Oh man, I'm becoming Taiwanese.

Sorry to hear about Granny Cutchin passing away.  I also hope that Kayleigh starts feeling better. That sounded pretty scary the other week! I was a little bit worried... She's doing better though... right?

This week was super weird.

I've had a horrible cough and cold this week. I'm getting better though.

We had this group from UT come visit us, they're a musical group called The Voice or something. I don't know, but we fed them some food in the chapel. It was probably one of the weirdest things I've seen in Taiwan. I definitely have adjusted to Taiwan culture.. Because when they walked in they were super loud. Oh yeah, and everyone was at least 9 ft tall. I felt so small. Then they were talking to me in English and I kept wanting to talk to them in English. It was really weird. I just felt so out of place all of the sudden. Then it hit me and I was like, "Oh man, I'm becoming Taiwanese."

Our week was just full of paranormal stuff. We had so many ghostly experiences this week... The first is we were riding around our area after eating at a super sketchy buffet infested with flies and mysterious meats. We were biking along when we stopped and were talking to his guy. He didn't really have a whole lot of interest and was kind of weirded out by us. Then halfway through this lady drives up on her scooter and cuts into the conversation and starts telling us that we need to pray with her real quick on the side of the road. So we're like, "oh okay...?" So we pray with her and then she starts making these weird noises and telling us that she has a demon and that she's possessed and wants an exorcism. So since she didn't live in our area we gave her to the Shalu Elders and set up a time during the week where she could meet with them and get this done with. So The day roles around and she goes to the church and I was there and watched the whole thing go down. She walks in and right as we're about to do it, she starts yelling, crying, screaming and all sorts of stuff. Then they gave her a blessing and she was fine. But, still it was super weird. I actually don't think she was possessed I just think she was crazy.

Then one night I woke up around 3 AM and heard something going on downstairs. So I sat up in my bed and looked around our room and everyone was in bed. So then I was like, "oh no...." So I just sat there listening and it sounded like someone was shuffling around downstairs. Then the noise just stopped and I just eventually fell asleep. When we woke up I told the other Elders and they all thought it was weird too. Nothing was missing/damaged or broken. But something was definitely in our house.

This week my companion also got into a car accident! We were biking around the corner of the insurance building next to our house and he went right into the back of a car because it was windy and his head was down. There wasn't a whole lot of damage to the car but there definitely was some scrapes. The police came and had to investigate the whole thing. Then they had to take us to the police station. So we had to get into a police car and drive down to the police station. It was really sketchy. When we got in the police station it looked like a New York City police station.. It was interesting I thought it was kind of cool. But something that wasn't cool was when they were asking us questions and trying to get the full story they would use Taiwanese to talk to each other. So my companion told them to stop. Then they told us, "What? We only are speaking Chinese.. We only speak Chinese." Then they laughed and made a joke in Taiwanese. So we had to call a member and help us not get rekt by the police.  I've had some super super close calls on my bike, too.  I got hit by a car 2 weeks ago. It was just like a slight tap. I didn't fall over or anything, but if I would've been a second later I would've broken some bones. When you get into a car accident you usually have to go down to the police station and get interrogated.  My companion might have to pay a small amount of money but the other people got a ticket because they were illegally parked.

We have recently as a district have been really getting into Ping Pong. Ping Pong is super big here. Everyone is super serious about it. I usually get destroyed but goodness it's so fun. It's just like the Karate Kid Movie with Will Smith's son when he's getting rekt by the old man in the beginning. Other than that, we were planning on just relaxing today. There's not really a whole lot to do in our area. My companion from the MTC, Elder Giles, always sends me emails about all of the awesome stuff he's doing in GaoXiong. I love that guy haha! I usually spend P-Day with the Shalu Elders. I've become pretty close with Elder Layton from Alabama.

All in all very crazy week! Hahaha! But I'm doing good. I can hold basic conversations in Chinese. Yay.....

Love,

Silas