Day 10 – Saturday 24th May 2008

Time flies when we are doing God’s work. It’s already our second last day in Nias. Morning kindergarten programme continues as Nias is still on a 6 day work week system. Auntie Lucy taught them the uses of our five senses. Interesting activities were used to draw their attention. 

Eyes See,

Nose Smell,

Ears Hear,

Mouth Taste

Hands Touch

SMELL~

For sense of smell, blindfolded children were supposed to guess what kind of food were they smelling. It is really challenging since many of the food smells the same!

 

Guess what's he's smelling? Our favourite, Coffee! haha... i think he too enjoy smelling it. I would love to drink it though.

HEAR~

For sense of hearing, we have audio clips of sounds made by various objects encountered daily. Well... They could identify most of the sounds like Birds, rooster, bulldozer,... but one particular sound puzzled them. THE VACUUM CLEANER! haha... i wont use a VACUUM CLEANER in a village, so neither would they encountered one before!

 

 

After the kindergarten class, we had a small meeting with the kindergarten teachers, to hand down teaching materials for them to use for their lessons in the future. There were many uniquely designed limited edition materials specially made by us. They cant be bought nor found in any shops. It is our desire for them to continue using it. One very special song which we made for the adorable kindergarten kids ->

   Preparations for Evangelistic Finale Night started as early as Saturday afternoon. Bought biscuits and cakes for the kids, spent time to pack them in bags for easy distribution tomorrow.

Due to certain arrangements made the day before, Darren, Robin and Esther went down to a local High School for a motivation talk session. Fajar, a student from the college initiated the visit. Due to some unforeseen circumstances, pictures taken disappeared... Robin was unhappy about it, but things have to move on.

Afternoon, we had our second session of Bible Study Fellowship with College Students. First session was conducted during the first day of Children’s camp.

 

 

 

We sang and played games with each other. First game for warm up was a quick introduction of names for everyone present. Then we dived into our first game: 007. The games goes like: "Zero" "Zero" "Seven" "Bang" "Ah!". Player A will point to B and shout "Zero", B to C "Zero", C to D "Seven", D points and shouts to E "Bang", AND FINALLY E will NOT REACT, but the two players beside E will have to say "AH!". Forfeit were dished out for those who accumulated errors.

I wonder who's doing the forfeit...

Second game we played was "THIS IS A SAD AND SOLEMN DAY, isn't it , ~" Details shall not go into specifics, but at least we knew who were the ones who can really NOT LAUGH. Had a great time trying not to laugh.. but i guess some members of our team is just too good.

 

Uncle William shared with us how we should be using the Word of God through a movie – “The dangerous book”. For many centuries and millenniums, Christians have been prosecuted and killed for reading the bible. It’s a miracle for any of us now to read a bible openly without fear.

66 Books of wisdom. Most of us would have read more than 66 books of any sort, be it John Grisham, or Dan Brown, Harry Potters. But have we read all 66 books of the Bible once through? I’ve not, perhaps many of us are just like me. However, in 1 Peter 2:2,3 , God commands us to be alike newborns, craving for the pure milk of the word that we may know that He is gracious to give us life. We should not live by bread alone, but by every word from His mouth that we may be fed spiritually. How can we know God’s will for us if we do not even read or hear what he says through the Bible? Thus I have made it a point for me to complete my reading of the entire Bible.

More pictures of the members of Bible Study Fellowship

In the evening, Jessica and Robin stayed over at their uncle’s place. Dinner was especially good with MORE MORE MORE DURIANS! Luckily Jessica isn't with us , else she will be overwhelmed by it. While the rest of us packs up and prepare for the day ahead. It’s the Evangelistic Finale Night!!

Day 9 – Friday 23rd May 2008

Again, we had our routine morning devotions followed by breakfast. Today's breakfast was especially good because of the spoils we've got from Gudong Sitoli town the previous day. We had BREAD, Peanut butter, Eggs... O gosh... it had been a long time since I've eaten any of that sort.

KINDERGARTEN PROGRAMME

Kindergarten programme resumes as per normal. Jessica and I stayed back for it. Jessica being a gifted teacher, was very natural and entertaining with the young children. All of them were strangely stuck on to her throughout her lesson. Perhaps it's also due to the strange balls on her hands. She was going through the wordless gloves with them =)

 YELLOW, BLACK, RED, WHITE, GREEN

Basic colours bearing much meaning... After which we did the wordless chain for them to hang on their bags. Lots of beads to string, had to help them out with the tying of knots and stuff, even the kindergarten teachers had trouble with it. The product is something which they can display on their school bags.

