Facilitating Community

Thank you all for the very quick notes of congratulations. We know we have not used the blog venue very regularly over the past few months, but we now know which of you are users of tools like Google Reader!

In answer to the FAQs:

Best expected due date is early September (at the next check-up we'll be more accurately about to predict a due date). As for the question of guy / girl, we don't know (I don't think we can easily at this stage!?!) :)

Starting a family has been something that we have been thinking and praying about for a while now. Being in a relationship with our godsons Ryan and Nicholas has helped us appreciate a lot more about the challenges, responsibility and joys of raising children. Definitely the reality of having a child while "overseas" was something that we were willing to do even before we committed to coming out to Taiwan. We must admit, there are many many days where we think about how different it would be if we were amongst our community in Toronto.

Despite the fears and mixed feelings, we know that God wants us to be here in Taiwan. Particually in preparation for the baby, but more importantly, for our own health and growth, we see this year as a year where we must intentionally work towards building strong community in our life in Taiwan.

Some steps that we plan to take / or are in progress:

• We are praying about trying a new church, a place where there are more people at the same lifestage as us (in vocation, family and age) as well as a church where it is more intimate and we can build deeper relationships;
• Ray has just started a monthly Bible study with a small group of men - tentmakers, leaders and business people. Sandra is also starting something similar with some of her female coworkers and missionaries;
• Planning a move. We are planning to move from our current location to somewhere very close to Sandra's school probably in the month of June or July. This will help with the baby, but it will also allow for us to have even more community in our home - with the Morrison community, church and others. The practical side is that we can look for a place with an elevator and perhaps parking spot!
• Have more intentional meetings with both of our coworkers. We find that time can pass by so quickly and we will lose the great opportunity to nurture the relationships we have already started!

Isn't it funny for two people who talk about relationships and community that we've been so "slow" in getting moving on some of these things?

On a slightly different note, for those who I haven't updated directly, my role with the firm went through a change in the last part of 2007. I'm now primarily responsible for Taiwan People (including many traditional HR functions) and Learning. It's a great responsibility and honour to be able to focus on building a proper people function here and I'm having a great time with it. Yes, there's discouraging times when change needs to happen slowly, but there are also many many victories and lives impacted every day. The next two or three weeks, I'm going to be travelling around to the top five universities in Taiwan (top five from an accounting graduate perspective) and meeting with the Deans, Chairs and student leaders. In the beginning I wasn't sure how they would respond to my broken Chinese and need to speak English, but so far, it's been a refreshing experience. We see a lot of opportunities to change the firm's position in the marketplace as well as have a contribution to academia here in Taiwan.

The work days go by quickly and there isn't enough time to keep up as we're building our team (I've already grown the team by 50% in the last few months). I can't imagine myself doing anything else right now.

So... we're here and we have the continued mixed feelings about being here and also wanting to be back in Canada. I don't think this feeling is necessarily bad, as long as we're able to focus on the "big picture".

Thank you for all of your support and we look forward to more regular updates.