my only housemate, Beth! and us infront of our Whitehouse, a.k.a. The Lodge! Really glad to have to know her better n she is such a cheerful gurl:) At least there was somebody that I can talk to after a long day work in the surgery.
before summer starts, a friend of mine gave me this little pot of sunflower, so that I will smile every morning I wake up despite knowing everybody is back home in Malaysia and I'm home alone. It did work. And just this morning, as I walked into the post office, I'm thankful to see there were some bouquets of sunflowers on sale in the shop...*grins* it's such beautiful scene isn't? for me only..lol
when friends went all out to do this batman pose for me no matter where they are:) Thanks Jason!
Just a few days after I got back from Paris, i received a HUGE parcel from a dear friend:) it's a SURPRISE!! And i really love it! NICE wrapping indeed!
it's a 3 layered transparent containers and each layer has some message on it! Which means so much to me! Thankies buddy for being so thoughtful!
and in the last layer of the container, there was a small note i gave him 3 years ago during a Christmas celebration in uni, it meant smth to him. But am just amazed that he still kept a small note like this which made a difference...to me now as well..and to know that perfect love drives out fear is AWESOME^_^
chinese Junk! yes, i must say am super happy to see these all when Lily laid them on our kitchen table! Ly IS a STAR to bring all these back to Manchester for me! YesS, seeing these alone makes me smile! Mooncake! Bakgua! Greentea biscuits! THANK YOU Mummy n Daddy too, for going all out to get all I want..hehe..
And i'm sure God knows I'm pretty lonely in the white house last week since I was home alone for the whole week! But this week situation turned better, one of my group mates decided to stay in as well for the week. She is in my batch but quite senior in age coz she took a gap year off and completed a master in public health. Quite surprisingly, we could click quite well. After work, we would hv dinner together and chit-chatted a bit. One day, she just hopped into my room and she started teaching me some medical mnemonics..random, but it's just a kind soul God put to make me feel alive in the midst of stress:)
Just half and hour ago, Lily and myself were supposed to make potato mashed patties for family reunion tomorrow in church. We tried for quite long but the patties just dun stucked together! And we're so frustrated and on the edge of giving up. I was really NOT HAPPY. Our patties were literally CMI (cannot make it!). BUT God sent us an angel, just at the right time!
STEPHANIE!! initially, she just stopped by to pass us smth and ended up being our chef and taught us 'how to make nice potatoes patties'..SERIOUSLY, i was so excited and dancing with joy when I see the patties stucked together into nice shape as she strted frying them..
and SMILE...my patties are all ready to be served tomorrow:) THANKS to my God sent Angel
not to forget Aunt Winnie(Ly's mum)!!SURPRISE!! She is one funny mum:) TQ for the lovely batik pj! I really like it and yes, funny why Lily dun 'suka' right! It's so comfy to sleep with :) She knew i like to wear batik dress as my pj. And she made Lily bring this back for me...touched indeed and her love and care is really overwhelming...looking forward to meet you soon, aunt!!!!
I didn’t expect it to be so exhausting initially because I thought we were very well prepared for it. We even had trainings few weeks before we departed. However, when we arrived, there were loads of changes made and needed spontaneous adjustments to adapt to the English level the students we had. Staying up late nights for preparation of work was tough for me because I’m so used to sleep early. Sunday was the heaviest day of all. We had to attend 2 French congregations, 1 Mandarin speaking congregation and a bible study in between! 4 meetings in one day..Thank God for His strength that sustained me throughout these 10 days, despitehaving to sleep about 4-5 hours only and had to teach from 10am to 5.30pm almost everyday. Not to forget, there were some talks going on at night as well which needed more preparation work.
I still came home in one piece. There is no way I could survive this stressful period if it wasn’t Him who gave me the energy:)
my morning class teenagers:)
and my afternoon class kiddos.
what we did was just teaching them basic English. Like for that afternoon class, i did body parts with them and asked them to label on me:) Quite fun ey...