IKIP COLLEGE PROGRAMME

Darren, Esther and Robin followed Gilbert over to college for the second session of communications programme. They have an entertaining session, learning the skills and the concept of communications. During their break, they had good conversations with the local students, sharing their faith and interest with each other. Using this opportunity, we extended our invitation for our Saturaday Bible Study Fellowship and for our Evangelistic Final Night. Response was great!

3pm English for Junior Session was conducted by me. We learn new sentence structure based on my favourite topic – Food! The different types of Makanan(food) and some questions and answers using those words we have learnt. Jessica's cousin too joined us for the lesson. Through interactive speech and sentence structures, we managed to know each other better. I like to eat CHICKEN. I do not like to eat DURIAN.

DINNER WITH CAMP VOLUNTEERS

In the evening, we invited all the helpers who helped us in one way or another for dinner at a restaurant. Altogether, there were 17 of us. We had a great time together, talking about the memories of the camp and gave our feedback on how to improve the activities.

 

 

During dinner, i was talking with Alimad about the Christian Faith. He commented that before he was involved in this Christian Camp, he always knew Christianity as "My family is one, so am I". Faith, Confession of sin, Believing in Jesus Christ as his Lord and Saviour was a totally new thing. I've shared testimonies of my walk with Christ, and i guess it spurred him on to pursue a closer relationship with God. God works in many ways, and while we are so focused on attending to the needs of the children in camp, God is somewhere else planting seeds of faith in the rest of us.

 

Day 8 – Thursday 22nd May 2008

Morning was a rain feast. Finally, the sky is pouring down the much needed water. We took all our buckets and plastic basins out to collect the rain. We now appreciate rain more than we did before we came, but above all, we learn to love our taps.

Devotion point: We should always trust God as our provider. From big issues to small things like our daily needs, there is nothing too small or too big for God to provide for us, and it is precisely what God wants us to do. Believe that He can and He will provide our needs. And what about quantity some may ask. I believe when He gives, He gives abundantly, so as to let us fully enjoy His goodness but more importantly, so that we can give abundantly as well. For I am born in an affluent country, not so much to enjoy what God has provided for me, but so that I could give to those who have not. And it is my desire to discover these “have not” so that if God willing, it can be provided for by us through Him.

Robin, Famachoi’s first son will be arriving in Nias from Singapore around 1. So Gilbert and I, along with Famachoi and Damai took a 2 ½ hour journey up to Gunong Sitoli. Damai has to get her X-ray done that morning in the hospital, thus we left early at 9am. The rest of the team stayed back in the Yayasan to help out with the kindergarten programme.

We had prepared coloured flashcards to teach the kids the colours in English. Jessica taught the kids the different colours in English by swiping out the cards from her behind her back suddenly. Darren and Esther did a review of what they kids had learnt the previous day with fun worksheets on telling time and numbers. It was a bit hard to teach the kids bigger numbers. So we just stuck with 1 to 20.

Along the way to the airport, I learnt 2 songs from Damai. The Nias Dialect version of Yesterday, Today, Forever and Haga Gunidaner. Haga Gunidaner is a song which encourages children to be strong as they are useful in the eyes of our Lord. As I’m thinking through this point, I came to a conclusion that God has the ability to use everyone at anytime. Be it adults, pastors, parents, teachers, or even those strangers we have met on the way to some place, He can use them to touch our lives. As my mind runs through all that has happened in the children’s camp, it gives me great satisfaction that I was able to share, teach and grow with them in the goodness of our Lord.

We drove past this local market where only durians where traded. So we stopped by and bought some 20+ durians. They were cheap, about 90 cents each. WAy too big and nice for something of that price! And guess how do you carry 40 durians on a stick? See this---->

At the local hospital, we met another pastor of a church in Gunong Sitoli. He is very keen in inviting us over to his congregation to preach a message. We have also discussed much about the situation of Nias. After exchanging contact details, we left for the airport in a hurry because we are late.

Robin waited about one hour, but the wait was nothing compared to the number of years spent away from his family in Singapore. We made our way back to the Yayasan, only stopping over for a short lunch along the way.

