Twilight...

I caved...I gave in...I read the Twilight series. I read it and didn't vomit as originally expected. Quite the opposite...I liked it. So here's what I thought:

My overall impression was very favorable. I really enjoy the way Stephenie Meyer writes because you can feel for the characters, feel as the characters, and really associate with the emotions they go through. She writes so that you can put yourself in the story as an objective third party or even as one of the characters. There are a lot of people who write with the intention of making the story seem wholly "other" and flowery and still unknowable.

While I cannot truly say I understand what it is like to be a vampire, I can understand frustration, self-depreciation, love, learning, struggle, inadequacy, and even loss. These emotions and experiences are all throughout the novels and speak to anyone who reads the stories. If you look merely at the surface (there is a human girl who falls in love with a vampire...purely fictitious and ridiculous) and read it purely for laughs, that's what you'll find; you won't like the story. However, if you read it with the intention of seeing the reality of a girl falling for a guy she thinks is way out of her league and empathizing with what each of the characters can and do feel in their situations, you'll definitely find relate-able characters, excitement, and even reminders about your own life and reactions to what you've experienced.

Any further than that...and...I'm...struggling for words.

Oh, and the last book was a complete let-down. "It's starting." And then what? What the freak, Stephenie, it never really starts and then it comes to a disappointing climax...because there was no climax. Uh...yeah...whatev.

I read "The Host" and liked it too. Similar reasons. The End.

Buying Local

Hello everyone. We've been in Portland for about a month and we have a month to go. I love living here and working at KPMG. I like the people in my office and enjoy the work I do. I'm looking forward to living here full-time and becoming a real Portlander.

Today I had a couple of thoughts pop into my head in between doing tax returns and wanted to share them with you.

1. I lived in Iowa this summer so I could learn to love strange accents. Last year I cringed whenever I heard the Minnesota "short a" and "long o" sounds. This year? I sometimes hear the Northwestern version of the same thing but this time I don't let it bother me. I always thought that the NW didn't have an accent but I am wrong. It sounds like locals are from Eastern Canada for some reason.

2. Vietnamese people are awesome. I also didn't realize that Portland has a huge Chinese and Vietnamese community. That means lots of cheap, good food for us! I had Pho for the first time while at training in LA and then again when I came home and I love it! I also got a haircut today from a Vietnamese lady for only $7.

3. Portland is split up into 5 "quadrants" NE, SE, SW, NW, and N. Yeah, it's weird, but we are in Portland. At least we don't call ourselves the Quad Cities when there are 5/6/7 cities. We live in Southeast. Northeast is rich, Southwest is suburban, NW is gentrified, and N is scary. SE has enough nice with enough crazy (one word: Hawthorne) that I really like it. Yeah half of it is rusting away, but I love it anyway.

4. Oregonians sure have goofy ideas on how to fix the bad economy here. One I hear a lot is to "buy local" which means to buy an overpriced Chinese product from a local store instead of from Wal-Mart. Yes, I know it means to buy local products from locally owned stores, but guess what? Not much grows in the winter anywhere in the USA so hope you had a good last dinner in October and can make it last until May.

However, I do have one area in which I agree that "buying local" helps out the individual. They are called entrepreneurs and they are the reason America has an amazing economy. Sometimes the person you pay for a service is the owner and only employee of a business. That Vietnamese lady I talked about before was great. I knew all of my $7 was going to her and her business. If I spent $14 at Great Clips closer to my house? Well, part goes to the employee, part to the owner, some to the franchise owner, etc. That franchiser uses that money to run TV advertising. That means some of my money goes to California and that's not acceptable! So find a place where you can help someone who does a good job and keep your money in Oregon instead of the alternative.

Thanks for listening.

We're Back!

Yes, that's right, we are back in America. We flew back on Friday night to Seattle. Megan's parents picked us up and we drove to Anacortes. A few things that I noticed quickly:

1. Driving on the right: Just as my brain was getting used to looking right before crossing the road, I have to switch back! I still sometimes walk down the roads here in Anacortes and expect a taxi driver to honk at me.

