One of the main purposes for visiting Taiwan as Asia Area Welfare Specialiasts was to view ongoing activities headed by Elder and Sister Sparrow, the Taiwan Welfare missionaries. The first activity was a puppet Health Fair presented to an elementary school, The Sparrows found pieces of a Health Fair puppet show in storage. It had been received in the year 2000. The missionaries had used it some in the years past, but it hadn't been used for several years. There was a script on a CD in Mandarin. A few of the puppets were broken or missing, so the Sparrows had ordered replacements and had 4,000 brochures printed that told about the puppets and the lessons being taught. Single missionaries trained as the puppeteers. There were 7 of them working this show. We walked the two blocks to the school from the service center. Some of the children were already in the gymnasium. They were all in uniforms with a different color top for each class. They all wore shorts since it is summer and very warm. They were almost perfect in behavior. They assembled in straight lines, and when they sat it was cross-legged with each child tucked up behind the next one. This group of 250 children were from kindergarten through third grade. We were deeply impressed with their deportment. No pushing, kicking or any sign of fighting.
The puppet stage had black curtains at two levels. The missionaries stood behind the stage. The music and script were on CD’s. The missionaries had to know how to manipulate the puppets so it would look like they were talking and show how excited they were while the music played. The puppets were very clever. They included a cigarette, an octupus representing addiction, a bottle of liquor, a nurse, men, women and children; about 40 puppets in all. There are about ten parts to the show. The missionaries have learned four. They included two on smoking, and one each on washing hands and liquor and drug addiction. Between each little play the leader had the children raise their hands in response to a question and Brother Phillips, the Public Affairs missionary, handed out small church imprinted pens. The children watched intently, laughed some and applauded at the end. The brochures were handed out. The missionaries came out from behind the screens and "high-fived" the students as they quietly filed out of the gymnasium.
English Teaching on Wednesday Nights
Every Wednesday night, the single and couple missionaries hold free English language lessons. They have five separate classes. The Sparrows teach an advanced class. They are assisted by a pair of young missionaries who teach a moral value lesson while they teach English. We attended the class with nine students, helped with the breakout groups, and Sister Smith told them about us. About half of the attendees are members of the Church.
Tonight's lesson was on adjectives and adverbs.
Students in the advanced English class. The sister in the foreground is Ivy and is an artist. We had a good visit with her and she sent us an email thanking us for teaching her.
Tzu Chi Recycling Center
Tonight's lesson was on adjectives and adverbs.
Students in the advanced English class. The sister in the foreground is Ivy and is an artist. We had a good visit with her and she sent us an email thanking us for teaching her.
Tzu Chi Recycling Center
On Thursday morning we visited three sites where we had participated in humanitarian projects. The first was the Tzu Chi Neihu Recycling Center. Tzu Chi was founded by a Buddhist female monk in 1966 who is dedicating her life to helping preserve the environment and help aged, disabled and poor to have meaningful lives. Since its organization 40 years ago, this charitable organization has gone world-wide, has its own international TV station, and operates in the recycling area, education, health care etc. We visited their large recycling center. We were amazed at what we observed. About 100 volunteers, most of them elderly, were sorting plastic bottles, clothing, paper into five categories, etc. Many come every day at the invitation of the TV programs. Volunteers also come and cook food for the noon meal for the volunteers. We observed cooking going on, sorting, getting items ready to sell etc. We spent about an hour and could have spent more. Our missionaries come four hours a week to help and serve. Two of them joined us as we toured the facilities.
The sign describes the vast network that Tzu Chi has developed. There are recycling centers in California and Washington in the United States.
These volunteers are preparing lunch. It is 10:15 a.m.
Paper is sorted into 5 caegories. The top category is white with no writing. Here volunteers are cutting away the writing on pieces of paper so the paper will be classified at the highest level.
They recycle almost anything. Paper, plastic, bottles, electronic equipment, clothing, metal. They disassemble appliances to retain the valuable parts. Good clothing is sold. They are a combination of Deseret Industries and a recycling plant. Here sorting is going on with paper, cardboard, etc.
Sister Smith visiting (smiling) with one of the volunteers. A young missionary volunteer looks on. Six missionaries come 2-3 hours each week for some of their service.
