17:07.
"Yahweh, Yahweh
Always pain before a child is born
Yahewh, Yahweh
Still I’m waiting for the dawn
Still waiting for the dawn
the sun is coming up
The sun is coming up on the ocean
This love is like a drop in the ocean
This love is like a drop in the ocean"
- Yahweh, U2
"When the bell tolls, it tolls for me..."
Yet even as I bow my head and contribute to the tears already cried over the stories and realities of those whose lives have been irrevocably changed forever, the onset of the end of the 2004 have brought some clarity about my life and direction.
I am coming full circle.
I have walked through the desert and cried till my eyes were dry, I have swung from one end of the spectrum of Feelings and Word, faith and theology and have learnt to walk the balance (or try with more discernment and less cynicism than I would figure I ever could be capable of); and I am learning to ask again, to dare to dream again, and not not ask for fear of not receiving; to let people in and let people see me vulnerable, whingy and weak and not in control; to worship and not hide behind an instrument; to worship with as much of me cut loose without caring about surrounding people.
More: The spiritual affirmation has been given, I know again that I can minister to people and be used. I know I have been filled and given a lot and I have to learn to use what I have been empowered with.
God, music and writing. My big three. Every area that is precious to me has been requested to be placed on the altar. The more I gave, the more I received in ways that the world would deem useless but these ways have made me glad.
In music, I have been challenged and stretched.
With journalism, I have placed my craft on the altar. And after I did, the significance of my craft and the power of the word and the power and effect of writing in my life... have been shown me so clearly I am rather astounded.
With full-time, I have placed it on the altar.
But I perhaps digress, I have come full-circle.
At the end of this unprecented year, I sit here at the same kitchen table I have sat at since Feb, listening to Aimee Mann and two good friends in my kitchen trying to prepare dinner, and passions and purposes are as clear as they once were.
TS Eilot wrote:
"We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time."
That's how I feel now. Six hours and four minutes away from the new year.
Will write more.
May this new year surpasses the next one.
Friday, December 31, 2004
Wednesday, December 29, 2004
15:44.
It was a Sabbath morning, a day after Christmas, and they – all those who are now not – were living.
Those who lived and worked by the coastal areas were hard at work, at their daily toil, making a living out of fishery and tourism. Those they served – the tourists – were sleeping off hangovers or making merry, living the coveted life these coastal resorts advertised.
It is the end of the year. Finally a break from the grind. Holidays were being enjoyed, reflections were being made, life was being had at a slower pace by lovers, families, friends.
And then it all ended.
No lingering goodbyes were allowed; no last hugs or kisses; for some, no last looks and till now, for some, no chance to look upon a loved one’s face.
For too many, their loved ones are in the dust, swept out at sea, bodies mingling with debris and dead animals. For way too many, there is no closure and only torment.
Too much have happened in an unexplainable act of nature. And we all know science cannot explain away pain.
The sun still shines but it can no longer warm them. On those islands and in the countries where destruction has taken over, who can look up to enjoy blue skies and balmy weather? Death is the only thing you can smell, see and feel. The Grim Reaper has done his work in a glorious sweep and with death’s marks evident all around, you wonder if being alive now is something to be thankful for.
The only peace belongs to those whose lives were snatched from them but who now are in a better place. But not all are.
50,000 and counting. Numbers have never seem so loaded, never been so despised, never became such hated harbingers of doom.
And the world moves on, as linear time dictates. People still laugh and make merry, parties are thrown and wine are drunk, dreams are made and consumed. God is not a respecter of men, and His ways, who can understand?
Why, Lord? Why?
Entire islands now underwater, so much lost. And we don’t even care as much as we should. And linear time, one-way, carries us forward as if what happened on Sunday does not even require a respectful pause.
How is the world going to move on from these? It will. But it is still baffling. How could we move on from these when the right thing is to stop all clocks and traffic, still every humming bird and song, and be silent.
For they are gone.
It was a Sabbath morning, a day after Christmas, and they – all those who are now not – were living.
Those who lived and worked by the coastal areas were hard at work, at their daily toil, making a living out of fishery and tourism. Those they served – the tourists – were sleeping off hangovers or making merry, living the coveted life these coastal resorts advertised.
It is the end of the year. Finally a break from the grind. Holidays were being enjoyed, reflections were being made, life was being had at a slower pace by lovers, families, friends.
And then it all ended.
No lingering goodbyes were allowed; no last hugs or kisses; for some, no last looks and till now, for some, no chance to look upon a loved one’s face.
For too many, their loved ones are in the dust, swept out at sea, bodies mingling with debris and dead animals. For way too many, there is no closure and only torment.
Too much have happened in an unexplainable act of nature. And we all know science cannot explain away pain.
The sun still shines but it can no longer warm them. On those islands and in the countries where destruction has taken over, who can look up to enjoy blue skies and balmy weather? Death is the only thing you can smell, see and feel. The Grim Reaper has done his work in a glorious sweep and with death’s marks evident all around, you wonder if being alive now is something to be thankful for.
The only peace belongs to those whose lives were snatched from them but who now are in a better place. But not all are.
50,000 and counting. Numbers have never seem so loaded, never been so despised, never became such hated harbingers of doom.
And the world moves on, as linear time dictates. People still laugh and make merry, parties are thrown and wine are drunk, dreams are made and consumed. God is not a respecter of men, and His ways, who can understand?
Why, Lord? Why?
Entire islands now underwater, so much lost. And we don’t even care as much as we should. And linear time, one-way, carries us forward as if what happened on Sunday does not even require a respectful pause.
How is the world going to move on from these? It will. But it is still baffling. How could we move on from these when the right thing is to stop all clocks and traffic, still every humming bird and song, and be silent.
For they are gone.
Tuesday, December 28, 2004
14:58.
Pray for the tsunami waves victims, final toll for now is near 24,000.
I'm not scared of dying myself but seeing death at work scares me.
During Christmas Eve at service, we were asked to go out and hang a bauble on a bare Christmas tree for those who have left who we want to remember. I sat in my seat and cried. Cried for the newlyweds killed on their honeymoon in New Zealand, my pastor's brother and his bride whom I have not seen before. Cried for the tragedy and its irrationality, cried for their families' losses and cried for the comfort that they are in heaven, and the fact that this comfort does not answer why such has happened.
If I am clingy and emo more these days, maybe it's because I want to hold on to those I love because I am so aware that I can lose your.
Dear Lord, do not turn Your Face away.
Pray for the tsunami waves victims, final toll for now is near 24,000.
I'm not scared of dying myself but seeing death at work scares me.
During Christmas Eve at service, we were asked to go out and hang a bauble on a bare Christmas tree for those who have left who we want to remember. I sat in my seat and cried. Cried for the newlyweds killed on their honeymoon in New Zealand, my pastor's brother and his bride whom I have not seen before. Cried for the tragedy and its irrationality, cried for their families' losses and cried for the comfort that they are in heaven, and the fact that this comfort does not answer why such has happened.
If I am clingy and emo more these days, maybe it's because I want to hold on to those I love because I am so aware that I can lose your.
Dear Lord, do not turn Your Face away.
Monday, December 27, 2004
00:45.
It hailed three times yesterday, the last episode not two hours ago. Yesterday was the coldest day summer had, I reckon. I was in three layers when I went out for dinner - weather website said it was 13 degrees then and apparently 8 degrees feeling like 4 degrees now - and feeling like a wrapped up dumpling again was inconsequential in return for the warmth.
The first time it hailed, I stuck my hand out of the window like a kid and was thrilled to see the little icicles collect in my hands. And when it hailed again the last two times, I stood at the living room balcony door and stared in awe at the sheets of rain and howling wind going whrrr. Lamp posts shook and cars looked like they could be lifted off sideways. I was glad I was indoors and glad for the sight before me.
The last few days seemed to have ran away, escaped from me, blurred into a medley I can't quite distinct without some effort.
Christmas Eve was spent on church, dinner and a nice drive out to The Boulevard, a posh stretch where residents go all out with the Christmas decor to win a year's supply of electricity. As in, all out. Big houses with major decor and lights. Very pretty. Every decorated house seemed like a storybook.
Christmas was church, hung out at a friend's and learnt Bridge as we waited to go to lunch, lunch, a jam session at my house (heh, the bass and electric guitar - albeit with a snapped string - are at my place now), then went to Caulfield for a combined OCF dinner and a walkaround the neighbourhood carolling.
That was the first time in my life I carolled. And I did enjoy it. Remembering the significance of Christmas, walking in crisp cold air with friends and spiritual siblings, and a licence to sing aloud.
Then, Boxing Day was church, lunch, checking out the famed Boxing Day sales and shopping, hanging out at a friend's place and reading the newest issue of 8 Days and going "what?? so-and-so is now at 8 Days??!", then dinner at Blok M, a great Indonesian restaurant.
Yesterday, I lazed about, journal-led, chilled and went out for a Greek dinner.
As I get older, I learn the great importance of good conversation and being silent.
I have a feeling this would be a lesson that would continue.
For now, I need to crash. My glorious futon awaits.
It hailed three times yesterday, the last episode not two hours ago. Yesterday was the coldest day summer had, I reckon. I was in three layers when I went out for dinner - weather website said it was 13 degrees then and apparently 8 degrees feeling like 4 degrees now - and feeling like a wrapped up dumpling again was inconsequential in return for the warmth.
The first time it hailed, I stuck my hand out of the window like a kid and was thrilled to see the little icicles collect in my hands. And when it hailed again the last two times, I stood at the living room balcony door and stared in awe at the sheets of rain and howling wind going whrrr. Lamp posts shook and cars looked like they could be lifted off sideways. I was glad I was indoors and glad for the sight before me.
The last few days seemed to have ran away, escaped from me, blurred into a medley I can't quite distinct without some effort.
Christmas Eve was spent on church, dinner and a nice drive out to The Boulevard, a posh stretch where residents go all out with the Christmas decor to win a year's supply of electricity. As in, all out. Big houses with major decor and lights. Very pretty. Every decorated house seemed like a storybook.
Christmas was church, hung out at a friend's and learnt Bridge as we waited to go to lunch, lunch, a jam session at my house (heh, the bass and electric guitar - albeit with a snapped string - are at my place now), then went to Caulfield for a combined OCF dinner and a walkaround the neighbourhood carolling.
That was the first time in my life I carolled. And I did enjoy it. Remembering the significance of Christmas, walking in crisp cold air with friends and spiritual siblings, and a licence to sing aloud.
Then, Boxing Day was church, lunch, checking out the famed Boxing Day sales and shopping, hanging out at a friend's place and reading the newest issue of 8 Days and going "what?? so-and-so is now at 8 Days??!", then dinner at Blok M, a great Indonesian restaurant.
Yesterday, I lazed about, journal-led, chilled and went out for a Greek dinner.
As I get older, I learn the great importance of good conversation and being silent.
I have a feeling this would be a lesson that would continue.
For now, I need to crash. My glorious futon awaits.
13:20.
Who's Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses, U2
You're dangerous, 'cos you're honest.
You're dangerous, you don't know what you want.
Well you left my heart empty as a vacant lot
For any spirit to haunt.
You're an accident waiting to happen
You're a piece of glass left there on a beach.
Well you tell me things
I know you're not supposed to
Then you leave me just out of reach.
Who's gonna ride your wild horses?
Who's gonna drown in your blue sea?
Who's gonna ride your wild horses?
Who's gonna fall at the foot of thee?
Well you stole it 'cos I needed the cash
And you killed it 'cos I needed revenge.
Well you lied to me 'cos I asked you to.
Baby, can we still be friends?
Who's gonna ride your wild horses?
Who's gonna drown in your blue sea?
Who's gonna ride your wild horses?
Who's gonna fall at the foot of thee?
Ah, the deeper I spin
Ah, the hunter will sin for your ivory skin.
Took a drive in the dirty rain
To a place where the wind calls your name
Under the trees, the river laughing at you and me.
Hallelujah! Heaven's white rose
The doors you open I just can't close.
Don't turn around, don't turn around again.
Don't turn around your gypsy heart.
Don't turn around, don't turn around again.
Don't turn around, and don't look back.
Come on now love, don't you look back.
Who's gonna ride your wild horses?
Who's gonna drown in your blue sea?
Who's gonna taste your saltwater kisses?
Who's gonna take the place of me?
Who's gonna ride your wild horses?
Who's gonna tame the heart of thee?
Who's Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses, U2
You're dangerous, 'cos you're honest.
You're dangerous, you don't know what you want.
Well you left my heart empty as a vacant lot
For any spirit to haunt.
You're an accident waiting to happen
You're a piece of glass left there on a beach.
Well you tell me things
I know you're not supposed to
Then you leave me just out of reach.
Who's gonna ride your wild horses?
Who's gonna drown in your blue sea?
Who's gonna ride your wild horses?
Who's gonna fall at the foot of thee?
Well you stole it 'cos I needed the cash
And you killed it 'cos I needed revenge.
Well you lied to me 'cos I asked you to.
Baby, can we still be friends?
Who's gonna ride your wild horses?
Who's gonna drown in your blue sea?
Who's gonna ride your wild horses?
Who's gonna fall at the foot of thee?
Ah, the deeper I spin
Ah, the hunter will sin for your ivory skin.
Took a drive in the dirty rain
To a place where the wind calls your name
Under the trees, the river laughing at you and me.
Hallelujah! Heaven's white rose
The doors you open I just can't close.
Don't turn around, don't turn around again.
Don't turn around your gypsy heart.
Don't turn around, don't turn around again.
Don't turn around, and don't look back.
Come on now love, don't you look back.
Who's gonna ride your wild horses?
Who's gonna drown in your blue sea?
Who's gonna taste your saltwater kisses?
Who's gonna take the place of me?
Who's gonna ride your wild horses?
Who's gonna tame the heart of thee?
Friday, December 24, 2004
01:36.
"O holy night, the stars are brightly shining,
It is the night of the dear Saviour's birth.
Long lay the world in sin and error pining,
Till He appeared and the soul felt its worth.
A thrill of hope the weary world rejoices,
For yonder breaks a new and glorious morn,
Fall on your knees,
O hear the angel voices.
O night divine,
O night when Christ was born!
O night divine,
O night,
O night divine"
- O Holy Night
Blessed Christmas, every one. Remember the Reason for this season. Not crass commercialism, not even gifts and carols, but the Almighty laying aside His Majesty and taking on the restrictions of a human body. God Incarnate, Christ with us, Emmanuel, Jesus Christ. The indignity of a human form, the weakness and fragility of a human body, a baby... Jesus didn't skip the ugly parts of life.
I still don't understand why You did it, Lord.
But then, maybe that's why I don't understand love very well.
But Lord, though I can't get it, I love you so very much so for doing it. For coming and not leaving. For being and loving. For being Love and Goodness and all that is beautiful.
I love You, Lord Jesus.
"O holy night, the stars are brightly shining,
It is the night of the dear Saviour's birth.
Long lay the world in sin and error pining,
Till He appeared and the soul felt its worth.
A thrill of hope the weary world rejoices,
For yonder breaks a new and glorious morn,
Fall on your knees,
O hear the angel voices.
O night divine,
O night when Christ was born!
O night divine,
O night,
O night divine"
- O Holy Night
Blessed Christmas, every one. Remember the Reason for this season. Not crass commercialism, not even gifts and carols, but the Almighty laying aside His Majesty and taking on the restrictions of a human body. God Incarnate, Christ with us, Emmanuel, Jesus Christ. The indignity of a human form, the weakness and fragility of a human body, a baby... Jesus didn't skip the ugly parts of life.
I still don't understand why You did it, Lord.
But then, maybe that's why I don't understand love very well.
But Lord, though I can't get it, I love you so very much so for doing it. For coming and not leaving. For being and loving. For being Love and Goodness and all that is beautiful.
I love You, Lord Jesus.
12:01.
The international departure gates at Melbourne Airport are feelingless, disrespectful metal doors which slide shut after your loved ones step through. Effectively disenabling any lingering looks, walk-and-wave-until-you-are-out-of-sight precious rituals.
Dec 21, about 1640, when those doors separated my folks from me and closed, I stood still for a second, looked up to the ceiling, blew out, turned to go but spun a circle instead to stare at those metal gates once more, before - as tears welled - walking away. Towards the direction of the sign directing all and sundry to "Buses" and away from my folks who were not far yet so far, in the same building but away from access.