2. Lots of Daylight: Many of the places we visited are near the equator. They don't really have seasons. The sun comes up and goes down around the same time every day. After a few weeks of that I'm really noticing how long the sun stays up during the summer in America. Coming up at 5:30 and going down at 9? Crazy.

3. Food: I was in a grocery store (Winco, my favorite) yesterday and really started to miss Asia. I told Megan I miss the drinks and food of Taiwan. I think it's sad that I have to spend $1000 to get over there, but its worth it for all the great food we had. Megan and I found a place in Malaysia that sold real fruit drinks (with ice, thank heavens!) for about US$1! I had 3 or 4 in our short visit. Nothing like mango and red dragon fruit or kiwi and apple.

4. Love: My best friend's mom told me that vacations are the best for a marriage and I have to agree. I told her I don't know why people spend money on counseling. A few weeks away really allowed me to remember how much and why I love Megan. School, work, and family can really become a fog that causes me to forget. I don't think I can afford not to go on longer vacations with just Megan. That now brings me to the fact that we asked a million friends to come with us. I'm really glad you all said no. You all missed out and I'm sure life here in America continued to be extra-boring as always, but Megan and I benefited. Thanks for taking one for the team!

Pictures can be found on Facebook of our trip.
Malaysia Pictures:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2337683&id=17800437&l=8ed910a8ef

Taiwan Pictures:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2332807&id=17800437&l=77af6462ad

I have a bunch more to download of Singapore and Indonesia and we'll be working on that soon.


Thanks again!

Taiwanese (The People and the Language)

So we've been in Taiwan for about and week and I'm loving it. It's crazy as always and I'm so glad we can be here. I could tell you all the places we've been but it doesn't mean much unless you've lived here before. Megan loves the food and is learning a ton. Do you know who else is learning a lot? Me!

As a missionary, I feel I paid more attention to what was going on around me than most missionaries, but it was still hard to get very deep into the culture. My visit in 2008 taught me a lot, and this 2010 visit is teaching me more and more. I feel like the Taiwanese are great people and the more I learn, the more I love them. Of course there are always dark areas but mostly they are a good people with good hearts.

This visit has corrected a lot of incorrect ideas that I collected on my mission such as:
1. People in Taibei never speak Taiwanese. WRONG!
2. Only the less educated speak Taiwanese. WRONG!
3. If a Taiwanese person can't get to church on time, it's probably because he doesn't really care about the church. WRONG!

Let me tell you something. The Taiwanese can never be accused of sticking to a schedule. Megan will ask me, "When will the bus arrive?" and I will say, "The bus stop sign says every 20-30 minutes but that really means you'll see 3 busses in a row and then none for an hour." I would get so mad on my mission when a Taiwanese would not come to church or show up late. Now that I think about it, I should have known better. Of course they are going to be late. That's just a part of the culture. I've heard that other SE Asian people are the same way.

Now on to the language. As missionaries, we would get so mad when people spoke Taiwanese. This probably comes from feeling left out as we were normally the only ones in the room who didn't understand what was going on. However, I can now watch as people speak to each other and really understand each other when the Taiwanese comes out. Today, a friend played his "moon guitar" and sang in Taiwanese. It has a "working in the rice fields during the Japanese occupation" feeling to it. I can understand a lot of what is being said if they are talking about me and it impresses people but I like feeling more connected to the people.

So, the point is that I love the Taiwanese people and I wish more people could understand what I mean. I'm so thankful that I can be here. Hope everyone is doing well.

We made it!

Hey everyone! This will be our last post in the U.S. for a while. We leave for Taiwan on Thursday morning. I still can't believe we are leaving in 3 days because it doesn't seem real, but I am still excited.

I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little nervous. Taiwan will be easy, I speak the language and I've been there before both as a missionary and as a civilian. I am nervous about Bali and Thailand but I keep telling myself not to worry because many Europeans seem to survive there.