She was a very happy volunteer
There are over 100 collection points in Taipei. Trucks pick up the items. Everyone in Taiwan must sort their garbage before it will be picked up. Here the plastic bottles are segregated by color. They will be transformed into fibers for the making of blankets. The blankets are used in the hospital part of the organization. LDS Charities is the name we use for humanitarian work in several of these countries. We donated baby blankets that church members had made to a hospital as part of a humanitarian project.
This exhibit shows the transformation of a plastic bottle into a blanket. The bottle is crushed, pulverized into crystals, treated to create filaments of fibre and made into the blankets.
Folding material made from plastic bottles.
The finished product!!
A great mop made from plastic bottles. The clothes behind us were also made from the bottle fabric.
Harmony Homes HIV/AIDS Orphange
Sisters Smith and Sparrows climb the long stairs to reach the orphanage.
Most of the older children were in school while we were there. This room has plastic interlocking colorful blocks on the walls and floor. A fun place to play.
One of two sand boxes made for the children as part of an LDS Scout Eagle Project
The play area on the roof of the orphanage. The man on the right is the Taiwan Service Center Manager and a Stake President, Carl Liang. He was our chauffer today.
Creatively painted walls. Sister Sparrow got a baby to hold throughout the visit.
Institute for the Blind of Taiwan
Our next stop was the Institute for the Blind. This is one of two centers in Taiwan for blind adult training. They bring students in for 8 months of training. They live in an campus dormitory and learn such skills as massage therapy, pottery, cooking, making Braille books, learning to make beds, eat meals, maneuver without a dog etc. They also have several dogs in training. They had a great need for better dorm furniture and that was what our project provided. New furniture consisted of beds, chairs, desks, clothes cupboards, and tables. We furnished 14 rooms with two sets in each room. We visited the dorms and the training facilities. They were very impressive. We had personnel take us around the complex. They have strips on the sidewalk that tell the blind when a corner is coming. Parallel strips mean you can keep going. Dots mean there is a corner. The Stake in the area assisted by helping tear out the old furniture, painting walls inside and out, assembling tables and moving in the new furniture. The students were sent home for a month while the renovation took place. Because the Church had this project, other charitable organizations helped with other parts of the complex such as a new laundry for the sheets we furnished, more equipment for training etc. They even had a wall with handprints made with water based paint from the volunteers. We saw Elder and Sister Sparrow’s prints prominently displayed. The Institute was very appreciative of our contribution
.
Elder Sparrow and Sister Smith at the entrance to the complex.
Two of the personnel that operate the Institute with their visitors. Carl Liang is on the left.
The classroom building was painted by the stake members. These rooms are for training in pottery, massage therapy, housekeeping skills, etc. The building in the rear is the dormitory where we furnished the new furnitire.
The volunteers who painted left their handprints on this Donation Wall. The church members painted the dormitory walls as well.
The pottery room. A great vocation for the blind who can make pottery by feel.
Beautiful guide dogs being trained.
Some of the old furniture. Church volunteers pulled out the old furniture, assembled the new and installed it into the rooms. Old metal bunk beds were donated to a homeless shelter. They were dangerous for blind students to use because of height. The students were not allowed to use the top bunks.
These strips are on the sidewalks of Hong Kong. The raised dots mean a corner or a stop. The raised strips indicate you can continue going ahead. The Church youth installed the dorm strips.
A new desk, chair and bed.
A new wardrobe and shelf component. They had nothing like this before
The furniture in the old lunch room was high stools and small tables. With these tables and 4 chairs, three blind students and one faculty member can enjoy lunch together and the students can learn how to manipulate eating. Many of these students come partially blind having contracted a disease such as diabetes. They are trained so that as their eyesight fails them, theyare able to cope and remain more self reliant.
The sign describes the vast network that Tzu Chi has developed. There are recycling centers in California and Washington in the United States. 
These volunteers are preparing lunch. It is 10:15 a.m.
Paper is sorted into 5 caegories. The top category is white with no writing. Here volunteers are cutting away the writing on pieces of paper so the paper will be classified at the highest level.
They recycle almost anything. Paper, plastic, bottles, electronic equipment, clothing, metal. They disassemble appliances to retain the valuable parts. Good clothing is sold. They are a combination of Deseret Industries and a recycling plant. Here sorting is going on with paper, cardboard, etc.
Sister Smith visiting (smiling) with one of the volunteers. A young missionary volunteer looks on. Six missionaries come 2-3 hours each week for some of their service.
