Friday, May 14, 2010

Taiwan #2

Due to the lack of time and internet access, here is an email from my team leader to his support team that entails what's going on with us... I will update you later. Love and appreciate all of you!! 

Faithful Prayer Team,
Greetings from Taiwan!! I'm writing to you from our train on the way to Taidong. We are still in transit to our final destination and closing in on 40 hours of travel time from home. It was longer than expected but we are all doing well and thankfully, everyone seems to be displaying a spirit of adventure and flexibility. We arrived on time to the Taipei airport, met up with Adam and Cindy Lee and took a bus to the High Speed Rail station where we hurried to catch the last train of the night going to Kaohsiung. Well we caught the train, it just wasn't ours and by the time the friendly passengers managed to communicate that this train was going back to Taipei, we were already on our way and had missed our train. The HSR company kindly refunded the majority of the ticket cost (even though it was our fault) and we ended up taking a 4 and a half hour bus ride down to Kaohsiung (about 2 hours longer than the HSR would have been). But all was made well because by the time we arrived, breakfast shops were opening for the morning and we were able to dine on the local cuisine which I have missed so much! We then walked a few block to the train station and used the wait to do some work on the english camp that will start this afternoon. We will be working with about 40 youth aged 1st-6th grade teaching them vocabulary for the Airport, Train Station and McDonald's. It should be quite the adventure as we are going to be visiting all of these locations with kids. An unexpected blessing did arise during our flight over. Since the demand for English Teachers is so high, the pastor at the church hosting us (Cindy Lee's Dad) wrote a grant to the government to fund our camp so all of our activities, supplies and everything is being covered by the Taiwanese Government (at least for these first few days) !! If God plans for the rest of this trip are anything like His provisions so far, get ready for some AMAZING stories !!
So we are here, we are safe, we are loving it but we are all ready for a nice, clean shower. Keep up the prayers and I'll be sending out another update before we head back to Taipei on Sunday to visit the Harmony Home Orphanage. Thank you all for your continues support in thoughts and prayers. You're blessing us all every moment that we are here.

His hands and feet,

Ryan 來恩 Jacobi