Elder Chase Millett: Basketball, Blood, and a Baptism

Hi Family. I hope that you are all doing well. We are doing fantastic here in Taibao!

To start off, WE HAD A BAPTISM ON SATURDAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yep, We officially welcomed Sister Chen into the branch yesterday!!!

So that is super awesome. The baptism was fun. Look at Sister Chen's before and after pictures and you can see the difference. She is glowing!!! (the before is her in her baptismal clothes and the after is the one with the branch members.) It was super cool to be able to witness that. It shows how much of a difference the gospel makes in peoples' lives. She is a super cool person and I can't wait to see how she progresses. Elder Watson and I sang a special musical number for it. At the baptism, we sang Nearer My God To Thee, but in Chinese of course! So that was fun.

As for the basketball part; On Saturday, before the baptism, we biked out to Xin Pi to meet a potential investigator. We had gone to this park last Saturday and played basketball with him and with some middle school age boys. We told him that we would like to meet him again and he said that we could come back and play with him the coming Saturday, so we did. He seems to like us, so we are slowly working up to sharing the Gospel with him.

As for the blood part; so after the baptism, a couple in the ward wanted to take us out for a bite to eat. We went to this place that we had never been to. Apparently this place uses like every part of the animal. So, they brought out this plate with some weird black-ish rice looking stuff. I ate some, and it wasn't too bad, a little bitter though. They told me that it was coagulated chicken blood!!! So, yeah, that was weird, but it was fun!!! I also ate some pig's skin (some from its head and some from elsewhere.) And I had a bowl of pretty typical beef noodle soup (so good!!!!)

The Costco experience in Taiwan is fun. It's like a little piece of home right here in Taiwan. It is very very similar, but the one here is a little bit smaller.

I am definitely enjoying this place. There are some downfalls though. Right now, it is moving into the spring season, which is like summer basically. Seasons aren't as different here as they are at home. It is pretty much warm all year round. We have had a couple of chilly days though, but they don't happen very often. It is starting to heat up, so the humidity is going up and the mosquitoes are multiplying. We have managed to bring the number of them in our apartment down, but outside it is still hard to keep them off of me, but I have been using bug spray and some mosquito repelling ointment that a member gave me and it seems to help a little bit. Other missionaries don't seem to have the same problem with mosquitoes that I am having. Maybe it is just because I am still new on the island. They must like that sweet American blood! Haha! We bike a lot, some places are like a 40-50 minute bike ride away, but because it is all flat, it isn't too bad. My legs don't get very sore, but my knees get kind of sore sometimes. But I guess I'll get used to it.

As for how I am adjusting, I am doing pretty good. I am still a little bit nervous about using the language, but Elder Watson has told me that the members have been impressed with how much I can say already. They are surprised that I am so new and can say so much. Our apartment is ok I guess. It is just not home though. It has NO carpet. It is all tile and wood. It is pretty old and worn, but it works though, gives us a place to live.

Anyways, that's about what's been going on this week. I hope things are going well for you. I hope that my car will get fixed promptly. And I will talk to you soon!!!

With lots of love,

Elder Chase J. Millett