Winter Camp 2014

Salutations, people.

Every year in January or February, my church youth group goes to a winter camp. This camp, as long as I've gone or have known of it, has gone to Woodlands, which is in North Georgia. I'll give you a little run-down of what happened.

On Friday Jan. 17, one o'clock p.m. (or a little thereafter), a bunch of youth piled in three or four cars for a long drive up north. If I'm honest with myself, the drive there and back is one of my most favorite parts of camp. Such memories abide in these long hours. We got there and unpacked that evening, then went to dinner - some people going to Wendy's to brave pre-iron gut, others wimping out and fleeing to Zaxby's instead. I was, of course, with the Wendy's crowd.

For those of you who don't know, pre-iron gut is basically preparation for iron gut, a horrible game where our youth leaders go to the store or restaurant, buy random articles of food, and mix it all up in two blenders. Then two teams of youth attempt to drain the blender to the dregs, and whoever can chug through the valley of unhealthy mix first wins the 'Guts & Glory Award', which is basically a slap on the back to help cough up what you just consumed and infamy for the next year or so. And a piece of paper that says you did it.

We had a special speaker, Wade Grubbs, with us for the weekend; he blazed through the book of Ecclesiastes, the main point being "live life in light of judgement". I'll be honest: I now see Ecclesiastes through different glasses. I never knew it could be as encouraging as it was.

I'll hit on the main highlights of the camp. Of course, the sessions were a given. Loved them. Loved every last minute of them.
When we weren't in the Word, however, most of our (and by 'our' I mean 'my') time was spent up in the game room, which housed three ping-pong tables, two foosball tables, and two air hockey tables. I was usually on the foosball tables, but I did my fair share of ping pong and air hockey. Saturday night, there was a massive tournament, and you could pick which of the three sports you could compete in. I participated in all three, and made it to about fifth place in foosball and ping pong. I failed miserably at air hockey (not surprising).

Another great event was paintball. Who doesn't like paintball? (Aside from girly girls, I understand that.) All those who signed up went in two shifts, one early and one late. Most of the new kids in the youth group went the early shift - I refrained from my urge to dominate them, instead opting for the late shift, which held most of the YG paintball veterans. Boy, did we have a blast (eeeeh? Get it?). I was chosen as team captain of the Red Team, opposed to our youth pastor who captained the Blue Team. We played capture the flag and team deathmatch, coming out of the shift with a one-one tie. And, of course, more on us than when we began (I was hit in the head, elbow, lower back, and front and back of the shoulder, not to mention getting paint splattered all over my mask visor from near-misses).

The camp we went to also offered a fairly long and awesome zipline (it was probably 1000+ feet long), a bungee, a climbing wall, and kayaking/canoeing out on its lake. I rode the zipline a few times and climbed the wall two or three times, but refrained from doing the bungee. I did do some canoeing, though. Ever tried paddling a canoe with one hand? I have...it kills the arm, man.

Last, but not least, the infamous Iron gut competition arrived on Sunday morning. Eight brave and stupid competitors lined up, four a team, to savor the sewage that is Iron gut. This year it was themed 'McDonald's breakfast'. It was comprised of such things as orange juice, sausage egg & cheese biscuit, coffee creamer, vanilla ice cream, hushpuppies, and a couple other things I probably conveniently forgot. Eight trudged in, and four emerged victorious, with stomach aches and aftertastes to boot. I slapped Bobby, the guy who was pretty much an Iron gut legend, on the back afterwards (he was on the winning team, of course), saying "Wanna go out for lunch? I've got a few places in mind..."

(Never done Iron gut, never will.)

And Sunday afternoon, we all piled in for the ride home. While I'll miss and remember with fondness the memories made this winter camp, I'll always be looking forward to the next one.
Sayonara!

Mirror, Mirror: Review

There are quite a few Snow White knockoffs out there, if you look. You don't have to, but if you do, there are, as I said, quite a few.

Well, here's one of them. I have to admit, the blaring 'Julia Roberts!' across the top of the DVD cover didn't exactly excite my interest, as I don't waste time keeping up with celebrities. Neither do I watch Snow White films.

I mean...really! I don't. Swear. Pinky swear. This was an exception...

