Aspire' 08

Dear Diary,

I am actually just back from a 3-day young adult camp at Aloha Resorts. Pretty exhausted actually and spent the late afternoon sleeping, before getting up for a jog down Aljunied Road to the Cemetery and back. I guess the camp kinda cleared my mind and made me feel less burdened as I was able to enjoy the long hours without technology like the internet, and hence able to spend time just lazing around, praying, contemplating, interacting with fellow Christians and appreciating the nature around us.

There were many things to write about last week… some may potentially be life-changing. However, I am skipping them for now till they are finalised before I release the bombshell. I met up with some former pre-registration training colleagues over dinner last Monday. Had two students in my pharmacy from Tuesday till Thursday. One of them left for another outlet on Friday after her short rotation in my pharmacy. It was very nice of her to write that short and sweet postcard to me. She even gave me a sweet delicious dragon fruit from Vietnam! =) Kinda will miss her a little actually… she is indeed very nice. Coincidentally… Teochew and from St Nick’s? Haha… There was like another former St Nick’s in my Young Adult camp group which I was in charge over the last 3 days. She is also super sweet… attached though… haha… Maybe I will just throw my daughters (if I ever have in future) to St Nick’s lah… haha… give Raffles Girls’ a miss.

As for my own student, I will teach her well. =) She seems like a brilliant kid although a little lacking in confidence, haha… I am sure she will change with this stint with me! ;-) Also quite sure that it is unlikely that I will be a preceptor next year. So this year’s students… I gotta make sure they are guided well… May they be well-loaded with information, brimming with customer-contact experience, adequately rested at home and feelings of fulfilment! Haha! Somehow, I feel that this batch of students is definitely more competitive and more knowledgeable than the previous year’s batch. Maybe that new lecturer Joyce Lee in NUS really made a difference. She even sent emails to us preceptors telling us what the students had covered… hmmm…

From Friday to today, I went for the Aspire 2008 camp. I have attended the young adults’ camp every year since 2006. I realised that many had left the group and even the church over the years. One over to Bible Presbyterianism, another one also possibly so, then one over to Catholicism, one over to New Creationism… actually, there were many more who left over the years. I was surprised that my priest called me up to lead a group in this camp when I barely attended any young adults’ fellowship meeting on Saturdays. I was reluctant but decided that I should see it as a service to God and God will use anyone despite his or her capability. We took a cab to the campsite but the taxi-driver did not know where the place was and left us stranded. In the end, with some bad communications, haha… we ended walking some 3 km along the roads with our huge haversacks before reaching the chalets! As for the program, we had lots of sermons, prayer sessions and periods of silent contemplation. I thought the small “altar” or “shrine” with that wooden cross was pretty interesting. We lighted candles and placed in front of the cross if we had any prayer requests to God. So traditional… like very Catholic or Eastern Orthodox, haha…

I got a really good room with just another 2 more occupants and an attached bathroom! Our room was just beside the congregating annex too! Whoopppeee… The camp theme was about living a surrendered and spirit-filled life. That is really good reminder for me to make time for God in devotion and prayers. Unfortunately the weather was sweltering and I was constantly thirsty. So basically, we listened to sermons, read the bible, pray, contemplated silently, lighted candles, exhorted each other… of course, there were many light moments too! ;-) Played some dog-and-bone games except we had to dig bible verses out of a pool of soapy water and run over slippery soapy groundsheets! Haha… Got all wet and soapy. There was one where each group had to protect their candles from being extinguished and try to extinguish the competitors’ ones. They had some funnily lame “morals” behind those games like you must keep the light of God shining in our lives and beware of the World and the Evil One who will come in all shapes, sizes, genders and ages… Really hilarious, haha…

Holy Communion was conducted on Sunday evening after yet another sermon. After which, we went to cook our dinner in our groups! I am so proud of my group because we really whipped up lots of dishes and all of us participated in the cooking! I chose an excellent spot and we were so “mechanically effective”, delegating of the lighting of the solid fuels, collecting water, cutting vegetables and luncheon meat, lighting candles… I also got many plastic chairs for my group mates. We were laughing and chatting about our food which basically were a bunch of “innovative concoctions”! Then when we had our fill, I was telling them about life in the hospital when I was a pre-registration pharmacist. They were listening intently. One is currently studying nursing in NUS and another ever worked in the hospital as an admin assistant before she went on to the university. There is always that thrill and excitement about what goes on in a hospital. Scared them a little about how some HIV guy with OCD, dug his eyeball out with a spoon… haha…

Then entire expanse of grass patch was decorated and lighted up with candle lights, tea lights and lanterns. So beautiful under the starry sky and the lapping of the sea waters. The sea breeze could be better though! Some of them played guitar and sang songs. After a while, I went back to my room and chatted with my bunkmates till 3am this morning. We were pretty funny… talking about girls and how hard to understand them, haha… We decided that maybe we should take the easy way out and seek the Kingdom of God earnestly so that all these “girls” will be given unto us, haha… Joking throughout the night but later we spoke about more serious theological issues and one of them fell asleep bored, keke…

Dad fetched us up slightly before noon and we were off for home sweet home. Lots of memories and a truly energising 3-day retreat indeed! Anyway, as I am typing this entry, I was trying to clear some backlogs in my computer and I realised I actually added a particular blog on my favourites. This blog’s last entry was on 16 July 2004. I checked the hyperlink which led to another new blog and again to another newer one! Realised that I don’t even know why this blog is on my favourites as I do not know who this person is… besides, she actually just ended pre-registration training this year… she is a pharmacist? Puzzling… but goes to show how often many things in our lives just get forgotten over time, haha…

Alright, that’s all for now… Take care!

God Bless,

Andrew