Friday, June 19, 2009
Yup, my sisters and I are back from the Orion Combined Camp 2009, held at PLMGPS from 14th to 18th June recently.
I want to say firstly that I wish we'd thought of having this combined thing much earlier, like say 5 years ago? Because the 3 different youth groups didn't really know each other, and by now when I'm already 19 - soon to be a not-youth anymore - it feels kind of late.
It started on Sunday evening (after MM's programme), but Yan (publicity) and I (logistics) had to be there at 4.30 for briefing and preparation, which included registration and clearing up the classrooms to be used for sleeping.
We had dinner and a bit of time to get to know our groups. I was first put into group Rigel (leader Amos Seet), but then later just before worship I found out I had been put into the wrong group! Sihui tried to find another tag, but there wasn't one, so I just got a different lanyard. And in the middle of the worship session (so weird right) I was introduced to the Hatsya group leader Dickson. Lol, the first thing I said after seeing him was, "You're Freda's brother, right?" Because they look SO ALIKE!
Worship was done by the MM team (supposed to be my team (Andrew's) but there was a swap, so in the end I couldn't sing for his session on Monday). [I know this isn't the point, but their keyboardist Luther plays AMAZINGLY.] The first theme talk by Pastor Kong (bits of it were in Chinese, imagine!) which was about the relationship between God and I. Good thing I could understand most of it! We formed small groups (Michelle Ng, Yingxuan, Qiying) to pray, and then he concluded it with a totally Chinese prayer (I understood 65%).
Anyway the logistics team had to go prepare food/drink, and Tan Whenn and I were to put hoses in the toilets for bathing later. John showed us the way (MM always uses the place for camp, I think).
Then my brother came to fetch me home, because I had my driving test on Monday, 15th June. I remember telling a few people in the camp that my test was on Monday, so when I went backsome of them, including Pastor Fui Fui, asked me about it, so I happily said that I'd PASSED!! Thank God!
Yue just arrived after me (being at GB camp) and we went to the hall to find them playing the cat-and-mouse-maze game, so we just watched, haha. Afterwards was the telematch (station games): Frog-race (frog), Soap/grape sliding (tofu), Egg-race (egg), Waterpipe game (bowl of water), and Find-Eraser-in-Flour game (paper scrap).
The frogs were gross! I don't know how Yong Chiang could stand carrying it around everywhere after the first station! And Si Kai SQUASHED OUR FROG. He practically jumped on it when their frog won the race!
The soap was pretty gross too, but we all did it. Amos Chong and John continued splashing soap on after previous members had wiped it off the mat with their backs! After it was the egg-rolling race, and I just want to say I'm glad I didn't have to use my tongue (Louis) or forehead (Caleb Chua)!
The waterpipe game was classically wet, but thanks to Dickson's long and skinny arm, we only had to fill it around halfway before he could reach in to grab the pingpong ball! We lost the final game, and got to take a picture with white-streaked faces and clothes!
We only got like 6th place in the end, but never mind, it was fun! The cleaning up wasn't as fun, though. It required many pails of water and brooms to clean up the flour/eggs etc. There'd be a lot of people waiting for Edward to fill up the buckets before carrying them across the field to the dirty areas, using them up in a minute and going back for more water.
Joshua (slacker!) was talking to Yue and Yiwen about coming up with a new Bible Quiz that's biased against me, involving physical fitness! Afterwards they continued talking about cheemer stuff (joined by Emily and Nicholas), and then it was dinner time.
I was surprised that I was supposed to be a station master for the night games, though my station was terribly easy. Tell group the rules (find extracts of a story hidden in the canteen), remind them of the time (15 min to find & memorise, 5 min to recite), hear the recital and send people to the torture chamber. It's pretty funny how some people can recite about 3 long sentences perfectly, while others can't even do one sentence right. My group (combined with another) was terrible! Aiyo, I even gave them helping words!
I bathed quickly when the rest of the groups were still playing their final game, and came down with Amanda (who hurt her toe), but there was no more supper (beancurd) left.
Despite sleeping pretty late, the three of us sisters still got up relatively early (7 plus) and went down to the canteen. [Yan claims there's something wrong with us :D] My log briefing didn't really occur because the guys were still sleeping!
Group QT was led by Dickson, who was responding to a question asked by Rachel on Monday about the Word in fellowship. The 3rd theme talk was by Rev Leow on the Church and Us, after which we had an interesting group discussion on our personal role in church and changing churches.
After lunch we had the outing game, which was basically a murder mystery where we had to travel to various stations in the region to ask the characters involved questions. Sadly, my group wasn't able to get the better time slots, and ended up having to go around in circles! So frustrating! Thank goodness John knew how to go everywhere from everywhere by which buses!
As a result, we were too late for the last station (PLCMC), so we asked Michelle Foo the questions at the bus stop while waiting for the 62, which took forever to come, and we were the last ones back at the school! We barely had any time to come up with our re-enactment of the murder solution, with Rachel in the main role despite her not having been on the outing!