Okay, I've seen quite a few Snow White movies. Confession. But that does not mean I'm enamored with the story, because I'm not. Promise.

*twitch*

No, really, I'm not.

SPOILER ALERT

So we start out with the classic Snow White story, except this time the evil queen (played by Julia Roberts) is narrating. She says it's her story, but we can forget that obvious lie and move on.

I'm going to assume for education's sake you know the Snow White story, because it's a classic. I'm jumping right into the movie's plot...which is different.

Snow White is a timid little pretty young eighteen-year-old princess who lives in her room all day. The evil queen keeps her that way, and in the meantime plays...ship chess with her baron. Yeah. Ship chess. It looked pretty cool. I wanna play it...

Anyway, Snow finally gets it into her head to go see her kingdom (which, apparently, amounts to a castle, a small town, and a forest...yup). She goes out and is shocked at the poor state of the people, whose poverty is caused by the Queen's lavish living and taxes that help her pay it. None of the people know her, and she knows none of the people, 'cause she's a hopeless shut-in who does nothing.

In the process of wandering about, she stumbles on our Prince Charming, who happens to be played by the guy who was the protagonist in the recent Lone Ranger movie. 

Yes, him. Snow finds him and his traveling companion strung up by their toes, having been captured by bandits and ransacked for all their wordly goods. She sets them free, they exchange a little awkwardness, and then they part ways.

The prince, apparently, is headed out in search of 'adventure'. Lame. But, lo and behold, he stumbles across Snow's castle and is admitted by the evil queen, who likes his looks and money so much she decides she's going to marry him.

She throws a huge ball in hopes of impressing him. He is met in the ball by Snow White (who didn't know he was a prince) and they exchange some more awkwardness. The queen observes their exchange, however, and decides she wants Snow out of the way, permanently. So she orders her manservant to kill Snow.

The manservant takes her out to the woods, feels some compassion, and cuts her free to run away. She begins sprinting through the forest in a huge dress (how much flipping wind resistance does that have to have??), then taps her dainty little head against a rotten tree branch and faints. Did I mention she was a bit fragile...?

Luckily for her, said tree branch happens to be part of a huge beaver hut that was built by the seven dwarves. Dwarffes. Dwarvfs. Stupid autocorrect, I had it right the first time. They are all shocked she's not in the kitchen and have compassion on her, taking her in and having her make sandwiches for all.

Nah, not really. But she does cook for them.

Little does she know (for about five minutes), these dwarves are in fact the bandits that strung her prince up to dry. She finds out when the dwarves raid a carriage that was transporting taxes to the queen. Suffice it to say that after that, they give the taxes back to the people. Sort of.

When the news of the 'highway robbery' gets to the castle, the prince grinds his teeth at mention of the bandits and sets out with a company of guards to finish them. The dwarves, who have been training Snow White in combat, sally forth to meet them and once again strip them of their clothes and belongings, chasing them back to the castle. In the midst of their scuffle, the prince meets up with Snow again and fights her, exchanging some more awkwardness.

By the time he gets back, however, he is obviously enamored with Snow. The queen, not liking the fact that Snow is still alive - much less that the prince is in wuv with her - consults her magic mirror (which is actually a portal to another dimension that contains nothing but her little witch-hut in the middle of an ocean and her alternate personality...eh...necesita psychologist much?). She turns her manservant into a cockroach for his failed delivery of the taxes, tells her magical alternate personality to kill Snow (again) and gets a love potion to make the prince love her instead of Snow.

Unfortunately for her, this love potion turns out to be a 'puppy love' potion...however that works, and it makes the prince behave like an overly attached puppy to her. And I think her quote "There are pros and cons to this" sums that up quite well.

Meanwhile, Snow is attacked by magical marionettes, because...well, I guess that was the best way to kill her? She couldn't just be turned into a cockroach and then stomped? Eh...movie logic. The marionettes smash a bunch of stuff before Snow discovers their weakness...strings. Yeah. Just cut their strings and they're helpless. Dumbest...assassination attempt...ever.

