Balloting @ St. Margaret's

Ten harrowing days. That’s how long it was from the time we registered to the day of balloting at St. Margaret’s. We trusted that the Lord would place Velouria there but the thought of 78 people vying for 73 places was still enough to place a fragment of doubt in your heart (having two sets of twins in the list of names didn’t help ease matters much either).

So there we were at 7.45 a.m. (Penny was sure that the balloting started at 8 a.m.) thinking we could chill out somewhere and have a coffee. The canteen was out of bounds so we headed straight to the school hall and counted every single minute to 8.30 a.m., when the balloting would begin.

As the seconds ticked on, more parents started streaming in. We were quite pleased with the fact the chaplain of the school opened the session in prayer at 8.30 a.m. on the dot, then off we went as the principal presented the ballot slips to the audience (via those old school projectors – they still have some use after all!) one by one before placing them into the box.

When the balloting began, the atmosphere was so tense that you would imagine someone getting thrown out if he so much as let out a fart. God spared us further torment as Velouria’s name was called out quite soon (didn’t keep count but reckoned it was within the first twenty). We were so relieved, but yet at the same time still felt quite tense for those parents whose daughters’ names had not been called yet.

But in the end, we all knew there had to be five who were not able to get in. Again, the chaplain closed the session in prayer and asked for God to guide those five girls and their respective parents. Praise the Lord! This is exactly the kind of environment we wanted for Velouria.

New beginning - reprise

So here we were. Our first Sunday out from New Covenant Sanctuary. It was a day we'd been looking forward to, with trepidation due to the new and unfamliar environment, and with anticipation with the knowledge that we were working towards bringing our walk with God to a whole new level. We'd been here before and we were comfortable. It wasn't a big church with tens of thousands of people, a huge stage for the worship team that looked more like a rock concert. But most importantly, we identified with Pastor Simon's vision of centering all aspects of church and personal activity around God's Word, with all else being secondary. Knowing it well was one thing, but applying it was a whole new ball game altogether.

Redemption Hill now had two services - one at 9.30 a.m., the other at 11.30 a.m. We figured it'd be better for us to attend the latter as it would give us some time after the service was over to speak with Pastor Simon and introduce ourselves as we had promised.

The worship was simple and touching. It has been a long time since I let my tears flow freely during corporate worship. The sermon was straightforward but impactful as well - Pastor Simon was speaking about work life and how we should use that to glorify God. It sort of changed my perspective of work and slogging it out with survival as the usual excuse.

We mingled around a bit and even got ourselves into one of the cell groups who meet every Friday evening at Hillview. Cool! We promsied that we would make ourselves available then. Grabbing some biscuits and drinks, we left the service feeling somewhat refreshed and burden-less (for lack of a better word).

We are REALLY looking forward to next Sunday. Haven't felt like this in a long time.

Pri 1 registration

The dreadful day that we've been waiting for had finally arrived - it was time to register Velouria for her Primary school!

After scratching off the option of MGS from our list (given their track record of not having vacancies for Phase 2C), we were left with St. Margaret's. Our resources indicated that they were not very academically inclined but we didn't really care. Who wants to put their kids in a school where they had to go through tons of revision papers every day and had to burn their Saturdays having extra lessons anyway? We sure don't! Most importantly, we wanted a school with a Godly environment that would nurture Velouria's desire to walk with God as she grew up.

Being the typical un-kiasu parents that we were, we sauntered our way into the school in the afternoon on the first day of registration. We went through the usual registration routine, which nowadays also includes a mandatory temperature taking, and waited for further instructions. The entire process took less than 15 minutes before the teacher came back to us with a couple of forms and told us 'That's it! Wait for the results to be announced after the last day of registration'. Satisfied, we went home.

It turns out that out of the 127 vacancies in Phase 2C for St. Margaret's, there were 132 applicants. Which means that we would have to go through the nail-biting process of balloting. And to deepen the suspense, we had to wait till 11 August (after the National Day long weekend, dammit!) to do so.

We await with bated breath...

Getting into the groove

After being together for almost a year, we are finally getting our act together as a band. I am a subscriber of the notion that music soothes the savage beast. So what better way to end the work week than with a jamming session, in a nice studio downtown no less!

