Dead on arrival

So the last two to three weeks have been quite an awesome and fast experience.  These are the days that I live for, for something that needs desperately to be accomplished, and I have to pool all of my resources together to get done while I travel around the globe.  I feel like such an international day trader.  You know like the ones in the movies where they show up in Germany, just getting in from India, with some sort of commodity that they need to trade and all of the cool devices to keep them updated on what is happening in the market.  It feels exhilarating to work like this!  So my journey home started with me saying goodbye to the amazing dance group that I hosted in Taiwan my last week on island.  It was the perfect way to end my chapter in Taiwan.  Having their doe-eyed faces looking at things that had become so every-day for me and for them to get the cultural experience of the beautiful people that live in Taiwan by living in their homes for a week and telling me about their experiences made me remember all of the amazing things that I'm going to miss about this island nation.  All of the dancers were all so amazing people as well and helped me be excited to go and represent BYU at the new job that I am undertaking.

So anyway, I left Taipei and got into Seoul, Korea in the afternoon.  I found a very comfortable bus called the airport limousine service (prices were actually very reasonable) and rode that to my hostel.  By the time I got  to the hostel it was already dark, but I was famished so I immediately left the hostel and got a bite to eat at a Kimchi restaurant.  It was very delicious!  After that I found a famous water canal walk-way that kind of acted as the median of one of the busiest streets in Seoul, except the great thing about this canal walk-way was that it was lower than the road about 100 feet and had such beautiful landscape.  You totally forgot that you were walking down one of the busiest streets in Seoul because you were distracted by the sound of the water as it rushed through the many water falls along the way.  It was a great way to spend Sunday night.  The next day I made sure that all of my stuff was packed away because I was leaving again that night.  Once that was finished I set off to see the National Palace which was a restored little village that surrounded the emperor's previous living quarters.  It was so gorgeous!  As I was taking pictures a group of middle school boys were going crazy over this American that was getting so close to them.  I thought I would entertain them a little and asked them to help me take a picture of myself with the background.  The picture didn't turn out that good but the guys really enjoyed it.

From Seoul, Korea I left at 10pm and arrived in Honolulu, Hawaii on the same day at noon.  I am now not only a world traveler but a time traveler as well!    My cousin's boyfriend Tyler picked me up from the airport with his native friend and they drove me to my hotel room.  This place was actually a resort that I got.  Everything was so expensive in Hawaii so I figured if I have to go big I might as well go all out.  This place actually even impressed the native that was with me.  It was right on this mini peninsula off the north shore of Oahu that overlooked what was called the Paradise Bay.  It was absolutely unbelievable.  I was really excited when I got there.  That night I went with my cousin to the Polynesian Cultural Center and we had a blast watching the shows and eating the food there.  The next morning was so perfect.  I woke up with the sun and had some light breakfast and I went right out to take a kayak into the Paradise Bay.  The sun was out and the weather felt so nice.  I was trying to reach a little island that I never got to but I took some time to just drift in the ocean with the gorgeous background and just listen to the sound of the ocean.  I didn't want to leave Hawaii that day, but I had to.  Later on Leslie drove me to Waikiki to go shopping and then I was off on a plane again.

I arrived into the Phoenix airport the next morning and my mom was there to pick me up, but my traveling was not finished.  No sir, the moment I got home I unpacked, an repacked my bags to immediately head up to Utah because I had to renew my teaching license and I had to go to Utah to do it, plus time was of the essence since I was starting my new in about 3 weeks.  I quickly looked at some quotes for car insurance for my new car and set it up with insurance before leaving.  By about 5:00pm I was on the road again with my Mom.  Utah was just a surreal little visit.  I got up to Salt Lake and got done all of the little logistical things that I could to make taking this new job to go smoothly.  In the meantime I got to see just a couple of friends that I hadn't seen in over two years.  I felt really bad that I couldn't see everyone but I was happy that I got to see the ones that I did.  Utah is such a special place to me and I'm sure I will traveling up there more frequently since I live closer now.

