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!

Homeroom dinner: The Flying Pan

On Friday 2nd February, my homeroom 'Got Chan?' went to The Flying Pan in Wanchai. It was really cool - there was hardly anyone there and we just had a great time of eating and socialising. The highlight was definitely the eating competition - eat 3 pancakes in the shortest amount of time. 8 boys entered the competition and I was the judge. The class gathered around the table and even the staff gathered round too. It was a very close competition between Cyril and Lewis (although Jonathan seemed to come from nowhere to catch up with them), but Lewis was the overall winner - RESPECT!! Lucas and Ethan had smothered their pancakes withchocolate sauce and managed to laugh and talk loudly - hindering their progress no doubt. After that those guys did a 4x4x4 monster pan team competition, I was so afraid they'd puke. is this what is meant by living life to the full (stomachs)?

Nicknames

Why do I have so many nicknames? Dawn reckons I must have at least 10:
Kaz
Kazza
Kazee
KazBaz
Khazikstan
Kazzatronic (don't know if this counts but Tom made it up and has probably only called me it once)
Channers
Chan Chan
Chicken
Chankers (One of Dawn's faves along with kazzatronic)
ChinChan
Chanmeister

Are there any more? (Actually there were ones that I had when I was little but I won't publish those here.)

January update

Okay - so before January disappears - I'd better just say what has been happening.

december - Crazy school rundown to Christmas - I felt my energy slowly fade right to the last day of school. I was thankful the LONG term was over (It started mid-august). I was in the church Christmas pageant as a taxi driver (the nativity set in Hong Kong- very creative indeed!), spent Christmas day at the Snelgroves (and their lively husky), played boxing day hockey at KCC (i.e. catch up with friends - usually Sam Mc) went to take my dad's aunty for dim sum - except she can only eat soft noodles or her teeth will fall out and did more socialising than usual (not very hard to achieve!).

New Year's Eve was a Sunday so I went to church in the morning and after lunch Anna and I went to get the guest room ready for the evening. We quickly went home before dashing out to meet Andy and Helen Hunter at the YMCA to bring then across to HK island for dinner - which was very cool and they even ate the jellyfish - RESPECT! We headed over to the Vine for the party 'Thirst'. It was very cool - starting with a track by Andy (DJ from the UK) and we had a great time of worship followed by a message from Andrew Gardener and then after the countdown more music from Andy. It was very cool - just like a British club - loved it!

January 5-6th was the first Resonate conference. To be honest I still felt a bit clueless as to what it was about even though it had been advertised at church a lot....but hey that's typical me...takes a while for the penny to drop. They needed volunteers, so as I was still on holiday I helped out. It was great fun to be helping out with other people from the Vine just showing people to seats and making sure delegates managed to get to the second venue. We also got to join in with worship (Reason, The Vine Band, Reuben Morgan), workshops and listening to the main speaker - Glyn Barrett who was great - really down to earth yet challenging. He also made me homesick for Manchester as he's a Man City fan and one of the churches he's involved with is Hope City Church Manchester.

Disappearing Decemeber

Yes- I totally failed to blog inn December 2006. yes - I'll blame the earthquake in Taiwan uprooting the cables - well considering I could have blogged during my holiday - surely it's fair enough!

Keeping me out of trouble!

Well, the last time I blogged was in October and it's nearly a month later.

November 15th was the night of Hillsong United live in Hong Kong at ICA - two shows at 6pm and 8pm. On the previous night we had met at 7pm for Derek to run through all that we were to do on the following night. That was cool and fun and we prayed in our small teams for the following evening.

The thing with me is that when I get too excited about something - I can't sleep. I was so restless that night that I was service managing in my sleep and thinking about it every time I woke up. Then I went through a day at school - which was cool and every time I saw a student who was going, I'd be talking to them about it and getting them excited too....did they learn anything that day....I hope so!!!!!! I went straight from school to ICA to arrive there at 4pm. Then there were a few changes that had been made and we had to get going with sorting stuff out.

It was fun managing inside the auditorium that seats about 700 people. However, so many people came that we filled the balcony upstairs and ended up with standing room only downstairs. (Yan and I had little walkie talkies, but because it was so loud it was hard to hear what anyone was saying.) Well, I think most people stood all the way through anyway - during the awesome time of worship and the message. It was amazing tostand at the back and just seeing these hundreds of people all raising their arms in worship to God. Then we had to usher people out for round two to take place. I was really pleased to see some of my students (past and present) there and even a girl on my hockey team (who later made a committment.).

