Church with the Chao's

Sunday morning rolls around and in America, that is the time when church usually occurs.

This is not the same in Taiwan.

We decided that it would be fun to go to church with Mrs. Chao and Eric so that we could experience what it was like to go to church in another country. Everything was, of course, in Chinese, but we didn't care. It was a great service. The church consists of about 25 people and according to Mrs. Chao, they are all rich. When I first heard that there were 25 rich folks renting out a room in an expensive club to have a church service I expected them to be snobby rich people going to church because they have to. That assumption was very wrong. The small group of believers were on fire for God and it was so cool to see people so passionate in another country. Eric was able to translate some of the service for us and one thing that the preacher said was that Taiwan is now 10% Christian. Isn't that awesome! I was so stoked to hear that. The service was pretty much like a service in America, aside from the Chinese. They started with a couple songs, had an offering, greeted each other, welcomed new guests, and had the sermon. Sophie and I were also able to get up and sing a couple verses of "Amazing Grace" which they all knew the melody to so they enjoyed it. The preacher, who was female, talked about how we need to realize what our purpose is on this Earth while we are here and how if we had no purpose, why would we still be here. God would have taken us if we had no purpose.

It was a great experience and we were very happy to have shared it with them. It's so cool how God works everywhere in the world, even in Taiwan. If, 30 years ago, you would have said that Taiwan would be 10% Christian, people would laugh in your face. Now, it is happening! Taiwan ROCKS!

Sophia and Jack with the Pastor

The Marvelous Marketers

Yesterday was a very eventful day.

As I mentioned before, one of the main reasons that we were able to come on this awesome trip was with the understanding that we would promote Monte Vista while we were here. Yesterday, we did just that. 

We started off the day by getting together all of the promoting tools (brochures, business cards, USB things, etc.) and setting off for one of the biggest agencies in Taiwan. An agency is a business that specializes in placing students in international schools. The agency that we visited was the same one that placed Eric at Monte Vista. We arrived and were met by two very nice ladies who were eager to hear what we had to say. We began to take out all of the promoting tools that I had and let them see and inspect them all. Eric was very helpful here because although they did speak English, Eric was able to make some things clearer in Chinese. He was also one of our biggest advertising tools. A guy from Taiwan that went to this school and is now going to UPenn. That is huge! A rival school to Monte Vista is Robert Louis Stevenson High School in Pebble Beach. If was fun to find out that all of the international students at RLS that applied to UPenn were rejected. Monte Vista must be doing something right. The ladies seemed to be very excited that we had come. They were very impressed that Monte Vista would send us to advertise and how that sets Monte Vista appart from other schools. Until yesterday, the agency didn't know much about Monte Vista. Now, they know so much more that they believe, with the iPads and Eric, they can send many more students to our school. It was a great way to start the day!

The Gang with the gals from the Agency. See what they're holding?

After the successful time at the agency we went to a well-deserved lunch at a local Japanese ramen place. We were enjoying our meal when out of nowhere a woman walks in and pays for our meal. We find out that Eric's dad knew where we were and called an old friend to come and pay for our food. We couldn't believe it. The hospitality here is amazing! They are the nicest people ever! God is so good to us!

Eric's school's logo

When lunch was over, we made our wat to Eric's middle school. The middle school wasn't as successful as the agency but we did get to drop off some brochures and I sang a song for one of the classes. They loved me. The school was very nice and, according to Eric, had a lot of new buildings. We met one of Eric's teachers and she was super cool. She taught Literature at the school. A cool thing that this school had were ESL classes taught by American teachers. 

Overall, it was a great day and we got the word out about Monte Vista. Hopefully, because of this trip, there can be a couple more students coming to Monte Vista in Fall 2012. 

I like this photo

Our Meeting with the Missonary

God has been good to us this trip. He has provided safety, health and fun. Yesterday God also provided a way for us to make a difference in a Vietnamese families' life that had just lost their son. Isn't God Amazing!