Once I got back from Utah I had a couple of days to organize the rest of my stuff and now I'm here in Yuma.  I've been here for a couple of days, trying desperately to plan for this next year teaching a subject that I love but that I haven't done for about three years and also trying to find a place to live.  This place already has started to feel like home.  You know that feeling that you are in the right place and that everything is going to work out?  I've had lots of those little tender mercies just within these last couple of days that have made me grateful to be able to have the gift of revelation and the spirit who has directed me in so much of my life.  With so many things in my life that don't feel like I'm doing very good, when something happens that does feel right I have to rejoice in it.  This Sunday is my Ebenezer for this new area.  I already feel overwhelmed in this new area and this new job and I know that I won't be able to be successful in this job unless I have divine assistance.  Doing this job is going to require all of me, including the part of me that requires the Lord's help.  I know that I need to be vigilant with my scripture study and prayer more than ever because I know that these students really need the support that comes from having music being an important part in their lives.

New car, new hotel reservations, new life

It never ceases to amaze me how much you dread something that is close to you to change, like moving from an area of great growth or changing from one cherished stage of life to the next stage, yet once it is final that you are moving on time seems to stop almost entirely.  This phenomenon I think I will call the "pondering zone" and maybe it is there to help us breath in everything that we are going to miss so that it stays with us during whatever is coming up.  I remember this "pondering zone" happening during the time after I graduated high school and waiting to go on my mission.  You really want to spend the time with your family and friends and take it all in, but you wish that the time would just go faster so that you could just get on with the next place!  That's where I'm at right now.  I've made a lot of future decisions in the past couple of weeks.  I decided what car I am going to buy for the next however long I'm going to use it (I plan on for a substantial amount of time).  I'm starting to make hotel reservations for my prolonged long trip home.  I'm looking for places to live in Yuma, Arizona and making plans about next semester.  Every little thing that I set in stone and make decisions for is making me just want to leave more and more.  I know!  Total 180 from like 1 month ago right?  I guess I'm pretty fickle.  I always enjoy the time between making great changes because I can clearly see the hand of God leading my steps and helping me make the right decisions.  I have been blessed in my life to see so clearly God's love and guidance.  It seems like whenever I really want something to happen, I only need to start moving forward and things fall into place.  Maybe not all at once but if I continue to move forward eventually the Lord makes it right.  Maybe this post was more for me than anybody else who is reading but I hope that it rings true in your heart as well.

Kiss the Rain

I know, I know!  This song as a title really dates myself but I couldn't help myself.  This song got stuck in my head today because of the week long rainstorm that has been my life lately.  People in Taiwan are quite peculiar when it comes to rain.  They fear it for some reason.  I can't think of how many times that it has just been sprinkling outside so I decided to not use an umbrella and people look at me like I'm crazy.  If there is any big activity (outside or inside) that is being put on by the community, school or church, and it rains, it is then seen as too much of a nuisance to go outside so it is then canceled.  I've seen it happen so many times.  

I myself don't mind the rain.  In fact rain can have such a cleansing and new effect.  What I don't like is when said rain continues to come down for a whole week.  Then the rain switches from cleansing to just a wet shower that lasts for days.  Plus once you are wet you stay that way.  I have no deep meaning to this post, just that I probably will miss how wet and green this country is once I am back in the desert of Arizona.  I guess the grass is always greener.

The long road home

     So I guess the worst thing that you can do as a blogger is write a really frustrating post about how your life is not going anywhere, that nobody loves you, and you feel like giving up and then never post again.  It probably looked like I committed internet social suicide and I apologize for the shock and causing any worries for my physical emotional safety.  There's been lots of stuff that has happened since then that has been very uplifting and I feel terrible that I haven't been posting about them.  I was just video chatting with a fellow blogger (Yay for video chatting with good friends from long ago!) and it inspired me to take back up the pen and continue writing so here goes with continuing telling you about my very interesting journey.