Bought my skybus ticket, and as I walked out of Tullamarine towards the skybus pick up point, that 150 metres was accompanied by head music in the form of some Christian song which lyrics go "I don't belong here" and yet I was vividly aware of an all-embracing, extremely real feeling of being at home. Just walking there, on that wide pathway with scattered random folks, I felt comfortable. Despite missing my folks, despite the doubts that did assault me, despite being alone physically, I did not feel the lone-ness during that walk.
In some part, it's like the embrace that the walk from the Bus 900 bus stop to my house back home, in Woodlands, in Singapore. It was like the night time walk home, when I would look up at the stars and walk, talk to God and feel peace and be held by that part of the world that was mine at those moments.
The skybus drops one at Spencer Street, which is near Telstra Dome and I found that every where I walked that evening, I was reminded of how now, my family is not with me.
I didn't want to go home 'cause I knew I would cry when I walked into an empty home.
[And all these coming from someone who always enjoyed having the house to herself]
So I made full use of my two-hour tram ticket and hit three Dangerfield shops looking for a bag I fancied two weeks ago, bought two tops from Melb Central, and Van Morrison's Astral Weeks from JB Hi Fi.
[I think I am listing the shop names so that one day, when I can no longer remember this place in detail, I can read about them]
When I finally reached home at about 8, I sat down at the sofa and sobbed.
Talk about being emo. Sigh.
And after eight days of either eating out or cooking for family, I went home to leftover rice in the fridge which I fried up. Nothing wrong at all but at that moment, it did seem, um, sad.
The strange thing is this - By Dec 22 morning, I was okay. Still missing those I love but sane, calm and stable, rational and able to feel the strangeness of being alone but not let it move me negatively.
Went for coffee with a good friend for some whinging. And when I got back at 2am, I walked through the door and into a quiet house - Hannah left the same day - and was at home with it. Vividly aware of the switch in moods.
I am immensely thankful that my parents and aunt were here, that they saw me graduate, that they lived with me, that I could cook for them, that they liked the food places and food I like (KOK, Nando's, Shanghai Dumpling, Seoul Garden, Thnak Thnak, Mars Cheese Cake, Corinthians wafer rolls, tim tams, quatros, starbursts, Red Rocks lime and black pepper chips, chinatown's egg tarts....).
[I cite same reason as last [] for listing all that]
For eight days, they lived in my world. And thank God they liked it.
And really, for that, I have no reason to be sad. Even while sobbing on that sofa three days ago, it wasn't driven by saddness, just displacement mostly. And in between wrecking sobs, I was thanking God.
I am - quietly so now... - happy.
The international departure gates at Melbourne Airport are feelingless, disrespectful metal doors which slide shut after your loved ones step through. Effectively disenabling any lingering looks, walk-and-wave-until-you-are-out-of-sight precious rituals.
Dec 21, about 1640, when those doors separated my folks from me and closed, I stood still for a second, looked up to the ceiling, blew out, turned to go but spun a circle instead to stare at those metal gates once more, before - as tears welled - walking away. Towards the direction of the sign directing all and sundry to "Buses" and away from my folks who were not far yet so far, in the same building but away from access.
Bought my skybus ticket, and as I walked out of Tullamarine towards the skybus pick up point, that 150 metres was accompanied by head music in the form of some Christian song which lyrics go "I don't belong here" and yet I was vividly aware of an all-embracing, extremely real feeling of being at home. Just walking there, on that wide pathway with scattered random folks, I felt comfortable. Despite missing my folks, despite the doubts that did assault me, despite being alone physically, I did not feel the lone-ness during that walk.
In some part, it's like the embrace that the walk from the Bus 900 bus stop to my house back home, in Woodlands, in Singapore. It was like the night time walk home, when I would look up at the stars and walk, talk to God and feel peace and be held by that part of the world that was mine at those moments.
The skybus drops one at Spencer Street, which is near Telstra Dome and I found that every where I walked that evening, I was reminded of how now, my family is not with me.
I didn't want to go home 'cause I knew I would cry when I walked into an empty home.
[And all these coming from someone who always enjoyed having the house to herself]
So I made full use of my two-hour tram ticket and hit three Dangerfield shops looking for a bag I fancied two weeks ago, bought two tops from Melb Central, and Van Morrison's Astral Weeks from JB Hi Fi.
[I think I am listing the shop names so that one day, when I can no longer remember this place in detail, I can read about them]
When I finally reached home at about 8, I sat down at the sofa and sobbed.
Talk about being emo. Sigh.
And after eight days of either eating out or cooking for family, I went home to leftover rice in the fridge which I fried up. Nothing wrong at all but at that moment, it did seem, um, sad.
The strange thing is this - By Dec 22 morning, I was okay. Still missing those I love but sane, calm and stable, rational and able to feel the strangeness of being alone but not let it move me negatively.
Went for coffee with a good friend for some whinging. And when I got back at 2am, I walked through the door and into a quiet house - Hannah left the same day - and was at home with it. Vividly aware of the switch in moods.
I am immensely thankful that my parents and aunt were here, that they saw me graduate, that they lived with me, that I could cook for them, that they liked the food places and food I like (KOK, Nando's, Shanghai Dumpling, Seoul Garden, Thnak Thnak, Mars Cheese Cake, Corinthians wafer rolls, tim tams, quatros, starbursts, Red Rocks lime and black pepper chips, chinatown's egg tarts....).
[I cite same reason as last [] for listing all that]
For eight days, they lived in my world. And thank God they liked it.
And really, for that, I have no reason to be sad. Even while sobbing on that sofa three days ago, it wasn't driven by saddness, just displacement mostly. And in between wrecking sobs, I was thanking God.
I am - quietly so now... - happy.
Monday, December 20, 2004
00:49.
Nougat swirls swallow me
Someone's sweetness stick to me
Cantaloupe smashes
Yellow and Red
Bring out the green
Water buffalo Team
Insensibilities
Mine to give but not to rein
Insensibilities
Is this me or who is she?
Cookies rain and honeydew pain
Make up my mind
Make up my mind
Little girl, all hair and eyes
Standing there just out of sight
Who.
What.
Yes,
Why.
Emotions are rather impractical stuff.
I will sleep and wake, to a morning with new mercies. Every morning has new blessings.
Nougat swirls swallow me
Someone's sweetness stick to me
Cantaloupe smashes
Yellow and Red
Bring out the green
Water buffalo Team
Insensibilities
Mine to give but not to rein
Insensibilities
Is this me or who is she?
Cookies rain and honeydew pain
Make up my mind
Make up my mind
Little girl, all hair and eyes
Standing there just out of sight
Who.
What.
Yes,
Why.
Emotions are rather impractical stuff.
I will sleep and wake, to a morning with new mercies. Every morning has new blessings.
Sunday, December 19, 2004
11:31.
I pack luggage with systematic clinical effectiveness.
No, I have not changed my mind regarding Feb 5 (that's my new departure date for those of your who have not been reading).
Last week, I packed up all my books and papers for my aunty to take back to Singapore. This week, I packed my winter stuff, boots, track shoes, and some clothes into a standard sized hard luggage case for my parents and aunt to take back to Singapore.
Systematic is the word I keep using to describe my method and way, seeing how I make up my mind regarding items and utilise all the space in the luggage.
Packing is an emotional affair.
As dresses and shoes and papers and CDs, toiletries and perfumes and memorable items goes into a box, it's as if every memory and routine and ritual and emotion associated with them goes right in there along with that physical item.
So I suppose I experience a slight dissonance when I am so... systemic with packing when I don't even know where I would be after Feb.
Nothing is quite happening here in Melb on the job front yet. Am still praying and am going to send out more resumes and such after Tuesday, which is when my folks leave.
And that is another thing.
They are leaving on the 21st, which is my original departure date. And they booked that date because they were hoping to leave along with me.
I suppose it's characteristically nostagic of me. Just now, I glanced at the couch - which has been my bed for the last few nights except for one - and my head and heart went like, "Sigh, only two more nights on that".
[When I lay down on that couch, my legs - from knees down - dangle or stick out... no, the couch is not 1.7metres; I use the rug on the couch as a blanket, one couch side arm as pillow and hug a pillow to sleep]
Having three people in your room and three new people in your house does mean I don't get the personal space I am so used to and so cherish, me being me, but yet, I know when they leave on Tuesday, I will feel very alone.
I probably will cry.
On the skybus home from the airport, I would probably just be sad and think of how uncertain every thing is from then on, and wonder - and try to push away - thoughts of why I did not leave with them. When I get home, I would probably look at the couch and my room, pull the sheets off to wash, and as I walk around home, be reminded of when they were with me here. I would see my loved ones and the evidence of their stay here in the extra food in the fridge, the position of a chair, maybe a left behind item and yes, I probably will cry.
Sigh. And I would cry harder and more when I think about how I know my dad probably enter the departure gates with a heavy heart, at the fact that his daughter is not with him and won't be with him until Feb 5.
Dear Lord, keep us and bless us and make Your Face shine upon us.
For without You, I wither and we die.
I am holding on, trusting and walking on.
And I love my parents very much and I really want to honour them and make them happy.
They are the most beautiful people in the whole flippin' world.
Whole.
*hugs*
I pack luggage with systematic clinical effectiveness.
No, I have not changed my mind regarding Feb 5 (that's my new departure date for those of your who have not been reading).
Last week, I packed up all my books and papers for my aunty to take back to Singapore. This week, I packed my winter stuff, boots, track shoes, and some clothes into a standard sized hard luggage case for my parents and aunt to take back to Singapore.
Systematic is the word I keep using to describe my method and way, seeing how I make up my mind regarding items and utilise all the space in the luggage.
Packing is an emotional affair.
As dresses and shoes and papers and CDs, toiletries and perfumes and memorable items goes into a box, it's as if every memory and routine and ritual and emotion associated with them goes right in there along with that physical item.
So I suppose I experience a slight dissonance when I am so... systemic with packing when I don't even know where I would be after Feb.
Nothing is quite happening here in Melb on the job front yet. Am still praying and am going to send out more resumes and such after Tuesday, which is when my folks leave.
And that is another thing.
They are leaving on the 21st, which is my original departure date. And they booked that date because they were hoping to leave along with me.
I suppose it's characteristically nostagic of me. Just now, I glanced at the couch - which has been my bed for the last few nights except for one - and my head and heart went like, "Sigh, only two more nights on that".
[When I lay down on that couch, my legs - from knees down - dangle or stick out... no, the couch is not 1.7metres; I use the rug on the couch as a blanket, one couch side arm as pillow and hug a pillow to sleep]
Having three people in your room and three new people in your house does mean I don't get the personal space I am so used to and so cherish, me being me, but yet, I know when they leave on Tuesday, I will feel very alone.
I probably will cry.
On the skybus home from the airport, I would probably just be sad and think of how uncertain every thing is from then on, and wonder - and try to push away - thoughts of why I did not leave with them. When I get home, I would probably look at the couch and my room, pull the sheets off to wash, and as I walk around home, be reminded of when they were with me here. I would see my loved ones and the evidence of their stay here in the extra food in the fridge, the position of a chair, maybe a left behind item and yes, I probably will cry.
Sigh. And I would cry harder and more when I think about how I know my dad probably enter the departure gates with a heavy heart, at the fact that his daughter is not with him and won't be with him until Feb 5.
Dear Lord, keep us and bless us and make Your Face shine upon us.
For without You, I wither and we die.
I am holding on, trusting and walking on.
And I love my parents very much and I really want to honour them and make them happy.
They are the most beautiful people in the whole flippin' world.
Whole.
*hugs*
Wednesday, December 15, 2004
00:50.
I graduated about three and a half hours ago at Telstra Dome, Melb. Supposedly, 30, 000 people were there - guests, graduating students and staff. I didn't take shots of the stadium 'cause I didn't want to have my bag with me but there's a shot of what it looks like here.
Spending three hours at a ceremony is not the way I norm enjoy spending my time and truth be told, boredom was spreading its dull fingers over me in the beginning. I spent about 5 bucks having sms conversations - each sms costs 25 cents - with good friends, and alternated that with shifting around uncomfortably in the plastic chair, and pulling and rearranging my gown and hat.
Felt really glad when I first saw a familiar face taking the stage, and felt my heart thumping and adrenaline rush when my turn drew near. Waiting on the carpeted pathway laid on the stadium's tuft and getting nearer and nearer to being the first in line, wheww.
They flashed your name on the screen and you go up to get your cert.
And during my time in the spotlight, when the presenter commented well done, a degree with distinction (!), I looked at the certificate - encased in a scroll like slip with a transparent cover and block coloured back - and realised waitaminute, I have just been awarded with a degree with distinction.
Whether that means I somehow make the top 10 per cent or top 5 per cent or top 15 per cent I am not sure, but it was a wow and a million because I thought my Credit for Philo screwed up chances of a degree with distinction. And I wasn't even sure if I could qualify since I was given two-year exemption.
I am just happy now. Very happy. Corny-ly, ridiculously happy. It was ridiculously good stuff, every thing, and some part of me think I felt the meaning of the scripture that says a woman in childbirth forgets the pain she has been through when the child is born.
This night is going down in the annals of S k y e T's history.
Dear God, thanks for every thing. Every little thing. Every single thing.
And for a great home cooked lunch. And dinners. And all that.
And at 0530, I have to wake up for Great Ocean Road. Daytrip with the parents on a coach.
Spread the love, people!
Wheeeee!
I graduated about three and a half hours ago at Telstra Dome, Melb. Supposedly, 30, 000 people were there - guests, graduating students and staff. I didn't take shots of the stadium 'cause I didn't want to have my bag with me but there's a shot of what it looks like here.
Spending three hours at a ceremony is not the way I norm enjoy spending my time and truth be told, boredom was spreading its dull fingers over me in the beginning. I spent about 5 bucks having sms conversations - each sms costs 25 cents - with good friends, and alternated that with shifting around uncomfortably in the plastic chair, and pulling and rearranging my gown and hat.
Felt really glad when I first saw a familiar face taking the stage, and felt my heart thumping and adrenaline rush when my turn drew near. Waiting on the carpeted pathway laid on the stadium's tuft and getting nearer and nearer to being the first in line, wheww.
They flashed your name on the screen and you go up to get your cert.
And during my time in the spotlight, when the presenter commented well done, a degree with distinction (!), I looked at the certificate - encased in a scroll like slip with a transparent cover and block coloured back - and realised waitaminute, I have just been awarded with a degree with distinction.
Whether that means I somehow make the top 10 per cent or top 5 per cent or top 15 per cent I am not sure, but it was a wow and a million because I thought my Credit for Philo screwed up chances of a degree with distinction. And I wasn't even sure if I could qualify since I was given two-year exemption.
I am just happy now. Very happy. Corny-ly, ridiculously happy. It was ridiculously good stuff, every thing, and some part of me think I felt the meaning of the scripture that says a woman in childbirth forgets the pain she has been through when the child is born.
This night is going down in the annals of S k y e T's history.
Dear God, thanks for every thing. Every little thing. Every single thing.
And for a great home cooked lunch. And dinners. And all that.
And at 0530, I have to wake up for Great Ocean Road. Daytrip with the parents on a coach.
Spread the love, people!
Wheeeee!
Monday, December 13, 2004
21:56.
It is the season of long posts. At least here on midair. Being in the revolution means never being in control and knowing that you are not driving the wheel, but walking on, giving your best, crying your heart out and getting attached because you don't stop loving. And in every test, you know the yes and amen is true.
With all that I am. And all I've got.
My parents and my aunt are asleep in my room. For the next few days, I would bunk on the living room couch.
For the next few days, I have family here in Melbourne, blood relations.
I want them to love my world, to feel welcome, to enter this world.
Slept at after 0230 in the morning, woke up at 0400. Got ready for their flight which was due to land at 0525. Possibly strange, how within three days, I have been to the airport twice, after the only time I have been at the airport was on Feb 10, when I landed.
0615, this morning - Even before I was through the glass sliding doors that are the airport doors, I saw my aunty then my mom sitting at those plastic chairs waiting, two luggage trolleys at the side of my Aunt Nan.
I walked faster, did the wave hands frantically thing and had on a smile so spontaneous I did not know it was there , quickened my steps even further as I got closer and hugged my Mom for a good dozen seconds.