We have been in contact with a Vietnamese Missionary, Koah (Kwah), that is affiliated with the Free Methodist Denomination. We were able to set up a day to go and talk with him. We picked him up at the subway and walked to a local coffee shop and talked with him. Koah was sent by the Free Methodist's to start to help the Vietnamese people in Taiwan and start evangelizing to them. Koah talked about how his main goal is to train people here and then send them back to Vietnam so that they can start ministering there. He cannot do that in Vietnam because he is not a citizen and the Communist party there watches him very closely whenever he visits. He has successfully planted a church here in Taiwan and many secret home groups in Vietnam. It is amazing to see how God has used him and his family here.

Before coming on this trip, we received an anonymous donation with one request by the giver: use this money to help a family in need. We were lost on how to use this money effectively. There seemed to be no poor families in the parts of Taiwan that Eric was taking us. We decided to ask Koah what he thinks we should do with the money and he had the perfect idea. In the Vietnamese church there is a family who's son had just died. He had raised money to come to Taiwan to work and had just recently died in a terrible accident. The family is very poor and cannot afford to buy a plane ticket for the father to come over from Vietnam to help bring back the son's body. In an effort to help, Koah has started to raise money among the believers to help with the financial burden that has been put on this family. When we heard that story, we knew that that is where the money needed to go. We were able to donate $50 (US) to this family in prayer that God will use this to really help that family.

Eric, Koah, Jack and Sophie

We ask, if you can, please join with us in prayer for this family. They really need it. Pray that God will provide the rest of the funds needed and for comfort as they have lost a loved one.

In Proverbs 19:17 it says, "Whoever is generous to the poor lends to the Lord, and he will repay him for his deed." Thank you to our anonymous donner, God knows who you are and I believe that he will bless you through this donation. 

Want to see some Taiwanese Magic?

We have learned a lesson from the Taiwanese Night Market for the price of $200 (TW).

Don't trust bunnies.

Satan

Picture three young and naive teenagers walking the night market in Taiwan. As they turn a corner they come across a nice old man selling cute felt bunnies. The young teenagers, although naive, would just keep walking at such a childish object, but something about those bunnies caught their attention. When commanded, those little felt bunnies would sit, jump, or even lay down. HOW COULD THIS BE! The three teenagers stood and stared in amazement, each one trying to conceive how it might work. What is this old man doing that makes these little bunnies jump? Another amazing thing is that it works in both Chinese and English. The teenagers all took turns commanding the bunny to do various things and it responded! They were amazed. "We need to get some of these for our friends!" they said, still a little skeptical of its power but not skeptical enough to not buy one. The old man gave the price of $100 a piece and they couldn't resist. They dug in their wallets and gave the man the money for two and got their prizes. It was then and then only that they began to see what was really happening and got the sick feeling that they had just been played by an old man in Taiwan. It was also the moment that they saw a string attached to the old man's ring and watched as the bunny moved right with his hand. Had they really been that stupid to buy something so ridiculous? Yes. Yes they had. They now are in possession of two worthless felt bunnies with strings on their backs, waiting to trick the next young soul stupid enough to pay attention. 

I guess that everyone can learn from this. As Forest says, "Stupid is as stupid does." Well, the stupid Americans did as the stupid American does and proved how stupid an American is when a felt bunny does. 

Stupid Americans. 

Sophia finally posted!

So im not a blogger and have never written a blog post..but Jack said I should stop being lame and actually post something since I haven't yet...here goes nothing! haha
Anyways, Taiwan has been INCREDIBLE.  From the humid weather (it's like you are tasting water as you breath) to the good and sometimes strange food, it has been an adventure- and we have only been here a few days! Today Eric's dad took the three of us to breakfast at the best restaurant in Taiwan, which also was rated one of the top ten in the world! .....I guess it was alright... kidding! It was delicious AND the service was incredible! Within a minute of sitting down there were waitresses bringing us tea and water.  The restaurant is famous for dumplings, and so we had various kinds of filling..from pork and chicken to red and black bean. The food is so neat here! (Along with pretty much everything else..)

