Taiwan is known for the giant Banana Spiders. We came upon this one as we hiked up a mountain trail just east of Taichung during a little time away from the office. They are called banana spiders because of the size and shape of their bodies. This one was rather small, about the size of your open hand.
These two wonderful sister missionaries taught a rather large, ok a very large, woman and she was baptized but had nothing to wear for the confirmation in the sacrament meeting. These sisters went to a store and purchased two identical skirts, borrowed our sewing machine and spent the time to completely reconstruct the two skirts into one extra-large skirt which would fit the woman. These sisters are a perfect example of our mission slogan, "youbanfa" which translated into English means "there is a way!"
This is Sister Greene with brother Lin. He is a very nice man who teaches English and we have gotten to know him very well and have taught him the gospel. His father was in the hospital for a few weeks after choking on some food and did not breathe for a long time which caused brain damage. We went to see him in the hospital and assisted his son-in-law in giving brother Lin's father a blessing. His wife has been a member of the church for thirty-five years and their son and daughter are members and have both served missions for the church, married returned missionaries and have five children between the two of them. Brother Lin's father died and Sister Greene and I were invited to the Buddhist funeral for him. It was very different from those we are familar with but we were very impressed with the way the extended family of this man were honored and respected and they even recognized Elder Greene as a minister of the Church of Jesus Christ and had him come up and show his respect to the family.
The day after the funeral we were picked up at the mission office by brother Lin's son and we spent about an hour-and-a-half at their home teaching about the state of the spirit after it leaves the mortal body. We used many of the scriptures from the 40th chapter of Alma in the Book of Mormon. After our visit in their home we were taken to a very nice out-door restaurant for a family dinner. At the dinner was brother and sister Lin, her mother, their son Nelson with his wife and two children. We had a wonderful time together and we have invited brother and sister Lin to our apartment this friday evening for a Mexican dinner and a lesson on the Lord's "plan of happiness." He and I have a lot in common. He likes to garden and makes great home-made bread and my father and his father died with in about two months of each other. Needless to say he and I get along quite well.
Chinese children are beautiful and I think in the pre-existance I must have been partly Chinese.