A Rare but Meaningful Gathering

Surprise! Surprise! I was gladly invited to Rebecca’s house on Saturday for a gathering with some of the families from her Dad’s side. It was an initiative on her Dad’s part to organize a Chinese New Year gathering with this group of relatives whom hardly meet up regularly.

First & foremost, I’m thankful that God seems to be slowly opening the hearts of Rebecca’s parents towards warming up to me… & although still quite rare, but I’m glad that at least they have started to occasionally invite me for such relatives’ gathering. It’s already a very good start & I thank God for it. =)

Rebecca’s parents were quite stressed up over the preparations of food & stuff for this gathering, so I helped out by buying a variety of pastries to share with her family & relatives… I bought 10 durian cream puffs, 5 mocha brownies & 5 chocolate éclairs in total… costing me quite a bit… but I was hoping that it would help lessen the stress burden of Rebecca’s parents, especially her Mum, who was so hard at work cooking & preparing.

I arrived slightly earlier before 5pm & helped to clear & arrange the tables, chairs, eating & drinking utensils, Chinese New Year goodies & bring out those dishes that had been prepared already. I also took a few photos for remembrance.

Just 15 minutes before 6pm, which was supposedly to be the appointed time for the relatives to arrive, Uncle John realized that we had run out of plastic plates to hold the food, so Rebecca & I offered to hurry downstairs to the nearby NTUC supermarket to buy. It turned out that there were no plastic plates being sold, which was extremely astonishing to me, coz I can’t believe that a supermarket like NTUC do not display & sell plastic eating plates!

Thus, we decided to make a trip to the nearby 7-11 convenience store, but once again, we are shocked that even 7-11 do not sell plastic plates! How could this be? It’s NTUC & 7-11… not neighborhood provision shop leh! So we hurried back to the NTUC supermarket, hunted around a few times, but deciding to call Uncle John & tell him that we will be buying 50 paper eating plates instead.

According to Rebecca, these families are almost never late. In fact, it is more often that Rebecca’s family turn up later than them. Yet this time, it’s strange that the first family came in close to 7pm, nearly one hour later than the appointed time! But never mind, the important thing is that they came… better late than never.

I felt odd meeting these ‘strangers’ for the first time… & it really isn’t easy for me to just adjust to the 3 families of relatives that turned up in the end. But I steeled myself to be courageous & I thanked God that I actually soon become more at ease with these groups of newly met relatives, whom I have never before in my life. All except for this girl, Melissa Seow… who recognized me as Mark’s brother! I was taken aback, before I looked again & remembered that she came with some of her church friends to send Mark off to his BMT at Pulau Tekong last year. Amazing! Mark’s church friend actually turned out to be Rebecca’s cousin & hopefully in time to come, become my cousin in law!

But she’s quite nice, so I didn’t have much difficulty occasionally interacting with her… especially when it came to laughing at the nonsensical jokes from the local movie ‘I Do I Do’… & Terence’s (Rebecca’s cousin) playing card magic tricks! He’s really, really good. He actually went to learn these card tricks from someone & paid him $25 per trick. And he has learned 25 different tricks so far… & he is very, very good at it… a young schooling boy able to captivate the attention of many of us! Believe me, my mouth just opened in awe & shock at his card tricks!

In fact, I’m very thankful that the entire evening didn’t seem as awkward as Rebecca’s family & I were afraid that it might be. It actually turned out quite fun & interactive, with several other happenings, e.g. Aunty Catherine (Uncle John’s sister) showing us how to stick a coin to a wall, by just applying a little pressure with a certain technique. That got many of the young kids interested & we all gathered around to learn this new ‘skill’. =)

Amos (Rebecca’s brother) & I also played mini basketball, by aiming & shooting at his small basketball netted hoop… of which, I personally found it quite fun, but very challenging to aim, especially when it comes to shooting from either a standing or sitting position. Not easy… good estimation & coordination required.

And I made one blunder… Terence, Amos & I started to practice throwing playing cards at far distances & I was quite good at it, that my playing card flew outside the kitchen window & disappeared… even though Rebecca & I attempted to find it downstairs after that. I felt so bad & kept apologizing coz now Terence has only 51 cards in his deck of playing cards.

The final part of the evening was a good indication to me, coz after I helped Uncle John to take several group photos of their family & relatives together… Uncle John actually volunteered to take another two group photos, but this time with me inside! Wow! Is that a sign of greater acceptance? I mean, I’m invited to take group photos with their relatives! Yeah! Praise God!

I went home at around 11pm, coz all of us needed to get up early for church the next day. It was an enjoyable time & I hope that I would be able to assimilate into Rebecca’s family & relatives over time… =)