Last Day of work at CCC HQ...

Time really flies man! today is my last day of my 2 months volunteer with CCC... but quite werid things have been happening in the office for the past few days... haha

for the past few days, i've been installing Linux on 2 PCs and to RAID 1 of them... the thing is that for one of the PC, it always hang when installing halfway, and the other one after installing it hang when booting up... we keep thinking it's either the CD or selection problem and keep retrying for more than 1 day, but still couldn't work... after searching the net, we found that the first problem was because one of the RAM is faulty and the second one is because of the network cable which cause the system to hang...

then today got 3 person in the ministry not feeling well and took MC and for the past 2 days also got ppl take leave, so for the past 3 days the office looks a bit dull and from tmr i'll not be there anymore... :( hope they'll go back tmr if not will also kind of short of manpower liao...

we also had our badminton time today... but with those ppl not feeling well, we ended up with only 5 ppl playing instead of the usual 9... but it's still fun, and i get some tips for training for NS from my fellow brothers... great! also a conicidence is that we had Badminton on my offical first and last day (1 July & 31 Aug) with CCC HQ, and there's none in between... haha...

really enjoyed working there, and thanks for those who supported and prayed for me during this period... will miss the time there man, esp after i go NS...

Aussie Team meeting... and after that...

saturday, we had our 3rd offical team meeting after the trip... me and june were helping to organise this meeting... at 1st when we ask a week ago, everybody can make it except 1 person... so we tot that we could have 11 ppl making it...

then 2 days before the meeting 1 person said she cannot... this one still nvm... but the most sweat thing is that 3 person last min cannot make it.. and another sweat thing is that the person who at 1st say cannot one came... haha.. so we got 8 ppl...

we went to suntec's city Joaquim Buffet Restaurant there to have our lunch and meeting... the buffet is quite cheap, only $9.80 nett, even on weekends...the name is actually porridge buffet but there's many other things to eat too, like kua chap, rice... the most famous one is the duck, where the chef just keep chopping and we just take.. haha... the restaurant didn't provide drinks, and if we want must buy... but there's dessert which has the syrup which we can drink la.. so we took a big bowl meant for porridge to fill the desert.. .sweat man.. the bowl so big sia... too bad i didnt take photo.. then nobody use the small bowls which was supposely meant for desert...

after that we share with one another and pray for each other and our aussie contacts... which is quite meaninful esp that we havent met for 49 days...

after the meeting, we went to marina square to shop for a while.. wow.. that place has change alot after the renovation.. cant even regonise it and almost got lost inside... hehe.. but should get use to it after a few more visits... after that me and kitty went to suntec to buy something before she went to meet her friend

as it was still early, i went to the new national library which i havent been there before since it open... nice man.. the building is high... 16 storey and it's mainly made of glass, so can see very far.. very good scenery... and seldom see escalator at 14 storey.. can take escalator all the way to 14 storey... there's also glass lift, which is quite scary sia as it's 14 storey... and the speed is very fast too, esp when going down.. like you're dropping down like that... the faith hearted should take the other lift or not look outside... haha

time is really fast... my final week working in CCC

wow... time is really fast... and i've come to my last week of work in CCC... i'll be working until 31 Aug which is next wed, so it's less than 5 more work days liao... will miss all the time here man, esp after i go NS...

after that it'll be just another 9 days and i'll be in NS liao... hope the 700+ days will fly by too... haha... then i'll be back to study in ntu... haha

watching Batman 1... the 1966 one... and playing RISK... me like very blur sia...

yest before the dinner in the afternoon, we actually watch a DVD called Batman 1... this was the first batman series ever...the one with the potbellied adam west in his leotards running around biff bamming villans, the one with the *excellent* props and the one with one of the coolest batmobiles ever designed...

we watched it at the chuch lounge, which has a good sound system but is kind of cramp... but ok lar, cos we focusing on the show... throughout the show we were all laughing like crazy... we laugh so loud that even those 50 meters away can hear our laughter... oh no... hope we didnt disturb anyone...

then during the show we ate ice cream.. is like in between all those big buffet i still eating ice cream... no wonder why the pants is also so tight today... but as the room is not air-con, the ice-cream melt quite fast... so after a while we like 'drinking' the ice cream instead...
after the show, we went on to play this game called RISK while waiting to go for the dinner... it's my first time playing this game cos i dun usually play games.. so i like very blur... keep asking my friends which one means what... we are suppose to complete at least one mission given to you... like conquering a land or kill your enemy (ie your opponent).. but i not use to the game so like lost a few army for nothing...