I love helping out at events like this, welcoming people - getting things ready for people to come into the presence of God.

Moganshan

I have survived!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Actually I had a fnatastic week where I managed to astound my colleague by being absolutely hyper and earned the name of 'Happy Camper'!

On Monday, I was picked up by the taxi driver at 5am and then went to pick up MeShi. We chatted to the airport where we met our students and parents were there to wish us well and kiss their children goodbye for the week. Group check-ins are quite arduous and it took us ages to all check in - 52 students and 4 adults. Thankfully, Elyse kindly went to buy me a coffee while we waited to get our luggage on. We were soon checked in and on our way to Moganshan.

We arrived at Hangzhou airport, to be welcomed by Christa and the rest of the APA team - they had even drawn up a banner for us - bless! We then loaded the buses up and set off for Baiyun Villas at Moganshan. There was a lady on the bus, and I guess she must have been a tour guide. However, her English was bad and she wanted to talk to talk to our group in Putonghua. Thankfully, Adam put a stop to this, at which point she decided to sing us a song...in Putonghua of course. Melvin sat next to me and whispered that when the APA leaders arrived, she'd sung to them too. It was weird.

We arrived at Baiyun villas and dumped out stuff in our rooms. The girls were very sweet and exclaimed that I should have the room with the balcony or the biggest room. However, I decided to let them have the bigger rooms and had a centrally located room. We went to have lunch at a nearby restaurant - the food ROCKED - and there was so much of it - not just that day but the WHOLE week!!!!!!!!! We then had a breifing from Christa and went into our groups to do some team building activities before eating yet again! We played 'spoons' except we had chopsticks on the landingwhich was fun - until two chopsticks broke as we were fighting ovr them (sorry Mini Boo- who got a chopstick in the face!)

On Tuesday, we went to do visit a tea plantation and took some cool photos of the area. Our group (the Pink Foot Potatoes) helped to weed and tidy up an area of trail. At this point I nearly stuck my head into a bunch of caterpillars - lovely! We then went back to a place called The Lodge where we ate food that another group had cooked. Then it was our turn to prepare food for dinner. I think the students had fun tearing and chopping the food into pieces. I did have to bring a cabbage food fight to a halt before it got out of hand. The girls came to my room to hang out and chat - that was cool - oh and Rav was there too.

Wednesaday brought beautiful weather and a day of activities. In the morning, we had morning exercise , which was fun and we played 'evolution' - I got to evolve into an HKIS student. We had breakfast and then headed down to the tyrolean cross and the abseil site. I was about the fourth person to do the tyrolean - which I was a little nervous about. However, they needed me to help on the other side. So, after repeating that I was scared about a fajillion times (I always verbalise my fear...and then laugh...very odd behaviour - I know), Mike told me that he was giving me a count of three. So, I gained the fear of being pushed off by Mike, so voluntarily stepped off the platform, screamed and laughed - it was good fun...and over far too quickly. It was more like a zip line with only a little bit of effort to get right to the other side. I was then shown how to detach students from the tyrolean safely. I think I scared Melvin and Chico on the first attempt, where I initially wanted to detach the dafety line - not a good move, but I got a hang of it. They were then freed to start students on the abseil down the waterfall. This I unfortunately didn't get to do due to time constraints, but it was cool that some of the students who found it difficult, overcame their fears and completed it. As we were sitting around a lot too, I got to talk to Ariane and Stef about how I became a Christian, how I came to be in HK and how I got my jobs - it was so good to tell of God's goodness in my life.

In the afternoon - after a spaghetti bolognese lunch at the lodge, we went raft building. This was quite amusing, as some of the locals were there and watched the whole process. A couple even joined in - helping to tie a couple of knots! We had a race, and then tidied up and went back to the Lodge for another meal - potatoes and stew - SO GOOD!!!!!

