NTM Part 11 - KHANTOKE DINNER

23 October Thursday was the day we made our way to Chiang Mai town from Fang. Transport has been arranged to pick us from CHOL at 2pm. With sad hearts, we hugged the children to bid our goodbyes and then began our 3-hour long journey. Robert & Dara had specially instructed the driver to stop at a coconut drinks stall along the way, which was about an hour before our destination. This little hut came highly recommended and it certainly didnt disappoint. We tasted the MOST lovely, juicy, refreshing coconut juice ever!!!! It looked small but it did its job perfectly, quenching our thirst and filling our hungry stomachs.

It wasnt long before we reached Royal Lanna hotel at about 5.45pm. Warunee has already checked into my room and went wandering in the day market nearby. Settled down to freshen up and off we went for the Khantoke dinner (traditional thai cultural dinner with dance performances). Two vans picked us up and there was a guide provided too.

We had the pleasure of dining in the aircon area of this restaurant. Our group complained of cramped legs after a while and wished we chose the other section where there was a cut-out centre segment for legs to be placed while seated on the ground. The food was great. I had never eaten so many pieces of fried chicken at one go and put it together with sticky rice.......mmmmmm.......yummy yummy! Eld John drank many bowls of soup (cantonese man) and ate 3 big drumsticks plus lots of rice and of course other dishes. Warunee ate up all the rice but not much of the dishes coz she said she had taken some food from McDonald while waiting for us to arrive from Fang. I could tell the rest of them were enjoying their food coz the waiters kept replenishing the dishes.

After a rather heavy meal, we settled down to chit chat while waiting for the dance performances. Perhaps we ate too fast and too quick, being Asians.... or rather Singaporeans....anyhow, Eld John was spotted sitting like an emperor munching on his drumstick and so 3 of us acted as his servants. Angela & Warunee were trying to fan him with the napkins and me pretending to wipe away his sweat....hahaha..... When we showed the pic to the rest who had gone to the toilet then, it was commented we resembled 3 concubines and not servants!!! LOLZ!

The dance performance finally began and it was real s - l - o - w to the extent that eld john fell asleep. Wanted to catch a candid shot but he woke up before i could take out my hp. Actually the performances were rather entertaining, each with a story to tell. We were given an A4 sized paper with details to each dance but you know, who reads this kind of stuff?

The whole emsemble of cast were dominated by females except for one dance of 12 swords performed by a male. It was very engaging as he attempted to do risky stunts and he did well.

After about 5-6 performances, some dancers came out to take willing audiences to the stage and do the traditional thai dance. None of us willing or daring to go except for Cindy. She happily made her way up and we could tell she was enjoying herself tho struggling to keep up with the delicate hand movements. The angmohs were the most comical.

Not bad for a former disco queen.....haha....Cindy told us of her past and kind of reminded me of Eld Boon who frequented discotheque before his conversion. Hmmm..... shall stop here before i start to imagine him grooving around to Saturday Night Fever or Grease.....oh boy.....period now.

We were brought to another place to watch more performances and after a while, it kind of got a little boring..... to me. Why? Because some of the dancers here were uncles and aunties from the various tribes and they were so not smiling and enthusiastic like the professionals. You could tell they were just doing their routines. How to cheer for a lack-lustre effort??? The children did the bamboo dance and they were adorable. Here is a pic of a lady dressed as a peacock. She was one of the better dancers here.

Soon it was time to end and we headed back to hotel. The ladies, with Hendrick, wasted no time to proceed to shopping at the night bazaar (our hotel is situated right smack in the middle). Warunee and I bought 3 bottles of freshly squeezed orange juice from a nearby stall and went back to our room to retire for the night. Eld John too. It would be a long day for us tomorrow......the adventure day.

NTM Part 10 - THANKSGIVING

On our journey to Chiang Mai on Friday 17 Oct, we had a weight problem due to the stuff we were bringing up: Puppets bag (12kg), Art n Craft bag (18kg) and Goodies bag (17kg). Our team's total baggage weight exceeded by 12-15kg. The staff was about to charge us and she was asking her assistance to add up on the calculator the total weight of our individual bags. Her assistance failed a couple of times and she was also unable to do it. I dont know why but i think God caused her to be confused. She looked up and saw the long queue formed behind us and then she said to me "OK, you can go now" and that was it. WOW, we saved about $150 and thank God for this. Amazingly and awesomely....haha....God enabled us to get them all checked in with no extra cost at Tiger airways.

