The 11th(??) Gathering

Well, Sam aka magickfreak has blogged about this gathering, but it hasn’t been put up at this blog. So, here goes an account from wandkey’s view of the gathering that took place, the last gathering UGS had before its admin, Kenny aka Fr3ech, left for studies at KL.

It was a Tuesday, the day after the form 5 people had got their SPM results, and everyone was still in the mood to discuss and rant about results and future study plans. Anyway, the VIP himself offered to host the gathering at his house. I was the fifth to arrive, Kenny, Danny, Tay and Andrew were already seated in front of the TV watching The Aviator. Well, actually Danny was snoozing away with a pillow covering his face. If it wasn’t that Andrew had told me earlier that he was there, I wouldn’t have quite been sure who it was. Haha. Anyway, there was pretty much silence until the rest of the lot came, Cedric, Ben, Angeline, Siaw Fern, Jylene, and Jeryl.

Then the pace began to pick up. There was Jylene going on about her amazing feat of last minute preparation for SPM and yet still getting straight As, genius girl and future M.D. And then all the left-over Chinese New Year goodies were pulled out and the eating commenced. Ben handed me a plastic container of almond cookies, proclaiming that they were very nice and I tried one. Later on that afternoon, that container was almost empty. Hmm… Ben? Haha.

As lunch time loomed, queries about what to eat were inevitable. Pizza was the unanimous decision but nobody was keen on driving out to get it then. Someone suggested calling 1300-88-2525, but somehow the plan was abandoned. Kenny whipped out a laptop and putting the wi-fi to good use, (Yes, his house has wi-fi), we tried to look for the local number of the nearest Pizza Hut. Somehow, people kept getting distracted, ending up looking at duno what instead. I got frustrated, took over the laptop and upon Ben’s suggestion searched www.yellowpages.com.my. Wahla, the numbers appeared. Unfortunately, none of the numbers worked. Haih, such is the inefficiency and failure of us to do a simple task of ordering pizza.

In the midst of all that pizza-ordering commotion, Sam and Nicole called up saying they were stranded at school and needed transport getting to the gathering. Thank goodness Angeline was able to drive down and get them. Or else a certain person’s birthday surprise would be a failure too.

Time passed fast while everyone was enjoying themselves, I think. There was lots of eating, our generous host Kenny not only bought some KFC but also lots of “chai kuih”. And laughter was abundant too, including the moment when Danny burst into song singing patriotic songs that he picked up from National Service, hilarious. Unexpectedly, Jylene piped up a few hours before the agreed gathering ending time that her car was already outside waiting and there was a mad dash to take a last-minute group photo before she left. The result is this…

Haha. Something about group photos taken casually just make me laugh, looking at everyone’s poses and facial expressions. Thanks to Siaw Fern for being the cameraperson, she even took the photo twice with each of the 4 cameras for good measure.

Later on after that, we received good news that Garrick was on his way after picking up Zhe Rong and best of all, they were willing to make a stop at Pizza Hut. Yay!

Well, people started getting restless fast and somehow Jeryl and Andrew ended up playing o2jam on Kenny’s computer. Which slowly attracted a crowd. “Thanks” to those two, a few people that afternoon were hooked into playing o2jam, Ben, Nicole, Zhe Rong and Garrick, to name a few.

Ben and Nicole were playing o2jam together, yep you got that right, together. Each of them took a side of the keyboard and played. Mutualism in its truest form. Haha. Aaaww.. such a sweet duet. Ben’s covering his face in this photo though, camera shy perhaps.

Soon, our other admin Cedric was getting fed up with how technology was getting in the way of our gathering. What with o2jam session going on in the back of the house, a laptop on the living room table, and the television blaring. He tried to call things to order and start a game of dares. It was not easy to get everyone to turn off all electronice appliances and play, mind you.

Unfortunately, playing with a group of people who are not willing to play has its consequences. Firstly, everyone had to write down a dare on a piece of paper and it was tossed into a cup to be drawn. I myself got lucky and even though I was the only one who had to draw two dares, one was “Watch TV” and the other was “Go to sleep”. Ingenious. There were weirder dares like “Pluck a strand of hair from a lady” and even lamer ones like “So boring.. want to sleep”.

Danny had the honours of drawing first and he got the “Pluck a strand of hair from a lady” dare. Somehow, Nicole ended up being the victim. And a paparazzi photo taking session ensued as the dare was carried out. I spot two photos in my photo…

The game soon got dull, sorry Boss, at least we tried. And everyone got back to doing their own thing.

Sensing a lull in the day’s events, I remembered the birthday cake I got that was still chilling in Kenny’s fridge and subtlely suggested to him that we bring it out. Cedric’s was called upon to divert the birthday girl Sam’s attention.

Apparently, Cedric’s attempts were futile as I was shocked to see Sam entering the kitchen from behind me as Angeline and I were preparing the cake. She was promptly chased back to the living room where whatever means the rest of them used to detain her there, I have no idea. Haha.

Ah Sam, even people bring birthday cake to her still have to snap photos of it.

Look! Sam’s face was smashed into the cake! Nah, just kidding. She was just removing the candles from the cake with her teeth, as requested by some people with funny ideas. Haha.

Doesn’t the cake look lovely? It’s chocolate mousse, my only regret was that I didn’t know so many people were going for the gathering and didn’t get a bigger cake. Sigh. As proof to how much Sam liked it, she even licked the cake base after the cake was all sliced up and served to everybody. Seems like it was quite a surprise party to her, since her birthday wasn’t due till a week later.

At last, we took a group photo and this time there was no cameraperson. Guess how we did it? Man, I should have taken a photo of all the cameras lined up in a row on the TV all set on timer mode. It was hilarious! We had no idea which camera to look at for the photos. It was press press press all the 6 cameras in a row and RUN!! Exhilirating.

Soon it was 5pm and people started leaving. Many thanks and well wishes were sent Kenny’s way and I don’t know about him, but if it were me, I’d be close to tears. Hope it was both an enjoyable and memorable gathering for everybody. Remember Kenny, it’s not goodbye, but “see you again next time”.