looks like I am not the only one living vicariously in Stormreach.
I lurve Get Fuzzy. How cool is it that I might have run by the artist before in the virtual world? Gonna check out every dude swinging a two-handed axe now. ha!
as a rude gamer t-shirt I saw online declare "Sleep is for the WEAK!"
LOL.
Thursday, May 25, 2006
Tuesday, May 23, 2006
Why I Won't Watch Da Vinci Code
1) Tom Hanks' mullet
2) Tom Hanks' mullet
3) Tom Hanks' mullet
4) Tom Hanks' mullet
5) Tom Hanks' mullet
Ye gads! Hair-style Liberals beware!
I am an anti-mullet facist-conservative-extremist-fundamentalist!
nyeah nyeah ni boo boo
His hair offends my belief system.
Quelle horreur!
hee.
2) Tom Hanks' mullet
3) Tom Hanks' mullet
4) Tom Hanks' mullet
5) Tom Hanks' mullet
Ye gads! Hair-style Liberals beware!
I am an anti-mullet facist-conservative-extremist-fundamentalist!
nyeah nyeah ni boo boo
His hair offends my belief system.
Quelle horreur!
hee.
Sunday, May 21, 2006
Thoughts on TissueAunty's birthday
It was TissueAunty's birthday today - I broke my promise to celebrate it with her over dinner(she insisted on treating) as I was in a meeting and prioritised that as more "important". I am kinda grateful that I got a second chance on my way home. Apparently after her birthday dinner, she went straight back to the little Bugis island, selling her tissue paper. She insisted on treating me to a drink and I sat with her for a while to make up for missing her birthday. Teasing her about her new haircut, I asked her what she wanted as a present. In an embarrassed whisper, she requested for a Singtel Hi Card and perhaps a little pushcart trolley to ferry her multiple bags of tissuepaper, knickknacks and all that she peddled. She also asked for prayer for her and her family.
I thought it was sweet of her to actually want to buy me birthday dinner. And sweeter still that her requests were so simple and asked for with so little bile or greed. She has so little and yet she wants to cheerfully share her wealth still. Since meeting her and being challenged by God on a personal level to be more participative in the life of the needy, I must say she has taught me some things about faith and perseverance in terrible circumstances. She has also shown me that God truly looks after the weakest and neediest in profound ways when we people neglect them. (Update: She found a flat that costs significantly less to rent and an easier-going $1200/month job manning a toilet at Bugis Village! Her son also secured a jib pushing a drink cart near Rochor. That's amazing considering her circumstances when we first met)
_________________
This made me muse a bit about something. On my DISC profile, with my high S and I, I am classified as a Counsellor/Adviser. It seems to tally with my experiences with random strangers. I am an uncanny magnet for strangers with the oddest hard luck stories on the streets. I think I send out a broadband signal - "easy target. will listen. likes oddballs. please approach. will find it hard to say no to request for conversation."
Everytime I meet a stranger with a hardluck story, I am challenged to put my beliefs about helping the poor to the test. I am fairly absolute in my statements to my students about the need to challenge the status quo and bridging the rich/ poor divide at an individual level as well as societal and international level. With each strange 'kook', I meet I am forced to readdress my values, "Are you gonna help or are you gonna walk away?"
It's really really tough and I can feel how easy it is to walk away. It is a temptation to help out in as fast, simple, "in and out" way as possible. Far tougher to make the decision to commit long-term to helping another person. It already is tough to dig out the wallet and dispense out the cash to a needy person. It is far far far tougher to go an extra mile and say you are willing to be involved beyond the chance encounter.
I know all the routine arguments because heaven knows, I have made them before in my lifetime ---- Yes, it is impossible to be involved personally with every single poor person that we meet, yes we can never insure that the money we give does not go to ciggies-drugs-alcohol, yes we are too culturally different to be of real use to them, Yes, I know we can just buy them food because that's what they need most.....so far the nagging feeling that will not leave my mind anytime I hear these arguments is - are those answers tripping just a little too quickly and conveniently off my tongue? Do my clever words disguise mere excuses? Do I want to buy food because I dont want to commit to giving real money and time to find out where exactly the person needs help in?
$5 for a pack of chicken rice is a cheap price to pay for assuaging guilty naggy feelings of "you ought to help the poor" and gaining the high of"wow,i am a generous person." We buy the drink and food for the homeless, feel warm inside with the chance to play benefactor and walk away from them for the rest of our life. We go back to our riches, they go back to an everyday reality of poverty. I just don't buy short-term charity. Real charitable work is a life-time commitment- a hard core decision to invest one's life in another's life. Cursory donations are useful but just don't cut it in terms of long-term solutions.
It's a challenge - and one that I am still wondering how I will fare in in my maiden effort/experiment with TissueAunty. Its tough...there have been so many encounters that I had where I was not sure how to go on further.
One time after working late at school, I was accousted by a drugged out looking chinese man asking for ten bucks. Not wanting to antagonise him, I listened politely to his ravings for a good thirty minutes - the conversation went from how his family betrayed him, to how he jumped off a building once and hurt his 'lum-par' (he gestured at his crotch violently to emphasise his point) but not one of his family looked after him, While talking to me, he would creepily talk at a space behind me, as if there was someone behind me. The nuttiest part was when he declared he had gone to prison before and was angry all the time and wanted to kill people. He stressed that sometimes he wondered if people walking on the street knew that he wanted to kill them. (At this point, I said, 'Oh no, I don't think they do and you should not kill people') He agreed and mentioned that in prison he met a Malay man who was always patient even though he insulted Malay guy's mom ('I call her C-B also he never angry!') From then, he wanted to be just like the guy. I nodded very very approvingly ('ya its good, learn to be like him'), gave him money and walked off as soon as it seemed like he was content he got stuff off his chest and was not gonna kill me.
Then there was the Eurasian man with one of those annoying survey forms who approached me in Raffles MRT, asking me questions about whether I liked my job and whether I was keen on switching careers to the sales company he was surveying for. I was trying to explain to him how I loved teaching and would never consider a career switch - he could not understand at all why anyone would not even try to find out how to get extra income. Conversation became a philosophical one about the nature of work and money with him trying to convince me about his stance - anyhow, turned out he was a slightly mentally unhinged unemployed man, sacked from his management post, and not taking it too well. He was a philosophy major and repeatedly made sure I understood that. Conversation lasted an hour. Anyhow, a few months later, I meet the same guy, doing the same survey at Bugis MRT. When he approaches me, I tell him straight away that he asked me before and we had a really long talk about why I was not keen. He goes on to reveal to me that he is angry the PAP wont subsidise his brain surgery and the government should watch out for how all the unemployed - "the walking dead" he called them - would rise up and overthrow it. He also names for me all the nasty civil servants he met at the CDC distributing social welfare. He also reiterates for me that he is not stupid, he came from a prestigious school and it was not his fault he was like that. (He spoke quite poshily actually, good enunciation)
And the most recent encounter: A woman with long greying hair, watery eyes and a mouth full of the smelliest, broken up , blackened teeth I had ever seen came up to me and claimed she had been praying for God to send her someone to help her pay her rent. The smell from her mouth was the foulest thing ever - she kept covering her mouth and apologising, saying she had cancer. She explains to me how her husband had died, and she was broke, and several times in conversation, she breaks off to pray one-liners to God. During entire conversation, she keeps reaching out to touch me on my hand and my stomach/waist when she wanted to emphasise "I am not a cheat. I got cheated before by a friend, I know what it is to be cheated. Please dont think I am one." We arranged to meet at City Hall the next day so I could give her some cash. She kept asking me to pray for her and how important it was because she had more vital spiritual needs than the material ones.
________
I wondered in every one of those cases, how could I offer long term commitment to help? When do I hand over the responsibilities to other people? It's a really tough call to follow. Need so much grace for it to happen! Still exploring....:)
I thought it was sweet of her to actually want to buy me birthday dinner. And sweeter still that her requests were so simple and asked for with so little bile or greed. She has so little and yet she wants to cheerfully share her wealth still. Since meeting her and being challenged by God on a personal level to be more participative in the life of the needy, I must say she has taught me some things about faith and perseverance in terrible circumstances. She has also shown me that God truly looks after the weakest and neediest in profound ways when we people neglect them. (Update: She found a flat that costs significantly less to rent and an easier-going $1200/month job manning a toilet at Bugis Village! Her son also secured a jib pushing a drink cart near Rochor. That's amazing considering her circumstances when we first met)
_________________
This made me muse a bit about something. On my DISC profile, with my high S and I, I am classified as a Counsellor/Adviser. It seems to tally with my experiences with random strangers. I am an uncanny magnet for strangers with the oddest hard luck stories on the streets. I think I send out a broadband signal - "easy target. will listen. likes oddballs. please approach. will find it hard to say no to request for conversation."
Everytime I meet a stranger with a hardluck story, I am challenged to put my beliefs about helping the poor to the test. I am fairly absolute in my statements to my students about the need to challenge the status quo and bridging the rich/ poor divide at an individual level as well as societal and international level. With each strange 'kook', I meet I am forced to readdress my values, "Are you gonna help or are you gonna walk away?"
It's really really tough and I can feel how easy it is to walk away. It is a temptation to help out in as fast, simple, "in and out" way as possible. Far tougher to make the decision to commit long-term to helping another person. It already is tough to dig out the wallet and dispense out the cash to a needy person. It is far far far tougher to go an extra mile and say you are willing to be involved beyond the chance encounter.
I know all the routine arguments because heaven knows, I have made them before in my lifetime ---- Yes, it is impossible to be involved personally with every single poor person that we meet, yes we can never insure that the money we give does not go to ciggies-drugs-alcohol, yes we are too culturally different to be of real use to them, Yes, I know we can just buy them food because that's what they need most.....so far the nagging feeling that will not leave my mind anytime I hear these arguments is - are those answers tripping just a little too quickly and conveniently off my tongue? Do my clever words disguise mere excuses? Do I want to buy food because I dont want to commit to giving real money and time to find out where exactly the person needs help in?
$5 for a pack of chicken rice is a cheap price to pay for assuaging guilty naggy feelings of "you ought to help the poor" and gaining the high of"wow,i am a generous person." We buy the drink and food for the homeless, feel warm inside with the chance to play benefactor and walk away from them for the rest of our life. We go back to our riches, they go back to an everyday reality of poverty. I just don't buy short-term charity. Real charitable work is a life-time commitment- a hard core decision to invest one's life in another's life. Cursory donations are useful but just don't cut it in terms of long-term solutions.
