Laundry Fail ---> An Evangelical Nightmare

Yea, the title might be a bit misleading, but that is not a misprint. Just hear me out.

So, a few weeks ago I was trying to do some laundry. No, that wasn't the first time I've done laundry since I've been to Taiwan, but I am afraid to admit it has been the last (excluding one laundry load in the hostel in Seoul. Yes, I brought a shit load of stinky, dirty clothes to Seoul to do laundry...). Before this fateful day I had always done my laundry at my student's apartment. Brought the clothes over in the morning, ran the load, finished class, took laundry home. Easy enough. But since my student, Jeff, returned to the States for his Senior year, I have not wanted to bother his family simply to do my laundry. When I first arrived his mom also mentioned that it would be fine to use the laundry machine on the first floor of the three-floor Triplex/townhouse-thingy in which I live. The first two floors are both lived in by Jeff's aunts with me on the top. She also specified that it would be best to do it during the week when she, the old aunt, was not there so as not to bother her. Again, easy enough. Or so I thought.

So, like Monday afternoon or whatever I stroll downstairs, and the old auntie is gone, so I throw some laundry in the washer and go to lunch. I come back to find her returned and with a friend as well. Oh god, the friend.... So I knock to see if it's okay for me to grab my laundry and then end up in this like 25 minute conversation with "the friend," who turns out to be a Christian Missionary working in China named Rae Yuan, back for a brief visit. It turns out that the auntie, whom I now just refer to as Pastor Chen (before she was Auntie Chen), is as you may have deduced, a Pastor.

Turns out there was a huge miscommunication regarding my laundry privileges. Pastor Chen was not informed that I might perhaps do some laundry there at some point. Seeing as how its the only fucking laundry machine in the place, I'm not sure why she was so "surprised," but surprised she was. Apparently so surprised, embarrassed and uncomfortable (all words that Rae used) that she was in the other room for the entire time that Rae Yuan was explaining the extent of this discomfort I had just caused. Its just some fucking laundry. Whatever, I just lost my laundry privileges and don't know where a laundromat is, but more unfortunately for me was that that was not the end of the story. Hence the second half of this post's title. Now on to the much less enjoyable evangelical nightmare.

So, amidst this laundry fuck-up, Rae Yuan starts talking about Christianity as well, like, a lot. Asking me whether I'm Christian, among other things, and just really beating a dead horse about this shit. But, she also appeared to be really nice and took a keen interest in wanting to help me find another job (at this point, I had just become jobless as my students had all returned to the States for classes). So, she invited me out to her church on Sunday where I was supposed to meet all her friends with a bizillion potential job opportunities. We were also supposed to go out to breakfast before church (god, old people wake up fucking early) for more supposed job opportunities. So, I accepted.

Then that early-ass morning rolled around and I rolled my sleepy-ass self to breakfast at this Western-style diner where I was surprised to see 8 old-ass ladies there to greet me. Okay, job prospects I think to myself. Plus, they all flattered me at the beginning by telling me how handsome I was. Not too shabby, even if it is early and they're fucking old. But then the purpose of the breakfast commenced. It was not a meet and greet, but rather a church cell group. Basically, for those who don't know that term (I didn't before this) a cell group is like a smaller group of people within a larger church who meet frequently because they don't have enough church related things in their life. So much church... The first 20 minutes was "the friend" Rae Yuan going on and on about her missionary work in Dalian, China and about the horrendous multitude of non-believers and how to convert them and a bunch of shit along these lines. Pretty extreme verb choices at times, but nothing too alarming. She just appeared particularly zealous about her "mission." When she finished, however, they passed out some kind of morning cell-group program guide, which included the passages we were going to read, and the fucking songs we were gunna sing. Oh, the songs.

So, they began singing during which time Rae Yuan kept beckoning me or slapping my shoulder to encourage me to sing with them. First of all, the fucking pamphlet was in Chinese, so I couldn't read that fast even if I wanted to, but more importantly, I reaaaally didn't want to. Singing is also not an appropriate verb. A better description would be melodic shouting. I mean this shit was straight out of Jesus Camp. They were fucking rattling the chandeliers with their words, all the while clapping and swaying with the occasional outstretched arms to the sky, tears dripping, limbs flailing, eardrums ringing. Remember, we are not in a fucking church, we are in a restaurant which happened to be full at the time. Those who were finished with their meals quickly left. I wish I joined them...

After the melodic shouting came prayer. Which was followed by full body convulsions and speaking in tongues. I've never been so freaked out in my life. I thought they were going to offer a non-believer sacrifice up at that point and fucking rip my heart out and eat it or some shit. Still at a restaurant, by the way.

Then we went to some mega-church (I was too much of a pussy and too startled to excuse myself) in which there was more roaring, convulsing and speaking in tongues. Then after church everybody wanted to meet the only foreigner in the fucking room of 800, so I had like a half an hour meet and greet with these people, "welcoming" me to their church. Please...

Yea, so you all get the picture. Rae Yuan made me her missionary project of the week it seemed and would not leave me alone until she returned to Dalian, calling me all the time, all under the continued guise of "job prospect," though there certainly appeared to be some very obvious ulterior motives.

No more laundry, but also, no more evangelism. That's a trade I'm willing to make.