Cool photo

When we were in Singapore last month we went to eat down by the river.  They had lights underneath the stairs all lit up.  They would change color and sometimes have multiple colors.  I thought it was really cool and tried to capture it with my camera.  Not sure this does it justice, but I thought it was pretty.

Fireflies and Seafood

Being near the sea, there is an abundance of seafood available here.  Our Chinese friends love seafood.  During the Christmas and New Year holidays we had opportunities to go out to eat with lots of friends.  On New Year's Eve, we went to a local seafood place that was amazing.  There were 17 of us and we sat at 2 tables.  One of the guys ordered food for us and we ended up with about 10 different dishes.  There was black pepper crab, and salted egg crab, two kinds of prawns (shrimp), la la (clams), sotong (squid), plus a beancurd soup, some lamb and some chicken.  It was a crazy amount of food!  

After dinner we went back to a friend's house played games and brought in the New Year.  After the countdown we each shared how God blessed us in 2008 and what we were looking forward to in 2009.  What a great way to start the year! 

A couple of days later, Roy and I took our ministry leaders on an overnight retreat.  We wanted to have time to plan and think about what God can do through us in the next year.  We went to a place that is known for its fireflies.  I remember sitting in my back yard in the summer time and seeing a few fire flies flit around here and there.  Sometimes there might be a lot - like 10, but NOTHING like what we saw!  We took a boat ride after dark on the river and you would see bushes filled with fire flies!  Hundreds of them on one bush - all twinkling like Christmas lights.  I wish I could have captured it on film, but we weren't allowed to use flash photography.  It was so very cool.

Our package deal included a "self serve" BBQ dinner.  So after our boat ride we went to see what this dinner would be and discovered that they provided a charcoal fire and lots of raw seafood and other meats along with a tray of watermelon and some chinese tea!  We had to cook the food ourselves.  By this time it was about 9:00 p.m.!  We had a great time grilling and eating and just sharing out stories with each other.  

Here is a photo of Roy and Kelvin manning the grill!

Here is a photo of our leaders - minus the one taking the photo.  

Here is a photo of the chalets we stayed in.  We had one chalet with two sides - each with two bedrooms.  It was quite nice.  
The next day we met and worked through our goals for the year, came up with a theme and then worked on some other details.  For lunch we drove to a nearby town and went to a seafood restaurant!  Crazy!  When we got home later and Roy asked what was for dinner I said, "not seafood!" 

December and the New Year

Merry Christmas!  Okay, so it is a bit late.  Sorry about that.  I put off blogging through the holidays because it got to be a bit crazy.  Roy was traveling a bit and I was busy baking, baking, baking.  

We decided to host an open house for our neighbors and friends the weekend before Christmas.  So, I made 3 kinds of quick breads, dipped pretzels in chocolate, made cookies, peppermint bark and other sweet treats and set up a dessert table along with hot apple cider (not as odd as it sounds in such a hot climate!).  We were blessed by many people coming to hang out and enjoy themselves.  




Christmas Eve was spent at church and I made 5 fudge wreaths for the dessert at the church (400 people came for dinner, worship service and a dramatic production).  It was quite a crowd!

Then on Christmas Day, I made a big dinner with all the fixings - turkey, stuffing, veggies, rolls, cranberry chutney, mashed potatoes and pumpkin pie.  We invited some international students who didn't have family in town and some other friends as well.  We had dinner and then sang some Christmas carols and shared stories about our past Christmases.  It was a sweet time.  Our Botswanan student LOVED the potatoes!  And, he really liked the pumpkin pie and bread.  

It was a really sweet time of celebrating Christ's birth.  We were amazed at how many stores decorated for Christmas.  But we were also blessed that unlike in the US, Christmas was seen as a Christian holiday.  There wasn't any pressure to change the name or to not say "Merry Christmas" even to a Muslim friend.  It is our holiday and just like we would wish them well on their holiday, they would honor us and wish us well on ours.  It was just nice to not have to be "PC."  

After Christmas Roy and I took a bit of a holiday and went ballroom dancing in Singapore!  That was so much fun.  We have really missed being able to do that frequently like we did in the US.  We used to go to a dance at least once or twice a month, plus we took lessons.  We found that we were a bit out of shape and needed to work on our communication as he led around the dance floor.