But we had problems with AirAsia in Bangkok airport. Their policy is one passenger one checkin bag of 15kg, which is what we paid for. Any extra bag will have to pay 100baht each and if exceed 15kg in total, got to pay extra. We needed to check in the stuff we brought and so Eld John and Susan (the two lightest bags amongst us) hand carry their luggage up. But we forgot one thing, i.e. to take out the shampoo, liquid stuff and put into another person's checkin bag. Oh boy, we didnt realise until our hand carry bags were screened inside. Unbelievably, Susan's bag was scanned and contents ignored but eld John's shampoo and body cleanser had to go to the bin. Angela gave her extra bottle to eld John so he need not spend money to buy new ones. And so you see, not all staff were vigilant. Susan could have been a "terrorist" and made a B O M B with her shampoo and stuff.....LOLZ!

Thank God for enabling Laura to teach in Sunday School about responsibility & Hendrick in VBS on repentance.

Thank God too for the preaching of God's Word. Heard from the team that John, at the age of 19, was able to expound God's Word in great depth. I missed his preaching due to sickness on Monday.

Eld John's message on Prodigal Son brought reminder about God's great love and compassion towards us. His message on Jonah during morning devotion was equally engaging and powerful, reinforcing obedience in our lives. Robert's preaching on King Uzziah, who sought God and was blessed till "his heart lifted up to destruction", gave us precious lessons too.

Thank God for Robert & Dara's hospitality towards us. Not forgetting Abigail's lovely cooking who whipped up Hainanese Chicken Rice (Dara's recipe), sumptuous thai food with Tom Yam and Prad Thai. Grace cooked Brownie for us too but i didnt get to taste it coz too much food to eat on that birthday celebration night.

Thank God for keeping the weather dry for us when we needed to have our activities outdoor. He send rain on Wed night to water the earth and gave us cooler temperature the next morning.

Just before we left CHOL for Chiang Mai, Robert brought us to the padi field to show us the future site for the school building. God willing, Dara upon finishing her thesis, will be working in some public school for few months and thereafter granted a licence to be the principal of the new school. We were also shown the site for the church building.

Padi field

Robert gave us stalks of wheat to take home for home deco and that was what some of us were holding in this pic.

Future Church Site

Group Pic before we left. Abigail, the No 1 cook, is the lady beside Eld John. She shared with us about how in the past she was not able to rejoice but now she could and since then, she had been smiling everyday for Jesus.

Thank God for a blessed time of serving, learning and fellowshipping in CHOL. Will show more pics during mission echo. Next to blog will be our holidaying in Chiang Mai.....stay tuned!

P.S. I left out one animal in the insects' blog. Do read if you can coz i just added it there. :)

NTM Part 9 - LAUGHTER LOADS & OTHERS!

We had a wonderful time fellowshipping together, especially the 6 of us in the dorm. There was one time we were discussing about the Sunday School art n craft and the ladies wanted one too for souvenir. It was a bookmark with lamination pre-done in Singapore with a chain of beads bearing the name. BK was checking if she had sufficient to spare and when she realized there wasnt, she mentioned we needed to go back to Singapore to laminate before we made one for ourself.

Cindy was sitting at a corner, next to Angela, and both of them started laughing. Guess i am being too conservative here if i describe them as laughing. They were almost like rolling in pain from laughter.....super helium effect type.

3 of us noticed that and asked to share the joke. In between giggles, Cindy told us as she couldnt hear what BK said, she asked Angela what was it that we want to MARINADE, only to have Angela answering CHICKEN before they burst into laughter. Cindy said she wanted to say laminate but somehow the word marinade popped out. This time, the remaining 3 also joined in to laugh till our stomachs hurt. It was highly contagious and super funny. Especially Angela's sharp and quick reply to Cindy's question. hahahahahahaha.....

The next mix-up came from Melissa. Cindy was singing to herself while bathing in the toilet. Melissa commented that Cindy can sing and keep her tune and perhaps she can be Paparazzi. Nobody quite understood what she meant and the connection to paparazzi. Then suddenly i realised what she wanted to say and i burst into laughter after uttering the word Pavarotti lah!!!!! Oh man, our ladies are so funny.

