Two Weeks Later

Famine's this weekend? Are you excited? I know I am!

So far we've raised over twelve thousand dollars in the name of less fortunate children all over the world. So... thank you all for your generous donations!

Here's a quick (not really) recap of what's been happening in the days (weeks?) since I last blogged.

! 15/6/07 - Friday

We did not get the ball back. Neither did we hear from the staff of MBS.

Life went on.

! 16/6/07 - Saturday

The Interact Club's kids carnival took place in school. It doesn't really concern most of you, but if you're wondering what a kid's carnival is, it's like a carnival, for kids.

Profound!

The kids were mostly from orphanages or impoverished families around Sentul. The majority were young kids, between the ages of six to twelve. However, the group had a couple of extreme values (that's maths!) in the form of two sixteen year olds and one seventeen year old.

All morning we kept the younger kids busy with musical chairs, station games and sand art, while the others joined us for basketball, football and stories about life in school and church.

Guy: So your principal is Malay or what?
Kevin: No, Indian woman. Used to be a man.
Jun Ian: HAH!

It was a good time. Our photographer guy took like seven hundred pictures in the few hours we were there. Not that I've got any.

Night heralded the arrival of Jamie Neo, here for the weekend.

Jamie: I will have mercy and leave your national landmarks untouched. The Petronas Towers shall stand.

Wow, really? Our humble nation is eternally in your debt.

Jun Ian: And which is your guide? The blind one or the bald one?

A few of us met up for dinner at Bangsar Village - Peako, Lih Fern, En Yaw, Eugene, Jamie, Mahadi and myself.

Peako: Where's En Yaw? Oh he's calling.
Jun Ian: Tell him we're at Nike. Don't say which one.
Peako: How many does this place have?
Jun Ian: Two. One sporting and one casual.
Lih Fern: So which one are we going to?
Jun Ian: Puma.

The restaraunt was a posh deal, but not without its shortcomings.

Eugene: I can't believe everyone's food is here but mine.
En Yaw: Why's your lamb taking so long?
Mahadi: Maybe they're trying to catch the lamb.
Jun Ian: Or maybe their sheep is giving birth.

On a variety of topics.

Jun Ian: Would you really give up a cool name like Neo for one like Mohamadon?
Jamie: Maybe... if you shorten it I guess.
Peako: That wouldn't be all. You'd have to change Jamie to Jamaliah or something.
Jun Ian: They make you do what?

! 18/6/07 - Monday

Dance practice started. It's pretty sad how we only have an hour a day for a month to get our act together for concert.

Practice hours per day: 1
Practice days per week: 5
Practice hours per week: 1 x 5 = 5
Weeks until concert: 5
Total number of practice hours: 5 x 5 = 25

That's like one whole day.

WMS FTW.

! 19/6/07 - Tuesday

My pet sister Joey's birthday.

...What?

junian?: oh wait!
junian?: how about a FISH!
?Jojo?: WHY IN THE WORLD WOULD I WANT THATT?!?!?!
junian?: no wait
?Jojo?: hahahhahahahah
junian?: if it died that would be bad
?Jojo?: WAT THE HELL MAN!!
?Jojo?: YEA!!
?Jojo?: that would be the end of our friendship!
?Jojo?: woot!!
junian?: who asked you not to take care of my FISH?
junian?: one day the fish i give you will save your life
?Jojo?: =____________________=
?Jojo?: if u rly give me a fish
?Jojo?: im SOOOOOOOOOOO gonna kill it

You will learn to love this sweet tropical fish.

! 20/6/07 - Wednesday

Wen Juin's birthday. Celebrated with boxes of Lindt and Chocolate Indulgence, which I discovered was the most delightful cake in the existence.

Some believe a new universe is created every time someone has a taste.

! 21/6/07 - Thursday

Keng Yee threw coleslaw at my head. I got her back though. I won't say where.

But it was an excellent shot.

! 23/6/07 - Saturday

CF Camp today. What can I say about it? It was awesome.

Like a religious rock concert.

Jun Ian: So you said you managed to get some of the best bands in the Klang Valley?
Marcus: That's right.
Jun Ian: How many bands are there in the Klang Valley exactly?
Marcus: Two. One for morning worship and one for night rally.

