Jude, Not Judas

St. Jude I, swiped from williamnyk on Flickr.

Awal Muharram was booked on my schedule as BEC outing day. The president had decided to go on a mini pilgrimage to St. Jude's Church, Rawang. The meeting point was at church. I set my alarm for 6:45am. I heard it and woke up, but I dozed off and woke up an hour later, jumping out of bed with just fifteen minutes to freshen up. The turnout was quite good. About sixty people were gathered. Went there in eleven cars using the PLUS highway. Arrived in about an hour. Rained heavily en route, but upon arrival at Rawang, the weather was superb. Sweltering actually. LOL. The church is located on top of a hill, good for the view, but bad for parking. We were welcomed by their Chinese-speaking group whose committee member used to go to my parish before he moved to Rawang. Did some sightseeing around the compound before we started the prayer session. Halfway through, we were also given background information about St. Jude, the patron saint of desperate cases and lost causes. But more importantly, he's one of the twelve apostles. At the end, we did our own prayer and reflection before proceeding to a nearby cloth printing factory. The owner's a parishioner and he was nice enough to invite us there to take a look at how the silk screen process works. Starting off at the design room, we saw how a design was separated by colour to create multiple stencils. One stencil for one colour. To create the stencil, they would transfer the design onto silk screens in a dark room using special light sensitive chemicals. From then on, we saw how the colour was matched and the actual printing process where the color was pushed with a squegee through the stencil. Quite interesting.



The factory was really large and filled with the stench of chemicals and solvents. In addition to T-shirt printing, they also do printing for cloth and I even saw them busy printing political party flags, no doubt for the coming general election. At the back of the factory was a water treatment plant, employee hostel and also farm. Judging by the fact they rear fish and geese, plant vegetables and fruits, they are quite self-subsisting. The army of migrant workers can just get what they need from the farm and cook up a storm! When we left the factory, nearly everyone was with packets of papayas and jackfruits. Must be the chemicals in the water that make everything grow so richly. :P. Was way past my lunchtime and I was hot and cranky. Only arrived at Restoran Fook Sing at 2:00pm. Thanks goodness for the strong air-conditioning. Seven tables had been prepared for us in a private room. Quite susprised to hear that it was arranged by the factory's boss! Had a sumptious lunch of radish soup, sambal fish, steamed free-range chicken, fried beancurd, pork ribs and stir-fried vegetables. To repay their hospitality, we did a small collection and presented the St. Jude's Church with MYR1000 for their new building fund.



Went home straight after lunch with the help of the GPS. Else I would have been lost. Directly sent mum to South City Plaza for her facial. While waiting, I went to spend some time with KH. Even an hour was worth it. But the boyfriend is very bad, always leaving me waiting at the guardhouse for a long time. Blegh. Spent our time chatting at his condo poolside. When our time was up, it had started to rain. Bad luck him. Even worse luck for me since I couldn't see him frolick in his skimpy N2N budgie smugglers. Dinner was with SK, Jaz and Grat at Restoran 88. KH also joined us though he already ate at home. Loved the pork ribs. Yummy. Sent KH to Pappa Rich (business seems slower now) at 3 1/2 Mile Square to meet his ex-coursemate and bestie. I joined KH for a while but eventually re-joined my own friends. The last time I saw his ex-coursemate was during her wedding. Since then, she had a child and divorced. Now she's found a new hubbie and would be tying the knot soon. Jokingly I told her that I should not see her anytime soon. As I was working the next day, we left KH there with his bestie.