year-end post

well.. time to update i guess haha..
christmas was great! as usual. mostly got cookies from some PLHers and some other cool gifts too. the marcopolo jersey, the liverpool bags, and a "liverpool training kit" HAHAHA! wrote cards to almost everyone in PLH i think.
then went to play football on the 26th with luke and his J2 classmates. first game we won 3-1. i scored 2 and luke got one. prinsep combination! haha. then second game we won 5-3. i got 4 and some other guy got one. havent played on the full field for very long. and two games is tiring like crap!!! at least scored quite a few.
then 27th dec was the synod thxgiving dinner. not much. just go there and eat haha.
29th (sat) went for band prac then lunch then went to aunty cat's house for DG gathering! haha. watched "catwoman" and played one game of mafia, then had a surprise bday party for sharon, pizza for dinner, one solid massage chair!!!, and then we went down at 9.30pm to play basketball and captain's ball until 10plus. so it was real dark, but we still could see the ball a little. haha. reached home pretty late, but good thing is man utd lost to west ham 2-1! lol..
30th (yesterday) after playing guitar for PLH worship had to be MC for the PLH graduants ceremony. didnt really think of what to say, so just impromptu everything on the spot. heh. think i said some funny nonsense as usual.. then after lunch at plaza sing went home and slept until the thxgiving dinner at presbyterian high.
today: went to weng shian's house just now to play football. kinda tiring cos the sun was so hot. so in the end we played four quarters to get more rest inbetween. lol. managed to score 11 goals. but the ppl i was playing with were like.. pri sch i think.. haha. except for joe, who scored quite a few himself:) the next oldest ones i think were weng shian, jeremy, e-sean, keng gene and his two frens. ok so they're all about pri6 and sec1. but they're not bad. haha.

well.. looks like another year has come to a close. i must say i've really grown alot this year. grown in God i mean.. i dont seem to have grown much physically :( lol.. made new friends, made better frens too.. yep.. well.. learn lots too i guess. dun think i can go into detail about my reflections for the year. it's too long and i dun think my fingers can hold out. haha. unless u really really wanna know, then pls tell me, i'll try my best. i think. still havent got my thoughts together. so my mind is not totally like.. arranged? i dunno. things are still abit jumbled up. need to sit down with a piece of paper, tonight after watchnight service maybe, and write down everything. haha.
well.. happy new year to everyone!
God be with you in the coming year(s) to come!:) peace out!

HO HO HO!

hmm.. actually don't have much to post about.. just thought i'd update haha. let's see.. ok i guess the past week has been pretty eventful.
have been going for confirmation class the past two weeks too. it's been really fruitful and have learnt lots of new stuff, as well as refeshing my memory and giving me new insight into things i already know.
liverpool have been knocked out of the carling cup as well. haha. well.. it's ok i guess. allows us to focus more on the league and it was back to winning ways on saturday night! beat portsmouth 4-1! haha. torres with two goals:) fantastic, man. secured us the game.
friday after class also went for CRYSIz outing. (with renya, renyi's brother) watched national treasure: book of secrets. not bad. though the storyline is abit funny. but the action is solid:) then we also played some pool then went to ryan's church event at night. so a good day in all:)
went to buy some christmas gifts after band prac on saturday too. managed to get all the gifts i needed. wow! haha.
then had some stayover thing last night which was pretty cool:) watched mission impossible 3 and small soldiers hahaha.. cos they were showing on HBO.
well.. that's about it actually..
merry christmas to everyone! remember! christmas ain't about the presents, or the christmas tree, or the turkey (altho it IS pretty good...) but it's about the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ, who came down to die on the cross for our sins and that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life!:)
peace to the lot of ya! and have a blessed christmas!!

