Church Annual Dinner

It's a very chinese thing, having big sit down dinners. This was was the church annual dinner, held in the main hall of the church.

55 tables of 10 people at each table - so 550 people in total! Which is apparently less than the last couple of years.

A time to say farewell to outgoing pastors... (pastors in Methodist churches rotate around the churches and don't stay in one particular church for more than a few years).

And for the outgoing pastor to give a farewell speech and sing a song.

Also a time to introduce new leaders - this is the new LCEC (Local Church Executive Committee) chairman for 2011. So he gives a little speech too.

The pastors go around to say hi and chat with people at tables and wish everyone a Happy New Year.

This is where the food is being prepared... in a mobile kitchen set up by the caterer just outside the church building.

One of the dishes that was served... it's a typical Chinese banquet, where dishes are served one by one. A big plate in the middle from which everyone takes a spoonful or two of food. The empty plate is then taken away to be replaced by the next course.

Another of the dishes - this one is rice in lotus leaf.

This is Pong at the dinner table (the glass you see in the bottom left hand corner is filled with hot tea).

And here is the program for the evening, which includes singing a few songs together too.

Community Centres...

Built by the Peoples' Association (PA), which is a statutory board established to promote racial harmony and social cohesion. There are all sorts of classes going on at community centres... Here are some banners advertising these courses.

They are often quite reasonably priced, and people actually go to these classes to enrich themselves or learn a new skill.

Photos of our church sanctuary

This advent season, our liturgical service is lighting the advent candles... so two people walk in at the start of the service, one carrying a cross and one carrying a candlelight on a stick.

Then the candle is lit at the front... an extra candle lit each week of advent.

Then at the end of the service, the light is brought out, to represent the Christ-light going out into the world.

More adverts on the MRT train platform

This is one of the videos that gets played on the MRT train station platform, educating commuters about queueing and letting alighting passengers out first.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPCdykxra-k

Dialysis centres

There is a dialysis centre on the ground floor of our block of flats where we live. The funds come from charitable sources as well as the government. "Singapore Pools" is like the National Lottery in England, and they must have made a substantial financial contribution to get their name on the signboard. NKF is the National Kidney Foundation. To find out more, check our their website: http://www.nkfs.org/

An incentive to do well in exams...

...Is that you get to earn extra money endorsing products. These are huge banner advertisements on the external walls of buildings, advertising an "essence of chicken", which is all the goodness of a chicken packed into a black liquid. If you drink it, it's improves your concentration ability and brain power, enabling you to do better in exams. That's how these students managed to get top marks and perfect scores.

[For those who want to know more about what essence of chicken is, you might want to check out the short write up by a rival competitor http://www.brandsessence.co.uk/about.asp; essentially, (pun intended), it was a recipe by a Royal chef to boost King George IV's health] 

Is this a mug or a cup or a glass?

It's a mug without handles, used to drink hot tea from... highly impractical indeed.

Glasses, cups and saucers

Tea and coffee here is usually served in transparent mugs.

Ruth, this MIGHT explain why some Chinese people have the strange practice of drinking hot tea from glasses... in fact, they may be wondering why strange English glasses don't have handles.

Hot tea and coffee is also drunk from cups and saucers.

The tea (or coffee) is usually poured into the saucer and then drunk from the saucer. It's amazing how many things we take for granted... that basic items like glasses, cups and saucers are used the same way throughout the world.

Breakfast in the morning

We have started to wake up earlier to go the nearby market for breakfast. Actually it's the Bedok South Hawker Centre that is next to the market. It's nice to start the day with a substantial breakfast so that we don't end up feeling hungry all morning. :P

This is Sunday morning at 7.30am...

In the foreground, you can see that a lady has done her marketing with her shopping trolley, and is probably waiting for her friend who is queueing to buy breakfast.

This is the roti prata man taking a lump of stretchy dough to flatten it before frying it. The end result is called "roti prata" which is usually eaten with curry.

Education in MRT train stations

This is a typical underground MRT station...

Messages on the doors teach train commuters manners... telling us to queue and let others out first.

And videos on LCD screens (see first picture) educate commuters on the need to be vigilant in order to save lives, including your own. Here is a video that is shown on these screens. I was quite amused by it, but Pong says, "I don't know why my wife is laughing, this is serious stuff." Have a look and see what you think.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=atm67wLMQvU

Things that come out in newspapers...

See how the Singapore government is so concerned about the welfare of her citizens, and actively offers pastoral care, in a public health way. Here's an advertisement in the local newspaper warning new parents about the dangers of romance being killed by babies and how to prevent that from happening.

Another common food stall...

... the "Yong Tau Foo" stall.

You pick the food items you want, mostly various types of beancurd stuffed with minced meat, and then pass it to the stall holder to boil and serve with your choice of noodles or rice.

The ice cream man

And after we got off the Singapore Flyer, we passed by an ice cream man, and Pong could not resist the temptation to have some ice cream.

Here he is cutting a block of ice cream, to be put inside a folded slice of bread.

Happy Pong with his ice-cream...

This is what it looks like close-up.

