after experiencing possibly one of the worst praise team crashes of all time in my penultimate large group (i put up the wrong version of "in Christ alone" for the powerpoint), i started to think of some of the greatest/worst moments in ccf praise team that i was fortunate enough to be apart of and one particular memory came to mind..
it was a ridiculously hot and humid day in august.. like a, you step outside and are immediately slapped in the face by humidity so you go back inside, day. we were preparing for my first welcome dinner on praise team (second year). the songs selected were who am i, still, and a chinese song "yo ee way sen" (10 points for anyone able to figured out that butchered pinying). everyone in ccf decided to advertise all throughout the irc since they all lived there. the flyer went something along the lines of "Free Chinese Food, Wesley Foundation 6pm" etc etc.
so 6pm hits and about 20 french international students walk over from the irc, mad hungry for some kung pao chicken. hardly any of them speak english and all of them are coming up to me and saying, "neeee haw". i am mildly offended, haha. some more people come in and by the time we start, i say we have a good 50-60 people filling up wesley (keep in mind the 20 french people off to the side).
anyways, welcome dinner starts and it gets to praise time. heres the set-up (from left to right): ruth and ning were on vocals, i was on guitar, judith was on the keyboard, and lily was on violin. in addition, each one of us was standing at least 10 feet apart (so imagine all 5 of us evenly spaced apart up at the front). youre probably thinking "thats a great idea since everyone will be able to hear each other okay and nothing will go completely wrong".. haha, so stupid. anyways, we start playing and of course, no one can hear any one (instead of practicing beforehand, we scrambled to figure out how to get 5 trays of food from yuan ho over without a car. answer: walking).
so we start playing and RIGHT OFF THE BAT, everything crashes. like this may have been the fastest collapse ever witnessed. i think each instrument was playing in a different time signature, and to top it all off, theres 20 french people standing right in front of me, dead silent, glaring at me in confusion, as we're try to teach them how to sing, "there is only one God" in chinese. worst idea ever. right after we finish, lily, who had never spoken a word to me before this point, goes "we suckkkk!!!" haha. judith's hangs her head in shame and is mumbling "aii yoooo" and im like "yo seriously, where did all these french people come from??"
moral of the story: when you suck, like really really suck, you don't have to worry about anyone getting the glory other than God.
7:45 easter service at trinity tomorrow for the winnn.