Once it got darker, we went to 'Taipei 101' which is the tallest building in Taiwan! It also has (so I am told) the fastest elevator in the world! ..It went up about 90 floors in less than 40 seconds. Once at the top the view was amazing! I will just show a picture..although my camera does not capture the fluorescence well enough to do the view justice....still beautiful though!

This view was probably the highlight of my day, city lights at night are so incredible! 

WELL I can now say I have officially posted my first blog.. Jack is much better at this than I am but I will hopefully improve and learn his skillful ways of blogging...

Goodbye from Taiwan!

I'm Proud to be an American!

One last thing before I go to bed that is too great not to post.

As we were coming back to Taipei from Taichung, at the train station, we ran into some nice police officers that wanted to take our picture with them. They didn't speak English so Eric and Mark had to translate and I guess they wanted pictures with us that they could post on their website to show that they are friendly to foreigners and that they welcome them (and their money). Sophie and I were just laughing as they came up with their camera and wanted to take pictures. I guess I should have expected it since we are so beautiful and American. We say that it is okay to take pictures and the older cop has his partner take a picture with me and then he takes a picture with Sophie. He was obviously the smarter cop. It was the funniest thing!

Oh to be American, such a hard life, full of paparazzi. Haha

These guys were the greatest

Well, it's about 2am here so I need to sleep! Goodnight!

This is definitely going on the Blog

The title of this entry is a very common phrase during this trip. Everything here is so cool and different that I just want to blog it all! Sadly, I cannot. But let me try to get you all up to date.

We are WAY too cool for you!

Breakfast. The stuff that looks like soup with meat is the
Stinky Tofu and Duck's Blood

Yesterday (Sunday), after the amazing breakfast that I wrote about, Eric's parents drove us to the train station in Taipei and we took the Bullet Train to Taichung. The Bullet Train can go up to 350 km/hr, but do to all of the stops, we only got up to 210 km/hr (which is still very fast). While you are in the train you don't even realize how fast you're going until you look out the window and see Taiwan blaze past you. It was a really cool experience.

We arrived in Taichung, which is a lot like Taipei, and were greeted by Eric's cousin Mark and friend Marvin. Mark is a junior high social economics teacher. I'm not sure about Marvin, but he was a cool guy. We started off by driving for a little over an hour until we got to Sun Moon Lake. It is the biggest lake in Taichung and super beautiful. The town at the lake reminds me of Mexico. There are a lot of people and they all want your business. We started walking around and decided that we were going to take a boat tour around the lake, but not until after we had a huge lunch, of course. We have a man go and find a good restaurant for us and we go in. Mark and Marvin order the lunch and we sit there helplessly as they catch up in Chinese. The food kept coming. They would bring a couple dishes that looked like plenty of food for the 5 of us and then they would bring more! And then more. We had so much food. The cool thing is that the food is very cheap and, for instance, we had a great breakfast this morning that fed all three of us and it was only a little more than $3.00. Why can't America be this cheap? Oh well, at least we don't eat Duck's Blood (no offense Eric).

Sophia is learning how to eat the "right way"

During the lunch it started to rain really hard. I mean REALLY HARD! It was so random. We stayed in the restaurant until the rain died down and went to the boats. They had a really cool system. You paid like $200 (TW), $6 (US), and got to go on a boat that took you to the first stop. You go as long as you want at the first stop and then go back and another boat will take you to the second stop. You take as long as you want, go back and take another boat back to the town. The first stop was at one of the holiest temples in Taiwan. You arrive at the bottom of a hill that when you walk up, you get to the temple (funny how that works). It was a beautiful temple and there were a lot of people bowing to the god or godess, I couldn't tell, and burning incense. After the temple tour we got back on the boat and we were taken to another small town. It was super cool and I was able to get some presents for this Doula I know ;). The whole tour was so much fun and so beautiful.

We have done so much and I will post more as it goes. I have posted a bunch of photos on my facebook, www.facebook.com/jackfreakinwilkins, and made it public so that even if you're not my friend, you can see it.

I love you all and thanks for reading!

Eric, Mark, Sophie and I are super awesome

A Break in the Action

We have been going all day! (I am on Eric's cousin Mark's computer so I can't put any photos up right now. Whe I get to my computer tomorrow, I will put a bunch up.)

