Encouraged and Energized at Our Retreat in Delta, B.C.

Leaving the frigid cold and minus 20 degree in Toronto, we landed in Vancouver. Sharon picked us up from the airport and made a short stop at her house to meet her family.

We drove to Delta,  British Columbia..

Never seen palm trees in Canada before until now, we were surprised to see them in B.C.!

We were at Delta to attend the CRRS retreat held at one of the hotels in the area of B.C.

The Chair of the Vancouver team welcome delegates to the international conference

This retreat was organized by the Vancouver Team of our charitable organization.

Since the CRRS retreat is held every two years in Vancouver, we look froward to the gathering of participants and speakers from various parts of North America. and other parts of the world.

This year we had two excellent speakers, Dr. Leung and Rev. Chiu sharing their insight and best practices with us.

Dr. Ho and S. had sometime to catch up at the retreat

We had three intensive days of meetings and some excellent sharing at informal hours.
















Though the schedule of the conference retreat was quite full, we were able to get out of the conference hotel and out for a walk.






















The retreat organizers were able to arrange an hour and half for us to do a praise walk at a nearby beach.

Despite the sky was grey and the beach was quiet, our spirits were high.

We did a praise walk on the beach at Centennial Park

We walked around a little, held hands, sang, praised God and prayed.

Dr. Leung shared his insights with us at the retreat.

We heard sharing of the best practices from the different chapters of the CRRS charitable organization.























I enjoyed the excellent speakers and particularly the hands on activities where we needed to work together as a team to solve problems.

Another touching moment for me was when we were doing sing and praise; I saw and felt the strong bonds between our board members.

Though we are from different parts of the world, we become friends through the charity work we do.

We lend mutual support to each other in time of needs.

While working on projects and helping other less unfortunate than us, our volunteers and board members get to know each other, have fun and great fellowship .

This 3 day conference retreat was a great team building experience increasing our understanding and knowledge of what other chapters of CRRS are doing outside our home region.

The best part was getting to know other volunteers and board members and building trust and cultivating friendship in the CRRS family!

My spouse and I were glad that we took part in the conference retreat this year in British Columbia!







R.T.
Delta
British Columbia

Tsawwassen Mills - A Beautiful Shopping Mall with Indigenous Artwork in Delta, B.C.

We are travelling again! This time our destination is on the west coast of Canada .

After landing in the Vancouver Airport, we were picked up by Sharon and driven to our conference site in Delta, British Columbia,  a suburb of the city of Vancouver.















We got to the hotel and it was a little too early for us to check into our room, so we drove around to check out the city.

We visited the Tsawwassen Mills Shopping Mall not far from our retreat hotel.


















Opened in October 2016, the Tsawwassen Mill shopping mall is a relatively new mall

It has many high end and interesting stores.

I noticed that there was something different about the design and decorations of this mall.
























We saw some unusual and beautiful sculptures and columns placed throughout the mall.

Many of these sculptures reminded me of animals and native arts.






















There were native arts displayed and hung from the ceiling.





















Instead of  boring neutral coloured ceramic tiles on the floor, the mall has shiny hardwood flooring with creative designs and vibrant colours.

A spacious area for visitors to enjoy their food and rest their tired feet

I discovered that this mall has been  built on Tsawwassen First Nations land, in Delta.




This explains the unique design and artworks with a distinctive indigenous theme throughout the Tsawwassen Mills Shopping Mall. 















Another special feature in this mall is the abundance of rest and seating area for visitors.

Seating areas are placed throughout the mall 

The availability of these many comfortable seating is a welcome sight for shoppers and visitors to the mall.

We did not plan to visit a big shopping mall on this trip.

We came across it by accident and
enjoyed visiting the Tsawwassen Mills Shopping Mall in Delta, British Columbia!


R.T.
Delta, British Columbia

Venturing Out to Toronto's Four Seasons Centre in the Dead of Winter

Looking out of our window into our neighborhood

It has been bitterly cold for the past two weeks during the 2017 Christmas and New Year holidays in Toronto and the rest of Canada.  But we are Canadians; we are not afraid of the cold! We carry on our daily living in frigid cold weather. Nothing would stop us from shopping, going to work, to school and enjoying ourselves.

We pay close attention to the daily weather reports and forecast and dress accordingly and appropriately for the weather.

For the past few days, the temperature in Toronto was hovering around minus 20 degree C., and with wind chill, it felt like minus 29 degree C. in Toronto.

The government did issue an extreme cold alert advising homeless people to avoid sleeping outdoors and to seek shelter at one of the city warming and homeless shelters. When the government issues warning against people going out or driving, we generally heed the advice.