and during my afternoon class, my other team members would be busy organising Youth Alpha for the youths! It's supposed to be a course to intro Jesus, but to our surprise, all who turned up were already Christians, so we spontaneously changed our initial plan and became a course to build stronger relationship with God and also among Christians. They did prayer walk, some talks n games! To our surprise, the youths from different churches grew closer and got to know each other better:)
This was kindly given by one of our students in class..If u know about the history of Macaroons, Pierre Herme makes the best macaroons across France! We were trully blessed:)
I'm very grateful for this opportunity to travel all the way to Paris and do His work. Many of my friends have doubts like..'WHY Paris of all countries?' Just cant link the need to evangelise there as people often see Paris as the posh place for romantic holidays and not Mission work. But this trip has trained me, to live out of my comfort zone( to shower in cold water one day when the hot shower wasn't working, to sleep on the floor and prep work till late nights), with just one vision in my mind, that is to serve the Lord in every way that I can, for instance to teach English to French born Chinese teenagers, to talk about Christ, and despite the limited TVB learned cantonese, I was asked to sing a cantonese worship song in front of a congregation. Not only that, since I grew up in English church, my biblical jargons in Mandarin are limited. But being the only person in team who can speak fluent Mandarin, I was put to translate a whole talk to parents who only speak mandarin/cantonese! They were all real challenges to me throughout the trip. But I realised, as long as we are made available to Him, He can use us mightily, just as how He used me in this trip to do things that I would not be doing. I'm now so challenged to do more I-M-posibble work for Him since I'm reminded again of the verse saying ' I can do everything through Him who gives me strength!'
and Sunday would be the most hectic day of the day. On our first Sunday, we had to attend 3 different congregations, 2 French services, 1 mandarin service and also a bible study in between. Starting from 9am till 6pm! Though I could hardly understand any of those French services, it's interesting to worship with believers who speaks in different languages and singing songs to worship the SAME God. *Aunt Kitty was our host! She is one woman of God who shows much love to all of us*
We had to perform sketch when we visited the 2 French services:) *stage fright me*
and the spontaneous Cantonese singing session..Lol!
We were very blessed by the church members there. Dr Jeremy and family are one of them:) This family is really dedicated to their church. Since the church just bought over the new building, much renovation work needs to be done. And the whole family would stayed up late till 3am in the morning, just to plaster the ceiling and clean up the church because manpower is very expensive, so the family took time off to tidy up the house of God! Really impressed by their love for the church. This is what we should learn. To love our church, just like our home.
This aunt was another God sent Angel to us one afternoon.
What happened was this afternoon, Shermaine(our co-leader) had to prepare us lunch because there were some leftovers dishes from the day before. But Matt(our leader) knew she is very tired and much work prep hasn't been done. All the others wise had to teach English. So he prayed that Shermaine would not need to do the chores and if she would have to, Matt will take over although cooking wasn't his love. So that very morning, as Matt informed Shermaine that she need not prepare the lunch and he will take over, this aunt came. She told us that when she woke up that morning, she felt God is asking her to cook something for us. She jumped out of bed and came to church early morning. She told us she didnt prepare much stuff to cook but guess what she prepared for us in the end...
The typical us, in our PJs at night, preparing classes for tomorrow! Though we had to sleep late, we really enjoyed each other's accompany. The dynamic of my team was great, from teenagers of 18 year old to adult of 33 year old. We came from different fellowships, but D Family members worked really well together, as one body of Christ!
And finally, the word ‘AMAZING’ described the many great things God has done throughout this trip. I love meeting God’s children from every part of the world and share how God has impacted their lives. It’s interesting that we all could click so well despite the different languages that we speak. Hopefully, the seeds that we’ve planted will grow on good soil and subsequently bring glory to God. This mission trip has taught me to let go and let God to take control, to trust Him fully and also expect the unexpected, why limit Him when there is no limitations in Him?
this is Northwich!
they hav a small town with different local shops selling all sorts
and spotted this bakery! But it was already close when i passed by, if not, me the bread lover will go in and 'sapu' some nice bread!
and a HUGE Lydl is just within 15 mins walk from my house..yay! No problem finding food loo!
simple balanced meal that i can prepare to feed myself!
and THIS is the WHITE house i'm staying!
very narrow stairs leading to my room
Tadaaa..
another view of my room:)
my corner with junk food! (Thanks to Lily who has imported so much yummy Chinese junk from Malaysia)
and i love sitting nexy to this windown and admire the breathtaking scenery:)
my lovely view from the window:)
our common bathroom and toilet!
and finally, our lovely kitchen!
every morning, we will have to take a 15 mins walk from our house to the surgery we're attached to. Walking pass this beautiful green pastures with nice weather just lift my spirit up and get motivated to start off my new day with a big smile!
This is where the surgery is:) With 11 partners working here, 15+ nurses to cover 23,000 patients! It's considered quite a huge one. I'm enjoying myself so far, esp the practice manager is very keen to organise teaching sessions for us and has scheduled different timetables for all of us individually, which is a good sign to kick off my fifth year!
