Holiday: Chester

I've just come back from Chester and am now having to deal with jetlag. I spent the last four weeks in Chester with my mum and dad. It was a very lazy time and I was away from the internet which was good. I managed to catch up with some good friends, Paul and Sue who moved to Wrexham, Mary and Juliet who are schoolfriends, the Thompsons next door and the Fitzpatricks around the corner.

My mum, dad and I had a few days out when my mum was off work - Manchester, Liverpool, the RHS flower show at Tatton Park and a day trip to Ellesmere and Wollerton Old Hall.


Flowery dragon at Tatton Park


Pyramid of gladioli in the marquee.


Peaceful Ellesmere


Geese on parade!


Wollerton Old Hall


Bumble Bee - make sure you don't kill them - they are a protected species!


There were different coloured gardens - here's the purple garden


A very pretty little rose!

I also helped out at Northgate Church during celebration week of Chesterfest (churches in Chester working together on projects to serve the community). I mainly helped to prepare breakfast and snacks for the kids holiday club and helped out with small groups on funsheets. It was really cool to get involved and meet some more people in the church.

Holiday: Perth Week 2

As I'm sitting here at the airport again, I thought I'd better finish blogging about Perth. Well, not that I started as Ann wrote my last blog - bless.

Perth was cool...a little bit too cool as I managed to get a head cold....but the touristing had to continue. I met up with Maree Herath and her two little kids - Dan and Sean. We went over to Rottnest Island by ferry ( unfortunately I had to inspect the ferry toilet three times) and it was again a sunny day. We managed to spot a peacock and two quokkas - one of which allowed us to walk over to it and pet it...very cute.

Sean and a Quokka - cute!













Ann, me and snow crab before the devouring began!


I went over to Fremantle twice - once to go to Fremantle Prison for a tour - which was very cool - and I think my tour guide was from Devonshire.

Ann, some of her friends and I went to the Mercy Ball - a fundraiser for mercy ministries that helps girls who have some sort of background of abuse or self-harm. It was very grand - amazing centrepieces at the tables, James Morrison - excellent trumpet player, Paul Morrison released his CD there - proceeds go to MM, dancing and good food!

I went to Swan Valley with Ann and Corinna on Ann's day off and we ate at a winery, ate gelato and sweeties and visited the Margaret River chocolate factory - where I bought pressies to take home to UK.

On my last day, I went shopping for UGG boots (or U-G-G s as Ann's mum calls them!) and we went over to Tania's place before going to watch Ocean's 13.

All in all, I had a merry time in Perth - catching up with friends, getting to know Ann's friends, shopping and seeing the sights! A nice Aussie adventure!

Holiday: Perth Week 1

This is Ann Ong contributing (or more like wrecking Karen's blog)... Karen's currently over here in Perth visiting.

It was a bit of a whirlwind the first couple of days she was here... once she landed, we dropped her bags off at my place and headed out to attend Riverview's Big Weekend (a weekend conference) where the speakers Darlene Zschech, Alun Davies and Andre Olivier spoke messages that really spoke into our hearts. The weekend was really full on... Karen was recovering from her past week of crazy hectic HK life... finishing teaching, attending a graduation ceremony, packing to come over here etc and was absolutely knackered... just ask her about her eyes and the notetaking during the services! Anyway due to her fatigue her camera wasn't used... but if you would like to see some of the action pics from the weekend click here or here.

It has been really great having Karen in town... it's been a godsend... she was my answer to prayer when I was feeling terribly homesick, out of the blue I received a message from her saying she'd like to come visit! I'm so glad that she's here... she's full of hilarious quotes, for example "oh, am I supposed to be thinking?"... Anyway we have been able to eat our way through town ie flat whites and cakes, taken many pics of leaves just for our friend Joe Tringali... and while I've been at work, this awesome girl has been a very diligent tourist, checking out the public transport system, the art gallery, history museum, zoo, bell tower, borders bookstore, etc. Well we'll leave you with some pics taken this week...

karen and adam thompson

ann and karen

yummo lots of food

a massive sweet potato (aka boab tree)

Perth CBD

gum nuts

flat white baby

yay for holidays

Blogging

I don't really think I like blogging. Mind you, few people know that my blog exists. That's probably because I'm a task orientated introvert - I was reminded of that last night at our church's leaders meeting - looking a bit at different types of people and how to encourage them. See...I do the task of blogging - but I don't show it to anyone. I think there are sections of psychoology textbooks that are written about me - except they don't know I exist....because I'm an introvert of course!

Maybe I should write a comment for this blog - moderate it myself and then not allow it.

Yes - it is probably past my bedtime.

By the way...there are no pictures on my recent posts as I'm not too sure where my camera is and haven't bothered to exert much energy in looking for it.

Tim Hughes and Planetshakers

Last week, Tim Hughes and the Planetshakers were here for the Yoiuth Alpha conference. There were two concerts and I volunteered to help. I ended up selling Matt Redman tickets for both nights. It was great to see our friend Nat who used to be at the Vine singing in Planetshakers and obviously loving it. Tim Hughes led worship songs with the Planetshakers band backing him and a few Chinese singers singing his wongs in Cantonese.

Matt Redman is coming here for 2 shows on 11th may - can't wait...must get his most recent album so i can be more familiar with his songs!!!! I've told all my students and put up a poster at school...hope they'll be there! I've bought 10 tickets - I think I'll just give them away...that would be nice!