the game will take quite long to complete so like before we get to finish the game, it's time to go for the dinner... but is a good experince so that next time i wont be so blur when playing this type of games liao...

whoa... eat sooooo much... gonna be like a pig... haha

Throughout the weekend, which is the past 2 days.. i have been eating like mad... cos i went to those 'Eat all You can' A-la Crate buffet for 2 days dinner in a row... wow..

on saturday i went with my parents to a restaurant call River City restaurant at Excelsior hotel... there we ordered like 20 over dishes.. with prawn, fish, crabs.. etc...then eat until like the stomach totally full to the brim... haha

then on sunday.. i know the church is going for a thanksgiving dinner for the concert last week, but i din know that we'll be having the 'Eat all you can' style... so is like.. whoa.. going to eat other load of food again...

the restaurant is called Lotus Garden... at the old Jurong town swimming pool there... from our table can see the swimming pool without the water.. then it's a diving pool so it's a deep one and we can see the bottom... like 4.5m deep.. scary sia.. if stand beside it and sure die if not kena cripple one if u fell in without the water... haha

now back to the restaurant and the food.. some ppl there got allergy to seafood so they can't eat prawns... so in the end like i ended up eating almost half the plate of the prawns.. abt 10.. i think gonna get high cholesterol if i continue eating... then some of the sisters at our table can't eat very much.. then after the 1st round they're full liao... so they want to eat dessert... so i tot maybe have the dessert first then later call for some more... but this one after calling the dessert cannot order other food liao... sweat! i dunno abt other places cause i dont usually do that... cos this type of buffet i always want to try as many as possible one... like very 'tan xin' hor... haha
but then after walking a while and wanting to try more food.. so feel hungry liao... luckily we got another 3 tables cos we have abt 40 ppl there so got 4 tables ma... so those from our table who still want to eat go to another table... actually abit paiseh but they keep passing me the food... so in the end keep eating non stop again... feel so bad... hee~... but one of the table with all brothers one they ordered like 31 out of the 46 dishes there... order until i think the waitress and cook got angry... haha..

i think gonna control my diet this wk... cos like going to have buffet again this and next saturday... really like enjoying myself b4 the NS... but if like that go in sure die one.. then i enlisting the following saturday liao... siao liao... must loosen the belt by one button today... think gonna eat little or fast when possible this wk... haha...

Festival of Praise (FOP)

the annual festival of praise which was held at the indoor staduim had just ended last wk... this is the biggest worship event of the year, and this year with Hillsong Australia and Delirious.. no doubt it will be great...

i went for the sat and sun one... me and some of my friend reach around 4pm and the queue is already like so long... but luckily some of my cruasade friends went there earlier so we just join them in the queue below the bridge... haha.. sound so bad.. cut queue..

at 6pm when the doors open, everybody gets so excited and push one another to try to enter the staduim fast.. whoa.. looks like abit out of control.. we were at the east gate which has a overhead bridge which we had to go through.. when i was at the top and look down.. couldn't believe it.. there were sooo many ppl and i couldn't see the queue end.. i think those ppl who came at this time wont have place to get in, esp on sat..

then in the staduim, we try to book seats for our friends as they're behind in the queue.. thank god most of them managed to came in on time, but got a few they got stuck outside becos the staduim is full already.. our group is like really big as since there are alot of crusaders in my church JCC, we queue up and sit together.. think we took up almost 4 rows of seats.. abt 40 ppl like that.. but good i managed to meet up with some ex-crusaders..

the whole event was great, esp the worship with hillsongs around.. all the great and powerful songs.. and some of us started jumping to praise god.. esp the song 'One Way'.. haha.. nv jump so great b4.. hehe.. the speaker Rev Colin Dye so called sermon, or the word of god, was great too..

for both days some of us had to the cab home.. on sat we went for dinner and then there was long queue at the kfc, so by the time we get our food it's too late to catch the train liao.. so had to take cab.. luckily got share cab, if not $22.. siao liao.. then on sun the fop only ended past 11pm.. some ppl went off earlier but i still want to praise, sing and jump to praise and worship.. so me, zq and a few of us stay till the end.. then also too late to catch the train as we went to look at the cds.. so we took bus to clementi to take cab.. it's cheaper this way, but i only reach home at 1am..

overall the FOP was super great! the feeling there is so great and rox.. but have to tahan the before and after show 'drama'.. that is squeezing through all the ppl, queue up under the hot sun, for bus, etc... but i think it's worth it, for such a famous band here.. looking forward to next year's.. hope i can make it..