Hugged my aunty, looked around for my Dad, paced about in the general direction they said he went off in and when I finally saw him, threw my arms around him and squeezed him while he repeated something - I think it was my name, in a glad tone - and kind of held his arms about himself awkwardly, not knowing how to hug me back.
If I ever have kids, I do want them to grow up in a culture where hugs and love are shown without embarassment or awkwardness. And that was written without any negativity, just to clarify,
A part of me can't believe they are really here.
The rainy weather today didn't allow much exploration. Seeing Dad enjoy Shanghai Dumpling was a grin.
I love my parents.
Dear Lord, help me honour them and love them more and give them all that they deserve to have.
It is the season of long posts. At least here on midair. Being in the revolution means never being in control and knowing that you are not driving the wheel, but walking on, giving your best, crying your heart out and getting attached because you don't stop loving. And in every test, you know the yes and amen is true.
With all that I am. And all I've got.
"To love is to be vulnerable",
so said CS Lewis while expounding on this very fruit of love.
so said CS Lewis while expounding on this very fruit of love.
My parents and my aunt are asleep in my room. For the next few days, I would bunk on the living room couch.
For the next few days, I have family here in Melbourne, blood relations.
I want them to love my world, to feel welcome, to enter this world.
Slept at after 0230 in the morning, woke up at 0400. Got ready for their flight which was due to land at 0525. Possibly strange, how within three days, I have been to the airport twice, after the only time I have been at the airport was on Feb 10, when I landed.
0615, this morning - Even before I was through the glass sliding doors that are the airport doors, I saw my aunty then my mom sitting at those plastic chairs waiting, two luggage trolleys at the side of my Aunt Nan.
I walked faster, did the wave hands frantically thing and had on a smile so spontaneous I did not know it was there , quickened my steps even further as I got closer and hugged my Mom for a good dozen seconds.
Hugged my aunty, looked around for my Dad, paced about in the general direction they said he went off in and when I finally saw him, threw my arms around him and squeezed him while he repeated something - I think it was my name, in a glad tone - and kind of held his arms about himself awkwardly, not knowing how to hug me back.
If I ever have kids, I do want them to grow up in a culture where hugs and love are shown without embarassment or awkwardness. And that was written without any negativity, just to clarify,
A part of me can't believe they are really here.
The rainy weather today didn't allow much exploration. Seeing Dad enjoy Shanghai Dumpling was a grin.
I love my parents.
Dear Lord, help me honour them and love them more and give them all that they deserve to have.
"Where can I go from Your Spirit?
Where can I flee from Your presence?
If I go up to the heavens, you are there;
if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.
If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
if I settle on the far side of the seas,
even there Your Hand will guide me,
Your right hand would surely hold me fast."
- Psalm 139: 7 - 1o
Where can I flee from Your presence?
If I go up to the heavens, you are there;
if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.
If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
if I settle on the far side of the seas,
even there Your Hand will guide me,
Your right hand would surely hold me fast."
- Psalm 139: 7 - 1o
Life feels like it has stopped and is moving at the same time.
Jesus, Jesus, I remember You.
I will remember, help me know, this is not the end.
No.
Jesus, Jesus, I remember You.
I will remember, help me know, this is not the end.
No.
Saturday, December 11, 2004
02:03.
December is fast disappearing.
Today is the 12th. Very early tomorrow morning - at 0525, to be precise - my parents and an aunt would arrive here in Melbourne. Two days after, I graduate at Telstra Dome.
Supposedly, six days after that, I would be en route home to Singapore on a Qantas/ BA flight at 1720.
Well, things don't always go as we suppose they will.
Yesterday - or really, the day before - as rain drizzled and then poured on the Melbourne streets, I was making my way to the Qantas office to get my return flight reticketed.
All the way forward to Feb 5.
Big difference, yes. I only made up my mind to do so on Monday and I only decided on Feb 5 before I went out of the house to put into action the decision made six days ago while sitting on a cold balcony at a resort at Port Campbell.
Monday, Port Campbell in a resort facing the bay while an all-day storm flooded places like Caulfield (or so, I heard on the evening news). It was raining, the weather was wintry and every thing seemed clear as I sat there staring at the mountains in the foreground, towering above the bay in which water raged and waves collide, while all around, rain danced and the tall pine trees swayed along. When the wind blew, rain droplets wet me. When the wind changed directions, it sometimes lashed me and stung my eyes, making me look as if I was crying further.
It was cold. I was reminded of July Camp. Some moments, I wanted to cry. I did tear as the wind froze me and there were times when a scripture or just something He says to my spirit made me tear and want to sob. With my journal, bible, a black ball point pen and a black felt fine marker, I sat there for the length of a football's match and alternate between scribbling, reading and looking at the sight before me. In awe and being.
I found peace in the Great Ocean Road trip. Every thing rages, buffered by winds, horizons disappeared for the mist and weather. It was storm and it was still. In chaos, I have order. I stood there staring at the 12 Apostles and knew all was in control.
Every thing in my life now seems totally transcient, unpredictable and unknown. Except for the Foundation on which I stand on, the Word who gives life and life to the fullest. And right now, having finally made the stay/ go decision after a few tumulous weeks, I can say with full faith that I am at peace and I know - in the now and now - that the choice to stay back is what is meant to be.
In many many ways, leaving on the 21st would be the practical choice. In fact, it is the practical choice. Every thing - finances, relationships - would end in a neat little box and bow. One year of great things and people - that would be the neat tag on that categorised box. Maybe, just maybe that would be easier to shelf somewhere in the memories cupboard too... you know, leave before you get even more attached, you fool.
There's a song called Elijah by Rich Mullins where the chorus breaks into: "But when I leave I want to go out like Elijah with a whirlwind to fuel my chariot of fire".
Since I always believe in ending with a blast, this would be a good time to go... you know, just in case the party dies down, the flames burn less fiery, and life in general becomes common should I stay on. But yet, I have brought my return date almost two months backwards.
People are leaving. Some for good. Leaving on the 21st kind of ensures in some twisted emotional sense that I won't have to witness the departures of those who surround me. It's a "safer" move.
But yet, I am staying.
When people ask me why, I cite the practical reasons of the unstable media industry back home and the fact that if I should return this month, I would be sitting around for a good period twiddling my thumbs waiting for a reply. Instead, I would stay here, send out resumes, work at a casual job in January,and... wait.
January will be that - a time of waiting.
Utterly scary. The decision I have to make involves two countries.
....
I just recalled rather vividly a scene from Secondary School when I told someone (not sure who) that yes, I will get PR somewhere else when I grow up. I am quietly surprised now at the recollection... since I figure I never quite think I would have to consider citizenship stuff and such.
Jan. It will be a time of waiting, scary good stuff. Finances wise, unless my freelance boss pay me and unless I get a job, it will be rather impossible. Let's not even consider the loan I have to repay.
You can think my choice utterly impractical, I see impractical factors in all the choices avail. But do you see how not taking the safe way out signifies how sure I am that right now, it's right for me to be here?
I am sure of nothing and no person except my God is faithful and I am called to great things and that my choice is accompanied by a peace I need to hold onto.
Everybody's changing. Every thing's changing.
My choice to stay on cannot be and isn't based on people factors. I know that full well and have that impressed upon me. It's not that I don't care about people, it's that I know that I can't make my decision based on who I would have around me simply because everything changes. That's the way of life. The only unchanging thing in my life is God.
Am I applying for PR? Some say it's practical because come March, the points system would be raised and it would be harder to secure PR. I am making that decision only in Jan, when exactly I do not know. I am knocking on doors and seeing which might open. And from then on, I make up my mind but my flight is booked for Feb 5 and I will leave by then, whether for only two weeks or for good or for a few years, again, I do not know.
This is a scary time. But the repeated reassurances from above have sunk in.
About three weeks ago, I could not see at all. The future was pitch black and I was blind. Now vision is restored. And I can picture myself both in Singapore and here, though my heart says I will return to Sg definitely after a while.
Maybe this extended period is a very slow process of saying goodbye. A preparation that the previous, half frenzied, push-everything-into-the-remaining-days rush could not fulfill.
Or maybe I am about to make an extremely big decision, potentially the second biggest in my life, about which land I would be on for my future.
Whatever it is, I am running to stay still. But I want to stop. And just be still.
I love you folks. Please pray for me.
December is fast disappearing.
Today is the 12th. Very early tomorrow morning - at 0525, to be precise - my parents and an aunt would arrive here in Melbourne. Two days after, I graduate at Telstra Dome.
Supposedly, six days after that, I would be en route home to Singapore on a Qantas/ BA flight at 1720.
Well, things don't always go as we suppose they will.
Yesterday - or really, the day before - as rain drizzled and then poured on the Melbourne streets, I was making my way to the Qantas office to get my return flight reticketed.
All the way forward to Feb 5.
Big difference, yes. I only made up my mind to do so on Monday and I only decided on Feb 5 before I went out of the house to put into action the decision made six days ago while sitting on a cold balcony at a resort at Port Campbell.
Monday, Port Campbell in a resort facing the bay while an all-day storm flooded places like Caulfield (or so, I heard on the evening news). It was raining, the weather was wintry and every thing seemed clear as I sat there staring at the mountains in the foreground, towering above the bay in which water raged and waves collide, while all around, rain danced and the tall pine trees swayed along. When the wind blew, rain droplets wet me. When the wind changed directions, it sometimes lashed me and stung my eyes, making me look as if I was crying further.
It was cold. I was reminded of July Camp. Some moments, I wanted to cry. I did tear as the wind froze me and there were times when a scripture or just something He says to my spirit made me tear and want to sob. With my journal, bible, a black ball point pen and a black felt fine marker, I sat there for the length of a football's match and alternate between scribbling, reading and looking at the sight before me. In awe and being.
I found peace in the Great Ocean Road trip. Every thing rages, buffered by winds, horizons disappeared for the mist and weather. It was storm and it was still. In chaos, I have order. I stood there staring at the 12 Apostles and knew all was in control.
Every thing in my life now seems totally transcient, unpredictable and unknown. Except for the Foundation on which I stand on, the Word who gives life and life to the fullest. And right now, having finally made the stay/ go decision after a few tumulous weeks, I can say with full faith that I am at peace and I know - in the now and now - that the choice to stay back is what is meant to be.
In many many ways, leaving on the 21st would be the practical choice. In fact, it is the practical choice. Every thing - finances, relationships - would end in a neat little box and bow. One year of great things and people - that would be the neat tag on that categorised box. Maybe, just maybe that would be easier to shelf somewhere in the memories cupboard too... you know, leave before you get even more attached, you fool.
There's a song called Elijah by Rich Mullins where the chorus breaks into: "But when I leave I want to go out like Elijah with a whirlwind to fuel my chariot of fire".
Since I always believe in ending with a blast, this would be a good time to go... you know, just in case the party dies down, the flames burn less fiery, and life in general becomes common should I stay on. But yet, I have brought my return date almost two months backwards.
People are leaving. Some for good. Leaving on the 21st kind of ensures in some twisted emotional sense that I won't have to witness the departures of those who surround me. It's a "safer" move.
But yet, I am staying.
When people ask me why, I cite the practical reasons of the unstable media industry back home and the fact that if I should return this month, I would be sitting around for a good period twiddling my thumbs waiting for a reply. Instead, I would stay here, send out resumes, work at a casual job in January,and... wait.
January will be that - a time of waiting.
Utterly scary. The decision I have to make involves two countries.
....
I just recalled rather vividly a scene from Secondary School when I told someone (not sure who) that yes, I will get PR somewhere else when I grow up. I am quietly surprised now at the recollection... since I figure I never quite think I would have to consider citizenship stuff and such.
Jan. It will be a time of waiting, scary good stuff. Finances wise, unless my freelance boss pay me and unless I get a job, it will be rather impossible. Let's not even consider the loan I have to repay.
You can think my choice utterly impractical, I see impractical factors in all the choices avail. But do you see how not taking the safe way out signifies how sure I am that right now, it's right for me to be here?
I am sure of nothing and no person except my God is faithful and I am called to great things and that my choice is accompanied by a peace I need to hold onto.
Everybody's changing. Every thing's changing.
My choice to stay on cannot be and isn't based on people factors. I know that full well and have that impressed upon me. It's not that I don't care about people, it's that I know that I can't make my decision based on who I would have around me simply because everything changes. That's the way of life. The only unchanging thing in my life is God.
Am I applying for PR? Some say it's practical because come March, the points system would be raised and it would be harder to secure PR. I am making that decision only in Jan, when exactly I do not know. I am knocking on doors and seeing which might open. And from then on, I make up my mind but my flight is booked for Feb 5 and I will leave by then, whether for only two weeks or for good or for a few years, again, I do not know.
This is a scary time. But the repeated reassurances from above have sunk in.
About three weeks ago, I could not see at all. The future was pitch black and I was blind. Now vision is restored. And I can picture myself both in Singapore and here, though my heart says I will return to Sg definitely after a while.
Maybe this extended period is a very slow process of saying goodbye. A preparation that the previous, half frenzied, push-everything-into-the-remaining-days rush could not fulfill.
Or maybe I am about to make an extremely big decision, potentially the second biggest in my life, about which land I would be on for my future.
Whatever it is, I am running to stay still. But I want to stop. And just be still.
I love you folks. Please pray for me.
Friday, December 10, 2004
12:49.
If winter ends
while summer reigns
and the trees, they fall
while puppy dogs weep
Where would we be?
Where do we go from here?
Bring me my guitar
Red hair, piano, standing straight
I stood where the earth falls apart
I stared at where no horizons separate time
I stopped thinking since it's blasphemous
And I simply be
Just standing side by side.
If winter ends
while summer reigns
and the trees, they fall
while puppy dogs weep
Where would we be?
Where do we go from here?
Bring me my guitar
Red hair, piano, standing straight
I stood where the earth falls apart
I stared at where no horizons separate time
I stopped thinking since it's blasphemous
And I simply be
Just standing side by side.
Wednesday, December 01, 2004
01:04.
Monday night. Or Tuesday morning. I was standing on St Kilda's beach for the first time, looking out into the sea and at the gulls and the night lights on the faraway coasts. City Of Blinding Lights came to mind and I started singing it softly.
Melbourne is far from being a city which you write such a song for. Apparently, U2 wrote the song with New York in mind. Yet still, the city lights - even with its lack of harsh glare - seemed to mean something. In its gentleness and softness, perhaps it reflects positively the city and its life to me.
I was with four carloads of OCF-ers and a good number of the boys got dumped into the water. Whether walking or sitting watching the drama, my mind moved to capture every thing photographically in my head and process them to vivid memories. I was aware that every thing that was happening would never again duplicate exactly and for that matter, even being on the beach at night might not happen again for a good long time... or ever.
So I remember, close my eyes and sing the song.
Monday night. Or Tuesday morning. I was standing on St Kilda's beach for the first time, looking out into the sea and at the gulls and the night lights on the faraway coasts. City Of Blinding Lights came to mind and I started singing it softly.
Melbourne is far from being a city which you write such a song for. Apparently, U2 wrote the song with New York in mind. Yet still, the city lights - even with its lack of harsh glare - seemed to mean something. In its gentleness and softness, perhaps it reflects positively the city and its life to me.
I was with four carloads of OCF-ers and a good number of the boys got dumped into the water. Whether walking or sitting watching the drama, my mind moved to capture every thing photographically in my head and process them to vivid memories. I was aware that every thing that was happening would never again duplicate exactly and for that matter, even being on the beach at night might not happen again for a good long time... or ever.
So I remember, close my eyes and sing the song.
Sunday, November 28, 2004
14:13.
From Charpinkie about the Boomerang Theory:
"some people have this connection... that no matter what happens... no matter how u stray, or go out to seek 'greener pastures', or simply just lead separate lives, in the end, u just return back to that one person because of that special connection. I suppose that's true.... There comes a point where u realise that it's not just the shared history or the level of comfort that draws you back to a person. It's just that irreplaceable spark and connection, I guess"
Will this be how it goes?
From Charpinkie about the Boomerang Theory:
"some people have this connection... that no matter what happens... no matter how u stray, or go out to seek 'greener pastures', or simply just lead separate lives, in the end, u just return back to that one person because of that special connection. I suppose that's true.... There comes a point where u realise that it's not just the shared history or the level of comfort that draws you back to a person. It's just that irreplaceable spark and connection, I guess"
Will this be how it goes?
Saturday, November 27, 2004
13:34.
