Where do I start? Be Warned.

Warning: This is going to be a long entry considering I haven’t written all weekend and I’ve had a great weekend! SO hang in there if you really care about me.

I’ve got so many things I want to write about I don’t know where to start. I guess that reinforces the point that “girls are like spaghetti and guys are like waffles”. Do you understand that? I find that quite amusing and true at the same time. Girls thinking is messy and all over the place, yet guys thinking involves one thing at a time.

I learned that at Love Actually 3. Love Actually looks at God’s plan for purity in dating. It is the 3rd year they have held Love Actually and I have went every single year and it’s been great, getting out of school, home and just spend time with christ followers all around hong kong from different churches.

I will put a group picture up as soon as I can get my hands on one, but for now. This will do. Love Actually was special. It started on friday night where we started with amazing worship, talked about what “Love” was, and just got to know each other. (Oh by the way, I had a great day at school before love actually, I was listening in every class, taking notes and was very attentive which is very rare for those who know me!) Saturday morning after breakfast and worship, we talked about “how to treat em right.” It was interesting and refreshing hearing everyone’s expectations of their future husband or the person they want to date. We played some games afterwards, but unfortuantly Nanda and I had to leave for different reasons.

Basketball practice on saturday afternoon was good. Didn’t run too much, it was just right. We did shooting, some drills, went over some plays, it was good overall. We got our practice jerseys and I’m starting to feel better about this season. I’m getting excited about playing in our own tournament, in our own gym in a couple of weeks. The way we run out of the locker room with music blasting in the gym, the way we warm up as a team. We are not a “team” yet, as Coach said. But I know we’ll get there through out this season, and when we do, we are going to do great things!

I went straight back to Shatin for love actually after practice, lugging my huge travel bag around. I’m sure people thought I was nuts. It was fun spending time with Levina and Ashley on the way to Kowloon. Just talking about classes, basketball, friends, just life in general! I was definetly speaking chinglish the whole time, trying more on the cantonese side, but sometimes it just doesn’t work out. Heh heh. I got back to the camp site around eight and was able to attend the ‘love and dating’ group session. We talked about how guys think, what we should or should not do, what boundaries we should set for ourselves ahead of time, and many more. Basically all about boys and how we should deal with them. There are a couple of comments during this time that I will not forget, first is one that I made and I reminded every girl that life is so much more than boys. We have so much out there for us but yet we close our mind to the boy we adore, the boy we think is the perfect one, but in the end we end up hurting ourselves.

“Gender Confusion” was good. It is when two of the opposite gender youth leaders come to the opposite genders room and answer any question they are asked. Tim LaTour and Mike Rose came to our girls room. It was so much fun, for us and for them. There were questions asked that they had a tough time answering, there were questions that just didn’t need any explanation. One of the questions that was asked was …

“How do guys talk about sports for so long?”

I lauged at this question.

“there are so much to talk about! How do girls talk about shoes all the time?” -Tim
“There are so many different kinds of shoes!” -The girl
“There are so many different kinds of sports!” -Tim
“but you can’t talk about them for so long! they’re not interesting!” -the girl
“WHAT?? I LOVE sports!” – The rest of us

I would never forget this. Sports is great and i can’t live without sports. I’m not the type of person who knows about each player and their scoring average, etc. But I love watching them and they excite me. I’ve got to say, I was exhausted at this point, I was lying on the floor listenning to everyone, they managed to help me stay awake. The answers to all the questions were interesting, and some of the reactions just made me laugh.

By the time we finished as a group, we had our own little party back in the room. We had sunchips, doritos, M&Ms, Hi-chews, etc. You can tell they’re all junk food, we all sat, listened to music and pigged out – don’t forget – this was midnight and right before we went to bed. So bad for us but one of those times where you just can’t resist. You’ve got to admit you’ve been through it.

Waking up in the morning was definetly hard, Sunday morning it’s been exhausting travelling in and out with public transportation all day on saturday and I definetly needed more sleep but I managed to get up in mist of my eyes trying to close on me. It was the last day, the last couple hours out in the middle of no where, in the mountains, out of all the traffic and craziness. We had a chance to sit up on the mountains and spend quiet time with God. Mike talked to us about Love, forgivness, surrendering. When we sin, we cheat on God, his heart is broken but because of his son Jesus Christ who died for us, we are forgiving through his grace. Mike used his daughter Isabella for example quite a few times, he held her in his arms and told us how much she meant to him. She was Mike’s apple of the eye. He is protective of her and don’t ever want to let her go. She is only one but she knows what sin is, she knows how it’s wrong but she still does it. And that’s what we do, we pretend that nobody will know what we’re doing and we go on doing what we know is wrong. What do you think about that?

