At the moment there is a nice Advent and Christmas atmosphere in Taipei. Everywhere are Christmas lights and Christmas trees and in the supermarket you can even hear “Silent Night” playing in the German original. We are of course delighted about the lights and the atmosphere. However, it is surprising that Christmas is so visible here, since the vast majority of Taiwanese people does not celebrate Christmas and does not really know what is being celebrated – namely that the God of the universe came into this world as a little baby.
Also at home preparations for Christmas are on their way. Simone and Amy are baking cookies and Amy is looking forward every day to open the advent calendars she got from her grandmas in Germany. Every night we light the candles on our Advent wreath and celebrate together as a family. We read a short poem, move Mary and Joseph one field further on their way to the stable and sing with Amy an Advent song. If you want to see Amy singing, just click on this link.

The translation of Amy’s song is:
“One candle shines, whispering ‘Jesus comes’,
Two candles shine, whispering ‘Jesus comes’,
…
Jesus comes as baby, comes into this world,
Jesus comes into darkness and makes darkness light.”