It's a challenge - and one that I am still wondering how I will fare in in my maiden effort/experiment with TissueAunty. Its tough...there have been so many encounters that I had where I was not sure how to go on further.
One time after working late at school, I was accousted by a drugged out looking chinese man asking for ten bucks. Not wanting to antagonise him, I listened politely to his ravings for a good thirty minutes - the conversation went from how his family betrayed him, to how he jumped off a building once and hurt his 'lum-par' (he gestured at his crotch violently to emphasise his point) but not one of his family looked after him, While talking to me, he would creepily talk at a space behind me, as if there was someone behind me. The nuttiest part was when he declared he had gone to prison before and was angry all the time and wanted to kill people. He stressed that sometimes he wondered if people walking on the street knew that he wanted to kill them. (At this point, I said, 'Oh no, I don't think they do and you should not kill people') He agreed and mentioned that in prison he met a Malay man who was always patient even though he insulted Malay guy's mom ('I call her C-B also he never angry!') From then, he wanted to be just like the guy. I nodded very very approvingly ('ya its good, learn to be like him'), gave him money and walked off as soon as it seemed like he was content he got stuff off his chest and was not gonna kill me.
Then there was the Eurasian man with one of those annoying survey forms who approached me in Raffles MRT, asking me questions about whether I liked my job and whether I was keen on switching careers to the sales company he was surveying for. I was trying to explain to him how I loved teaching and would never consider a career switch - he could not understand at all why anyone would not even try to find out how to get extra income. Conversation became a philosophical one about the nature of work and money with him trying to convince me about his stance - anyhow, turned out he was a slightly mentally unhinged unemployed man, sacked from his management post, and not taking it too well. He was a philosophy major and repeatedly made sure I understood that. Conversation lasted an hour. Anyhow, a few months later, I meet the same guy, doing the same survey at Bugis MRT. When he approaches me, I tell him straight away that he asked me before and we had a really long talk about why I was not keen. He goes on to reveal to me that he is angry the PAP wont subsidise his brain surgery and the government should watch out for how all the unemployed - "the walking dead" he called them - would rise up and overthrow it. He also names for me all the nasty civil servants he met at the CDC distributing social welfare. He also reiterates for me that he is not stupid, he came from a prestigious school and it was not his fault he was like that. (He spoke quite poshily actually, good enunciation)
And the most recent encounter: A woman with long greying hair, watery eyes and a mouth full of the smelliest, broken up , blackened teeth I had ever seen came up to me and claimed she had been praying for God to send her someone to help her pay her rent. The smell from her mouth was the foulest thing ever - she kept covering her mouth and apologising, saying she had cancer. She explains to me how her husband had died, and she was broke, and several times in conversation, she breaks off to pray one-liners to God. During entire conversation, she keeps reaching out to touch me on my hand and my stomach/waist when she wanted to emphasise "I am not a cheat. I got cheated before by a friend, I know what it is to be cheated. Please dont think I am one." We arranged to meet at City Hall the next day so I could give her some cash. She kept asking me to pray for her and how important it was because she had more vital spiritual needs than the material ones.
________
I wondered in every one of those cases, how could I offer long term commitment to help? When do I hand over the responsibilities to other people? It's a really tough call to follow. Need so much grace for it to happen! Still exploring....:)
Saturday, May 13, 2006
Snipers
According to the DISC personality test, because I am a super "S" type - I have learnt to cope with my environment by learning to be more objective and rational over people. I swear - that is a big challenge in the face of sniper-type personalities - you know, the kind who cannot resist giving you all their snipey little barbed, bullets of the day. Never fails to bring a good mood down to earth.
Is it a uniquely Singaporean social greeting to make comments about one's appearance? Like "You look very tired/haggard/fat/wierd etc." Whatever happened to just courteously asking after someone's general well-being or family?
The response that always runs in my head is - Oh gee, thanks for pointing it out! I wouldn't have been able to guess. I mean hello, if the person looks tired, he probably knows that he looks it and does not need you to unceremoniously point out how big his eyebags are, or how paunchy he is looking etc.
Of course, the silly part is, I know I have done that to people myself. Its like this horrible mechanism that pops into play - before you know it, you have said the dreaded words, "Oh wow....you look (Fill in the uncomplimentary blank)" ARGH. You have crossed over to the dark side before you know it.
Ok, must repent from planks of primary forest in my eye.
Must consciously say in head, whenever feel tempted to make 'evil comments' about someone's appearance, must replace with 'more encouraging comment' or better yet, just not comment at all.
The tongue! It is such a little monster!
Is it a uniquely Singaporean social greeting to make comments about one's appearance? Like "You look very tired/haggard/fat/wierd etc." Whatever happened to just courteously asking after someone's general well-being or family?
The response that always runs in my head is - Oh gee, thanks for pointing it out! I wouldn't have been able to guess. I mean hello, if the person looks tired, he probably knows that he looks it and does not need you to unceremoniously point out how big his eyebags are, or how paunchy he is looking etc.
Of course, the silly part is, I know I have done that to people myself. Its like this horrible mechanism that pops into play - before you know it, you have said the dreaded words, "Oh wow....you look (Fill in the uncomplimentary blank)" ARGH. You have crossed over to the dark side before you know it.
Ok, must repent from planks of primary forest in my eye.
Must consciously say in head, whenever feel tempted to make 'evil comments' about someone's appearance, must replace with 'more encouraging comment' or better yet, just not comment at all.
The tongue! It is such a little monster!
Thursday, May 11, 2006
The Measure of a Man
Have been preparing for the Prejudice & Discrimination lecture this weekend by watching this PBS documentary - "Ghosts of Rwanda". Its a stunning piece of work - full of astoundingly frank interviews with witnesses from all levels of the 1994 genocide and their reflections on what they did to help or harm. From the big movers and shakers who basically waffled and did too little too late - like Kofi Annan, Madeline Albright, Clinton - to the NGO workers, reporters,UN soldiers and victims on the ground who were face to face with monstrosity. There was even an interview with one of the Tutsi extremist murderers who had eventually converted and repented of his actions.
There were several parts of the documentary that made me so incredibly angry. We can be such stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid evil creatures.
Watching the clip of the then-Hutu extremist leader Bagassora proclaiming with absolute righteousness that every Tutsi deserved to be destroyed made me so damnably frustrated that I actually hit the table with my fist. I just wanted to punch the *#$@!. It was a stupid, meaningless act but the only one I was capable of as a distant viewer, watching atrocities in the haven of a ridiculously privileged little Asian nation, through the pixels of a TV screen, immortalised in the shiny rainbow surface of a pretty shrink-wrapped DVD.
And then there were all those amazing unsung heroes who rejected the chance to flee for sanctuary, stood their ground and refused to turn away from mass murder: Un-named,unarmed UN officers who had nothing but wooden chairs, staunch moral conviction and bare hands to push away murderers who wanted to enter a church to kill the 1000s of Tutsis hiding within; Carl, the lone church worker - the only American expatriate to chose to stay in Rwanda when the whole expat community fled - who managed to save more people than his ENTIRE GOVERNMENT could by confronting Bagassora himself in a chance meeting. Mbaye, the Senegalese UN captain who ignored instructions to stay neutral and herded 1000 Tutsis to safe zones on his own initiative.
An Irish BBC reporter is shown in the documentary walking past 5000 bleached, shrunken corpses lain out in a church courtyard, piled there by their murderers. There is no mistaking the pain in his voice as he remembers seeing a pristine white statue of Jesus Christ with arms extended in welcome while below him, draped on the steps of the church is a rotting corpse, with arms similarly spread out. He said,"I was raised an Irish Catholic but I had drifted far far away from my religion. But that day, I looked at Jesus and I prayed for His Kingdom Come."
When I watched the political giants stumble over their words, shift their eyes away and twitch the corners of their mouths as they tried to explain how they could have turned away from such Evil, I realised one thing more powerfully than ever.
The measure of a man is not his earthly power - his riches, his power suit, his military might, his political position, his number of MBAs and glittering portfolio of experiences. All those countless stupid ads for luxury watches and diamonds that proclaim otherwise can bite me - not one of those silly trinkets defines who I truly am.
The measure of a man is the moral choice he makes in the face of Injustice and Evil.
When everybody else flees and everything turns mad, what kind of person you are behind all the gloss then becomes starkly apparent.
The documentary made me really realise:
I have no love for cowards and hand-twisting naysayers.
I have no love for smarmy, empty political rhetoric.
I hate too clever-by-half, snotty little soundbite answers for terrible problems.
I hate complacency and the excuse, "It's not my problem." or "I did not know".
The anger that came out of me while watching the documentary makes me seriously wonder what kind of person I will be in any ethical storm - as large as a national genocide or as small as a classroom decision.
Will I take my stand and take heart, seek refuge in the fact that I did what God demands? To save the wretched, the helpless, the child, the widow?
Or will I flee and seek refuge in nice-sounding euphemistic explanations? And worse, bleat God's name in vain to justify my inaction and complacency?
The measure of a man surely is in whether he chooses the narrow RIGHT WAY that is less trodden or whether he chooses the wide, crowded SAFE WAY to destruction.
When my kids watch the clip this Saturday, I hope and pray that something sensible will sit inside them and help them see that.
As for me and my bile against the murderous thugs of this world - I jsut hope I will remember "But for the grace of God, there go I!"
There were several parts of the documentary that made me so incredibly angry. We can be such stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid evil creatures.
Watching the clip of the then-Hutu extremist leader Bagassora proclaiming with absolute righteousness that every Tutsi deserved to be destroyed made me so damnably frustrated that I actually hit the table with my fist. I just wanted to punch the *#$@!. It was a stupid, meaningless act but the only one I was capable of as a distant viewer, watching atrocities in the haven of a ridiculously privileged little Asian nation, through the pixels of a TV screen, immortalised in the shiny rainbow surface of a pretty shrink-wrapped DVD.
And then there were all those amazing unsung heroes who rejected the chance to flee for sanctuary, stood their ground and refused to turn away from mass murder: Un-named,unarmed UN officers who had nothing but wooden chairs, staunch moral conviction and bare hands to push away murderers who wanted to enter a church to kill the 1000s of Tutsis hiding within; Carl, the lone church worker - the only American expatriate to chose to stay in Rwanda when the whole expat community fled - who managed to save more people than his ENTIRE GOVERNMENT could by confronting Bagassora himself in a chance meeting. Mbaye, the Senegalese UN captain who ignored instructions to stay neutral and herded 1000 Tutsis to safe zones on his own initiative.
