Tom Yum Soup in Quito

Tom Yum soup in Quito!

We tried Tom Yum Soup recently and I like it! It was sweet and sour, unlike the famous spicy ones in Thailand. There were prawns and mushrooms inside the soup. It was unique and delicious for me. PR did not like it because it was not spicy. Before trying this soup, we were watching a movie called “Monsters vs Aliens”. It was a 3-D movie and it was the first time we watched a 3-D movie in a cinema. We needed to put on special lenses to watch this movie. Everything felt so real with the added dimension. Trying Tom Yum Soup in Quito and watching 3-D movie in a cinema were 2 new experiences for us in Ecuador.

Happy Birthday Emily! :)

This is a belated post.. :p

2 weeks ago, we celebrated Emily’s birthday. Haha… Emily is a fun, bubbly, mother-of-twins who always brings laughter to the people around her. She has been a great help to the church, taking charge of the Sunday school and leading praise and worship. A woman with a very soft heart for God and people, she’s one of the most invitational among us too! Many of her family and friends have come to (at least) visit our church! Her children have caught on her invitational spirit too! The twins, when they were playing with Lucas, the Pug at the picnic the other day, met three other little girls and immediately invited them to church! I was soo pleasant surprised!
Though Emily is a very young mother and has gone through quite some difficult moments at her young age, she has learnt to depend and draw strength from God and still remains joyful throughout her difficult situations! A sweet and caring sister and friend and example for many of us and also the children in Sunday school. We love and appreciate her alot!

Here are pictures from her birthday.. haha.. celebrated Emily-style (because we know she would be game for it.. hahaha). First we celebrated at a Mexican restaurant with the team and we played Truth or Dare.. haha.. found out a few secrets of Emily through that! And they wowed us.. haha.. Emily also had to do quite a few dares.. which were very funny.. including one where she had to shout “Barcelona is the worse football team in Ecuador!” and she’s an avid fan of Barcelona.. awwwww… Check out the other dares in the pictures.
Second, we celebrated in CG… it was a “VERY SWEET” celebration.. hahaa.. full of cream! :p
Last week I also cooked Emily’s favourite… prawns! for her.. Will upload pics of that next time.. haha..

Meanwhile, enjoy:

STPR and Emily :)

Timothy with the present.. and his present (a hand-knitted scarf from Carol!)

Yummy Mexican food!

Luis, “Muy rico..mm!”

Mateo, “Rico!”

ST, “Woah.. Muy rico!”

PR eating nacho with Jalapena! Picante!

Happy Family! :)

Emily opening her presents.. a book.. and…

A t-shirt! :)

Emily and Katty reading the “Truth or Dare” paper

Boohooo….! Emily made to eat 5 Jalapenas…dared by Daniel!

Agua! Agua!

another dare from Daniel – to help the waitress! hehhe

Katty’s dare.. Emily needs to imitate Luis! Haha!

Attempt no. 1

Attempt 2! hahaha…

Carol laughing at Luis and Emily’s faces!

After the different truths and dares.. a “I’m going to kill the cake!” look

Hugs from Katty after sharing :)

Celebration in CG: Alejo testing out the cream…

Happy Emily before the “Surprise”!

Here you go!! Psssssttttt!

“Tu!!! Pastor!!!!”

A blob of cream on our wall… flicked by Emily.. hahahaha!

Aww soo sweet.. heee.. creamy Emily!

“Soy deliciosa torta – Emily Maxipan!”

Mandarin lesson on Skype!

There is a great possibility that I am going to have my first student learning Chinese on Skype through video conference in May. It is very interesting to me because I have never taught Mandarin through the e-space before.

This student works in the oil company in the Amazon and needs to learn Mandarin for his business. We will arrange a first session to meet to connect our laptops through Skype and pass him the textbook. After that, we will just meet once a month to clarify anything face to face.

Hopefully, in the future, we will have more classes like that and we can just work from home. Phoebe will probably start teaching Mandarin in May too.

Good Friday Picnic

Here are some pictures from the picnic we had at Parque La Carolina after the Good Friday service. It looked as though it was going to rain, but God is great! He kept the rain at bay once again!

We had great fun playing basketball and later, soccer. And Luis+Carolina+Daniel+Mateo’s new dog, Lucas had lots of fun enjoying and running with the twins and me. hehe… And I was sooo encouraged when the twins took the initiative to invite 3 girls that they met to church! Our new generation learning to share! Cool! Well done, Emily (their mother and sunday sch teacher)! And check out Carol’s cool basketball dance moves!

There are many bball and vball courts in Carolina Park!

Everyone’s intent eyes kept on the basketball!

My handsome husband getting a shot at the basket!