PLH camp 2007 B.B.C.

man... i'm sooo sad right now... liverpool lost to man utd last night.. sian.. and man utd had like only 3 shots the whole game.. never mind.. i don't really wanna think abt it. let's look at the positives.. we controlled the whole game and had many shots just that we couldnt convert them into goals.. there's still a long way in the season to go and we can catch up.. we have a game in hand over the other 3 big guns.. the way we controlled man utd for the whole second half was encouraging. and the kop sang "you'll never walk alone" at the final whistle again. well.. so far i think arsenal have been the toughest test of the season so far for us. man utd are just real lucky.
anws.. let's look at some happier things.. like the PLH camp! haha. BBC stands for Body Building Camp. (building up the body of Christ)
the first day the campers arrived at 2pm. i actually arrived the night before cos dad had to stay over cos the youth comm stayed over to prepare for the camp. anws.. lydia led worship first and i played drums. after a whole year without playing drums for PLH worship was kinda rusty and made some mistakes with me beat. we got our groupings afterwards and my grp was called Spongebob Squarepants. -.- lol.. so had ice-breakers and then shower! whoo! the second floor guys toilet shower rocks!! the water is real warm and nice. haha. first day was actually kinda uneventful til night time. i led worship. think it was pretty ok. hosanna rocks man! i will lead it again the next time i lead worship. haha. my room was addicted to it the whole camp. ok, mostly the twins and i haha. then it was Dad's talk on building the body of Christ and then the BBC news night! haha. think all the groups had real good presentations! like shane the muscle man, and weng shian with his british voice impersonation haha. then at night the conference room boys stayed up late to talk. actually it was kinda bad cos i was supposed to be in the music room. then those who wanted to stay up late went over to bunk in the conference room. then the music room was for good boys who wanted to sleep early. haha. anws.. the Cake Sai Clan was formed! talked abt some stuff which shouldnt be put up here cos it was mostly the guys' opinions abt girls and stuff LOL. slept pretty late. but we managed to wake up early the next day.
all the boys were up early and went down for morning devotion and breakfast. then we had worship and a second talk by Dad. then it was the outdoor games. think my group handled the tasks pretty well and managed to reach farrer park field the first. (the game was kinda like amazing race) and then it was the flag game. each group had made their own flag and had to protect it. i went on offence, as always, and had to steal other groups flags from their base. actually there was a rule that if u got hit by the water bombs u had to return to base but it was soon ignored and forgotten. lol. so the whole game became a mass scramble in the mud for flags. then i managed to steal the barney group's flag and actually didnt know what to do with it cos the initial plan was just to get the flag and there was no plan of what to do AFTER u got the flag. haha. well.. the PLHers made my mind up for me. RUN. cos once ppl saw i had gotten hold of the first flag, they came chasing after me to get the flag for their own group. o.O so it came to me to get back to base. so ran the whole field and managed to evade everyone else and get a touch down back to spongebob base! team spongebob 1 others 0. haha. in the end there was no final score cos it became so messy and everyone was muddy and stuff. became nothing but smashing mud at each other. lol. all i know was our flag stayed clean and dry the whole time, cos at the end of the game, steve took it out of his pocket and it was as clean as ever. haha. good on ya stevie! then it started to rain and we all went to take shelter at a void deck nearby. when it became real heavy, the water started to flow down the corners of the roof of the shelter. so i took of me shirt and started to wash it and take a mini-bath. soon all the other guys were following my lead and, much to the despair of the girls, our shirts were all clean and we were having a good time bathing. haha. then walked back to church after the rain had stopped. took real baths and changed into our nice formal clothes for the christmas dinner. there was exchanging of gifts and stuff. and the guys had to give roses to the girls haha.. thaddeaus was declared man of the match in the Cake Sai Clan room for giving his rose to angelina haha. takes guts man. even I was shaky in giving my rose to a girl. lol.. then there was worship explosion! some nice songs which uncle alvin led. i was standing with zek, david and steve. could see they were enjoying it, except steve. haha. then we asked for one way at the end, which the band kindly obliged to playing:) then after the worship was that time of night again.. where the Cake Sai Clan gather for funtime! haha..
