ANOTHER AMAZING FUNERAL PARADE

At the head of this parade was the female band leader and two flower tossers with their baskets of flowers followed by the young woman's band playing hymns. What the women wear in these parades never fails to amaze me.

I have never learned the meaning of the men decorated like devils in attire that would be appropriate for an American Halloween parade.

These characters are fairly common in parades here. There were four or five in this parade.

All of the funeral parades have drum trucks followed by huge drums on wheels which are beat upon by walking drumers

Sister Greene is never far from her desk especially when new missionaries are scheduled to arrive or when missionaries are preparing to go home. We had seventeen new missionaries arrive two days ago and she did all of the paperwork to get them here legally along with countless letters to the missionaries, parents, bishops and stake presidents long before they even enter the Missionary Training Centers, either in Provo, UT. for foreign missionaries or in the Phillipines for the local Taiwan missionaries. Five days after these missionaries arrived we have fourteen missionaries completing their missions and returning to their homes, and Sister Greene has to have all of their exit packets, missionary travel tickets and documents completed and in their hands and everyone mentioned above notified by mail weeks before they are scheduled to leave. As for Elder Greene, I have to have all of their financial paperwork completed for their arrival and later for their departure, plus getting their monthly money to them during their mission and in my spare time I pay all of their rent, utility, travel and other expenses related to the missionaries and the mission home..

A TRIP TO THE TAIPEI TEMPLE

Last Saturday some of us in our small LDS Branch went to the Taipei, Taiwan Temple. The Girls in this picture are the English teachers who came to Taichung to spend six months to a year teaching English to young children at two different private schools. In all we have ten LDS young women who are all university graduates and they give our little English speaking Branch a great deal of support. Our Relief Society President, Primary President and Young woman's President all come from this group of young women.

This young member, and a close friend of ours, is applying to attend BYU-Idaho and is hoping to be accepted for the Fall 2010 semester. Her name is Geena Li and she served a mission here in Taiwan.

These are some of the members, meeting outside of the temple, who made the three-hour trip to the temple with us. Some made it a family outing and brought their children.

This is just a small Portion of the huge Taichung Cemetery where thousands of mostly Buddhist Chinese are buried. The giant pagoda is a focal point on the edge of the cemetery and from the various floors you can see the whole cemetery

Today is Monday, April 5, in Taichung, Taiwan and is the annual Qing Ming Festival or better known in the USA as Memorial Day. We left early, about 8:30, for the cemetery with forty two Sisters and Elders to participate in a large service project involving the cleaning, sweeping and bagging of trash that had collected since last year. We all wore the church "Helping Hands" shirts and were very visible among the hundreds of Chinese there to clean up the tombs and graves of their departed loved ones. On many occasions, as Sister Greene and I picked up empty food containers and other trash, people would come up to us and thank us for cleaning their cemetery. They were surprised and very pleased at what we were doing and often people would bring their trash to us rather than throwing it on the ground. There were TV camera crews and reporters there and some of us will be on the evening news report, although none of us will see it. This kind of service project is very good public relations for the church.

Elder and Sister Greene cleaning a few of the grave sites in this predominantly Buddhist cemetery. A number of graves were in disrepair with no family members to attend to them.

Sister Infanger (from Idaho) on the left and Sister Weinheimer (Ivins, UT) on the right.

When we finished we hiked a short distance to a coverd pavillion, with President Hoer and Sister Infanger carrying the water, to eat a lunch that the city government had provided for us. It was a full morning effort that was well appreciated by the government and all of the Chinese families who were visiting the grave sites and we missionaries really enjoyed giving a morning of service. The weather was overcast and cool during the work but as we finished and gathered together to eat, the heavens opened and we had a heavy rain which lasted until we had finished eating and were ready to head back to the mission office.

AN AMAZING FUNERAL PARADE

We live about a block from a huge walled mortuary, larger than a normal city block, with daily funerals and processions, but yesterday we saw something that I doubt we will ever see again. We don't know who died but it must have been an important politician or a high-ranking military General. The parade came down the main street right next to our mission office and with all of the beating of drums and the loud music, we were interested in seeing what was going on. The parade started with six or eight huge trucks loaded with people and drums. They were followed by about forty identical brand new and very expensive black cars which were all decorated with identical strips of white decorations on the hood and beautiful white flowers on four-wheelers in front and behind. They were followed by a long line of high school girls in matching short red mini-skirts playing "Nearer My God To Thee," on musical instruments

The drum corp was next with some huge drums on wheels and men beating in cadence on smaller drums as well. They were followed by a large group of men all dressed alike in yellow hats. Behind them was a military drill team going through a rifle spinning routine with a military band behind playing , with "gusto, the hymn "Nearer My God To Thee."