An Irish BBC reporter is shown in the documentary walking past 5000 bleached, shrunken corpses lain out in a church courtyard, piled there by their murderers. There is no mistaking the pain in his voice as he remembers seeing a pristine white statue of Jesus Christ with arms extended in welcome while below him, draped on the steps of the church is a rotting corpse, with arms similarly spread out. He said,"I was raised an Irish Catholic but I had drifted far far away from my religion. But that day, I looked at Jesus and I prayed for His Kingdom Come."
When I watched the political giants stumble over their words, shift their eyes away and twitch the corners of their mouths as they tried to explain how they could have turned away from such Evil, I realised one thing more powerfully than ever.
The measure of a man is not his earthly power - his riches, his power suit, his military might, his political position, his number of MBAs and glittering portfolio of experiences. All those countless stupid ads for luxury watches and diamonds that proclaim otherwise can bite me - not one of those silly trinkets defines who I truly am.
The measure of a man is the moral choice he makes in the face of Injustice and Evil.
When everybody else flees and everything turns mad, what kind of person you are behind all the gloss then becomes starkly apparent.
The documentary made me really realise:
I have no love for cowards and hand-twisting naysayers.
I have no love for smarmy, empty political rhetoric.
I hate too clever-by-half, snotty little soundbite answers for terrible problems.
I hate complacency and the excuse, "It's not my problem." or "I did not know".
The anger that came out of me while watching the documentary makes me seriously wonder what kind of person I will be in any ethical storm - as large as a national genocide or as small as a classroom decision.
Will I take my stand and take heart, seek refuge in the fact that I did what God demands? To save the wretched, the helpless, the child, the widow?
Or will I flee and seek refuge in nice-sounding euphemistic explanations? And worse, bleat God's name in vain to justify my inaction and complacency?
The measure of a man surely is in whether he chooses the narrow RIGHT WAY that is less trodden or whether he chooses the wide, crowded SAFE WAY to destruction.
When my kids watch the clip this Saturday, I hope and pray that something sensible will sit inside them and help them see that.
As for me and my bile against the murderous thugs of this world - I jsut hope I will remember "But for the grace of God, there go I!"
Monday, May 01, 2006
Confessions of Ashara Stormborn, 4th level Cleric of Stormreach
Over the weekend, I was reminded that I had not been updating my blog for the longest time. Its kinda flattering to know people are reading your scribblings, so easily flattered goof that I am, I shall be suckered into trying to update again.
Anyhow: The reason why I have been offline on Blogger is pretty prosaic - I have been disgustingly obsessively playing Dungeons and Dragons Online, which launched in in April. It's my very first MMPORG - Massive Multi-player Online Role-playing Game. Within 30 days, I have racked up a shameful amount of gameplay into the wee hours of morning. But hey, anything to pry that +1 Flameburst Morningstar from the cold virtual hands of the evil Minotaur Priest right?
So in a short bunch of weeks, I have become one of the subculture of gaming nerds that sit in the LAN gaming centres at 3am, yelling, "RUN! THE SPIDER IS BEHIND!! WAH LAUUUUUUUUUUU." I have become well-acquainted with the bursts of virtual gunfire from Counterstrike ("Lock and Lode!" "Terrorists Win!") as well as the grunts of hard-working orcs from World of Warcraft ("workwork").
Apart from fulfilling my persistent need for gaming, it's a really fascinating phenomenon to dissect psychologically and sociologically. Ok, ok - so it sounds like yaya papaya justification for an insidiously time-consuming teenage-boy hobby but REALLY, I think the applications of MMPORG technology and thinking in other fields would be interesting to explore.
Darling Wikipedia informs us:
"MMORPGs have existed since the early 1990s. However, they have a history that extends back into the late 1970s. Over 25 years ago, players would connect to an entirely text-based world (no graphics) called a MUD (Multi-User Dungeon) which was usually hosted at a University, sometimes without the knowledge of the system's administrators. The gameplay and community of these games was similar to the MMORPGs of today. MMORPGs have begun to attract significant academic attention, notably in the fields of economics and psychology that study relationships between real world economies and societies vs. synthetic economies and societies...."
What I think is interesting is how we take our real life personalities and ethics into the virtual world as well. Gaming - like sports - presents insights into people's motivations and character. I read somewhere that the cleric class tends to attract certain types of people - either the person wants to be really independent and self sufficient (able to fight and heal himself at the same time) or he does not mind using his own resources to help other people (spending spell points on healing other people instead of conserving for himself) Sounds more or less like why I keep playing the class.
Now based on that little tidbit of human psychology, we tested it out in real gameplay. My friend played a wizard and she got herself cursed and blinded - essentially useless to the party. I was too low level a cleric to have the spell Remove Curse/Blindness. So we sent her to a tavern in the game where other players from all over the world hang out and had her send a virtual shout-out, "Alms for the blind? Help the blind and needy". In-game, when you are cursed it is obvious to everybody as there is a gigantic ugly red and black light above your head. Sure enough, a total stranger helped out.
She, being Christian, could not resist sending out another virtual shout-out, "I was blind but now I see! Thnx."
Heh. Ok, Shall go find more serious topics to write about soon.
Meanwhile, I am officially a geek.
But you know....even The Geek shall inherit. haha
Anyhow: The reason why I have been offline on Blogger is pretty prosaic - I have been disgustingly obsessively playing Dungeons and Dragons Online, which launched in in April. It's my very first MMPORG - Massive Multi-player Online Role-playing Game. Within 30 days, I have racked up a shameful amount of gameplay into the wee hours of morning. But hey, anything to pry that +1 Flameburst Morningstar from the cold virtual hands of the evil Minotaur Priest right?
So in a short bunch of weeks, I have become one of the subculture of gaming nerds that sit in the LAN gaming centres at 3am, yelling, "RUN! THE SPIDER IS BEHIND!! WAH LAUUUUUUUUUUU." I have become well-acquainted with the bursts of virtual gunfire from Counterstrike ("Lock and Lode!" "Terrorists Win!") as well as the grunts of hard-working orcs from World of Warcraft ("workwork").
Apart from fulfilling my persistent need for gaming, it's a really fascinating phenomenon to dissect psychologically and sociologically. Ok, ok - so it sounds like yaya papaya justification for an insidiously time-consuming teenage-boy hobby but REALLY, I think the applications of MMPORG technology and thinking in other fields would be interesting to explore.
Darling Wikipedia informs us:
"MMORPGs have existed since the early 1990s. However, they have a history that extends back into the late 1970s. Over 25 years ago, players would connect to an entirely text-based world (no graphics) called a MUD (Multi-User Dungeon) which was usually hosted at a University, sometimes without the knowledge of the system's administrators. The gameplay and community of these games was similar to the MMORPGs of today. MMORPGs have begun to attract significant academic attention, notably in the fields of economics and psychology that study relationships between real world economies and societies vs. synthetic economies and societies...."
What I think is interesting is how we take our real life personalities and ethics into the virtual world as well. Gaming - like sports - presents insights into people's motivations and character. I read somewhere that the cleric class tends to attract certain types of people - either the person wants to be really independent and self sufficient (able to fight and heal himself at the same time) or he does not mind using his own resources to help other people (spending spell points on healing other people instead of conserving for himself) Sounds more or less like why I keep playing the class.
Now based on that little tidbit of human psychology, we tested it out in real gameplay. My friend played a wizard and she got herself cursed and blinded - essentially useless to the party. I was too low level a cleric to have the spell Remove Curse/Blindness. So we sent her to a tavern in the game where other players from all over the world hang out and had her send a virtual shout-out, "Alms for the blind? Help the blind and needy". In-game, when you are cursed it is obvious to everybody as there is a gigantic ugly red and black light above your head. Sure enough, a total stranger helped out.
She, being Christian, could not resist sending out another virtual shout-out, "I was blind but now I see! Thnx."
Heh. Ok, Shall go find more serious topics to write about soon.
Meanwhile, I am officially a geek.
But you know....even The Geek shall inherit. haha
Sunday, March 05, 2006
Miracles large and small
A friend who went through much in life penned her thoughts on miracles to a group of us through email.
I thought it was quite poignant. Decided to doctor it a little, change the structure to disguise its writer.
But essentially this is it. Wanted to blog it, to share and remember it.
I think sometimes its just sweet to savour the miracle of being loved across the universe
- To know that Someone thought you worth the time and effort to befriend and behold.
The same sweet Someone who takes our inner desert of death and dryness,
digs and dwelves out a spectacular, gushing, flowing fountain of Life
and grows a Kingdom,
Amazing grace indeed :)
And now from J herself:
"There are times when my soul craves for the spectacular.
I cry out, like a child to the Father,
for mountains to crumble, clouds to burn, oceans to part, the dead to walk.
But of course, He knows better.
In the past, the children of Israel did not have God inside them.
He was outside.
So God needed to shout with the spectacular to get their attention.
Today, God is in us. Remain in him. He remains in you.
When He moves, we know.
We don't need to rely on the spectacular.
Today's miracles are just as spectacular.
But we don't see them outside because it is all INSIDE.
What we read about and gaped at in the old, is but a reflection of the greater in the new:
The spectacular within.
Today, walls still come tumbling down. Not of bricks and motar which we read about.
But of bitterness made sweet, unforgiveness turned mercy, fear turned to courage
Seas still part. Inside us.
Walls still fall. Inside us.
Darkness blazes into light. Inside us.
What was dead comes to life. Inside us.
Stone becomes flesh. Inside us.
One glorious day, these things will all happen in the Land of the Living once more in even fuller glory than ever.
Till then, we take heart, and wait on Him..the One who brings all things to pass.
It was so easy for me to miss the miracles that happen today.
I was looking outside."
I thought it was quite poignant. Decided to doctor it a little, change the structure to disguise its writer.
But essentially this is it. Wanted to blog it, to share and remember it.
I think sometimes its just sweet to savour the miracle of being loved across the universe
- To know that Someone thought you worth the time and effort to befriend and behold.
The same sweet Someone who takes our inner desert of death and dryness,
digs and dwelves out a spectacular, gushing, flowing fountain of Life
and grows a Kingdom,
Amazing grace indeed :)
And now from J herself:
"There are times when my soul craves for the spectacular.
I cry out, like a child to the Father,
for mountains to crumble, clouds to burn, oceans to part, the dead to walk.
But of course, He knows better.
