Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious

Magical... To have a nanny who can pull endless objects out of a small bag... A nanny who flies with a magical umbrella... Medicine that tastes like whatever you want to... Someone who makes cleaning fun... One who gives children a taste of their own medicine without necessarily hurting them... Practically perfect!... A place where you can buy words and conversation... (I can think of a few who should sell them to balance out the 'noise'! See one of my previous posts titled 'blahblahblahblahblah....') Anyway...

If you haven't figured already, I went to watch Mary Poppins yesterday. Although I had to learn how to play Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious on the piano when I was younger, it was only at the musical yesterday that I learnt how to say it without looking at the word! It was fun! Really enjoyed myself!

Chim chiminey, chim chiminey, chim chim cher-ee...

Laptop-less

For the first time since Easter break, I didn't bring my laptop home with me for the weekend. Ah, it's so nice not to do work over the weekend. It took a bit of willpower on Friday for me to resist packing my laptop in its case and bringing it home. There's still work that needed to be done but I thought enough was enough for that week. It can wait till Monday. It's lovely to have the weekend to do what I want, which admittedly wasn't much but it was still great that it was time for myself! :)

Oh, in my two week absence from updating the blog because of hectic workloads, I still managed to take an evening off to watch the Lion King (the musical). Oh, it was brilliant. The vibrant colours! The costumes were so cleverly made to the animals come to 'life'. The giraffes, elephants, hyenas, Timon, Pumbaa...! Zazu was funny, as usual. Only (slight) disappointment was Mufasa's death which wasn't as touching as the film but it was still good good good!

Falling Leaves

Adeline Yen Mah writes beautifully about her childhood in China. Born as the youngest daughter in a family of five with her mum passing away not long after her birth, she has not had an easy childhood. In what would have sounded like a typical Cinderella set up, her dad re-married and the step mum was cunning and manipulative - even on her deathbed. She played the siblings against each other to her own advantage.

Adeline wrote of being left out most times. How she yearned for her father and stepmother's love and affection. How she wanted to be part of a united loving family. Time and time again, as a child, throughout school, going through to university and eventually in her own family, she tried to find out if her father and stepmother loved her. She tried to get them to accept her and be proud of her achievements. Time and time again, she was rejected.

Impressively, instead of being depressed by this, Adeline used all this in a positive way. She studied hard, she worked hard. All the time, all she wanted was for her parents to acknowledge her achievements. At the slight chance that they might, she dropped what she had to pursue that little chance that doing this or that would make them happy. It never turned out that way. However, she emerged triumphant. She is a success in her own right. Despite attempts by her own family to 'bring her down' (whom you would expect to be the most supportive), she came out of all this a real winner.

I respect her for what she has been through - the emotional and physical abuse, and turning that into something positive. Only a strong person can do that. Adeline Yen Mah did that.

Playing God

This is a rant. Just to pre-warn you.

I was infuriarated after reading this article. I totally agreed with PATCHES's contribution in the Opinion pages. It is indeed authorities' biased cruelty to dogs. Council 'president' Abdul Halim Abdul Latif says the situation only became chaotic when the dog owner turned aggressive.

Uh-huh.

So poor Eng Her Sun was going to sit back and watch the dog shooters just kill his dogs? I treated my dogs as my family and totally empathise with Mr Eng - I would go mental if anyone hurt my dogs much less even try to kill them. Council 'president' says they had 'no choice' because of mounting complaints from neighbours of the noise etc. Agree that perhaps Mr Eng should have been more considerate. Think about moving the dogs to other areas. But just to kill them on the basis they didn't have a choice? Time to stop using their brains to think about how best to get bribes and what excuse to give the caller on the phone about their poor service. I have been amazed at the creativeness these people have when it comes to inventing excuses for their sloppiness and laziness so it does show that they do have brains and can use it if they want to. Time to start using those brains for the right reasons - what about offering Mr Eng to re-house his dogs?