English for Juniors -When we are back at the Yayasan, Jessica and Auntie Lucy were midway through the second session of English for Juniors. The attendance is alot better with about 10 students. Using Charades style, the participant tries to convey a simple message regarding "I put on my ~". So if the item is a pair of watch, the participant acted out the motion of attaching the watch to the wrist and looking at the item on the face of the watch. Some like Auntie Lucy were great at acting, while others gave us a really good laugh. Even though the lesson is simple, i believe that as long as they can learn one thing well for each lesson, after a year of learning, they would have improved tremendously.

I put on my ~

Auntie Damai preparing the durians for a Durian soup dish tonight - specially made by Uncle Gilbert. Looking all the durians we bought... I couldnt help but steal some before it reached the bucket. Jessica took refuge somewhere far away. The aroma of durian just permeates throughout the house. Anticipating a good dinner, we prepared ourselves for a feast.

~DINNER~

Evening’s dinner was good. We had nice prawns and fish. The taste of the durian dish was unforgettable, even for the princess. It tasted sweet and aromatic, without the "disgusting" taste of durian. God bless our team with good food and especially good health as none of us suffered any illness.

Prayed hard in the evening together then retired shortly.

Day 7 – Wednesday 21st May 2008

This is Day 1 of our Kindergarten Programme. Jessica and Auntie Lucy with Darren taught the children. Due to some timing difficulties, college programme was postponed to Friday and Saturday, thus Uncle Gilbert stayed back to help with Logistics and packed up our place.

~Kindergarten~

It was time for the kindergarten program to start proper. We shifted the whole schedule forward to start on the 21^st of May, and everything ran like clockwork. Speaking of clocks we tried to teach the kids how to tell the time in English. The kids got to take home their very own clocks which they had made.

When teaching the kids the numbers, we realised that the kids knew how to recite one to ten very well. But if you showed them any number in between, they would have to start counting from one again in order to recall the name of the number in English. So Esther reviewed with them the numbers using flashcards in order for the kids to immediately recognise the numbers and say it in English. There was one really funny moment when Excelsis had to answer a question of some sort that required her to go beyond the number 10 to something like 15. So she started counting from one using her fingers and when she ran out of fingers, she bent over and started counting her toes before finally shouting the answer confidently in English. “15!” It took all my strength to keep from bursting out in laughter. Childlike innocence is beautiful.

~Water Party~

Lazy afternoon syndrome kicked in as we made plans to do house visitations and evangelism. However, we were called on to fetch water from the well across the road as the good weather we had for the past week reduced our water supply drastically. City kids like Darren and I were puzzled about the mechanics of fetching water from the well with a bucket. Without a proper flick motion, the bucket dropped into the well will just float and this unable to contain any water! After many attempts, we finally got the hang of it. Imagine all the mocking we received from the local children.

We worked together as a team. Sometimes we will go in a pair to fetch 3 buckets at once. Other times, we would go one by one. It's easier to do it in pairs because the load of the bigger pail is shared. All of us worked and worked and worked. Finally after numerous trips, we have filled up the 2 tubs in toilet, 2 full containers and many other smaller ones.

A job well done. Gathered lots of stares and giggles from the villagers in the process.... *Wonder what are they thinking of?*

~English for Juniors~

Due to some miscommunications, about 6 students came over for English for Junior Programme. Not wanting to disappoint them, Jessica came forward to take them through a short session with what we have prepared for the next day.

She taught them basic questions and replies like "MY NAME IS", "I am ___ years old". Then we went on to using a kindergarten book to teach basic sentence structure. We tried to structure our lesson to suit daily conversations, so that they are able to apply and use them often. Lots of interactions and questions & answer sessions were included to encourage participation. After the lesson, all of them were eagerly anticipating next day’s English for Junior’s Programme.

~Dinner~

Dinner was accompanied by our favourite fruit. The king of all fruits - DURIAN. Woe to those *ahem* who doesn't like it. The princess finally plucked up her courage to try her very first piece of the sacred fruit. It was a good try, but didn't like it nonetheless.... maybe another time.

In the evening, we had an hour session of songs with a medley of instruments. Jessica as on the out-of-tune guitar, while Esther played the violin and Uncle Famachoi topped everything up with the recorder. We sang and sang till our hearts go wild. But at least we had coconut drinks to soothe our throats. Events like this would always be part of our memories as we recall the good times we had in Nias.

Soon it’s time for bed.