President Uchtdorf in Taipei!

Last Sunday, President Uchtdorf spoke to the members of the church in Taiwan. This is on the bus on the way to Taipei to hear President Uchtdorf speak! It's about a 2-1/2 hour drive from Taichung (where we meet for church) to Taipei!

This is outside the stadium where he spoke! I love the clouds and the sun in this picture!

They had this huge banner out front announcing that President Uchtdorf was speaking!

This is my old roommate, Tricia! She's from Taiwan and she's now living in Taiwan. We knew we were both going to be at the meeting with President Uchtdorf and so we tried looking for each other. We hadn't seen each other in 5-1/2 years before this picture was taken. I briefly tried looking for her, but there was so many people, that I stopped looking. But Tricia said she immediately started looking for me when she got there. She said she saw a section with a bunch of blond people and decided to look there, and that's where I was :) (It was the English translation section for the other speakers that spoke at the meeting).

We were sitting pretty close to the front!

There was a lot of people there. The stadium wasn't full, but there was still a ton of people!

I know this picture is blurry, but there's President Uchtdorf after the meeting! He and his wife were being surrounded by people as they left the meeting!

President Uchtdorf's talk was amazing! He spoke about many things, but he kept on speaking about the family. He emphasized the importance of teaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ in our families and living the Gospel of Jesus Christ! He mentioned how important prayer is, personal and family prayer. He said that the Lord always hears and answers our prayers! Sometimes, though, the answers are in the form of trials, trials to help us grow, to help us realize the importance of the Gospel in our lives! The Lord loves us! He wants to help us!

Well I guess that's all for now!

What the Random!?

It reminded me of England, although I've never been there before ;) It also reminded me of that talk by Sister Thompson of the General Relief Society Presidency, so I had to take a picture!

I believe this is a rice field! I took the picture from a moving train, so it's not very good. It surprised me how much water they need to grow rice.


A big night market in Changhua (the city I live in)! It has so much stuff. Food, clothes, toiletries, accessories, shoes, pretty much anything you can think of, they have it there :)

Another picture of the night market!

This is me and one of my roommates on our bikes (she didn't know I was taking the picture :) waiting while a train passed up ahead!

The line-up waiting for the train to pass. There are so many scooters here!

I took a test ride on a scooter one night. I was a bit shaky, but it was quite fun!


Look at the statue of the huge goat in the background! I have no idea what it's for, but I had to take a picture of it :)

The chapel where the International Branch meets in Taichung (a neighboring city to Changhua). It's a nice little chapel. I think there's four wards that meet there. This is the back.

Another view of the chapel. This is the front.

These are some of the random pictures that I didn't know what to do with, but I thought you might be interested in seeing. I hope you enjoyed a few more pictures of the wonderful island of Taiwan!

Land of the Monkeys! (Ershui)

Today, Karyn, Kailey, Liz, Kevin, Amy and I headed off to Ershui on the train! It took about 30 minutes to get there. It was awesome! We rented bikes for super cheap and then biked to this awesome Buddhist Temple! I can't get over how colorful their buildings are :)

I posted this picture because Kevin told us that each light represents a family. (Someone pays to put their family name there). It's supposed to bring peace and happiness into that family. It reminded me of prayer in a way.

We took a wrong turn on our way to the monkeys and saw this cool tiny cemetery. The little building in the background is a tombstone.

Isn't it beautiful?!

Our first sighting of a monkey!

It got really close to us, but did not bother us.

Look how green and beautiful it is!

Our little group, minus Karyn, posing for a picture!

I hope you see that monkey in the tree above me :)

The monkeys were so close! We saw about 15 monkeys in the wild today!

Monkeys in the tree!

Close-ups! Look at the cute little baby monkey with the top monkey :)

More monkeys!

We thought this monkey looked like a little old man. He was so cute!

For some reason, Taiwanese people really like Americans and love white skin. Because we are all very white and American, we get stared at a lot no matter where we go. It's kind of funny :) Today was no exception. We got a lot of stares in Ershui.

Ershui was awesome and I loved it! It's so beautiful and the monkeys were awesome!

The Modern Toilet Restaurant!

Well here's the post I said I would make about the toilet restaurant! Yes that is a bathtub with a piece of glass over it as our table and yes our chairs were real toilets (well not ones that are used now:)

This is what I ordered from the restaurant! They're just mozzarella sticks, but they were served in a urinal! Unfortunately none of us got anything that was served in a mini-toilet, otherwise I would have gotten a picture of that. It was awesome though!

This is a flavored shaved ice with raisins and candy and marshmallows and ice cream and nuts in it (served in an urinal also). It was actually quite delicious! All six of us who were there shared two of these and we still didn't finish.

These were the sinks in the bathroom there! It was actually a little disconcerting to wash my hands from a spout from a toilet ;)

Overall it was a pleasant experience at the Modern Toilet Restaurant! I have no idea how the teachers before us discovered this restaurant, but it's definitely one to be remembered :)

You Should be Jealous of Me :)

Happy Independence Day! There happened to be fireworks and a big celebration here in Changhua on July 3! We made it our Independence Day party!

Look at this gorgeous sunset we saw on our way to see the fireworks!

This is the entrance to the huge celebration! We honestly have no idea what they were celebrating, but there were thousands of people there! I wish I could have gotten a good picture of the crowd, but alas I did not.

Look at the awesome dancers in front of the Big Buddha!

If you're looking at the Big Buddha and then turn around, you get a panoramic view of the city of Changhua and the fireworks! (There actually ended up being fireworks set off right behind the Big Buddha too, but I did not get a good picture of that, because I was recording it and I can't figure out a good way to upload the video)

Me in front of the Big Buddha! It really is so huge! I love it!

This is one of the dragons protecting the Big Buddha!

We stood here for a long time watching the people play in the fountains! The water was moving according to the music that was playing! I decided I wanted to play in the fountains, but the moment I decided to, they turned off the water.

Self-portrait in front of the Big Buddha and fountain!

The temple behind the Big Buddha! It's gorgeous and so colorful! The details are amazing!

The Buddhist Temple Near our Apartment!

This is a Buddhist temple beside our apartment complex! It's beautiful!

See the tall building on the left?! That's where we live! We have a three story apartment that starts on ground level. It's nice! I like it!

Some details of the temple!

Inside the temple on the first floor!

This is on the second floor!

Look at that detailed carving!

I loved the way the light is shining through the glass!

The sunset!

Is it sad that even though I really don't like this picture, this post felt incomplete without a self-portrait?! ;)