In the past, the children of Israel did not have God inside them.
He was outside.
So God needed to shout with the spectacular to get their attention.
Today, God is in us. Remain in him. He remains in you.
When He moves, we know.
We don't need to rely on the spectacular.
Today's miracles are just as spectacular.
But we don't see them outside because it is all INSIDE.
What we read about and gaped at in the old, is but a reflection of the greater in the new:
The spectacular within.
Today, walls still come tumbling down. Not of bricks and motar which we read about.
But of bitterness made sweet, unforgiveness turned mercy, fear turned to courage
Seas still part. Inside us.
Walls still fall. Inside us.
Darkness blazes into light. Inside us.
What was dead comes to life. Inside us.
Stone becomes flesh. Inside us.
One glorious day, these things will all happen in the Land of the Living once more in even fuller glory than ever.
Till then, we take heart, and wait on Him..the One who brings all things to pass.
It was so easy for me to miss the miracles that happen today.
I was looking outside."
Thursday, March 02, 2006
thoughts on teaching
this year i started teaching at a church run non-profit school for dropouts preparing for O level exams. The first thing that struck me when I walked into class on the first day was the collective visual impact they made.
The fact that all of them came in their own crazy piercings, coloured hair, ripped outfits, tattoos and make-up was jarring. My first thought was "Wow. I better know what I am saying. These guys are in their full on tribal regalia." It was massively cool in a "Dangerous Minds" sort of way but also fairly intimidating in much the same fashion. The first row of kids that faced me were Neo-goth punk boys. Two wore mascara, one had tattoos all over - including his girlfriend's name across his fingers and one massive neck tattoo of a pair of praying hands. He also had two gloriously huge, 50 cent size holes in his ear lobes.
I never gave much thought to the whole "wear uniform or dont wear uniform" debate. After all, I was used to putting on my little boring pinafore all the way till JC. I do understand now why they say putting students in school uniforms really does have a disempowering effect - all the students are made to look like carbon copies while you, the teacher, are in the position of power by virtue of your difference in outfit. It's akin to how soldiers, servants and factory workers all dress one way and generals, bosses and masters dress another.
Its been four weeks so far and already I see they are truly a tribe of their own, quite separate from the pristine mainstream. I have a sweet, lovely young librarian-looking girl next door who is already married with a little kid. When she waits outside the school with her Far East kid of a husband, I have to remind myself they are parents, not kids. I have a Young and Dangerous lookalike who can tell me he had not been turning up for class because he was clearing up a case at the police station.
But beneath the bizarro external side lies fascinating little stories. My mascara boy who togs himself up in skinny Britband ties and big punk pants shared with me that he loves designing Perenakan jewellery. My bouncer-looking, stocky mat-rocker biker boy reveals quite happily to the rest of the class that he is proud to be virgin and says his ambition is to be a good husband and provider to his future wife and kids.
Just this year, a fellow teacher shared with me some wise advice - "We teach who we are."
A good teacher prepares his students for exams. A great teacher prepares his students for life.
And of course, life is that funny slippery thing that can never be taught via text book...it can only be demonstrated, modelled, lived and shared. It is passed on through the ether, between the lines.
It's something I have grown very conscious of with my new discerning, tough as nails audience. I obviously come from a culture vastly different from theirs. They know it, I know it. Thankfully, they are sweet enough at heart not to hold it against me as long as I do the same for them.
How should I speak and teach such that they do not feel the difference between us, but the commonality that we actually share? How do I translate principles into lingo and images they understand?
Blogging is a funny thing - In an odd way, it is easier for me to be vulnerable through the medium of written words. You have the armour of weighed out thought and you don't directly face your audience and witness the immediate twitches people make in reaction to your words. It really is quite another dimension to learn how to be vulnerable on the fly, on the spot, at the moment when someone asks a cutting question or makes a shrewd personal remark.
The most powerful thing we can share with another person is the Truth of who we were, who we are and what we will be.
Yet it is the most frightening thing in the world to be truly vulnerable. It requires inhuman humility that only God can teach.
I guess to be a truly great teacher, you got to start and always continue to be a truly great learner. I need God to show me I can never think of myself more highly or lowly than I should. That's so tricky!
Anyhoo.....that appears to be one of my lessons for the year. Let's see how many decades I will take to ingest that!
The fact that all of them came in their own crazy piercings, coloured hair, ripped outfits, tattoos and make-up was jarring. My first thought was "Wow. I better know what I am saying. These guys are in their full on tribal regalia." It was massively cool in a "Dangerous Minds" sort of way but also fairly intimidating in much the same fashion. The first row of kids that faced me were Neo-goth punk boys. Two wore mascara, one had tattoos all over - including his girlfriend's name across his fingers and one massive neck tattoo of a pair of praying hands. He also had two gloriously huge, 50 cent size holes in his ear lobes.
I never gave much thought to the whole "wear uniform or dont wear uniform" debate. After all, I was used to putting on my little boring pinafore all the way till JC. I do understand now why they say putting students in school uniforms really does have a disempowering effect - all the students are made to look like carbon copies while you, the teacher, are in the position of power by virtue of your difference in outfit. It's akin to how soldiers, servants and factory workers all dress one way and generals, bosses and masters dress another.
Its been four weeks so far and already I see they are truly a tribe of their own, quite separate from the pristine mainstream. I have a sweet, lovely young librarian-looking girl next door who is already married with a little kid. When she waits outside the school with her Far East kid of a husband, I have to remind myself they are parents, not kids. I have a Young and Dangerous lookalike who can tell me he had not been turning up for class because he was clearing up a case at the police station.
But beneath the bizarro external side lies fascinating little stories. My mascara boy who togs himself up in skinny Britband ties and big punk pants shared with me that he loves designing Perenakan jewellery. My bouncer-looking, stocky mat-rocker biker boy reveals quite happily to the rest of the class that he is proud to be virgin and says his ambition is to be a good husband and provider to his future wife and kids.
Just this year, a fellow teacher shared with me some wise advice - "We teach who we are."
A good teacher prepares his students for exams. A great teacher prepares his students for life.
And of course, life is that funny slippery thing that can never be taught via text book...it can only be demonstrated, modelled, lived and shared. It is passed on through the ether, between the lines.
It's something I have grown very conscious of with my new discerning, tough as nails audience. I obviously come from a culture vastly different from theirs. They know it, I know it. Thankfully, they are sweet enough at heart not to hold it against me as long as I do the same for them.
How should I speak and teach such that they do not feel the difference between us, but the commonality that we actually share? How do I translate principles into lingo and images they understand?
Blogging is a funny thing - In an odd way, it is easier for me to be vulnerable through the medium of written words. You have the armour of weighed out thought and you don't directly face your audience and witness the immediate twitches people make in reaction to your words. It really is quite another dimension to learn how to be vulnerable on the fly, on the spot, at the moment when someone asks a cutting question or makes a shrewd personal remark.
The most powerful thing we can share with another person is the Truth of who we were, who we are and what we will be.
Yet it is the most frightening thing in the world to be truly vulnerable. It requires inhuman humility that only God can teach.
I guess to be a truly great teacher, you got to start and always continue to be a truly great learner. I need God to show me I can never think of myself more highly or lowly than I should. That's so tricky!
Anyhoo.....that appears to be one of my lessons for the year. Let's see how many decades I will take to ingest that!
Monday, February 27, 2006
tagged :)
have been so offline that i did not realise i got tagged by Miz C all the way from Beijing. Ok, just for you, babe. :)
Seven Dreams Before Death:
1. See Italy again
2. Kiss a guy that I love
3. Publish a School of Thought book
4. Visit Auschwitz
5. Start a youth ministry
6. Have the perfect hostess' kitchen
7. Start and finish my own graphic novel
Seven Things I Can't Do In This Lifetime
1. Be perfect
2. Kiss a guy that I don't love
3. Give up dreaming
4. Give up carbs
5. Drive
6. Look anything like Stephanie Sun
7. Understand accountancy and the theory of relativity. (i tried many times and failed)
Seven Things that Attract Me
1. a man who has learnt to be grateful for all that he has
2. humbleness in any company
3. wisdom to listen
4. an ability to laugh out loud
5. ability to both offer honest criticism and honest praise
6. an open, generous, kind heart
7. Self-awareness
Seven Things I Say
1. "Okaaay, can you rephrase that in another way?" (classroom)
2. "Think...don't just wait for my answer....think!" (classroom)
3. "Wah lau...."
4. "orrrr?! Win already lor!"
5. "Oooh...!" (for good food, nice clothes, smarmy attempt to make fun of people etc)
6. "...(random made-up tune)..."
7. "I don't THINK so...!"
Seven Books I Love (guilty pleasures included)
1. The Song of Ice and Fire series (George RR Martin)
2. The Dragonlance series - Chronicles and Legends only
3. Donald Miller's Looking for God Knows What
4. CS Lewis' Mere Christianity
5. The Bible - especially the Book of John
6. Philip Yancey's What's So Amazing about Grace / Soul Survivor
7. Doestevsky's Brothers Karamazov
Seven Movies I Love (guilty pleasures included)
1. Memento - too clever by half
2. Defending Your Life - nerd full of fears and too many words gets the smart girl.
3. Can't Buy Me Love - i love me a nerd gets the girl tale. this is classic
4. Pretty Woman - honestly, it's a heckuva trashy movie that I can watch again and again.
5. LOTR trilogy - especially Two Towers, come on, its Helm's Deep!!!!
6. Before Sunrise/ Before Sunset - killer chemistry. realistic characters.
7. 2046 - did not love the show as much as i loved the train of thought it was able to spark off. would never watch it again.
all the people i could tag have been tagged....although if you are reading, SkinUp, HKGirl..I would love to see your list!:)
Seven Dreams Before Death:
1. See Italy again
2. Kiss a guy that I love
3. Publish a School of Thought book
4. Visit Auschwitz
5. Start a youth ministry
6. Have the perfect hostess' kitchen
7. Start and finish my own graphic novel
Seven Things I Can't Do In This Lifetime
1. Be perfect
2. Kiss a guy that I don't love
3. Give up dreaming
4. Give up carbs
5. Drive
6. Look anything like Stephanie Sun
7. Understand accountancy and the theory of relativity. (i tried many times and failed)
Seven Things that Attract Me
1. a man who has learnt to be grateful for all that he has
2. humbleness in any company
3. wisdom to listen
4. an ability to laugh out loud
5. ability to both offer honest criticism and honest praise
6. an open, generous, kind heart
7. Self-awareness
Seven Things I Say
1. "Okaaay, can you rephrase that in another way?" (classroom)
2. "Think...don't just wait for my answer....think!" (classroom)
3. "Wah lau...."
