Helllllo Jiayi! :) ...bye Nantou :(

Helllllo! Seaton's going to update today, but before that...

the post before was called jesus beliebers because the girl STMers and TAs did a cover of Justin Beiber's Baby for the final performance at the AEF in Nantou...and it was stuck in our heads for days. Jesus, Jesus, Jesus ohhhh~

Now...Seaton will update and recap on our last few days.

After the alter call on Wednesday we were given an opportunity to share more openly about the Gospel. Thursday night was hectic because everyone was also preparing for the evening performances. It was a chance for each class to perform their worship songs in front of their friends and kids. In addition to the ten worship songs the STMer/ TA performer bringing "American culture" The girls performed a remix of Justin Bieber's Baby "Jesus, Jesus o0o0o0o0h!" The guys went Asian pride with Big Bang's Lies and Wedding Dress. After doing it once indoor we took it outside and perform all ten worship songs again. In the classes many teachers once again ask the students to see who accepts Jesus in to their lives so the teachers can pray for them. Please continue to pray for them.Friday was the day kids left. We were given chances to say a little somethings to our kids. After sharing there were a lot of tears. It was very sad to see them leave one by one. After the kids we were given a time to do personal reflection. It was sad because just hours after our kids left it was soon the rest of the Nantou team. By night once again it was just the STMers TAs and Worship Team.

On Saturday the entire day was dedicated to the Parade. The parade was near Carrefour. It was exciting because the Puli team was back. The Worship Team did an Aboriginal dance from their tribe BUNNIH It was nice to see everyone today again. After the parade we were given a chance to eat out with students' parent. Most of us ended up at a shave ice place. We went back at night and the excitement continued all night.

Starting on Sunday our main focus was no longer the students simply bonding with the TAs. Especially when the Worship Team went back to their home in the mountain, Hsinyi right after service. Service was originally set up to be half testimony sharing and half message. It ended up the whole hour and a half devoted to testimony.

OKAYYY! Jenn here noww..

Sooooo.. seaton left off on Sunday. So Monday we went to visit homes. We went to visit the aboriginals and some of our students! It was a good experience seeing where they lived. Also, we went to a grape farm where one of the students mom worked. Afterwards, we visited some of our students home. One of my students lived in the mountain area. It was an important place in the village because it was the place where people of the village came to meet up. It was also raining really hard, and they told us that when it rains too much, they have to run. It is a very scary thought that their living situation is not very good. Seeing where all these people lived gave me a whole new perspective on Taiwan.

Tuesday...AMUSEMENT PARK TIMEE!! It was called 9 Tribe. It also had a theme for the summer, One Piece. Lots of students were excited about it haha. So we first took a cable car up to the top of the amusement park and then slowly walked down. There werent many rides, but we got to see some aboriginal dance. There was one water ride where we went backwards, and got SUPER wet! then we went on another ride that was very very bumpy and twisty and loopy! It was pretty fun until...it started POURING! yes, it was pouring and a lot of us did not have umbrellas. Besides the rain, the rest was fun! Afterwards, we ate at a really nice buffet at a hotel. The amusement park and the hotel was located around sun moon lake. It was really nice and pretty.

So today, we cleaned up the high school where we have been staying at and drove to Jiayi to join another camp. We met up with the other Canaan people and we just helped out with the kids. Afterwards we had a really nice dinner, and thats about it for now!

Reflections:

Jenn: This missions trip was definitely not what I had expected. It was a lot harder than what I thought it would be. For the Nantou camp, I was placed in Group 10, the highest group of kids with age ranging from 12-15. I was a little dissapointed because everyone wanted the little cute kids and didn't want the older kids. However, I felt that it would be good for me, because since they are the oldest, they know the most English. (I know very very little Chinese). So during the preparations, I was overwhelmed by the language barrier. I constantly had to keep asking what was going on and looked confused all the time. In addition, we had translators(TAs), but my translator wasn't too good in English. Also, he was very very shy and did not talk much. Unfortunately, I was a bit shy as well. It was both our first times at AEF! It was very frustrating trying to communicated with the TA to talk to the helpers or to talk to the kids. When I was left alone, I had almost no way of communicating with the kids. They ended up not being able to listen to me and me not being able to control them. After a little breakdown, I got a huge wave of encouragement from everyone. So many leaders, came up to me to comfort me and to give me support. My whole class wrote me notes and told me they loved me. Everyone showed me love and it was such a great feeling. I was very shocked at how much everyone cared for me and was worried about me. The rest of the camp, I felt that my class had gotten so much better and that even though language was still a barrier, they had respect for me. I loved them and they loved me. I knew this because the last day, everyone was very sad to go. We took a lot of pictures, got contact information, and everyone gave hugs all around. This camp definitely was a big learning experience for me in learning to depend on God and to not worry. I felt that I was too stressed about everything and not leaning on God to help me through it. I thought I would have never gotten through the camp either. I suffered a lot, but out of the suffering, I became a lot stronger. I have so much love from all my friends in Taiwan all because of God's love for me. This missions trip was definitely very hard, but was a great experience overall.