Welcome Back! Rachel, I will miss your blogs! I have hardly been able to wait until I am notified that I have a new one. You have truly made the most of your experiences! Come see us in Cbus-Love Cindy
Welcome Home, Rachel Dear Rachel: I have really enjoyed reading your travel blogs. I've gotten to know you and Taiwan a little better with each entry. Thank goodness you really did take advantage of your free time to explore AND that you wrote about so many of your experiences. I hope that you'll keep posting for a few more months, at least, because coming back to the States will be an interesting experience -- you might feel like a foreigner for a little while and I'm curious about your impressions of America from that new place.
Love, Lee-Ellen
Excited Rachel, I have really enjoyed reading all of your blog entries and e-mails this past year. What an amazing experience you have had. I know that it is hard to say goodbye, but I have to say, I am really looking foward to seeing you when you get back in town. I have missed you!
Moving in fast forward Part Forever Dear Rachel,
I loved your comments about not sitting around waiting for things to happen in your life. That is a wonderful life lesson. I also think that you have become someone who makes things happen in your own life, good, bad, ugly...doesn't matter...when things are moving, they are not stagnant. Life in the stagnant lane is deadly.
Although most of your life, people will not be lining up to tell you that you are beautiful, you can still conjure those little voices whenever you need to hear them.
Life is really not about being happy all the time either, or else you run the risk of not truly growing and maturing. But seeking joy and fulfillment is a good thing. You have had an incredible year and I can't wait to talk with the "new you".
I have just a few words for you to keep in your heart.
First: Remember your roots!
And last: NEVER SETTLE!!!
All my love,
Aunt Linda
End of school blues Hey, Rachel! Enjoyed reading your latest news flash. Your pink eye should be cleared up by now. although, as I told your mom, why were you so bummed, pink is your favorite color?! Dr. Karen Huling would like to suggest a diagnosis to your unsettled state these days, to your increasing desire to get out of school: End of school trauma. Very normal, very overwhelming at times, but be assured that this, too, will pass along with your pink eye. May is the hardest month to teach school, to think school, to be at school, to keep at it until it's over. Hang in there! It is definitely not just the students who are excited when a school year is over! I have experienced this same "illness" every year that I have taught and I expect it will return one year from now as I wrap up my own school year (in case your mom didn't tell you, I am returning to second grade next fall). Try to enjoy the children. I am sure they will never forget you.
Well, Mark is back here with us as he works the Muirfield Tournament. It is beastly hot here today and getting humid, although I am sure it is nothing compared to your heat. It's good to have my second son home. :)
Tom has one more day of school, tomorrow. His party plans are in full swing. He wants to travel the world with you. So much funner than going to college, he thinks. There is always that nagging thing called studying that is so unappealing to him. :) I will just be thrilled when I see that diploma in his hands.
Well, sweetie, or should I say, sweaty sweetie, I need to get some dinner started. I could be happy with a bowl of cereal, but the rest of this crew wants REAL food.
So good to hear the latest, and we look forward to laying our eyes on you sometime this summer. Love you, Aunt Karen
$$, spelling, sweat and headphones Okay I just have to make some comments on this one. You must have learned that headphone trick from me. When I forget to charge my IPOD and it dies at rehab I still keep my headphones on so the old folks leave me alone. I was worried about you running out of money while you were shopping so thanks for telling us you went to the ATM. When were you ever worried about spelling something wrong on your blog??? That was a first. Thanks so much for sharing about your sweat. That was something I really wanted to know. Only 7 more weeks?? Wow!! I hope you have some money left for the shopping trip you promised me for mailing out 43 applications for you. Peace out!
A joke your students back home might enjoy Your mention of Mexican food reminded me.
A Mexican fellow always wanted to see a New York Yankees home game, so he goes to the Big Apple for that specific purpose.
He talked about his trip to his friends, most enthusiastically, on his return to Mexico.
"Americans are such kind people", he said. All the seats in the stadium were sold out when I got to the game, but the staff very kindly suggested that I could get a could view from the top of the flagpole. Everyone in the stadium wanted to make sure I could watch the game and not miss anything. Just before the game started, everyone stood up and sang 'Jose can you see?' ".
Don't get me started. Otherwise, I will say that Ireland is the richest country in the world because its capital is always Dublin.
Am I wrong? Do I understand that baseball players use a crotch deodorant called "Umpire"? It's for foul balls.
It would be hyprocritical of me to berate you for going to a game to ogle the opposite gender. From time to time, I have been known to do the same. As a matter of fact, I met my old girlfriend at a tennis match. We broke up, because love meant nothing to her.
Awesome! Rachel, What an experience!! You described it so well I could even smell the firecrackers! It will definitely be a tad different to live life in the good ol' US of A again for you, Asian Princess!! Be careful, and thanks for all the great blogs.
trilingual, between the two of us. You can speak Spanese, I can speak Chrench, and presumably we can both speak English. At least I hope so, since that is how we make a living.
"Sitting on the Park Bench... ...Eyeing all the Girls with Bad Intent." Proabably Jethro Tull was before your time. In any case, whoever that is in the picture should quit making an ass of herself.
Familiar It all sounds so familiar. I couldn't agree more. So strange that you can feel homesick to a place which is not your motherland. I am now going through a phase also, that I am missing Taiwan. And we have been there 6 months ago. The strangest thing is that I miss Taiwan more than my wife!!
Rachel, I am so sorry to hear of your accident and the pain that you are having. I hope that you were not in pain when you were in the crowds of the Matzu Gras.
Did you get claustrophobic in the crowds?
I think I saw those platform shoes at Schottenstein's :-)
love you,
Aunt Linda
I have spent the past year living and teaching in Taiwan and traveling all over Asia to see whats out there. I am coming to the end of my time in Taiwan and I am unsure what will be next, hopefully it will include lots more traveling and blogging. Stay tuned to what adventures my life brings.
"Life rarely works out in the way we expect, and our happy ending may have all sorts of unexpected twists and turns, be shaped in all sorts of unexpected ways."
"Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off ... full info
Cindy Dunn
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Welcome Back!
Rachel, I will miss your blogs! I have hardly been able to wait until I am notified that I have a new one. You have truly made the most of your experiences! Come see us in Cbus-Love Cindy