Sorry for the delay in posting. My stomach decided that it hated me, and I spent the last few days trying to get better. I finally wound up going to the doctor and getting medication, and now all is well again! YAY!

This is Lemon. Lemon is a fourth year student (I think) at Shu Zen and she is studying English as a foreign language. Her English is quite good and she’s been our guide around Shu Zen, especially when it comes to food. She’s had to field a lot of “what is that” kind of questions and she hasn’t appeared to get tired of them – yet. She is from Tainan (a city just north of here) and will be working with us during the English camp.

This is Helena. She’s a nursing student, but she’s quite adept at speaking and reading English. She’s helped me out a couple of times when I wanted to know what a particular bit of food was, as well. She’s very nice and will sometimes join us for breakfast.

In the classes (which are over until English Camp starts in July), we would mostly spend a lot of time talking with the students. Often they would have a set of five questions ready for us and we would break into three groups and each person in the group would ask me their questions. After we were done answering questions (or working on their resumes, or reading aloud from their textbooks and having them repeat after us) the students would usually want to take pictures with us. It seems like every student was armed with either a camera or a camera phone and they love taking pictures.

Graffiti on the wall of one of the classrooms. If I didn’t know better, I would think that the girl in the glasses is me!

Sometimes we’d leave our phone numbers (or room numbers) with the students and sometimes they would stop by our room to chat, which was pretty cool. We’ve also received some invitations to go and visit their homes, but nothing definite has come out of that yet. I’m hopeful that when school winds down (they are in their last week of classes and finals are next week) that I’ll be able to go home with them.

When we went to visit Maria’s class we were given a present of Bubble Tea (or Pearl Milk Tea) which is a drink that originated in Taiwan and one that I had tried (with Krikit and Lily) on my trip to California last December. I wasn’t fond of it then and I’m still not a big fan. The tea part tastes okay (too milky and sweet for me, but the taste is fine). However, I just can’t get used to sucking up the tapioca balls through the big straw. Also, the texture of the tapioca balls is strangely chewy in a never ending sort of way and they don’t really seem to have any flavor. Anyway – it’s not horrible, and if it was the only thing available, I would drink it, but I’m just not a fan.

Regardless, above is a picture of Jenny (one of the students who will be working summer camp with us) and my bubble tea.

Maria at work and some students in the background….

one of the students singing an American pop song (can’t remember the name of it, sorry)…

and a picture of me and Maria after the class ended.

When I said that in most of the classes we wound up taking pictures with the students, I wasn’t kidding.

We snuck into a practice room and watched/listened to the band practice for the graduation ceremony.

Last Thursday, I found a stray puppy and kidnapped her for pictures and petting. She slept underneath the desk during the first period I was having conversational practice, but got a little too frisky (and was trying to teethe on the purse Sara made me), so I let her out of the room during the second period. Luckily there was another animal just waiting to be petted in the group that Kristen and Dwayne had…

I promise, despite what it looks like, that I did not actually eat the cute, little hamster. Really.

On Thursday, the night before graduation, there was a concert on the steps right outside our dorm. I wasn’t feeling well, but I did manage to get a couple of pictures (any help with who was at the concert would be delightful)…

And that’s about it for now. I missed graduation (and class on Friday) due to being sick, but I’ve got more pictures to post and will do that either later today or tomorrow. We’ve got a long break right now until English camp starts in July. We just need to get things organized for the campers ahead of time, so I’m hoping that I’ll be able to make a couple of day trips to see the sights.

Next up: Medicine, malls, and miscellany…. Dorm life…