countdown at home

This year we didn’t plan on having any party for Angie’s birthday because

1) she was not really keen on having one

2) we don’t have a house help

but at the last minute, we decided we should have a countdown at our place with some people. We wanted the new Christians from the youth camp to have a meaningful Christmas countdown.  So we invited Alvin and Doris and Choong and Senny with their families.  Allan’s brother, Desmond and his family joined us too because Yi Min, Angie’s cousin is also a Christmas baby. Yeah, we have 3 Christmas babies in the Yong family, Anna, Angie and Yi Min

Yi Min had a birthday do earlier at Allan’s sister’s place and after that we all gathered back at our house – of course one of the biggest draws was the opening of Christmas presents at midnight!

It was a simple affair with no food, but the cake was a MUST!

 Angie and Yi Min, minutes away from midnight

Notice Angie watching the time

We want to thank the 2 families for the support they willingly gave so that Desmond’s (Allan’s brother) family and Keng Lik’s friends could experience a more meaningful Christmas countdown

Wished you were here Anna, we really miss you this year, but we know we will have many more Christmases and birthdays with you.

Thanks to all who gave us presents

Most of all, thank you Jesus for being the greatest present of all – the gift of yourself – the gift of undeserved eternal life!

Family dinner – 23rd dec

My sister comes over from Singapore every Christmas and we would take the opportunity to have our family reunion cum Christmas dinner with my mum and my other sister, Allie. This year, we had the privilege of having Allie’s in laws, Tony and Judith join us.  They were on holiday here to visit Phill, Allie and Sasha.

Our darling Sasha – so cute ……………

We had our turkey roasted Asian style and ……

our chicken roasted “turkey style” – my neighbour cooked most of the food – she is a fantastic cook, but that’s not her vocation – its her hobby.  She is actually a lawyer, but just loves cooking.  She spent almost an hour deboning this chicken (deboning without cutting it up!), then stuffing it and roasting it.

She also baked meringue and fig pies

Cinnamon cookies …….

………… and minestrone soup

What did I prepare?

Well, I bought and sent the turkey to be roasted plus put the buns (delifrance frozen ones) into the oven to be baked :)

Rose prepared the Caesar salad and Phill opened the wine

We had a good dinner :p

Allan at Bandar Sunway VBS

Allan was invited to speak at the Bandar Sunway Gospel Centre Vacation Bible School a couple of weeks back and he was so encouraged by the commitment of the teachers and church members there.  They don’t have a large congregation – perhaps about 80 or so, but the effort put into the VBS was tremendous.  The church members also came to support the VBS. Here are some pics:

 

agc.youth christmas party 2007 :)

Emcees for the night were Andy (in red) and ……………

Joanne …..

Michelle did a great job organising the gift exchange. Notice the Christmas tree behind? Well, we didn’t have enough decorative items, so Joan had the great idea of getting the youth to write their wishes for 2008 on a piece of paper and tie it to the tree.

Andy with Kim Yen during one of the ice breaking games – welcome back, Kim Yen, we pray that you will be able to join us regularly in 2008

Deidre, Angie, Joy and Andrea having fun

Angie and Joan

 

Angie and Kingsley

 

The congreagation at the end of the night – having fun singing fun songs – not wanting the night to end

We had a full hall of about 120 people and with about 50% visitors – didn’t manage to take any pics earlier – this one was taken at the end of the meeting when most people were wondering around, either eating or packing up

PRAYER CARTOON

Self-explanatory…………..

agc.youth turning point camp 2007 – conclusion

We started out with less than 20 ppl signed up 2 weeks before closing date.

We only had 40 a week before closing date

We had our 60 by closing date, with 6 non-christians

A few days later we had 86 with 23 non-christians

At the first invitation, a few raised their hands indictating their desire to accept Christ

The next day, only 3 raised their hands

but the response slips showed 7 accepted Christ and the others are still joining us at our normal youth meetings

Please pray for us and for them

agc.youth turning point camp 2007 – the floods that didn’t come

It rained almost non-stop and many villages around the campsite were flooded.  Our hearts feel for them.  Raub, Maran, Sg Lembing and a few other places were flooded.  Johor was quite badly hit too. This river is normally only half this size.  there was fear in some people, especially the campsite owners, but we prayed for safety and protection and told the owners, Mr and Mrs Lee, that God will protect us….. and He did.

This river is just beside the camp site.

 

On monday night, we prayed for good weather on tuesday to have our activities. And we had.  The campers had a great time and ended up all muddy, then when they went to the bathrooms, we discovered that there was no water! Only some of our rooms still had water supply.  The dorms were out of water. 

The water department informed us that the water pumps were submerged under water and also that their water tankers could not reach the campsite because the road from Raub to the campsite was flooded.  We faced 3 -4 days without water!

We prayed that God would intervene, that the tankers could reach us – and that whatever remaining water in the campsite water tanks would hold out miraculously.  We managed to get the girls’ problems sorted out by asking them to use our rooms and the boys used the taps out in the open!

Anyway, a few hours later, we had cause to cheer when we saw the arrival of not one, but 2 tankers.

Praise our Great God!

agc.youth turning point camp 2007 – PEOPLE

We thank GOD for …………..

Alvin – who set aside precious time from his holidays in Singapore to help at camp……….

God’s gift of music to Jee Yann………

Angie – faithfully setting up the projector every session

Eugin – coming to camp despite having assignments to complete

Joel – one of our youngest campers

Joseph – for his cheerfulness

Kuang Fei – our camp commandent

John Kit – one of our photographers, together with Andy and Marcus

Hiew Hoong Cheong – our camp speaker

Kevin Yap – Mr Malaysia 2008

 

 

 

 

 

agc.youth turning point camp 2007 – the 4 groups

The four groups at camp after their outdoor games……..

David’s group – Paul

Joanne’s group – Barnabas

Eugin’s group – Silas

 Yee Ann’s group – Timothy

 

agc.youth turning point camp 2007 – activities

Our game masters – Kah Choon, Kuang Fei, Jet Yen, John Kit and Kevin – basically the Allan & Friends’ staff la – came up with brilliant games, as usual

Kah Choon with the mud crawl station

Some of the rules were -

Each group to “guard” an egg throughout their activities – the egg must remain intact till the end

The dirtiest group would get extra points

The groups get extra marks for cheering

Here are the pics -

This game looks deceptively easy but it brings out the best and the worst in people’s characters and personalities!

Most of the group members will be shouting at this point “down, down!! who is pushing the stick up?”

They finally managed to get the stick down to the ground

Another muddy station

Trying to build the best pyramid

The mud crawl – notice the egg in Yi Min’s hand?  She is the guardian of the egg for her group

Rushing to the next station – look at the espression on Ernest’s face – priceless!

Nic having a great time

Man Wai

Andrea going all out – I’m proud of you!!

 

 Alvin tried very hard to keep his shorts clean by folding the legs all the way up – he only brought one pair of shorts – the effort was in vain – but it sure made him look sexy!