105 Gibson Centre - Celebrates Its Phase 2 Opening in Markham

Rev. Harding Ng welcome guests at 105 Gibson Centre

Sunday, March 25, 208

It was a great day at 105 Gibson Centre, Markham!

My adrenaline was flowing at its fullest!

Many people came to celebrate 105 Gibson Centre's  Phase 2 Opening on March 26, 2018

Rev. Jonathan C., Director of 105 Gibson share the centre's mission

As the stream of people kept coming into the meeting hall, we were busy adding chairs and serving food to accommodate the large crowd joining us on this special occasion - the Opening Ceremony of 105 Gibson Centre's Phase 2 Expansion.





The congregation at TCCC along with many volunteers of 105 Gibson Centre worked very hard in 2017 raising fund for the $1 million renovation project. It was amazing to see God's miraculous work and the generosity of many of our donors supporting our centre. Today was the day when the Phase 2 renovation was officially open and in use!

Ribbon cutting at the Phase 2 Grand Opening Ceremony

As one of the tour guides for this opening event,  I had the privilege of leading a few tour groups throughout the afternoon.   I escorted the visitors to see the centre and  the newly renovated 8000 square feet space as well as explaining to them our mission and expanded services.

It was a high for me as the visitors gasped in delight at the sight of the newly renovated facility.
Some of the highlight  include:

A beautiful hangout place for seniors -a  part of the renovated space 

1. Abundant Life Court - a space dedicated to serving those who are 55 and over.

Seniors entertaining visitors to the centre

It is a place for seniors to hang out socialize and have fun with others.

A new dance studio

The Abundant Life Court has a dance studio offering exercise and dance classes to meet the needs of seniors.

A classroom for workshops & activities at the Abundant Life Court

It also has a clinic for senior and a meeting room for workshops and recreational programs.















2.  A community kitchen to prepare food for centre users and community events.


It is available to the community for private function rental.

A brand new community kitchen at 105 Gibson Cenbtre, Markham

A permanent home for  105 Gibson Centre's Thrift Store 

3. A permanent space for the Centre's Thrift Store.

A lot of good bargains at the Thrift Store

The Thrift Store accepts donated items in good condition from the community with its proceeds going back to support the Centre's operating cost.

The Thrift Store is open 2 afternoons a week

The Thrift Store plans to conduct a training course offering job seekers training and on the job retail experience enabling them a better chance to find their first jobs.






105 Gibson Centre has much to offer to its surrounding community. We can hardly wait to share with our friends and neighbour how many great programs and support it offers to the residents and users of the centre. We welcome everyone to come and experience the grace and love of God in this place. It's 105 Gibson Centre's mission to reach out to the needy who in the future can make it their second home!

Come, explore,  learn and enjoy this place together with us at 105 Gibson Centre!

R.T.
A Volunteer
105 Gibson Centre
Markham, Ontario

Cracker Barrel - Our Favourite Eating Place in Florida

Dunedin, Florida

My spouse and I are retired people and we enjoy travelling.

Brisket served with salad & sweet potatoes

As retired baby bloomers we are health conscious and are careful about what we eat.


While we were travelling in Florida recently, we ate out in restaurants every day

Grilled cheese sandwich & house salad at CB restaurant

We tried hard to have balanced and nutritious meals daily on our vacation by eating a lot of salads and vegetables while avoiding too much red meat and deep fried food.

Cracker Barrel Restaurant, Port Richey, Florida

We were glad that we found our favourite restaurant - Cracker Barre in Port Richey, Florida.

We like the old fashion decorations at CB

Having eaten our meals at CB a few times on our previous travels, we knew exactly what to expect from this great restaurant.

We love the warm and welcoming ambiance at Cracker Barrel restaurants.

We love the decorations in this eating venue.

Every Cracker Barrel is decorated pretty well the same. The restaurant has a welcoming and warm ambiance with a huge fireplace and many old fashion items hanging on its walls.

A huge fireplace in the restaurant - my favorite part of the restaurant

Grilled  rainbow trout with two salads  along with homemade cornmeal muffins!

We also knew  that we would have a good selection of  healthy dishes from their menus at  very reasonable prices.

Besides providing customers an excellent place to eat, each Cracker Barrel also has a store selling old fashion merchandise.

For example, I haven't seen this old fashion refrigerator since I was a little child more than half of a century ago!

We saw this antique cooler at the CB store with  the Coca -Cola logo on it.  This brought back many happy memories from our childhood.

Other old fashion items at the store included rocking chairs and timeless games and toys.

We loved the relaxing old time atmosphere at Cracker Barrel so much that we ate most of meals  there while we vacationed in Florida.

Enjoying a game of chess on the patio of  CB

One afternoon after our meal, S. and our friend sat in the rocking chairs on the patio of the CB restaurant and enjoyed a game of chess.

I was surprised at how long they spent time playing the chess game together and were having a good time!