Following the military band was a group of female Budhist monks with shaved heads leading the huge stretch funeral hearse. On the front of the fresh white flower decorated hearse was a picture of the deceased man.

Directly in front of the hearse was a group of women dressed in black and carrying baskets of white rose petals which they scattered on the pavement. We were somewhat surprised to see, what appeared to be, by his clothing, a Protestant or Catholic clergyman walking along in the procession. Behind the hearse was the family, of about a dozen women and men all dressed in black with what appeared to be the man's wife being assisted on either side by women holding her up and at times appeared to be carrying her as she mourned. Behind the family, bringing up the end of the parade, were about two or three hundred people, mostly men, all dressed in black, and they all seemed to be out for a stroll down the street displaying little if any emotion. The parade lasted about thirty minutes and really stopped or slowed down anyone trying to navigate with or around the parade.

Our faithful and hard working assistants to the mission president, Elders Hall and Oldham, finally cleaning out their office.

A couple of blocks from our apartment is a huge Buddhist mortuary and these paid flag carriers and the drivers of the decorated trucks in the background will all be part of the funeral procession after the service. These funerals occur seven days a week and usually more than one or two each day.

Sister Greene in the beatiful garden of the huge Confucius Temple. The tree behind her has an amazing root base.

Shopping at the street market.

This is at the ultra modern Costco store in Taichung. It would be hard, if not impossible, to see a sight like this in an American Costco. They have live fish, crabs and clams on display along with the pre-packaged meats, etc.

STREET MARKET & THE GOLD BUDDHA TEMPLE

Right across the street from our apartment is this street market where we purchase most of our fruit and vegetables. They also have various other stalls selling raw meat, usually pork,which they cut up for you, fish, eggs, noodles, clothing, Chinese herbs and grains, and a lot of household items. They also have a number of food stalls selling prepared Chinese food. We arrived a little late this morning and there weren't as many customers at the market as usual.

This huge gold Buddha is at a temple about two or three blocks from our apartment. It is quite large and ornate with a temple and other worship buildings within the large walled compound.
Elder Greene is standing in front.

This is a new outer building that has been constructed over a much smaller and older temple to help preserve it and to protect it from weather and damage. Sister Greene is standing near the doorway at the top of the steps.

Elder and Sister Greene on our preparation day seeing a little of Taichung. We are fortunate to have another huge temple, honoring Confucius, about a block in the opposite direction , from our apartment as well.

A TYPICAL SIGHT WALKING TO THE OFFICE EACH DAY.

This mother has a unique way of taking her children with her. The baby on the front is standing on a stool and her sister behind is actually tied to her mother's waist. I guess that it beats paying a babysitter. There is a law in Taichung forbidding more than two people at a time on a scooter but no one pays any attention to it and it is not too unusual to see two adults, a couple of children and somestimes a dog all sharing a single scooter. this mother's jacket is on backward to protect her shirt from getting dirty. It is also common to see many younger women wearing mini-skirts or short shorts on scooters.
This is where you can find Sister Greene, fulfilling her responsibilities about ten hours a day. It is remarkable the work that she gets done but she always finds time to give the sister missionaries a hug, a spiritual thought and a lot of love. Below is Sister Lin, a local missionary who finished her mission last week and returned to her home in Taipei, Taiwan. She was a special helper to Sister Greene for a few days before being released and saw her almost like a mother figure.

The Chinese people love beautiful green plants, flower gardens and fish ponds and they can be found all over Taichung. The gold and white fish in this small pond below, at the local "water" office complex, were huge and would swim to the edge of the pond expecting to be fed.