There was one time we wanted to take a group pic in the dorm together. It was a Sunday, after our lunch with Robert. Without a tripod, Angela found a chair to replace it and so she tried to put her camera to timer. It was her first time doing timer thingy and she failed miserably. Each time she thought she did but instead she clicked a pic of us minus herself. I managed to help her find the timer button in the end and so we thot finally there would be a good pic. We positioned ourselves, all seated on the floor, and waited for Angela to set and run over. She did set and ran over but our ladies commented pic not nice and needed to take again. Well, again and again we did.... about 3 times and Angela complained she was very "Chuan" running up and down. Hahahaha.... Here is the fruit of her labour:

Nice?

There was a table tennis table in the compound and soon it became a favourite past time for Eld John and Hendrick, playing with the CHOL boys. John, Adam's bro, is the BEST among all of them and with 11 balls for each game, no one was able to beat him. And so the bat on the right side of the table changed hands several times. I couldnt resist and joined in the fun but lost to him too. Then i urged Angela to play. She was hesitant at first, citing reasons like she and BK only know how to play tid tod tid tod kind...slow play. Hahaha..... she finally took the bat and play against John. Guess what? She was the only one who could get to 10-11. How so? Because she played too simply, John didnt know how to return her shots. LOLS!!!!! And Angela sweated the most here coz she said very "gan jiong" and stressful. Here is a pic of the only shot our team taken for table tennis game. Playing against Hendrick was Adam.

Thank God for a good team. Here are some pics of CHOL and us for savouring.........

NTM Part 8 - INJURIES & SICKNESS

Hmmm, Laura was the first to be injured. At Bangkok airport, while on our way to collect our luggage using the straight travellator. She was talking to someone behind her (cant remember who now) and so she didnt see it ending. Eld John and I were in front of her, about 1.5 metres away. We already stepped out of it when we heard a thud sound. She had fallen down. Normally one would leave up the foot and step onto the metal platform (dont know if vocab is right here) and off it when it reaches the end of the travelator.....poor Laura...she was kind of stopped by the platform abruptly and fell forward. She sustained a huge bruise on her leg after that. It was really big and ugly. But thank God no abrasions or cuts or even ankle sprain.

The next injury would be Laura again. Apparently one day, she was standing somewhere with uneven ground and didnt have a good footing, and so she kind of sprained her ankle. It wasnt that bad coz she could still walk around and she didnt tell me about it too. We only knew it when she shared during CHOL prayer meeting.

My gastric juice decided to burn or boil up during the trip and on Sunday night 11.30pm, my turmoil began. Actually i had some pain or slight pain during Sunday service. And as soon as service was over, i popped in a pill and thot it would go away. During the BBQ dinner, i still felt some pain but i thot with the ingestion of food, pain would subside. Anyhow, i experienced great pain back in the dorm and quickly popped in another gastric pill. It didnt help. I knew at that moment it was going to be a full blown thingy.....signalling no sleep and pain pain night. It didnt matter then how many types of gastric pills i swallowed, of which i did, coz the pain would swell to great heights before it cleared away. This has been with me for close to 30 years and i am all too familiar with my illness and its attack.

While the rest were sleeping, I was all curled up in pain. Also felt like throwing out but didnt want to coz it would give me more pain. Put a strepsil into my mouth and it was still there in the morning, probably reduced to 1/4 of its original size. Guess i am very good in sucking sweets and keeping it in my mouth forever. And so during the long cold night, all i could do was to count the number of times billy goat made his rounds, listened to the dogs howling and replying one another, checked gecko's melody line and trying to decipher rooster's code to the rest of his kind. I prayed to our Almighty Father to be merciful and help me with the pain and get some sleep but i couldnt. I had to wait for the storm to be over and usually by day break, the every 5-10min cycle of intense pain would begin to slow down in frequency. It did.