4. "orrrr?! Win already lor!"
5. "Oooh...!" (for good food, nice clothes, smarmy attempt to make fun of people etc)
6. "...(random made-up tune)..."
7. "I don't THINK so...!"
Seven Books I Love (guilty pleasures included)
1. The Song of Ice and Fire series (George RR Martin)
2. The Dragonlance series - Chronicles and Legends only
3. Donald Miller's Looking for God Knows What
4. CS Lewis' Mere Christianity
5. The Bible - especially the Book of John
6. Philip Yancey's What's So Amazing about Grace / Soul Survivor
7. Doestevsky's Brothers Karamazov
Seven Movies I Love (guilty pleasures included)
1. Memento - too clever by half
2. Defending Your Life - nerd full of fears and too many words gets the smart girl.
3. Can't Buy Me Love - i love me a nerd gets the girl tale. this is classic
4. Pretty Woman - honestly, it's a heckuva trashy movie that I can watch again and again.
5. LOTR trilogy - especially Two Towers, come on, its Helm's Deep!!!!
6. Before Sunrise/ Before Sunset - killer chemistry. realistic characters.
7. 2046 - did not love the show as much as i loved the train of thought it was able to spark off. would never watch it again.
all the people i could tag have been tagged....although if you are reading, SkinUp, HKGirl..I would love to see your list!:)
Monday, February 06, 2006
h@te!
I REALLY REALLY REALLY h@te the overuse of "@".
I get severe heartburn (akin to when I hear timmy thomas' Dying Inside To Hold You, but that's a rant for another day) when I see it! So was superduper amused when I found someone had already written a diatribe on it. I particularly love his analogy about the 50 year old man - it really really hits the spot! :)
BadBranding@Singapore by Imagethief
"I keep thinking that the brand developers of Singapore will outgrow "@", and they keep disappointing me. I was scandalized five years ago when the glamorous, new office tower at Dhoby Ghaut was named "Atrium@Orchard". In 2006 using "@" in a brand is beyond unforgivable. It's the branding equivalent of a fifty-year old man with a pot-belly and severe male-pattern baldness growing a pony tail and getting his ears pierced in a futile attempt to stay youthfully hip. It reveals a failure to grasp contemporary style that is so final and absolute that it obliterates by definition the very sensibility that it was meant to create."
I get severe heartburn (akin to when I hear timmy thomas' Dying Inside To Hold You, but that's a rant for another day) when I see it! So was superduper amused when I found someone had already written a diatribe on it. I particularly love his analogy about the 50 year old man - it really really hits the spot! :)
BadBranding@Singapore by Imagethief
"I keep thinking that the brand developers of Singapore will outgrow "@", and they keep disappointing me. I was scandalized five years ago when the glamorous, new office tower at Dhoby Ghaut was named "Atrium@Orchard". In 2006 using "@" in a brand is beyond unforgivable. It's the branding equivalent of a fifty-year old man with a pot-belly and severe male-pattern baldness growing a pony tail and getting his ears pierced in a futile attempt to stay youthfully hip. It reveals a failure to grasp contemporary style that is so final and absolute that it obliterates by definition the very sensibility that it was meant to create."
Wednesday, February 01, 2006
The Meme of Four
4 jobs you have had in your life (discounting current job)
1: Waitress
2: Burger Flipper
3: Editor
4: Designer / Illustrator
4 movies you have willingly watched more than once
1: Defending Your Life
2: The Breakfast Club
3: Can't Buy Me Love
4: Dirty Dancing
4 interesting places you have slept in:
1: 6 months in a Spanish inspired appartment in Westwood, California
2: 3 years on a mattress under my studio table in the School of Architecture, Singapore
3: 1 sleepless night at the hostel Carlito's Way, Rome
4: 1 prayerful night on a roughspun bunk in a Monastery of Silence, France
4 T.V. heroes you loved as a kid
1: Bob, the pianist on Sesame Street
2: Jem, the pink haired superstar (truly truly outrageous!)
3: Tony Hart, the artist on TV whose pet was Morph, the plasticine man
4: the guys on the Curiosity Show
1: Waitress
2: Burger Flipper
3: Editor
4: Designer / Illustrator
4 movies you have willingly watched more than once
1: Defending Your Life
2: The Breakfast Club
3: Can't Buy Me Love
4: Dirty Dancing
4 interesting places you have slept in:
1: 6 months in a Spanish inspired appartment in Westwood, California
2: 3 years on a mattress under my studio table in the School of Architecture, Singapore
3: 1 sleepless night at the hostel Carlito's Way, Rome
4: 1 prayerful night on a roughspun bunk in a Monastery of Silence, France
4 T.V. heroes you loved as a kid
1: Bob, the pianist on Sesame Street
2: Jem, the pink haired superstar (truly truly outrageous!)
3: Tony Hart, the artist on TV whose pet was Morph, the plasticine man
4: the guys on the Curiosity Show
Tuesday, January 31, 2006
literary memes?
Literary Meme #1: Stray Thoughts
"1. Grab the nearest book
2. Open the book to page 123
3. Find the fifth sentence
4. Post the text of the next 3 sentences (#5,6,7) on your blog, along with these instructions.
5. Don't you dare dig for that "cool" or "intellectual" book in your closet! I know you were thinking about it. Just grab what is closest. No cheating."
My nearest book was in my bag "Soul Survivor - How 13 Unlikely Mentors Helped Me Survive The Church" by Philip Yancey. The sentences come from the chapter about Leo Tolstoy and Feodor Dostoevsky. Two authors I keep feeling inspired to read but never actually getting down to it.
"As I look back now on the cloister of Southern fundamentalism in which I grew up, I wonder if perhaps I suffered from a narcissitic disorder. I saw the world through the shuttered windows of church and family, with no ability to project out of myself and comprehend the viewpoint of, say, a sharecropper in rural Alabama or a Polish immigrant in the Bronx, much less a member of the aristocracy or a peasant in 19th century Russia. Tolstoy threw open the curtains, beckoning me into a world I knew nothing about."
Great book! The opening chapter about pastor turned controversial civil rights activist Martin Luther King Jr. and the closing chapter about Catholic priest Henri Nouwen are truly moving. The last paragraph in the Nouwen chapter is just....phwoar.
Literary Meme #2: 6 Writers who Shaped Your Thinking (and their book that meant the most to you so far)
1) Louisa M Alcott - the Little Women quartet (Little Women, Good Wives, Little Men and Jo's Boys)
2) Anita Roddick - Business as Unusual
3) Paul of Tarsus - First Letter to the Corinthians
4) John Zebedee- The Gospel of John
5) Philip Yancey - What's So Amazing About Grace?
6) C S Lewis - Mere Christianity
"1. Grab the nearest book
2. Open the book to page 123
3. Find the fifth sentence
4. Post the text of the next 3 sentences (#5,6,7) on your blog, along with these instructions.
5. Don't you dare dig for that "cool" or "intellectual" book in your closet! I know you were thinking about it. Just grab what is closest. No cheating."
My nearest book was in my bag "Soul Survivor - How 13 Unlikely Mentors Helped Me Survive The Church" by Philip Yancey. The sentences come from the chapter about Leo Tolstoy and Feodor Dostoevsky. Two authors I keep feeling inspired to read but never actually getting down to it.
"As I look back now on the cloister of Southern fundamentalism in which I grew up, I wonder if perhaps I suffered from a narcissitic disorder. I saw the world through the shuttered windows of church and family, with no ability to project out of myself and comprehend the viewpoint of, say, a sharecropper in rural Alabama or a Polish immigrant in the Bronx, much less a member of the aristocracy or a peasant in 19th century Russia. Tolstoy threw open the curtains, beckoning me into a world I knew nothing about."
Great book! The opening chapter about pastor turned controversial civil rights activist Martin Luther King Jr. and the closing chapter about Catholic priest Henri Nouwen are truly moving. The last paragraph in the Nouwen chapter is just....phwoar.
Literary Meme #2: 6 Writers who Shaped Your Thinking (and their book that meant the most to you so far)
1) Louisa M Alcott - the Little Women quartet (Little Women, Good Wives, Little Men and Jo's Boys)
2) Anita Roddick - Business as Unusual
3) Paul of Tarsus - First Letter to the Corinthians
4) John Zebedee- The Gospel of John
5) Philip Yancey - What's So Amazing About Grace?
6) C S Lewis - Mere Christianity
Saturday, January 28, 2006
Faking Church
just thought i would plug a pretty good book I finished this week. It's called FAKING CHURCH by Dan Schaeffer. It addresses the phenomenon of how even the most well-intentioned Christian can be faking his way through his relationships with other people. Gently written as much as possible, this book is still a real jolting reminder that christians need to constantly take an honest look at why we serve and how we do so. I like that Schaeffer keeps everything very real, grounded in his own mistakes in ministry and in the cases he sees in his own church.
When I read it, I felt compelled to ask myself a lot of hard questions behind the things that I do or say. It's pretty humbling, sobering stuff and not for the faint of faith. But it is well worth a read whether you are serving in a ministry or not. :)
___________________
on the other side, I stumbled across a superduperly ODIOUS website full of self-righteous Christians mocking the works and ministries of other churches. Not gonna post their website address.
I was quite taken aback by their snide, easy judgementalism, all backed by dozens of Scriptural references. ARGH!!!!!!!! How can you look at God's words and not see? Worse of all, in the Comments section, you can read how they all pat each other on the back for being the faithful servants of God keeping the sinful world at bay. It's like "oh congratulations, you so rightfully pointed out that XXXXXXX looks exactly like a sluttish whore of Babylon on her book cover. Her eyes look exactly like a witch's. tsk tsk, she's going to hell."
ARGH ARGH ARGH. This is why 'conservative christians' has become an insult. No no no no. Why are you people doing this?! Have you not seen? Have you not heard? How many times did Jesus tell you he (not you!) will come to judge? You hard-hearted, blind .....gah! (end of rant)
When I read it, I felt compelled to ask myself a lot of hard questions behind the things that I do or say. It's pretty humbling, sobering stuff and not for the faint of faith. But it is well worth a read whether you are serving in a ministry or not. :)
___________________
on the other side, I stumbled across a superduperly ODIOUS website full of self-righteous Christians mocking the works and ministries of other churches. Not gonna post their website address.