I went around to everyone's blog looking for pictures or a detailed account of some sort but I couldn't find any.

So I shall be the first. But there will be no actual pictures.

a Never Jumped

Ever been to chapel in the mornings? The barely audible vocals, the trash of the instruments, the futility of the piano, the crowds of Buddhists.

And the jumpers.

Don't know what a jumper is? In the language of our school chapel, a jumper is a person who gets so caught up in the music or worship during chapel that they start jumping up and down during the chorus of a fast song.

For example.

The thing about jumpers in daily morning chapel is that there's not a lot of them. The atmosphere's not that immersive, and people tend to be self-conscious. So what normally happens is that a couple of jumpers will start, in random places around the hall, then stop after a couple of lines.

Camp was not like that.

When XYZ, the second best band (according to Marcus) in the Klang Valley arrived that morning, one of the first things they did was teach us all to wave our arms and jump together, and which parts of the song to do what. Then they played Majesty.

The way the crowd responded was mind blowing.

z Hosanna

Worship's not all about hollering and jumping though, awesome as it may be. The Christians believe in quiet time and prayer, and we had that in spades too. As it turns out, the proper way to calm yourself after vigorous chapel activity is by closing your eyes and singing Hosanna like forty times.

d In Case of Emergency Break Dance

Pastor Andy Yeoh was one of those dynamic young church enthusiasts who never seem to run out of steam. His passion was infectious, and he spoke for an hour longer than the committee planned. But that was okay because he was just that good.

Right at the start, he gets on stage and starts bouncing around.

"Okay, I wanna try something out, and I need someone to help me. Is there anyone here who can breakdance?"

I freeze and my heart skips a beat as every gaze in the hall spins around to fix on me.

"Jun Ian!" Someone shouts.

"MARCUS!" I protest, pointing. Futile.

There I was, standing up on the stage next to him (I almost tripped on his Bible) and he starts talking again. He wants to make up a rap, about God. The drummer would play a beat, he explains, and he wants me to dance while he raps.

Before I know it, the beat is playing, the pastor is rapping and my inner voice is screaming at me in disbelief.

"My G-O-D is B-I-G!" Pastor Andy starts flashing crazy ghetto signs at the crowd, walking in true rapper style and looking at me like I'm supposed to be doing something.

"My G-O-D is B-I-G!"

No problem, I think. You can do this. Just step, bounce, step, bounce, cross and turn, step and slide... People are cheering. Guess this isn't so bad after all.

"My G-O-D is B-I-G!"

Step, bounce, step, wait, is Kay Lee recording this? Cross and turn, trip, whoops! Focus! Did anyone notice? Don't think so.

"My G-O-D is B-I-G!"

Step and slide, bounce and spin...

"My G-O-D is BIG!"

He shouts one last time, then it's all over.

m The Shoe and The Tower

The station games at camp were cool in the sense that most of them were original, creative and gave you sense of accomplishment to complete without being too challenging.

Except Marcus's game. Stupid Marcus.

I will not go into detail about Marcus's game. Suffice to say it involved running in circles with your head sideways around a stick until he was satisfied or you collapsed. No prizes for guessing which usually came first.

My favorite game was probably Caroline's. Construct a tower out of tape, newspaper and string. The tallest tower still standing after a blow from Zhou Wei wins.

The heights of the towers were measured in broomsticks. Before my group arrived, the record stood at three and a half broomsticks.

So I tied the string to my shoe and threw it over the branch of a nearby tree. The branch held. I lowered the string to the ground and we started tying newspapers around it. When we decided we were done, we raised the string back up to form a spiraling tower of six and a half broomsticks.

Thinking out of the box. It's awesome every time.

e Hallel

I thought the morning worship session was awesome. The night rally took it to a whole new level. The best band in the Klang Valley according to Marcus, ACTStreme took the stage. Apparently God loves to party hard, because pastor Andy returned to teach us moves that wouldn't have been out of place at a rave. Jumping as high as we could, punching the air, spinning in circles and gyrating wildly were all a part of worship that night.