     I titled this post "The long road home" because this returning back to America thing that I'm preparing to do has been quite a painful trudging process even though I am returning to loved ones and to the country that I know and love.  Don't get me wrong, and please try to understand that I am really excited to be returning home and this in no way means that I'm thinking of staying.  I was recently talking to a close family member about how hard it is going to be to leave and I think I made this person feel like they were not important to me and I don't want to give that impression.  This experience being here in Taiwan for the past two years has just become so much more than a temporary spot to wait out the economy.  For starters, I always want big decisions and major changes in my life to be progressing in the "better and better" category and I might have outdone myself moving to Taiwan.  I mean when you move to a tropical island out in the pacific ocean that speaks a foreign language and eats foreign things like cow stomach and ducks blood, how do you get better than that by moving back to America (other than moving to New Orleans)?  But the real thing that is upsetting me is that once I had made the decision a while back that I was not going to be staying for another year I endeavored myself to finish seeing all of the things that I still hadn't seen, and saying the things that I wanted to say to the people that mean the most to me, and doing the things that I wanted to do with those people, and I've realized that I don't have enough time to do everything.  I have also realized that I really haven't enjoyed this endeavor as much as I thought I would because with each thing checked off the list and words said to people that I care about have driven the painful stake of leaving this experience deeper and deeper into my soul.  For a person that likes to keep moving in order to keep life interesting, I kind of hate moving.  It really sucks!  There are moments that I've had and memories that I have made that have changed my life forever but I'm afraid that, much like my mission, since I have made these great memories in a place so far away from home and the norm of living in America that these experiences will be so easily forgotten and seem like a they didn't happen and these people didn't exist.  To me and my life, relationships are a very important thing to me and I try very hard to grapple onto the people who mean the most to me and I don't want Taiwan to fall out of my grasp because of distance.

     Recently I have been watching the missionaries and how they keep a hold of their memories and carry around a bye-bye book which is a collection of people's thoughts, memories, and words of love and encouragement that is put together in a sketch book.  The people of Taiwan really grab onto this tradition and make their personal page very creatively interesting by drawing funny cartoons of memories or posting crazy pictures of themselves and even making a scrap book kind of thing.  It is so great to see how Taiwanese people love being creative and they really take advantage when given the chance.  I wish I could collect all of my memories here into a bye-bye book like them and have something that I could look back on and always remember.  I think I will start a bye-bye book of my own.  I know that it won't be able to fit everything that I want to remember but it could contain some.

     I will say this, I AM very excited to be coming home and I look forward to the many amazing and life changing experiences that I am to have with all of you coming up.

Fear and discouragement!

Today and most of this week I have been trying to take advantage of the time I have off to get a head-start on my near-future plans. Since lately I have been kind of living life about a month in advance, this process of "future planning" has been very slow, lacking in motivation, but most of all almost staggeringly horrifying. What?! HORRIFYING?! This is coming from the guy who signed up to teach EFY on a whim 3 months before it started and left to work the whole summer without a car and not-knowing how he was going to get to all 9 sessions that he was assigned. This is coming from the missionary who had no previous relatives to lean on for experience, who had to pioneer the whole "preparing for a mission" period without empathetic family members and then after was called to a small island half-way around the world and had to leave for said mission the day after the 9/11 terrorist attack. This is coming from a performer who relishes in the thrill of solo A Cappella performance opportunities and aspires to be a Choral teacher where he will need to do weird and very emasculating things in front of teenagers daily. I seem to have no problem putting myself into any of these risky and what other people might see as "horrifying" situations. In fact, I live for situations like these! But apparently ask me to sit down and make an accounting of what experiences that I have had, put these experiences in words and plan my life out for more than a month in advance and all of a sudden I start sweating bullets and practicing avoidance behaviors like mad. When did I start being such a wussy pants? I guess I have always known that I detest making plans for a future that I cannot see any clearly than a Kaleidoscope of possibilities. There's just too many opportunities for me to choose the wrong thing so why not just continue to choose the right things that I am choosing now and not worry about anything else? Then comes the knowledge that after awhile continuing to drive yourself into a rut and not progressing is another wrong choice. So now we come to where I'm at right now, a wrong choice at my back and millions of other choices in front of me. I know probably, like you, a lot of scripture references now come to mind like Paul stating "If ye are prepared ye shall not fear." or "Faith is not to have a perfect knowledge of things." but these scriptures don't really give much comfort besides the fact to tell me that these feelings are natural. I just kind of wish I had someone here to tell me that who had arms to hold me instead of pages to inspire me. Sometimes inspiration doesn't have the benefit of a tactile experience.