Thursday was a damp and misty day - and we were embarking on our adventure race. I decided - even though we didn't have to join a student group - to stay with half of the Potatoes and see what they had to do. I was afraid that they would all run off and I'd be left panting behind them. Thankfully this was not the case as my group started by being led by a enthusiastic Rav who seemed to want to venture down every dirt track possible. We got quite lost trying to get to our first station, but we found the other half of the Potatoes and we found it together. We gradually made our way to a few other posts, which built up the team's confidence. I must say that the last hour or so was the best fun as we managed to get a couple of stations. Then as we were walking back to the final meeting place (If we didn't get there on time, we'd lose points.) when I pointed out a roundabout to the students and they looked at me and carried on. Piak, who was with us also pointed out to me that the station there was very close by, which caused me to laugh as my students continued to ignore these subtle hints. As we continued, Rav realised he'd left his backpack a couple of stations down the line. So, he and Piak ran back for it, while I led the rest of the group to the station we'd passed to see if we could get some more points. Unfortunately, we couldn't find the information as it had been removed...and yes, I did proclaim very loudly that it SUCKED! We ran back to the point where we'd split into two groups, Piak rang me and I thought he said he was nearly back at the market - which was close to the end point. he repeated and he was actually saying he was nearly back at Mark's (The Lodge) which was the end point. I screamed and slung my backpack on and managed to get my group running once more to make it back to theLodge. It was so chaotic and exciting - loved it!!!!!!

On Friday we woke early, ate breakfast, boarded the buses (where my lost camera was reunited with me :) ) and we headed back down the mountain to Hangzhou. We spent about an hour there shopping (actually I think most students stopped off at Dairy Queen) before we went to lunch at LoWaiLo restaurant on Westlake (very good food yet again!). We had a group photo, got back on the buses and .....the bus pulled over after a while. I thought the driver was lost again...but it turned out that the guide and the driver were speaking in the local dialect so that our students couldn't translate for us and there was some disagreement about payment. Thankfully, Christa sorted it out and we were on our way to the airport. It took us ages to check in and we arrived safely back in HK.

I just want to say that the following people ROCK:
Mark, Joanna and Isabelle - The Lodge - a sanctuary of good cofee, hot chocolate, brownies, food and music!
Christa, Adam, Hodge (and Joyce), Ebben, Melvin, Piak, Chico and Mike - Asia Pacific Adventure- brilliant professionals and excellent at what they do - you can trust these people with your lives!
Melita, Terry and Peter - my colleagues - so chilled out, cool and hilariful (hilarious and wonderful)!
Our students - so nice, so fun and so much energy - love it!!!!!!!

Nausea

I've felt kind of nauseous today. I haven't been sleeping well this week - often waking in the middle of the night and having to eat chocolate before I get back to sleep. Last night before I went to bed I discovered I didn't know where my passport or Hui Heung Jing were. Then I woke at 2:30am thinking - it should be by my big backpack. Therefore I had to get up - and lo and behold- there it was. At least my mind was at rest about where it was.

I've started packing - but feel kind of unsettled as I also know I need to go away this weekend. I think the fact that I've been marking kids work all day hasn't helped. Plus the fact that I just finished marking one big assignment to then have 100 lab reports and 100 end of unit tests to mark, and knowing I won't be able to do much at the weekend is disturbing. I know - it's not urgent and we shall all carry on living - I guess I just know that it won't be nice to come back to the marking pile when I get back from China. I guess that's partly why I went down to Happy Valley - to watch the U16 team play - to support the girls I know from KCC and Rachel and Jen from school. I could escape and prevent myself from marking work at home and not just sit in front of the telly.

Matthew 6v27
Can all your worries add a single moment to your life? Of course not.

Matthew 6 v 32-34
Your heavenly Father already knows all your needs, and he will give you all you need from day to day if you live for him and make the Kingdom of God your primary concern.
So don't worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring its own worries. Today's trouble is enough for today.

China - here we come!

It's Tuesday and I just got back from hockey training - one of the only ones I'll be able to make as I normally have either Ministry leaders PLUS or Flight852 leaders meeting on Tuesdays. It was good to have a run around, and get some skills. Unfortunately I won't be able to put them to practice this coming Saturday as I have a Flight leaders retreat. Well, at least I played last Saturday which ended in a 3-3 draw against Val D. Hopefully, my team will have enough players and win against Val E.

Following the retreat I will be heading off to Moganshan, China on Monday on an 8am flight....ugh! I think I have a love-hate relationship with these trips with the kids. I haven't had to do most of the organising, but the chasing up of the little things is still a hassle, plus getting myself ready! I know that once I get there I'll enjoy it. I have a great group of kids to go with- really fun, nice and well-mannered and we're going with an excellent organisation. plus I've been to Hangzhou before, so it is still a little familiar. I'll still have to rely on teh kids for translation as I am limited by my phrases of "How are you?", "Thank you!", "No good!", "I love you!" and "Jesus loves you!". However, these could be enough for the most simple evangelism EVER!

