Taiwan

I never imagined that I would have a Chinese family.  But I do, and they all live in Taiwan. So we went there this month.  Son Gerald, his Frances and their two children, Seth and Angelica have been settled there for some 13 years now.  It has been our goal to visit there each year. But we have missed some.  We were overdue for a visit, so we chose the time they suggested for us and left for our journey there on Tuesday, January 19th (the day after my birthday!).  Our flight to San Francisco was cancelled, making our connection to Taiwan impossible to make.  So our trip there was postponed until the following Wednesday.  We flew to Taiwan on standby, making the possibility of traveling first class open to us, if there were any open seats.  There was one!  Layne gave it to me and he took a seat in Business; that's almost as good.  So the 14 hour flight was filled with comforts, movies and delicious food.  But even with the comforts, not much sleep took place.

We had a wonderful time in Taiwan.  Gerald and Frances live in Feng Yuan, about a 1 1/2 hour drive from Taipai.  Feng Yuan was once a country town but is now a city, filled with buildings and people, and noise.  There is no zoning so homes and businesses are all gathered together in the crowded streets.  Sidewalks come and go and when they are present they are often full of parked scooters, the preferred method of transportation for most of the citizens.   The people tend to stare at us lighter-haired visitors, but they are very friendly and helpful.  Gerald and Frances live on what was once the family rice paddy.  It is now filled with homes and businesses, once all belonging to the Chang family.  Their home is one of several built by Frances' father to house his family.  He and his wife live right next to them.  Their homes are lovely even though they stand in very crowded spaces.

Frances' uncle Tony painted this picture of the family rice paddy when they first arrived, 100 years ago.  That rice paddy is now filled with buildings, many belonging to the Chang family.

The open space to the right of the painting above, now holds the home you can see below, where the senior Changs live.  It is lovely inside and even includes an elevator, installed after the Changs visited us in Sunol and saw the elevator we had in that home.

Right next door to the Chang home stands this lovely place, where Frances and Gerald live.  It is four stories high with marble throughout.  The coolness of it is great in the summer but quite chilling in winter!

Just inside Gerald and Frances' home is this living room.  The metal screen you see above the window is lowered at night for security.  Seth is walking toward the camers.

Ger and Fran's kitchen.  In most Taiwanese kitchens there is no oven; everything is cooked on the stove top.  Baking is provided by bakeries.  The Changs, however, have an oven so Gerald and the kids can bake American goodies in their oven.

Gerald and Frances run an English school.  One of their campuses is located directly across from their home; pretty convenient!  They have developed their own program for teaching language which appears to be very successful as they do no advertising; all students find them from word of mouth.  They both love the school and the whole system they have developed for teaching language.  Gerald says. however, that they plan to move to the US sometime soon.  He has been saying that for awhile but it appears that it will actually happen within the next year or two.  Frances says she is willing to make the move.  I have worried that she would not want to leave her parents, but, in Taiwanese culture, it is her two brothers who are responsible for caring for the parents and she is invested in that idea.  Frances was raised by her rather stern and unkind grandmother so she isn't particularly close to her parents.

The senior Changs are a delightful couple however.  We ate dinner with them almost every night and enjoyed the delicious selection of Taiwanese vegetables, fish and meats served over rice and followed by soup.  Dessert is fruit.  They eat nothing raw but cook their vegetables until they are barely done.  It is all very good.  In fact, I've come home with a desire to eat more like them.  Of course Layne is longing for a steak after all that low-flesh food at the Changs.  Affection is mostly hidden in Taiwan, but the senior Changs always embrace us.  Even without a language to share, we manage to communicate some ideas back and forth.  Simple ones.  These lovely people gave us matching gold rings for our 50th anniversary.  We were quite overwhelmed that they would do such a lovely thing for us!  They also treated us to their shoe factory and invited us to choose as many shoes as we wanted.  None were big enough for Layne, but I found four pair!

Here is our Taiwanese family.  From left to right, Gerald, Papa Chang, Mama Chang, Angelica, me, Layne, Seth and Frances.  The picture is taken in the small front yard of Ger and Fran's home, with the Chang home in the background.  Note how tall Papa Chang is; just an inch shorter than Layne.  That's very unusual for a Taiwanese man.

It was cold in Taiwan.  In fact, it was cold enough to break their records for cold.  It even snowed one day.  It fell but didn't stay.  Still, Taiwanese don't know what to do with cold.  They are in their winter jackets when the temperature falls to the 60s.  So you may imagine how hard it was for them to adjust to freezing weather.  It didn't last long however.  It was soon back to the 50s or so.

We managed to get a good visit in with everyone.  Seth and Angelica are lovely kids; very bright and open.  We talked and played games.  We loved hearing about all of Gerald's ideas about education and all sorts of other things.  That man is a thinker!  In all, our trip was quite wonderful.

