I Felt the Earth Move...

Hey!!!
I was just about to write a new post a few minutes back...and my chair and computer started tilting to the left! Yikes! The chimes on my wall near the kitchen table started tinkling(!), and the light fixture over the table is still swinging. I move from one fault line to another. Great. This one was a little scary!

[This is from The Taipei Times 4/2/06: A powerful earthquake, measuring 6.4 on the Richter scale, rocked Taiwan yesterday, sending panicked residents rushing out into the streets, but there was no immediate report of serious injury.

The quake struck at 6:02pm, with its epicenter 10km underground near Taitung City, the Seismological Observation Center said.

"It is a relatively shallow quake, making the impact even more obvious," a center spokeswoman said.

The powerful quake was felt in most parts of the country, with skyscrapers in Taipei shaking in a slow up-and-down movement].

Yesterday I subbed for a science teacher at Anjoli's school. I had 6th, 7th and 8th grade students...with slight attitudes (natch). It's a Christian school, so one of the students reminded me that we're supposed to pray. I knew I was supposed to, but I have never in my life lead a group in prayer before so I was feeling weird about it. I looked for volunteers or some sort of guidance - all I saw was a sea of blank stares...so, being my irreverant wiseass self (yes I can be), folded my hands and looked up to the heavens and said, "Oh God, please help me with this class!" I told them I was KIDDING!! They were not amused...I got the rolling eyeballs, looks of disgust...what a way to start the day, eh?
Then I took them to an assembly - they sang songs of praise (ok - they pretty much just sat there while the younger ones sang), and a few of them who were ESL students put on a funny skit (making fun of American movies/t.v, but it had to do with the Bible really). I ended the day with the same class, and instead of watching a Discovery Channel dvd, I took them outside for recess (they usually don't have PE on Fridays) so I won them over after all. I brought them back and said a NICE prayer for them. ("Oh Lord, thank you for this day, and help everyone have a safe and happy Spring Break"). Phew, I survived. Good thing it was only a half day! One of the 6th graders told me she'd like me to come back and teach next year, so that was nice!
Sujoy took Anjoli to the Shilin Presidential Gardens today, so I'll share some pretty pictures (taken by Sujoy).