TEACHING IN THE NIGHT MARKET

This is the "Night Market" packed with hundreds of people socializing, shopping and eating. This is where new missionaries are brought their first night in Taichung, Taiwan teaching the gospel standing on a "Dan Jones" Box in the center of the busy street packed with people. They had arrived in Taichung just about twenty hours earlier. We come out to give support, sing hymns and encourage the new missionaries as they bear testimonies in their new language, Mandarin. It is a real confidence builder for the missionaries. After bearing their testimonies they each go with a seasoned companion and teach among the crowds of people. From tonights efforts collectively the missionaries received 87 referrals. President and Sister Hoer are in the center of the picture. We had twenty four Elders and Sisters with us.

While I was acting as a photographer for the mission Sister Greene, at the far left in the picture, joined in with some of the missionaries singing "Love at Home". The boxes that they individually stand on to preach from is in the forground.

We have a few Rexburg, Idaho missionaries in our mission. Above is Elder Lundin and the picture below is of Elder Gardner, who just arrived with this new group of missionaries.

164 Missionaries on the steps of a Daoist Temple at Sun-Moon Lake. It was a major production to get everyone lined up so all could be seen.

The popular "Hawaii 51" restaurant not far from the mission office. The owner of the restaurant is taking the missionary lessons and one of the young men working there is a member so they give all missionaries a large discount when we go there to eat. They have American hamburgers, fries, onion rings and all kinds of other Western dishes. A hamburger with fries costs 160 Taiwan dollars, about $5.00US, but she discounts it to us for $99. The exchange rate here is about $1.00 to 32 Taiwan dollars. The six sisters with us are great missionaries, Sisters Chen, Sollis, Infanger, Bretzke, King and Tung.

Inside a very ornate Buddhist temple, which is housed on the first floor of a high-rise building owned by a Buddhist television station in Taichung, are two stone Chinese Tigers. Below is a huge brass Buddha with an equally large brass insense burner. The walls and the ceiling are covered with thousands of impressive personalized brass plaques of financial doners.

                    We often passed this site on the way to Costco!

A group of young men dressed up like ancient Buddhist characters, beating on drums and collecting money from shop owners and people on the street for charity.

EVER CHANGING LIFE IN TAICHUNG

It is interesting what you can see on the streets and in the buildings of Taichung. There is little question as to this man's best friend who gets to sit up front for the world to see! He was thrilled to have me take this picture, before they took off down the street on the scooter with the dog's ears flapping in the wind.

While sitting in the Cathay Bank today a sweet lady sat down nest to us and sitting on her shoulder was a cute little bird. She held it up for a picture and then she set it down on the back of the bench and it quickly jumped on JoAnn's shoulder and gave her a kiss. Actually I think that the bird spied some left-over lunch on her teeth and decided that it was his for the taking.

We have English teachers and young members over quite often. Bush, the boy next to me, is soon to turn 18 and though his dad isn't against him becoming a member of the church he felt Bush needed a little more time to decide for sure if it was right for him to be baptized. Angela, next to JoAnn is a young member and a helper to us all. Lisa Hammon, holding up the "victory" sign, is an English teacher and has just finished teaching in Taichung. She leaves in five days and will travel all over Asia for almost three months before returning home to the States. The new English teachers arrived a few days ago and ten of them showed up at church yesterday. Eight are LDS and all are college graduates. They will be a great blessing to our small English speaking branch.

President and Sister Hoer trying to get 164 Elders and Sisters to line up on the steps of a huge temple to have our picture taken. It was a remarkable feat to get us all lined up according to height on about a dozen or more steps so that every face could be seen, and then to stand still long enough to have a picture taken.

CHRISTMAS CAROLING IN THE TAICHUNG PLAZA

We began our Christmas celebration with the missionaries in a local shopping plaza. They shared the spirit of Christmas with their carols and with many tracts and copies of the Book of Mormon given to interested passers by. It's amazing how many people, even on the streets, wish us a Merry Christmas, but so few celebrate the real reason for the season. Even the immigration office had a decorated tree and chocolates to pass out!

Strolling the modern plaza with President and Sister Hoer in the lead. This is where JoAnn had the special experience with the woman selling plants. She was prompted to buy a certain one for Jim for Christmas when the woman refused to accept any payment but gave it to her as a gift, accompanied by a hug! It was a beautiful expression of love and kindness.

Jim with an old missionary friend from his Hong Kong missionary days, Jim Phillips. Elder and Sister Phillips are public affairs missionaries in much of Asia but they live in Taipei. We enjoyed a lovely dinner with them.

         President and Sister Hoer with Elder and Sister Phillips.