"And You feel like no one before
You steal right under my door
And I kneel 'cause I want You some more
I want the lot of what You got
And I want nothing that You are not"
- Original Of The Species, U2
Am I getting ready to leave the ground?
Because the world looks so different when I am on my knees. Sometimes, all I can see are carpet and dust. And all I can feel is that I want You some more.
I have not vocalised this before until last night - The S k y e T who left Singapore 10 months ago and the S k y e T now is so different, miles apart. When I said that during an unscripted testimony last night at the last official OCF meeting for the semester, my soul took a step back in realisation of the worth of my words.
My life is a tornado, a whirlwind, sliding doors, escalators... a seagull's bounce just before it flies, a sparrow's bewilderment when it gets blown out of a tree, the landscape when clouds cover the sun and switched the world's lights out. In the vapour, in the wind, in the stuff one can't never catch, I see my life.
All that I can't leave behind I take with me in the luggage of me. And may God find it fit to use what I have, and may what I do leave behind be of some worth. I have no idea if I have left something, make some dent, changed the order in the slightest bit for good.
Maybe I am learning to say goodbye.
Throughout my life, at those crossroads - End of Sec school, end of Poly, end of jobs... it has not been hard to walk away. More often than not, it has been easy to move on. There have been trepidation, of course but I have been eager to go on to something new, start a new chapter, carry on writing the pages of my days. This time, it's not the same.
I am honestly not sure what is going to happen.
But I am staying on my knees.
And I am not going to get up.
I want to see God face to face while in this mortal flesh.
"And You feel like no one before
You steal right under my door
And I kneel 'cause I want You some more
I want the lot of what You got
And I want nothing that You are not"
- Original Of The Species, U2
Am I getting ready to leave the ground?
Because the world looks so different when I am on my knees. Sometimes, all I can see are carpet and dust. And all I can feel is that I want You some more.
I have not vocalised this before until last night - The S k y e T who left Singapore 10 months ago and the S k y e T now is so different, miles apart. When I said that during an unscripted testimony last night at the last official OCF meeting for the semester, my soul took a step back in realisation of the worth of my words.
My life is a tornado, a whirlwind, sliding doors, escalators... a seagull's bounce just before it flies, a sparrow's bewilderment when it gets blown out of a tree, the landscape when clouds cover the sun and switched the world's lights out. In the vapour, in the wind, in the stuff one can't never catch, I see my life.
All that I can't leave behind I take with me in the luggage of me. And may God find it fit to use what I have, and may what I do leave behind be of some worth. I have no idea if I have left something, make some dent, changed the order in the slightest bit for good.
Maybe I am learning to say goodbye.
Throughout my life, at those crossroads - End of Sec school, end of Poly, end of jobs... it has not been hard to walk away. More often than not, it has been easy to move on. There have been trepidation, of course but I have been eager to go on to something new, start a new chapter, carry on writing the pages of my days. This time, it's not the same.
I am honestly not sure what is going to happen.
But I am staying on my knees.
And I am not going to get up.
I want to see God face to face while in this mortal flesh.
Thursday, November 25, 2004
18:39.
For once, I slept early and dozed off by 1am.
I woke up at 340am, irritated about being a vicious mozzie's meal, before my mind was stunned into clarity by the yellow almost-full moon looking right in at me through the picture window. Went to the bathroom, counted four bites on my right arm, went back to the futon, applied the trusty Ping An Oil from home (from Hong Kong), and... logged onto Msn.
The unusualness of how the day was started perhaps set my random mood for the whole day.
By the way, I love going to Vic Mkt for a short run - one where my arms don't fall off from carrying purchases - in the early afternoon on a sunny day. Shades on, slippers on, no jackets required... if one could bottle feelings like they can capture moments with cameras and videos, this is one I want bottled.
And I will like to bottle the whole of Vic Mkt in two formats - the usual one and the night mkt which started yesterday - in those ship in a bottle capsule. Only on much larger scales. And take them home with me.
U2's album is so good. I can't not smile :>
Having a drum set at home is so good. I can't not laugh.
Music is so precious, I thank God You made it and left it with us.
Despite every uncertainty, and there are so many, I feel happy. The sun shines through said picture window, Bono is singing A Man And A Woman (his wife is so fortunate...), and in a short bit, I would be going out to have dinner with some friends.
Life is good.
The freedom of having your own living space is addictive. But yet, I won't seek to have my own pad in Singapore. It would be different, yes, perhaps too different for me to want it.
And you know, perhaps none of these should ever be bottled. Because life here is so beautiful because it is alive. Because it is fluid. Because it is not mine to control or hold. Because it holds me, not vice versa.
I love hearing live music in my own house.
I love it all.
Cool-whee.
Thank You, Lord. I love You so.
For once, I slept early and dozed off by 1am.
I woke up at 340am, irritated about being a vicious mozzie's meal, before my mind was stunned into clarity by the yellow almost-full moon looking right in at me through the picture window. Went to the bathroom, counted four bites on my right arm, went back to the futon, applied the trusty Ping An Oil from home (from Hong Kong), and... logged onto Msn.
The unusualness of how the day was started perhaps set my random mood for the whole day.
By the way, I love going to Vic Mkt for a short run - one where my arms don't fall off from carrying purchases - in the early afternoon on a sunny day. Shades on, slippers on, no jackets required... if one could bottle feelings like they can capture moments with cameras and videos, this is one I want bottled.
And I will like to bottle the whole of Vic Mkt in two formats - the usual one and the night mkt which started yesterday - in those ship in a bottle capsule. Only on much larger scales. And take them home with me.
U2's album is so good. I can't not smile :>
Having a drum set at home is so good. I can't not laugh.
Music is so precious, I thank God You made it and left it with us.
Despite every uncertainty, and there are so many, I feel happy. The sun shines through said picture window, Bono is singing A Man And A Woman (his wife is so fortunate...), and in a short bit, I would be going out to have dinner with some friends.
Life is good.
The freedom of having your own living space is addictive. But yet, I won't seek to have my own pad in Singapore. It would be different, yes, perhaps too different for me to want it.
And you know, perhaps none of these should ever be bottled. Because life here is so beautiful because it is alive. Because it is fluid. Because it is not mine to control or hold. Because it holds me, not vice versa.
I love hearing live music in my own house.
I love it all.
Cool-whee.
Thank You, Lord. I love You so.
Wednesday, November 24, 2004
Tuesday, November 23, 2004
22:59.
Hey... if you read the previous two now-deleted posts, don't worry. Dismiss them as PMS, which is really true, and accept them as a Christian's, a person's life struggles. If I worried you or disturbed you, I apologise. You just had peeks into my darkest moments. Am I ok now? I know, believe and feel that all things work together for the good of those who love God and I am trusting and walking on.
Yup.
Hey... if you read the previous two now-deleted posts, don't worry. Dismiss them as PMS, which is really true, and accept them as a Christian's, a person's life struggles. If I worried you or disturbed you, I apologise. You just had peeks into my darkest moments. Am I ok now? I know, believe and feel that all things work together for the good of those who love God and I am trusting and walking on.
Yup.
Monday, November 22, 2004
01:06.
My roomie left in a big yellow cab about 11 hours ago. Feels like the ending of a chapter. I am glad we had Sat's night bash for her. Special stuff helps saying goodbye easier. Germie rocks. I thank God that our staying arrangements worked out so very well.
[Hope Margaret Drive's Char Kway Teoh was avail, dear ;) ]
In 28 days time, it will be my turn to leave. Last night, I felt a very strong urge to stay here. It wasn't a new thing but neither is it one of those I-must, dug-in-heels stuborn insistence.
Singapore has so many things for me. Both places do. Less than an hour ago, as I was closing my room's door, I felt a sudden strong twinge of desire to be home in Singapore and with my family. It's strange how both places seem to be simple in their own ways. Life is simpler here in some aspects, and yet, life is simpler in many aspects too in Singapore. At the moment, I feel like I don't want to fight any more or try to make sense of things, I want to cuddle into bed, maybe shed a few tears of uncertainty and drop into sleep. And I want to remember and know that I am sleeping in the Everlasting Arms and that in my weakness, He is made strong.
I blame PMS for my mood.
I need to be quiet. It feels a bit like I am driving on a bridge that has broken off and I am about to get to that point where every thing stops or drops. Either that, or I fly.
Help, God, help.
My roomie left in a big yellow cab about 11 hours ago. Feels like the ending of a chapter. I am glad we had Sat's night bash for her. Special stuff helps saying goodbye easier. Germie rocks. I thank God that our staying arrangements worked out so very well.
[Hope Margaret Drive's Char Kway Teoh was avail, dear ;) ]
In 28 days time, it will be my turn to leave. Last night, I felt a very strong urge to stay here. It wasn't a new thing but neither is it one of those I-must, dug-in-heels stuborn insistence.
Singapore has so many things for me. Both places do. Less than an hour ago, as I was closing my room's door, I felt a sudden strong twinge of desire to be home in Singapore and with my family. It's strange how both places seem to be simple in their own ways. Life is simpler here in some aspects, and yet, life is simpler in many aspects too in Singapore. At the moment, I feel like I don't want to fight any more or try to make sense of things, I want to cuddle into bed, maybe shed a few tears of uncertainty and drop into sleep. And I want to remember and know that I am sleeping in the Everlasting Arms and that in my weakness, He is made strong.
I blame PMS for my mood.
I need to be quiet. It feels a bit like I am driving on a bridge that has broken off and I am about to get to that point where every thing stops or drops. Either that, or I fly.
Help, God, help.
Thursday, November 18, 2004
00:17.
Music purchased in the last three days:
CD - SGT Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band, The Beatles - AUD13.99
CD - Perfect Day, Lou Reed - AUD8.99
CD - Dark Side Of The Moon, Pink Floyd - AUD13.99
CD - Symphony Nos. 40 & 41, Mozart - AUD1.99
DVD - Rattle And Hum, U2 - ASUD24.95
The stuff I like can be found cheap here. Whee.
Music purchased in the last three days:
CD - SGT Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band, The Beatles - AUD13.99
CD - Perfect Day, Lou Reed - AUD8.99
CD - Dark Side Of The Moon, Pink Floyd - AUD13.99
CD - Symphony Nos. 40 & 41, Mozart - AUD1.99
DVD - Rattle And Hum, U2 - ASUD24.95
The stuff I like can be found cheap here. Whee.
Wednesday, November 17, 2004
16:02.
I took forever to do this, and God knows I am not even sure of these companies I am sending my resume to. But three emails later, and a read though a friend's story of how God led him to greater heights in a land where he didn't speak the language or know the system after he quit the paper a few weeks after I did have heartened me amazingly so.
I am singing the lyrics of Zoo Station, U2:
"I'm ready
I'm ready for the laughing gas
I'm ready
I'm ready for what's next
I'm ready to duck
I'm ready to dive
I'm ready to say
I'm glad to be alive
I'm ready
I'm ready for the push"
And I am going to send out more emails with my neat little pdf resume out tonight.
For now, I am going to take advantage of the 26 degrees weather (I feel like I am burning up just sitting in my room) and go hit the park with my laptop. It's my date with God and we are going to think through some stuff.
The joys of Someone who will never let you go.
I took forever to do this, and God knows I am not even sure of these companies I am sending my resume to. But three emails later, and a read though a friend's story of how God led him to greater heights in a land where he didn't speak the language or know the system after he quit the paper a few weeks after I did have heartened me amazingly so.
I am singing the lyrics of Zoo Station, U2:
"I'm ready
I'm ready for the laughing gas
I'm ready
I'm ready for what's next
I'm ready to duck
I'm ready to dive
I'm ready to say
I'm glad to be alive
I'm ready
I'm ready for the push"
And I am going to send out more emails with my neat little pdf resume out tonight.
For now, I am going to take advantage of the 26 degrees weather (I feel like I am burning up just sitting in my room) and go hit the park with my laptop. It's my date with God and we are going to think through some stuff.
The joys of Someone who will never let you go.
Tuesday, November 16, 2004
21:59.
"From the place where morning gathers
You can look sometimes forever 'til you see
What time may never know, what time may never know
How the Lord takes by its corners this whole world
And shakes us forward and shakes us free
To run wild with the hope, to run wild with the hope
The hope that this thirst will not last long
That it will soon drown in the song not sung in vain
And I feel the thunder in the sky, I see the sky about to rain
And I hear the prairies calling out Your name"
- Calling Out Your Name, Rich Mullins
"From the place where morning gathers
You can look sometimes forever 'til you see
What time may never know, what time may never know
How the Lord takes by its corners this whole world
And shakes us forward and shakes us free
To run wild with the hope, to run wild with the hope
The hope that this thirst will not last long
That it will soon drown in the song not sung in vain
And I feel the thunder in the sky, I see the sky about to rain
And I hear the prairies calling out Your name"
- Calling Out Your Name, Rich Mullins
Monday, November 15, 2004
22:30.
Perhaps I am "just another writer still trapped within my youth", like (yup) Dan Hill sung in his wrenching 80s power ballad.
Quotes that comforted me today, derived from books I eventually exercised enough self-control to put back on their shelves at Word just now.
"The central story of my life is about nothing else. An unsatisfied desire which is itself more desirable than any other satisfaction." - CS Lewis
If I look back on my 23 years, one of the threads that has remained on the forefront of my consciousness and being is this dissatisfaction. It breaks me and keep breaking me. Whoever I thought I was has been shattered in the wrestling with the Almighty.
I sometimes - not unoften - half-kill myself questioning if this sanity-bending drive could be just because I am screwed up.
I am searching for the me before the world was made. Maybe I am searching for my face before the world was made, as wonderfully expressed by Yeats.
[And Bruce Springsteen's singing Hungry Heart now].
Today, I walked the streets and felt an infinite sense of my finite-ness.
The Swiss-German theologian Karl Barth wrote, "The will for life is also the will for joy. It is hypocrisy to hide this from oneself. A person who tries to disbar himself from joy is certainly not an obedient person."
Now and then, I have been bothered by how infinitely normal I am becoming. I have always thought that with the meaning of life, comes happiness and all else. I am back at a place where I still believe that but with a difference, the different-ness of now having felt personally the desire for happiness in an articulated aware fashion. And there were times when I questioned my desire, if I could want it more than Numero Ono, and I wasn't sure if this fairly new (in its clarity, it was new) want was right.
God, your love is teaching me how to kneel.
In You, I am both common and unique, child and adult, cynical yet trusting, alive and dead... being more contradictions that I identify as I live in You. Keep me Yours, Lord. My mind is a whirlwind and a firewall all at once, and my heart is out of control.
Jesus, You are my best friend.
And You will always be.
Perhaps I am "just another writer still trapped within my youth", like (yup) Dan Hill sung in his wrenching 80s power ballad.
Quotes that comforted me today, derived from books I eventually exercised enough self-control to put back on their shelves at Word just now.
"The central story of my life is about nothing else. An unsatisfied desire which is itself more desirable than any other satisfaction." - CS Lewis
If I look back on my 23 years, one of the threads that has remained on the forefront of my consciousness and being is this dissatisfaction. It breaks me and keep breaking me. Whoever I thought I was has been shattered in the wrestling with the Almighty.
I sometimes - not unoften - half-kill myself questioning if this sanity-bending drive could be just because I am screwed up.
I am searching for the me before the world was made. Maybe I am searching for my face before the world was made, as wonderfully expressed by Yeats.
[And Bruce Springsteen's singing Hungry Heart now].
Today, I walked the streets and felt an infinite sense of my finite-ness.
The Swiss-German theologian Karl Barth wrote, "The will for life is also the will for joy. It is hypocrisy to hide this from oneself. A person who tries to disbar himself from joy is certainly not an obedient person."
Now and then, I have been bothered by how infinitely normal I am becoming. I have always thought that with the meaning of life, comes happiness and all else. I am back at a place where I still believe that but with a difference, the different-ness of now having felt personally the desire for happiness in an articulated aware fashion. And there were times when I questioned my desire, if I could want it more than Numero Ono, and I wasn't sure if this fairly new (in its clarity, it was new) want was right.
God, your love is teaching me how to kneel.
In You, I am both common and unique, child and adult, cynical yet trusting, alive and dead... being more contradictions that I identify as I live in You. Keep me Yours, Lord. My mind is a whirlwind and a firewall all at once, and my heart is out of control.
Jesus, You are my best friend.
And You will always be.