All 10 acts were good, some hilariously funny and entertaining! Things like Augustine the dad lusting after Zhi Xiang the mistress, Joshua the Butler trying to cosy up to Yi Hern the mother, Rachel the hysterical crazy mother, Benedict the emo girl cutting herself for not wanting teh-o-bing, Priscilla the threatening police officer, Sara the Ah Beng boyfriend and Noel the random Mango Tree!
I wasn't satisfied with the real story (in which nobody actually died and all the 'clues' had lame explanations) because it made me feel I wasted my entire afternoon going round in circles and walking until my legs hurt. But I guess the point was to have fun watching what nonsense acting the groups could come up with in the span of an hour!
I think I slept even later (worship practice till 2.45am), but still managed to get up at around 7 plus again on Wednesday(not bad right). The final theme talk was by Rev Louis Chai (whose 2 sons are in the camp btw) about God's Kingdom and Us. I confess I was terribly sleepy during the talk.
It was free time in the afternoon, to be followed by theme-related games, but they switched the games to the night, so most of the people were playing games at the track/field, jamming in Naomi Hall or sleeping.
After dinner we had a photo-taking session for each group (everyone wore the camp T-shirt), and then the committees and such. It took rather long, and our team was wondering when worship would start.
Then we had the extended worship, for which I was playing keyboard in the first slot, with Andrew on guitar, Si Kai on drums and Caleb Tay on bass. My left leg cramped after that because all my weight was on it as I tried to reach the poorly-placed pedal with my right foot. I think the worship was a bit too long perhaps for the CJ and MM people who weren't used to it. Oh well.
Then we had Pepsi and pizza for supper! After that I remember playing a bit of bridge, before they told everyone to go to the hall to play Twister, involving answering questions related to the theme talks and programme. The representative whose group answered correctly wouldn't have to move, while the representative whose group answered wrongly would be the only one to move. In the end, probably because it was taking too long, they started killing off players more quickly, and in the end made it a final deathmatch.
I think our group's Dickson was seriously the best one, because of the 5 combined groups, three of them got out, leaving him, this MM girl called Jessica, and Qi Hang who was playing for fun. Essentially, Jessica kept doing things like changing position, removing her hands/feet from the positions and resting her knees on the mat, but kept being saved by the MM people's cheers, while Qi Hang occasionally got up to say things in the mike, being the programme IC. So those two didn't have as hard a time, while Dickson was trying to keep his left foot on right index finger with the other hand on blue or something!
That night I guess most people got very little sleep. I played bridge and poker in Naomi Hall. One thing I noticed about the CJ people I played with, is that they like to high-five each other when their pair wins. Seriously. They even high-five when someone else washes and hypothetically one pair with super good cards would clearly have won. This includes Joshua Huang, Benjamin, Yi Hern and Yunting.
I was going to hopefully sub one of the losers in Si Kai's playing group, but then Joshua, Chris etc. came in and I went to learn to play Texas Holdem Poker with them, using random cards from Joshua's and Alicia's wallets as chips!
I decided that I needed to sleep since log team always has to be up earlier, so I went back to the room at about 4am to sleep. I still managed to wake up at 7 something, but only really got up at about 8.10am. Despite breakfast being at 10am, most people were late (as usual), pushing the programme backwards by a lot.
We split up for cleaning, and I was in charge of the 2 groups cleaning the classrooms we slept in - picking up litter and rearranging the tables and chairs to their original positions. I thought we were done very fast, only to realise that Linus' group (toilets) had been finished long ago, asking if we needed help. We went back to the canteen to see most people slacking around with a few guys doing the final hosing of the floor.
The last part of the programme included sharing time (commandants, Darren, Priscilla, Yan, Amos Chong), and revealing of angels and mortals time. My mortal, Steven, was actually Yan's angel, and he wrote her like 12 notes! I spent so much effort on my last note to him and he didn't even see it because he'd left! My angel was Dickson, who only wrote me ONE note because "I didn't reply him"! It's not my duty to reply him! Lol.
They gave out certain mini-gifts to committee people, group leaders etc. They even had a slideshow for "outstanding campers", including things like Best Charlie's Angel (Joanna), Star of Talentime (Noel, Mango Tree), and Prettiest Camper (Barbarella Monika Cheng!!!). Rev Chai covered his face when the slide showed Augustine as "Most Tempted to Touch" from the Talentime.
The camp ended with Rev Louis Chai praying at about 2.50pm, and we cabbed back to KAP for lunch at 4pm before going home.
I'm sure I've missed out many interesting-er snippets of things that happened, like people putting frogs on their mouths, or Yue reading the Bible in Chinese, or talking to Caleb about Bleach, but the most important thing is that the camp was good and I got to know a lot more of the PLCMC youth! Praise God for the wonderful camp!
Thanks to all the blogs i referred to (countless) for html code help :) (esp. cyn' and sixseven)
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