Tuesday, June 28, 2005  6:46 PM
church camp.
Church camp at St John's Island was truly an experience. Both spiritually and socially. I expect all the bloggers in church will have their own little recounting of the camp, so like the majority of the flock, here's mine.
My walk with God definitely took another step forward. I felt His presence at camp, during worship and prayer sessions and as I marvelled at His wondrous creation of nature. The magnificent stars that shone like diamonds at night made me feel just a step closer to Heaven, as they dappled across the lighted sky. And the sea, the waves hitting against the rocks, just sitting there and hearing the tide, you just feel at peace with yourself, without the distractions of mobile phones, computers, television. Just simply God. It was so refreshing being away, and I felt like I never wanted to come back to reality. When I sat by myself just looking out into the horizon and writing my letter to God, I cried. I felt so close to Him, and I had brought with me many troubles to camp, which I hoped to forget and to resolve, and I placed my faith and trust in Him right then. And I'm still searching for the answers, but I know God will walk with me.
I broadened my church social circle. That sounds so primary-schoolish and mundane, but for once I'm so thankful. My class, they're the greatest people on earth, especially those that went for camp - Jules, Sharon, Shuhui, Bev, Jess and Matt - but we've (us girls) always been so exclusive and never liked to break out of our comfort zone, and thus being labelled 'Glamour Girls' in Sunday School, and I'm not doubting the fact that many people think we're snooty and only care about fashion, shopping and brands. We tried opening ourselves up to YAG, and I found some treasures which I never would have thought I'd find. Most of the new friends I made were from Matt's old class, the '85 batch, and I got to know some from the '83 batch as well. Through countless rounds of 'Murderer', 'Bridge', 'Bluff', 'Dai Di' and those walks and chats along the beach, we're not social outcasts anymore. And I'm praying these new friendships I made at camp will not fizzle and die out once camp's over, but will strengthen daily.
I slept on a beach. Cool, huh? Well, I never really slept for the two nights at camp, the first night being the lack of aircon and the buzzing of the insects, and Jules and I staying up while everyone slept to chat, but the second night was spent playing games, then chatting by the beach, till someone came up with this idea to walk to Lazarus Island, this island just right next to St John's, which condemned trespassers. Well, we trespassed all right, at 4am in the morning. Nine of us trooped over to that island, and us girls - Jules, Sharon, Bev and I - talked as we walked, and played 'Paddlegourd', you know I have no idea how it's spelt or pronounced really, but it's this game where you spin and spin in circles and then race in a straight line to a finishing point. And at 4am, where you see nothing but a flat ground ahead, it was the perfect setting. Then we just collapsed, with the guys I'm sure thinking we were loony bins sleeping on the bare sand, and us too - just that we cared more about sand in our hair - so we chose a separate spot and lay in a rectangle on each other's tummes.
I cooked and made my own bed and cleaned toilets, dishes and the kitchen. Well, that sounds really impressive to my domestic resume doesn't it? Cooking consisted of cutting up the potatoes and carrots, and occasionally helping about here and there, although I think I was more of a hindrance than a help. And during the barbecue, I actually fried calamari rings, flipped the beef and buttered all sorts of things. *grins proudly* I made my bed too! Although Janis deemed me utterly hopeless. And I cleaned a toilet? Yes, I did. I've never done that in my life, so it was pretty much an experience. But it was actually really fun! And Shuhui, Bev and I spent about two hours in the kitchen (amidst a twenty-minute break during a blackout) washing dishes and cleaning it up. We had a factory-like system going for the dishes, and I felt really accomplished. LOL. Then we decided to wash the floors, and we bickered about how we wanted it done, because Bev insisted that it was okay if the suds were still there cos it would dry up anyhow, but Shuhui wanted it to be all clean, but that meant getting the floor wetter and wetter. I stood there with a kettle of water in my hand and simply poured water on the floor when I was told to. But the three of us are simply and disgustingly hopeless at household duties, especially me. I stuck my head in the sink and almost puked. (But I tried. I really did.)
I always knew I had an affiliation with Hong Kong. HAHA. Broken and the most terrible Cantonese EVER came rambling out of me during camp with my four honky-tong sisters. We pretended we were living in some rural village in Hong Kong in like the 1930's as we had throwing rocks competitions, and to try to hit the coconut off the tree. Us - Pretty, Apple, Candy, Cherrie and Yan Yan (and occasionally Coco) - I swear, we could be our own comedy to the Hongkongers.
I am always innocent. During 'Murderer', I was NEVER the murderer once, but everyone still tried to kill me off. Poor me. Even when Bev thought she saw my card (a civilian one), I was still voted off.
Well, that's pretty much it. Let me go poke around at the diferent variations of how church camp went...
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Thursday, June 09, 2005 10:44 PM
Zaizai's special day.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, ZAIZAI! :) My darling's a year older now. LOL. And so am I, damnit.
Anyway, the Taiwan trip was really amazing, I just love the country, just like how I love Hong Kong, and maybe even more, because finally I understand the people more, cos of the spoken Mandarin, instead of Cantonese, which falls about 80% on deaf ears. With Mandarin, I can at least understand about half of what the people are saying. Well, I'll probably do more updates on the trip slowly, but a little snippet, and one of the most exciting parts was during our second last night, when we were at this Japanese shabu shabu restaurant (which is like, HEAVENLY, by the way), called 'Shi Min Da Dao' shabu shabu, we bumped into one of the members of Machi! Well, guaranteed it's not Zaizai or like, ummm... I don't know who else I like in Taiwan, but it's still a celebrity! And he's American so he speaks English so all the better. LOL, we didn't know his name and stuff, but still we went up to him and if we could take a picture and stuff like that. And he was really nice about it, and we started chatting for abit and later on, he told us to "Have a great stay in Taiwan!" Although, the girl he was with didn't look too pleased about it. OH WELL, I guess she feels threatened by two English-speaking beauties. LOL. But, yep later on we found out his name's Jeffrey and he's the leader of Machi. So, to all Jeff Huang fans out there, um, haha?
And also, the guys in Taiwan are mega cute. As in, the normal people walking on the streets are tons cuter than those at home. And the hot springs experience was just relaxing, and so refreshing, and not to mention the delicious food?! I miss Taiwan. I wanna go back sooooooooo badly.
I should stop whining. Will continue tomorrow.
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