Easter Middion Trip : Cebu

Okay - so the first part wasn't mission trip at all - I do confess! Anna and I flew into Cebu a few days earlier than the rest of the team for a very well needed break at the very nice Shangri-la, Mactan Island resort. It was gorgeous - blue skies every day, mango smoothies, clean beach, snorkelling and swilling with tropical fish, excellent service (we were a little embarassed at first that people would insist on carrying things for us when we are fully capable of doing it ourselves)....oh...and I became a professor! For some reason the hotel had it on record that I was a Professor instead of a Miss or Ms. ...which caused much amusement to myself, Anna and the hotel recceptionist who checked us in. He continued to call me Professor for the rest of our stay...nice!

We then were dropped off at the arrivals part of the airport on Wednesday, and I managed to spot the Nehemiah House (orphanage) boys and ladies waiting for the Hong Kong team to arrive. One of the ladies remembered my face from 3 years ago - so cool! It tool me a little while to remember some people's faces. The HK team arrived safely and we went on our 45 minute journey to NH where we were also staying. They prepared a meal for us - it was so hot that I mainly ate the watermelon. The kids from NH had all gathered together in the main hall to welcome us - they had a banner saying'Welcome Hong Kong team' and had a programme of worship, testimonies, dances and songs - it was so good....and I recognised some teenagers from my first mission trip there. A girl called Xandra is now doing dramas and is on the worship team - it's great to see hopw much God is doing in their lives.

Our team weren't particularly strong in areas of music, dance or dramas, but all had servant hearts. It was awesome...NH told us what their needs were and we managed to meet them. We did some outreaches, a day of worship, games and craft activities for the NH kids and a feeding programme at NH where kids were bussed in for presentation, Bible study and food. The staff thanked us this day and we also prayed and ministered to them. It was great to see everyone stepping out, some of our youth gave their testimonies for the first time, and a family with a four and six year old were fantastic and even those little kids were getting a sense of service and giving for God.

On Easter morning, we had sunrise service at 5am, so we had to wake at 4;15am to get ourselves ready and take our suitcases doen so we'd be ready to depart too. We had an excellent service and had communion with all the people at NH. When I think about it - it's awesome to think that we fellowshipped and encouraged members of our family.

Struggles

Here I am in my room - checking bank status and e-mails before I head for the sunny sands of Cebu. My clothes are laid out on my bed ready for packing.

Just got home from'Flight 852" - it was cool - we're doing Quest and we had quite a turnout today despite it being the first day of the Rugby 7s. I love the fact that students from my school are coming - some on a regular basis. I don't know where they're all at, but I'm glad they feel comfortable to come (it must be a bit weird having your Science teacher there) and they enjoy it.

I rang my mum and dad so they won't miss talking to me on Sunday.

I've been having quite a struggle personally this year - and I think it has been hard to face. I'm teaching, being a half of a student life leader, going through my formal assessment year at work, coaching hockey, playing hockey, service managing and youth leading at flight852. I know that one of the defence mechanisms I've had is to not care as much about stuff, otherwise I would be so stressed out, I would break down. However, it's got to the point where I could give everything up and not care. That's a worry for me, as I know that's not who I am. I like to do things because I really want to and I know if I don't really want to do it what's the point...there is none. However, God has repeatedly been telling me not to give up. It's hard because i just don't really understand what the bigger picture looks like and He does.

I'm so glad I went to the flight 852 leaders meeting on Tuesday. We shared what God's been talking to us about and it was hard, but I was honest and said what i felt. It was really cool as later we started praying for the youth and then Meg had a word for me about me being a gateway for youth at HKIS. Then she felt I should be prayed for. It was really cool - specific words were spoken over me that encouraged me so much - about God reflecting his light off me and not to worry about burnout and how God really is using me in the school. I often feel so ineffective at school - I'm just teaching Science, interacting with students, trying to be patient with students and sometimes failing, trying to give when I'm tired, downtrodden and want to give up. However, God has been so faithful this year. I've been sticking posters on walls, telling students about flight and they've come. Not just one or two, but probably about 15 have come. Only a few a regular attendees, but some want to be but have other commitments ...but it's so encouraging. Did I mention that they're also some of the nicest kids ever? I hope God really speaks to them and they continue to search for or develop their relationship with Him.

Not a happy Chinese New Year for me

A week before we broke up for Chinese New Year holiday, I started sniffing and lo and behold I got a cold. I hadn't had a full on guns ablaze cold for a while - I even took 2 days off sick leave.Now that is unheardd of! I went back in for the last day of school to sort stuff out and kids were nice - asking me how I was. One student asked where I'd been and another student and I managed to get them thinking I'd been to Hawaii. This prompted the question,"How did you get on the plane if you have a cold?" VERY funny!

Well, I spent the hols making a butt shaped dent on my sofa watching many DVDs including desperate housewives, prison break and CSI:NY. Dawnie, Anna and Michelle were great keeping me company in the living room while I coughed and blew my nose. I've managed to get through at least 4 toilet rolls. NASTY! I went to the docs and got my meds - including antibiotics for bronchitis and I reckon I have sinusitis too...hence all the snot....gross!

People prayed for me too which is cool. I was service managing and Alex and Richard Roscoe prayed for me - a nice reminder of being in the family of God...very encouraging.

Psalm 41 v 3
The Lord nurses them when they are sick and eases their pain and discomfort.

Oh...and if you're wondering - no I haven't been to my relatives and therfore have not picked up red packets! However, my mum and dad have phoned me most days this week - better than a gazillion red packets!