My mom at the Shen Yun performance, Four Seasons Centre, Toronto

Though the temperature was chilling to the bone, there was no official warning from the government asking people to stay home.  Therefore, we came out of our warm homes during the holidays and attended a Shen Yun performance at the Four Seasons Performing Arts Centre shortly after the New Year.

Front entrance of the Four Seasons for the Performing Arts Centre, Toronto

Home of the Canadian Opera Company and the National Ballet of Canada, the Four Seasons for the Performing Arts Centre is located in downtown Toronto.

Designed by by a Canadian company, the building was completed in 2006  and can accommodate over two thousand people.

The design of this piece of modern architecture includes an unusual glass staircase.

The Four Seasons Centre was very strict about no photography taken inside the theatre. Following the instructions, I did not take any pictures of the Shen Yun performance. It was a marvelous show with lots of Chinese traditional and tribal dancing. My mom obviously enjoyed the performance as she was wide awake being interested for the whole time.

At the end of the performance, she was happy and commented enthusiastically on the show. She told me that of all the dances we had seen, she enjoyed the handkerchief dance the most. She was mesmerized by how skillful the dancers were in manipulating and controlling the handkerchiefs which became beautiful and powerful props in th dancers' hands.

As long as we can make my mother happy and bring her a good time, this makes us happy. It was worth the time, the effort and our venturing out into the freezing cold to bring my mom out for an enjoying afternoon in the middle of a seriously cold Canadian winter.

R.T.

Four Seasons Performing Arts Centre

Toronto, Ontario 

Enjoying the Musical Show " A Christmas Carol" at Elgin Theatre, Toronto

As our children were growing up, we tried to do things together such as reading, skiing, going to church, visiting other and trying fun activities during our annual holidays.


Our grown children are sensitive to our desires. No matter where they are, they always come home to visit especially at Christmas time.










We wanted to do something special with our son while he was home visiting us.

On Boxing day, we went to see "A Christmas Carol" in downtown Toronto.


The show was playing at the Elgin Theatre in downtown Toronto.

Patrons can purchase drinks and snacks at the elegant Elgin Theatre, downtown Toronto

A National Historic Site, the Elgin Theatre is an elegant theatre built in 1913 with magnificent Corinthian columns in its lobby.

This show " A Christmas Carol" was a musical show quite different from what we had expected from the classical Charles Dickens' version of the story.

To the younger audience's delight, this show was a modern version of the classical play with the cast performing dances to many popular modern Christmas songs.




















In the show, Scrooge was still portrayed as a money crazy character being mean to his employees.


















He was visited by the ghost three times throughout the night. However, this different play had many twists and current events incorporated in the modified version of " A Christmas Carol".

















We love watching the show together as a family.

We enjoy time spent with our grown sons and being together and having fun is precious to us!





R.T.
Elgin Theatre
Toronto, Ontario

Christmas is a Time for Family and Loved Ones!

We attended the Christmas dinner at the Mennonite Preston Church in Cambridge, Ont.

Christmas time is my most favoirite time of the year! There are so many activities going on both in Toronto and out of the city for us.

Though, retired, we are very fortunate as we get invited to many of these celebrations by our friends and former colleagues every year.

A couple weeks before Christmas, we celebrated with the congregation at the Mennonite Preston Church in Cambridge, Ontario.

We enjoyed a delicious homemade turkey dinner with all the trimmings.

After the dinner, we attended the service that followed.

With the candle light flickering in the dimmed sanctuary and the sound of Silence Night playing softly, I felt blessed, joyful and grateful.





Besides celebrating the birth of Christ, spending time with my family and loved ones was another favouite part of mine during this Christmas season.

With snow falling gently on the ground, happy holiday songs playing in the background, it was a delightful time to walk around in the mall.


 I took my mom out for an afternoon doing Christmas shopping. She loved seeing all the sparkling decorations and experiencing the excitement and energy in the mall.

We had a smaller family gathering on Christmas Day

After our big fat annual family Christmas get together, we had a smaller family Christmas dinner on Christmas day.

Opening gifts on Christmas day in our house

E. and his cousins usually see each other once a year during this Christmas family dinner.

After dinner entertainment - solving puzzles

Since last year, we started the tradition of presenting something entertaining to one another after dinner.

This year, my sister in law shared two interesting puzzles and we spent some fun time trying to figure them out.

Problem to solve -  Change this configuration on the left to make 4 triangles of equal size by moving just 1 match stick.


E. was quite intrigued by this puzzle and he was the only one who could solve it after some time.







Since the boys are getting older, we gave them some good old metal puzzles as gifts.
Everyone was engaged in solving these old fashioned games.

There is nothing I enjoy more than spending time with my loved ones during the festive Christmas season.

We are grateful that we could be with our family and those who care for us!

R.T.
Toronto
2017 Christmas holidays