They prepare to get married, but Snow hears about the wedding and takes her dwarves to go break the thing up. They steal the prince and leave the wedding guests in their underwear, making an interesting spectacle when the queen arrives and finds her bridegroom kidnapped and the wedding in disarray. She stomps off to go kill Snow herself.

Back at the dwarves' hideout, they try many ways to lift the spell on the prince. These 'ways' include ear-boxing, blowing a horn in his face, playing pool with his head, and plain good ol' fashioned slugging his face. With fists. Nothing seems to work, until one of the dwarves suggests 'love's first kiss', and tells Snow she can do it. Snow works herself up to finally do it (apparently it's her first kiss ever...I'd say bravo, but one: she's eighteen and unmarried, and two: she was shut up in a castle for ninety percent of her current life.), and she kisses the prince, lifting the spell on him. 

The queen then arrives. Apparently a mythical beast lives in part of the forest and terrorizes the kingdom (this was explained way back in the movie), but now it turns out the queen controls it and she sends it after Snow. The beast turns out to be her father under a spell (who vanished into the forest way back in the beginning of the movie), and Snow severs the magical link between him and the evil queen. Severing this link not only kills the beast, it also appears to age the queen, removing her beauty. Snow then marries the prince, and they all live happily ever after.

A few things to mention. Quite a few actors played/camioed in this movie, including Julia Roberts (duh), Sean Bean (who was the king...WHAT?), a very brief show of Johnny Depp, and that little dwarf from Pirates of the Caribbean. And a few others I can't stick names to. However, it's quite obvious they were only there for the trailer hook, nothing more. The movie has a B-rating.

They do have a throwback to the 'poisoned apple' from the original Snow White story. After being defeated and aged, the queen shows up disguised at Snow's wedding and offers her the apple as a wedding gift. However, her words give her away, and Snow doesn't take the bait, instead jabbing her with one of her own lines "You should know when you're beaten" that the queen said during the ship-chess game.

"You're a traitor!"

"You're a jerk!"

(The Prince and Snow White)

END SPOILERS

Despite its B-rating, I did actually somewhat enjoy this movie. It was an interesting quirk on the original Snow White tale. While not that well executed, the dialogue and characters are interesting enough. The plot is not that great, but its less-than-spectacularness is downplayed by the movie's pros. Animation, for the little CG there is, is fine; save for one scene where the painted background is blatantly obvious. 

The movie was light-hearted, obviously not taking itself seriously. Jokes are numerous and fairly executed.

Overall, I'd say this movie is a might-watch. It's hovering between meh and good, so...draw your own conclusions. I'd recommend getting it from the library, which is what we did.

And that, as they say, is that. Sayonara!

Reaper's Safety Session: Blogging

Greetings, EARTHLINGS! Ah'm feeling a little strange today so HEEEEHEEEHEEEHEHEEEEHHH.....Buckle your seat belts!

Today we're going to talk about that all-important issue that helps keep the world in overpopulation: safety.
Topic? Blogging.

It's everywhere, help, save meeeee! In my face, under my pillow, in my toothpaste....GAAAAH! HEEEEELP! Here's a few tips to dealing with this nasty disease.

1. Make a blog proclaiming the evils of blogging. That'll rally people to your cause in no time.

2. Post all sorts of controversial stuff and news. That, or make it completely boring about your life; what you had for breakfast, how your cat clawed your leg to shribbons (shreds/ribbons...actually, that might be interesting). No one will read it, then.

3. Stay away from the internet. So what if I told you to create a blog? Did I say you had to? No. Did I say I was trustworthy? No. Did I say I would be consistent? Of course Iie.

4. Go around a local mall thrusting books in peoples' faces, yelling "READ! READ MY STUFF!"

5. Spam Google with angry emails about how their system is broken. That's always worked.

6. Lie down. Try not to cry. Cry a lot.

7. Laugh, because you're an idiot and there's nothing you can do about it.


You'll never get rid of it, so might as well live with it! SAYONARA.

The Hobbit: Desolation of Smaug

Hello one, hello all.

As you may know, the sequel to the first Hobbit movie came out just recently (in relation to this post, anyhow). People I know have already given their opinions of it, and generally it seems to have a positive acclaim to it (save for one or two people, ahem ahem). But of course because we're on my blog, what do I think of it?

