International Graduate Student Ministry – Gracepoint Berkeley

It was a really fun one-day tour around San Francisco on Monday (8/10) with the new friends that we have met through dinners and airport pickups. The weather was perfect. Although the trip was not exhaustive in terms of the number of sites that we visited, We hit several famous spots including Fisherman’s Wharf (and had clam chowder for lunch), Lombard Street (and the flowers were blooming), Golden Gate Bridge, and Golden Gate Park.

Wedmod and I took our small groups of international graduate students for a fun one-day outing in San Francisco on July 3rd. We started the day hiking the Land’s End Trail next the Legion of Honor museum. After the hike, we drove down Clement and spotted a small Chinese dim sum place. We were placed at the back table with a nice man-made waterfall view. Dong was very happy with seating arrangement as he got to enjoy the man-made view. After that, we headed out to the Ocean Beach to play soccer and football. While I love playing football, I believe soccer is a better sport. We wrapped up the day with beach bonfire and Canton-style BBQ over the fire. We also had clam chowder, which really hit the spot in the chilly wind! Check out the pictures.

Before the semester started, we wanted to have an outing with everyone: so we went to San Francisco and the new California Academy of Sciences museum.  They have a very nice rain forest exhibit with poisonous frogs, lots of fish and the deepest coral reef aquarium in the country (I think), African penguin colony (and a fun feeding), and an albino alligator.  Sadly, the albino was getting medical treatment while we were there, so we missed it.  If you go, I highly recommend you skip the Swamp Talk and just go and watch the alligator(s).  They don’t move much!

It was a lot of fun as we divided into smaller groups in an attempt to see everything.  Chul’s group somehow got tickets to see the 3D bugs movie, which tracks the life of a few unfortunate insects trying to survive in a cruel world.  Others of us barely got into the Planetarium show, which took us on a journey through outer space.

We were all tired afterwards, and really hungry.  All we had beforehand was a nice Vietnamese sandwich, so we went to Banana Island in Daly City for some delicious Malaysian/Thai/Singaporean food.  Too bad our president Chin-Long had to miss the Malaysian food.  It was great!

Last Friday, everyone took off for Castro Valley Golfland for a round of minigolf.  We all braved the cooler weather to play a round of 18 holes.  In case you were wondering what miniature golf is, it’s not golfing on a small scale.  Instead, every player has a putter (a small golf club about 1 meter long) and has to hit a golf ball into the hole.  What makes minigolf fun is the fact that many of the holes have random obstacles: you need to hit the ball straight down a line and into a castle where the door opens and closes…  or you need to hit hard enough so that it can jump over a stream of water…  or you need to put the ball into a hole that’s located in the middle of what looks like a volcano.

If you can’t tell, its a bundle of fun.  You don’t need any real golf skill.  In fact, half of the game is about luck.  Ask the guys who were golfing with me–I had two “hole in one’s” in a row!  And one of those came when I hit the ball into the wrong ramp, but got a lucky spin on the ball.  (amazing)

The entire time, we were laughing and making fun of each other.  One poor guy in my group had trouble on every weird obstacle that involved a door…  and his roommate, instead of feeling great compassion, almost fell over laughing every time.

In case you were wondering who the picture to the right is of, these are the guys who hit under par.  In other words, they beat the “average” number of strokes it takes for a person to complete a round of minigolf.  Our champions.  The rest of us…  well, we were below average.  If you missed it this time, make sure to join us next time and test your skills.

Up for tonight: Sports night at Alameda High.  Bring your shoes!

Shufei wrote about their Doreimon cookie night, and I felt that we had to talk about what we did after Friday Forum.  2 weeks ago, Meowmeow and I took a smaller group of people out to Twin Peaks in San Francisco.  Twin Peaks has one of the best views of San Francisco… and for those of you who have never gone, the night view is even better.  (You will always see couples spending time there because its actually quite romantic)  We got there right before the rain started, so we had a fogless, gorgeous view of the city.  We stayed there quite a long time actually.  So long that we all got cold and wet because the view was so great.

We then headed out to Golden Island Cafe in the Sunset district for some tasty Cantonese desserts like sago with canaloupe juice, topped with mixed fruit…  or hot glass jelly and coconut milk…  or my personal favorite: mango sago.  Everyone agreed that the desserts were great.  So next time you are out in San Francisco and want to find a tasty treat, try Golden Island.  Or just make sure to come along with us next time!

