This week in a nutshell

It's been a weird week. The sudden weather change has been part of that. I'm suddenly a little chilly wearing short sleeves and flip-flops now! And, I'm plenty cool in my apartment with the windows open. In fact, last night I tried, for the first time since June, to sleep without my air-conditioner. And, I didn't wake up sweating! So, maybe it's finally time to retire the A/C. Yay for a lower electricity bill! I'm holding out as long as I can, but pretty soon I'll have to dig out the sweaters and jackets and put away my dearly loved flip-flops.

This week has also been weird and annoying because they are tearing up/fixing/I don't know what they are doing to the road outside my apartment. This doesn't inconvenience me in travel, but the noise is a HUGE inconvenience. They only drill/dig at night from about 10pm-3am! It's quite loud. Fortunately for me, I am not sleeping at this time. :) But then yesterday on my one school day where I can really sleep in, my upstairs neighbors were remodeling or something and banging around and hammering the floor all morning! Ahhhh, it drove me crazy. So, it's been a loud week. I wish I'd had my camera with me, but one night, next to the traffic blockades on the road and the flashing lights warning of a construction site- they had a mannequin man dressed as a road worker with a hard hat set up with his arm pointing toward the detour and a flasher tied to his hand! hahahaha. It was the funniest thing to walk past this mannequin in the middle of the road!

On Sunday, only one girl showed up to small group which was disappointing. But she had a LOT of questions so we mostly talked through those. She not only interacts with JW's, but some charismatics and other denominations, so she has a lot of questions about a lot of things. Her questions were really difficult and it's a real challenge to me to know what I believe and be able to show her where in Scripture I base those beliefs on. It's definitely keeping me on my toes, having her in my small group. It's really good for me and hope we are able to help and encourage her as well.

On Tuesday, I went to the furthest part of Taipei from my town to observe another Shane teacher. I'd mentioned to my manager on my 6-month evaluation form that I'd benefit from observing other teachers to get ideas and see if I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing. So, I observed a teacher who has actually been here less time than I have, oddly enough. I got a few ideas from him, but the biggest benefit was just the verification that apparently, I'm doing what I should be since his class was much like mine are. It was also good to see that I'm not the only one who struggles with behavior management. While I was annoyed that it took an hour and a half to get to this particular branch, I did get to see a part of the city that I've never seen before and it was really beautiful.

After the observation, I rushed back to the church area of town t0 join my women's small group for our last get-together since we are disbanding (long story). We got together with the men's small group again and had a pot-luck and game night at the new church office. It was a lot of fun and very relaxing. Here's all who showed up...not many of the girls came, obviously.