working my magic

finally. i have patched up non existent dimensions and opened new realms to worlds of another.

in short, i just relinked, or linked new peeps. enjoy....

cant sleep. not cant sleep.. not sleepy. 12.44, not sleepy

hmmm

feel like being in church. so can hang out with church peeps. clearly, i am missing camp...

ive been online frequently. talking to church peeps. now my mom thinks im addicted to a game or something. arhh

lol. paranoia. i blame the newspapers.

only show the negative things in the world. and/ or superficial things. my parents got frightened cause of that, explaining that that might be the reason i dislike school. lol

nothing like that. its just... i lost the motivation to study

studying in our intricate education systems. branching out , slowly blossoming into core trades. "poly or uni", or "what sec school u wanna go?? "

thats the first question yr cousins or relatives ask when u see them on a so called "important " year in your life.

how important issit in your life? wat value does it really hold?

issit important, cause it vitally affects what u might be in the near future? a laywer, or a road sweeper? thats the question that pops up every once in a while

or are u studying, cause yr parents say that u must? maybe just to use u as a trophy?

or to fill up that little hole that seems to be growing in yr heart as u grow older. to trade in a couple of years of mugging, with the few months of ardent glory, knowing that content will follow u all over, till the world forgets that yr psle score was top in yr level, or year. till someone from yr extended family rakes it up so as to pressure our younger relatives who hv already missed the chance to catch their favourite television shows just because PSLE is coming... and u better not do badly.

"but why? if i do badly, what happens?"

"then u dont get into a school of yr choice."

"i have a school of choice?"

seriously speaking, we were 12 for the sake of man!!

do u really want to let a 12 yr old determine his future?

its like giving a child dynamite.he might just blow it and ruin his life, or decide to go bomb a mine, and get rich in the process.

all while he's twleve, cause the young generation is really smart, u see, dont let it go to waste.

ok. thanks.

we are thrown into new environments at the age of 13, expecting to adjust to our problems, identity crisis, and changes, all while juggling 9 subjects, all at once.

and the media subjects computer games to being the bain of not wanting to go to school.

its only school, 9 subjects, putting up with teenagehood, relationships, changes..... he can handle it. not a sweat.

im pretty active in the morn. 1.47 am. just realised that i think too much at night, thus i cant sleep

hmm. just chatted with yilli online. boy, can one holiday transform a boy into a man. apparently, this dude can decide that he wants to do well in his studies, and drop what he loves most- basketball. hes studying now as i am typing.

i really found the most mature SA guy so far.

this post is really just a rant on how the bustle of life can bring u away from what life should really be like, and that friends, or friendships could just be lost because we didnt revise chapter 7 yet.

to me, studying is something, but not everything. i dont want to win the race and find that i didnt help 10 other friends lying hurt on the pavemnt.

and this isnt because i am really a com addict, or that im still sulking over my psle score.

God has a plan for me, i and i feel led to write this this morning. that maybe what youre working for, isnt what u should work for. im still trying to learn what god wants me to do in my life. but im not going to let the bustle in life turn me deaf from what i have to do. of course, ill study, but not because i want to get into some prestige school, but because when i do stuff, i do them for god.

ok... feeling tired now. c ya


time moves at a rapid rate

friends forgotten, new friends made

hols are boring. we all agree

its not really fun when ure too free

but its nice , cause the silence gives a chance

to hear and work on god's demands


quite worried about the demands of the coming year. but ill say a little prayer, and leap with faith ;P

off to bed!

back from camp

BACK FROM CAMP!!!!



i dont think i am feeling happy bout that. cause, i am really missing the campsite. well, i hv to take a crap sometime.lol



reiteration time!



Day 1



Met up in the campsite at 8. was late by 9 mins. sat with tim tam, and dennis, mingxuan, kenneth and some of my old CM buddies were there. chatted, took my attendance, waited for my cousin, hansel, and clement to come



at about 8 plus, it was ice breaker



boring.......



icebreaker games was boring, and just as i was about to label this camp a failure, we were grouped into our teams



this year's groups are extremely hard to pronounce. mines



MAHAL



there were others



Cinta,



Racous



libb (if thats how its spelled)



Aroha



Amor



and some others



sorry, like i said, the teams are hard to pronounce, so i couldnt remember them all



my team consisted of



(NOTE: this is what i knew of the people b4 going through camp, so i knew quite little)





Leader: BRYAN



first met in youth, also in worship ministry, he plays electric, studies in barker, thats all i noe abt him so far





