A few more notes from yesterday’s trip: Chiayi was really warm compared to the cool weather of Taipei…the lunch was a bunch of really strange Japanese dishes which are supposedly delicacies but I find them to taste pretty bad…my dad borrowed my book Abide in Christ on the plane and immediately used it in his talk…too bad I didn’t get a picture of the monument for Tropic of Cancer, it’s not that interesting, though…the flights were bumpy, but the view on the return flight was excellent.

I don’t know why I just felt really tired the entire day. So I wasted the entire day mostly to sleeping and stuff. There was a strange noodle lunch… The evening was better, I guess, with attending mesister’s some orchestra practice thingie. Met up with Timothy there, not too bad. And that’s about it for this boring day. Well, I guess I could add some excitement to this day by saying that there was another minor earthquake in the afternoon…

When I used to have too much quiet time, I complained about boredom and loneliness. Now that I have very little quiet time, I complain about the lack of it. That’s what happens when I’m so unappreciative of the environments that God has provided me with…

What can I say about what happened today? Well, in conclusion, let’s just say that if God really wants to torture my soul, then He would make me really famous. So what happened? My dad was invited to speak at Chiayi National University today, and he decided that he would take me there as well. We actually flew there in the morning, he gave the talk, lunch, tour, then flew back in the afternoon. The thing is, these people treated my dad (and as an aside, me) like a superstar or something. It’s undescribable what they did…what with the flowers, song and dance, applauses, unnerving praise, a mass send-off at the airport…yikes. I obviously felt very uncomfortable with all the attention. Eventually a few guys did talk to me a bit privately on the side, and that was comfortable enough.

I think my dad took me with him because I was disappointed that he would not spend any time with me while I’m here. The price he paid is exactly the cost of my plane ticket…which is almost the same as his speaker’s fee. So essentially he took me along to gain nothing but my company. And for that, I’m kind of touched. Sure we still didn’t talk much, but I guess the intention was good enough. Also, at least now I get a sense of what my dad does for work, and that’s not bad, either. Of course I still have no appreciation for what he’s doing, but that’s beside the point…

No pain, no gain. Really.

I need to have the discipline to keep myself away from the TV here whenever I’m bored. There are just too many possibilities for temptations from the television…

Lunched with 5 women (4 of them old, 1 of them mesister). They almost laughed their heads off, really. It was amusing.

I don’t like it when people are fearful of me…

Interesting how I had my very first home-cooked meal in Taiwan last night…(well, dumplings don’t count.) Really, I’m very insensitive to food, actually. I couldn’t tell if a dish is particularly good or just ok. As long as the food fills the stomach and doesn’t leave a particularly bad taste in my mouth, I’m ok with it. At the same time, I don’t appreciate good food at all, just because I couldn’t tell. So yeah, when people tell me that I must be getting really good food here in Taiwan, I really didn’t feel it…certainly it’s better than my mundane meals back in Waterloo, but it’s nothing to drool over…

I’ve discovered a good way to fall asleep in times of insomnia: just pray until you sleep.

Lots of rain these days…makes the temperature cool, and I can live with that.

It’s Tuesday already? Wow…time flies by very quickly, eh? Boring shopping in the morning, with the company of rain. Afternoon was spent composing an email which ended up having more than 2,000 words…and it was good. I was quite depressed recently, but now I’m receiving peace from God.

Is it really possible to study the word of God and pray for 2 hours first thing each morning? I very much desire to do that…but… I guess it’s good that I still desire for it…

Wallace and Gromit rock.

Two emails today. The first one made me smile, the second one made me cry, and drove me to church to pray, and cry some more. That’s the day it’s been.

I have very little faith in my prayers. I prayed my hearts out at church this afternoon, and I received a sense of peace immediately. However, soon afterwards, I started to doubt about the faith that I had in that prayer, and it’s just bad. I don’t know what I’m doing.

Watched half of Wallace & Gromit…sure it’s amusing, but my heart’s still weary of the reality… Oh yeah, and it appears that my laptop couldn’t read DVDs anymore…

I realize that the puzzle books are killing a lot of time that could have been spent in prayers and studying the Word. So now I’ve put them away…

A bit of a massive shopping at Elim yesterday, bought 5 copies of Abide in Christ to give away, 2 copies of miniature Bible also to give away, and a compilation worship CD which I may also give away as well… Well, I guess for the CD, I’m used to the mp3 from the Willingdon website, which is live worship in church, and has a sing-along factor which is lacking in the compilation CD. I also feel the songs in the CD are closer to a performance than worshipping the Lord…then again, I’m new to this.

Oh yeah, there was a lunch yesterday which mom initiated for no good reason, but indeed got 11 people to attend. It wasn’t too bad, I think…

It appears that I have a sad history of losing close friends…maybe that’s why I’m so afraid of making new friends? Or at least get too close to friends? I don’t know…

Why is my heart growing weary of getting close to God?