When everyone else was waking up and preparing for morning devotion, i sat quietly on my bed. They noticed my silence and asked me if i was ok. Told them i wasnt and explained why. I needed to eat some plain bread and so i asked if they could help me take 2 slices. Cindy and Susan went to get the bread and hot water for me. I brushed my teeth and sat down to try to eat while the rest went down for devotion. It was a very very long meal....... probably took me an hour to eat. I still felt like throwing out but i resisted.

The ladies brought me more hot water after devotion and breakfast. They were very concerned. While i rested on my bed, they accompanied me in the dorm nearly the whole morning. It was getting hot, noisy and hard to sleep but i tried. Able to doze off on & off. Pain was less frequent, probably about once every 30-45mins. It was definitely dying off but intensity was the same each time it hit me.

Cindy asked Abigail to cook porridge for me and it was brought up during lunch time by Grace. Dara visited me with a bottle of home-made barley and it tasted good. Eld John came too. Thank God he came coz i was struggling to eat and finish the porridge.....really felt like throwing up but i had to eat coz was feeling so weak. One spoonful of porridge took me about 5 mins to swallow and ingest and then i would not want to repeat the action again. I stared at the bowl and had to force myself to eat. With his presence, I had to keep eating and not think too much about vomiting or swallowing. It kind of distracted me and so i finished the whole bowl. Hendrick & Laura came too and we discussed a little about VBS.

My afternoon was spent the same way, trying to rest and waiting for pain to go. Oh yes, i had one more thing to add. My diarrhoea started after lunch and so i kept going to toilet. Thank God it wasnt like those attack i had back in Singapore, like 20 times a day. It was about 6-8 times on that fateful MONDAY, 20 October.

During dinner time, i heard Cindy shouting for our team members' names. They were all having dinner and so I didnt know why she was shouting and she seemed very near me or the dorm. I was too weak to get up to find out. Then Mary turned up with my dinner.... chicken porridge. While i was eating, Cindy came up and told me what happened. She wanted to bring up the porridge for me but met opposition from two dogs at the foot of the dorm. They seemed to growl at her or rounded her up and so she was frozen to the ground (she is scared of dogs btw). That was when she shouted to them to help her but nobody heard except the sick me. So sweet of her to try to do that for me. Thank you Cindy :)

Thank God for healing and those who prayed, even those back home in Singapore. I smsed Eld Lan and Dr Lowly in the morning to request for prayer. By 10pm that night, i was already feeling much better. I received a sms from Amara clinic and needed to do some urgent work and send a file to them. Decided to go to Robert's office and do just that. Thank God i finally made my way out of the dorm that Monday and downstairs to breathe in some fresh air. The children were delighted to see me but they were getting ready to sleep in the tents and so i waved good night to them.

Thank God for enabling to do the work quickly and send the file. Was so looking forward to a good night sleep now that the pain was less intense and frequent. But with the full orchestra, it was really impossible, even after popping in the flu tablet.

My next two days had pain still but bearable. I was able to continue to function and God has been good to me. All in all, it took about 4 days for a complete healing. This was my first NTM trip that i fell ill with gastric pain. Dont remember it happening in 2003, 2005 & 2007 trips. Perhaps i was too stressed up or what. I had regular meals except for that friday we flew in to Chiang Mai. It was not the usual hour but i didnt starve myself. Hmmm....... i pray that it wont occur at the CtYF NTM trip.

Outing & Treasure Hunt

This day finally came - CtYF outing to Henderson Wave. Had been trying to come up with clues for the hunt and was on msn chat with JJ & Aaron a few times. Thank God last night we finally settled. Thank God for Aaron too. Initially it was just JJ & i being the i/cs. During the recce, we roped in Aaron to help and he has been a great help.

It was fun coming up with the clues and i hope CtYFers didnt have a hard time figuring it out :) Sorry if some were "hard" and misleading.....especially to the MRT one..... lOL!

James', or rather Tim's group (he was i/c), thought toooooo deep into the clues and got "lost"

Their one clue (actually every group had this clue):

8 is the figure
8 is the key
8 is the answer
To rest your weary feet

They thought it was foot reflexology, which was a spot i had never seen during my recce. Definitely off the track they were supposed to take. I thought the answer clearly ring as a stool or some place where you can sit and rest your feet from walking. How in the world does foot massage comes in? Perhaps they think too much of NTM and looking forward to a thai massage in chiang rai??? Hee hee...

