Friday, April 29, 2005

Confirming what I always knew..

Wang Hui Ming,

Your personality is Phlegmatic Choleric.
actually nah, i am more or less equal in all after my great S-ness. *winks*

Your scores are below

Overall:
Melancholy:6
Phlegmatic:17
Sanguine:8
Choleric:9

Strengths:
Melancholy:1
Phlegmatic:8
Sanguine:6
Choleric:5

Weakneses:
Melancholy:5
Phlegmatic:9
Sanguine:2
Choleric:4

Tuesday, April 26, 2005

lyrically beautiful, even after so many years.

I saw the fragments of a shattered stone
One spring time on the hillside, when, alone,
I walked to greet the sun. The pines distilled
Big drops of dew unceasing; sadness filled
My heart. I knew this was the Stone of Tears,
The stone of memory of long-past years.

from the English Translation of Romance of the Three Kingdoms, ch. 120.

Sunday, April 24, 2005

很冷。

有一天,魔鬼把公主抓走,公主一直叫。。。

魔鬼: 你尽管叫破喉咙吧! 没有人会来救你的!

公主:破喉咙!破喉咙!破喉咙!

没有人:公主!我来救你了!

魔鬼:说曹操,曹操就到!

曹操:魔鬼!你叫我干吗?

魔鬼:Wah Liao. 看到鬼! (hokkien: Kwah Dio Kwee!)

鬼:靠!被发现了!

靠:胡说!谁发现我了?

谁:关我什么事。。我是无辜的。。

魔鬼:我很 pek chek. Oh My God!

上帝:谁叫我?

谁:没有人叫你啊!

没有人:我哪有?










从此,魔鬼精神分裂。。。


很冷。
小心感冒。

goodness!

courtesy of Eugene Ang.

Thursday, April 21, 2005

i admire you.

I realize so many people have been so much stronger than I have understood.
People like san, shan, tze and many more.
Your strength is not a gleaming, steely, obvious hardness; it is an inner resilience to bend and not to break in the face of adversity.
And while doing so, to continue on with the rest of life.

All of us have problems; all of us encounter challenges. It is never the circumstance or the challenge that is the end; I like to think of it as the means to an end.
We can choose to be above my circumstances, or under them;
We can choose to emerge stronger or admit defeat.
We can choose to remain the self-same people that we have been, or we can choose to grow and change.

You are inspirational, my students.

Wednesday, April 20, 2005

it feels so lonely online now

that everyone is off at Live Recording.

I wish I was there to soak in His presence too, but I can't be.
Perhaps I will just fly car down tomorrow after meeting?
Then again, I probably can't get into the hall - no tickets.

But yet, I miss Your House and Your people so much.

*sheesh

~looking forward to Friday.

Monday, April 18, 2005

a heartfelt post

read RPK recently and saw a heartfelt post tt moved me a lot:
when dreams come true

his sentiments, not mine.
but all of us go thru valleys at some time or the other.
e most touching thing, however, at e end of his genuine and heartfelt prayer:

"i praised your perfect timing.. thank you Lord."

even thru e hardships n doubts n all; the path may not look obvious; it may not even be visible. But remember.. when you cannot see His hand.. trust His heart. God's timing is perfect n His faith in us is unshakeable. And so we praise Him at all times; He has set our feet upon the rock.

Amen.

Sunday, April 17, 2005

others can, i can't.

call me a workaholic, but it just feels STRANGE to be around in church and zo'boh.
i cannot stand to sit around while others are doing things and i could be of help.

on the same note, therefore, i cannot stand to be 'excused' from doing something i could do.
perhaps it is just the way i think;
but i expect the same from the people whom i lead.
and that includes my ushers, students and all those people i can influence.

For I am always driven on by the verse John 9:4:
"I must work the works of Him who sent Me while it is day; the night is coming when no one can work."

Thus the standard i expect from me and those who follow me.

May I continually strive for a better attitude.

Tuesday, April 12, 2005

My Dog Is Very Cute!

I also dunno why I am posting this. Perhaps it has to do with the fact that I CAN"T TALK to save my life now and therefore need to blog-a-lot?

Anyway.

My Dog (and my Mother) are both really cute!

Adventure #1: Mother brought dog for a walk; then she waited for him to go pee, with her hand still on the leash.. after a long long while, she realised that my dog was not running to her.. Finally she turned around and found that my *dumb* dog fell into a hole by the roadside.. too deep for him to climb out himself.

Adventure #2: Mother brought dog for a walk; then she unleashed him and let him run around.. after a long long while, she realised that my dog was not running to her.. Finally she started searching for him and found him lying in the cab of an aircon-ed truck parked downstairs. Then she climbed up to get him.. at the exact moment the Driver returned and got the shock of his life seeing an Aunty chasing a Dog around in the cab of his truck.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

Presenting.. my Sily Terrier, SCAMPY!







Sunday, April 10, 2005

i admire

those who can maintain their blogging interest over months and years.

i find that i'm running out of things to blog, most times, and i'm down to about two posts a week, if even that. my writing frequency goes up when it's holiday season - more boh liao and more time - and drops all the way down in times like these, when my never-ending battle with the Piles of Marking is beginning again.

pondering, i realise that it's because this is not my passion; it isn't one of the more important things in my life. when the novelty wears off, it slips all the way down my priority list.

looking at it from the other point of view, i should therefore be consistent in those things that are REALLY important. imperishable things, and not simply the things of this world. yet, it is so human to want to fall away and spend time on those things which are urgent, and yet may not be important; i have to constantly keep reminding myself to love Him first, above all else. jiayou bah, ahming!