first up was the ground-wrestling championship! it was a mini royal rumble. (royal rumble is actually 30 ppl, we had 6 guys competing.. so its like.. one-fifth.. haha.. the other boys were too small to play.. Cake sai clan has roughly 10 ppl? me, the twins, zek, steve, shaun wong, jeremy, shane, keng gene, weng shian, yiren, thaddeaus, jon quek (who only slept at the side at night and eavesdropped on our talks lol..) so that's.. abt 13. haha. those competing in the royal rumble were me, the twins, shaun, jeremy and yiren. (zek's leg was injured, steve was sick, and the rest were too small-sized to compete. so they cheered on from the side of the room) lol.. i was drawn as the first guy in, along with jeremy.
rules are: the next competitor enters the fray after one minute intervals, we are not allowed to strike with our hands or kick, only grappling and stuff, to eliminate an opponent you had to pin both his shoulders on the floor.
well.. needless to say, being the first one drawn in, i was afraid of losing my proud record of having never lost a fight.. but i made a good start at jeremy's expense.. pinned him in under a minute.. sorry little bro.. then next in was yiren.. tougher than i expected.. didnt manage to pin him. next thing i knew i was hauled off him by shaun who had entered next. it became a mass brawl as david and jon entered soon after. i dont really recall how yiren got eliminated.. but soon only the big 4 were left standing: shaun, the twins and i.
i was credited as the under-dog, being the smalliest, scrawniest, thinnest guy among the four of us. and shaun is a rugger and the twins lift weights (and plates, now that they are working). so there was a massive size and strength difference. i tell you, i looked pathetic standing in the ring with them. moreover, i had been first to enter, so i was also the most tired..
decided to form a temporary alliance with shaun against the twins cos was afraid they might gang up on me if we eliminated shaun. so we went for david. but soon shaun was preoccupied with jon and i was up against david. somehow managed to pin him. haha. they credit it to me having good tactics and stamina. as well as hidden strength in the scrawny body of mine haha. like i was able to lift and pin them and stuff. as well as being able to stand my ground when we go head-to-head in a pushing battle.
then when david was out i teamed with jon to pin shaun cos we both knew we would have a much tougher battle one-on-one with shaun then with each other. after a long while, we managed to pin both his shoulders on the floor with a combined effort. (one guy on each shoulder. lol) that left me and jon. and like little shane exclaimed: look at the size difference! haha.. and jon had been last to enter too. so he was most fresh. when we went into a test of strength he flung me to the side real easily lah lol..
well.. after minutes of circling each other and analysing the other (actually we were just tired and needed to rest, HAHA.) we grappled with each other. somehow i managed to get jon on the floor and tried to pin him. got one shoulder down but the other one was still up. then after a while he gave in cos i think my knee was on his chest or something. haha. so that made me the Cake Sai Clan ground wrestling champion! lol.. well.. the other 3 guys were pretty stunned by it. but i must say they were good losers and accepted defeat graciously.. i was just relieved to have got out alive. lemme tell you, the three of them are monsters. and that was the toughest fight i had ever been in. (partly cos it was against 5 other guys) after the match couldnt even get up properly. felt like throwing up and my whole body was in pain. we also suffered multiple abrasions on our knees and elbows due to the carpet floor. haha..
well.. all i can say is.. size doesnt matter, and heart and mind are very important too. so to all u small people out there.. get strong in the mind and then transfer it to ur muscles haha. seriously, andrenalin rush made me stronger to pin them haha.
well. after a good bath again, the boys were about to play our nightly round of games. but there was an extra rose in the room! this next part is actually illegal. as guys are not allowed on the girls' floor.. but.. er.. anws.. i was written a script by david and the guys, and we all went up to the girls' rooms. went to the room kym was in and i had to give her the rose after saying some romantic stuff. lol.. well she accepted the rose and we all rushed back downstairs so we wouldnt get caught. k we didnt do anything like peep or what and the whole thing took less than 3 minutes.. but i guess it was still against the rules.. so.. er.. sorry. oh ya, i had given kym my rose at dinner too. some of the guys even took like 5 to 10 roses to give lotsa girls lol.. i gave one to kym and one to my sis. (and one to kym again at night. so that's 3 roses i dished out.) well.. after that crazy stunt, the guys had Round 2 of our night talks. haha. what is said in the room, stays in the room.. well.. we slept at abt 3am.
woke up the next morning for service and i think all the guys managed to stay awake. and checked out of our rooms too. and that was the end of the PLH camp 2007 haha.
well.. it was pretty fun and good lessons were learnt on building the body of the church. good friendships were formed in the Cake Sai Clan too. lol. so i guess it was pretty beneficial. i know most of the guys sure enjoyed it haha. whew.. rocks man..