The object to look for is this.... erh not aunty BK but the thingy she was sitting on. There were 8 of them just before the start of the wave.



And they also missed this clue.....tortally!

No one beats me
In terms of shape
Some even tried
Harping on me

Object to look for is this:


It was just immediately after the wave. 5 of them standing tall and the whole group went 20 mins away from this place and couldnt find it and finally had to call me. And since it was getting late, i read out the next clue to them, only to have them looking at the wrong place again. Their next clue:

Interesting style
Object of pleasure
Come in a pair
Each with a shelter

Instead of going to the Twin Pavilions (no pic to show), they went even further ahead to the Telescope area and thought it was the telescope (pair for the two eyes to see thro). Sigh....... Anyhow, by mistake, they actually jumped the 2nd last clue and landed at the last and finished the hunt.

Need to put up this cute structure (telescope) that resembled Wall-E (hope i get this right now). Didnt know the spelling and so i put in as "Steel Wolly" as the last clue for all the groups. JJ & Aaron didnt correct me, thinking i purposely spell this way to confuse them. Oh man!


Lemuel's group, Kian Hwee i/c, also had some merry go round thingy. They couldnt find their fifth clue and jumped to the 7th. Their 5th clue:

Take stairway 3 to hell
near 13 Preston Road
Be a Pumbaa for once
Slugs slugs all the way

I was there since 11am, together with Uncle Hong Kim, Aunty Beng Kheng, Aunty Christine and 3 little ones, Marcus, Marissa & Cherie to plant the clues. And we did put it at the log, the only log just below the staircase 3. And yet they said it wasnt there. No other group had this clue and so no one could have taken away. Hmmm.... perhaps it dropped to the ground and could not be seen....u never know. Maybe Pumbaa came and ate it all up.......hahahahhaaaha.....

But if they couldnt locate this, how in the world do they know they have to find something red? I heard their group went down below to look for red flowers and spent a long time doing that. Hmmmm.....were they confused by this clue?

Adenanthera pavonina - These red beauties originated from Southeast China and India. Jewelleries and rosaries are their common uses. Write down the common name at the back of this slip for submission.

This is actually the Sign for Saga Seeds. As you walk the trail, there are many signs put up by NPB for education purposes. I only extracted part of the info there. And all they had to do was to feel around the sign and the railings next to it and their clue would be there.

Guess after struggling long enough, they gave up and came back up and found this sign. Or else how could they have gotten their 7th clue......20 steps in 2 flights to the haven of rest

They got stuck here too! Heard they went down and down to look for something.... i really didnt know what. Lem, is it true? I am still rather blur to the things your group went thro.....hahaha.... I thought the 20 steps to haven of rest usually meant going up. Maybe i presumed too much. Anyway, it was supposed to be this:

Hope they had fun, walking and searching for clues, and the last they missed, object never found was



It was a slab of stone just before reaching Mount Faber centre and i thought they would never miss it. Perhaps they ventured too deep into the sides or what. I had taken another pic but it would be too easy for them to locate if i gave this one:




Group 1, Justin's group, was doing so well initially but they ended up lost looking for this clue:

Extra Precaution:
The road ahead is confusing
Make a wrong turn, that’ll be the end
Follow the way of the grey bricks
To MRT you all must go

Pitter patter
Pitter patter
Rain it isn’t
Nor a drizzle
Simulation
is the key
Therapeutic
it can be

It was supposedly to be the cascading waterfall, at the Mount Faber visitor centre or near there. As you walked along the road, you can see at least 3 of them. I hid a clue there and perhaps it would be gone now, any sharp-eyed security guard would have seen that piece of blue paper sticking out at the side wall.

Where did they go? They went all the way down the marang trail and into Vivo city looking for pitter patter.... something about water..... LOL! Our hunt ended at the telescope area at Mount Faber.....not even Marang trail and they went sooooooooo far. Misled by the MRT word! And they never returned to find us but waited at the MRT because they were too tired to walk up again!!! LAZY people!

Hmmmm, i put the precaution there so that as they turned out from Henderson Wave, they would know to head for MRT area or route. It didnt mean for them to go straight to Harbourfront MRT. LOL!

