Apartment Searching...

Grace and Peace to You all!
Well searching for apartments, and I guess practically everything is difficult when you don't know the language. A couple of days ago we took apartment finding into our own hands. Allison and I just started walking and looking at random buildings that seemed to be apt. buildings. We were walking when we saw a very nice big apt. complex. In Taiwan apartment complex's aren't normal. Here apartmetnts are grouped together in buildings side by side but each building or even each apartment can be owned by different landlords! Complex's are usually more expensive. When we came upon this apartment complex we found that it had a huge gate surrounding it and wonderful security guards guarding this gate. We wanted to check out the price so we approached the security guard. Once again language is a barrier. I asked if we could see the apartments and see the manager to ask the price and the security guard thought that we just wanted to "visit" the apartments.....like you "visit" the beach....So he politely told us "No, I can not let you in." We were a bit confused because we didn't know why he thought we just wanted to go in the complex and "take in the sights"; we wanted to see how much apartments were. The security guard was a sweet fellow, he loved his job and had a can-do attitude, and he was also very serious about his job. We started to walk away until we heard someone yelling, "Hello, sir!" We turned around and the security guard was waving at us to come back. We walked back and we saw an older gentlemen with our friendly security guard. The security guard still thought we just wanted to visit the apartments so this older gentlemen, being that he lived there, was going to show us around. Since this older gentleman was going to walk us around, the security guard let us in. When he let us in he quickly put on his nice security guard hat and smiled:) We finally got the point across, in some broken chinese from our end, that we wanted to look-to-rent, and he understood, gave us a price range that was way out of our budget, and then we said our goodbye's. As we were leaving he saluted us with a very big smile, knowing that he had done his job and that his boss would be very proud of him. Overall I believe we both,us and the security guard, learned a lot about communication that day.

We continued searching for apartments and got some GREAT help from a couple of people on staff. We looked all day, and found one that we liked but it was on the 5th floor! We met up again later that evening to look at a couple more but none of them gave us peace. Finally the landlord said that she had a couple more if we would like to see them.....We walked around to the next apt. building and there was an apt. open on the 2nd floor! Wouldn't you know that this was the place that God had prepared for us all day, the very last one:) Everyone who was with us walked in and was making comments about how great and how clean this apt. was. We really felt God was confirming over and over that this was the place He had set aside for us. We decided on this one and looked at one more just to know, and agreed to rent the 2nd floor apt. for two years! God really and truly blessed us with this apt. We are about a 10 sec walk to our friends, and a 1 or 2 min. walk from some more of our friends. Also our landlord, as we asked, offered to give us brand new cabinets in our kitchen and throw in a brand new stove! The YWAM taiwanese staff all said that this landlord is a great one to have, which is really important. We are now moved in, got a refrigerator that we bargained for, which part of the bargaining led to me actually helping the guy carry it up to our apt., instead of him hiring one of his friends, and are now bulding our new home.

Our wonderful friends also took us to the IKEA and the COSTCO here in Taiwan. That was the first time for Allison and I to ever go, either here or in the U.S. We found some things at IKEA to start bulding our home. Apartments here are completely unfurnished, so we just had a lot of empty rooms. By far, our bedroom is way ahead of the rest of the apartment. We found many things that we put in our bedroom and also got blessed by two fantastic chairs, and a mattress!

Earlier this morning I was reading Heb. 11, which some call the "Hall of Faith". In this chapter God says that "without faith it is impossible to please him, and those who seek Him must believe that He exists, and that He rewards those who diligently seek Him.." As I thought about those words I have really seen God's favor and provision as we have stepped out in faith coming to Taiwan. There have been times where we needed to declare that "Yes, God you do exist and you are a rewarder of those who seek your face!" A lot of the people in this chapter actually never saw the fruition of the promises that they were believing in, yet still believed! For us this is a challenge and encouragement. A challenge because the great promise, Jesus, we have, so we all the more should press-on in this "good fight of faith". IT also encourages us greatly to know that God is so all satisfying that even if we aren't seeing the immediate results of our faith, everyday we can be fulfilled by Him and His presence which will keep us and sustain us! We encourage you all to continue diligently seeking the Lord as He will very much reward and strengthen those who do! May the Lord bless you all!

Brr... Rabbit

It's cold here...We arrived safely in Taiwan two days ago and wow is it cold. It's not just cold but it's rainy so we came at the perfect time! Actually we are so thankful to be here and we have really felt God's presence and grace as He is affirming that this is where He wants us right now. We are so excited and anticipating what He wants us to do as we wait on Him to speak to us. We are excited and free to wait on Him to give us direction. This next week will be a time for us to seek the Lord's guidance together on a number of things so please pray for us!

Taiwan of course is a LITTLE different than the U.S. as many of you would figure:) There are some things that I need to get used to again and Allison is learning to adjust to used to! Here are some of the differences that we have already seen in our two days of being here:

• The last two nights Allison has woken up at odd times in the middle of the night and has told me," I'm hungry." It seems that our baby,Hannah Grace, is still on U.S. time and get's hungry in the middle of the night. We are hoping she adjusts to the time change soooon!


• We are staying in a 3 room apt. that the base let us stay in for free until we find our own. Actually we like to think of it as a 5 room apt. for the bathrooms/showers are all the same room. So we have two "bathrooms" but the bathrooms are the toilet, sink, and shower combined in one space. It's awesome, very convenient...


• We love to eat healthy so of course we like to check out the labels on food that we buy to check and see what we are eating. Well here the labels are all in chinese, so in that case we can't read it and just tell ourselves that it's gotta be good:)


• Dallas you thought you were all alone with all the crazy drivers...WRONG! It seems that that some of them migrated with us. I(Collin) knew about the driving here, but Allison didn't...she was surprised! Of course it's safe, and they don't go near as fast as drivers in Dallas, but there's not really any sidewalks and moped's and cars just drive where and how fast they want to...I think Allison might be exagerrating a little bit...I think it's fine:)


• Not only is it cold here, but there's no central heating system. So ALLISON layers up and walks around with blankets while she is inside. If we go for a walk(which we do when we go anywhere) it feels good when we get back to our apt.


• Anyone who travels to Taiwan: toilet paper goes in the trash can, not toilet, unless you want to be doing some fishing...


• Allison had a great experience when we went to the grocery store: we walked to check out and immediately the grocer started speaking chinese to her, which of course she looked to me because apparently she thinks I'm fluent...We made it and we're learning!


• Also before you go into any house or apt. you take your shoes off. This keeps things clean and it's viewed as being respectful. Plus you get to wear some really great slippers inside:)

Those are the things that we are adjusting to. Please know these are not at all complaints but just funny things that we are getting used to. Allison is brave. Today we went to my favorite place to eat and she tried everything! It was amazing and made me so happy:) We had dumplings. They are a little than dumplings in America so there's really not any great to explain it. This was Allison's first experience with Taiwanese food and she loved it! PRAISE the Lord! We hope each of you are doing well and savoring the goodness of our God, He is worthy! Bless you all.

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