Ahhh...

Ahhh...we just got back from Kenting Beach in south Taiwan. It was absolutely beautiful! I know I said I would update you guys on the past couple days and I always think I'll have more time than I actually do but when we get home from the day I'm always so tired so I take a shower and just want to go to bed. Anyways all that to say I will tell about the past couple days but maybe slowly over the next week. We head to the orphanage tomorrow so now I might have less time to blog and comment and post pictures and all that good stuff...not that i've done a lot so far...but now it will probably come slower soo...a quick overview/update.
Yesterday we traveled down to the beach and it was a couple hours to relax, journal, write and read which was nice :) We got there in the afternoon and spent the rest of the afternoon and evening on the beach, it was so nice and warm! The water seemed cold at first but wasn't too bad once you got in. It is like a rocky, green, planty beach with some sand, so different than a typical beach but absolutely beautiful! I think some pictures are up on phanfare, mindrup.phanfare.com. Then we spent this morning on the beach again and headed back this afternoon, so it was a short trip but so relaxing!

Now that we've been here a couple days I'm getting "used" to everything(at least as much as i possibly can). Here is a little bit of what I wrote in my journal this morning...
"Well i think today a lot has sunk in, like each morning for the next 11 weeks I will wake up in a beautiful yet bustling country where I can't talk to most people, everything smells different, some good some not so good. I hear this now starting to to be familiar language that I have no idea what it means. I am growing way accustomed to shi shi(shee shee - thank you), and ni hao(nee how - hello), although hello, and ok are fairly understood here. I really wan to learn the language now, I'm dying to know what people are saying and be able to talk with them.... I did wake up homesick today(but my dad helped me with that). Everytime I see a McDonalds now I crave it, never EVER thought that would happen! A neat thing is now I crave some Taiwan stuff, like pork dumplings... ahh to die for! And beef noodle soup, it's so comforting and yummy! It's going to be interesting though, today I realized my 4 major food groups, cheese anything, bread, sweets/chocolate and diet coke are either extremely uncommon or completely not available! (yes people there is no diet coke here :( ) I panicked when I realized that, but then I noticed I've gotten this far without it and without even noticing so i'll definitely...hopefully...be able to make it without them. I'm learning to like coke or at least be able to drink it and like meats and strange spices more, so it's different and interesting and probably good for me."
So to sum that up basically it's just so different but i'm starting to get used to it being different, maybe not used to everything but just knowing I won't wake up to what I'm used to. The first couple morning I woke up i had to kind of talk myself through where I was, what was going on and why I was there and just prepare myself that today I would be surrounded by another language and not really talk to anyone but my dad, (*side note* I'm so glad my dad is here and that there will be sweet people at the orphanage who speak english too!! I've never appreciated that so much! ) So it's been different for sure but an adventure and very exciting!
Few more highlights, this place we went to the beach had some great shopping!! :) I bought some pretty stuff, so that was a lot of fun, we walked around the town until we found a Thai place and ate there. So far we've eaten taiwanese, thai, vietnamese, american(we broke down one night and got mcd's and ice cream :) ) and korean food. Most of it good, some interesting! There we're salamanders at the beach, which was kind of freaky they look like a cross between a snake and lizard and i hate both so when a group of people chased one under my chair that made for some funny laughs...at me ;P And I thought it was really neat to say i've now swam on both sides of the pacific ocean, from california and now Taiwan... daddy didn't find that so cool. lol but i did :) Oh i laughed out loud at one point when I realized I was walking around on a beach in taiwan surrounded by people speaking chinese while I was listening to country music on my ipod and singing it out loud, i'm sure they thought i was crazy and obviously had no idea what i was saying. Although they play a lot of American music here. When we were at the airport in South Korea, "shackles" by mary mary came on, i thought that was so funny and random. So I think that's all for now :) Here are a couple photos!!

THE BEACH

ME AND MY DAD

SHOPPING

THAI FOOD

WALKWAY TO BEACH