I was up in front, next to one of the amps with Mike, Jocelyn, Grace, Tammy, Eli, Xyun, Hannah, David, Laura, Carmen, Mariko, Jon Yeoh, Zhou Wei and a whole crowd of people. It was insane.

There was a bit that went something like this, pastor Andy would call out,

"Give me a J!"

And we'd reply,

"J! We got your J we got your J!"

Which we did, with variations, for all the letters J-E-S-U-S and I just found that incredibly fun and cool. And then he taught us a new word.

Hallel.

According to the pastor, Hallel was a form of praise that literally meant go crazy. In accordance with some ancient party tradition, all of us had to take six steps, in each and every way, and then on the seventh, reach Hallel and lose ourselves completely.

"One... Two... Three... Four... Five... Six... SEVEN!"

Time slowed down as the lights flashed, the instruments rang and everyone threw themselves into a frenzy. The world around me exploded into a maelstrom of furious energy. I felt the vibrations of the crowd in the deepest reaches of my body, and while it lasted, I felt a sort of warmth fill me, and everything was clear in my head.

I guess you could call it a peak experience.

So much for my tale of CF Camp 2007 : Floodgates. There are a few things I didn't get to mention, like Ivan and Ju-Hann's sketch of the prodigal son, but it's actually past midnight and I'm really tired from staying up til two every night since the weekend.

I'm ending this post here, but you'll find out about what happened this week in my next post, most likely after Famine.

While you wait, why not have a look at my playlist?

Keep Their Candles Burning

Matthews: Banyak orang ada anjing, kucing, burung...
Brian: Harimau...
Liwen: Babi.

I didn't blog much about things during my last post. Lots of things happened in the past week or two, during the holidays and in school. Some of these things deserve telling.

One such thing happened today.

We were playing football, as is our custom on Thursdays. The ball was a slick looking Adidas model that Wai Khuin brought. About five minutes into the second game, Adi kicked the ball over the wall (rhymes!) into the Methodist Boys School next door.

One of two things usually happens when the ball goes over the fence.

1. Someone in MBS throws it back.
2. One of us has to go get it.

So this occurence, while annoying common some days, has only ever resulted in a slight delay in the game.

Today, there were a few guys on the other side of the wall, so we shouted to them to help us retrieve it. Some of them ran off to search in the bushes, and I started thinking about what a funny thing it would be if they just decided to keep it.

Then a funny thing happened.

An indian boy in a black shirt found the ball and ran over. Instead of throwing the ball to us, he started kicking it around. Then when someone shouted at him he tucked it under his arm and ran into the school.

We stood stunned for a few moments.

Then Dass dashed off towards the school, followed by Adi, Nathan, Hari, Pardeep, Azfar, Daniel and a few other guys. I went with them, kinda hoping there would be a fight of some sort that I could participate in, or at least witness. Mr Siva tagged behind us, trying in vain to turn us back.

Daniel: Check out the size of this stick! We could really beat in some heads!
Adi: Put the stick down, Daniel.

We ran through the school. It was the first time I had ever been in MBS. Everything was so different. The school looked very old, and all the linked fences, open classrooms, worn tables and big metal signboards had a certain charm to them. The kind of charm you might find in say, a prison. But a homely sort of prison.

On the gate was a bright red sign:

Syabas! Kerana Anda Tiba Ke Sekolah.

Translated, that means, congratulations for making it to school!

Stellar. Why doesn't anyone congratulate me for coming to school?

There was another sign in the courtyard:

COUNTDOWN

[___] Days To PMR
[___] Days To SPM

Thankfully, both had been left blank.

Anyway, a quick tour through the school later, we found Dass, standing by the front gate with a security guard and a few students. As it turned out, they saw a boy with a ball under his arm sprint out of school a few minutes earlier. No one stopped him. That was the crazy thing. He just stole a ball, ran out of school and went home without even being questioned.

Defeated, we returned to our school. The MBS told us they'd try to get him when he came for school tomorrow, but for now we were out of a ball. So we split up and some of us went to play volleyball.

Lots of people probably saw us at it, since school was just over and we played like tools. If you get a chance, watch Jason play volleyball. It is a joy and an enlightenment.

