Lee Valley ... New Year .....

Lee Valley Getaway Trip

We went to Lee Valley on the 27-29 Dec. After so many days of slacking, I was thinking: 'Okie, few more days of more slacking, then i really need to work hard hard!'

Indeed, Lee Valley was really a very very nice place to be in for retreat! Enjoyed so much about the fellowship, movies (although I only watched 1 among many many dozen the others have watched), food (1st night steamboat, 2nd night dumpling) as well as the cycling expedition! Played Polar Bear (to know how the game goes, talk to Yoppy. He's so addicted to it now), Monopoly, Big-2 (chor dai ti), various card games and etc. Din get much sleep ... coz stayed up really late but woke up early to catch the breakfast. Nevertheless, it was a good trip! So we've already planned for our next trip early Feb.

Borough Market

On Saturday, we went to Borough Market, one of my favourite place at all time, simply for one reason: FOOD! :P Lamia n I ordered this steak fab (burger), and it was like the size of Lamia's face! Big ler! But it is really delicious! If you are thick-skinned, you can always ask for food-tasting! :P God is good ... coz when we were about to leave, it rained a bit! Thank God it doesn't rain while we're still strolling around the market!

New Year Eve

31 Dec, New Year eve. As it was a Sunday, as usual ... loaded the equipment to van, drove to church, unloaded, set up, sound-checked ... prayer meeting and Celebration Service! Finished service, packed up, wished Happy New Year to everyone, drove home .. n waited for Mariani, Hedya, Amber and Doris (from Cardiff) to arrive, before the 6 of us headed to Chinatown to meet up with others from our group. Had dinner at Wong Kei n finally at 10pm, met up with others of the group. All in all, there's 20 of us going to countdown! (Kenny, Yanti, Yoppy, Ah Sun, Candy, Ivon, Joshua, Hui Ping, Shawn, Pei Ying, Max, Matthew, Mariani, Hedya, Amber, Doris, Andy, Olivia, Yong Wei, Gemmy).

Knowing the size of our big group, it was really difficult to move everyone from Chinatown to Embankment. Yoppy played an instrumental role in getting everyone organized ... as I led, he made sure ppl follow! God is good! We got into Embankment, directly in front of the London Eye. We're so blessed, because not long after we got into the area, the organizer closed the entrance cause it reached its capicity! We're there around 10.20pm. Praise God! Din take any photos cause it was dark. If u wanna see the fireworks, go to youtube n do a search :P It was good to usher away 2006 and welcome 2007 with so many people!

Getting home was far better than last year ... although involve lots of pushing n squeezing. After all those, when we got on the tube, surprisingly, the it was quite empty. I really wonder .... wat's all the pushing and squeezing about .. where there's no ppl on the tube! Nevertheless, we all got home safely! :) Another sleepless night ... everyone came to our house and we played games.(Yoppy was estatic abt Polar Bear again, but since it require quite some thinking n talking, ppl was quick to show boredom :P). We played this 'Pick-a-card-Put-on-Forehead-and-DARE' game. It was sooo fun! Manage to sabo a few ppl, especially Kenny, who ironically drank twice the 'special' drink i've made (chili sauce + fish sauce + water). Everyone go home around 4.30am.

New Year Parade

Slept for 3 hours, woke up around 8am. Immediately, had a short counselling session with a friend in the church office (she turned up at our door, which was a surprise for me, cause i jst woke up). Showered and dragged myself to Picadilly Circus where I met up with Ivon, to watch the parade! I was quite sceptical because I watched The Lord Mayor's Show last year, which was quite boring! This parade is so much better than i expected, especially the marching bands from US (10++ of them, all self-funded to come here to join the parade), and the cheerleaders who performed right in front of us (jst cun-cun stop at our spot). It was really overwhelmed with new year atmosphere!