When I go to Taiwan in a few days, I can say that I have been to Disneyland. It may not mean much to the Taiwanese people, except that they may have heard and seen things about Disneyland in America, and people say it is the happiest place on Earth. I wasn’t going to die an unhappy man if I didn’t visit Disneyland, and I didn’t have much desire to go when I visited LA a few weeks ago. But I decided to make this historical event to go Disneyland for the first time in my life, along with the other historical events in my life now, like moving out of Alameda, and moving to Taiwan.

It wasn’t what I expected. I thought Disneyland is for kids, and adults would have no fun there. But, I was wrong. Disneyland is for adults too. It is a pretty fun and happy place. The classic rides like Space Mountain, Matterhorn, and the Indiana Jones ride were fun, and I didn’t feel like throwing up at the end. For example, if I go to Magic Mountain, another theme park in southern California, I would be nervous waiting in line to get on a ride that I will regret going on when I am on the ride. I guess I am not a thrill seeker, but I would like to be a kid again, especially in Disneyland. Oh boy, I wish I was fifteen years younger in Disneyland! I would have had more fun as a kid.

I went with a group of my friends in ISM and people who have been to Disneyland before. That made being there a lot more enjoyable. If I went to Disneyland in the future with my wife and kids, I don’t think I would have much fun. Because I won’t be as young as I used to be, I wouldn’t be able to leave Space Mountain with a smile on my face, but with a dizzy feeling in my head. I have to make sure I don’t lose my kids, and I would have to keep up with them. I see when parents go to Disneyland; they do it for their kids.

Imagine standing in a circle, holding hands with the people next to you. Now imagine that you are chanting the words “this is so fun… this is so fun… this is so fun…” over and over again. In a monotone voice. And you aren’t allowed to laugh or smile. If you can’t, don’t worry–most of us couldn’t either! We had one of the funniest moments when the final three brothers were staring each other down, swinging their arms, and chanting. Not one would break. So Shufei got the funny idea to start saying “this is so FUN”. But the word “FUN” was about 2 octaves higher than his normal voice. It was hilarious. (he did not win by the way)

Welcome to Saturday night’s ice breaker games. People were divided into teams at random. And then each team had to produce an artist to draw an ISM staff member. (Note, the author of this post does not believe that any of the characters on Wesley’s napkin look like him. I resemble… err… resent that.)

And a poet. And a strongman. And a marksman. Yes, it was random, but there’s a certain power in silly games to bring bonding and laughter like no other. Eliah, our resident governator-type, did 83 push-ups in a row. Yes, 83! I don’t think I can do 83 in an entire day if I tried… with breaks. (note, the blog author has bad wrists and cannot do pushups) But it was pretty amazing to see him do 83.. and then watch Joe and Josiah try to break 50 and find themselves unable to.

This is Ken, our resident Korean military marksman. He couldn’t get the Nerf dart to hit a soda bottle. Amazingly, our star marksman–like in the Olympics–was a Korean woman… Mia.  (Okay, so Korean women dominate in archery and not shooting–its close enough) Yes, do not mess with her! I think she was as surprised as we were that she was able to hit anything.

This is how we wrapped a long day of hiking in the rain… with dinner (ribs and corn…  and ramen) and these fun games. I can’t wait until next year! And if you missed this trip, hopefully you can join us next year.  Until then, you can just practice in the mirror: “this is so fun…”

I know many of you have probably heard about our Yosemite trip last weekend. Yes, it was supposed to be a camping trip. But due to some rather unfortunate weather, we decided to rent 4 very nice houses instead. Okay, so it was 3 very nice houses and 1 house that even the guys called “spooky house”. I actually stayed at the spooky, haunted-house looking place. It wasn’t too bad. But it was sort of eerie to have to park the minivan near the street, then walk down the dirt driveway with only a flashlight… only to see a house on the hill with a long, winding staircase leading to the front door. And the house was wooden, so it didn’t look very inviting either. Chul tried to scare some of us by turning around and saying, “Do you think I am really Chul?”

Well, we weren’t too scared… at least, not as scared as Sharon and Mia during the Bourne Identity. (We had a rock-paper-scissors contest to see which movie we would watch. Shufei, representing the movie Glory Road, handily won the 2 out of 3 contest. But being gracious, the men let the women watch Bourne Identity while some of us played Bang! and Settlers of Catan.) During the movie, I think some people almost regretted choosing to watch. (like Sharon and Mia) In the back, they started to hide their face behind pillows and screamed at every suspenseful moment. I heard one of the guys did as well, but he will remain nameless. (though I think he lurks around here like a panda…)

The drive to Yosemite in May was not what we expected. There was rain and snow. Yes, at the start of summer, it was snowing. (It kept the drivers awake!) And it rained on the entire hike up to Vernal Falls. But rain or shine, we were determined to enjoy Yosemite. The weather was cool, the rain was fairly light… so it was actually perfect hiking weather, aside from the fact that we were wearing rain jackets, wind breakers, and ponchos. (a bright red one!)

