Vel's graduation

After missing last year's graduation concert as a result of her chicken pox, we made sure Velouria didn't miss this year's as it was going to be her last with Grace House. We, along with her teachers, were quite worried as she had taken ill for several days before the concert and hence missing out on quite a few rehearsals.

But praise the Lord she recovered pretty much quickly and was back to her usual nonsense self again; reciting all her lines (apparently the graduating K2 class was given the honour of giving an opening address to the audience on Mandarin), dancing away and singing all the songs with much gusto.

We were up bright and early and made our way to the school before the required 8am. Judging by the crowd there, we were not the only kiasu parents and being typical Singaporeans a queue started forming outside the hall even before 8.30am. Amazing!

As always, the pre-concert wait was a long one, made worse by our attempts to reserve seats for my parents and brother who had problems parking. When the concert finally began, we were so all excited and straining our necks to catch Velouria whose already petite frame was made smaller by the distance of the stage from our seats.

There were many endearing acts by the various classes, with one of WWE proportions where one boy started using his toy guitar (they were doing a rock n roll number) to hit his classmates around him. He was eventaully removed from the stage and I can only imagine the embarassed parents cowering in their seats.

Finally, it was time for Vel's act. They were doing a Chinese dance number and despite reminders to stay clear of the aisles, I still managed to sneak to the front of the stage to catch a small reel of Vel in action.

As always, the concert ended in a finale where all the classes came out to sing a song together. The area was so crowded that we lost Velouria in the sea of heads!

After the concert ended, even the pick up point was crowded with parents eager to pick their children up. I didn't bother to elbow my way to the front of the crowd and just waited for the crowd to slowly disperse. One of Vel's teachers eventually spotted me chilling out in my corner and brought her out for me.

Famished by then, we all headed to Red Star for a fantastic dim sum lunch to end of the morning.

This Is The Day... Vel's graduation concert

All the hoo-ha and anticipation finally led up to this day. We were all so excited; changing Velouria, making sure her hair was all in place, putting on make-up for her (only to realise later that our enthusiasm was uncalled for as their teachers actually tied her hair and applied make-up all over again backstage).

After handing her over to her form teacher, we all milled into the concert hall and were all chatting and laughing, snapping our cameras and watching the Powerpoint slideshow (showcasing photos from activities that the students were involved in) over and over and over again. We were all straining our necks to see if anything was going to come out from the side of the stage.

Finally, at 5.30pm on the dot, the MC (a horrible one at that, kept getting all the names wrong) came on stage and went through the usual pleasantries. This was followed by a thank you speech from the Director of Grace House, Ms Isabel Ng, and the Head of Children Ministry of Grace AOG (can't remember her name but she was quite a character though - 'I love children and the children love me' is a line I'm going to remember for a looooong time).

Then came the graduation of the K2 kids. Their entrance could rival any banquet first dish presentation, with all the fanfare and marching. What really touched us was that Ms Isabel Ng actually prayed for the children after they were all presented their certs.

Then the concert proper began. The first item was of course with Velouria's group singing 'It's A School Day'. It was quite a mess (but a cute one) with all the kids more interested in identifying their family and friends in the audience. It was a good preview for the next few items coming up as the audience (us included) lapped it all up and clamoured for more (parents were all rushing to the front to get pictures of their kids).

There were more items in between but I think what caught everyone's attention were the Playgroup kids. These were children between the ages of 2 & 3 who were not eligible to go to N1 yet. It was a joy to see some of them running all over the stage (much to the teachers' dismay), some just froze and forgot what they were supposed to do, while others just freaked out and cried. It was a blast!

Then Velouria's group came out again. They were decked out in beach gear, with the girls in a fake hula grass skirt made from raffia and plastic flowers. This time they did a very reggae rendition of 'See The Works Of The Lord'.

But what topped it all was the finale item when ALL the kids came out and sang 'This Is The Day'. I believe this was the one that the kids trained really hard for as all of them were screaming out all the words at the top of their lungs (even for the Mandarin version!).

In the end, though we were all famished we all left smiling, satisfied that all the wait was worth it. This Is The Day indeed...