The Yong children studying – this only happens before examinations, like 1 week or 10 days before an exam. Normally, I’d have to ask them to sit at the dining table where I can keep an eye on them, otherwise studying doesn’t get done! I’m not trying to compare, but really, I’m glad I didn’t have to do this with Anna, the eldest – she’s the type who would study without being told.
Saw this car at Ampang Jaya some time back, can’t remember when, but it was definitely more than 2 months back. Couldn’t resist taking a pic and so I stopped the car, and asked permission to take a picture with my handy dandy phone – in fact almost 70% of the pictures in my blog are taken with my handphone.
Its the mid autumn festival/mooncake festival tomorrow. I remember we used to have a lavish dinner at my late mother-in-law’s place. The children would enjoy themselves playing with lanterns whilst the adults would just sit around eating moon cakes, peanuts, chestnuts and sipping tea, normally out in the garden.
This year we hadn’t planned on having anything except to have our care group over at David Yap’s house tomorrow.
Allan is away with the Senior citizens for a one night retreat and I had planned on having a quiet night, just relaxing at home in between sending the 2 girls to Kumon and picking them up later. Believe me, this is actually a luxury!
Then Ah Hui called and asked me to have dinner with him because he was bored stiff, I told him that I already had dinner (which was true) and hesitated to invite him over, my natural selfishness wanted the “me time”, but he sounded so lonely that I told him to come over anyway. We had some good food which I could heat up for him. He came with some lanterns and soon we had them all over one of our trees………..
(First 3 pics by Andy, next 4 by Ah Hui and the last one by me)
The paper lanterns really looked quite pretty on the tree
The moon was cooperative too:)
Andy, Angie and Andrea had fun helping to light up the candles
Andrea playing around
Angie’s a bit more self conscious
Picture quality is limited with just a “Point and Shoot”
Our neighbours had just returned from their tuition class and happily joined in the fun
The candles went out after about 30 minutes, but it was enough time for us to really enjoy ourselves. Thanks Ah Hui, for bringing such simple fun to us. I thought I was doing him a favour by helping him out of his boredom, but it ended up the other way around.
Bless others and you’ll be surprised – you may just end up being blessed instead:)
What goes around, comes around……………
This may not be 100% accurate in how it will actually happen, but the rapture will DEFINITELY happen.
Are you ready?
Will you take 9.5 minutes to watch this?
Final Week – 10/9 – 15/9
Everyone is excited about going home and waiting for the week to end. The classes on leadership and stewardship was very helpful and helped me to see what kind of leader I was and how I should be growing. I was also challenged to tithe 10% totally to the local church, anything given outside of church should not be included into the 10%, it would be considered free will offering and not part of my tithe. I am willing to commit myself to do so and pray that God will help me.
The International praise night was interesting with the Africans outshining the rest of the world but I reckon that we, from Malaysia, Philippines and Indonesia did well with our songs too.
Everyone looked forward to the graduation night on Wednesday. It turned out to be a very pleasant evening. We had a formal sit down dinner and were served salad, starters and a nice tender steak. I enjoyed the steak and I believe most did too. At the last minute I was requested to take Ernie out and do a short show. I accepted the invitation with no hesitation. Many ideas ran through my mind but I decided to just take the opportunity to thank the volunteers and the faculty. It turned out okay and I am glad I was able to lighten up the night. In case you’re wondering what the puppet is saying in the part about “anyway”, there is someone there named Anyway 🙂
Budi gave a good speech on behalf of 718 and he talked about our experiences and feelings. Bishop Andrew then spoke and encouraged us to be faithful to what we learnt. He ended by leading us to sing a song to the volunteers.
All of us then received our certificates and our Alumni Pin. We are all so proud to wear the pin and be an Alumni of HI.
On the last two nights, a small group of us walked out to the nearby supermarket after dinner and just window shopped. I took the opportunity to buy Ice cream foe everyone – it was on offer:) It was fun and the ice cream was delicious.