Macdonalds, Monopoly and the Singapore Flyer

Pong sometimes has to have a quick lunch at Macdonalds which is very close to his workplace due to the busyness at work, and there is this Monopoly promotion going on now... not unlike the one in UK - where you get little peel-off "Monopoly cards" which you can collect to win certain prizes. One of the "Instant Win" prizes was buy-1-get-1-free for Singapore Flyer tickets. We happened to be meeting Pong's sis for lunch there today, so off we went.

Singapore flyer is like the Millenium wheel in London - glass capsules on a huge ferris wheel. And here are some of the amazing views of Singapore from it.

And here's one of Pong and me as well - so you know we are still alive and well. :P

Some food stalls...

This is the type of food stall that you will find in most coffeeshops or hawker centres. It is usually called the "cooked food stall" (not that food in other stalls are not cooked) or the "economical rice stall". In Chinese, it's called the "dishes and rice" stall, which describes what they sell perfectly. Basically there is a range of vegetables and meat dishes, and you just point to which ones you want on your plate of rice. There is a standard price for 1 meat +1 veg, 1 meat + 2 veg, 2 meat + 2 veg etc etc.

First week over...

So one week has passed and we are still surviving. We now have a slightly better idea of how our time commitments will pan out and are in the process of developing a routine. I will finish work around 5.30-6pm (except for when I have a complex patient, which I had on Wednesday and had to stay till 9.20pm with my consultant to sort out!) and Pong will probably finish work around 8-9pm. So we will probably have dinner on weekdays at my parents' place - it means I can spend time with my family while waiting for Pong to finish. My Saturday mornings are usually filled either with working (I do 1 in 3 Saturdays) or at a registrar teaching session (at least once a month) or attending some educational course. Then we may set aside Saturday lunch/ afternoon to spend with Pong's sister (and brother-in-law and two nephews. Sunday mornings will be taken up by church, and we will try to leave Sunday evenings for housework and preparing for work on Monday.

We are still exploring joining a housegroup - there is one possible group at church to join, but they have not been able to meet regularly as not enough people can make it. At the moment, they are meeting at 5pm on Saturdays so that it won't be so disruptive to other family and personal commitments.

Xinyi is also mooting the idea of having a bible study group that is similar to our CGS bible study group in Cambridge... but not sure when we will be able to fit that in. Ideally we should be trying to settle into housegroups in church rather than forming a bible study group outside church. But such a group may facilitate reaching out to non-Christians friends, as that is the means that we are used to and have found effective in the UK. It will also hopefully be a source of fellowship and encouragement for people in similar situations... the medical wives and civil servant husbands. :P

In terms of service, we have been asked and we have agreed to lead a "seekers' class" at church. We are planning to go through the first 5 chapters of John, following a Fisherman bible study guide which examines the claims of Jesus... with a view to running Christianity Explored in early 2011. We have also been asked to help out in teaching Sunday School in the new year.

All in all, do pray for wisdom about the above commitments, particularly for the seekers' class, that the right people will come and also that the week-to-week bible study discussions will be edifying and helpful.

Please also pray that we will be witnesses at our workplace. We are still settling into work at the moment, so we have more news on this front later. :o)

We have survived...

...our first day at work! We both started work today. Pong has found his work colleagues very friendly, which is great... but they were pretty shocked when he was getting ready to leave the office at 6pm. Everyone else was still around. He has lots to read up now for his work responsibilities.

I have also found my work colleagues friendly. The medical officer and the nurse clinician in my team both seem very friendly, and also efficient and competent. So that is a real thanksgiving point too.

This is where I work.

Pasar Malam

So Pasar Malams are travelling markets... the marquees are set up in a particular place for about 1 month and there are all sorts of stalls there, ranging from food stalls to clothes stalls and stalls selling special cleaning liquids that magically get rid of all sorts of stains. There is one just across the road from our place at the moment and here are some pictures of it.

The guy in the middle is demonstrating a cleaning product on a microphone and people are gathered around to listen to him and see what the product is all about.

An example of a food stall...

Another food stall....

This is a stall selling DVDs and CDs.

This is the ice cream man. It's a cooler box with wheels attached to a motor-cycle. It used to be attached to bicycles in the past. The ice cream usually comes in rectangular blocks which are cut into a rectangular block the size of an ice lolly... this block of ice cream is then sandwiched between two pieces of bread or between two pieces of thin wafers.

Interesting signs...

We have been taking pictures of interesting banners and signs... to post them when there is nothing really interesting to say.

Here is one that was in the coffeeshop just down the road from our church... It's by the Public Utilities Board educating everyone about the function of drains... and how to keep the drains clean.

Our church

We are attending Pong's home church - Paya Lebar Chinese Methodist Church. This is where we got married too.

As you can see from the signboard, there are 7 congregations, and we attend the "English (Liturgical)" one.

This is the library - Pong's favourite place... so he will probably be helping out in here again.

The books are packed into a cabin bag...

And then laid out on a table after the service as a mobile library... the books are changed every week so there is a different selection on display.

The service itself is liturgical, so this is what the order or service looks like, and hymns are sung from the methodist hymnal.

There are light refreshments and drinks after the service to encourage social interaction and fellowship.