Quick Lessons In Bio #1

Punitha: And next to the medulla oblongata are the pons, which control visceral functions like breathing.
Jen Ming: Are there brain ducks in the pons?

Quick Lessons In Bio #2

Punitha: This part is the cerebellum. It controls your body balance and if it gets it hard you can get knocked out.
Jing Hang: So it's like... the balls of the brain?

One more thing... registration for the Interact Club's 30 Hour Famine opens tomorrow.

I don't have to tell you to join up as soon as you can.

Our theme this year is PS the children, which stands for protect and save the children. A common mistake is thinking it means please save the children.

Jing Hang: What is the theme of our famine this year? Form fours!
Eugene: Please save the children.
Jing Hang: Are you sure?
Eugene: Yes.
Jing Hang: Very sure?
Eugene: Yes.
Jing Hang: Do you want to save the children?
Eugene: Yes...
Jing Hang: How are you going to save them?

Why do we have to save the children anyway? Well, simply put, children are the future of the world.

Save the children, save the world.

I know. We are huge fcuking lamers.

But that doesn't mean you shouldn't give your all to save the children.

Help them keep their candles burning.

Fun With English

The Secret Lives Of Panda presents

Fun with English in 5W/P Set One!

On Tuesday, we played a game. I'm not sure what it's called, but it's the one where everyone takes turns to come up with a different sentence to form a story. Sounds childish, I know, but it was dope.

The text in fiery shades is the story we came up with. The text in icy blues is everything else.

Mdm Moses: I didn't know what just hit me.
Wei Han: I felt dizzy.
Sze Jian: So I lied down on my bed.
Mdm Moses: Lay down.
Sze Jian: Right.
Jethro: Then my sister came in... and jumped on me.

The class gives an two-note, ascending oo-OOH.

Jun Ian: Then... I came in and pulled Jethro's sister off him.
Mdm Moses: What? It doesn't work that way. It's you.
Jun Ian: It's me? No it's Jethro.
Wen Juin: Actually it's Wei Han.
Mdm Moses: No the way it works is that you're the one on the bed now.
Jun Ian: Oh okay. Then Jun Ian came in and pulled my sister off me.
Wen Juin: I felt sad because I couldn't spend quality time with my sister.

The class laughs.

Angeline: I sent my sister out of the room and locked the door.
Mdm Moses: So it's just you and Jun Ian in there? What's going to happen?
Phin Wern: We... had a long chat.
Jun Ian: I just realised I wrote myself into the story...
Wen: Yeah...
Jun Ian: That's so cool.
Rachel: We made plans about what we were going to do with Jun Ian.
Mdm Moses: Huh? But you're talking to Jun Ian!
Rachel: Oh I thought my sister. Never mind la.
Chuan Han: Okay... I felt sleepy so I sent him outside.
Eu Jin: And I went to sleep.
Mdm Moses: The story became so tame suddenly! All about long chats and sleeping!
Yan Por: I had a nightmare and I woke up.
Caryn: I saw Jun Ian... staring at me.
Yi Wen: I wondered what he was doing back in the room.
Brian: Then I realised Jun Ian wanted to sleep with me.

The class explodes into furious laughter.

Jing Hang: I... didn't know what to do.

Something about the way he says it makes the class laugh even harder. Even Mdm Moses is laughing.

Lih Fern: I decided to let Jun Ian sleep with me.

The class reacts.

Sherene: But I got hungry so I went out.
Mdm Moses: Okay okay... from now on, no more obscenities.

But she's still laughing.

Lisha: I realised I should have licked Jun Ian.
Mdm Moses: What did you say?
Lisha: Uhm... I realised I should have kicked Jun Ian.
Zhi Mei: Then I went to eat dinner.
Derek: I had my dinner.
Li Wen: And then after dinner I had another cake.
Mdm Moses: Another cake? A whole cake?
Li Wen: Yeah.
Peako: I went to the fridge and when I opened it, I found Jun Ian inside.
Soe Foong: I had a stomach ache.
Mdm Moses: You found Jun Ian in the fridge and had a stomach ache? Okay Denise, finish it.
Denise: Then I heard the sound of my alarm clock ringing. I woke in my bed and realised it had all been a very strange dream.
Jun Ian: Classic ending.