I must say - I'm not even sure why I'm shocked at the Malaysian authorities' actions. The bias-ness towards dogs happens all the time. In order to get a dog licence in one of the cities, you would have to get permission from your neighbours before you get a dog. I'm sure there is good reasoning behind this. But why dogs only? Why not cats? My parents had a neighbour two doors away who had about ten cats and there was no sign that he would stop the cats breeding anyway. Fair enough if it's his choice. But he doesn't stop his cats from trespassing into others' houses and doing their business in others' gardens. He doesn't stop them from climbing onto and scratching neighbours' cars. When asked about them, he merely shrugs. Then when one of his cats trespassed into my parents' garden and my dogs got excited, he got annoyed at MY dogs in MY parents' garden for aggravating the cat who trespassed. Ooooooh - was I annoyed then. Why blame the poor things whose only crime was to give all their love and trust to (wo)men - more than I can say for most humans?

So ok, agree that the authorities in here may have had a case. But why stop at dogs? If you have good reasoning for it, then the same should be done for cats, etc. I can make it my personal mission to find all houses with more than 2 cats (the allowed number for dogs in most places) and will happily provide it to the authorities free of charge. But I won't do that. Because 1) I don't believe the cats should be shot either; 2) I won't stoop to the same level of the authorities and smug dog shooters; and 3) I have better things to put my brain to use on. Authorities should think about having more events to make sure people are responsible pet owners. That they know when dogs do their business outside, they should scoop it up and dispose of it properly. That their cats should not wander around into others' gardens.

Here's another thought for the authorities thinking up of more excuses to make dog owners' (or actually, all residents) lives miserable and give authorities a chance to earn their money: Why don't you make all residents ask their neighbours' permissions before having a child? Ask all neighbours before you can have a piano, organ or any musical instrument - because it would make noise too. Ask all neighbours before you can have a motorcycle and take out the silencer so it that does the annoying loud vrooooom noise when it starts and goes.

Football changes you

It's strange. Walk up to most men and if you shove them, they try and stay deeply rooted to the ground. Give them a friendly punch and they will not wince. If they were hurt in an accident or fight, despite evident bruises, they claim it does not hurt.

Put them on the football pitch and that all changes. Players from top football nations seem to transform into weird clumsy creatures on the football pitch. Tripping over a blade of grass with no intervention from humans or nature. A slight touch to any part of the body and it sends them sprawling to the ground. Hit them on the chest and they tumble spectacularly and end up holding their face or leg in agony. These occurrences increase even more when they are within the special box also known as the penalty area.

Bizarre, isn't it?

Oh to be a child again...

...to believe that mummy and daddy are all-knowing and all-powerful...
...to eat and play and sleep...
...and sleep and play and eat...
...to believe that toys come out to play after midnight...
...to be carried everywhere...
...t0 have only one worry: when to throw the next tantrum - when they're eating food for adults, or to get the new toy?...
...to only worry about getting all stars in the nursery art work (meaning colour (any colour) within the lines, not ouside)...
...to believe that mummy and daddy will protect you from anything...
...to have your every wish as everyone else's command (within reason and sometimes depends on gender and order of birth)...
...to fully trust in everyone...

Oh to be a child again and be full of trust and belief! Long road of promises ahead!

Little things remind me of being a child again....

• Alpha Kindy, for obvious reasons
• the song 'New York New York' as that was one of my first dance performances. How I frustrated the teacher at practice because I kept twirling the wrong way. Only getting it right at the concert itself.
• 'You are my sunshine' - my first solo song performance. At that time, I could just about get away with being tuneless with having a 'cute' costume that my mom painstakingly made.
• Webster - eating 'nga po fan' with my mom while watching Webster some evenings when dad's working late or has an evening function.
• Full House - following the Tanner family through their family sagas.
• Swings - trying to push myself up in the air as far as possible - not sure why!
• Swimming - my favourite past time with my dad, trying to beat him at swimming because that would mean I was the fastest (of course, I thought my dad was the fastest, strongest, cleverest man in the world, so to beat him at swimming meant I got one of the 'titles'!).
• SJBC - grew up with Sunday school friends and teachers.
• Panini sticker books - falling for those gimmicks and trying in vain to get the books all filled up. If only some stickers weren't so elusive....
• Mind Your Language - the TV show I watched with my dad just before going to bed. Is it to blame for my language skills now? Perhaps...
• Yamaha classes - music classes in a fun way. Having a go at the drums, triangle, castanets, bells. Singing Sayonara to each other at the end of each class.
• Ballet classes - little pink chiffon skirts and leotards. My first dance prop - the bird cage.
  

Steamboat

With Jenny and Karim....