Group 4 came in first, not after they trodded all the way down to MRT too! Oh boy....guess i will be more careful when i plan, if i ever i get to plan for hunts again.....they too were misled by MRT word. But they totally didnt search for clue at the 2nd last place. They were given this pic:

They found it but never search for clues there and walked straight to MRT. I thot it was pretty obvious for treasure hunt you need to look for clues at every spot to move on???? Hmmm.... anyhow, JJ called them back to this bull's eye thingy and after much prompting, they found the "Steel Wolly" clue. The clue to pick up at Wolly would be

"Congratulations. You have finished the hunt. Find me"

I was seated nearby, not clearly visible....somehow inconspicuous corner. They couldnt see me and so IZ used one telescope that needed not coins to operate and spotted me. Haha.......I didnt expect them to use that to spot me. I was like 100 meters or less away.

Rewarded all of them with some tidbits and chocs and the first team had extra...Hersheys (oh man, i dont know how to spelll!!!!)

To all the CtYFers who came, thank you for your participation and cooperation and feedback. It was fun watching you play.

Thank God for very fine weather too. It was raining in the morning and we had to delay the clues planting till 11am. Rushed thro to finish... in fact was still planting the last clue when YFers gathered at Jurong East MRT. Thank God for the adults who helped and the little ones. It was enjoyable and fun doing it together and i love treasure hunt.....whatever hunt, i think :)

Hope Lem or James or Norm can post up the photos shot in Ekklesia journal or maybe Tengah website youth page so we can all view them.

NTM Part 7 - ANIMALS

I went to CHOL with the mental preparation that i would be sleeping less or probably not able to fall asleep. And true enough, i had all 6 sleepless nights. It wasnt that bad in previous trips as in usually by 3rd or 4th day i would have easily fallen asleep due to tiredness. But somehow it was not so for this trip. Why?

These creatures are the culprits:

Culprit No 1 - Billy Goat

Initially i thot there was a cow making his rounds in the night. During our first night, we heard it at close to 12Midnight, right under our dorm. As the bamboo house was raised up, we thot it was possible for animals to wander underneath us. Afterall, the bells ringing seemed to come right below us. And so this cow that we thot came every night. And he would wander to and fro and i could hear the bells all too clearly.

There was one particular night, Mon night, that i was literally being kept awake because of the bells. I could even count the number of times he made his rounds. The ringing of bells sound was actually not loud but being a light sleeper.... it was a constant torture to me.

On Tues, as i was getting ready to go to the hotspring, i took a good look round the compound and realised there aint no cow. And the gate being locked in the night, where can we find a cow???? Not the neighbours definitely. Then i spotted this creature

Billy Goat! Evidence of the bells round his neck proved his guilt. He looked being tied up in this pic and so wouldnt wander in the night......WRONG! The bells round the neck sounded when he moved reminded me of the OT high priest's robe with bells, and when no sound was heard, he would be presumed dead. Dont get me wrong, I dont want this billy goat dead but at least could he just keep still for the night and sleep just like everyone else?

Bursting with curiosity, i asked Robert on Wednesday if he ever let loose this billy goat in the night. His answer was a NO. Then how in the world could we hear him just below us? Science tells me that sound travels and indeed it must have coz the distance bet his enclosure and our dorm is about 60 metres. But Robert did add that they do get loose on their own and wander out. AHA! See! I told you! I heard him right below me alright!

Take a good look at him in broad day light:

Culprit No 2 - Dogs

Robert has 5 dogs in his compound. They can bark all they want in the day but in the night they dont bark anymore. The new dog sound is HOWLING......like werewolf. It was super super super eeeeeerrrrrriiiiiieeee! I have never heard dogs do this kind of thing and terribly loud too. They would start exactly at 12midnight, if not +/- 5 mins. Every night without fail we heard howling, except for one night, perhaps Tues or Wed of which i couldnt remember. They were howling but not too loud.

We asked Robert one day why do they howl like this. His explanation: "They were talking among themselves and then they were in pain or too tired and so they said OWOOOOOOOOOO to one another". Oh man, this was so lame.....guess he didnt have an answer too.

But i am beginning to worry after what Warunee told me. When i met her in Chiang mai and told her about the howling sound, she said her dogs in BDC and all the other dogs in the neighbourhood are doing the same thing!!!!! Is it the New Dog Phenomena or what word should i even use to describe this????

