Sister Amie George's Mission in Taiwan: Week 3 in Taiwan!

October 27, 2013

Hey Mom and Dad!

This week's been good! It's really flown by. I think time is just going faster and faster. The more I get used to life here the faster it goes, haha. As for your questions:

My shoes are good for biking. I'm glad I got the ones with straps and everything. I think all the sisters pretty much have the same kind. My companion got some here just for days that it's really rainy, because shoes will get soaked, but I haven't had a problem with the rain yet in my shoes, so I think I'm good. If I do I might buy some cheap ones like her, but I'm glad I have the shoes I do. As for the clips on the skirt, I tried it once and it didn't really work, but that could've just been the skirt. So I'll probably try it again later, because that would probably help the whole, skirt flying up thing a lot. Although I will say that I've gotten pretty good at steering with one hand and keeping my skirt down with the other, haha.

As for a daily schedule, it kind of changes all the time. But generally, we wake up at 6:30, then exercise till about 7:15. Then we shower, get ready, eat breakfast, and then start studies at 8. We have an hour of personal study, 2 hours of companion study where we can prepare for lessons or just share what we learned or anything, it's really helpful, then we have an hour of language study. Then we have lunch from 12-1. Then 1-5 is working time! We have lessons, or go out contacting, or visit members or anything. Then 5-6 is dinner. We generally just eat street food because it's better, cheaper, and more convenient. Then 6-8 is working time again. We have lessons, go contacting, call people, or anything. Then we have to be home by 9, to do planning from 9-9:30, then 9:30-10:30 is getting ready for bed time. Generally the days go by pretty fast. I'm getting used to the schedule, and we've actually been really busy this last week! We've had lots of lessons, and also meeting with lots of ward members, which has been good for me to get to know them, so this week has been good.

Well, I'm doing good! Like I said we've been really busy, so I don't even know where some of the days have gone, but it's been good! Our investigator's are doing really well too. ___ came to church yesterday! She could only stay for the first hour, but I think she really liked it. She has a baptismal date set for end of November. She's doing really good. We taught her the Plan of Salvation last time and I guided the lesson, and I think it went really well. She said she thinks it's all true, so yay! Haha, my companion and I were happy about that. Another investigator said she'd come to church but didn't, so hopefully we get to meet with her soon. We also shared the Plan of Salvation, and I think that really helped her. She's kind of hard to read, but she keeps meeting with us, so I guess that's good. We also met with a less active sister last week. She has 2 little daughters that are super cute. We're meeting with her again tonight, so hopefully it goes well.

I really do love the ward here. Yesterday before Sacrament this old couple introduced themselves to me, and we were just talking and they asked when I got here and I said "Oh just about two weeks ago" and they both said how good my Chinese was, and how when I get back to America I can teach Chinese, and I was like "actually that's kind of the plan! Chinese and English!" So that was fun. The Bishop is really amazing too. We're really trying to get the ward involved in the work and everything, so hopefully we can get that going.

Chinese is really kind of hard sometimes though, not going to lie. I think part of me expected to get here and just automatically be completely fluent and perfect and everything, which is not the case, but I am doing good. It's just a hard language! Haha, I love it though. I've been better about talking more, and I'm understanding more and more. I've been leading more lessons, but some of the church vocab I still don't know so I'm working on it. I really want to get through Phase 1 (all the church lessons and vocab and everything) so I can start on Phase 2 (just normal words that you use every day on the street), but I don't want to go through it too fast. I'm getting better at tones too I think. Sometimes I don't really know what tone they are saying, but I just try to replicate it and repeat it enough so that it sticks, so I think that's helping. I'm getting better though. And I have only been here 2 weeks, so I just need to keep that in perspective, haha, I'm doing good though :)

Oh! And some exciting news!!! So, President Day called my companion and I the other night and invited us to be in a choir for Christmas! It sounds so cool. It's like a Christmas choir, so around Christmas time we'll get to travel around the entire mission, and just sing and talk to people, and it's a really cool missionary opportunity. It's kind of a time commitment, every Monday we have to be in Taipei at 4 for practice, but both my companion and I really wanted to do it. We were both just like "well, we'll have P-days for the rest of our mission, and it sounds like so much fun!" So we have our first meeting later today in Taipei so I'll let you know next week how it goes. But that was really exciting :)

I have to remind myself that I'm actually in Taiwan right now as a missionary, haha. It's so weird. I feel like sometimes I'm still in the mindset of just preparing or being in the MTC, but I have to remind myself how awesome this is! I especially try to remind myself of it whenever I get really tired of biking or when I don't understand anything someone just said to me or when I'm sweating a ton even though it's not even hot, haha. It really is crazy to think about though.Every time when I'm introducing myself to someone new and I say that my Dad actually also came on a mission to Taiwan, they get really excited, haha. It really is kind of cool that I'm also in Taiwan!

Well, I miss you guys! But I'm doing good here :) Getting the hang of everything I think :)

I also sent you guys a letter this past week, so hopefully you get that soonish, haha.

I love you! And am officially signing off now, haha, but this week will be good I think :) I'm sorry I don't have a picture of my bike and me yet, but I will for next week! And I'll let you know how choir goes :)

Love and miss you! Tell everyone I say hi and I'm doing good :) I'm going to try and email more family members next week. And thank you for all the pictures! They're all so cute! Evie is getting so big!

Love you!
-Qiao Jie Mei

Amie and her companion with some of the families in their Ward

The first 5 pictures are taken by the
Danshui River in Amie's first area

Hot Pot! One of Amie's favorite meals from living in China!

More adventures with food! Yummy!
Lloyd and I are jealous, haha!

This sweet lady in the Ward is a chef by profession,
and always has delicious 'tiandian', or desserts,
for the missionaries!

Delicious tiandian!

Taken on a visit to a member who lives by the ocean.

View of the ocean

So, I saved the best for last! The following is a series of pictures taken of Amie trying her first 'pi dan', or 'century old egg'! Ever since the first day we moved to Shanghai, she has been open to try ANYthing! I laughed so hard at these pictures! Not sure she'll be eating this again, based on her expressions! For your information, here's what 'pi dan' is:

Century egg or pidan (Chinese: 皮蛋; pinyin: pídàn), also known as preserved egg, hundred-year egg, thousand-year egg, thousand-year-old egg, and millennium egg, is a Chinese cuisine ingredient made by preserving duck, chicken or quail eggs in a mixture of clay, ash, salt, quicklime, and rice hulls for several weeks to several months, depending on the method of processing.^[1]
Through the process, the yolk becomes a dark green to grey colour, with a creamy consistency and an odor of sulphur and ammonia, while the white becomes a dark brown, translucent jelly with salty or little flavour.