Megan and I have spent the last few days driving up here to Anacortes, Washington. We stopped at friends' houses in Boise and Portland. I love all the friends I have. While in Portland I met with a fellow KPMG'er who graduated from BYU. He's way funny and really helped me feel comfortable with joining KPMG (along with the partner who used to live in Taiwan). He has a downstairs suite that he rents out once in a while. We are so lucky that it's empty now and we'll be living with him during the 2 months of the internship! I was worried that we'd have to find a month-to-month apartment somewhere and live on a blow-up mattress. This way is much cheaper now and we'll live in a nice neighborhood with a great view.

The only downside? He lives in a city that no one in Portland has ever heard of. It's called "Happy Valley, Oregon." Really. Megan and all of her friends have never heard of it, so I just tell people "Clackamas" and they know where I am talking about. It's a few blocks away from the mall where I bought Megan's engagement ring (and saved a ton of money on Oregon's lack of a sales tax!!!).

Well, I guess everyone have fun here in America and we'll talk to you when we get back June 4th!

Being Nice

I have been around a lot of places in the world. There are two places where I was shocked at the friendliness of strangers--Portland, Oregon and Canada. As a newly married person, I planned two days and two nights in downtown Portland as part of our honeymoon. Megan and I spent a lot of time walking around and seeing my new wife's hometown. We would be talking to each other and a a random person walking near us would hear our conversation and comment on it. Crazy! So many people came up and talked to us, asked us questions, etc. I've learned this is normal in Portland.

Canadians are always known for being nice almost to a fault. Americans love making fun of Canadians and I feel bad because Canadians are so dang nice that it seems unfair. Plus, Canadians haven't done anything bad to us (other than Sidney Crosby scoring in OT!!!). We get tons of oil from them and I hear their retirees are propping up the Phoenix real estate market, too. Dang exchange rate, but you can't blame them for it.

Megan and I had just landed at Toronto's airport late at night. We were a little nervous being in a new place (and a foreign country). Things were a lot different than we expected. We boarded the bus for our hotel and sat next to some locals who were quick to talk to us. They pointed out Tim Hortons, a Canadian coffee shop. They said, "You know Tim Hortons, he played in the NHL." Megan and I looked at each other confused and laughed to ourselves, I guess they don't realize that while most NHL teams are in the US most Americans don't care or know much about hockey. Regardless, Megan and I love Tim Hortons and think back to that day in July when we found out about it whenever we eat their chicken salad sandwiches.

The point of this post is that being around nice people is always cause for being happy. Often, I walk around and try to help people and smile and all that but often I get ignored or frowny faces or "Why are you talking to me?" looks. Wow people, lighten up. Shouldn't Mormons be a part of this extremely nice group? I think that many of us play the role we are assigned at church. We only talk to people affected by our calling, only talk to our home teachees/visit teachees, etc. Don't dare step out of that circle! Someone is having a hard time? Well, I haven't be assigned to help, so I don't want people to think I'm taking charge without Priesthood authority, etc. Guess what? It doesn't take a calling or the Priesthood to be nice or helpful. It takes a few words or a smile or a visit.

So when I see you (meaning anyone in the whole wide world) approaching me on the sidewalk, you better smile and look at me in the eyes! When I see you in the laundry room, smile!

Does this make sense?

Almost there!

How can it be that finals will be over in 2 weeks? Crazy. I'm so happy to finish and relax for a while and spend a bunch of time with Megan.

3 weeks until we'll be somewhere over Alaska heading toward Taiwan!

KPMG let me know that my internship training starts on June 21. 4 days in either New York or Chicago. I'm pretty sure my dad and Megan will go around either city while I am in class during the day and then we can enjoy a $4 haircut in New York or good pizza in Chicago at night!

Our lives are great! We had 2 different couples stay in our apartment over the last two days. One couple slept on our blow up mattress and the other on our bed. Megan and I? On the living room floor with blankets. Wow, that hurt, but it was good to see a former mission companion (Tayler Tibbitts) and Megan's friends from back in the day. See? When we say you can stay over we aren't lying!

We still don't know where we will live in Portland. We will find something. I am really excited to live in a new and cool city. Unfortunately, if you have two dogs, are married, can only stay for 7 weeks, and don't smoke weed (or tolerate it), cheap housing is hard to find in Portland. Gotta love Portland!

There was a point to this whole post, but I forgot it! Hope you enjoyed it!