Manj and Kuldip

The happy occasion on Sunday 18 June 2006

Speak O Lord

SPEAK, O LORD, as we come to You
To receive the food of your holy word.
Take Your truth, plant it deep in us;
Shape and fashion us in Your likeness,
That the light of Christ might be seen today
In our acts of love and our deeds of faith.
Speak, O Lord, and fulfil in us
All Your purposes, for Your glory.

Teach us Lord full obedience,
Holy reverence, true humility.
Test our thoughts and our attitudes
In the radiance of Your purity.
Cause our faith to rise
Cause our eyes to see
Your majestic love and authority.
Words of power that can never fail;
Let their truth prevail over unbelief.

Speak, O Lord, and renew our minds;
Help us grasp the heights of Your plans for us.
Truths unchanged from the dawn of time,
That will echo down through eternity.
And by grace we'll stand on Your promises;
And by faith we'll walk as You walk with us.
Speak, O Lord, ‘til your church is built
As You fill the earth with Your glory.

Keith Getty & Stuart Townend
Copyright © 2005 Thankyou Music

To listen to the song, go to http://shop.kingswaysongs.com/product_info.php?products_id=432

Light at end of Tunnel

'Big wigs' coming this aftrernoon for preparation for tomorrow's presentation. That means lots of discussion, which would be good because I really need to make sure they are happy with this before tomorrow. That also means I probably won't have as much time to do some of my other responsibilities including working on a workbook that I promised will be published this week.

I hope it goes well tomorrow. So far feedback has been positive but until the presentation actually happens and the end result still remains positive, I won't think it's ok yet. Every week, I think the next week will be it, after which I will be able to have a nice relaxing weekend because yet another major deadline would have passed. But every week, I find another major deadline looms or the present deadline gets extended to another week. Sigh. I can almost see the light at the end of the tunnel now. I hope for a nice relaxing weekend next weekend!

Bear Grylls

I was privileged to be part of a group who met Bear Grylls. Bear is the youngest ever British to reach Mount Everest and return alive - at the tender age of 23. If that wasn't inspiring enough, listen to this - this was after he had a parachuting accident whilst with the Special Forces and broke his back in three places. Major W-O-W! AND after his return from Mount Everest, he crossed the North Atlantic Arctic Ocean in a small open inflatable boat. As our Managing Partner put it - Don't you feel like an underachiever now? :)

His talk included pictures and videos of his climb. One of his videos was of him crossing metal ladder across a crevasse (with a drop of about 11000 feet). He stopped halfway at the ladder and the video provided a view of the drop. My knees went weak just looking at that. To think the photo of me standing on the glass floor at CN Tower made some people's knees weak, think what this video would do. And the video he showed of reaching the summit - the view from the Roof of the World. Spectacular. Simply incredible. No words can describe it.

Bear spoke so humbly about his adventure. He was honest about his feelings during trip. I didn't feel as if he was boasting at any point, although I felt he was surely allowed to, after climbing the highest mountain in the world!

He told of having to pass Rob Hall's body on the way up and related how Rob died. Rob radioed back to base camp when he realised he was running out of oxygen. Base camp was unable to help him as he was in the 'death zone', so they patched his call to his wife in New Zealand. She pleaded with him to just stand up but he couldn't. In the end, they spend his dying hours choosing a name for their unborn child.

Bear attributed his safe return to the grace of God. He was almost killed in a fall if not for a second rope he attached to himself just a second before the 'floor' collapsed beneath him. He talked about teamwork and how important it was in that journey as you spent 24hours a day attached to another person by a rope. His last message to us? The only difference between an extraordinary person and an ordinary person is that little word 'extra'. It is the special thing within us that would set us apart from others - ordinary people who will go the extra bit or will give the extra bit more. We need to find that 'extra' bit.

I'm probably not doing Bear's talk much justice so visit Bear's website www.beargrylls.com for more details on his adventures and some fab photos. It was really motivating listening to him recall his adventure and talk about climbing with such passion despite the obstacles that were in his way. He is planning to paraglide over Everest next year so we'll pray for his training and safe return on the next trip!

The weekend is over

It has been a long week. Even though it was only a four day working week because of bank holiday Monday, it felt a lot longer than that. By Thursday evening as I boarded the plane back to UK, I was mentally drained. I couldn't believe it was only three days. There was still one more day, which thankfully passed without requirement for extreme brainpower use.

