Heat Wave

So I've been back for a week now. Lots to report, but first, final thoughts from Taiwan:

-An interesting trip. Never been in a place where I couldn't speak on read a bit of the language. The concepts of different languages and why we speak them confounds me a bit.
-Singapore Airlines is awesome. Fly them when you get the chance. Superb service, great food, watched a ton of movies, and enjoyed it.
-Airplanes amaze me. How do they get off the ground? One of the planes we took looked as though it was going to fall to pieces on take-off. Obviously it didn't.
-The food in Taiwan is overrated. I'm sure it's good, just hard to find and order.
-Can you say humid?

With those thoughts out of the way, time to share the events from the last week. After landing, I bought a Mountain Dew at the airport train station at 7 AM (yes it was awesome), hopped on the train, and came back to the good ol' Sydney University Village. Felt good to be back. The whole day I was useless, sleeping from about 1 PM-5 PM. I missed class. Oops.

So when I said there was a lot to catch up on, I may have been exaggerating a bit. Wednesday and Thursday I was back at Thomson. This time I was put in the Law library. Sorting and filing assorted laws was not the most stimulating job, but hey, money is money right? There were a few laws that intrigued me. For example, I'm pretty sure Prostitution is legal. Breaks my heart. Most of this country does though, just seeing the brokenness and depravity. Anyways, I had no class Wednesday night because of the holiday on Monday (go figure) and Thursday my favorite Network class.

Friday was interesting. A few weeks ago, I had signed up for Encounterfest, a youth retreat put on by Hillsong Church. For those of you who don't know who that is, Hillsong is a mega church here in Sydney with over 18,000 people attending each week. It was quite the interesting time, to say the least. The church is Pentecostal and Assembly of God, so whatever that means. People are really spirit-led, which I don't have a problem with (too badly) but I am not going there. No, what really grinds my gears about Hillsong is the appearance of a business it carries. Sure, there is biblical teaching there. And the message preached by Jonah Smith was awesome. I even saw a presentation by a 15 year old named Zach Hunter, an abolitionist (yes, there are millions of slaves still in the world). I am skeptical of a church that spends $28 million on a spot of land in Sydney. That releases a CD every year. That has its own business entity. That asks you for tons of money. They take in millions a year. Is that church? I can't tell you for sure, but I don't look upon it with favor right now.

I am now fired up to make a change. To try and fight for peace, justice, and against poverty. To love people. Put their interests before my own. We live in a world that is run by selfishness. Hate, anger, and violence, dominate the headlines. And yes, good does happen. But we need to thrust it to the forefront of our society. These tests and trials are what I was looking for when I took this trip.

But I'm not here to complain about Hillsong. They have plenty of quality people there, and I will dabble there. But I prefer St. Matthew's up in Manly. Much more emphasis on Biblical teaching, and I'll take the word of God over someone telling me what the Spirit should be telling me. No thanks.

So on Saturday I decided to skip the conference and do work. Semi-successful, although not as much as I would have liked. Sydney FC was on Saturday, and we went. It was awesome! They were playing the arch-rival Melbourne Victory, and it was pandemonium before the game as police were in place to ensure there was a limit to violence. Eamonn and I only managed to catch the tail end of the squabble, although once we were in the Stadium, the Melbourne fans began to throw flares amongst the Sydney fans across the field. Unfortunately, Sydney lost 1-0 in a tight match. One of the better games I've seen them play this year, but still a loss.

After that, it was time for rugby, as the world cup reached the quarterfinals. England and Australia squared off against each other, and I watched with a mixture of Englishmen, Australians, and Americans. Quite a fun experience, although kind of a dull game. England won, 12-10, without scoring a single try. Kind of boring.

Sunday was a trip to the Curl's for cooking, laundry, and relaxing. It is quite the experience hauling my packed suitcase and two plastic bags full of cooked stir-fry and pasta. I had a good laugh, and it is so nice to have an actual house to go to and hang out. Manly is a ridiculously nice place as well.

Today was quite ho-hum. I had another day of work, finding me in the library once again. Class dragged on for a long time as I was fighting off a headache the whole time. Post class, Eamonn and I went to the Marly for steaks, after which I came back here to watch the Office and do some reading. That's the latest. Email me if you want to hear more, but that covers most of it. Hope all of you are well.