Day 4: Campus Ministry and visiting our host’s house

It’s Friday liao, and weekend is approaching… we’ll only have 3 hours of ministry time on Friday as most student there don’t have lessons on Friday… we can see the difference the moment we enter the campus.. there’s lesser students walking around…

Since there’s fewer students walking around, it means there’s a even lesser chance of meeting a contact… so we decided to go to the dinning area at the campus centre to do our survey… there’s still some students there having lunch or resting… most people also pack their lunch from home as the food there, esp Asian food are really expensive… the only thing that’s cheap is pizza.. but cant eat that everyday la…

We sat there and met a group of students.. they’re from Singapore and Malaysia… we did the survey with them and start a conversation with them… they also told us more about Melbourne… but we did not managed to share the full 4SL with them as they prefer to read it themselves… but most of them took home the booklet and said they’ll try to come down to our booth next tue…

As we talk for more than 1hr, it’s already pass 1300hr and there’s not much student left in the dining area…most of them are eating or are locals… so we decided to go to the grass patch near the religious centre to rest as we’re suppose to meet there at 1400hr for a training session…

We had our training on Lordship of Christ at the main chapel of the religious centre… it’s a good environment as the place is quiet… but halfway through our session, we were informed that some ppl had booked the place so we had to leave… thank god we found another smaller chapel but this one has direct sunlight coming in so it’s abit hot…

After the training, as it was only 1630hr, we had some time to spare.. so we walk around the campus and take photos… at this time on fri there’s actually not much ppl left on the campus… looks like a holiday instead… it looks really deserted from far and its totally opposite to Singapore… in the campus there’s specific location where student clubs can paste their poster or flyer there.. the place is full of poster and there’s no guarantee that the poster will stay till the event date.. but we still decide to paste some of our poster there to ‘advertise’ our events next week: The High Visibility event and Student Life LIVE meeting…

We then proceed to the bus stop to take a bus to Wailing house… we are to take 738 but we forgot that in Melbourne they have the same service no. but will travel in different direction… so when we see the bus there as we walk to the stop, we just ran there and board the bus… it’s only after the bus left that we found out that it’s traveling in the other direction… actually this won’t happen to 737 that we usually take as it’s the terminal stop, but 738 is not…. So we had no choice but to alight and take the one from the opposite stop… while waiting we saw a 2nd hand car dealer and the 2nd hand car in melbourne can cost as little as $3499… that’s probably one of the cheaper things there compare to Singapore, but we cant bring back… haha… although the next bus is coming in 5mins but it’s terminating at monash uni… so we took that bus back and here we are… back at monash uni bus stop… we decided to wait there as there got another bus… luckily the Met card there allows unlimited rides within the period so don’t have to pay extra… we waited there for almost 25mins before the bus come… it took only 5 mins before the bus reach the place but we spend almost 1hr on it…

Wailing house is also a single storey house… in Australia as the land is big so there’s seldom multi storey apartment like our HDB… most ppl house are either terrace or bungalows… can affort that as the land is cheap… haha… we had our dinner and sharing there.. the spaghetti cooked by the Australia staffs are really good… the house is also very neat and tidy too…

We left the house at around 2030hr… the 3 Australian staff send us home in their cars as it’s inconvenient for us to take bus home… we also did not have our worship and devotion but we planned to start tomorrow…

Day 3: 1st Ministry day in Campus

Today is our first ministry day in campus… but before we could leave our apartment the ppl from NP are getting very anxious as there results are coming out… as they got this SMS system which will send the results to them via SMS, so they’ll receive the result at 0830hr SGT which is 1030hr here… SP doesn’t have this system so still have to ‘hunt’ for a computer to check for ours in the later part of the trip…

Unfortunately one of them did not do very well and had to repeat a module… we had to comfort her and this has affected some of us for the first part of the day… also the rest they were excited that they pass… so we also leave later than what we suppose to.. as such, we miss our bus that we planned to take, the 1050hr one, so we had to take the 1120hr one… actually the ministry time in campus is from 1100h to 1600h, so we’re late in the sense…

When we reached the campus, most of us are quite anxious as it’s our first time doing street evangelism in another country… Moreover, many of us have not done it for very long… luckily, we have survey forms to help us to start our initial conversation with the students… As our focus is on international students, we should try to approach them… They can be distinguished quite easily from the locals, from their hair can already… each of us will pair up with another person and try to stick together on campus… I’m partnered with Jack…

