GCE PE Study Trip to UK- Day 6&7 Weekend Visits

After an intense week of lesson observations, sharing, resource gathering- it finally came to the week end. We spent most of Saturday just lazing about, recovering from the late night at the prom on Friday. Tried to out to Manchester and Chester on Sat but unlike Singapore where bus and trains come every few minutes, we realised that the bus and train schedules left early and returned late-so we settled for a trip to the town centre instead.
On Sunday, I took a visit to the Church next door to our inn. It was a lovely church and I spent a few minutes there enjoying the peace. All around the church were graves- some of which were of soldiers from Congleton that fought and died in WWI
Later in Sun afternoon, Jon Proctor picked us up and we went to visit Chester. Chester held remnants of Roman architerture and we had a good tour of the place, seeing how an eclectic mix of Roman, Tudor and modern housing integrated together in the town.

Jon gave us an insightful view into some of Cheshire's rich and colourful history- how it has developed over the years, some local history and lore:i.e. how the canal locks are used to raise and lower water levels in the transport of pottery, the differentiation between county and town, etc.

After the tour of Chester, we headed over to meet with Matt and his family. Finally, I got to see his dashing baby boy Adam and lovely wife, Jill. Matt also introduced me to his buddy Jim Pugh and wife, Viv. Jim does Shotokan Karate and we had a great time talking and chatting about martial arts (Jim, really enjoyed talking to you-too bad we had such a short time together. Hope we get a chance to train together in the future!)

We then adjourned to Jon's house for some dinner and met his wife Amanda and his 2 lovely children: Jonathan and Amy.


For some strange reason, little Amy took to us like a bee to honey. She showed us her toys, and showered me and Mr Sng with lots of hugs and kisses.

She was such a lovely little child and really brightened up our day! She was incredibly chatty for a child of only 4 years old. In Singapore, we'd say she's very 'manja'- a term used to describe someone (usually a girl) who's able to plead, persuade and cajole you to anything she wants.

It was a great pleasure and honor to be invited into the lives of Jon and Matt's respective families. Tomorrow we're off to visit another specialists sports school and in the evening, we're off to Old Trafford stadium! Yes, the home of Man Utd!