SPOILERS ALERT

So...this movie basically spans the time where they left off the last movie till the time they enter the mountain. The film ends on a horrible cliffhanger with Smaug going off to destroy Laketown, which of course (if you've read the book) is where he meets his doom by Bard. A couple of things I need to complain about.

First of all, the elves. Thranduil = pink explosions whenever you see him on screen. In fact, in that scene where he shows Thorin how he's been burned with dragonfire too, I found myself wishing he stayed with that look throughout the whole movie. At least we wouldn't be seeing rainbows every time he's in frame.
Then we have Legolas. Okay, I confess. I like to make my characters practically unbeatable too. But this elf? He's a god. Okay? Unrealistic. If anything, he loses perfection from the Hobbit to Lotr. Which is unacceptable if you want any semblance of consistency.
And, of course, Tauriel. Now I have to admit I like her. Pretty? Check. Great fighter? Check. The only problem? She's completely unnecessary. Seriously! Edit her and her 'wuv' with Kili out of the movie and you've lost absolutely nothing. At all. I'll explain more about why later.

Secondly, the blatant Deus Ex Machina all over the place. Coincidence after stupid coincidence. Guys, I understand that movies are supposed to 'work out' perfectly, but SERIOUSLY. This movie could have come up with a lot more imaginative and believable events instead of stupid "movie logic" scenes. Visit my fellow blogger Joshua Koh over at http://mysteriesleftundone.blogspot.com/ for more about that.

Lastly...the nostalgia. It's quite obvious from a few scenes that they're trying to remind you that 'Hey, Lotr is next'. When, in fact, all they accomplish is 'oh, look, um...lord of the rings. yay.' For example, the Sauron scene. Eyeception. Sauronception. Whatever. And then, of course, Gandalf being captured and seemingly in threat of 'imminent death'. Hey, uh, movie? I've seen Lotr, and Gandalf's in it. You can't fool me, hahahaha!
But in all seriousness, I wish they would keep that out. The Hobbit has its own flavor from Lotr, and while they are connected via sharing of the same world, they follow different storylines.

Here I'll start explaining what I don't like about what they've done with the Hobbit. Originally, the story is somewhat like a coming-of-age story. You have Bilbo, a homely little hobbit who never goes on any 'adventures' and consequently doesn't know much about a rugged life. Then he is dragged out his door on a quest to regain a treasure. Along the way he meets various trials and hardships, and we get to see him grow more confident as he goes, finally culminating in his bravery at the Lonely Mountain.
But instead, the producers have decided to throw in Radagast, Dol Guldur and the 'sorcerer' into the mix, along with Azog from the Lotr appendixes. They wanted it to have more action and tenseness in there, which while I can understand, distracts from the main character - Bilbo. To add to the confusion is Tauriel and her 'unlikely love' with Kili, which as I mentioned, is totally unnecessary and in fact, might just be a throwback to Aragorn and Arwen. It's not something I enjoy, and in fact I think Tolkien wouldn't be very happy with it either.

And that, as they say, is that. Do I still like it? Yes, I do. Even given its shortcomings. You'd have to work really, really hard to destroy the wonderful world of Lotr and The Hobbit. And of course, I do understand that the translation from book to film often changes things. I just wish they'd been more original.
Sayonara!

CROSScon 2013

Just after Christmas, I left (that Friday) to go to a conference about missions. The title is as is.

Here's what happened:

Friday, 6:00 a.m., I arrived at the church and piled in a van with eleven others: Ryan Tetreault, Kyle Betsill, Emily and Leslie DePena, Katie and Danielle Saba, Amber Marcum, AnnaKate Jackson, Anna Thompson, Gina Granauro, and Natalia Gomez. We drove north to Louisville, Kentucky for about eight hours, including a stop in the middle for bathroom and a stop for lunch. We arrived around 2-2:30 p.m. (Lauren Keller and Charissa Crotts arrived via other transportation).
We went straight for the conference instead of stopping at the hotel. Registering, we then saved some seats, wandered around the many booths in the gigantic conference room and waited for the kickoff event.
At 4:30, the conference began with none other than TRIP LEE rockin' it out with some of his songs. Now, I'm not much into rap, but I've never met a real-life celebrity before. Seriously? It was great.
After Trip, guess who came up to preach? JOHN PIPER! I was racking up the list here. He was amazing and passionate, as John Piper usually is. After his sermon he was interviewed by Mark Dever, pastor of a D.C. church. We then left, exhausted and ready for bed, to go to the hotel.