Saturday, November 13, 2004
Friday, November 12, 2004
23:10.
Let me tell you about Mornington.
Five of us made the 2-hour drive up to this coastal area on Nov 2, a public holiday which name I cannot recall (it's something about the Melbourne Cup and races...).
The idea for a roadtrip was vocalised on Oct 25, during coffee after Urban Life, City Church's cell groups. We planned on making it on a Saturday but Nov 1, again after Urban Life, this time at a jazz club we hit after cell group, Raymond announced he couldn't make it on Sat due to an Ethopian wedding he was due to attend. So there in the Bennett's Lane, bathed in blue-ish glow in a club that rapidly un-filled after the band ended, we decided to do the road trip the day after.
And that was a full paragraph of information that you didn't need to know and I have no idea why I chronicled.
Any how, yes. Mornington.
If happiness could be measured, then I was perhaps guilty of being excessively happy. If indeed happiness could ever be excessive.
From pancake breakfast along Chapel, shouting to Nirvana in the car along with James and Kenneth while Germaine and Ray just stare (I think...) to screaming at the coastline (twice) from a lookout cliff in a fashion akin to every other movie or television drama character who did so before. Never mind that we waited half an hour for James and Ken to pick us up, never mind that we were going with a carload of people mostly unfamiliar to us. From scattering salt on Kenneth at Portsea, running out in the pouring rain to take picture of Skye Road and me with the road sign (kudos to Germie) and every other little thing that happened... flip, really just even being in the car, I was happy. The rain could not stop that, being in slippers during pouring rain was but an insignificant matter, as was being cold and at times, wet.
I was happy when Germie and me went downstairs at 745am to meet Ray and wait for the car, I was happy when we were all sprawled on our living room's floor at the end of the day about 10.30pm, every one engaging in nonsense. And if I am using the three words too often in this post, it's because I was really... happy.
The darnest thing was that after they left, and Germie started her tussle with the essays in the living room while I sat on my futon in our room, I felt some sadness. Nothing lasts forever.
Maybe that utterly weird ritual with candlelights, incense and a would-be pen portrait on - of all surfaces... - toilet paper in James' modified beng (heh) car could be inscribed with meaning beyond what we understand.
If you went "huh?" at that description of a seeming weird ritual, you are justified in doing so. 'fraid I don't quite have words to describe the whole event and what happened leading up to it. In sum, I ran back to the car half-drenched from shooting Skye Road [inserts big grin] to find my roadtrip kakis lighting tealights and incense, the same good friends who proceeded to chant some pseudo latin before each blowing out an incense. That was the Skye memorial. Hah.
If T N P and OCF and all of last and this year have been the heightened lessons or rather, increased manifestations of God's work in teaching me to love, then I have to say that that day in Mornington was a heightened exercise in happiness.
Germie, Ray, Ken, James... thank you.
And pictures are on the photo blog.
Let me tell you about Mornington.
Five of us made the 2-hour drive up to this coastal area on Nov 2, a public holiday which name I cannot recall (it's something about the Melbourne Cup and races...).
The idea for a roadtrip was vocalised on Oct 25, during coffee after Urban Life, City Church's cell groups. We planned on making it on a Saturday but Nov 1, again after Urban Life, this time at a jazz club we hit after cell group, Raymond announced he couldn't make it on Sat due to an Ethopian wedding he was due to attend. So there in the Bennett's Lane, bathed in blue-ish glow in a club that rapidly un-filled after the band ended, we decided to do the road trip the day after.
And that was a full paragraph of information that you didn't need to know and I have no idea why I chronicled.
Any how, yes. Mornington.
If happiness could be measured, then I was perhaps guilty of being excessively happy. If indeed happiness could ever be excessive.
From pancake breakfast along Chapel, shouting to Nirvana in the car along with James and Kenneth while Germaine and Ray just stare (I think...) to screaming at the coastline (twice) from a lookout cliff in a fashion akin to every other movie or television drama character who did so before. Never mind that we waited half an hour for James and Ken to pick us up, never mind that we were going with a carload of people mostly unfamiliar to us. From scattering salt on Kenneth at Portsea, running out in the pouring rain to take picture of Skye Road and me with the road sign (kudos to Germie) and every other little thing that happened... flip, really just even being in the car, I was happy. The rain could not stop that, being in slippers during pouring rain was but an insignificant matter, as was being cold and at times, wet.
I was happy when Germie and me went downstairs at 745am to meet Ray and wait for the car, I was happy when we were all sprawled on our living room's floor at the end of the day about 10.30pm, every one engaging in nonsense. And if I am using the three words too often in this post, it's because I was really... happy.
The darnest thing was that after they left, and Germie started her tussle with the essays in the living room while I sat on my futon in our room, I felt some sadness. Nothing lasts forever.
Maybe that utterly weird ritual with candlelights, incense and a would-be pen portrait on - of all surfaces... - toilet paper in James' modified beng (heh) car could be inscribed with meaning beyond what we understand.
If you went "huh?" at that description of a seeming weird ritual, you are justified in doing so. 'fraid I don't quite have words to describe the whole event and what happened leading up to it. In sum, I ran back to the car half-drenched from shooting Skye Road [inserts big grin] to find my roadtrip kakis lighting tealights and incense, the same good friends who proceeded to chant some pseudo latin before each blowing out an incense. That was the Skye memorial. Hah.
If T N P and OCF and all of last and this year have been the heightened lessons or rather, increased manifestations of God's work in teaching me to love, then I have to say that that day in Mornington was a heightened exercise in happiness.
Germie, Ray, Ken, James... thank you.
And pictures are on the photo blog.
Thursday, November 11, 2004
Wednesday, November 10, 2004
01:59.
"I will go where You send me
Jesus, take me now I'm Yours
I'm Yours
I lay my life on the altar
Every thing I give to You alone
Here I am"
- Here I Am, Planet Shakers
This song, the theme song for July Camp, will always mean so much to me.
I don't sing songs just because that is what I am supposed to do in church or OCF or Urban Life. I sing because I want to, because I need to, and because I have A Reason to sing. I worship with my mind too.
And with all songs, I am aware of lyrics and I evaluate biblical correctness and how much I mean the words that pass my lips.
I guess to sum that up, it's just that I won't sing without heart and conviction because empty words are simply that - empty.
So I've sung the songs, evaluated the thoughts and meant the words. I have given my heart, Lord. And now, I live them. I lived them, am living them, and will live them.
Wherever it is You want me, Lord, here am I. And I will go.
I'm not digging my heels in and forcing my time. I will only dig my heels in if You say stay but the world protests to make me move. Where you want me to be, I will go. For only in You am I complete.
"Evermore... I am Yours evermore"
- Evermore, Planet Shakers
I am Yours. It was in City Church while singing this song when I started to pray. A leather tag on my jeans brands it as Levis'. Designers mark their creation with their names. When you are someone's, it is supposed to be reflected in your appearance. I asked to be branded, marked, as God's. As Jesus'.
"Whatever it takes, I will be one who lives in the fresh fullness of life
Of those who are alive from the dead, whatever the cost, whatever it takes"
- Cassie's song, The Kry
The journal of Columbine's High martyr arranged in song were lyrics and song on my lips this noon. So whatever it takes... whatever You need to do, Lord do in me. I want to reflect Christ. I want to truly be Light. I want people to be able to see that I am Yours.
"My prayer is still the same"
- Rain Down, Planet Shakers
You are telling me, You have been telling me an answer. We are back to the beginning. I will seek You first above all else. I believe, yes, I believe that once you find the meaning of life, every thing else - happiness and all that one existentially desires - fall into place. It's You, Lord, it's all about You. I will seek no one and nothing else.
You are my first love.
And I am Yours.
I adore You.
"I will go where You send me
Jesus, take me now I'm Yours
I'm Yours
I lay my life on the altar
Every thing I give to You alone
Here I am"
- Here I Am, Planet Shakers
This song, the theme song for July Camp, will always mean so much to me.
I don't sing songs just because that is what I am supposed to do in church or OCF or Urban Life. I sing because I want to, because I need to, and because I have A Reason to sing. I worship with my mind too.
And with all songs, I am aware of lyrics and I evaluate biblical correctness and how much I mean the words that pass my lips.
I guess to sum that up, it's just that I won't sing without heart and conviction because empty words are simply that - empty.
So I've sung the songs, evaluated the thoughts and meant the words. I have given my heart, Lord. And now, I live them. I lived them, am living them, and will live them.
Wherever it is You want me, Lord, here am I. And I will go.
I'm not digging my heels in and forcing my time. I will only dig my heels in if You say stay but the world protests to make me move. Where you want me to be, I will go. For only in You am I complete.
"Evermore... I am Yours evermore"
- Evermore, Planet Shakers
I am Yours. It was in City Church while singing this song when I started to pray. A leather tag on my jeans brands it as Levis'. Designers mark their creation with their names. When you are someone's, it is supposed to be reflected in your appearance. I asked to be branded, marked, as God's. As Jesus'.
"Whatever it takes, I will be one who lives in the fresh fullness of life
Of those who are alive from the dead, whatever the cost, whatever it takes"
- Cassie's song, The Kry
The journal of Columbine's High martyr arranged in song were lyrics and song on my lips this noon. So whatever it takes... whatever You need to do, Lord do in me. I want to reflect Christ. I want to truly be Light. I want people to be able to see that I am Yours.
"My prayer is still the same"
- Rain Down, Planet Shakers
You are telling me, You have been telling me an answer. We are back to the beginning. I will seek You first above all else. I believe, yes, I believe that once you find the meaning of life, every thing else - happiness and all that one existentially desires - fall into place. It's You, Lord, it's all about You. I will seek no one and nothing else.
You are my first love.
And I am Yours.
I adore You.
Tuesday, November 09, 2004
02:02.
A Place To Stand On, Rich Mullins
Well there's a lot of things working against me
But I know I can't lose
Yeah there's a lot of things working against me
But I know I can't lose
And there's a lot of miles still between me and my home
But I've learned a lot through the years, now
I'm more than just young
I got a lot of things working against me
But I know I can't lose
And there's a lot of love locked up inside of me
That I'm learning to give
Yeah there's a lot of love locked up inside of me
That I'm learning to give
So that like that bush in Sinai that burned but was not consumed
May the speed of my life throw sparks on the shadows of the tombs
I got a lot of love locked up inside me
I'm learning to give
So hold on to my hand yeah hold on to my hand
'Cause I need a place to run to and a place to stand
And there's a lot of things this world has hidden
That I'm learning to see
Yeah there's a lot of things this world has hidden
That I'm learning to see
Well I have seen some injustice but I've seen mercy too
I was blinded by the things I saw until I looked at You
There's a lot of things this world has hidden
I'm learning to see
So hold on to my hand hold on to my hand
'Cause I need a place to run to and a place to stand
Hold on to my hand yeah hold on to my hand
'Cause I need a place to run to and a place to stand
A Place To Stand On, Rich Mullins
Well there's a lot of things working against me
But I know I can't lose
Yeah there's a lot of things working against me
But I know I can't lose
And there's a lot of miles still between me and my home
But I've learned a lot through the years, now
I'm more than just young
I got a lot of things working against me
But I know I can't lose
And there's a lot of love locked up inside of me
That I'm learning to give
Yeah there's a lot of love locked up inside of me
That I'm learning to give
So that like that bush in Sinai that burned but was not consumed
May the speed of my life throw sparks on the shadows of the tombs
I got a lot of love locked up inside me
I'm learning to give
So hold on to my hand yeah hold on to my hand
'Cause I need a place to run to and a place to stand
And there's a lot of things this world has hidden
That I'm learning to see
Yeah there's a lot of things this world has hidden
That I'm learning to see
Well I have seen some injustice but I've seen mercy too
I was blinded by the things I saw until I looked at You
There's a lot of things this world has hidden
I'm learning to see
So hold on to my hand hold on to my hand
'Cause I need a place to run to and a place to stand
Hold on to my hand yeah hold on to my hand
'Cause I need a place to run to and a place to stand
22:41.
I reckon it must had been in Sec Three when a classmate or teacher mentioned a post-millenium year (2010? 2020? I can't recall) and I automatically went, "Oh my gosh, I probably be dead by then". The irrelevance of that comment in the light of the fact that 2000 was only four years away then was pointed out to me and I covered up my boo-boo with a "30 is like being dead" or something to that effect. You know, the usual pride of youth and teenage disdain towards age.
I used to think I was always grown up for whatever age I was at. Today, I just told someone that I don't think I will ever grow up. How cliched a line it may be, but I employed it. I'm 23, living in the year 2004 and moving as linear time dicates. And next year, I will be 24. And this story won't end until this earthly tent ends.
Do I feel like an adult? I don't think I have ever really felt like a child, not totally.
There are moments in my life when every thing seems to become real-er, clear-er and freezes for a spilt-second frame. They have happened throughout my life, from childhood to now, and perhaps what happen during those moments - or at least one thing that happens among every thing else - is that I really feel my skin. The outsider looking in becomes the onlooker from inside, from behind these brown eyes, as if I am not the first person.
So it is that I am still the same person. And if it's all right with you, we won't go into great discourses of identity as definition and memories and soul vis-a-vis Identity.
My finite-ness presses against my soul.
This afternoon for my first meal of the day, I chomped down a Big Breakfast (the joys of all-day breakfast menus... sigh) of one sausage, two eggs, two pieces of toast with butter, two strips of bacon, one hashbrown, some sauteed mushrooms, half a tomato and a black coffee.
Considering my breakfast normally consists of one toast and a coffee or tea with no sugar, this was properly unpreceded. The theory of good conversation, coffee and (oh all right, 12) bucks being a sure win was tested in that nice cafe ran by Italians with stereo speakers playing guitar music from the three guitar virtuosos at Bourke.
I somehow cannot see today duplicated in Singapore - Spending five-and-a-half hours with a new friend whopping great brekkie, then chilling later at her place and watching Eat Drink Man Woman before I strolled home down Elizabeth road to cook dinner. It was one of those days with sun but a pleasure chill in the air still and it was that cool embrace of Spring that embraced me and strolled home with me alongside people who just knocked off work.
Solid good way to spend the day.
Maybe I am supposed to be slowly saying my goodbyes to this land and its people now but I keep falling.
I just keep falling.
I reckon it must had been in Sec Three when a classmate or teacher mentioned a post-millenium year (2010? 2020? I can't recall) and I automatically went, "Oh my gosh, I probably be dead by then". The irrelevance of that comment in the light of the fact that 2000 was only four years away then was pointed out to me and I covered up my boo-boo with a "30 is like being dead" or something to that effect. You know, the usual pride of youth and teenage disdain towards age.
I used to think I was always grown up for whatever age I was at. Today, I just told someone that I don't think I will ever grow up. How cliched a line it may be, but I employed it. I'm 23, living in the year 2004 and moving as linear time dicates. And next year, I will be 24. And this story won't end until this earthly tent ends.
Do I feel like an adult? I don't think I have ever really felt like a child, not totally.
There are moments in my life when every thing seems to become real-er, clear-er and freezes for a spilt-second frame. They have happened throughout my life, from childhood to now, and perhaps what happen during those moments - or at least one thing that happens among every thing else - is that I really feel my skin. The outsider looking in becomes the onlooker from inside, from behind these brown eyes, as if I am not the first person.
So it is that I am still the same person. And if it's all right with you, we won't go into great discourses of identity as definition and memories and soul vis-a-vis Identity.
My finite-ness presses against my soul.
This afternoon for my first meal of the day, I chomped down a Big Breakfast (the joys of all-day breakfast menus... sigh) of one sausage, two eggs, two pieces of toast with butter, two strips of bacon, one hashbrown, some sauteed mushrooms, half a tomato and a black coffee.
Considering my breakfast normally consists of one toast and a coffee or tea with no sugar, this was properly unpreceded. The theory of good conversation, coffee and (oh all right, 12) bucks being a sure win was tested in that nice cafe ran by Italians with stereo speakers playing guitar music from the three guitar virtuosos at Bourke.
I somehow cannot see today duplicated in Singapore - Spending five-and-a-half hours with a new friend whopping great brekkie, then chilling later at her place and watching Eat Drink Man Woman before I strolled home down Elizabeth road to cook dinner. It was one of those days with sun but a pleasure chill in the air still and it was that cool embrace of Spring that embraced me and strolled home with me alongside people who just knocked off work.