Sponge Docks, Tampa Spring, Florida, USA

We enjoyed our meals at CB and introduced our friend to our favourite restaurant in the U.S. as well!

He loved it!





R.T.
On a recent trip to
Tampa area
Florida, USA

Days Inn in Port Richey - Good Value for Our Money

We visited Florida recently.

We have just finished our holiday in the Florida area. Prior to our visit, we went on the internet to search for a decent and reasonable priced hotel/motel.

We could walk to a number of places including this nice McDonald's near our hotel .

It took me quite a while as we were not sure about a few of the places which were given some very negative reviews.

Lobby - Days Inn, Port Richey, Florida

We decided on Days Inn in Port Richey, one of those hotels that received a few bad reviews.









We were willing to take a chance because of  its location to where we wanted to be and its reasonable daily rate.








We stayed there for ten days and we liked it because:

• At US$ 20.00 a head, we could take a shuttle bus from the Tampa Airport to the front door of the hotel. No prior reservation was necessary. This was perfect for us as we did not want to bother anyone to come and pick us up from the airport in the late evening. 
• The inn offered a good complimentary continental breakfast including hot and cold cereals, fresh fruit, and yogurt and choices of bread

Breakfast area at Days Inn, Port Richey, FLorida

• 
  The staff was very friendly. Anne, one of the staff members serving at the breakfast area was cheerful and helpful. Her smiles were infectious and she brightened up our mornings. 
• She was the one who gave us useful information on where to visit such as the Sponge Docks and Dunedin.  

The Front Desk lady was just as helpful. When we complained about the cleanliness of the  bathtub in our room, she called the maintenance crew right away and the issue was resolved on the same day.

We stayed at the New Port Richey Days Inn for over a week and there was no serious unpleasant issues at all.

If we go back to visit our friend at Port Rickey, we would stay at Days Inn again.

R.T.

Satisfied Guests

From Toronto, Canada

Learning about the Fishing and Boating Industry at the Florida Aquarium

Tampa, Florida

We debarked from our cruise ship and was in Tampa at around 10:30am.

However, our plane was not departing until 7:30pm the same evening.























We had a few hours and would like to see Tampa.

The Heroes' Plaza, Tamapa, Florida, USA

However, being mindful of the traffic and not wanting to miss our flight,  we decided to stay close to the city.

The Florida Aquarium, Tampa, Florida

The Florida Aquarium is located right beside the cruise ship terminal!

I loved the seahorse in this display at the aquarium.

We did not have to take any taxi as we could just walk there with our luggage.


The aquarium even offered to store the luggage for people buying tickets to visit the aquarium.

That was convenient for us!

After dropping off our suitcases for storage, we were free to enjoy and explore all the exhibits inside the Florida Aquarium.

A group of eels at the Florida Aquarium

The things I liked about our visit to the aquarium:

1. For some part of the aquarium, I felt like I was outdoors walking on a trail.

There was sunlight shining upon us and we could see trees growing above us.

We enjoyed the outdoor like environment in the Florida Aquarium, Tamapa, USA

2. Lots to see with clear explanation on the various exhibits.

I learned a lot from the exhibits about Florida, its fishing and recreation boating industry and many other facts:

Florida is the cruise centre of the United States. Over 60% of US passengers board in a Florida port.

• Florida’s recreational boating industry has twice the economic impact of citrus.

• Florida has 14 deep water ports handling over 33 billions dollars in imports and exports.

• Florida is the fishing capital of U.S. as it has more adult anglers than any other states. Over half of the anglers in U.S. practise “catch and release” – they don’t keep what’s on their hooks.

Commercial fishing in Florida is a 300 million industry.

Saltwater fishing contributes more than 4.4 billions to the Florida economy.

People are encouraged to retrieve and recycle their fishing lines as discarded fishing lines entangle and kill thousand of birds and other wildlife every year.

"Pilings and bridge supports under bridge begin to attract life as soon as they are built.

In a few years, these surfaces are encrusted with algae, sponges, oysters and barnacles"

3. The hands on - touch and feel part was interesting.
























One of the touch and feel stations was the Stingray Beach.



















The stingray beach invited visitors to touch and feel!

























Many visitors including us enjoyed the touch and feel station especially the little ones!























I was impressed by how well the young ones followed the rules on using only two fingers to touch the animals in the water.


















4. I learned a lot about the tourism and fishing industry in Florida.








The things I did not like about our visit:















I was disappointed with the Superhero show
presented with the divers in it.






















Initially, I was excited to see the divers appearing in the presentation and expected that they would demonstrate what they normally do while down in the water, e.g.  interacting with the creatures in the aquarium such as feeding some fish or checking out something etc.

















To our disappointment, the divers did not do much.

They simply hang around while the presenter of the program talked. I found it a waste of the divers' presence there.

Do I look like a mermaid?

Other than my disappointment in the presentation, we enjoyed and learned many things during our visit to the Florida Aquarium!



R.T.
Florida Aquarium
Tampa, Florida
USA