I was quite taken aback by their snide, easy judgementalism, all backed by dozens of Scriptural references. ARGH!!!!!!!! How can you look at God's words and not see? Worse of all, in the Comments section, you can read how they all pat each other on the back for being the faithful servants of God keeping the sinful world at bay. It's like "oh congratulations, you so rightfully pointed out that XXXXXXX looks exactly like a sluttish whore of Babylon on her book cover. Her eyes look exactly like a witch's. tsk tsk, she's going to hell."
ARGH ARGH ARGH. This is why 'conservative christians' has become an insult. No no no no. Why are you people doing this?! Have you not seen? Have you not heard? How many times did Jesus tell you he (not you!) will come to judge? You hard-hearted, blind .....gah! (end of rant)
dream dream dream
this post is triggered off by Orangeclouds' posting about her strange angry dream. Suddenly made me recall that i had the oddest dream last night - one more to add to my collection of strange movie-dreams.
________________________________________________
I am hustling through a dark neighbourhood filled with confusing side-streets and poorly marked signposts. I am obviously hurrying "home" - wherever home is in the dream. A group of strangers run past me at one point carrying parangs. I am momentarily freaked but glad that they ignored me. Feeling tense and scared, I finally find the compound I am looking for.
In front of the compound, a guard says, "Quick, get in , get in, they are looking for people." He resumes sitting on his wooden stool, pretending to slump casually so he does not alert anyone of the tension going within the compound.
I fumble at the crusty old wooden gate, wondering where the latch is. When I finally find it and step in to the courtyard, I see a man being tended to by a woman. He sees me and says, "They chopped off my fingers."
I look at his hands - indeed, they are a mangled jigsaw of flesh. Some fingers are foreshortened, some have been crudely sewn back. His hands are an angry red colour.
I wake up.
___________________________________________________
bizarro. This goes down in the books, right next to my "Conversations with Hitler", "Japanese Samurai Household Dies in Symbolic Glory and "Attack of the KIller Cartoon Shark" dreams. They are just so way out there beyond comprehension.
My recurring dreams are simpler to understand - "Going To Europe And Discovering I did not Pack" is about fear of not being prepared. "Chinese Exam Day And Discovering I did not Study" is about fear of not being prepared (again!) and old chinese exam anxiety (yes, it still haunts me), "My Room Turns into the Temple of Doom!" is about my childhood paranoia about snakes.
I have yet to figure out what those dreams about losing all your teeth mean.
Best recurring dreams I have had would be "Travelling in Europe for a month and only waking up when plane touches down" (desire to go on more holidays) and "Cute Guy Shares Umbrella With Me in the Rain" (desire for cute guy to share umbrella with me in the rain? cheeeeem.)
Someday, it would be nice if God could tell us why he gave us strange dreams. Freud's answers just cannot make it ah!
________________________________________________
I am hustling through a dark neighbourhood filled with confusing side-streets and poorly marked signposts. I am obviously hurrying "home" - wherever home is in the dream. A group of strangers run past me at one point carrying parangs. I am momentarily freaked but glad that they ignored me. Feeling tense and scared, I finally find the compound I am looking for.
In front of the compound, a guard says, "Quick, get in , get in, they are looking for people." He resumes sitting on his wooden stool, pretending to slump casually so he does not alert anyone of the tension going within the compound.
I fumble at the crusty old wooden gate, wondering where the latch is. When I finally find it and step in to the courtyard, I see a man being tended to by a woman. He sees me and says, "They chopped off my fingers."
I look at his hands - indeed, they are a mangled jigsaw of flesh. Some fingers are foreshortened, some have been crudely sewn back. His hands are an angry red colour.
I wake up.
___________________________________________________
bizarro. This goes down in the books, right next to my "Conversations with Hitler", "Japanese Samurai Household Dies in Symbolic Glory and "Attack of the KIller Cartoon Shark" dreams. They are just so way out there beyond comprehension.
My recurring dreams are simpler to understand - "Going To Europe And Discovering I did not Pack" is about fear of not being prepared. "Chinese Exam Day And Discovering I did not Study" is about fear of not being prepared (again!) and old chinese exam anxiety (yes, it still haunts me), "My Room Turns into the Temple of Doom!" is about my childhood paranoia about snakes.
I have yet to figure out what those dreams about losing all your teeth mean.
Best recurring dreams I have had would be "Travelling in Europe for a month and only waking up when plane touches down" (desire to go on more holidays) and "Cute Guy Shares Umbrella With Me in the Rain" (desire for cute guy to share umbrella with me in the rain? cheeeeem.)
Someday, it would be nice if God could tell us why he gave us strange dreams. Freud's answers just cannot make it ah!
Wednesday, January 25, 2006
mental games
was looking at article about how Constance (the former VJC girl, ex air stewardess who fell in love with a karang guni man)finally got convicted for killing little Sindee Neo. The photo they had of Constance was so normal looking and sweet-faced. The psychologist's take was that Constance had spiralled into where she was now because her schizophrenia went unchecked.
I wonder what was going through her head from her fresh faced JC days all the way to her standing before the judge, getting her sentence.
here's one ridiculous conundrum i find myself on some moody days:
sometimes i will start by wishing people were easier to understand or easier to talk to.
Then I start wondering how easy I am for someone else to understand.
Then I worry that though I may think I am easy to get to know, I may be deceiving myself in actuality.
Then I start worrying about whether I am a hypocrite.
rinse. repeat. angst.
kick self in backside.
return to living normal life.
I wonder what other unproductive mental cycles of silliness we all have within us? Those private, bizarro self-defeating mental routines that are triggered by goodness knows what? What little madness-es do we have within us and hide?
sometimes when i see 'mad people' or extremely socially awkward people, i wonder exactly how disimilar i am actually from them.
hmm.
I wonder what was going through her head from her fresh faced JC days all the way to her standing before the judge, getting her sentence.
here's one ridiculous conundrum i find myself on some moody days:
sometimes i will start by wishing people were easier to understand or easier to talk to.
Then I start wondering how easy I am for someone else to understand.
Then I worry that though I may think I am easy to get to know, I may be deceiving myself in actuality.
Then I start worrying about whether I am a hypocrite.
rinse. repeat. angst.
kick self in backside.
return to living normal life.
I wonder what other unproductive mental cycles of silliness we all have within us? Those private, bizarro self-defeating mental routines that are triggered by goodness knows what? What little madness-es do we have within us and hide?
sometimes when i see 'mad people' or extremely socially awkward people, i wonder exactly how disimilar i am actually from them.
hmm.
Tuesday, January 24, 2006
boob tube
So on the 1030pm bus ride home, I lug myself up the double deck. Sit down and lo and behold, TV mobile is beaming the Victoria Secret show. The wonders of technology - Free Boob-Show across hundreds of buses across Singapore! LIVE! In Technicolour!
I am not exaggerating to say almost every single male on the upper floor could not keep their eyes from wandering towards the flickering images of boobsy supermodels struttin' their stuff in the flimsiest of bra and panty combos. Even I had a hard time stopping myself from giving the models the once over. After all, those ubiquitous angel wings and bling-blings Tyra Banks and Heidi Klum were sporting weren't exactly doing a great job at providing cover.
Quite funny to see how the Victoria Secret show tried to 'intelligent' up their show by having industry experts comment on how talented Miz Banks was, how she brought 'a certain something' to the poses and runway strut. Okaaaay.
Anyhow, its definitely a mildly disturbing experience to sit among a whole floor of guys - young teens and old uncles - so obviously hypnotised by the boob tube. Ack. It parallels the time I went to a comic convention and saw a whole ARMY of guys camcordering this girl dressed up as Lara Croft, the Tomb Raider. You could tell from their expressions what they were trying to capture. Ew ew ew!
hello, TV Mobile! what's up with the boob parade!?
I am not exaggerating to say almost every single male on the upper floor could not keep their eyes from wandering towards the flickering images of boobsy supermodels struttin' their stuff in the flimsiest of bra and panty combos. Even I had a hard time stopping myself from giving the models the once over. After all, those ubiquitous angel wings and bling-blings Tyra Banks and Heidi Klum were sporting weren't exactly doing a great job at providing cover.
Quite funny to see how the Victoria Secret show tried to 'intelligent' up their show by having industry experts comment on how talented Miz Banks was, how she brought 'a certain something' to the poses and runway strut. Okaaaay.
Anyhow, its definitely a mildly disturbing experience to sit among a whole floor of guys - young teens and old uncles - so obviously hypnotised by the boob tube. Ack. It parallels the time I went to a comic convention and saw a whole ARMY of guys camcordering this girl dressed up as Lara Croft, the Tomb Raider. You could tell from their expressions what they were trying to capture. Ew ew ew!
hello, TV Mobile! what's up with the boob parade!?
Wednesday, January 18, 2006
super belated christmas pic
Kudos to Alto for the trigger happiness. Kudos to all for the game participation in Mission:Carol To Your Folks.
People displayed love in many ways on christmas 2005. Let's keep that up and see what christmas 2006 will usher.
People displayed love in many ways on christmas 2005. Let's keep that up and see what christmas 2006 will usher.
Tuesday, January 17, 2006
An Insight into God's Love
Today's bible study was still on the 1st chapter of the Book of John. I had read through it in the afternoon and I was kind of dry of any major insights. Basically, nothing leapt out to me as particularly striking or memorable. So it was really encouraging to find that studying the Word together with the group at night brought a fresh look at what seemed like a pretty innocuous little episode in the dramatic Book of John. I must have breezed past these 5 verses so many times without catching how... profoundly... moving it is:
_____________________________________________________________________
John 1:44-50
Philip, like Andrew and Peter, was from the town of Bethsaida. Philip found Nathanael and told him, "We have found the one Moses wrote about in the Law, and about whom the prophets also wrote—Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph."
"Nazareth! Can anything good come from there?" Nathanael asked. "Come and see," said Philip.
When Jesus saw Nathanael approaching, he said of him, "Here is a true Israelite, in whom there is nothing false."
"How do you know me?" Nathanael asked.
Jesus answered, "I saw you while you were still under the fig tree before Philip called you."
Then Nathanael declared, "Rabbi, you are the Son of God; you are the King of Israel."
Jesus said, "You believe because I told you I saw you under the fig tree. You shall see greater things than that." He then added, "I tell you the truth, you shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man."