We returned home on Friday.  No first class this time but the trip was pleasant just the same.  Except that Layne started feeling the symptoms of a cold and was generally a little grumpy.  Of course I may have added to that by a couple of little problems I created.  Taiwanese security wouldn't let me carry the small scissors I always have in my purse so I had to check them.  Picking them up at baggage claim took a very long time as they were the very last thing to appear on the luggage ramp.  Layne and his sniffles waited rather impatiently for that.  Then I got in trouble for including a piece of very unique fruit in my bag.  I was fascinated with it and, since it was not yet ripe for eating, decided to put it in my suitcase.  Mistake!  We had to wait in yet another line for it to be checked, and confiscated!  By this time Layne was totally disgusted.  But we were in plenty of time for our connecting flight to Boise.  Early enough in fact to take an earlier one.  We arrived home on Friday, early in the afternoon.  Layne collapsed in bed. He was in a much better mood when he awoke several hours later.

Here I am with that devil fruit.  You must admit, it is interesting!  I never knew such a thing existed so was fascinated to see how it tasted.  I guess I'll never know.

After a soggy weekend, we spent this sabbath giving two pornography talks and relaxing.  It is so good to be home!

The Quiet Part of January

This first half of January has been quite lovely.  We are both home, organizing our lives for the new year.  I have an absolute thing about being organized despite the problem I have with big pockets of chaos.  I've been reorganizing my desk, files and family history shelves.  It is just about done and it feels SO GOOD!  Organizing is fun; maintaining is a bit less so.  When I get caught up in a project I tend to lose all sense of order.  And often I forget the systems that I so carefully set up to keep me from losing things and plans. I am such a frustrating combination of order and chaos.  My overall January plan is this:  first organize this month, then use the rest of the year to produce.

Layne took me Birthday shopping this past week and it was so much fun!  For me anyway.  He is so good to me.  He got me everything I asked for.  That turned out to be three sweaters, a new cover for my phone and a pair of dressy walking shoes.  I felt so indulged!  Tomorrow I will be 73.  I never thought much about being this old when I was young.  Why is it we spend half of our lives being old but somehow never think it will come to this?  I find myself figuring it all out as I go.

Our January days are short and, this winter, they have been full of storms.  Outside is a mix of snow and rain.  It is beautiful either way.  The dark has its charms.  I have filled the house with candles and twinkle lights and, each early morning and evening that we are home, we turn on the fireplace.  It is warm and charming and I love it.  Here's a scene from one of our snowy days.  It was melted by the end of the day.

I've been getting up extra early these mornings and sitting in front of the fire to study the scriptures, think, read and write in my various journals.  It is such fun and so rewarding.  I may never give it up.  I'm so glad to have the light the gospel brings to me.  It warms my heart and expands my mind in the most amazing ways.  I love the opportunities of our older age.  Time is more under my control than ever in my life, it seems.  I like it.

New Years

We closed out our 2015 with family.  How could it be better than that?  Audrey, Cliff, Isaiah, Chase and Morgan spent the first part of the week with us.  We took them to see the Caldwell Christmas lights...again.  They are so lovely!  So that is our third visit and it was just as nice.  Except that it was very cold.  Still, some of us managed a walk around the light infused river banks in spite of that.  It is fun to spend time with our kids.  By Tuesday, though, they were all gone.

Here's Chase and Isaiah standing in front of one of the trees in Caldwell.

Games dominate with the younger set.  The older ones read and work on their various devices.  Here are Morgan, Isaiah and Chase hard at a rather lengthy game.

I'm determined to get organized this month.  I have a vision of how I should do it and what goals I should set.  But so far I have busied myself with all sorts of other things.  Perhaps I have just a tinsy problem with procrastination.  It isn't that I don't want to do it, its just that, somehow, things come up to interfere.  Gotta get going though.

I've got three trips planned over the next couple of months.  Layne is a bit disgusted with this as he wants to just stay home.  I also feel the call of home with all its comforts and things and time set up to suit us.  But family calls and I feel that I must answer that call.  I want to spend time with my sister, and our kids when the chance comes up to do it.  This move to Idaho means that all these precious people are far away.  That means that, if we want to spend time together, we've got to make some effort at making that happen.  I keep telling that to Layne.  I"m working on wearing him down. He loves visitors but not being a visitor.  Such a man!

We invited two couples over for New Year's Eve.  We had a yummy dinner, played games and talked until after midnight!  I was pretty proud that we older folks were able to tolerate such late night fun.  And, now that the fun is over, I'm going to get organized.  No more procrastination for me.  Nope.

It is Sunday night and guess where we are not?  Our Addiction meetings are over.  For us.  It feels strange to be sitting here instead of sitting with my lovely ladies in our weekly support group.  Although I'm loving time at home, I miss my ladies.  But change is always hard.  But I'm sure I'll get used to it!

Christmas night brought us a full, beautiful moon.  Here is what it looked like the day after Christmas, in Idaho.  It was big, bright, and pretty magical.