Culprit No. 3 - Gecko

Icould never catch a pic of this creature, wherever it was, and so i took one from the internet....Thailand Gecko, so you could understand what i am talking about.

This gecko, or at least the one above our dorm or near our dorm made its presence known nightly. Its range of vocals is pretty impressive. Why do i say that? For those who know music, you will understand what i mean by harmonic chords in progression. For those who dont, it sang every night the following:

Taking Doh as the base note, it produced this tune - Ti Doh, La Doh, So Doh, Fa Doh, Mi Doh, Re Doh. Haha... no Doh Doh. I followed its pattern closely coz i couldnt sleep, remember?

The ones i heard in BDC last year didnt sing like this. Angela asked me one night when she heard the gecko's sound what creature was that. i told her gecko and said it looked like lizard. And so she learned something new about God's creation :)

Culprit No 4 - THE MOST IRRITATING, MOST ANNOYING - NEXT DOOR ROOSTER

In case anyone of you think rooster is cute, think again. The rooster in the neighbour's compound right behind our dorm is the No. 1 irritant! It wasnt just me who said this. Voted and seconded by every lady in our dorm. I could never got hold of a pic of the actual culprit and so make do with a drawing.

Yes, rooster cuckcoo coo coo everyday.... i know that. I cant blame them for doing that but this one rooster just loved to come right behind us, adjacent to us, flapped his wings so so so loudly and then cuckoo coo coo his way whole night. He will start between 4 or 4.30am and all the way until he is satisfied. No other rooster start the calling. Only him giving the cue every morning.

It was super super irritating one night and Angela upon waking up on Sun morning told us she was just about to go over and tape the mouth of this rooster. I laughed at her suggestion tho i secretly wished we could actually do that. haha... But on Tues morning, my feelings for this rooster was no more taping up the mouth. I felt like strangling and killing it to eat, thereby permanently solve my sleeping problem.

Can you imagine i was trying to fall asleep at 11 plus and when my eyes were about to shut, the dogs started to howl. Then the billy goat made his rounds a few times. The gecko was next. And then back to the dogs again. Just when i thot everything was peaceful, rooster made his opening note for the feather orchestra. And sometimes, the dogs will add to that. Oh man! How to sleep like this???

Melissa took a flu tablet from me on Sat night (our second night) and i took one too. She had Angela's ear plugs on and she slept pretty ok. I dont think the ear plug would have helped me. It is just me.....lousy sleeper...Sigh. I am pretty sure Shing would sleep thro and so would all those who could sleep like a log when the heaven fall down :) Well, thank God for blessing you with good sleep if you are one of those.

NTM Part 6 - INSECTS!!!! EEw....

This is one ntm trip, perhaps the first, where i SCREAMED the most. Cockroaches, some giant beetle that resembled killer bee or Amazon roach & real bee plagued our ladies dorm.

First it was a roach that crawled under my bag on day 1 & brave Susan caught it bare hand before it devour my unzip bag. This made us on high alert & placed our bags inside our little "nests", shielded from all invasion possible. See our lovely nests....

BK & i share the first one. Angela & Melissa each took the inidividual. Susan & Cindy share the last nest.

Then it was BK's turn to catch. In fact she didnt even catch. The roach was near the dressing table one day & upon the scream of Melissa, BK did a super fast whack on the roach with a bottle of shampoo nearby. It was 100% accuracy. Well done!

Angela was in between the scarety gang & bravo ones. She was brave enough to bathe daily at Eld John's toilet & did attempt to kill if she could. Guess our most unforgettable episode was on Sun night.

We were getting ready to sleep when i spotted a huge huge black thingy hovering above us. i sounded the alarm. Only the brave ones looked up. Melissa screamed & both of us quickly got into my nest, nearest n safest. We saw it landed on top of a wooden beam. Susan & BK approached with extreme caution armed with whatever they could grab. None of us knew whatever that was. Then it kind of disappeared. Strange. Both lady warriors looked hard & us too. We thot it had gone off for good until melissa gave a loud scream that it was inside our nest! The safest haven became the perilous & torturous pit...... I didnt even see it but trusted her judgement. Both of us literally sprung out in lightning speed. If ever there was a trophy for 1st prize, it would be us :) Oh man, i didnt want to stay around to cfm its presence. She ran towards the back while i ran out of the dorm, erh both screaming. It was hilarious, scary n silly!!! Hmmm, guess i wouldnt scream in ctyf presence. Die die also pretend to be brave but not this time. I felt the liberty to release my energy, sound & kinetic.