Ideas for teaching

Ugh...I have just finished marking 100 sets of focus questions. This has a high boredom factor attached to it and I'm sure this is bad for my eyes. I have told some students before that I love being in the class with them - getting them to learn stuff, and although I know it is important, marking is one of the worst chores I have to do as a teacher...so laborious, time consuming and essential. I still have about 94 element boxes to mark and will be giving an end of unit test soon. I can't wait until they have that machine like the one from the Matrix, shove it in the back of students heads to probe and measure how much they have learnt and then it's done. Seriously, there must be someone in a hidden lab somewhere working on it.

While they're at it, they can make me some new eyes and an automatic internal caffeine release system.

Holiday:Kota Kinabalu

Yesterday I just flew back in from Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia. We had a school holiday from Thursday to Tuesday and I went for a relaxing holiday with my friend, Praise. We stayed at the Shangri La Rasa Ria resort - which was luxurious to say the least!

We flew in and had a quick tour of the city before heading to the hotel. There we settled into the room and then headed down to the outside restaurant for the buffet. We spent well over three hours eating crab, prawns with HUGE heads etc - but we had to pace ourselves and make it worthwhile. There was also a local dance group which was cool and we were entertained.

We went off to some island (I know I'm really good with names of places!) where we ventured into the water to trip over rocks and get scratched by the violent corals. There was a little boy who came over to us and we watched him through the day finding new people to try and make friends with but actually just ended up pestering. We gave up on the idea of being immersed in water and sun bathed to ensure we obtained the obligatory tan. After our lunch of prawns, noodles and crab we continued our lazy afternoon in the sun which ended with the spotting of a monitor lizard on the beach, at which point we made a mad dash for our cameras to record the sighting.


We stopped off in town on our way home and popped in to the other Shangri-la hotel, which I was definitely less impressed with and then we ended up having a curry at Naan back at the Rasa Ria.

Sunday started with rain which we were sad about as it was what we had planned to be our 'animal' day - we had planned to ride horses and visit animals in the jungle next door. We managed to have a one hour horse ride along the beach - past the buffaloes who go there every morning. Now for someone who had never been on a horse before it was cool but I felt very uncoordinated as my guide tried to get the horse to trot with me not really knowing what to do. I finally figured out what to do in the last 15 minutes of the ride by which time I had already acquired the sore bottom. Just after our dismount the rain poured down as we ran back to the hotel.

We later went to the pool at which point we were supposed to be seeing animals in the jungle as we thought it was happening 2 hours later. Oh well. We weren't too disappointed as we then got ready for our 2.5hour spa treatment which included a body wrap where we were covered with powdered rice, egg and lemon. I ended up feeling like a huge piece of sushi. After that was all rinsed off we had a very nice massage and mini facial.

The next day, we went off to Kinabalu Park to walk some of the trails and of course see Mount Kinabalu. That weekend had been the Climbathon where people had raced up and down Kinabalu in just over a couple of hours - good grief - where do they get the energy from, and can I have some? We walked at a leisurely pace looking at the flora of the park including a pitcher plant, orchids, bamboo, naked trees etc. We had lunch and then continued with a walk around the garden where we saw loads of orchids, but most were about half the size of the nail on my pinkie. It made me wonder why are they so small? Well, God can make it that small, so he does..totally amazing and beautiful!



We ended the day back at the hotel and ate at Coast which is a restaurant by the beach with chandeliers shaped like Jellyfish - very cool. Oh...and that was another 3 hour meal!

New Season

Today I woke at about 7am...but finally went to sleep again after checking my e-mail and eating a couple of bits of choccie. Then I had weird dreams about having braces again - except they were horrendous and made my teeth bend forwards and a tooth even dropped out...hate those teeth dreams - makes you panic so much when you wake up, but then a huge surge of relief is felt as you realise your teeth are normal.

