Abingdonian 2017

84 The Abingdonian The year started in very high spirits for Austin House following an excellent showing in the summer exams. With the first house competition, House Singing, quickly upon us in the first half of term, we opted for a slightly more ‘left field’ song than in previous years and set about the challenge of perfecting the gospel classic Oh Happy Day by the Edwin Hawkin Singers. With some initial trepidation, the boys galvanised over the course of an intense week and produced one of the most joyous performances of the afternoon. To everyone’s surprise (!), we were not crowned champions, but it was a fantastic week of house camaraderie. Special mention must go once again to Cameron Thomson, who motivated and directed a wonderful week and final performance, whilst Oliver Breach was absolutely fantastic on the piano. One of the many highlights over the course of the year was the paintballing trip. Mr Edgar proved a very difficult moving target, whilst Mr Golding proved the exact opposite and Mr McDonnell showed his bravery with some dashing runs into enemy territory, although he did wear a few bruises to show for it! Chun Lung Cheng and Bill Li proved the most stealthy of competitors, managing to hide for three straight games without being found or even firing a paintball. They eventually had to be called out of their hiding places (deep in the stinging nettles) after they had not been spotted for approaching an hour... quite an incredible achievement, although I don’t think a career in the Special Forces beckons for either of them! The 2016/17 inter-house sports competitions saw some wonderful individual and team performances over the course of the year. John Allen kicked us off with a well-deserved victory in the U16 pool competition, which was quickly matched by David Bunn and Toby Rowles, who won the U16 squash. Our U15 basketball team reigned supreme, as did the U15 ergo and rowing quads in the Lent and Summer terms. To add to this, the U14 football side were victorious, as were David Bunn, John Allen and Oliver Breach on the table tennis tables. However, the highlight House Reports Austin House Vil Kiraikou