun Moon Lake, but they would pick me up when the got back. They wouldn't be back until almost midnight, so I had like 3 hours to kill. So I decided, hey everybody tells me that there are good places around here to get a massage. I think I'll find one! So I asked a cabby to take me to one and he drove me to a place that was pretty close. The first thing I asked when I got in was if the place was a real massage place and not one of those "risque" ones with "extra services". They assured me it was. So I had a comfy 2 hours relaxing and getting all my stress out. I found the place to be quite normal without any problems. But when my friends picked me up the kept teasing me about getting their "special services"! I was like, No way! I wouldn't dream of doing that stuff! They knew I wouldn't but the whole weekend I didn't hear the end of it. Later that night we shot off fireworks. That was cool just to go off with my friends and hang out until we were too tired to stay out. Then we went home and talked until we were too tired to keep out eyes open. haha. On saturday we ate steak for lunch, (our whole morning was shot because we slept in late. haha!) then went to a KTV place. It's like Kareoke, but they give you your own room where you and your friends can hang out and goof off and sing anything you want! I lofe going there, especially with friends that love to goof off. I found that there were even some songs that I could sing in chinese! Saturday night was the best part of the weekend. We went to Shadows home and had bbq with her family as well as about 15 other young single adults. There was even this other foreigner there from Holand. It was so interesting to talk to him in chinese the whole time. The best part of the night was knowing that I was doing the same thing I did that very night three years ago! My first day in my first area was the day of Mid-autumn festival and I was with the same people I was with three years ago to the day!! It was such an incredible thing to think about because I would've never thought it possible at the time. It was also so funny to joke around with my friends about how horrible my chinese used to be back then! haha! All in all, it was quite a fulfilling weekend. I felt spiritually lifted after spending time with such good friends. I look forward to spending time with all of you soon also! See y'all in three months! :)

funny time in class...

Hi everyone! How's it going for y'all? I'm doing great, as usual. I just wanted to tell you guys something funny that happened to me today. for the first class from 9 to 10 (there are three classes during this hour, each lasting 20 minutes long.), I decided to read the story "The Giving Tree" by Shel Silverstein. I'm sure you've all read it before. If you haven't, you should. Well, I've read the story when I was a kid and when I was on my mission we even did a skit on it for the Changhua 1st branch. But when I read that story this morning, it was like it hit me in a new light. As I was reading about how the tree gave it's apples, then it's branches, then it's trunk and finally let the boy who turned old sit on it's stump to rest, I kept thinking about how unselfish that tree was and how even though it gave everything and had nothing it was still happy. It was so embarrassing but I cried in front of the whole class! The kids were like, "Alrighty then, Teacher Aaron is crying over a story...that's wierd." Not only did I do it once, but I cried all three times I read the story! The last time was only a little bit but it was so embarrassing because my voice was quivering at the end and I'm sure someone saw my chin trembling! haha! I laughed at myself afterward. Anyway, I trust you all with this because I know only my good good friends and family read this blog, but don't tease me! haha, I'll catch you guys later. byebye!

Typhoon came and gone...

Sorry it's been awhile everyone! I need to make more entries, huh? Well, the typhoon came and went and we're ok. We only took off Wednesday afternoon as well as the whole day Thursday. The typhoon passed sometime on thursday night and everyone was back to school and work on Friday. Gosh, it's so super boring when you don't have any electricity or internet. That's not so bad if you've got some books to read, but I had already read all the books available, so I was stuck with nothing to do but clean and go through some stuff in my room. Boring!
In any case, things are still going good here. Recently the kids have been even more well-behaved than usual, if you can believe that. I've been having fun coming up with fun and interesting lessons. This past week the theme has been about occupations. We've taught them about the average stuff like doctor, firefighter, dentist, etc. but I've been having fun teaching them about the less known jobs. I've taught them about a linguist! for that lesson, we learned some simple pieces of Spanish, French, German, and Japanese. Today I also taught them about a carpenter. We used a hammer and nails to practice putting two peices of wood together. The kids really enjoyed it. I faked like the hit my thumb a few times and they would just break out in peals of laughter!
I'm glad you guys are reading, even though I don't make entries as often as I should! I'll do my best to make some more often, ok? They may become more boring though! haha, peace, I'm out!

Typhoon coming!

Hi everyone! Nothing much exciting has happened since last entry, so it's been like a whole week. Ya know, same ol' same ol'. But a typhoon is supposed to hit us sometimes this afternoon and get pretty strong in the evening. I'm pretty sure it's not as strong as Katrina, which I'm glad for. Speaking of which, I'm so glad that Beth, Claus and the family made it through without any accidents! I love you guys! Hang in there!
Yesterday I did one of my most intense exercises since my cross country days in high school. Usually I ride my bike up to this place in the mountains where there's a river and places to swim. Well, yesterday I ran there! It was intense. I had to stop and walk once because it was such a long run. When I got to the foot of the trail up to the river, I took a swim to cool off and then ran the whole way up! It's a steep road up there and I barely made it on my bike a few times. It felt sooooo good when I actually stood at the top and looked out over the valley and river. It took me over an hour and a half there and back, but I loved it.
Have an awesome time everyone! I'm thinking about you and miss you all! Leave a few comments and let me know how you're all doing! Bye!