I slept surprisingly well on the bed in Eric's closet. I thought that because of jetlag, I would wake up at like 4am and be wide awake. That, thankfully, was not the case. I slept until 6:20 and felt very good. Sophie was awake at 5. She's starting to feel the effects.

We started the day by going to a great Taiwanese breakfast place. Eric, his mom and dad, Sophie and I drove all through Taipei until we arrived at the restaurant, "No Name" (and yes, that's it's name). One of the more interesting items of the menu, that we had, was Stinky Tofu and Duck's Blood. Of course, they didn't tell us it was Duck's blood until we had both tried it. It wasn't bad and until they told us what it was I thought it was a strange meat of some kind. I only tried it once. There was also some really good beef, chicken, noodles and also the leaves of a sweet potato, which was one of my favorites. The meal was served in a cafeteria style and then it all came with rice. The rice we had was called "Congee" and it is rice served in water. It went really well with this ground up pork and cucumber dish we had. After the meal Sophie and I felt like we never had to eat again in our lives. Not because it was bad, which it wasn't, but because in Taiwan, the food in cooked in buckets of grease and packed to the max with flavor. If I lived in Taiwan, I would have to go on Biggest Looser. The only thing is that even though we were full, you never stop eating. Everywhere we go there is a new, famous food that we need to try or a different restaurant to eat in. Right now, after 3 meals that we weren't necessarily hungry for, we are at Mark's parent's house and the grandmother is giving us all this different food to eat. Even though our stomach's feel like they are going to burst, we still say yes and try everything. She is so sweet, but I think she won't truly be happy until we have eaten all the food in her house. She just now gave us a whole can of nuts and a can of See's candy. Lord help us.

We have done so much today and I wish I could sit here and write it all. We are leaving to spend the night at a house that has no Internet so I won't be able to write the rest, or post photos, until I return to my Mac. But until then...

 I love you all and Nee-how piao liang (you are beautiful)

WE MADE IT!!!!

After almost 24 hours of travel, WE HAVE ARRIVED IN TAIWAN!!! We landed at the Taipei International Airport and proceeded to go through customs. Let me tell you, God was watching over us because we had no trouble in customs, it was easy, and we are now safely in Eric's home.

Taipei is a beautiful city! Sadly I have no photos of the city yet, but I do have a nice one of Eric.

When we arrived at Eric's we got situated and took showers. After the shower we were treated to a Taiwanese delicacy, Pizza Hut. This wasn't just any Pizza Hut, the pizzas were seafood pizza and Korean BBQ pizza. It was awesome! I was super surprised. They also ordered some Chicken that was very good!

Everything so far is AWESOME! I can't wait for the awesome adventures soon to come.

My Sleeping Arrangement

Tokyo is HOT!

Well, we made it to Tokyo!

My leg room

After the 10 hours in the air my legs have survived and after a bit of confusion, we have found where we need to be to pick up our flight to Taipei. The flight was not as bad as I thought it would be. There were 3 and 1/4 movies played, 2 meals, a snack, and even some episodes of Fraiser. The flight attendants were nice and no babies cried (THANK THE LORD!). Sophie was able to sleep some and I rested a little. All in all, it was a successful flight.

Sophie at the WiFi Table

We arrived in Tokyo and the first thing that meets you when you exit the plane doors is HUMIDITY (and lots of it). Everybody at the "Free Wi-Fi Table" is looking like they are in a sauna, including me. It is soooo hot!

Would you like a Sprite?

When we got off the plane, being the minors that we are, we didn't really know what to do and neither did any of the Japanese workers. We aimlessly wandered the airport until an angel from God behind an information desk helped the stupid Americans get where they needed to be. Now, we are trying to get in touch with the family and I thought it would be a good time to update you all.

Child Play area in Airport (we spent a lot of time here)

Tokyo Airport

More fun when we get to Taiwan!

Wish us Luck! (or pray, PLEASE PRAY!! haha)

AT THE AIRPORT!!

So our plane is about to board and I wanted to make sure we got something on here.