Nichole: first met at my first youth camp 2 years ago. same group. i only remembered she got cut on the leg during one of the activties b4





annabelle: first met in youth ministry. not same group, so i only know her at face value





raynard: first met at children's ministry i guess. we were infants then . so we knew each other pretty well





Arthur: frequented our church about a month ago, heard he didnt come o our church for 2 yrs, and now he's back





Nixon: totally new guy from BB, i was the one who invited him, since i was in Pub comm. he came cause he thought the camp was compulsory due to his CCA





CLement. knew him in primary school. been classmates ,then schoolmates, then classmates





Russ: knew him since the day i was born, u can say he's pretty cool.





yep. that was our team. left for camelot adventure camp, settled admin. and off to lunch!!



ate lunch. it started raining, but games still commenced



this year's camp's theme was ILOVE. so team bonding was core. by god's grace, our teamwas the ownage of bond, Daniel Craig would have been proud



we fought hard on the first games. it was non competitive, more of high score games. so hiong, that we tore xiaorong's mat during the sushi conveyor belt game. maybe it was after nathaniel's team, but i am not shifting the weight to anyone.... oops bad pun!!!



xiaorong was pretty angry, that we tore her mat, cause she would hv no where to sleep. sorry!!!



our team came 2nd on that day, if i am not wrong, behind Racous, and wedged btween libb. tony announced the results, read libb as limey. nice. it kinda sounds better



had dinn, speaker session( which was pretty good) group time, which was spent on bonding, and practising for the skit, or somng for day three,





DAY 2



woke up, breakfast, speaker session. today was on how god loved us. pretty good.ok... pastor aaron was awesome everyday.



group time, devotion. bonded even more.our team was super bonders la



lunch.....



off for games!!



we left the campsite and headed towards the field residing near.



since our team already planned to burn the competition, i sprinted to the field to get the extra 5 points. mingxuan was a better runner, so he kinda owned me. fortunately, it depended on the team, and my team arrived first. yay.



our next task, was to do river crossing! we were wearing our Personal flotation devices. this waspretty awesome. it wasactually pretty sureal. though the river was already open out to sea, and singapore's waters seem more green than blue.hmm. held on to ropes and slowly descended down the riverwall. algae made the drop treacherous, but it was like abseiling. not a problem! clement slipped. ohno! raynard too, annabelle,slipped a bit

after river crossing, we had to go back to the beach and aid in the tugging of the rope. had to wait 4 theother grps. oh well. they didnt need my help. so i decided to fufill a little self discovered to-do of the day. skim stones.

wooh . did that rock! i was pretty suckish. my best would be 3? MQ and the others started joining in. tim unleased his alpha-male-ism, and got a sick score of 7 skips! crikey!!

slowly, the beach went scarce on rocks, and clemnt, hansel and i started to scout for them. i faked an australian accent, and we became rock hunters. well, it kinda was a quest for pebbles, but that sounds dumb.

min didnt see the totally rocking throw tim made. she was stoning around u see, so he did anotherone. but unfortunately, she turned her head yet again. sigh. wehadto go find more rocks, b4 tim finally heaved another death throw, and this time, i missed it! lol

more games awaited us. but the main game would be the bible quiz one. teams had to pit against each other in theknowledge of thebible. this one, i admit, i am lousy at. sorry dad!!

daniel was opposition, so we got owned quickly. but sincethe other team loved us so much, they vetoed us 3times. veto means the winning team gives a chance for the opposition to not eat the forfeit stuff

which are either- wang wang with mustard or tabasco,
- raw quails egg
- some ginseng to chew on

we evantually won once, and vetoed themback. but we lost the other 2 questions, and the oppo ran out of vetoes. i chose the first forfeit. and waddya noe? raw egg!

we had to eat 5. i grabbed the first, since i felt bad. bryan, nichole, raynard, nixon, and arthur took the rest i think. poked a hole, and slurp it down, they said.

i slurped it. it was the FREAKING NICEST EGG I DRANK IN MY LIFE.

It was so good!!! andim not being sarcastic, though i know i hv a notorious reputation

it was awesome!!