I have never been challenged so much on every point I make. Down to the microscopic detail. With different scenarios, issues, reasons. But it's good. It will be guidance issued to all global teams so it has to be robust. Hence all the challenge is good. But when I'm in the middle of it, trying to explain my reasons and justifications, it can be tough. And it will repeat itself as more people read the guidance, they will want to give their opinions and I will have to reason with them to determine best way forward. All valid opinions. All to be taken on board to make it better guidance. Doesn't mean it's easy though. I hope that this will be one of those experiences where I come out totally stretched, challenged and exhausted but find very rewarding.

I really needed the weekend to recover. The lie-in on Saturday morning was very welcome. I still had to put in some hours of work over the weekend but hopefully it means my workload this coming week won't be bad. This week will be another long one. I am already looking forward to Friday when the next weekend starts. I will be presenting the as-close-to-final process back to the immediate team on Friday, before another round(s) of chingallenge the following weeks from other team representatives. But at least the first barrier is overcome. Hopefully it will be accepted and my team lead is satisfied with the outcome. It has not turned out exactly the way I wanted it to be, but I hope he's ok with it.

King of Kings, Majesty

King of Kings, Majesty,
God of heaven living in me.
Gentle Saviour, closest friend,
Strong Deliverer, beginning and end,
All within me falls at Your throne...

Your majesty I can but bow,
I lay my all before You now,
In royal robes I don't deserve,
I live to serve your majesty.

Earth and heaven, worship you
Love eternal, faithful and true
Who bought the nations, ransomed souls
brought this sinner near to Your throne
All within me cries out in praise

King of Kings, Majesty,
God of heaven living in me.
Gentle Saviour, closest friend,
Strong Deliverer, beginning and end,
All within me falls at Your throne...

Jarrod Cooper

Delft

As there was not much to do in Rijswijk, I decided on Wednesday to venture to another Dutch town about 5mins away on the train. Referred to by my Dutch colleagues as Netherlands' equivalent of Cambridge, I spent a delightful evening walking around Delft. The weather was not on my side - windy with the dark clouds overhead threatening a downpour at any minute. It wasn't a dampener though - it was still lovely to wander around this picturesque and quaint university town.

Oude Kerk

Picturesque Oude Delft
Canals and bicycles - how much more Dutch can you get?

Trust

Trusting someone is like giving part of you to that person. You are giving them the opportunity to really know you. It's also giving that person the chance to disappoint you, to hurt you. You take a risk when you trust someone. You expect them to cherish the trust you have put in them.

It takes months, even years to build up trust. Yet it takes only a second for it to be broken. Can it be fixed? Perhaps. But it will never be the same. You spend even longer building up the trust again. But is it still trust? It won't be 100%. A nagging thought at the back of your head wonders if you've done the right thing. You wonder whether you've just set yourself up to be broken again.

But can you enjoy life and the promises it offers if you don't trust someone? If you don't take the risk of being hurt? I don't know. Easier to sit back and be a cynic. Trust no one. But what will your life be like if you continue to be sceptical of everyone?

If someone trusts you, don't take it lightly. It may seem like a simple thing - trusting that you will do the right thing, but it is still trust. It can build up to a lot more. If you don't break it. If you do, it will not be the same.

Conference photos

We had our conference last Thursday and Friday (18 and 19 May 2006). It was brought forward from July, following the restructuring with a new Chairman, which meant that our original conference dates in July clashed with some of the industry conferences which we are now aligned to and hence will have to attend. So instead of going to Paris for a three day conference and much promised partying in the evening, we went to...... Hammersmith. Ok, so Hammersmith is no Paris. No Eiffel Tower, no Moulin Rouge, no Seine. But it didn't matter - we had no time to venture out anyway. Besides, the performances in the evening from various regions could (almost) challenge Moulin Rouge. We definitely had some showbiz talent waiting to be spotted!

Here are some highlights, but follow this link for more conference photos!

Angry? Stupid? Just plain confused

I don't know if I read too much into things. The way people act, the things people say and sometimes even if they use a word I wouldn't have, my mind races to try and understand why they said what they did or why they acted the way they did. Sometimes, even why they didn't say what they should!