One thing I’ve observed in the church here is this lack of freedom. It seems like everything must go a certain rigid way. Only an observation that saddens my heart.

Two restaurant meals yesterday. First one, a gathering of 9 for an Italian meal. I don’t know…that felt kind of disappointing, actually. The conversations were kind of…shallow? Yeah, empty of any real substance… Maybe I was expecting too much. The second meal, a private Japanese bbq dinner with Austin. Both of us are kind of awkward, but that was ok, we managed to have a good time. I don’t know how he perceived the disturbing things that I talked to him about, but at least it opened up a brief conversation about faith, so that’s a good step.

Even though I thought I’ve overcame jetlagging, I still suffer from it…hence a 5am post here.

Maybe it’s because of the new uncomfortable environment, I find it really hard to desire to spend some serious time in God’s words. I can pray, I can worship in songs, but when I couldn’t find a table to put the huge Bible on, I couldn’t read the word… Sigh…that’s just the worst excuse ever…

Back to Taipei now. Getting agonizingly depressed. The silence from Francis is, as the cliche goes, deafening. The temptations are just coming on very strongly. I have trouble living with my family. And my heart couldn’t settle down to seek God. Just a few little things that are bothering me…

I guess I should mention the trip down to Kaohsiung and then Gongshan on Thursday. It was good, I think, but probably not as good as I hoped. The best part was to chat and play with Henry and Joy. I was really tired, but still managed to stay awake somehow…

I really like the trains here.

I simply don’t have enough love…not enough to forgive people…sigh…

Here in Taiwan, if I don’t die out of heat exhaustion, then I’ll most likely die out of air poisoning…

Still jetlagging a lot. 3am here and I couldn’t sleep. Of course it didn’t help that I passed out at around 8:30pm…

Morning was spent with grandmother at the hospital again. Nothing interesting happened, although the food at the hospital cafeteria is amazing…as hospital food goes. There was a point where I got so hungry that I was shaking pretty badly…hmm…that’s not good. Anyway, here I am in an afternoon that is being spent aimlessly doing nothing. That’s not good.

Oh yeah, I forgot the small earthquake this morning…which happened while I was on the 11th floor of the hospital. Interesting…

Strange dreams recently. And the fact that I actually remember what I dreamed? Just weird…

A relatively quick (but sometimes slightly shaky) train ride took me to Tainan this morning, and we were whisked away directly to the hospital to see grandmother. And oh my, she has changed a lot…looks a lot older, but still as enthusiastic as before. I was pretty dead tired by the time I got to the hospital, just wanting to get some sleep… I don’t know what to say…it’s all pretty shocking for a tired body.

Long afternoon nap (which isn’t good for adjusting for jetlag), then a strange fishy dinner plus ice thingie, and here I am, typing away and trying to stay up for at least a while before I go to sleep again.

I feel pretty depressed again…sigh… This whole Francis thing is somehow really bothering me, mainly because I have no idea what’s going on. Also, there’s the adjusting to a life surrounded by people…which feels kind of odd.

Walking aimlessly around the 101 district, that’s what happened for the evening, after a deep afternoon nap. In another startling realization, even though my main hope for coming here is to meet people, unfortunately most of them are still in school, or at work, or at military service, during weekdays…and I can only hope to meet with them during the very short weekends…sigh…

Jetlagging is getting worse now, actually. Woke up several times this morning, the latest of which was 3am. I visited the washroom a bit too frequently…and I had terrible dreams, one where Francis treated me like he treated Ed, and that was just awful. Off to Tainan in a couple of hours.

To me, faith has at least two levels of meaning. On one level, faith is believing in the doctrine, the standard Jesus is the only son of God and He died on the cross for our sins, etc. To me, that’s the easy part. There is another level of faith…faith that leads me to believe that Jesus is indeed my heart, and is working inside me, etc. A personalization of the doctrine, basically. Now that’s hard, and I’m continuing to struggle with this, having doubts all around. I keep repeating this prayer from the Bible: “Lord, I believe! Help my unbelief!”

Wooooooo…finally, internet connection from the laptop! Too bad I’m leaving tomorrow to Tainan…

Easter church service this morning. It’s very hard to make the connection when the main language is Taiwanese… But anyway, a lot of people saw me and exclaimed, “You’re back?!” And I’m thinking, of course I’m back, how else could I be there? Had a nice (if not large) lunch with mom, mesister, and her boyfriend…heh. Her boyfriend and I do have a few things in common…like our collective distaste at mushrooms and our enthusiasm for puzzles…interesting…

Yes, people see that I’ve lost weight. Yes, I’ve been doing exercise. But no, I don’t have enough courage to say the kinds of exercise that I used to do…before the huge giveaway… Sure it would be a good opportunity to share my story if they ask, but the story is maybe too long? and disturbing? Well, at least I couldn’t just say it within the realm of normal conversation… Yeah, I guess I’m both too eager and too passive about this sharing thingie…