We are so excited about this! I feel like this is the beginning to a life-changing event. ERIC CHAO, HERE WE COME!! I will update in Tokyo and when we get to Taiwan.

 HERE WE GO!!

 

And the winner is...

LAUREL PAVESI!!! 

Laurel's ticket was picked by Headmaster Steve Sharp at Monte Vista today. She will be receiving a $100 Corralitos Market Giftcard. Thanks again to everyone who bought tickets, you are all winners (if winners is defined as: Awesome people that help dreams come true).

The plane takes off in 14 hours. WOW! Even with all of the rush of preparing, packing and my mom freaking out about everything, I feel ready. I have been so blessed by God with such an amazing family, group of friends, and church family. This trip would not be happening if they hadn't heard God's voice in this, which is pretty obvious, and reacted.

In Psalm 34:7 it says, "The angel of the LORD encamps around those who fear him, and he delivers them." I believe that as Sophia and I travel for 13+ hours tomorrow that the angel of the Lord will be with us and deliver us to Taiwan safely and keep us healthy. I hope you all believe that too!

LET'S DO THIS THING EVERYBODY!!!!!

~ Jack

P.S. If you don't believe that Laurel won, here is video proof of Mr. Sharp pulling the ticket.

   

God is GREAT!

I cannot believe how blessed Sophia and I are that we can say this.

We have officially raised ALL OF THE MONEY that we need for the plane tickets for this trip! That is over $2600.00! Praise God!

We would like to thank Monte Vista Christian School for their generous contribution and we would also like to thank everyone who participated in our raffle. Without you, this trip would not have happened.

The winning ticket from the raffle for the $100 Corralitos Market Giftcard will be drawn June 9 by Headmaster Steve Sharp of MVCS. 

I am starting to become nervous/excited about what this trip is becoming. At the very beginning, this trip was so that Sophie and I could go hang out with the super-popular Eric Chao. That's all it was, a crazy summer vacation. Now, it has become so much more than that. This change occurred, when God stepped in.

The list of things that needed to happen for this trip is huge, and most of them seemed impossible at first. How could we raise $2600? How will our parents even let us go? All these questions that seemed not to have answers started to become miraculously clear as God got onboard. The money started to come, the parents' minds started to calm, and the door started to open. We have a chance to meet Missionaries while we are there. We have a chance to get information that could change the relationship of the students at our school. We have a chance to change lives. HOW AWESOME IS THIS!?!?! I believe that the only reason Sophia and I are boarding that plane on Friday is because God is putting us on that plane. He has plans for this trip that I can't even comprehend.

Less than 48 hours left and Houston, WE ARE GO!

Keep an eye on this thing and there will be updates Galore!

THREE DAYS UNTIL DEPARTURE!

Wow!

So if you don't know, Jack Wilkins and Sophia Buie are embarking on an adventure that will change their lives forever. Jack Wilkins and Sophia Buie are going to Taiwan!

This trip to Taiwan was concocted for three reasons:
1) To hang out with the super-popular, recently graduated Eric Chao
2) To expand their horizons
3) To participate in a Cultural Exchange Program (CEP) with Monte Vista Christian School (MV)

Jack, Eric, and Sophia at Graduation

The CEP is a product of the brilliant minds of Jack, Sophia, and Headmaster Steve Sharp of MV. While in Taiwan, Jack and Sophia will experience what it is like to be thrown into a new culture and survive. This is an experience that boarding students at MV have to experience every year they decide to attend MV. As Jack and Sophia go through the whirlwind of a new culture, new food, unfamiliar faces, and being much taller than most of the population, they will document their trip and bring back their findings to MV. They will then present them to the student body. They are hoping to raise awareness of how a dorm student lives and how the students can support them and hopefully engage dorm students in American Culture.

This blog is a portal for family, friends, acquaintances, second-cousins and nomads to experience this epic trip right along side Jack and Sophia.

Check back daily starting June 10, 2011 for updates from Jack and Sophia and get ready for one WILD RIDE!

(P.S. From now on, the posts will not be in third person)