At eight the next morning, Saturday, we left for the conference (I had breakfast in our room). For the morning session we started with some great singing, followed by Thabiti Anyabwile (yeah, I can't pronounce it either) and Kevin DeYoung, both brilliant men of God. The session ended at 12:15, and we then went to lunch. After lunch, we had our 'breakout' sessions, which were different talks by different speakers that you signed up for beforehand (although many people, myself included, just went to whichever one they wanted). There were two sessions, each an hour with a 45 minute break in between each. Then dinner. Finally, we went to the evening session at 7:00 where Conrad Mbewe preached an amazing sermon and afterwards Mark Dever interviewed some missionaries attending the conference. We left the conference right after the evening session ended for the hotel.

Sunday, we again left at eight and arrived for the morning session where Richard Chin (A Chinese man with an Australian accent...suffice it to say that was a first for me) and Mack Stiles (a missionary) both preached. Then lunch, then the breakout sessions, and finally the evening session pastored by Matt Chandler, after which David Sitton (another missionary) gave his testimony and called people to come to missions. Afterwards, we attended a Q&A with Matt Chandler and then left for the hotel.

Monday, the morning session was preached by Michael Oh (a Korean) and D.A. Carson, a well-known Christian writer. Afterwards we had the breakout sessions followed by the evening sessions, preached by David Platt, an ordinary man that, if you had been there, would undoubtedly seem touched by God. We left sometime afterwards for some sleep.

Tuesday, we left the hotel at 7:45 a.m. and arrived back around 5:00 p.m.


And that was that. Let me make a few notes.
-I brought a ton of soundtracks, which everybody loved and we listened to halfway there and halfway back.
-I met John Piper. Don't believe me? I posted a picture on Facebook. If you don't know me on Facebook, well, then, sorry. Too bad. Just take my word for it. XD
-Mark Dever is hilarious and serious all at the same time. He reminds me a lot of Kent Keller, who used to be a youth pastor at my church.
-We got FREE BOOKS. Like, six of them! And a free CD by Sovereign Grace!
-Michael Oh was quite the shocking preacher. While he made a good presentation, he kept using a phrase (that he explained, and which I'll mention later) that wasn't very savory, and he only used two passages of Scripture total. It was more of a presentation than a sermon, let me say.
-David Platt...quoted eight chapters of Romans straight. From MEMORY. He looked like he coulda gone further too. Put us all to shame. We should be memorizing Scripture like that.
-I've never had a better time in my life. Great teaching. Great worship. Great fellowship. Great God. Awesome, awesome time. I want to go again. Here's some quotes from each of the speakers.

John Piper: "The goal of missions is the supremacy of God in the joy of all peoples."

Thabiti Anyabwile: "No one can stand, no one can survive." (referring to the wrath of God)

Kevin DeYoung: "You can risk everything because God risks nothing."

Conrad Mbewe: "Death has died in the death of Christ."

Richard Chin: "We sign a blank check for Jesus."

Mack Stiles: "I love the small hinges upon which the great doors of life turn."

Matt Chandler: "The life worth living for Christ is a live worth losing."

Michael Oh: "Give a damn for Christ." ('damn' refers to a small Indian coin, which was of little value. That's where the expression 'I don't give a damn' comes from. Oh was encouraging people to give money for the sake of the gospel. I didn't like it, many people didn't.)

D.A. Carson: "To live above with those you love is quite the wanted glory: to live below with those you know, quite another story." (poking fun at our discontent)

David Platt: HE QUOTED EIGHT CHAPTERS OF ROMANS. I think that's enough.


Of course, there were many other speakers who did breakout sessions. I don't have a quote from them, so I hope you're satisfied. It was a great time. You should come for the next CROSScon. Visit their website at crosscon.com to learn more about global missions. Sayonara!