This afternoon, I was slightly thrown off by a conversation. I don't even know if I should be. It felt as if something I have been working towards and something that people say is a guarantee, is now uncertain. All to do with someone's words. All along, the things I have been doing were in this direction. I have been told I will achieve this particular goal, that it would be a no-brainer. So after this conversation, I went away confused. Was I lulled into a false sense of security before? Should I feel stupid for having trusted people's judgements and comments before or should I feel angry for having been pretended to? Perhaps it was silly for me to assume certain things. Or perhaps the person was just managing my expectations.

The question mark looms overhead.

Return of the To Do List

If you ask me to do something, I'll immediately write it down on my To Do list. Every single thing. Sometimes, I break it down to the tiniest level reasonably possible so that it feels great to be able to give a nice tick or cross the task out when it's completed. When people see me writing the task down or when they see my To Do list, they usually comment on how organised I am. I don't actually see it that way. I see it as deteriorating memory failure! If I don't write it down, I will forget all about it and it won't get done!

For the last month, I went without a To Do list. I thought I'd trained myself enough to mentally store, prioritise and remove the tasks upon completion. Obviously had too much confidence in my mental ability. If I could draw out the mental To Do list, it would have been a messy and scrambled picture because priorities were (continuously) reassigned depending on deadlines, tasks and severity of consequences. I couldn't remember what the previous priority was and which had higher priority than which.

So now, I've started my To Do list again and it's sitting there happily with 30 tasks. Does it depress me that it looks like I've got lots of work with such a long list? No, sadly, it actually makes me feel better. I don't have to keep reminding myself of all the tasks and priorities. My brain cells (the last few are very precious!) are free to concentrate on other things. After penning my To Do list at the start and end of every day, I actually feel a sense of relief. No comments on how sad I am please. It gets things done, ok?

Task 18: Update blog - done!

Da Vinci

Watched the movie on Friday night with homegroup. I thought I'd be too tired to concentrate on the movie, since I only had 4 hrs sleep (self inflicted because of the conference event, so am not asking for sympathy!).

I thought the movie was interesting. I can't compare it to the book as I've not read it yet. However, credit must be given to Dan Brown for how cleverly he uses symbols and came up with the plot. Also how he wound facts into fiction, which explains why some non-Christians are adamant that bits of his book can be taken as facts of Christianity.

The publicity and hype are good for others to hopefully discover what Christianity is about and what the truth is, rather than believing in fiction. The sad thing is those who claim to know all about Christianity and rubbish it, using 'facts' from Dan Brown's book. Most of these are not founded in valid research and the originators of some of the 'facts' have also been on media confessing that it was made up. But yet, as is typical, some do not read past the headline to see what the whole thing is about, rather just believe that fiction is fact.

For those who are interested in finding out more (go on, you know you want to!) :)
www.bible.org
www.jesusanddavinci.com
www.rejesus.co.uk/davinci/index.html
www.rbcdavincicode.org
www.syfc.org.sg/events/dvc/cinema.html (would especially appeal to Singaporeans and Malaysians)

Did he or didn't he?

I'm sure you're all holding your breath to find out whether Bri booked his theory test. As at 12.39am on Saturday 20 May 2006, he didn't. (Remember, the deadline promised was Friday 19 May 2006). This was after a generous 39minutes extension of the deadline. :)

So, will he or won't he eat a mushroom since he broke the promise?

No.

Bri wants an(other) extension. Reason? He can't find his provisional driving license to book his theory test. Would have been a valid excuse had it not been because he was only looking for the license at about 12.15am on 20 May. Which suggests that it was the first time (despite having a whole week) an attempt was made to book the test. Now, apparently the promise is that the test will be booked when he finds his license. Rightttt..... Ooookkkkkkk.....

Nagging, positive encouragement and even the threat of having to eat a mushroom, which if you know Bri would know that it is the ultimate 'yuck', didn't help. I give up. Will I make him eat a mushroom now? No - Bri knew what was 'at stake' (pardon the dramatics) and if he doesn't fulfill the promise yet refuses to eat a mushroom, it suggests two things: 1) There's a lack of understanding of what a promise is, or 2) The promise didn't mean anything anyway!

I'm sure we'll all hear about it IF (I've stopped using the word 'when' for this) Bri books his test.