Synod Youth Camp 2007

whew.. just came back for Synod Youth camp. when i reached home just now straight away went to my bed and slept. haha. now got until 1am before the liverpool game.. so anws.. this is my camp...
Day 0: this was 4Dec (tuesday) and only group leaders had to go. (it's a "pre-camp") we had to report at 2pm at kuo chuan prebyterian sec sch. the day just consisted of ice-breakers and "sai gang". like we had to clean and arrange the tables in the classrooms for the campers coming on the next day. only julian and lydia came with me. made a few new friends with the other leaders from the other presbyterian churches. heh. there's sherman, who's a real funny guy from CLPC, and Si'en, who's a really nice girl, from living praise presbyterian. and others who i can't think of right now. anws, joe, ekping, sam and tim came later at night after their youth comm meeting and we helped to make stuff fo the games.

Day 1: the other campers arrived in the morn. PLH had two groups. J and K. J is my team (me, lydia, hannah, daryl, kara, huixian, tim, sam, miguel and mitchell from presbyterian high school) we were called Justice League! and let me tell you we had some fantastic cheers and a great team morale. haha. the other team, K, was Kaypo o.O haha.. the worships for the camps were ok i guess. but we didnt know quite a few of the songs. our speaker, bishop Al Stewart (from australia) was pretty good. really enjoyed his talks. i had to pay attention to all of them anyways cos as group leader i had to lead the group discussions. haha. there were electives, and i went for the guitar crash course which i think wasnt very good. especially for the poor beginners. and a talk on spiritual gifts. then we had the group games!! it was the rat race which consisted of tasks and challenges that we had to do. and by the end of Day 1 guess what.. Justice League was top of the table with a whopping 1860 points! followed closely by Group A with 1804 points. (Group A was Si'en's group) there was also this crazy drink (carbonated water with oldenlandia) like what?? and we had to drink cans of it. the leaders even had to go up on stage afterwards to drink a whole can! >.< most people didnt finish it. but i did.. and got kinda sick afterwards. as in like, feel like abit nauseous and groggy. heh.. there's this "clubhouse" at night too which was our time to relax from the day's activities. so it was good. PLH played werewolf together. which is like mafia, only more complicated. and the leader's had to go for a nightly meeting at 11pm to give feedback on the day and stuff.

Day 2: the camp pretty much has the same routine everyday, which is quite ok, so morning would be breakfast, then worship, the talk, and then group discussion. think my group was really great, like we learnt to open up to each other and stuff. made my job of leading them even easier:) then we will have lunch and our electives. day 2 my electives was sports psychology and some teacher talk. both were pretty good. the sports psychology had to do with the part mentality had to do with sports, and the teacher talk was more like realising God's plan for you. like you don't HAVE to become a teacher.. haha. i don't plan on becoming one anyways.. never have.. then we were supposed to have outdoor games but then it rained real heavily :( felt real sorry for the organising committee. looked like they had put in a lot of effort to set up the battlefield on the school soccer pitch for battle royale and captain's revenge. it was both positive and negative for justice league. it was negative cos we were really pumped up for the games. and i was psycho-ing myself up too. getting hyper and all that. until like lydia and hannah had to tell me to calm down. lol. it was positive because that meant that at the end of day 2, justice league was still leading the pack! haha.. due to the games from the previous day. anws.. the afternoon was kinda wasted but it gave me a chance to bathe. haha. then after dinner the PLHers had our nightly game of werewolf and i had to go for my leader's nightly meeting too.