Tactile experiences are very important to me. This is why I love dance and hiking and being outside so much is because you get to touch stuff. Anyways, to avoid getting too mushy I guess this time of reflection and planning has reminded me of things that I need in my life. This can get discouraging but if I have learned anything over the years is that discouragement only stays as long as it is welcome. It is a very polite guest and knows when it has overstayed it's welcome. Even though I may fear planning for my future, I also anticipate what the future holds and am excited for the learning and growth that it will bring. So for now my mantra is "Carpe Propositum!"

Funny happenings in the country of the rising sun

So I’ve been trying to remember all of the funny things that have happened on our little excursion here in Japan so I could share some of them with you. I really am not familiar at all with Japan and was going on this trip purely because I haven’t been here before and I like to experience other cultures. Well, right from the get-go our group of Taiwan English teachers realized that we had picked up some bad habits whilst being in Taiwan. We’ve been whistled down a couple of times by policemen when we’ve crossed the road when there were no cars coming but not when the crosswalk said walk. All of us (even me!) have accidentally said our little “xiexie”s and our “buhaoyisi”s realizing immediately afterwards that we were speaking the wrong foreign language. I think the funniest moment of Taiwan faux-pas was when we were going to take a bus to the Imperial Palace. In Taiwan when a bus stops that is where you load so if it stops a long ways off because there are many buses already stopped you have to race to the place where it is unloading so that you can get on before it takes off again. So when the bus that we needed stopped a little before the bus stop because there was a bus that hadn’t left the loading place yet all of our party started to quickly move in the general direction of the bus which immediately drew stares of bewilderment from the long line of Japanese people waiting patiently at the loading area. That kind of stopped us in our tracks and embarrassingly we realized that the bus would probably be nicer than the buses in Taiwan and actually pick up passengers at the designated bus stop area. Japanese people apparently do things by the rule book.

In the hostel we were staying at there was another very unique experience that I found fascinating. I kind of am a fan of hostels now. They are such an interesting atmosphere of different cultures, ages and travelers that are put in a space without much room and privacy and yet have an immediate camaraderie that you just can’t get anywhere else. We met three girls who were staying there from Taiwan who were thrilled to meet Americans who were teaching in Taiwan. I also met some guys from America there working for their vacation (they were studying in Mainland China) and also a group of vacation workers from Australia. I think the Australian accent is pretty much the most attractive accent out there. I was talking to an Australian while doing laundry and I swear I could have made out with her on the spot! The most interesting guy I met was a dude from Turkey. Who would have thought you would meet a guy in Japan from Turkey? He spoke the language pretty easily it seems and he was a pretty interesting fellow. We talked a lot about how I don’t know much about that part of the world and how that was a shame and he told me about how where he lives there really wasn’t much hostility towards America at all as far as he could tell. I found that heartening, but also depressing that the media paints such a bias and untrue picture of the middle-east.

All in all I have really enjoyed being here in Japan. It has been a very liberating and fascinating trip. The culture here is so much like Taiwan, and yet it also has its own little corner in the world and really is its own entity. I would really like to come back to Kyoto to visit again. There was so much that we didn’t get to see. Maybe someday.

New Years!!

This week my post is a video! Hope you enjoy it.