The scenery was beautiful, even though it was foggy. In fact, it was reminiscent of a Chinese mountain painting with the fog partially covering El Capitan and Half Dome. So it was great to see and be reminded that nature–which is so wondrous at times–was something that God called “good” when He created it.

In sum, we were thankful to enjoy nature, deeper relationships, and great food… even in the rain. (yes, we were in our nice houses a lot of the time too) I’ll have a separate post about the hilarious icebreaker games from Saturday night.

Bright sunshine. Blue sky. Mild temperature. Such is the gorgeous Bay Area summer weather. And it would be a waste and a shame to stay indoor to… study. What should we do with this? Sports, hiking, picnic, BBQ… you name it–as long as it is outdoors. And I anticipate that we will do many of those things this summer. We will keep you all posted about our activities, so stay tuned for the summer updates and feel free to share your summer activities with us.

As a starter, some of us played basketball at Willard Junior High School, where Gracepoint Fellowship Church meets for Sunday Worship Service. Even though ISM is a UC Berkeley graduate student group, some of us are actually working professionals who do not have as much time to exercise. As a result, I thought that many of our working guys would have a hard time lifting themselves off the ground. How wrong I was! To my surprise and amazement, I discovered a bird-man among us. I took a picture of him as a solid proof. (By the way, I didn’t do any photoshop work on the picture.) So, if you want to play basketball with the man who can truly fly, come to our next basketball game!

We went to see The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian after our weekly Friday Forum. So on the opening weekend, Friday Night, the theater was packed… full of our church members. College students and post-graduate staff volunteers from UC Berkeley Acts 2 Fellowship, Kairos, and Koinonia were there for the show. The only place where I normally see our church members en masse would be prayer meeting and Sunday service.

The movie itself was fun: large battle scenes, a raid on the castle, and swords flying everywhere. The action was good. The only problem was the scenery reminded me a lot of Lord of the Rings movie , “The Two Towers”. (which, by the way, was also incredibly unfaithful from the book… Helm’s Deep in the actual LOTR book was not that contested or scary) In fact, once the trees came back… well, it was like Lord of the Rings. Joe commented that the movie was “Lord of the Rings Junior”.

Sort of. Lord of the Rings didn’t have talking mice like Reepacheep. The little mouse had a big personality that was somewhat reminiscent of the characters in the Princess Bride (big, blown up “noble” personalities that are comical) or Mercutio from Shakespeare’s Romeo & Juliet. But that didn’t stop Mia and other girls from talking about just how cute a talking rat can be. Scary.

Of course, this movie also deviated from the actual C.S. Lewis book in 1 respect: the cheesy romance stuff. If you have seen Star Wars Episode II, then it almost makes you laugh in the same way when Susan and Caspian are flirting with each other. If you haven’t seen Star Wars Ep 2, don’t. It’s not even worth renting. Anyways, most of us thought this was a bit much.

Anyways, I still recommend the movie. Just be ready for The Two Towers + Star Wars Episode Two = Narnia Two, also known as “Prince Caspian”.

As announced during a number of our past Friday Forums, we are going on a camping trip to Yosemite after finals. (May 23-25 in case you were wondering) For those of you who don’t know, Yosemite National Park is a beautiful place with plenty of different types of scenery and hiking trails. Some of the most popular photographs that are displayed in people’s offices and homes are actually Ansel Adam’s depictions of Yosemite! (see here and here)

And instead of what have done in the past (rent a nice vacation home in Groveland), we are camping. As in, sleeping in tents outside, and doing all of our cooking around a campfire or propane gas fires. And the showers are limited. The English term for something like this is “roughing it”.

Because of space constraints, this event is invite only. (Sorry, we can only accomodate so many people in the tents that we were able to get from our church!) So if you did not receive an invitation, but feel that you should have, please talk to one of your friendly ISM staff.

Yosemite has so many trails, ranging from easy to intermediate to difficult. Now the question for everyone: what sort of hiking trails do you want to do? We want everyone’s input on this because we may split the group into 2 groups if enough people want to do something very rigorous. (Of course, this assumes that some people want to take a more leisurely stroll as well)

Please comment!