_____________________________________________________________________
You have to ask yourself, why on earth did John the Apostle think this little exchange between Jesus and Nat so worthy of recording? Nat is hardly an iconic figure versus Doubting Thomas or Peter the Rock. Nat hardly gets featured much beyond this little exchange. Up to now, I don't think I remembered there was even a Nat in the gospels. Jesus did, though, and I think that's the point.
Picture this: Nat walks up to Jesus without expectations. He thinks he is just checking out what Philip is making such a fuss about. He had just mused aloud to Philip about the impossibility of Jesus, the supposed heavenly Son of God, coming from a rundown backwater town like Nazareth.
Jesus looks at this guy, sums him up in a glance and makes this absolutely way-out compliment,"Here is a true Israelite, in whom there is nothing false." I mean, seriously...if someone came up to you and told you that you were 100% True Quality, you would gently remind the person, "Please! I am still human! I am not perfect."
Is Nat the True Israelite? If so, why aren't we writing books about him and calling him a saint? How could we have overlooked this paragon of virtue in history, certified by Jesus Christ himself? Surely, Nat must be a normal bloke. Nothing else in history - aside from this exchange - renders him otherwise (as normal as the rest of the disciples at least).
How about Nat's reply - "How do you know me?" Either Nat is being outrageously audacious in agreeing with Christ's assessment of him as Israel's Boy Wonder. OR he is being earnest, a little awed and doubting. I would go for the second option as I think it makes more sense.
If someone told me I was 100% True Quality, and if that someone was really quite perfect himself, I would respond that way. I would not be able to believe the compliment without hesitation. I would filter that compliment through my own glasses of self-introspection. I would like to know how it is that this guy Knows me in a way I don't Know myself.
No doubt this must be running through Nat's normal bloke-like head. That's what makes Jesus' reply so profoundly moving and enigmatic - "I saw you while you were still under the fig tree before Philip called you."
With one simple sweet sentence, he strikes right at Nat's heart, through every fear and every doubt. He just tells him I AM the God beyond all time and all space. I knew you even before it was your time to come to me. I saw you for what you were before I met you. And now that you stand before me, understand this - I Know. I Know.
That's all that Nat needs to realise the compliment is no less than God in human form Himself. His breath crushed out from him as he tries to grasp the bigness of what he has just heard, he declares in awe, '"Rabbi...you are the Son of God...you....are the King of Israel."
Convinced by the emotional power of the moment, he lays his first promise of faith before Jesus. Yet, his new Lord looks at him and Knows this as well. Jesus offers this very sharp insight in surprising gentleness and grace - "You believe because I told you I saw you under the fig tree. You shall see greater things than that. I tell you the truth, you shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man"
What amazing grace is this? Jesus knew Nat believed at this point only because of the sheer power and emotion of the moment. Yet he kindly promises him signs of greater things that will help his belief take deeper root and find larger form. Jesus saw/sees who Nat is/will become as long as he abides in Him - a true Israelite, without blemish or falsehood.
Nat may not be able to see himself as clearly as Jesus sees himself but One Day - One Final Day - he will. Till then, let him rest in the assurance that Some One loves him enough to see all that he will be, not what he presently is.
We are exactly like Nat - ordinary in a sense, not cosmically heroic, full of little doubts and fears. And for us Christians, we all have had that one day, where despite our silly remarks and general ignorance, Jesus met us in an unforgettable encounter. He blew our minds away with the depth, height and breadth of his Love for us. So many of the writers of Psalms breathe endlessly about the love they feel from the wonder of having a God know who you were as your little atoms were being slowly knit together in the womb.
I think its hard for human beings to find someone they can trust enough to know them and still love and forgive them. I don't think any of us can find another being of that calibre. Even our best friend or spouse cannot unflinchingly access the deepest, most personal, most shameful, darkest, smallest parts of You.
But God sees and Knows and does not turn away. I think that's why so many of us Christians fell in Love with him. You can't help it when you are faced with that kind of Love.
Like Nat, we must wonder - how can you love me so much? How can you, the Perfect God, pay me such a compliment that I too am Perfect? Jesus answers - Have faith and remain in me. I Know already what you were, what you are and what you shall be. I shall make you clean. I shall make you real. True. Perfect. Because I am real, true, perfect. You don't see clearly. I do. Trust how I see you and how I see things. And have the faith to live accordingly.
I think being a Christian gets much easier and much more beautiful when we grasp more and more of that truth. His Love is enough. Understand the full depth of that grace we have been extended and you can run through life with feet fleet as a deer. You will scale new heights. Not by your work. By His grace.
When we are deeply loved, joy and genuine living is simply a natural outcome. We love because we have been loved and known first.
We are a living work of art. Artists Know fully the perfect vision of their work in their heads. They understand the process of perfecting can be a painful, funny, messy, beautiful, terrible thing. If a process sketch looked at himself, he would see scribbles and scratches and a faint concept of perfection. It would be terribly difficult for a 2-Dimensional sketch to imagine what the 3-Dimensional Artist must be visualising. He may not understand that he is Fully Known already despite his scribbly state. But he does not need to understand at this moment...as long as he knows in part for now, and keeps faith, he will see that Perfection come one day. Just as the Artist has always Known.
No wonder Paul the Apostle writes so breathlessly in 1 Cor 13:12-13:
"Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known. And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love."
Indeed. We are already creatures that are fully Known. It is the fully Known version of our little selves that God sees and welcomes into his Heaven. Fully Known only through being fully loved. And Christians only know this because we too made the same simple faithful response Nat had so many years ago when faced with Jesus himself - "You are...the Son of God."
Just a response. Nothing more. Nothing less.
That's all it takes to understand the secret of the KIngdom of God.
Let's spend a moment to just bask in the tremendous-ness of that fact.
_____________________________________________________________________
John 1:44-50
Philip, like Andrew and Peter, was from the town of Bethsaida. Philip found Nathanael and told him, "We have found the one Moses wrote about in the Law, and about whom the prophets also wrote—Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph."
"Nazareth! Can anything good come from there?" Nathanael asked. "Come and see," said Philip.
When Jesus saw Nathanael approaching, he said of him, "Here is a true Israelite, in whom there is nothing false."
"How do you know me?" Nathanael asked.
Jesus answered, "I saw you while you were still under the fig tree before Philip called you."
Then Nathanael declared, "Rabbi, you are the Son of God; you are the King of Israel."
Jesus said, "You believe because I told you I saw you under the fig tree. You shall see greater things than that." He then added, "I tell you the truth, you shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man."
_____________________________________________________________________
You have to ask yourself, why on earth did John the Apostle think this little exchange between Jesus and Nat so worthy of recording? Nat is hardly an iconic figure versus Doubting Thomas or Peter the Rock. Nat hardly gets featured much beyond this little exchange. Up to now, I don't think I remembered there was even a Nat in the gospels. Jesus did, though, and I think that's the point.
Picture this: Nat walks up to Jesus without expectations. He thinks he is just checking out what Philip is making such a fuss about. He had just mused aloud to Philip about the impossibility of Jesus, the supposed heavenly Son of God, coming from a rundown backwater town like Nazareth.
Jesus looks at this guy, sums him up in a glance and makes this absolutely way-out compliment,"Here is a true Israelite, in whom there is nothing false." I mean, seriously...if someone came up to you and told you that you were 100% True Quality, you would gently remind the person, "Please! I am still human! I am not perfect."
Is Nat the True Israelite? If so, why aren't we writing books about him and calling him a saint? How could we have overlooked this paragon of virtue in history, certified by Jesus Christ himself? Surely, Nat must be a normal bloke. Nothing else in history - aside from this exchange - renders him otherwise (as normal as the rest of the disciples at least).
How about Nat's reply - "How do you know me?" Either Nat is being outrageously audacious in agreeing with Christ's assessment of him as Israel's Boy Wonder. OR he is being earnest, a little awed and doubting. I would go for the second option as I think it makes more sense.
If someone told me I was 100% True Quality, and if that someone was really quite perfect himself, I would respond that way. I would not be able to believe the compliment without hesitation. I would filter that compliment through my own glasses of self-introspection. I would like to know how it is that this guy Knows me in a way I don't Know myself.
No doubt this must be running through Nat's normal bloke-like head. That's what makes Jesus' reply so profoundly moving and enigmatic - "I saw you while you were still under the fig tree before Philip called you."
With one simple sweet sentence, he strikes right at Nat's heart, through every fear and every doubt. He just tells him I AM the God beyond all time and all space. I knew you even before it was your time to come to me. I saw you for what you were before I met you. And now that you stand before me, understand this - I Know. I Know.
That's all that Nat needs to realise the compliment is no less than God in human form Himself. His breath crushed out from him as he tries to grasp the bigness of what he has just heard, he declares in awe, '"Rabbi...you are the Son of God...you....are the King of Israel."
Convinced by the emotional power of the moment, he lays his first promise of faith before Jesus. Yet, his new Lord looks at him and Knows this as well. Jesus offers this very sharp insight in surprising gentleness and grace - "You believe because I told you I saw you under the fig tree. You shall see greater things than that. I tell you the truth, you shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man"
What amazing grace is this? Jesus knew Nat believed at this point only because of the sheer power and emotion of the moment. Yet he kindly promises him signs of greater things that will help his belief take deeper root and find larger form. Jesus saw/sees who Nat is/will become as long as he abides in Him - a true Israelite, without blemish or falsehood.
Nat may not be able to see himself as clearly as Jesus sees himself but One Day - One Final Day - he will. Till then, let him rest in the assurance that Some One loves him enough to see all that he will be, not what he presently is.
We are exactly like Nat - ordinary in a sense, not cosmically heroic, full of little doubts and fears. And for us Christians, we all have had that one day, where despite our silly remarks and general ignorance, Jesus met us in an unforgettable encounter. He blew our minds away with the depth, height and breadth of his Love for us. So many of the writers of Psalms breathe endlessly about the love they feel from the wonder of having a God know who you were as your little atoms were being slowly knit together in the womb.
I think its hard for human beings to find someone they can trust enough to know them and still love and forgive them. I don't think any of us can find another being of that calibre. Even our best friend or spouse cannot unflinchingly access the deepest, most personal, most shameful, darkest, smallest parts of You.
But God sees and Knows and does not turn away. I think that's why so many of us Christians fell in Love with him. You can't help it when you are faced with that kind of Love.
Like Nat, we must wonder - how can you love me so much? How can you, the Perfect God, pay me such a compliment that I too am Perfect? Jesus answers - Have faith and remain in me. I Know already what you were, what you are and what you shall be. I shall make you clean. I shall make you real. True. Perfect. Because I am real, true, perfect. You don't see clearly. I do. Trust how I see you and how I see things. And have the faith to live accordingly.
