Mark's Thanksgiving Dinner at DeWitt's

Last week Jared asked me what Mark would do for Thanksgiving, then a bit more subdued he said "Oh yeah, they don't celebrate that in Taiwan." For a little boy that loves holidays this was a bit hard for him. Later that afternoon I received a Facebook message from a member in Mark's ward.

November 23, 2015

During General Conference we had a new apostle called.  His name is Gary E Stevenson, who also happens to have a son in Taiwan on a mission.  Mark's first companion was Elder Stevenson.  Later in this letter he mentions that the new apostle is coming to visit this week.  I asked if this happened to be the father of his first companion, here is his response:

Yes, It is the same Elder Stevenson I was companions with. Often we will refer to our first companion as our dad and because my first companions father was called as an apostle I have had a few people make the joke that my grandpa was called as an apostle.

Hello!

 This has been a pretty great week for lot of reasons. First off I think I must have gained at least 100 pounds. I don't think I have ever eaten so much food in my life. It started last Monday when some members offered to take us to Costco for our weekly grocery shopping. Then on Wednesday I had an English student cook a turkey for me to celebrate thanksgiving. On Friday there were some members that invited about twenty missionaries and twenty other people over for a thanksgiving dinner. On Saturday our ward had a thanksgiving activity which also involved lots of food. So 100 pounds might have been a bit of an exaggeration but I think I will need to do a little extra running this week to work it all off.

November 15, 2015

Hello everyone! I hope that you all had a great week. This was another pretty awesome week of missionary work over here in Taiwan. We have a small mountain in our area but i have never been there before, I have always heard that there aren't a ton of people there, just a few small towns. this week we decided that we wanted to go there and find some new people to teach. after biking up a few huge hills we came to the conclusion that there were even less people than we originally thought.

​There was absolutely nobody out there, so we decided to go back to the city. On the way back we could here lost of things moving around in the bushes on either side of the road. and then we started hearing lots of grunting noises too. We stopped so we could figure pout what it was and then discovered that the trees were full of monkeys. 

November 8, 2015

There have been multiple times that i have started writing my letter on Monday and then either got distracted, ran out of time or just forgot to push the send button when i was done. I'm sorry but it happened again last week.

At times a mission can be a bit of an emotional roller coaster full of ups and downs but looking back on the week it is always so much easier to remember all of the good parts. And this was a pretty good week.

Last Monday our district decided to go to an all you can eat buffet that had all kinds of sea food and other things that i have never tried before. I decided that I wanted to try all of the things i have never had before. As I was eating my district kept on giving me funny looks but i wasn't really sure why. when i got to the squid i asked the missionaries in my district if there was a certain part of it you were suppose to eat and they all responded with "I don't know, I've always been to scared to try any of that". but they were all very impressed with my bravery for trying all of this new food.

October 25, 2015

Hello Everyone!

This was another pretty great week in Taiwan full of lots of excitement and miracles. One of the highlights of this week was exchanges with Elder Tseng.

October 18, 2015

Hello everyone!

Last week I talked a little about our English party. Every Wednesday we have English class. We have a beginner class, middle class and an advanced class. The classes are all taught by the missionaries in our district, usually each member of the district is assigned to teach an English class. The missionaries that don't speak English usually just watch or help the new people know where to go. Last week there were transfers and our district changed a little. We have three elders from Taipei, a Sister from Taipei, a sister from Korea and me. I am the only one that speaks English. So we still aren't exactly how this is all going to work out but I'm guessing in the upcoming weeks I'll have a few more great stories to tell about English class.

October 11, 2015

Hello again!

This was another pretty great, action packed week over here in Taiwan. A few of the highlights would be our English party and general conference.  I think I'll start with the English party.