As this’s our first day and not very familiar with the campus yet, for most of the time we just stayed outside along the pave way leading to campus centre doing surveys with the students… but we did not get to share any 4SL as the students are all busy rushing for class but could not stop to listen… still got some contacts though.. and passed them the poster of our events next week… We pack bread from our apartment for our lunch… but that’s not really enough, so we go to the campus centre to buy fries to eat…

After ministry time, we went to The Glen shopping centre for our grocery shopping… we had to buy our things like bread and food for us to last through the entire week… as we walk around we keep adding things to our trolley and at the end of it, we had 2 big trolley full of things… some more the thing is that the trolley here is larger then those in Singapore.. also lar, some of the things there are not very cheap, although some things like fruits are cheaper than s’pore they’re produced in Australia… I think we bought about 110 items and cost more than A$300… each of us had to hug several bags of things back to our apartment… luckily it’s only a 10mins walk and the weather is cooling… actually quite cold as the sun has set already… it’s only 1830hr here…

We took for our dinner tonight… as we’ll be cooking dinner at home most of the time on weekdays, we had a duty roaster and each of us will take turns to cook and wash dishes… as this is our first time cooking for the team, I think somehow we under estimated the size of the dishes and each of us only had a small portion of each of the dishes… it’s like food rationing… haha.. most of us are still hungry after that and open up the biscuits that we’ve just bought…

As most of us are still very tired, we decided not to have our worship again, and just have a debriefing before going to rest… think it’s becos our body are still not adjusted to the weather here, even thought we had a good sleep last night… we also decided to postpone our Great Ocean Road tour to next Saturday so that we’ll have time to rest over the weekend and plan for next week 3 major events…

Day 2: Orientation and Prayer Walk around the Campus

We wake up at around 10am MEL time… (8am SIN time, so still ok)… then we had our brunch (meaning eating breakfast and lunch together) as it was quite ‘late’ liao, before we move over to have our training session on ‘Living with Harmony’… this is quite important as we’ll be living with each other for the next 19 days, and we have to learn to understand and give in to one another to prevent mis-communication or quarrels… we were also briefed on the Australia lifestyle and climate…

The session lasted for about 2hrs… after that, we got more excited as we prepare to go to campus, which is Monash University… to get there, we had to walk abt 10mins to the bus terminal to take a direct bus there… the bus no. is 737… along the way to the bus stop, we try to familiarise ourselves with the route to the bus stop as we’ll be using this road everyday…

Whoa… the bus intervals there are really long… about 20-30mins… cant afford to miss the bus if not have to wait for that long… we reached there at 2.35pm, just in time to catch the 2.40pm bus.. if not must wait till 3.15 then sweat liao… the bus ride took about 20mins, and along the way we get to see more of Melbourne… one of the most ‘funny’ thing is the traffic light… in Singapore at the traffic light predestrian crossing the green man will flash at the last few seconds but here it was the red man that flash… at first we thought there’s something wrong wit the traffic light…

After we reach monash uni, we went for a prayer walk around the campus… we also were brief for what we’ll be expecting for the next 10 ministry days in campus, and also to pray for it… we also went around exploring the campus like their canteen and religious centre… as we were hungry by then, we decided to buy somethings to eat… the food there also quite expensive, even on campus… I bought a fries for A$3…

Soon it was 4.30pm and we head to the cellar room to attend their live meeting, which is like our CLM… but theirs is only 1 hr long… we had worship and then a speaker will speak… but I think we were too tired and still not use to the weather that some of us fall asleep during the session…

After the meeting ended, it was 6pm and the sun has already set and the sky was dark outside liao… this is total opposite to Singapore… it’s still 4pm back home and the sun is still shining brightly… we talk with the aussies for a while before heading to the bus stop to go back to glen waverly fpr dinner…

We had our dinner at Grand Tofu, which is a Chinese restaurant… there’s a few other Chinese restaurant at glen waverly, like Bob’s kitchen… I had chicken rice… the serving of the food here is really big sia… for those small eater can actually share with another person… the price is like value for money, cos it cost $8 and got a serving about twice as big as in Singapore where it cost $4…

After dinner, we head back to our apartment… as many of us are very tired already, we just had a short briefing before going for our rest and sleep to prepare for tomorrow…

Day 1: The Mission Begins… Flying off to Melbourne…

We assembled at Singapore Changi Airport at 1320h for our check-in process and to talk to our family members, friends and supporters who came to send us off… it is quite emotional for some of us as it’s the 1st time going for mission trip and be away from home for so long… we’ll be spending the next 20 days among the 12 of us…

All too soon it’s 1430h and it’s time for us to enter the departure gates… one of our team member’s pastor said a prayer for all of us before we bid goodbye and enter the gates…