I think being a Christian gets much easier and much more beautiful when we grasp more and more of that truth. His Love is enough. Understand the full depth of that grace we have been extended and you can run through life with feet fleet as a deer. You will scale new heights. Not by your work. By His grace.
When we are deeply loved, joy and genuine living is simply a natural outcome. We love because we have been loved and known first.
We are a living work of art. Artists Know fully the perfect vision of their work in their heads. They understand the process of perfecting can be a painful, funny, messy, beautiful, terrible thing. If a process sketch looked at himself, he would see scribbles and scratches and a faint concept of perfection. It would be terribly difficult for a 2-Dimensional sketch to imagine what the 3-Dimensional Artist must be visualising. He may not understand that he is Fully Known already despite his scribbly state. But he does not need to understand at this moment...as long as he knows in part for now, and keeps faith, he will see that Perfection come one day. Just as the Artist has always Known.
No wonder Paul the Apostle writes so breathlessly in 1 Cor 13:12-13:
"Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known. And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love."
Indeed. We are already creatures that are fully Known. It is the fully Known version of our little selves that God sees and welcomes into his Heaven. Fully Known only through being fully loved. And Christians only know this because we too made the same simple faithful response Nat had so many years ago when faced with Jesus himself - "You are...the Son of God."
Just a response. Nothing more. Nothing less.
That's all it takes to understand the secret of the KIngdom of God.
Let's spend a moment to just bask in the tremendous-ness of that fact.
Thursday, January 12, 2006
2006 Resolutions...sort of
In no particular order.....
1. Get a new Powerbook once and for all. Yay!
2. Be a humbler listener and curb instinct to be a holyschmoly smartypants!
3. Actually use my PDA to organise the chaos I call my mind. Got plans? Execute, execute, execute! and use that PDA to help!
4. Spend more time with my family. House not equal as hotel you know.
5. Get back in gym rat mode. Last year of gym membership- diedie must chao kuan use to the fullest!
6. Clean up 1/4 of the chaos I call my room (1/4 is realistic estimation I think)
7. Adopt a hamster to channel all my lack-of-a-rabbit-affections to.
8. Share and admit to my weaknesses more often to curb instinct to play holyschmoly smartypants!
9. Stop drinking teh si like its the last drink on earth. Must...try....other....drinks.
10. Go on One Good Date. Mwa ha ha. Insert archi insider joke.
11. Love God. Love Neighbour. Feed Sheep.
1. Get a new Powerbook once and for all. Yay!
2. Be a humbler listener and curb instinct to be a holyschmoly smartypants!
3. Actually use my PDA to organise the chaos I call my mind. Got plans? Execute, execute, execute! and use that PDA to help!
4. Spend more time with my family. House not equal as hotel you know.
5. Get back in gym rat mode. Last year of gym membership- diedie must chao kuan use to the fullest!
6. Clean up 1/4 of the chaos I call my room (1/4 is realistic estimation I think)
7. Adopt a hamster to channel all my lack-of-a-rabbit-affections to.
8. Share and admit to my weaknesses more often to curb instinct to play holyschmoly smartypants!
9. Stop drinking teh si like its the last drink on earth. Must...try....other....drinks.
10. Go on One Good Date. Mwa ha ha. Insert archi insider joke.
11. Love God. Love Neighbour. Feed Sheep.
Wednesday, January 11, 2006
An afternoon with Samo
I have not been blogging because I have not been particularly inspired. It wasn't that life was boring or bad - the past two months actually have been pretty great. But nothing moved me enough to set aside time to blog. Musing about whether my blog had breathed its last, inspiration literally walk in through my door.
The lights in my office always do a major short circuit when the stormy season sets in. Old buildings and slack management may make for great rental rates but poor maintenance.
So I made an appointment with the in-house electrician to get my lights up and going again.
My management has a knack for hiring the funkiest looking electricians - the supervisor is a 40 something Phua Chu Kang clone, from fluffy Afro to long fingernail; his junior is also in his 40s, resembling a slightly skinnier Samo Hung complete with bowl-shaped haircut and teeny old man whiskers. They are truly old-school, honest-to-goodness blue collar to the bone types - their PDAs come in the form of mamak shop bought 30 cents spiral bound notebooks; their skin uncompromisingly tough and pockmarked; their accessories only come in towkay-gold.
PCK was away so Samo turned up, all apologetic for missing several appointments he had made earlier on with me. I left him to fiddle with the electrical wiring while I went into the next room to tidy up files. Feeling whimsical, I played an old Hillsongs CD and wondered what God had in store to show me for the year ahead. 2005 was full of encouraging random encounters and I asked Him in my head when would be my next. Turns out it was going to be in a couple of minutes and iut was gonna be good ole Samo himself.
Samo walked in and mused, "Eh, miss, you Catholic ah?"
"No, I am Christian. Why? You are, ah?"
"Eh Miss, you tell me, don't mind me asking, why my uncle can become so powerful?"
"Emm...did your uncle become a Christian?"
"Ya ya. Aiyohhh he was very naughty,miss, last time, so naughty that he went to jail you know? Smoke, gamble, drink. Very naughty ah! But then he ah...go church. Then now, very good already! I cannot believe. How come he got power ah?" He looked at me earnestly.
At this point, I could not stop smiling at him. He really looked very perplexed.
"Emmm....it's not magic power like bomoh or taoist priest that kind. Different power. Your uncle became Christian. He knew he had no more power to change himself so he let God change him. You know what we always want to do good but diedie also end up doing some bad thing. Can be very frustrating and feel very sad. We have no power."
"Ah miss, I am not Christian. Then I try to run away from my uncle because he always bother me to go church go church. So I go to give him face then he stand on stage and talk you know? I don't believe he so naughty last time, can stand up there so neat, wear tie, comb hair, like good like that! Wah I really cannot believe."
"Heh."
"Some more, miss, I tell you, I never tell anyone before....er am I wasting your time ah miss?"
"No, no , it's ok."
"Goodgood....you know when I went to the church ah, I dunno why you know! I don't understand what they are saying, what plihplahplihplah but you know miss, I CRY you know? Dunno why also! I dunno why I cry! And when I ask my uncle he also say he dunno why. But he say he believe I will become Christian one day. But you Christian too right? Maybe you can tell me why it happen?"
I could not believe my ears. That was exactly my conversion experience. Dragged to church by a friend, God pierced through all my unbelief and ignorance with a bout of inexplicable tears from nowhere as well.
"That happened to me too." It was such a cool moment, to meet another person whom God reached out to in the same way.
Just then, his handphone went off - a crazy caophony. It was another tenant bugging him about another appointment.
"Oh sorry miss, sorry I must go fix another light. Eh you don't mind, I talk to you about this Christian thing another day ok? Sorry I waste your time ah."
I told him anytime was good for me. And he had definitely not wasted my time.
_______________________________________________________________________
Postscript - For some strange reason God keeps sending people who are far more proficient in dialects and chinese down my path. Maybe he is telling me its about time to reclaim my mother tongue. ha!
The lights in my office always do a major short circuit when the stormy season sets in. Old buildings and slack management may make for great rental rates but poor maintenance.
So I made an appointment with the in-house electrician to get my lights up and going again.
My management has a knack for hiring the funkiest looking electricians - the supervisor is a 40 something Phua Chu Kang clone, from fluffy Afro to long fingernail; his junior is also in his 40s, resembling a slightly skinnier Samo Hung complete with bowl-shaped haircut and teeny old man whiskers. They are truly old-school, honest-to-goodness blue collar to the bone types - their PDAs come in the form of mamak shop bought 30 cents spiral bound notebooks; their skin uncompromisingly tough and pockmarked; their accessories only come in towkay-gold.
PCK was away so Samo turned up, all apologetic for missing several appointments he had made earlier on with me. I left him to fiddle with the electrical wiring while I went into the next room to tidy up files. Feeling whimsical, I played an old Hillsongs CD and wondered what God had in store to show me for the year ahead. 2005 was full of encouraging random encounters and I asked Him in my head when would be my next. Turns out it was going to be in a couple of minutes and iut was gonna be good ole Samo himself.
Samo walked in and mused, "Eh, miss, you Catholic ah?"
"No, I am Christian. Why? You are, ah?"
"Eh Miss, you tell me, don't mind me asking, why my uncle can become so powerful?"
"Emm...did your uncle become a Christian?"
"Ya ya. Aiyohhh he was very naughty,miss, last time, so naughty that he went to jail you know? Smoke, gamble, drink. Very naughty ah! But then he ah...go church. Then now, very good already! I cannot believe. How come he got power ah?" He looked at me earnestly.
At this point, I could not stop smiling at him. He really looked very perplexed.
"Emmm....it's not magic power like bomoh or taoist priest that kind. Different power. Your uncle became Christian. He knew he had no more power to change himself so he let God change him. You know what we always want to do good but diedie also end up doing some bad thing. Can be very frustrating and feel very sad. We have no power."
"Ah miss, I am not Christian. Then I try to run away from my uncle because he always bother me to go church go church. So I go to give him face then he stand on stage and talk you know? I don't believe he so naughty last time, can stand up there so neat, wear tie, comb hair, like good like that! Wah I really cannot believe."
"Heh."
"Some more, miss, I tell you, I never tell anyone before....er am I wasting your time ah miss?"
"No, no , it's ok."
"Goodgood....you know when I went to the church ah, I dunno why you know! I don't understand what they are saying, what plihplahplihplah but you know miss, I CRY you know? Dunno why also! I dunno why I cry! And when I ask my uncle he also say he dunno why. But he say he believe I will become Christian one day. But you Christian too right? Maybe you can tell me why it happen?"
I could not believe my ears. That was exactly my conversion experience. Dragged to church by a friend, God pierced through all my unbelief and ignorance with a bout of inexplicable tears from nowhere as well.
"That happened to me too." It was such a cool moment, to meet another person whom God reached out to in the same way.
Just then, his handphone went off - a crazy caophony. It was another tenant bugging him about another appointment.
"Oh sorry miss, sorry I must go fix another light. Eh you don't mind, I talk to you about this Christian thing another day ok? Sorry I waste your time ah."
I told him anytime was good for me. And he had definitely not wasted my time.
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Postscript - For some strange reason God keeps sending people who are far more proficient in dialects and chinese down my path. Maybe he is telling me its about time to reclaim my mother tongue. ha!
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