My First...

It started off as an innocent trek with our school's groundskeeper, Mr. Xie, to see his family farm. We were out hiking in the mountains when I felt this shocking pain. It was my first bee sting. Or rather, my first two bee stings - first on the top of my head, and then on my finger. I am not a fan of bees! I'm sad to not be able to shock people with "I've never been stung by a bee," yet I'm glad to find out that I'm not allergic to them either - not this kind anyway!

We got to hike in the beautiful mountains near our home, and see the many fruit trees that belonged to his family: jackfruit, mango, lychee, dragon eyes, papaya, bananas... the list goes on. We saw the sun setting and enjoyed the fresh air.

However, the best part of the whole trip was hanging out with Mr.Xie and his family - his parents who are 79 & 83 years old and are still farming, his two brothers and two sisters and their families. His eldest sister made these awesome Taiwanese dishes: vermicelli and sweet potato, three-egg dish (chicken eggs, salted duck eggs and thousand year old eggs), fish, soup, and pork. We just sat around, drank tea, and tried our best to speak in Taiwanese. What an amazing time - we really want to learn Taiwanese so we can befriend people around here and also let them know about Christ. People around here are so amazingly friendly and generous - you've got to come visit!

In front of the Xie farmhouse - it's made of mud and ba

Mr. Xie & his mom in front of their 80-year-old farmhouse.

A mountain-top view of our village. (You can't see much of
the village, well, because there are so few people living there!)

The Xie's Jackfruit trees. They are massive. Jackfruits, we learned,
always start growing in pairs - one male, one female. As they grow,
the female will get bigger while the male one eventually dies off! We asked
if they sold these at the market, and they said no, as only about 2 out of 10
jackfruits will be suitable for eating.

Asparagus - I had no idea it grew like this!

Dragon fruit - while it's flowering

The senior Mr. Xie - isn't he awesome??

The Xie family kitchen

The large wok of incredibly yummy sweet potato vermicelli.

Supper - including the Three Coloured Egg in the foreground.