We had a communion service on Friday and after that a debriefing. We were given a few DVDs and also a Bible software. This was a pleasant surprise and we are all very glad. After this we were free and officially our course had ended. Some of us went out to Kahului for last minute shopping. I was thinking of getting some costumes but on second thoughts, did not buy any as my luggage was already overweight.
I could hardly sleep as maybe deep inside I was excited to go home.
Flying Home
The journey was quite smooth and the travelling was less boring with a small group of us travelling together. I discovered that I left my waist pouch in the plane when we got out from Narita Tokyo. I quickly went to the Airline agent and she said she would contact the cleaners to find it for me. Unfortunately, the cleaners did not find it. I lost a camera and US$120+. Yes I was sad but had peaceful. I just have to trust God to get it back for me, if He doesn’t, I’ll take it as another lesson to be more careful with my own things.
We said our goodbyes to Bandon, Johnny, Ronnie and Mani at Singapore. I quickly looked for the MAS agent but they were closed and would only open at 4.30am. Armand, my room mate, got his boarding pass to fly off at 10am the next day. We then went to look for a room at the Transit lounge but were told that they were full. We walked around and decided to wait it out watching the giant LCD screen showing EPL matches.
At 4.15am I went and waited for the counter to open and was so glad I could change my flight from 1pm to 6.50am. Armand and I then went for an early breakfast. Armand also wanted to try and change to an earlier flight but was told that he was on standby. Armand then walked me to my gate and we said our goodbye and parted.
Armand has been a good roommate and we have become friends. I will continue to be in touch with him and pray for his ministry.
On touchdown I got a call from Veron and soon we were hugging each other…I am HOME!!!
THE END
Here are more pics and a video from Allan’s trip……………
Scene on the way to Hana beach reminds me of the great ocean road, Melbourne, Australia
At Black Sand Beach
Boy at Hana beach
Oops! Couldn’t resist putting this in!
I dread the terrible jams and congestion every year just before the breaking of fast during the month of Ramadhan. One other interesting thing is that there are a lot of people sitting patiently at the restaurants waiting for the end of the fasting day. If you want to drive, or do your shopping, then 7pm will be a good time because everybody would have already be home or at a restaurant.
This year ……………….
I
Basement Car Park at Ampang Point Shopping Centre
I could not believe my eyes – the car park was half empty and the restaurants were equally empty on the first day of Ramadhan.
My conclusion …… either the economy is very bad or Muslims in Malaysia are becoming more religious and being more serious about their fasting, breaking of fast and the subsequent prayer they have to perform at about 8 – 9pm, which means they have to be home or at the mosque for the breaking of fast.
Allan was supposed to arrive at 2+ pm this afternoon but he managed to get the earlier flight out of Singapore at 6.50 am, which was a good thing cos he had already been there since midnight last night. However, it kinda tossed our plans a little bit. The girls had prepared a welcome banner and Angie said she would put it up when she got back since Allan was due to arrive home only around 4pm. Anyway, I got the call at 6.10 this morning and when Allan announced that he would be back by 8am, I had to rush to set up the banner (which consisted of 28 pieces of paper which I had to staple and cellophane tape to a rafia string) for the girls since Angie had already left for school and it would take too long to wake Andrea up! It was a rush as I also wanted to get out of the house by 6.45am – that’s when the jam starts.
I saw an MAS plane flying in when I arrived at 7.51am and wondered if it was Allan’s flight. If you watch chinese movies, it was kinda like that, you know – picture this, scene of wife rushing to the airport, then next scene the husband in the aeroplane, then, flip back to the car approaching the airport, flip back again to plane descending ….. Ya, I had my fun…. now back to the story, actually it really was his plane – found that out when I checked with him later. I called him at about 7.55am and he knew cos he had not switched off his hand phone!!! But at least he didn’t try to answer it! The plane had just touched down then.