During the quiet time, I was looking down onto Shatin from the top of the mountain. I have realized that it is all relative, I was looking at God’s creation. What if someone suddenly destroyed it? His heart would be broken. When we were little, we would go on the beach and all we would do is build Sand Castles. have you ever had someone walk right on it, kick it, or do something that destroys the sand castle that you built? The thing that you spent so long making and you love it! because it’s your creation. If someone breaks it, you are upset. How many times have you tried to teach someone something and they don’t get it? Or they say they have learned it, but they really don’t understand it and make the same mistake over and over again? How many times have teachers taught you stuff but you don’t learn it and do horrible in class? I know I’ve done it more than I can count and it breaks a teachers heart. It’s the same idea. When we sin, we are going away from God’s creation and we have broken His heart. When we don’t listen to what He has to teach us, that breaks his heart.But he wants us to go back to him, his hands are open wide ready for us to come back. And for that guilt we feel, he wants us to throw it all away, give it to him, because he has forgiven us and given us a new life – to start over. So why ruin that and keep making the same mistake again and again?

It was really a good end to Love actually, to be able to sit up on top of the mountain and meditate on God’s words and his teachings for 30 minutes, and have amazing youth pastors along side of us helping us along the way. Some of them have gone to the states for the seminar and I pray that they learn lots and they focus on you God along the way. I thank them for planning this weekend retreat and giving us their time.

My plan was to go home and sleep, do some homework and chill out for the rest of the day. But my planned twisted a little bit. I arrived in stanley, met up with Jarod and Dave and went to Bayside for lunch. Walked in the stanley waterfront for a bit, played cards and just hung out and chatted until about four. All this time, lugging around my huge bag. I decided to go home, rest for a bit and then we decided to go to the flying pan for dinner. It’s been a lazy day and really good to hang out with them. Thanks to you both for making me laugh and letting me have a great time even though I was exhausted and didn’t want to go anywhere. Anyone else would’ve just made me cranky. Heh heh.

First off.. whoever is still reading up to here. Props to you. I am almost done but a couple of things happened today that made me smile and just realize how great our world us. I was on the bus on the way back to stanley today and there were a couple of tourists on the bus. There wasn’t enough seats so i was standing the whole ride. This lovely old man that was a few feet next to me was taking pictures of the view the whole time and smiling to himself. I thought “how great it is to have someone just enjoying the view and the world!” His hat suddenly fell on the floor. There was a lady right in front of him who was standing and just stood there watching him try to get the hat on the floor. He was having trouble, but the lady just stood there. I was a bit disappointed but I bent down and helped him. He gave me a smile and said thanks. He was a stranger but I felt a warmth in his smile and that just made me smile.

Secondly, we were on our way out from the flying pan. I went to pay for our check and this guy was standing there talking to the waiter. I happen to be standing next to them and over heard his conversation.

“hello, Do you need help?” – waiter
“I was here this morning and I ate (this and that) …” – guy
“Yeah..?” – waiter
“I didn’t have enough money to pay so now I am back to pay for it.” – guy

Wow! I was amazed at him. I didn’t know there was still people like this in our real world. We cheat, we cheat from others whether we know its wrong or not. Especially in Hong Kong and in the WanChai district, this is something that I would never ever expect. amazing. I am so amazed and reminded of the great people we have in this world.

Okay.. I am done, just to keep you from dying reading my post. I bet you didn’t even read the whole thing. Haha. That’s okay, tomorrow is a public holiday and it’s great. I will be relaxing, doing homework, going to basketball practice and sleeping. Things are great and I am so thankful for everything!

I am still confused and don’t know what to do about something important. Choosing between two things i love to do is hard. With the pressure from other people, I really don’t know what I should do, but I pray that God will show me the way, what He has planned for me.

I hope ya’ll had a great weekend!

Cheers Jo!