2nd forfeit. raynard chose. egg.... we checked, it wasnt rigged. i volunteered for a2nd helping, but thay didnt allow. crap

the rest of the team ate.

we got lots of brownie points for being awesomely nice

another main game was the cold hard cash game. cooler. ice water, coins, math, need i say more.teams had to endure 40 secs of handin cold water b4 gamestarted. ouch. we did our cheer to kill the pain. hopefully it helped. we got brownie points for that 2!

nichole, raynard- the gore fetish boy, and i talked about saw movies.well, i didnt really talk aboutit, just grimaced.... but it kinda affected me. cause, just after was cold water coin game. scary

day 2 finishedin a nutshell. had time to plan forskit. i was singing, so slacked off, and sneaked into leader's dorm to learn howto play bridge. taught by weicheng, and slowly, the apprentice overthrew the master. claerly beginner's luck. clement learnt too

3rd day

today's games were labelled: this is sparta,or changi

fiercest games the day had to offer .extra 5 points for team that reached station first. but wait, new player joined the game!

name: zeon

status:tired after obs

first met in YM. nice guy. recently ate at sumo house with him and his bro. had quite alot of "rumiers" going around bout him. usually gets bullied with nataniel.lol

i am analysing everyonelike a poke dex or something.haha...moving on!

we also combined tribes to form countries. yes.... totally survivor. aroha was the team with the lowest points the last day, and we were the first...so we merged . bryan lost confidence. but aroha proved us wrong. we became country: Mahoha!!

fierce man. me and better friend mingxuan sprinted off. me, not the long distance material kept a distance, while mingxuan secured positions for us. we got the extra 5 points for each station. was tiring, but worth.

each station tested different skills. first game gave us 15mins to plan . but unknowingly, 5 mins later, the most hiong planners would be taken out of play. our team had rapidcommunication, so we did quick planning, b4 bryan, nichole, mingxuan, andi were taken out. lol. asexpected. other hiongsters from other groups,like priscilla, min, jared.... were all taken out of play.

2nd station tested our sewing. the Gb girls in our team owned the parade.sewing like crazy.

yup. challenging games lasted about 3 hrs. ran like a mad man on steriods.

now came the attraction. after lunch, we grabbed our PFDs(flotation devices) and grabbed our paddles

it was time to unleash the dragon. we laernt the basics of dragon - boating. but not much communication was carried out. welost all our races. but, our team did somethingother teams didnt have time to do. capsize drill. super fun! we intentionally capsized our boat, and flippedit over, climbed aboard, pailed out water and rowed back to shore. super fun, but equally tiring.

took a bath. complained about disgusting toilets with sand infestations, and centipede habitations

talked about disgusting games, where we had to eat chillis or lemons, or celery, without using hands. ewwww

changed into my jammies!!! pajama party!!!!

my parents went to buy me those swimming jammies.

nat burst into laughter, kenna burst into laughter. the whole world burst into laughter. christabel said clemnt looked cutein his jamas.lol. b4 goin for dinner, played gnome toss with kenna, his fav game, and sincei brought it, i might as well play it. Min came in, and inquisitively joined the game. braced for screams, and the game began. my gut feeling didnt prove me wrong. she killed herself countless times. her bro came in to prove this game could be won. proved wrong. helost too.lol. clemnt, defending champ, came in. but hisdeck was too big, and we had t stop for dinn.

4 people said i lookedlike a ward patient in my jamas. i give up.

FEVER!!!! began!!

Human patapon was the game. our group was pon

other groups were chaka, don, and pata.

jared would play the drums, and each team had to do their synchronised actions. only when every team did their part, could they move. uber fun!!

kudos to the leaders obsessed with patapon

campfire time!!
pajamas competition began. bryan and his bro won most stylish pajamas. bryan wore a decepticons pajames, while joshua wore autobots. totally good versus evil

skits began

my team sucked eggs as comparedto the other teams skits.lol . bryan guitared. anabelle, clement andi sung. the rest danced, and arthur did his dance solo. no one in church knew he was such an awesome popper( itslike robot dancing, but cooler)

we werent too bad, but not as good as natalie high on steroids, giving a rendition of high school musical. nor hassan acting all mousy in a seperate play.
also, baberella chantel macartley gave a surprise visit, teamed up with other television satires. dom and olivia did the water chestnut juice advert, with the catch phrase "because i love u"

everyone was like" awwww"

lol. we didnt win any place for this event

but it was still memorable altogether

it is traditionto not sleep on the last night of camp, buti diedon my sleepingbag

4th day

worship at 7. i was half dead, rushing through encouragement cards.

sang. welcome to the family, youth ministry edition, and it warmed my heart how church can become such a beautiful community

left camp with a heavy heart, beautiful memories, and 6 encouragement notes to remember my friends by

if this 4 plus hour long post about my 3 days experiencing god didnt convince u that u missed out on the best TMC youth camp ever, go ask hansel, clement or even my church peeps the next time u get the chance. u might just see that extra confidence in clement, the great change in hansel, or even the great love expirienced by all in TMC. its good to know that ur loved and its good to noe that ILOVE as well

- russ hoe, 8 to 9 december 2008