She was a very happy volunteer
There are over 100 collection points in Taipei. Trucks pick up the items. Everyone in Taiwan must sort their garbage before it will be picked up. Here the plastic bottles are segregated by color. They will be transformed into fibers for the making of blankets. The blankets are used in the hospital part of the organization. LDS Charities is the name we use for humanitarian work in several of these countries. We donated baby blankets that church members had made to a hospital as part of a humanitarian project.
This exhibit shows the transformation of a plastic bottle into a blanket. The bottle is crushed, pulverized into crystals, treated to create filaments of fibre and made into the blankets.
Folding material made from plastic bottles.
The finished product!! 
A great mop made from plastic bottles. The clothes behind us were also made from the bottle fabric.Harmony Homes HIV/AIDS Orphange
From the Recycling Center we drove for thirty minutes to the Harmony Homes HIV orphanage where we did a Stake Initiative as part of a young man’s eagle project. They made the roof area of the orphanage into a play area by cleaning the floor, painting a highway on the floor, painting the walls, and building two sandboxes. We took lots of pictures and were treated warmly by the staff. The home is perched on a rock and is accessible only by long stairs. The Sparrows hope to do another project with an adult HIV group that live in a Harmony Homes shelter.
Sisters Smith and Sparrows climb the long stairs to reach the orphanage.
Most of the older children were in school while we were there. This room has plastic interlocking colorful blocks on the walls and floor. A fun place to play.
One of two sand boxes made for the children as part of an LDS Scout Eagle Project
The play area on the roof of the orphanage. The man on the right is the Taiwan Service Center Manager and a Stake President, Carl Liang. He was our chauffer today.
Creatively painted walls. Sister Sparrow got a baby to hold throughout the visit.Institute for the Blind of Taiwan
Our next stop was the Institute for the Blind. This is one of two centers in Taiwan for blind adult training. They bring students in for 8 months of training. They live in an campus dormitory and learn such skills as massage therapy, pottery, cooking, making Braille books, learning to make beds, eat meals, maneuver without a dog etc. They also have several dogs in training. They had a great need for better dorm furniture and that was what our project provided. New furniture consisted of beds, chairs, desks, clothes cupboards, and tables. We furnished 14 rooms with two sets in each room. We visited the dorms and the training facilities. They were very impressive. We had personnel take us around the complex. They have strips on the sidewalk that tell the blind when a corner is coming. Parallel strips mean you can keep going. Dots mean there is a corner. The Stake in the area assisted by helping tear out the old furniture, painting walls inside and out, assembling tables and moving in the new furniture. The students were sent home for a month while the renovation took place. Because the Church had this project, other charitable organizations helped with other parts of the complex such as a new laundry for the sheets we furnished, more equipment for training etc. They even had a wall with handprints made with water based paint from the volunteers. We saw Elder and Sister Sparrow’s prints prominently displayed. The Institute was very appreciative of our contribution
.
Elder Sparrow and Sister Smith at the entrance to the complex.
Two of the personnel that operate the Institute with their visitors. Carl Liang is on the left.
The classroom building was painted by the stake members. These rooms are for training in pottery, massage therapy, housekeeping skills, etc. The building in the rear is the dormitory where we furnished the new furnitire.
The volunteers who painted left their handprints on this Donation Wall. The church members painted the dormitory walls as well.
The pottery room. A great vocation for the blind who can make pottery by feel.
Beautiful guide dogs being trained.
Some of the old furniture. Church volunteers pulled out the old furniture, assembled the new and installed it into the rooms. Old metal bunk beds were donated to a homeless shelter. They were dangerous for blind students to use because of height. The students were not allowed to use the top bunks.
These strips are on the sidewalks of Hong Kong. The raised dots mean a corner or a stop. The raised strips indicate you can continue going ahead. The Church youth installed the dorm strips.
A new desk, chair and bed.
A new wardrobe and shelf component. They had nothing like this before
The furniture in the old lunch room was high stools and small tables. With these tables and 4 chairs, three blind students and one faculty member can enjoy lunch together and the students can learn how to manipulate eating. Many of these students come partially blind having contracted a disease such as diabetes. They are trained so that as their eyesight fails them, theyare able to cope and remain more self reliant. These were all great examples of the Church Welfare Program in Action.
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