Since you last heard from us:

• Ethan married his sweetheart Jill on July 31.  It was a beautiful wedding and a great chance to be together with the family members who were able to attend.
• After the wedding, Lorne and Kathy-Lu (along with Philip, Bethany, and Elyssa) travelled to Prince Edward Island.  We visited the Anne of Green Gables home and the A.B. Simpson memorial.  Simpson who was the founder of the C&MA was born in PEI.
• We all returned safely to our homes.  Lorne and Kathy-Lu are stil struggling to overcome jet-lag from the trip.
• Typhoon Soudelor visited Taiwan bringing strong winds and rain.  The government declared a holiday from work and classes to keep us all safe.

Typhoon Soudelor, although classified as a medium strength typhoon when it hit Taiwan, set some interesting records:

• The highest recorded wind speed at the Taoyuan INternational Airport (Taipei) at 209 km/hr (130 mph)
• The greatest movement of the anti-sway damper ball in the Taipei 101 skyscraper tower – one meter.  Wind has never caused it to move that much previously.
• The greatest number of households to lose power at one time.  4.1 million homes, about one out of every four, was without power during the storm.  As I write on Monday evening, more than 24 hours after the storm officially left the island, some people are still without power.  (This includes Albert and Elaine Lu who have been without power for more than 48 hours.)
• The highest wave recorded to crash against the mountain was 17.1 meters (56 feet) and occurred in a cave in XinBei City.

Baozhong was sheltered from the worst of the storm by the central mountain range.  So in our area:

• The storm began with about 12 hours of gale force wind.  Because there was no rain, the wind picked up sand and debris and used it to sandblast everything around.  This devastated recently planted corn and peanuts.  In one sugar cane field we saw that the leaves were gone leaving only the veins from inside the previously attached leaves.  Many trees were snapped off by the intense winds.
• The church sign, which was made of plasticized canvas, tore loose.   Thankfully it can be repaired.
• The sheet metal roof over the fourth floor balcony of our house (which is also the church building) came loose in the wind.  We have contacted our landlord to help deal with this so that it does not fall and injure anyone.
• We held our Sunday morning small group service without power.  We moved the chairs close to the windows at the front of the building so that we could see to read the Scripture.  We were still able to worship.

These things might sound like large challenges, but they are not very big when compared to what some other people are experiencing…..Seven Taiwanese died, five are declared as missing, and more than 400 were injured during the storm….The people of Myanmar are suffering much worse as they struggle with flooding and need help.