Well, we are happy he’s back and he is really glad to be home too. I unpacked for him while he had a shower and after that we went to see Richard Gan who is leaving this evening for his medical studies at the University of Nottingham, UK. He is the 3rd in the family to pursue medicine – his father is a skin specialist and his sister, Li Peng is graduating next year as a doctor.
Next stop was the office and I think he is happy with how the renovation’s been done. We later went for some breakfast and right now, he is slipping, zooming, zonking between twilight and day light – jet lag!!!
8.45pm – We’ve been doing a lot of walking around, going here and there, to keep Allan awake so that he can sleep through tonight and hopefully get over his jet lag faster. Just now, just before we walked the dogs, he looked at me, smiled sheepishly and asked in cantonese “Ko tiew gao q cho mae mang cho ah?” Direct translation “What is the name of that dog already?” referring to one of our dogs! I burst out laughing and couldn’t believe it – he’s THAT tired!
He’s now sound asleeeeeeeeepppppppp…zzzzzzzzzzz
We take our 3 dogs out every day (or at least we try to) for their walks and their … other stuff … Anyway, its good for us and for the dogs. How about that – social time for the dogs and their owners!
Whenever Allan is not around, I always take Lucky, the most active and the “alpha male” of the brood. I just feel I can handle her better, but today was not a good day for me to handle her because both my arms are aching terribly. Last night the pain actually woke me from sleep even after taking a pain killer.
I sent Angie to have her bath, then took Andy and Andrea along for the walk. We walked towards the back of our house, which was a terrible mistake …. because the neighbour’s dog was out! That dog and ours are mortal enemies.
Well, my dog, Lucky just went wild and flew at the dog, jerking me along but I held on because I have seen these two dogs fight before – they don’t let go even with blood dripping all over! Well, I saved the vet fees but I fell and now my arms hurt even more, not from the fall, but from the pull. I guess if my arms were not hurting, I would have been able to handle Lucky, I have been able to before.
Anyway, I’m still glad that it was me and not Andy or Andrea – Andy was in shorts and Andrea was wearing a skirt, I was wearing thick jeans – it would have been a bad fall for them! I’m also thankful there were no scratches… well 2 really minor ones, so small that it doesn’t really count.
Sunday: I bought more chocolate and playing cards (in case you’re wondering – they’re for our magic shows) from Wall mart and then at I went to The Ross and bought more branded under wears to give away. I think I have enough of shopping for a while.
Mon,Tue: The last 2 weeks went by quite quickly and most of us are now counting our days to go home. As usual, we have classes in the morning, then a 2 hour break after lunch and more classes until 7pm. I normally take a stroll with my roommate after dinner and then go to the gym for a short work out and play table tennis.
This week is the Regional presentations. We were divided into 8 regions. Malaysia was grouped with Indonesia and the Philippines. I took the initiative and gave them some ideas. I will do my ventriloquist routine with “Ernie” to highlight a few issues while the other delegates will act them out plus do a street interview. We have to spend some time getting ready for our presentation on Wednesday, so there is less rest.
Wed: We started our class on The Majority. This class has opened our insight to know and have a firsthand knowledge of their faith. It is truly a big challenge ahead and my heart has a great burden for them, that God will unveil their eyes and release them from their bondage.
Well our presentation went quite ok. Ernie was quite a hit as many of the Africans were new to ventriloquism and my money changing trick. But the main thing is that we managed to get our message across. PTL
Sat, Sun: Time flies and we are now going into the final week of our training. We rented an MPV and drove to Hana at the Southern end of Maui. The drive was great as we meander around the mountains on one side and the sea on the other. We saw many beautiful views and was just awed by God’s wonderful world. It was tiring but a fulfilling one. PTL
With Mexican friend, Luna after his presentation
The drive to Hana reminds me of the Great Ocean Road in Melbourne, Australia
God’s beautiful creation …. the view, not me 🙂
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