By the time all of us enter the gates, it’s already 1450h, ½ hour before the plane takeoff… as such, we did not have time to look around those shop there and proceed to the plane at Gate 34… The airline that we took was Emirates… It’s my first time taking this airline and flying out of SE Asia, so I’m quite excited… there’s no queue outside the boarding gate… I think this is because the plane came from Dubai to transit here and most ppl are already in the plane…

A short while after we enter the plane… the pilot said we’re preparing to taxi out the runway for take off… quite surprise as it’s still 1510h and I think we’re one of the last few to board the plane… We take off at 1530h and start our 7 hr flight to Melbourne… it has a front view camera and we can see the runway clearly from our seats…

Inside the plane, we had our dinner and watch some movies… the in-flight system is not as good as the SQ one and we can only watch the movie when it’s play, and we cant forward or rewind it ourselves… the sun set about 3hrs into the flight and some of us starts to sleep while some of us and me continue to watch the movie…

Time flies even when we flies… haha… we started to descend to Melbourne airport and started to see the Melbourne night view… the plane landed at 0011h Melbourne time (Singapore time 2211h)… as MEL is 2hrs faster than SIN from Apr to Oct… between Nov to Mar, it’s 3hrs faster as they have daylight savings…

The checks at the airport is quite strict and it took quite long for us to clear the immigration… after that, ask we walk down to the exit, we keep thinking how cold is the weather outside, as we were told it’s 10 degree… yup, it’s really cold… don’t think we can survive without the jackets…

As it’s already 1am, two of the Australian staff came to pick us up and some of us take a cab down to our apartment at Glen Waverly. I was in the cab and the way the meter jumps is very scary sia… it jump 10 cents every second… we started at A$2.40 and when we reach Glen Waverly abt 40km away, the meter reads A$125 (which is abt S$160)… in Singapore this would cost only abt $40 with midnight charge… so expensive le…

Finally, we reach our apartment... it’s 0159h (2359h in SIN)… wow… look nice le… we just had our hot shower and had a light supper… going to sleep liao for tmr.. (today actually cos its 3am there liao..)

Gen12ii Commissioning

Time is really fast... today is the Gen12ii Commissioning night liao.. and in less than 24 hours, we'll be on the plane flying to Melbourne to begin our 19 days missioin trip there...

we had our team retreat today, to set our target and goals for the mission trip... it's more than 5 weeks since our whole team last meet, and it's really great to see each other again 1 day before starting the trip... and to have a symbolic send off at the commissioning...

i also went for a photography workshop as i'll be helping the photographer to take photos... hope we can take lots of good photos during the trip... hee~

Easter Sunday / Australia Mission trip

Yesterday was Easter Sunday, the day Christ raised from the death.

This year, my church don't have any special event for easter so the service is like quite normal. The only thing is there's some food provided.

By the way, if you'll have not known, I'll be going for a Gen12 Mission trip with Campus Crusade for Christ to Melbourne, Australia (Monash University). The trip is from 19 April to 9 May 2005. We'll be reaching to the International Students there, who come from all over the world like China, India, Africa, etc...
I need to raise $1,800 to go for this trip, and currently I only raised $735. If you're willing to support me, you can reply to this message or call me at 98356856.
Thanks.

Good Friday

Finally, a break from the project work... Yesterday nite do project until 9.30pm then go dinner with my classmate... it's one of those rare chances where we get to go out together haha...
after that eat until 11pm cos we waited for the indian mutabak... somehow the store yesterday was also the first day of operation... so we were one of the 1st few customers...hehe

then this morning when to church for good friday service to commerate Jesus's death on the cross... but i think the service is too tradition liao, cos they keep meditating, and might not be good for visitors... i also got abit sian and tiring towards the end...

btw, this year is one of those rare occasion where both major christian event (christmas and good friday, ie the birth and death of jesus) both falls on 25th... the 1st criteria of this is that 25th march must be on fri... dont tink good friday will fall on 25 apr...

although now i understand more of the christian calender but i still dunno how they calculate when is good friday, it is like chinese new year where it will fall within the specific period of about 1 mth but keep going forward and backward within it... haha... but christmas falls on a standard date... also for the seasons like Ephipany and Pentecost the lenght of them will depend on when is Good Friday, but Advent, Christmas, Lent and Easter always have standard length... still dont really understand why is like this...

Maundy Thursday

Today is eve of Good Friday, also known as Maundy Thursday. This is the last night where Jesus had his last supper before being crucified on the cross the following day.