Day 3: since it was the second last day of camp and the last day of games, Justice League was super pumped up on this day. after breakfast, worship, the messsage and group discussion, we made up some cheers. super solid cheers man. haha. real funny too. and the whole team was shouting it pretty loud together. we had to serve lunch too. i decided to go on rice duty. like, scoop rice for people. amazingly, most of the portions i gave to people were correct. hahaha. anws, the day's game was the Amazing Race! haha.. it was 4 hours of solid racing and completing tasks and stuff. but it ended pretty fast to me. haha. maybe cos we were so hyper about it. unfortunately, we didnt do really well for the amazing race and so lost top spot.. in the end, group A, which was led by Si'en, won. haha. but actually the points, as we found out later, didnt really count for anything. anws, the guys went to shower and there was this super long queue. and it became real funny, cos everytime a guy came out of the cubicle after bathing everyone would be like cheering and stuff. lol. and then the next guy would go in and try to bathe as fast as possible. then after dinner we had worship and the Finale Night. Shaun (lee) and Sarah Smith were the MCs for it. so the PLHers were really hyper. first there was an archapella group which was really good. and then the auctions. this was really funny cos shaun and sarah would give some crappy clues about what was the prize and you had to use the points you had gathered from the games as your money. but we didnt really bid for anything, so our points were pretty much wasted. lol.. anws, after the Finale Night i had to go for the leader's meeting again. lights out was actually supposed to be 1am but the leader's meeting ended at 12.30am. but it didnt really matter cos in the end i slept much later than 1am.

Day 4: the last day.. actually felt kinda sad to be leaving camp.. but oh well..after the usual routine of breakfast, worship, message and group discussion, we had to do clean-up for the whole school. then after the debrief we had lunch, after which i went home with joe.

all in all i think the camp was a good time of fellowship with me own lighthouse people, as well as making new friends from other churches. which serves to build up the church of God. also, as group leader i was able to grow as well. but i had a great team behind me too:) Justice League actually made me realise how important the team is. like teamwork and morale and everything. it ain't ALWAYS down to the leader. no matter how good a leader u are, if ur team can't be bothered then it's really no use. and even if you aren't that good a leader, a good team will help make your job easier. so.. thanks to Justice League once again:) i've really got to know you guys better. as a leader, and also as equals on a personal level.
the talks were benificial to my walk as well. as leader, i had to understand the talk better than most people, so i could lead my group later on. and listening to 4 sermons 4 days in a row ain't easy. haha. but it allowed me to understand some passages better and grow in me faith:) through all the Justice league group discussions, i must say i was really able to reflect and think more about my life and stuff. think maybe it was the same for them too. life is really much more meaningful if you live it only for God:)
peace out mates!

i'll just write something for the sake of having a title

well today's worship leading was ok i think... altho i think my singing was abit off and the band missed a whole part out of Hosanna. we started worship late again too at 11.15am.. gotta take note of that.. haha.. but it was a good worship leading for me from a personal point of view. i can only hope it served to move the PLHers to really worship God. another note to take would be to have back-up singers standing in front. instead of singing at the back where nobody can see them haha..
then went to play football with dad, uncle gary and some of his frens. so they're all like middle-aged men.. dont think i played very well, but still managed to grab a few goals. then dad injured his leg cos he tripped over my leg.. heh..
and the liverpool vs bolton game is starting at 11pm. i hope we'll get a good win. at least 3-0 or more. show man utd how it's done. hahaha.. i havent forgotten that bolton beat us last yr 2-0 by a freekick which should never have been given. we were, like many times last season, dealt with an unfair result. so i hope we put it right this year. i'd like to see torres and crouch start upfront. but hey, that's rafa's decision.
anws i'll be going for synod youth camp from 4-8 dec. (actually it's 5-8th.. but leaders have to go a day earlier for a "pre-camp") so there'll be no posts for awhile after this one.
peace out!

i can't think of a suitable title

i must say i am feeling much much better now. and it didnt come the way i expected it too. cos today went to ryan's church (cos he came last week so i agreed to go for his, like an exchange program kinda thing) and the worship really was good. its kinda like more intense than what we experience at prinsep. but could really feel God working thru the worship. allowed me to really reflect and think about my life and stuff. guess this may be kinda long, and also quite personal, so won't write it down here. but i know there are many areas of my life where i've not been perfect and maybe have wronged people and stuff. it took a rollicking on tuesday, a long phonecall on thursday, a serious talk with me best bud this morn, and a worship just now to make me realise all these, but hey, God works in mysterious ways, and His plan is perfect. so all i gotta do is trust in Him and live it all for Him.:)
guess i'm feeling more prepared to lead worship tmr. and for the camp too.
time is taking back everything i thought i had. tell me how... beat time with God.
change. i must. i can. i will.