Day 2: Lots to think about

Firstly, I must apologise for the lack of pictures from today. This is becuase I left my memory card in the laptop after uploading them yesterday and so could not take any pictures. I will have some when I get back off someone elses camera but can't get them yet, will try though. Well today was very different. We started the morning with a long drive down to the areas where the typhoon have hit and destroyed. On the way I thought about what I may see when I got there, I mentally prepared myself for things around me being half up, rubble everywhere etc and as we approached it that is what I found. Some of the roads we drove down were half torn up, concrete had cracks in it and bridges were now missing and temporary ones in there place. It made you realise quite how cut in half the island must of been. As it is in the mountains of the island, there were lots of quite spectacular views, so occassionally we would stop so that there was an opportunity for us to take some photographs. Then we stopped an picked up a local pastor and continued on our journey. We stopped again for what I thought was a photo stop however when I climbed out of the car was very confused to just see a big empty space of rocks and rubble and then in amoungst the trees was a picture of a village with a river running past. It was only then that I realised that this rubble we were looking at was the village in the picture before the typhoon, I was gobsmacked and felt very embarassed almost to be there too late. There were lots of families who had lost their loved ones in the typhoon wearing orange (their mourning colour as ours is black) sitting on the rocks and looking around. It was very hard to believe that there was once what looked a very beautiful little village there and now there was nothing. We were told of how these families spent a month after the disaster lifting these rocks to try and find their loved ones. All of this was quite devostating to see and touched us all, we said a small prayer and then travelled back down the mountain. Part way down the mountain, the pastor we picked up took us to another place of devostation, his home and the retreat he had made for churches to visit. It was a centre that could hold between 60-70 people and was surrounded by orchards. It now consisted of water damage, mess and rubbish. He told the story of how he stood on the outdoor communal area seating and clinged to the pole as he prayed that God would help someone rescue his family. It was incridible to see how strong he was but he also saddened us with the news that he doesn't think he will be able to rebuild this community. After this we continued to drive, dropping the pastor back off and as we drove, I fell asleep. I awoke to find us outside our chosen destination for lunch, somewhere with loads of Taiwnese culture, Mc Donalds!!! After lunch, we went to the museum of Hakka culture which was good, looking at the tribes etc was nice things being written in English also! We then started to travel back where we stopped at a small village and went for some ice cream, I had a banana split which was gorgeous! :) That was about it really for today, I'm currently back at the hotel relaxing and possibly might go for a walk later down the street.
I guess today gave me a lot to think about from the pastor's positive outlook in life to how thankful we must be about everything! Speak tomorrow! x