Thursday, April 07, 2005

gg on to a new phase in life

yestd i had e chance 2 tok 2 moses 4 a while aft BS. my good bro is gg into army tmr; it wil b a new phase of his life. newness always means new challenges n a time of stretchin, n it's my sincere wish tt mo n all e others who r gg in today (like weimin, olli, yonghui, jackson, yangz, wijaya etc etc) wil emerge better n stronger pp. when we move on, der's always e risk of slidin back against e chance of becomin better. i knoe, mo, wiv God wiv u, u will defly be able to overcome challenges n shine 4 Him. jus rem, in e midst of e tiredness, to seek Him 1st n love Him alwayz. amen.

n if ur wonderg y im blogin in sms-lang, its cos i nv bring my fone. ji1 dan4! in honour of my forgetfulness, all of u loyal blogders r gg to have to suffer my posts in sms-ese for today. =P

n yes, i wanna be a true worshipper of God: GOTP-9, e penultimate of maturity n love 4 God.

Tuesday, April 05, 2005

breathe.

i am so busy i can barely breathe.

the predictions i made a few posts earlier are coming to pass; a month of challenges indeed.
but i *will* persevere. i *will* triumph.
I am the head and not the tail; above and not beneath.

Have you not known? Have you not heard?
The everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, neither faints nor is weary.
His understanding is unsearchable.
He gives power to the weak, and to those who have no might He increases strength.
Even the youths shall faint and be weary, and the young men shall utterly fall, but those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.
- Isaiah 40:28-31

Monday, April 04, 2005

strawberry high



a punnett of fresh strawberries (and i really mean the fruit)
is the nicest possible thing on a dreary monday afternoon.

~yum

i am not a messenger..

i am an influencer.

greatly impacted by what ryan shared yesterday.

a messenger disseminates information; an influencer makes a difference.

and i want so much to make a difference in the lives of others; my ushers, my students and my cell group members. Ushering is so much more than just the physical things we do; yes, physically demanding, but by our busy-ness, we grow and we learn. and i need to be a good custodian over the souls of my people, because i desperately want them to know the purpose with which they serve, and grow in love and joy and wisdom even as they do so. and i need to be less selfish with my time and my words, and not retire into my own tiredness when i could be making a difference.

Amen.

Top of the list: relearn my words-of-affirmation love language.
yeah, i realised that i love by giving of gifts and acts of service. but not everyone receives love that way- let me be all things to all men.
perhaps i will no longer be so scary then.

Sunday, April 03, 2005

Installment-ONE, unedited and raw.

"Sometimes, like today, I get the feeling that he may just die – as he moves slow, unsteady and unspeaking from the chair to the bed and back. Fascination, and a strange sense of repulsion, are the emotions that surge as each tussle of whether to touch him (and see if he is cold yet) or simply leave him be (and hope he wakes up later) is fought in the back corridors of my mind. Inevitably, simply-leave-him-be wins, because I cannot care less. I know I should, I know I should, I KNOW I should; yet I fear his death not because it will bring me emotional pain, but because it will bring that pain to others around me whom I love.

I do not want to be like him, this man whom I have been forcefully associated with.
I do not want to be his miniature."

The beginning of my SWF 2005 entry.

And in case you're wondering, no, it's not going to be an oestrogen-fuelled outpouring of my life story; it'll be part fact, part fiction, and part goodness-knows-what. For I have a vague idea of what my story will be, but it will probably change beyond recognition as i go along.

And will more installments appear? Perhaps.

Stay tuned!

april: a month of challenges

If i can survive this, I can survive anything:

~Church Wide BS, Live recording, standing in e gap for e being-examed-students
~council elections period - ELECO camp, staying for internal elections till predictably 11+ at night

~marking - BT1, SPA (ugh)

~setting practicals, S paper, tutorials

~lecturing GND and asexual repro (double ugh).. bacteria have such a sad life

hahahahahahahaha 'joys of asexual reproduction my FOOT'

bacteria have such a freakily sad life.

*dun even remember what else.*

Well, that explains my nick: Cheong Ah!

But beyond merely 'cheonging' through the month and making it, i want to be able to MAKE IT THROUGH with excellence. I want to be able to lecture well, prepare good notes, bring understanding to my students and not just while away time in class, be there for those who neeed me - as a listening ear, as a counselor, and as a guide. I want to be able to get to know my ushers and students better - and be someone who influences lives. I want to face each small challenge in this month and best it; I want to bring the Presence of God with me in every situation.

When there are no challenges, there is no need for reliance on God.

When there are no challenges, there is no possibility of breakthrough.

May April be a breakthrough month for me. Amen.

Friday, April 01, 2005

the taxis are a disgrace

waited 45 min at city hall, no less, for a cab to cab home with ahlong today.

and cabs with 'on call' and 'busy' signs floated blithely by.

freaking, the cabs only started appearing at 1145, when having to pay midnight surcharge was a certainty rather than an iffy-issue.

yeah, i'm bitching. sue me. sue the cab drivers, if anybody! Might as well have taken MRT. Sheesh.. what happened to the spirit of integrity? Is three point twenty freaking dollars THAT important?

anyway. all things have a silver lining, i got to fei-lo-ship (or, as we would have it, thin-lo-ship) with ahlong. something not done for a LONG time. Jiayouz bro.. God will bring the desires of your heart to come to pass. Amen for me too. *wink* and study hard for your exams yeah? 14 days to freedom.. whoohoo..