Life Goal Achieved: Learn to Read Greek

So I just realized I'm eating some Easter jelly beans and I'm supposed to be working out soon. Don't judge me!

Ah, sweet summer solace. It's so nice to be free. Free from 8 AM classes, deadlines, expectations, responsibility, paying bills... Okay, so not quite that far. But seriously, it's great to be out of school for a few months. I feel bad for people that take classes year-round, honestly. But more power to 'em - they'll be my boss someday, I'm sure. Meanwhile, I'm enjoying the freedom that is summer.

This summer is especially freeing, in my mind. This may have something to do with the fact that over the last three summers I have traveled to Sierra Leone, gotten married to the love of my life, and traveled to Taiwan. Ya know, the usual.

Like I said, though, this summer is going to be nice. I mean, all we're doing is completing our internships, which sounds like a lot bigger deal than it is. I promise. Internships got nothin' on airport security in Taiwan. Those beagles don't play!

Scary stuff, right?

Three Birds, One Stone

Disclaimer: I originally wrote this up on Easter, hence the Easter references. Enjoy!

Happy Easter! If ever there were a day to "start over" in life, it's today. After all, that Jesus guy up and walked his dead self out of his grave some 2000 years ago - a pretty big deal if you ask me. 

See that little quip up there? It's actually relevant today. Or it's supposed to be, anyway. We'll see if it is or not by the end of this post.

So today is Easter. I contemplated posting some tangential nonsense what Easter is actually about. However, I have a feeling that you'll be hearing plenty about that in the next 24 hours or so. Let me give you a little hint, though: it has nothing to do with those bright, colorful, delicious little chicks made out of sugar. You know what I'm talkin' about...

So instead of talking about the real meaning of Easter (Peeps, obviously), I'm going to talk about something mostly unrelated. I hope you'll forgive me. To make it up to you, I'd like to introduce you to something that I rather enjoy. This "something" is a list I've been (unofficially) keeping for about a year now. Let me just give you the list and see if you know what it's about...

An Epic Life Goal: Late Night in the Phog

Alright, alright. Enough already. The clamor is too much. By popular demand, I have made time to blog for the first time in over 2 months.

Just kidding. About everything except the whole blogging thing, anyway.

The last two months have been exciting, to say the least. They have been challenging. They have been fulfilling. I want to share about a lot of it, and I even have a list made up on my desktop of things to blog about. Time to blog, on the other hand, is rare. Thus, instead of continuing to do dishes (what seems like an everyday affair nowadays), I am taking a break to tell you about one of the most exciting nights I've experienced so far this semester: Late Night in the Phog...

Back in America: Another Life Goal Complete

I've missed blogging the last week as I've been running around like a baby who has just found his legs. As you can also see, I miss THOGL, Taiwan, and everything about the place I just left. But alas, this post has nothing to do with anything you've read so far. For that, I'm a little sorry - mostly for dropping your IQ a point or two. And although the title of this entry sounds like it has potential, it is also very misleading on almost all accounts, except for the fact that I did accomplish another life goal recently...

Life Goal Completed: Visit Asia

Disclaimer: I want to get off on the right foot here as I begin to post about visiting Asia. In order to do that, I need to address the fact that, although I've spent the last 9 weeks in Asia, I've only been in one country, with basically one type of people group, and heck, I've haven't even been to the mainland; I'm on an island! However, this is still Asia, and I've definitely had a life goal for a while to spend time on every continent, so even though I'll make generalizations about Asia, know that they don't necessarily apply all over the continent, just like any other generalization isn't always true.

Now that we're clear on that...

First of all, I'm blessed that God has allowed me, at the young age of 20, to have already spent time on four continents. I'm especially thankful for the last two months I've been allowed to serve here and fill a need for a time...

Some More Water in the Bucket: Visit the Pacific Ocean

I can feel it when I sleep, when I wake up, when I walk, when I shower, when I eat, when I hold babies, and even when I blog: we got to go to the beach yesterday!

Getting out is quite a feat around here. Kalyn and I hadn't seen daylight for 3 weeks as of yesterday, so getting to go out was almost the highlight of our month. Even more exciting is the fact that I accomplished another life goal: visit the Pacific Ocean!

In Progress and Done: Care for Orphans

I'm thankful for my school, Manhattan Christian College (MCC), for a number of reasons, but namely because of our professors. I'm thankful that 95% of my classes are about things that I want to learn about, even if they bore me at times. I'm seeing more and more as I get older that the "basic" classes I took were some of the most important and some of the "busy work" given in those classes has taught me a lot...

More than Just a Life Goal: Visit a Buddhist Temple

A few nights ago, as we were taking care of the babies, Kalyn and I talked about how we were getting cabin fever from not being anywhere outside of THOGL or our apartment here in Taiwan. We were a little frustrated and not sure what to do because, well, we work at night. There aren't a lot of places open around midnight here, we can't just abandon the babies, and let's be honest - nobody wants to pick up a night shift and then work again the next day. We figured out a solution to our "sickness", though. We decided to visit the Buddhist temple that hovers over the lake on the way home in the morning (after our shift was over)...

A Random Act of Accomplishment

Tonight, as I sat down toward the beginning of shift at THOGL, I didn't expect much to happen outside of hearing a lot of babies cry. Little did I know that I would be accomplishing a life goal before the night was over...

Ride a Passenger Train: Another Life Goal Completed!

So, as you can see from the picture, I rode my first train! A few days ago we traversed from Luodong, Taiwan to Hualien, Taiwan via train, and I couldn't contain my excitement. Turns out it was pretty awesome!







Entering the train, I wasn't really sure what to do, seeing as how I am in a foreign country and hardly understand 10 words of Chinese. However, our fearless leader, Ted, made sure we found our seats...

Start a Blog (That Doesn't Belong to Xanga): The First Drop in My Bucket

Alright, so here I am. I'm taking on a task I've been avoiding, but a task worth doing. I've started a blog.

Of course, you knew this already because you're reading this. Obviously, nothing groundbreaking to you. However, it's a different matter for me...