Solid good way to spend the day.
Maybe I am supposed to be slowly saying my goodbyes to this land and its people now but I keep falling.
I just keep falling.
Monday, November 08, 2004
00:38.
As I laugh louder and live harder and ride the emotional rollercoaster, it seems as if I am running to stand still. There are few things, or nothing in life which you can really count on. And as for people, the count only increases slightly.
Most of us walk through life lonely. Some of us find paper clutches to combat this. Others dare not reach out. And still more, there are some who are careful about reaching out in case love and friendship are really only just lonely people desperate for companionship wanting to get some.
If I could be categorised, I would be in that last category, concerned about motives and drive, both an observer of society as well as observer of myself and convicted that being alone does not at all mean being lonely.
Last year, God started to teach me more about loving. This year, the lesson continues - as it will throughout my life - and I have learnt and am learning to give and... to love.
The truth is this. In the last seven or so years I started attending church, I have never had as much spiritual support as I have right now here in Melb. And despite there being few options for a kaki if I spontaneously wanted to go grab a coffee, I feel connected to people in a way I don't reckon I have had for a long time.
The truth is this. I have fallen in love with all these people in OCF and church and when I board that Qantas/ British Airways plane on Dec 21, my heart would probably break into further pieces.
I find myself not really wanting to think a lot about the stuff on its way. And I wonder if my laugh has some hint of desperation. Some kind of desperation to just get all I can now, while I can.
In a paradox, I find too myself wanting to give. Give as much of myself away as I can. Give as much of whatever good I could possibly give away. Just give. The strangest thing might be that I honestly don't think it's about me. It's not about leaving the best image I can of S k y e T. It's not about desperately trying to ensure that I am remembered (not that being remembered is a nasty thought....). It's just not about this finite creature who lives by grace and day by day, is only becoming more aware of how much of a jar of clay she is, and an extremely broken, small and not user-friendly one too at that.
There are many things I want to write about. To God, who knows all things; to me, who knows nothing; and to you, readers who I have given access into my head. But for now, I am going to hit the sack. Am not sleepy but gastric pains are coming on and I don't want to stick around to have them come full-on.
Walking on the Melbourne streets at night is one of the most peaceful things in life. And before I leave, I hope I have another chance to encounter a flock of seagulls on the ground at night so I can run right into their midst and go "boo!".
As I laugh louder and live harder and ride the emotional rollercoaster, it seems as if I am running to stand still. There are few things, or nothing in life which you can really count on. And as for people, the count only increases slightly.
Most of us walk through life lonely. Some of us find paper clutches to combat this. Others dare not reach out. And still more, there are some who are careful about reaching out in case love and friendship are really only just lonely people desperate for companionship wanting to get some.
If I could be categorised, I would be in that last category, concerned about motives and drive, both an observer of society as well as observer of myself and convicted that being alone does not at all mean being lonely.
Last year, God started to teach me more about loving. This year, the lesson continues - as it will throughout my life - and I have learnt and am learning to give and... to love.
The truth is this. In the last seven or so years I started attending church, I have never had as much spiritual support as I have right now here in Melb. And despite there being few options for a kaki if I spontaneously wanted to go grab a coffee, I feel connected to people in a way I don't reckon I have had for a long time.
The truth is this. I have fallen in love with all these people in OCF and church and when I board that Qantas/ British Airways plane on Dec 21, my heart would probably break into further pieces.
I find myself not really wanting to think a lot about the stuff on its way. And I wonder if my laugh has some hint of desperation. Some kind of desperation to just get all I can now, while I can.
In a paradox, I find too myself wanting to give. Give as much of myself away as I can. Give as much of whatever good I could possibly give away. Just give. The strangest thing might be that I honestly don't think it's about me. It's not about leaving the best image I can of S k y e T. It's not about desperately trying to ensure that I am remembered (not that being remembered is a nasty thought....). It's just not about this finite creature who lives by grace and day by day, is only becoming more aware of how much of a jar of clay she is, and an extremely broken, small and not user-friendly one too at that.
There are many things I want to write about. To God, who knows all things; to me, who knows nothing; and to you, readers who I have given access into my head. But for now, I am going to hit the sack. Am not sleepy but gastric pains are coming on and I don't want to stick around to have them come full-on.
Walking on the Melbourne streets at night is one of the most peaceful things in life. And before I leave, I hope I have another chance to encounter a flock of seagulls on the ground at night so I can run right into their midst and go "boo!".
Friday, November 05, 2004
02.51.
Slept at 6.06am yesterday. The sunrise was worth staying up a while longer for. Pictures sequence are haphazard. Apologies. I just really feel like posting every shot. I shot 120 photos over about 15 minutes. The light in the skies changes with every second every shot seems to me a different story. Life is good. Mornington's and Skye Road's pictures will be up in a few days.... :)
Slept at 6.06am yesterday. The sunrise was worth staying up a while longer for. Pictures sequence are haphazard. Apologies. I just really feel like posting every shot. I shot 120 photos over about 15 minutes. The light in the skies changes with every second every shot seems to me a different story. Life is good. Mornington's and Skye Road's pictures will be up in a few days.... :)
Thursday, November 04, 2004
Monday, November 01, 2004
12:41.
I miss home.
It's not really about Singapore. Nor is it about how I already miss Melbourne even as I spend my last month or so here. Somehow, in my current stateless make-up, I yearn for that home I know I am going back to.
"Home... hard to know what it is if you never had one
Home... I can say where it is but I know I'm going Home
That's where the heart is" - Walk On
Less than an hour after I got up for the day, I was on this futon with my guitar, strumming and singing Rich Mullin's If I Stand.
"So if I stand, let me stand on the promise that You will see me through.
And if I can't let me fall on the Grace that first brought me to You!
And if I sing let it be for the joy that has born in me these songs
and if I weep let it be as a man who is longing for his ho-ome"
I don't have my heart.
I've given it to my God and Lord a long time ago.
Oh sure, I perpetually am tugging it back for the stupidest reasons.
But it's still with Him.
That's the only way it can live on.
Three chords, a red guitar and the truth.
And I miss drumming already.
I miss home.
It's not really about Singapore. Nor is it about how I already miss Melbourne even as I spend my last month or so here. Somehow, in my current stateless make-up, I yearn for that home I know I am going back to.
"Home... hard to know what it is if you never had one
Home... I can say where it is but I know I'm going Home
That's where the heart is" - Walk On
Less than an hour after I got up for the day, I was on this futon with my guitar, strumming and singing Rich Mullin's If I Stand.
"So if I stand, let me stand on the promise that You will see me through.
And if I can't let me fall on the Grace that first brought me to You!
And if I sing let it be for the joy that has born in me these songs
and if I weep let it be as a man who is longing for his ho-ome"
I don't have my heart.
I've given it to my God and Lord a long time ago.
Oh sure, I perpetually am tugging it back for the stupidest reasons.
But it's still with Him.
That's the only way it can live on.
Three chords, a red guitar and the truth.
And I miss drumming already.
Friday, October 29, 2004
01:11.
Last evening's speaker at OCF delivered a sermon that was probably the most intelligent and biblical one I have heard for a good while. There were inferences, but theologically grounded mostly, and time was extended to explain part of the women-should-not-talk scripture in the Epistles. I appreciate that. I sincerely do. Again, it feels like it has been a good while since I heard from the pulpit affirmation for my gender, specifically tackling supposed scriptural anormalities like those. I learnt the stuff he explained through my readings a good while ago, probably four years or maybe three when I had to tackle my feminity with my faith and the church but so many still need to hear and be reminded.
So many things to learn.
So many things to analyse and wrap my head around.
Reminders spring at me, left, right and center, of how I need to study my faith. How I need to understand theological workings and innings. How I need to be able to use the (perhaps) vanity of words to define realities my spirit already recognise.
And even as these reminders, like thistles and thorns thrown at my heart, abound, a part of me seem to be resting, finding peace in the idea of returning to journalism. A certain joy and quiet gladness at the thought of spending hours and days and months and some years just telling stories, telling people's stories.
And yet, to add a third leg to this diagram, a browse through a publication just now opened up the door to another angle. It was not this sole publication that tripped me down a non-angry almost-rant. How vain these words, how useless are words, how utter wasteful, stupid and nonsensical it should be that so much of what is written never really makes sense. All but mere vanity, words written to fill pages just for that sake, words empty, containing only puffed attempts to illuminate and gather, communicate and encapsulate. Yet so heartless because they are but some exercise.
People talk too much. In the same way, they write too much sometimes (I am not excused). And like how a babble falls to the ground like slime or dust and takes up way too much space and captures some bit of attention which you are not willing to spend, empty words occupies too much even in their inherently meaningless existence.
Clutter. That's what these are.
And like all deconstructivist theories, the theories themselves are as full of holes as the ideologies they debunk. Or seek to. I write in some derision about writing. Isn't that ironic?
Ah. Shut up. I am going to bed.
Sleep well.
Last evening's speaker at OCF delivered a sermon that was probably the most intelligent and biblical one I have heard for a good while. There were inferences, but theologically grounded mostly, and time was extended to explain part of the women-should-not-talk scripture in the Epistles. I appreciate that. I sincerely do. Again, it feels like it has been a good while since I heard from the pulpit affirmation for my gender, specifically tackling supposed scriptural anormalities like those. I learnt the stuff he explained through my readings a good while ago, probably four years or maybe three when I had to tackle my feminity with my faith and the church but so many still need to hear and be reminded.
So many things to learn.
So many things to analyse and wrap my head around.
Reminders spring at me, left, right and center, of how I need to study my faith. How I need to understand theological workings and innings. How I need to be able to use the (perhaps) vanity of words to define realities my spirit already recognise.
And even as these reminders, like thistles and thorns thrown at my heart, abound, a part of me seem to be resting, finding peace in the idea of returning to journalism. A certain joy and quiet gladness at the thought of spending hours and days and months and some years just telling stories, telling people's stories.
And yet, to add a third leg to this diagram, a browse through a publication just now opened up the door to another angle. It was not this sole publication that tripped me down a non-angry almost-rant. How vain these words, how useless are words, how utter wasteful, stupid and nonsensical it should be that so much of what is written never really makes sense. All but mere vanity, words written to fill pages just for that sake, words empty, containing only puffed attempts to illuminate and gather, communicate and encapsulate. Yet so heartless because they are but some exercise.
People talk too much. In the same way, they write too much sometimes (I am not excused). And like how a babble falls to the ground like slime or dust and takes up way too much space and captures some bit of attention which you are not willing to spend, empty words occupies too much even in their inherently meaningless existence.
Clutter. That's what these are.
And like all deconstructivist theories, the theories themselves are as full of holes as the ideologies they debunk. Or seek to. I write in some derision about writing. Isn't that ironic?
Ah. Shut up. I am going to bed.
Sleep well.
Thursday, October 28, 2004
22:29.
I love my CDs, I resist the portable MP3 wave, and I am sentimental towards my much abused discman. But. Look at this.
Its cost can buy me a decent electric guitar and amp, plus a couple of good albums but this really could make me make the switch. I really like it.
Black! Red! Silver!
Engraved signatures!
But oh, the cost!
I love my CDs, I resist the portable MP3 wave, and I am sentimental towards my much abused discman. But. Look at this.
Its cost can buy me a decent electric guitar and amp, plus a couple of good albums but this really could make me make the switch. I really like it.
Black! Red! Silver!
Engraved signatures!
But oh, the cost!
Tuesday, October 26, 2004
Monday, October 25, 2004
00:22.
Another one of those times when I flip through my history to remember what it was like last year this time - archives.
Asad Latif's article at the end of that page still is as relevant to me now. Your are the actors, I am just a writer. I live a life that writes about life.
Is this my calling, Lord? Not just vocational but ministry. Are the two streams simply one for me, and manifested in journalism?
Word of God, speak.
I will be still, and trust and believe.
I love You, Jesus and I never want to forget You.
Another one of those times when I flip through my history to remember what it was like last year this time - archives.
Asad Latif's article at the end of that page still is as relevant to me now. Your are the actors, I am just a writer. I live a life that writes about life.
Is this my calling, Lord? Not just vocational but ministry. Are the two streams simply one for me, and manifested in journalism?
Word of God, speak.
I will be still, and trust and believe.
I love You, Jesus and I never want to forget You.
Saturday, October 23, 2004
22:26.
Fresh scallops are amazing stuff. Absolutely totally far-out good stuff. And they are only about $15 per kg. How far out is that. Germaine and me were wondering where abouts in Singapore we could get fresh scallops (with the orange coral intact) and we really could not think of any where which would sell these beauties we get from the lovely Vic Mkt.
I got a tray (about 400grams?) for $5 near closing time. Baked one batch with prawns and veggies and sauteed the other batch with butter, mixed herbs, garlic salt and a dash of lemon.
I am addicted. Gonna eat more of these gorgeous seafood before I leave here.
And I am the new owner of a 3-disc Elle Fitzgerald set, The Byrds Super Hits, Johnny Cash's Ring Of Fire and The Best Of Don McLean... all for $31. Melbourne record stores sales are good for classics fans like me. I was already very much restrained, honest.
Fresh scallops are amazing stuff. Absolutely totally far-out good stuff. And they are only about $15 per kg. How far out is that. Germaine and me were wondering where abouts in Singapore we could get fresh scallops (with the orange coral intact) and we really could not think of any where which would sell these beauties we get from the lovely Vic Mkt.
I got a tray (about 400grams?) for $5 near closing time. Baked one batch with prawns and veggies and sauteed the other batch with butter, mixed herbs, garlic salt and a dash of lemon.
I am addicted. Gonna eat more of these gorgeous seafood before I leave here.
And I am the new owner of a 3-disc Elle Fitzgerald set, The Byrds Super Hits, Johnny Cash's Ring Of Fire and The Best Of Don McLean... all for $31. Melbourne record stores sales are good for classics fans like me. I was already very much restrained, honest.
0322.
So I am not going to be able to change my sleeping habits soon, huh?
Ok, over at the photo blog - pictures of last morning's click-fest. No pictures of sunrise, because the sun eluded me. The skies turned light and blue but its source was coy. I stood on the balcony as first light manifested and as I took photographs, realised my hands were shaking, in part due to the morning chill (pleasant chill, me reckon) and the lack of sleep. Thus, wrong as it felt to hit the sack when the world is bright, I did.
Time to hit the sack.
Peace out.
So I am not going to be able to change my sleeping habits soon, huh?
Ok, over at the photo blog - pictures of last morning's click-fest. No pictures of sunrise, because the sun eluded me. The skies turned light and blue but its source was coy. I stood on the balcony as first light manifested and as I took photographs, realised my hands were shaking, in part due to the morning chill (pleasant chill, me reckon) and the lack of sleep. Thus, wrong as it felt to hit the sack when the world is bright, I did.
Time to hit the sack.
Peace out.
Friday, October 22, 2004
0435.
This is odd.
All is done.
Done.
Completed.
I have finished my final essay, that one due next Tuesday, I have finished it.
I am feeling... feeling-less at the moment. Hah.
I remember blogging last year after a late night at work, 3am to be precise. I don't think I ever expected that 3am working nights would become such a norm for me now. Or rather, they have been.
Now that I don't have any more school work to do, maybe I won't stay up so late any more.
This is weird.
Is it done?
Yes, it is. My Asian Cinema essay on Asia and Asian-ness representation in Kill Bill Vol. 2, it is done. Not a brillant piece of work, and I realise how Cinema subjects are a lot more enjoyable during the semester when you are watching films and discussing them rather than having to put pen to paper and make coherent cultural arguments.
I just yawned. It's 0442am. For some reason, I feel wide awake. Despite that yawn, yes. Some night bird - nightingale, could it be? - has been singing somewhere outside for a long time and likewise, for some while already, the traffic has been increasing.
All is quiet in the house, me at "my end" of the kitchen table, except for the tick-tock of the living room clock and the tapping of these keys I hit.
Oh wow. I can't believe I am done.
It is October 22 2004.
On Feb 09 2004, I boarded a Qantas plane at Singapore and arrived here in Melbourne on Feb 10, early morning.
It was a drizzly day. It was my first time flying alone, I didn't had any sleep at all on the flight, and my first glimpse of this apartment was that it looked like a condo, like an apartment, not a home. It was spartan, it still is if not for our clutter, and oooh, yes, the lovely drum set. But since that day, this has become home in a lot more ways.