And so BK got to work. She opened the net & whacked it with slippers i think (not sure). All i knew was when i peeped inside the dorm, creature was all curled up & still on the bamboo floor. It measured so small now in its death stage. Angela took a pic of it with the heroine's foot in position. Ha ha ha ha.:)

We made so much noise that some children downstairs, probably having night bible reading sssh us up. I felt terribly guilty coz we did disturb them, especially me lah. Wow, i am putting my reputation at stake here but honestly, i didnt want to pretend & whatever was that? A giant beetle. When i told Dr lowly, he made me even more guilty by saying this: "Beetle is the most gentle & harmless creature ever"...:( At home whenever Rac n IZ screamed for beetle invasion, i would try to shoo it away. But that night i thot it was an amazon roach invasion! Sigh.

Ok, next to mention would be this one huge insect of what not that stuck on the back of my left elbow during the BBQ steamboat dinner downtown, which happened before this beetle incident on the same night. I felt something at my left elbow and so I used my right hand to feel. To my horror, it felt like 1.5 inch long by 3/4 inch wide. I turned pale & thank God for auto reflex action that swept it away. Phoebe was sitting bet Susan & myself but i didnt want to create commotion in public. My hair stood on ends & i tried not to imagine what it was. Over n done with. Oh my, should give myself a pat on the back huh? Lol.

Killer bee came to our toilet during the day (probably Tues or Wed). Cindy & Susan so determined to kill it that they sprayed an awful huge amount of insecticide, so much so we were forbidden to use toilet because of the fumigation smell! How long we abstained? Maybe 30mins. Both of them didnt know if target was hit. I was the first to use the toilet, i think, & i found it all curled up on the floor, small sized too. Hee hee. Robert has good foresight to buy this new can of insecticide spray for our use & use it loosely we did!

I had one more encounter with an insect, perhaps a locust? I dont know. Or thailand grasshopper but didnt look like one. It was during prayer meeting on Wed night when Eld John was testifying. It flew near me & seemed to come nearer. Then it was Hendrick's turn to share. The creature was still there and seemed even nearer. I covered my ears & started to curl up, looking down (i was sitting on the floor). Good old Susan noticed me & came to my rescue. She came to sit bet insect & me & shooed it away. Hurray!

Last to mention would be about Eld John. He erh, is afraid of roach & so he happily allow angela to use his toilet every night, so as to screen the place for him. U know for someone afraid of roach, it didnt make sense that he would leave his bags all opened up on the floor 24/7! We were teasing him that he most likely would bring one or two into the van on our last day back to chiang mai town. Ha ha. We didnt want that to happen & so check was performed on his bags. His 2 bags passed the QC test.

Whoa, thinking of CtYF NTM to BDC now......insects.....Xiao fen will be my heroine. Yeah!

NEW ENTRY: Oops, i missed out one animal that gave me a little scare..... it was the toad.....a giant toad. It stationed itself at the main toilet in the building for two nights, after everyone went to sleep. In the morning at 6am when i went to bathe, i found it at the entrance to the toilet. That was Wed morning. I stepped on the floor a few times and it hopped away. But Thurs morning was not so. I was actually on the lookout for it and saw it inside the toilet. Oh boy, how was i going to chase it out? As i stepped in, it went deeper inside. I didnt know what to do and decided to go back for the warrior ladies. Susan was in the toilet and BK was somewhere else. Reluctantly, i went back to the toilet & as i walked back, was trying to devise a way to lure it out. BUt i didnt have to in the end coz it hopped out and stationed itself outside the toilet while i was gone for a brief 5 mins. Haha... it knew i needed to bathe and brushed my teeth and so it gave way to me. Slamming my foot on the ground made this toad disappear into thin air and now i could have a good bath...... Eew, i cant imagine if it hopped onto me.....definitely wouldnt turn into a charming prince.....haahaahaahaa :)