My Saturday afternoons have become preoccupied with other arrangements so our only option left was to jam elsewhere since Mel's home studio was a great big no in the evenings, lest the neighbours should complain about the din we were making. It is therefore also subtly ironic that we are currently toying with the name Hush House, considering the amount of noise we make and distortion we use in our music.

So we found ourselves at Shiin Studio on North Canal Road (just above Settler's Cafe) where Mel apparently also jams with his other outfits. Cosy little place with two small studios, but with some rather decent equipment. Finally, a nice set of tight, tuned drums to pamper my sticks with. Here, they were equipped with a 6-piece Gretsch that came with double pedals (not that I needed them anyway - getting too old for that s**t).

All in all, a great (but albeit costly) evening of wonderful music making. We even got to try out our cover of Beach Boys' Don't Worry Baby with me on backing vocals. Cool!

New beginning

After months of hesitating and asking God for direction, we finally came to a decision to leave New Covenant Sanctuary. Maybe it's just us, but Sunday after Sunday, I feel that Penny and I were just going through the motion of going to church and serving our respective ministries. I cried out to God and asked for forgiveness that we'd become so passive. What had happened? We don't even know. I guess we came to a point where we were fed up of everything going in circles, and church was the last place we'd expect to deal with spirals.

Many have asked us - what if it was God's will for us to be placed in NCS, wouldn't we be going against His will by leaving? It's a case of being stuck between a rock and a hard place - we'd be damned if we did and damned if we didn't. Again, I prayed for forgiveness and told God that I'd rather sin in an attempt to get closer to Him than to remain there and sin anyway by harbouring so much bitterness that would kill our spiritual lives eventually.

I couldn't bear to leave everything that we tried so hard to build up, but I asked myself 'Would I be able to make a difference?'. In the end, it's all about doing it for His glory and not mine. I remember the prophecy given to me was that I'd work with youth of THE church; the prophecy didn't say THIS church, so I comfort myself with the thought that it's still His house no matter where we serve.

If it was really God's will for us to be there, guess He would send a 'big fish' to 'swallow' us up and spit us out back there.

We continue to pray for the people of NCS as we begin a new chapter in our walk with Christ.

Beaten at Monopoly Junior

I suck at Monopoly. In fact, I suck so bad that even Velouria can beat me. And we're not even talking about the standard Monopoly. We're talking about Monopoly Junior. With smaller notes. Less expensive property. Lesser squares.

Velouria had just gotten a hand me down set and I, being the kiasu parent attempting to educate her about the benefits of board games, decided to have a go at it with her.

The set came without any manual, so I distrbuted $100 to both of us and off we went. Being the aggressive 'businessman' with no strategy whatsoever, I just started buying up all the property that my token landed on. Just my luck that I got all the cheap, crappy ones. Velouria, on the other hand, was a scheming strategist that would have put Donald Trump to shame, buying up properties after a tremendous amount of thought. Only God knows what went on in her head in the midst of all that contemplation.

It seemed to have worked however. In the end, after mortgaging all my houses and selling off all my property, I had no moolah in my box. In stark contrast, Velouria had a handful of blue (her colour of choice) houses left on the board and a considerable stash of cash in her box.

Beaten by a six... no, five and a half year old girl, in a board game designed for pre school children. Major bummer.

Hilarious TVC

Rarely does a TVC catch my eye - most have got me reaching for the remote to channel surf, bolting to the washroom for a quick pee break or waltzing to the kitchen in search of something to satisfy my insatiable appetite for the munchies.

The last one that got me to sit up and notice (not to mention make me tear even) was Leo Burnett's TVC for MCYS's 'Beautifully Imperfect' campaign. Other than that, most other ads simply make me cringe:

a. with lousy acting (the Allwell herbal drinks with the couple at a hawker centre)
b. with cheesy, hard sell scripts (the Sinsin Soya Sauce ad with the grandma advising the dude against OD'ing his food with soya sauce and the wife jumps to his defense by saying that it's low salt, blah, blah)
c. just by being downright irritating (the Carlsberg ad with the beer and foosball table delivered to three dudes camping on a ledge of a snowy mountain)
d. all of the above

I happened to catch Heineken's new TVC today. Honestly, it caught me completely off guard and I thought it was going to be another silly TVC advertising some household product or some other contraption you DO NOT need in the home.

Damn funny lah. From a guy's point of view anyway.