It has been some days past eight months since Melbourne became my city of residence. And it has been about eight months since I started school and now (unofficially, albeit) I end?
Between now and graduation on Dec 15, what do I do?
Actually, now what do I do is a question that flitted through my mind just... oh my gosh! The skies are turning blue!!! Sunrise is coming!!!
*scuttles off to get camera*
Am back.
This is so darn cool.
A number of times when I worked till after 4am, I told myself I should just stay up till 5am and catch the sunrise but never did. What better day than the last day I have to stay up late for work to do this?
It's 0453. Skies are turning indigo, I have an idea where the sun should be rising from but I don't see a significant lightness in the skies there.
I sit and wait.
Life.
Is.
Good.
This is odd.
All is done.
Done.
Completed.
I have finished my final essay, that one due next Tuesday, I have finished it.
I am feeling... feeling-less at the moment. Hah.
I remember blogging last year after a late night at work, 3am to be precise. I don't think I ever expected that 3am working nights would become such a norm for me now. Or rather, they have been.
Now that I don't have any more school work to do, maybe I won't stay up so late any more.
This is weird.
Is it done?
Yes, it is. My Asian Cinema essay on Asia and Asian-ness representation in Kill Bill Vol. 2, it is done. Not a brillant piece of work, and I realise how Cinema subjects are a lot more enjoyable during the semester when you are watching films and discussing them rather than having to put pen to paper and make coherent cultural arguments.
I just yawned. It's 0442am. For some reason, I feel wide awake. Despite that yawn, yes. Some night bird - nightingale, could it be? - has been singing somewhere outside for a long time and likewise, for some while already, the traffic has been increasing.
All is quiet in the house, me at "my end" of the kitchen table, except for the tick-tock of the living room clock and the tapping of these keys I hit.
Oh wow. I can't believe I am done.
It is October 22 2004.
On Feb 09 2004, I boarded a Qantas plane at Singapore and arrived here in Melbourne on Feb 10, early morning.
It was a drizzly day. It was my first time flying alone, I didn't had any sleep at all on the flight, and my first glimpse of this apartment was that it looked like a condo, like an apartment, not a home. It was spartan, it still is if not for our clutter, and oooh, yes, the lovely drum set. But since that day, this has become home in a lot more ways.
It has been some days past eight months since Melbourne became my city of residence. And it has been about eight months since I started school and now (unofficially, albeit) I end?
Between now and graduation on Dec 15, what do I do?
Actually, now what do I do is a question that flitted through my mind just... oh my gosh! The skies are turning blue!!! Sunrise is coming!!!
*scuttles off to get camera*
Am back.
This is so darn cool.
A number of times when I worked till after 4am, I told myself I should just stay up till 5am and catch the sunrise but never did. What better day than the last day I have to stay up late for work to do this?
It's 0453. Skies are turning indigo, I have an idea where the sun should be rising from but I don't see a significant lightness in the skies there.
I sit and wait.
Life.
Is.
Good.
Thursday, October 21, 2004
13:10.
I was lying half on my futon, Anna Sui's extraordinary moisturing mask (ah, the joys of freebies) at its rehydrating work and me just looking up at the clear blue skies with fluffy white clouds peeping in through the window.
And a sense of time struck me, like one of that imaginary Cupid's arrows.
That moment of perfect satisfaction, that moment of peace and contentment, that moment of wonder at the now-and-now, it will never repeat. Every moment will never ever replay again. They are here once and not ever again and this is time. This is life.
I look at my overspilling wardrobe drawers and contemplate life.
Thought about packing up the winter clothes and sending the coat to a dry cleaner.
Idyllically mentally running past shops front windows along Lygon and Elizabeth to remember where cheap dry cleaning services exist.
I thought about the people in my life now and my heart felt heavy at the thought of the tomorrows after I leave.
People with whom I make connections, acquaintances who I do care for and want to know better, beautiful people whose paths I want to share.
I think I feel most alive when I am answering doubts, comforting pain, sharing a life's tale.
So what? Every story gets cut off when I leave?
Goodbye S k y e T, nice knowing you. See you in heaven, maybe.
Is that it?
Oh the pain.
Maybe at the end of the day, I fight change as much as I fight normalcy.
And the only baggage I can bring is all that I can't leave behind.
My heart aches.
I was lying half on my futon, Anna Sui's extraordinary moisturing mask (ah, the joys of freebies) at its rehydrating work and me just looking up at the clear blue skies with fluffy white clouds peeping in through the window.
And a sense of time struck me, like one of that imaginary Cupid's arrows.
That moment of perfect satisfaction, that moment of peace and contentment, that moment of wonder at the now-and-now, it will never repeat. Every moment will never ever replay again. They are here once and not ever again and this is time. This is life.
I look at my overspilling wardrobe drawers and contemplate life.
Thought about packing up the winter clothes and sending the coat to a dry cleaner.
Idyllically mentally running past shops front windows along Lygon and Elizabeth to remember where cheap dry cleaning services exist.
I thought about the people in my life now and my heart felt heavy at the thought of the tomorrows after I leave.
People with whom I make connections, acquaintances who I do care for and want to know better, beautiful people whose paths I want to share.
I think I feel most alive when I am answering doubts, comforting pain, sharing a life's tale.
So what? Every story gets cut off when I leave?
Goodbye S k y e T, nice knowing you. See you in heaven, maybe.
Is that it?
Oh the pain.
Maybe at the end of the day, I fight change as much as I fight normalcy.
And the only baggage I can bring is all that I can't leave behind.
My heart aches.
Wednesday, October 20, 2004
01:50.
Burn me up, wash me clean. When I'm with You, I don't need to speak. All are meaningless and words are vain. Yet with this form I enter now, I'll discard them in a while, for though words are my tools, definitions and craft, You are my peace and in quietness and trust, I will find rest in Christ alone.
On Fire, Switchfoot
Tell me where I need to go
Tell me when I'll need to leave
Tell me what I need to know
Tell me who I need to be
But everything inside me knows
There's more than what I've heard
So much more than empty conversations
Filled with empty words
And I'm on fire
When You're near me
I'm on fire
When You speak
I'm on fire
Burning at these mysteries
Give me one more time around
Give me one more chance to see
Give me everything You are
Give me one more chance to be... (near You)
Cause everything inside looks like
Everything I hate
You are the hope I have for change
You are the only chance I'll take
When I'm on fire
When You're near me
I'm on fire
When You speak
And I'm on fire
Burning at these mysteries
these mysteries...
I'm standing on the edge of me
I'm standing on the edge of me
I'm standing on the edge of me
I'm standing on the edge
Burn me up, wash me clean. When I'm with You, I don't need to speak. All are meaningless and words are vain. Yet with this form I enter now, I'll discard them in a while, for though words are my tools, definitions and craft, You are my peace and in quietness and trust, I will find rest in Christ alone.
On Fire, Switchfoot
Tell me where I need to go
Tell me when I'll need to leave
Tell me what I need to know
Tell me who I need to be
But everything inside me knows
There's more than what I've heard
So much more than empty conversations
Filled with empty words
And I'm on fire
When You're near me
I'm on fire
When You speak
I'm on fire
Burning at these mysteries
Give me one more time around
Give me one more chance to see
Give me everything You are
Give me one more chance to be... (near You)
Cause everything inside looks like
Everything I hate
You are the hope I have for change
You are the only chance I'll take
When I'm on fire
When You're near me
I'm on fire
When You speak
And I'm on fire
Burning at these mysteries
these mysteries...
I'm standing on the edge of me
I'm standing on the edge of me
I'm standing on the edge of me
I'm standing on the edge
22:07.
I know: That we all still exist in the system and all that are here are coloured with the lens within the matrix. That being fallible, it is impossible for us not to make mistakes. And being human, the works of our hands are created, conceptualised, birthed from the cursed earth we hold them in. So when I see the failings in the way we choose leadership, smut on church hierarchy and the problems of religious language, it's nothing new. And nothing to bring out a guillotine for a new spin on Salem's. But knowing all these doesn't mean I feel better.
I know: That we all still exist in the system and all that are here are coloured with the lens within the matrix. That being fallible, it is impossible for us not to make mistakes. And being human, the works of our hands are created, conceptualised, birthed from the cursed earth we hold them in. So when I see the failings in the way we choose leadership, smut on church hierarchy and the problems of religious language, it's nothing new. And nothing to bring out a guillotine for a new spin on Salem's. But knowing all these doesn't mean I feel better.
Monday, October 18, 2004
21:58.
I walked across an empty land
I knew the pathway like the back of my hand
I felt the earth beneath my feet
Sat by the river and it made me complete
Oh simple thing where have you gone
I'm getting old and I need something to rely on
So tell me when you're gonna let me in
I'm getting tired and I need somewhere to begin
I came across a fallen tree
I felt the branches of it looking at me
Is this the place we used to love?
Is this the place that I've been dreaming of?
Oh simple thing where have you gone
I'm getting old and I need something to rely on
So tell me when you're gonna let me in
I'm getting tired and I need somewhere to begin
And if you have a minute why don't we go
Talk about it somewhere only we know?
This could be the end of everything
So why don't we go
Somewhere only we know?
Oh simple thing where have you gone
I'm getting old and I need something to rely on
So tell me when you're gonna let me in
I'm getting tired and I need somewhere to begin
So if you have a minute why don't we go
Talk about it somewhere only we know?
This could be the end of everything
So why don't we go
So why don't we go
This could be the end of everything
So why don't we go
Somewhere only we know?
- Somewhere Only We Know, Keane
Such a melancholic song and so very beautiful. Not representative of my about-to-tackle-first-ever-cinema-essay mood but ah, so beautiful. And Marty did it immensely well too. There you go, my first Australian Idol reference in this blog.
Woebeme?
I walked across an empty land
I knew the pathway like the back of my hand
I felt the earth beneath my feet
Sat by the river and it made me complete
Oh simple thing where have you gone
I'm getting old and I need something to rely on
So tell me when you're gonna let me in
I'm getting tired and I need somewhere to begin
I came across a fallen tree
I felt the branches of it looking at me
Is this the place we used to love?
Is this the place that I've been dreaming of?
Oh simple thing where have you gone
I'm getting old and I need something to rely on
So tell me when you're gonna let me in
I'm getting tired and I need somewhere to begin
And if you have a minute why don't we go
Talk about it somewhere only we know?
This could be the end of everything
So why don't we go
Somewhere only we know?
Oh simple thing where have you gone
I'm getting old and I need something to rely on
So tell me when you're gonna let me in
I'm getting tired and I need somewhere to begin
So if you have a minute why don't we go
Talk about it somewhere only we know?
This could be the end of everything
So why don't we go
So why don't we go
This could be the end of everything
So why don't we go
Somewhere only we know?
- Somewhere Only We Know, Keane
Such a melancholic song and so very beautiful. Not representative of my about-to-tackle-first-ever-cinema-essay mood but ah, so beautiful. And Marty did it immensely well too. There you go, my first Australian Idol reference in this blog.
Woebeme?
Saturday, October 16, 2004
Friday, October 15, 2004
12:52.
I am heartbroken.
Totally, absolutely impossibly heartbroken.
The physical area where that dub-tub organ sits physically hurts.
The lyric playing in my head for the moment is "Cry-ai-ai-ai-in" (Crying, by Roy Orbison). The song actually playing on my laptop is Here Is Gone, by Goo Goo Dolls.
My housemates just witnessed me wailing around the house.
Sigh.
Did S k y e T finally surpass that commitment phobia, ventured into a relationship and got hurt?
Hmm... the first bit is correct, the rest are figments of your imagination.
For the life of me, why I got so affected over an academic affair is beyond me.
Crown me the queen of nerds, even though I still need my roommate to exterminate the spyware and adware and various ailments that were in my laptop.
Ok, in a nutshell, story is this.
I submitted my final photography portfolio yesterday, deadline's today. I submitted the last assignment last week but the lecturer only got back to me today.
I got a 9/10 for my last assignment and I am utterly chuffed about that but *insert a dozen sighs* I didn't include half of the photographs in that assignment in my final portfolio. I pray this won't cost me my HD.
Hm. I am feeling okay already.
All right, moving on.
I am heartbroken.
Totally, absolutely impossibly heartbroken.
The physical area where that dub-tub organ sits physically hurts.
The lyric playing in my head for the moment is "Cry-ai-ai-ai-in" (Crying, by Roy Orbison). The song actually playing on my laptop is Here Is Gone, by Goo Goo Dolls.
My housemates just witnessed me wailing around the house.
Sigh.
Did S k y e T finally surpass that commitment phobia, ventured into a relationship and got hurt?
Hmm... the first bit is correct, the rest are figments of your imagination.
For the life of me, why I got so affected over an academic affair is beyond me.
Crown me the queen of nerds, even though I still need my roommate to exterminate the spyware and adware and various ailments that were in my laptop.
Ok, in a nutshell, story is this.
I submitted my final photography portfolio yesterday, deadline's today. I submitted the last assignment last week but the lecturer only got back to me today.
I got a 9/10 for my last assignment and I am utterly chuffed about that but *insert a dozen sighs* I didn't include half of the photographs in that assignment in my final portfolio. I pray this won't cost me my HD.
Hm. I am feeling okay already.
All right, moving on.
Thursday, October 14, 2004
16:40.
Article On SG's death penalty rate:
Mind you, I believe and applaud the work of Amnesty International and I'm not an advocater of the death penalty but if the spokeperson's best argument for our "safe and tough on crime" (you don't think there's a co-relation between the two?) city to rethink the death penalty is that "by carrying out high numbers of executions, Singapore is going against global trens towards abolition of the death penalty", then forgive me for expressing some scorn.
Your best argument is that we should abide by the majority?
There's a reason why I like Mahathir and his anti-West, nationalistic sentiments.
Wednesday, October 13, 2004
22:45.
Excerpt from some Buffy fanbies pop culture references decoder site, about a comment one of the characters made about "to serve man":
" 'To Serve Man' is the title of an episode of The Twilight Zone in 1962. Aliens come to earth, offering man help. A book, which was written in an alien language, was decoded and was found named 'To Serve Man'. They thought this meant that this was a book on helping man, but it wasnt until they were on the ship that they realised that it was really a cookbook, and they were the main course."
*laughs till head pops*
Excerpt from some Buffy fanbies pop culture references decoder site, about a comment one of the characters made about "to serve man":
" 'To Serve Man' is the title of an episode of The Twilight Zone in 1962. Aliens come to earth, offering man help. A book, which was written in an alien language, was decoded and was found named 'To Serve Man'. They thought this meant that this was a book on helping man, but it wasnt until they were on the ship that they realised that it was really a cookbook, and they were the main course."
*laughs till head pops*
15:55.
Lyrics and prayer
Come thou fount of every blessing
Tune my heart to sing Thy grace
Streams of mercy never ceasing
Call for songs of loudest praise
Prone to wander Lord I feel it
Prone to leave the God I love
Here's my heart Lord take and seal it
Seal it for Thy courts above
Here's my heart Lord take and seal it
Seal it for Thy courts above
Teach me some melodious sonnet
Sung by flaming tongues above
Praise the mount I'm fixed upon it
Mount of Thy redeeming love
O to grace how great a debtor
Daily I'm constrained to be
Let Thy grace Lord like a fetter
Bind my wandering heart to Thee
Prone to wander Lord I feel it
Prone to leave the God I love
Here's my heart Lord take and seal it
Seal it for Thy courts above
Here's my heart Lord take and seal it
Seal it for Thy courts above
Lyrics and prayer
Come thou fount of every blessing
Tune my heart to sing Thy grace
Streams of mercy never ceasing
Call for songs of loudest praise
Prone to wander Lord I feel it
Prone to leave the God I love
Here's my heart Lord take and seal it
Seal it for Thy courts above
Here's my heart Lord take and seal it
Seal it for Thy courts above
Teach me some melodious sonnet
Sung by flaming tongues above
Praise the mount I'm fixed upon it
Mount of Thy redeeming love
O to grace how great a debtor
Daily I'm constrained to be
Let Thy grace Lord like a fetter
Bind my wandering heart to Thee
Prone to wander Lord I feel it
Prone to leave the God I love
Here's my heart Lord take and seal it
Seal it for Thy courts above
Here's my heart Lord take and seal it
Seal it for Thy courts above
Friday, October 08, 2004
Monday, October 04, 2004
13:50.