It was our first match of the season today. So, I made sure I had some breakfast, and enough time to digest it. Don't know why, but every time before a match I start doing my coughing (like I'm going to hurl) thing, and it doesn't stop until I start playing...bad case of nerves or what?! Anyway, KCC C played HKFC G and at first I thought I was playing alright, until Babs told me that I was telling the right half to mark the person I should have been marking. Well, I had wondered where the forward I was supposed to be marking had gone. To be honest it was becasue ALL of the opposition had gone back to defend, We were up 2-0 at half time and we ended up winning 3-1 (but Jimmy had to tell me that because I thought we only won 2-1....good job I don't teach maths). The one scored against us was right near the end when everyone was shattered due to running around in the heat of the sun (2-3:30pm) and I was already marking the girl on the right post and there was a free player who managed to score. I didn't have a great game - some okay bits, but it is the first game after all...and miracle of miracles - we won! Plus we had a lovely photo of the team in our nice new kit (I hear we're getting new skorts, so we won't have to feel like we've got a constant wedgie!)

Just finished watching 2 episodes of 'LOST' thanks to my student who has lent me series 2 while baking about 50 cupcakes for Primetime. Gosh...aren't my Saturday nights exciting!!

My life as I know it

I haven't really written that much about what's going on at the moment. Start of the academic year is always crazy, so it's no huge surprise that I'm only just getting to write about it now.

School started and so did the hunt for our grade 8 student life leader...and nobody really wanted to do it...mostly due to other responsibilities. I grew pretty tired of people telling me I'd be really good at it (sounds like I'm blowing my own trumpet...well...I do have one after all!) and I just really felt it was quite false even though they probably meant it, but I just knew that admin and our team needed someone to lead. Finally my friend and I decided to share the position....quite grudgingly. Thankfully it's been okay so far.......but I've had quite a few days where I have a really bad attitude to it and totally did not like feeling I had to do it just because no one else will.

Something else that is also new - but the HUGE difference is that I want to do this, is that I have joined Flight852 as a volunteer. It was cool, as I remember Matt had asked me several times before the summer, and I'd not replied. It was quite funny as one of the reasons of why I gave up being captain of my hockey team was so that if I decided to help with Flight, then I would have more time. (Ringing through the week trying to get the hockey team together was taking up a lot of time.) It was pretty cool as only about a week before I came back to Hong Kong, I was at Northgate Church in Chester, when I heard this speaker from the States. I can't remember much of what he said now, but I remember him talking about not being afraid, and you know when you just get totally convicted? Yep...it was one of those moments. Having experienced burn out through having worked with Youth before, and knowing that it had literally taken years to recover....I had been very cautious about agreeing to volunteer. I remember saying to Tom that it is something I want to do (and hopefully get some of my students plugged into too) and the most important thing is that I'm in a leadership team and somewhere where I'll feel safe and supported.

School has been good - my students are FANTASTIC again. Seriously - they are so fun, and I always feel like they energise me. I love laughing with them, eating yummy homeroom snacks, going on and on about LOST, teaching and learning sciency stuff - especially fun videos from the internet, some of them come to my room for extra help with Science and to top it off they think I'm younger than I really am!!!!!!!!! I'll be going off to Moganshan with a group of 13 students and we're the 'Pink Foot Potatoes' (Instead of the Black Eyed Peas) and I think the group is designing a T-shirt....and they're soooooo excited!!

We had the launch of the CD 'Who May Ascend' at teh Vine Centre - the place was packed and everything went smoothly (always important to me as the service manager!) but it was so fun watching people worship, and some of my colleagues came too. The CD is soooooooooo good. I've given wuite a few away already.

Hockey season is starting again - I went to two training sessions and then got drenched in the 'red rain' at the third. I have my new and much nicer kit and will get to wear it at my first game of the season on Saturday. Nice!

Sleepless nights

Ugh..cannot sleep - I got up from bed and did my usual - head for the fridge to rustle round for some chocolate. Managed to take two mini eggs and a mimi Reese's peanut butter cup. I ate them while reading a bit more of Ted Dekker's "THR3E" and then checked out a few friend's blogs before writing this. Seriously it's 1:30am....I keep waking up in the middle of the night and it's either too hot or too cold or no chocolate in my stomach. Really don't know why that seems to help but it does - probably all psychological - I don't care - it works and they're not sleeping pills. I don't think my body actually believes me when I try telling it that I am actually tired and do need to wake up in approximately four and a half hours and then spend the day trying to meet the needs of 75 teenagers who will able to come up with at least ten questions each about their research project like "What is a use of Rubidium?"...well at least I get to play with sodium tomorrow morning.