Lenin, my turn to get a shot!

All running after the ball. Very competitive!

Luis Vs Dario.. who won??

Someone scored a 2 pointer!

Oops! The ball got stuck!

Lenin and Daniel to the rescue!

Carol plays gracefully! :) Dance move 1!

Dance move 2!

Woooh… dance move 3! hehe..

The 1st-day-scary, after-that-adorable new Pug named Lucas!

Lucas licked me!!!! :p

The twins (and Lucas) invited these 3 girls to church!

One of the twins kicking the soccer ball!

Patrol guards on 3 diff colored horses!

Martha, showing that this time she didn’t lose her shoes! :D

Super tired… heee

Daniel also tired out.. but happy for the enjoyable ‘work-out’. :)

a great catch-up with Betty

We had a great time catching up with Betty yesterday night to welcome her back to Ecuador after a looong 6 months. She has been an extremely helpful sister and a very memorable first member of the church. She also happens to be a lover of sushi like us! (Sushi-lovers are a rather rare people type here.. not everybody likes asian food or raw fish…) So again, we took the opportunity to treat ourselves to our favourite food. :p Thank God for the fruitful time of sharing too. Think it may be some time before we treat ourselves to sushi again, especially as we gear ourselves for an eventful time of constructing and moving into the church location.

Each one of us ordered different kinds of sushi and we shared our lives over good food. The topics we talked about ranged from family lives, church, what we learnt from God, our careers, how we have changed etc. We talked from 8pm till 11plus at night and were the last to leave from the restaurant. Betty drove us home after that.

We took a few photos which include a kind of sushi on fire. Its name is Flambée. It was delicious and quite an eye-catcher with the pouring of flaming sake over the sushi!

Catching up with Betty over sushi

Pouring sake over sushi

Sushi on fire – Flambée sushi! Yummy! :)

Interesting talk

This is an interesting talk by Nick Vujicic on perspective, vision and choices. You can take a look at his website too: http://www.lifewithoutlimbs.org/

If you like part 1 below, you can continue with part 2 and 3 in the links below:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6bL3GR4iAW0&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3O6OluBxGtM&feature=related

Another heavenly voice

A 6-year-old girl impresses the judges with her singing :

Purposes of our church

We have been cutting down on ministry and seeking God more recently. As our church moves to the next phase of growth, I am asking God where He is leading our church towards. I realized that as the church grows bigger, I cannot try to meet everyone’s needs. I read Rick Warren’s book entitled Purpose Driven Church 10 years ago but this time when I read it again, it makes so much sense to me now that I am leading a church.

While I was reading and seeking God for His purpose for our church, He spoke to me through a phrase in Rick Warren’s book:“A Great Commitment to the Great Commandment and the Great Commission will grow a Great Church”. It excites me so much that I plan to paint this phrase in Spanish on the wall of our new church location and preach an opening sermon on this when we move to the new location. In fact, I am going to write a sermon on this topic soon.

There are altogether 5 purposes in this phrase, based on the Great Commandment (Matt. 22:37-40 – Jesus replied: ” ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”) and the Great Commission (Matt.28:19-20 “Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”)

Purpose #1: Love the Lord with all your heart
Purpose #2: Love your neighbor as yourself
Purpose #3: Go and make disciples
Purpose #4: Baptizing them
Purpose #5: Teaching them to obey

I plan to preach more sermons on these purposes this year so that our people are on the same page and we can grow together. I hope that our people will embody the purposes and inspire other Christians to be disciples. It was clear that God wants us to to focus on discipleship. While we are renovating our new place so that more people can join us for our church service, do pray for our church to be purpose driven and that our activities will be aligned with the purposes. We do not wish to grow a church that is driven by only activities and program. When the church grows bigger, I know I cannot please everybody but only God. It is so important to allow God’s leadership in this church.

Appreciating Classical Music

I played violin for 20 years since I was 10 years old, from playing in string ensembles in schools to playing in church in Singapore. Naturally, I love classical music since young. Below is a video of a passionate man introducing classical music. It is awesome how a man with passion can inspire people. He is surely an evangelist for classical music.

Inspiring song

This is an inspiring video on having hope.

She’s 47 and she sings AMAZING, GORGEOUS, BRILLIANT. That’ll teach us not to be cynical and ALSO, to never give up chasing our dreams! An apt song she sang too… “I dream a dream” from Les Miserables… wow..

Remember, neither dreaming nor fulfilling your dream is dependent on /limited by age. We need to dare to dream… and what’s more… we have a great God behind us, who showed us the impossible is possible isn’t it? Dream big for God, brothers and sisters, and go achieve it!

If you can’t watch the video below, click on the link here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9lp0IWv8QZY