In a moment yesterday, the distance between S k y e T circa Jan 2004 and S k y e T circa now hit me between the eyes.
It was in church, and the pastor was acknowledging that people have been hurt by the church and there are some who might or may have felt or feel that they love God but do not love the church. Invountarily, I mumbled, "That sounds familiar" after which my own words kind of struck me. The intensity of the days when I just didn't like the church even as I could love it in some ideological sense fleetingly touched me there as I sat in my chair in church.
Those days are over.
It's as simple as that. As final and absolute as such. Over.
I started praying about my return a while back. Not just the where-should-I-go bit but praying for my God to prepare me for this return and to open the way and bless my future endeavours and for me to be able still to bless others and love more.
There in church, I threw away the worries and doubts and fears and I cover 2005 with faith. Light flooded the future in my mind's eye. Not unlike some sci-fi movie, a picture of myself being flooded with light from the inside by a beam of light coming right at me was in my head.
It was about three weeks back perhaps when while walking up the stairs (this is exercise) and remembering the goodness shown me throughout the years, God spoke.
"Whatever you put your hands to, I will bless."
I was taken back. I know this not to be a licence to chase and hanker after my own desires for their fulfillment but a promise like the one given to Solomon and the kings of Israel. As long as I seek You first above all else, You will bless me and make the way straight.
Thank you, Lord.
In a moment yesterday, the distance between S k y e T circa Jan 2004 and S k y e T circa now hit me between the eyes.
It was in church, and the pastor was acknowledging that people have been hurt by the church and there are some who might or may have felt or feel that they love God but do not love the church. Invountarily, I mumbled, "That sounds familiar" after which my own words kind of struck me. The intensity of the days when I just didn't like the church even as I could love it in some ideological sense fleetingly touched me there as I sat in my chair in church.
Those days are over.
It's as simple as that. As final and absolute as such. Over.
I started praying about my return a while back. Not just the where-should-I-go bit but praying for my God to prepare me for this return and to open the way and bless my future endeavours and for me to be able still to bless others and love more.
There in church, I threw away the worries and doubts and fears and I cover 2005 with faith. Light flooded the future in my mind's eye. Not unlike some sci-fi movie, a picture of myself being flooded with light from the inside by a beam of light coming right at me was in my head.
It was about three weeks back perhaps when while walking up the stairs (this is exercise) and remembering the goodness shown me throughout the years, God spoke.
"Whatever you put your hands to, I will bless."
I was taken back. I know this not to be a licence to chase and hanker after my own desires for their fulfillment but a promise like the one given to Solomon and the kings of Israel. As long as I seek You first above all else, You will bless me and make the way straight.
Thank you, Lord.
Saturday, October 02, 2004
22:34.
There are moments when it seems I am estranging myself from what has become my norm. Whether this is a draw-back-because-I'm-leaving or my-head-is-too-noisy-and-I-don't-have-the-words-to-tell-you-about-what's-going-on knee-jerk reaction, I am - you guess it - not too sure.
I have dug my heels in and refused to turn back, I want to run the final lap and grab as much as I can but tomorrow seems to hold my heart, and he is treating it like a wooden heart that is not supposed to feel or react.
I turned my attention to yesterday and tried considering the possible results if I had not gone down the paths I have. I dare not imagine. Or rather, I cannot see it any other way. Maybe studying what I did and do and being in these endeavours have made my mind a lot more complicated but I rather be this way than to never had known.
I rather be in the question than to never even be able to recognise there's an itch to scratch.
Hold me Jesus
'cause I am shaking like a leave
You have been King of my glory
Won't You be my Prince of Peace
There are moments when it seems I am estranging myself from what has become my norm. Whether this is a draw-back-because-I'm-leaving or my-head-is-too-noisy-and-I-don't-have-the-words-to-tell-you-about-what's-going-on knee-jerk reaction, I am - you guess it - not too sure.
I have dug my heels in and refused to turn back, I want to run the final lap and grab as much as I can but tomorrow seems to hold my heart, and he is treating it like a wooden heart that is not supposed to feel or react.
I turned my attention to yesterday and tried considering the possible results if I had not gone down the paths I have. I dare not imagine. Or rather, I cannot see it any other way. Maybe studying what I did and do and being in these endeavours have made my mind a lot more complicated but I rather be this way than to never had known.
I rather be in the question than to never even be able to recognise there's an itch to scratch.
Hold me Jesus
'cause I am shaking like a leave
You have been King of my glory
Won't You be my Prince of Peace
Friday, October 01, 2004
01:51.
*smiles*
It rocked. It really did. Drumming a song like Accidentally In Love with delightful company, all persons who know their stuff heaps more than I do. The energy, the synergy, the whole fun of playing in a band and performing instead of playing for a worship session, every thing clicked, gelled and rocked.
[And I chose the song.]
Some of these folks really impress me. The 18-year-old who breaks into guitar solos that actually make my jaw drop and spine tingle in pleasure and amazement, the 24-year-old medical student and very encouraging and helpful fellow musician who so gamely does silly stuff to get people to laugh, the 22-year-old bassist who decides he wants to sing lead for the first time and gutsy-ly does so while playing bass too. These folks blow my mind.
The only time I looked up from the set and into the crowd, I saw cameras flashing and folks advancing towards the band with videos and what-nots. It felt rather... good. All in good fun, you know. Just like drumming in a dress after kicking off my heels.
I am chuffed. God is amazing.
It's unreal. I finally performed a song as a musician. I think all of us were grinning or chuckling when we ended, it was such good fun but all that practice and all was over in three - all right, maybe four - minutes?
Golly gee.
Golly, golly, golly.
*smiles*
It rocked. It really did. Drumming a song like Accidentally In Love with delightful company, all persons who know their stuff heaps more than I do. The energy, the synergy, the whole fun of playing in a band and performing instead of playing for a worship session, every thing clicked, gelled and rocked.
[And I chose the song.]
Some of these folks really impress me. The 18-year-old who breaks into guitar solos that actually make my jaw drop and spine tingle in pleasure and amazement, the 24-year-old medical student and very encouraging and helpful fellow musician who so gamely does silly stuff to get people to laugh, the 22-year-old bassist who decides he wants to sing lead for the first time and gutsy-ly does so while playing bass too. These folks blow my mind.
The only time I looked up from the set and into the crowd, I saw cameras flashing and folks advancing towards the band with videos and what-nots. It felt rather... good. All in good fun, you know. Just like drumming in a dress after kicking off my heels.
I am chuffed. God is amazing.
It's unreal. I finally performed a song as a musician. I think all of us were grinning or chuckling when we ended, it was such good fun but all that practice and all was over in three - all right, maybe four - minutes?
Golly gee.
Golly, golly, golly.
Tuesday, September 28, 2004
13:56.
"Five bucks, a coffee and a fag, that's all we need."
Or something like that, from Reality Bites between Winona and Ethan's characters.
I have not wanted to sleep the last two nights. My body did, the rest of me didn't. I wanted to sit, just sit and think and space out in intervals, maybe things will seem clearer to me if I work my body and mind out of my rountine.
Get me an Ethan, I have five bucks, we can have a coffee and skip the fag.
I believe in words. If I speak, will reality's boundaries and lines seem clearer?
I don't want normalcy, yet I seek some sort of balance in the wise restraints. I want to walk on the edge and feel like I am doing so all the time so should I throw my caution off the cliff?
Some days, nothing makes sense, least of all my own head and heart and their uniform foolishness.
I am much afraid of settling. Not settling as in marriage and kids, but settling as in compromise. I don't ever want to settle for someone because I am tired of holding out for the right one or finding it too hard to believe in there being one right one. I don't ever want to settle in a church that is comfortably, possible complacent, for my weak soul. I don't want to ever settle for a job that is okay. I don't ever want to be in the middle.
So should I now jump?
My soul feels like it is just being squeezed.
And to be random, as a sidenote, Metalica: Some Kind Of Monster is a great documentary. Go catch it, even if you are not a fan. I am not really one but I love music.
My Lord and God, Jesus Christ, give me some peace. Or help me receive it.
"Five bucks, a coffee and a fag, that's all we need."
Or something like that, from Reality Bites between Winona and Ethan's characters.
I have not wanted to sleep the last two nights. My body did, the rest of me didn't. I wanted to sit, just sit and think and space out in intervals, maybe things will seem clearer to me if I work my body and mind out of my rountine.
Get me an Ethan, I have five bucks, we can have a coffee and skip the fag.
I believe in words. If I speak, will reality's boundaries and lines seem clearer?
I don't want normalcy, yet I seek some sort of balance in the wise restraints. I want to walk on the edge and feel like I am doing so all the time so should I throw my caution off the cliff?
Some days, nothing makes sense, least of all my own head and heart and their uniform foolishness.
I am much afraid of settling. Not settling as in marriage and kids, but settling as in compromise. I don't ever want to settle for someone because I am tired of holding out for the right one or finding it too hard to believe in there being one right one. I don't ever want to settle in a church that is comfortably, possible complacent, for my weak soul. I don't want to ever settle for a job that is okay. I don't ever want to be in the middle.
So should I now jump?
My soul feels like it is just being squeezed.
And to be random, as a sidenote, Metalica: Some Kind Of Monster is a great documentary. Go catch it, even if you are not a fan. I am not really one but I love music.
My Lord and God, Jesus Christ, give me some peace. Or help me receive it.
Sunday, September 26, 2004
23:47.
Found something in my mobile's outbox yesterday while clearing sms-es; short prose I typed once when I must had been without pen and paper somewhere.
Broken alabaster
Shards of pain
If Good is born
my death is gain
Last Friday, I led the weekly Bible Study. Theme for the week was Vision, from this book on Character that we are using for the semt. I got every one to write their own eulogy, telling them too that this was what a lecturer did to me before.
That afternoon, I had written my own. Could not use the one I wrote for WritComm in 2000 now, could I? If any thing, I don't have it with me and cannot recall its exact words but do so its gist.
My eulogy for me, circa Sept 24, 3.15pm:
She loved Jesus, not religion
Challenged conventions
Lived in Athens and Jerusalem
Walked on the edge
to find Faith, not just traditions
She was real and honest
not afraid to cry or scream
She was alive
In her questions and doubts
she rested in the Everlasting Arms
She showed me Jesus
The Athens and Jerusalem bit was tripped off a great quote from some past great.
It must had been about a week ago when my own first name flashed into my mind and looked completely strange to me. Strange not as in weird, but strange as in unfamiliar. Who is S k y e?
I know and yet don't know.
These couple of days, there's an utterly strange (as in unusual) girlish chirpyness that has taken over me. I am half appalled.
It's some sort of teenagehood I never had perhaps... am drumming *big grin* Counting Crows' Accidentally In Love on Friday for a contest we are having. For all those years of various instruments, passion for music and all of that, I never played a - I hate to use the term - "secular" song with a band before. Never. The band scene in Singapore always seemed to me limited to the rich kids who have money to buy instruments and a private house to jam in, the Malay boys, or I am now told, the church youth are getting into it, not that I have ever joined my church's youth group. So there you go.
Now I should go listen to the song umpteen times to get the fills.
Found something in my mobile's outbox yesterday while clearing sms-es; short prose I typed once when I must had been without pen and paper somewhere.
Broken alabaster
Shards of pain
If Good is born
my death is gain
Last Friday, I led the weekly Bible Study. Theme for the week was Vision, from this book on Character that we are using for the semt. I got every one to write their own eulogy, telling them too that this was what a lecturer did to me before.
That afternoon, I had written my own. Could not use the one I wrote for WritComm in 2000 now, could I? If any thing, I don't have it with me and cannot recall its exact words but do so its gist.
My eulogy for me, circa Sept 24, 3.15pm:
She loved Jesus, not religion
Challenged conventions
Lived in Athens and Jerusalem
Walked on the edge
to find Faith, not just traditions
She was real and honest
not afraid to cry or scream
She was alive
In her questions and doubts
she rested in the Everlasting Arms
She showed me Jesus
The Athens and Jerusalem bit was tripped off a great quote from some past great.
It must had been about a week ago when my own first name flashed into my mind and looked completely strange to me. Strange not as in weird, but strange as in unfamiliar. Who is S k y e?
I know and yet don't know.
These couple of days, there's an utterly strange (as in unusual) girlish chirpyness that has taken over me. I am half appalled.
It's some sort of teenagehood I never had perhaps... am drumming *big grin* Counting Crows' Accidentally In Love on Friday for a contest we are having. For all those years of various instruments, passion for music and all of that, I never played a - I hate to use the term - "secular" song with a band before. Never. The band scene in Singapore always seemed to me limited to the rich kids who have money to buy instruments and a private house to jam in, the Malay boys, or I am now told, the church youth are getting into it, not that I have ever joined my church's youth group. So there you go.
Now I should go listen to the song umpteen times to get the fills.
Friday, September 24, 2004
10:54.
Spring turns my thoughts to Singapore.
It's the warmer weather, I guess, and the rains, but the pivotal thing would be the feel of the air. There's a certain smell in Spring's embrace that is similar to Singapore in the evenings. The first time it hit me, I had to shake my head to clear the deja vu.
Even now. Nursing my empty cuppa black tea and flanked by my brekkie plate with toast remnants and the big picture window into the outside world, half of me is doing a curious cautious dance with that deja vu, which the dreary half-overcast sky brought.
Maybe it's part of being sick for 8 days with nights spent pulling the duvet over my head so I won't disturb my roommate with my hacking coughs, and a particular bad night where I literally burned in discomfort and sleeplessness; maybe it's the admin problems the school provided regarding certified true copies of my transcripts and me feeling rather helpless that I can't do any thing from here except call home and get my bro to run errands for me (bless his heart, he did, and I do miss him); maybe it's hearing the "miss you" in my Dad's voice when I call home but I miss my family so much.
The idea of being stateless seem to mean so much. This idea, first introduced in cinema classes in relation to the characters of anime... dye my hair blue and get me some cute outfit, no wait, I don't mean it. Not the latter half any way.
I can never be Su Tan.
That's the name I am called by by admin people and doctors and what-nots, people who look at an application form and automatically assume the first word of my Chinese name is my first name. Considering I have two Christian names, I really don't quite get why they don't just use either one.
Su Tan is a butchered name, a created entity due to her Asian-ness of which she is very proud of. Su Tan is an invented name for a person who does not exist.
I can never be Su Tan.
Perhaps this is why at this moment any way, I know that Australia can never be where I settle down in.
Stateless.
God help me get sorted out, lead me as I send resumes, hold my heart and let me not be a cynical punk.
I can fly. And I will fly above the chaos and find the order in my head and heart.
Spring turns my thoughts to Singapore.
It's the warmer weather, I guess, and the rains, but the pivotal thing would be the feel of the air. There's a certain smell in Spring's embrace that is similar to Singapore in the evenings. The first time it hit me, I had to shake my head to clear the deja vu.
Even now. Nursing my empty cuppa black tea and flanked by my brekkie plate with toast remnants and the big picture window into the outside world, half of me is doing a curious cautious dance with that deja vu, which the dreary half-overcast sky brought.
Maybe it's part of being sick for 8 days with nights spent pulling the duvet over my head so I won't disturb my roommate with my hacking coughs, and a particular bad night where I literally burned in discomfort and sleeplessness; maybe it's the admin problems the school provided regarding certified true copies of my transcripts and me feeling rather helpless that I can't do any thing from here except call home and get my bro to run errands for me (bless his heart, he did, and I do miss him); maybe it's hearing the "miss you" in my Dad's voice when I call home but I miss my family so much.
The idea of being stateless seem to mean so much. This idea, first introduced in cinema classes in relation to the characters of anime... dye my hair blue and get me some cute outfit, no wait, I don't mean it. Not the latter half any way.
I can never be Su Tan.
That's the name I am called by by admin people and doctors and what-nots, people who look at an application form and automatically assume the first word of my Chinese name is my first name. Considering I have two Christian names, I really don't quite get why they don't just use either one.
Su Tan is a butchered name, a created entity due to her Asian-ness of which she is very proud of. Su Tan is an invented name for a person who does not exist.
I can never be Su Tan.
Perhaps this is why at this moment any way, I know that Australia can never be where I settle down in.
Stateless.
God help me get sorted out, lead me as I send resumes, hold my heart and let me not be a cynical punk.
I can fly. And I will fly above the chaos and find the order in my head and heart.
