Empower U
MindChamps is great. Empower U is awesome. In 3 days time, I had as much fun as 10 weeks in Mindchamps. The first day moved kind of slow. We did some icebreaker before proceeding into the activities. There were two guys from Sydney Australia, Brent and Dale, and I find them two really great Lecturers. Whatever questions they asked, Benedict and I just raised our hands in response. Imagine two crazy guys sitting in front, raising their hands whenever Brent or dale asked a question.
On Friday, March 9. I met with some of my friends from Mindchamps in Toa Poa Yoh Interchange. I left halfway during ninjitsu training, and sensei was fuming when he discovered my disappearence. But who cares. I am going to empower U. Wooohoo! Boy was I excited. Naturally, we lined up behind the queue and waited to get our attendance taken. They gave us some name tags to wear before we proceeded up the stairs to the second floor. During that time, Benedict did an idiot test on some of us. Man was it stupid. I got 4 out of 5 questions correct. Well, at least i did the best among my friends. Berina and John got 1 out of 5 correct. And one of them was labeled as a complete idiot, but I won’t name who.
Anyway, during the course, they made us sit in eight rows of chairs. I sat in front with some of my friends. I looked back to find the rest of the gang, but only found the girls sitting one row behind us. Too bad though… I throughly enjoyed the session. We had fun and games. I partnered with benedict, and we had this game where we had to lift each other up while holding hands. Ben seemed quite light, and I was so suprised by his weight that I immediately dropped him. First mistake. hazel was behind him. He literally fell on hazel. That earned him a wack from hazel. If only she knew it was me… Well, lucky I wasn’t the one getting wacked.
Ben later strained his leg. He said that kenji, (70+ kg) accidentally fell on his foot. Ouch. He sat out through all the other activities. Man, thats too bad.
Anyway, we ended the fun and games with the promise of more vigorous excercises on Saturday. Oh boy… Fun is coming up. Too bad that I lost my voice after the end of the programmed. I didnt want to leave! Man, I wanted to thank Brent and Dale for such an awesome lecture.
Anyway, I gulped down all of my water and even had to take some of JieJi’s. Benedict’s parents sent us home. Man, was his parents strict. Benedict kept hushing me when I wanted to talk about him. When his father spoke, he did so in a strict and firm voice. But I thought he was kind enough to send JieJi, Brandon and me home.
Okay, Now comes Saturday, 10th march. And the second Day of Empower U. I got up early at 5.30 for ninjitsu training. I skipped ninjitsu on friday, and this was my punishment. The day started out bad. I rammed into a wall while running. My face still hurt when i arrived at toa poa yoh. I arranged to mee jieJi and brandon in Toa PoaYoh interchange. Sadly though, Jieji was late and brandon said he wasn’t feeling too good to come. When I finally met JieJi, (who arrived 15 mins later), I accidentally bumped into the girls. (Ashikin, Berina and Hazel). I was hungry after all the running that I bought some chocalate cream oreos. I bought some milk to go along with it. Note to self: Never eat oreos with Milk when You are outside. It will be a very troublesome task trying to juggle oreos and milk with both hands. Anyway, we waited for everyone and finally got into the bus fifteen minutes later then scheduled. Why? Because we had to wait for everyone.
Anyway, I didnt expect that saturday to be one of the happiest day in my life. The day started out quite bad. We were sorted out into eight different teams. And boy, I hated my team. Did i mention that everyone was so lethargic? No activity. Just me. I saw Berina, kenji and Clement in the group. I suggested Kenji to be the team leader. His response?
“Nabei! Kanina go choose me. I dunno how to *&^% lead.”
Nobody objected for me to be the leader then. Kenji got into the assistant leader’s position evantually. I really felt sad about my team. I really did.
Later, brent wanted a student as an example for time management. Somebody infront yelled John. Then someone else yelled Ng. I don’t know who did it, but i can swear it was someone in my class. My face was written in shock. Especially when Brent asked for a middle name and Ding Xiang yelled, “AHA!”
John Aha Ng…. My new name….. How did I even get that name……
John Aha Ng became my new name, especially among my aristotle friends. Suprisingly, it made me kinda popular. During lunch break, some people i didnt know pass by and smiled. One of the girls pointed at me and said, “John Aha Ng” Man was it embarrassing.
The fun part started in the evening. back then, my spirit was kind of low. Most of my friends arent in my team… So iI was feeling very lonely. But when brent introduce us to the “Breaking Board” event, My mood made a sudden leap to happiness. I sat with my friends (yeah) and I wrote my thoughts and opinions on the board. I wrote all the negative things about my self on one side, and all the positive things on the other. What we had to do, is to break it. Dale thought us how to break the boards with minimal injuries. Then he told us to settle at the back and dance. Benedict was the first person to go. He broke his board and went up the stage to do a solo dance. I was like, the seventh to be picked. I’ll be suprised if they didnt pick me anyway. I was dancing like crazy then. The assistant team asked me if I was ready to break the board. I replied, “hell yeah.” and that was all he needed. He held the board up, and I rammed my palm into it. Wow. Later that day, i discovered that i scrapped my hand, but then I was too happy to notice. I jumped up the stage, found jieJi and Shawn, and started dancing like crazy. From 7 p.m, I let my feelings go wild. I danced with JieJi and Shawn and Brandon and Dingxiang, and gosh, was it fun. ben, sadly told me that he was too tired to dance. Awww… I wanted him to join the fun…. Anyway, I grabbed jieJi and Shawn and brandon and started jumping together. A group later copied me, and soon, almost every guy was jumping around! I got to the front, and jumped infront of everyone. Some people followed, and soon, a group of people gathered in the front. I’m not exxaggerating when I say this, but i really enjoyed dancing. Especially when I’m dancing with my friends. To describe my experience in words is near impossible.
the sad thing was, I lost my board. I was too engrossed in my dance that I totally lost my board. I tried to search for it, but it just another fruitless attempt. We were running behind schedule, so brent had to release us before he could finish the course. Well, too bad though… Anyway, I called for a meeting with everyone after the empower u. everybody looked kind of irritated, and it hurt me deep inside. But feelings aside, I put on an enthusiastic smile and proposed a meeting on saturday. The negative replys i got dampen my spirit a little, but I reminded myself about My promise to Michael. I will be like Michael… I will help a friend…. I will try my best….
So I proposed my idea anyway before we all broke off to leave. ben’s father didnt fetch us this time, so I had to go home via bus. I went home with Berina, Kenji, Jeremy, Ashikin, JieJi, Hazel and Brandon. JieJi, brandon and I swapped headphones, so I was listening to two different songs at the same time. My head nearly exploded trying to follow both songs. Anyway, the rest of the night went through quite uneventfully, with the exception of Brandon reminding me of John Aha Ng.
Darn that.
I got home quite late. About 11.30 pm. Man was I sleepy. I took a shower before crashing into my bed. But before i fell asleep, I thought of my group, the mocking birds. I nearly cried when I remember their “negativity.” They were so inactive! I offered one long prayer to god before falling asleep. Hopefully, things will take a turn tommorow. Hopefully.
Leave a Reply