Gary & others

Here’s your gary post!

Gary not only opened the door for me today in YIH study room he also said “Hello Jee Lee. I’ll see you tomorrow” with such a sweet smile!!! Aaaahhhhh… hahaha

And that’s the end of your gary post!

xxx

Now, onto more important things:

I was undecided as to whether I should attend nav rally today. I didn’t really want to go for it because I have work to be done and I wasn’t feeling too well. But, I was suppose to gather CCA points stuff and also the appreciation thing for huiyue. So, I went, albeit late. The songs spoke to me really! There were a few songs I weren’t familiar to but it really spoke what I was feeling!

I’m at a junction where I really need God and my heart feels like it’s going to blow! And I need God so much! And I know God is there! God is more faithful than anything else in the world!!! If all else fails, if everything else withers, God stands strong and His words!

And my heart just cry out, truly “woe am I for I am a woman with unclean lips” but God is faithful and just and will forgive us…and yes, there is much forgiveness needed. There’s so much for me be sorry about! Goodness.

And I echo one of Chris Tomlin’s song, which lines go:

“You see the depths of my heart and you love me the same.

You are amazing GOD!!”

Because people can’t even accept me for who they think I am on the outside, what more you who know the very depths of my heart – the dirtiest of all stains – and you still love me, you still send Christ to die for me, and for Jesus to take all the pain and suffering and mockery just to patch up my relationship with God. Oh God, forgive me for not seeing and treating you for who you really are!!!

Reflection

I don't really like presentations. And I had two today. Well, the first one went pretty alright, I think, although my fellow group mates were pretty disappointed. Well, understandable because my very slack tutor did not give us any clue to what he expects from us. So, we squeeze out whatever creative juice we have out of our brains and came up with a pretty interesting presentation. Gah! At the end of it, he said something like "Next week's group, remember to not follow this pattern of presentation". Argh! You should have said something earlier!!! Oh well, it's done. And I'm pretty pleased that we all did our preparation and it went pretty well. I enjoyed it!

An hour later, I was due for another presentation. This time, alone and together with it, came its good and bad. It is good because there's no group meetings, anal stuff to handle, basically having a group presentation can be pretty complex and irritating. The bad part about handling a presentation all on your own is precisely that - you're all alone! Means, you do A LOT of research and you do it all alone. There's nobody to lend you a helping hand and you're left to learn to swim on your own! I wouldn't have complained so much had the topic been a little easier! 3 topics of presentation in one lecture and none of it sound familiar! My topic was on syntagmatic and paradigmatic. I breathe a sigh of relief now because it's over!!! But, oh boy, it was hard trying to figure out what syntagmatic & paradigmatic was all about. I had to read every single article that Dr. Ooi put up, which meant that there were many extra readings to do in a week. So, finally, after reading all the readings he put up, I had a sliiiight idea of what syntagmatic & paradigmatic was all about. BUT, I can't just have a slight idea of what it is. I am afterall, suppose to present it in the class. So, I have to get books from the library, google it, wikipedia it…and yeah, that's about it. So, gathering all sorts of readings and having read through all, I then had a problem, which was: information overload. So, I have to give a 10 minute presentation on something that I had no idea of in the beginning but had too much at the end. I had a hard time trying to decide what to include and what not to include in the presentation. Thank God, HE helped me figure that since it is only going to be 10 minutes, I don't need to be all-encompassing. Cover the basics and pray it will be good enough. So, yeah.

But, I still feel sucky about the presentation. Okay, I rehearsed my presentation last night to jiaying. It was her idea. It's not something that I would usually do but I thank God for it because while rehearsing, I realised that woah, I didn't know how to explain syntagmatic & paradigmatic properly. Yeap, I had problems. So, I kinda wrote down a script. Haha! Talk about feeling incompetent! So, I was super nervous and the room was very cold, so I was shivering! And so I prayed. And before my turn came, the postgraduate student walked in. And Ade and Mich looked at me and say "All the best". Yeah. Coz, it's so pressurising to present to the class when you know that there's a "stranger" who is in class and even if he is not paying attention to whatever I say, he can judge if I'm saying the right thing or if I suck in presentations or whatever it is. It is stressful - and yes, unnecessary stress!!! I thought I was going to die. I almost couldn't put my thumbdrive in. Sigh. Pray super hard! God is good! At the end of it, I don't know if I did well but I guess, my objective to explain the concepts well to my peers was met. Ade said she understood what was going on. So, that was a very encouraging sign. But of course, Matthew said he found my topic a bit abstract. So, that wasn't very encouraging! Nonetheless, I'm glad it's done and I think I didn't do that bad. In fact, I think people understood it.

3 long paragraphs on my presentation and I've still not gotten down to writing what I really want to write about. Talk about being long-winded!

Just today I was thinking, "aih, sometimes it's so much about me and so little about God" And during our presentation today, Janet made a comment (it was a religion module): Humans have made religion to suit themselves, for self-help, self-motivation…" And before I open my mouth to rebut her, I realise what she said is true. It's suddenly all about us. God bless us. God do this for us, do that for us, blah blah blah. When is it about God? When is it about glorifying HIS name? When is it that it is not about us? Difficult to pin-point a time.

Many people don't see me as someone materialistic and I am not severely materialistic (if there is even a need for differentiating this) but I am. There are many things in the world that I want and it is difficult to say "Okay God, everything is yours - including all the things I've wanted"…But, by God's grace, I have been able to say it from time to time and I know that deep down, I want to live my life for Christ, even though sometimes I wish for the things of the world.

Who ever said denying our selves and carrying our own cross daily was easy eh? Haha… But, God is good because He has promised to be there for us till the very end of age. He has sent us HIS helper - the Holy Spirit. He has done so much. So much that we are undeserving of. We have received much grace!!

Yeah. God is good. I want to live my life differently for Christ!!!

Pictures and summary

The pictures are here!

Of Putting up Christmas Tree in the Lee’s house. Of course, watching ‘The Night Before Christmas’ too. My phone camera only 2MP so please pardon the bad picture quality. Too bad none of us brought our camera along.

Of glorious Siew Yuk. Restaurant Kokok.

Of Christmas night. Our annual event. The gang hanging out first in Centrepoint MacDonalds and then at the Leong’s but minus the Yees. I enjoyed myself with them.Talking nonsense. And of course, the day Samuel got his nick name. He’s now “Bad Colour Samuel” in my phone.But Sam, you know we all love you just the way you are!

Of having brunch and sending off the USMers. And a bunch of university students, who were supposedly mature people, being super fascinated with flies mating.

New year's eve's eve, me and Josh were out just to get stuffs and talk. Since 1U don't extend their opening hours, we had to go to MacDonalds Centrepoint again.

On 31^st Dec, with the USMers were in Penang and the Yees in land of the bombed (aka Thailand), the only ones left were yours truly, Joshua, Samuel, and Yueen San. And since Yueen San had relatives from Hong Kong in KL, she couldn’t spend the day with us but instead had to go layan her relatives who only speak Cantonese. If you know how fluent San is in Cantonese, you’d understand how much they'd enjoyed each other’s company. hehe. So, Joshua, Samuel and I were left to do things on our own. We wanted to have lunch together. Samuel wanted to get wallet. Joshua didn’t want to go to places like 1U which will be packed. So, we all went to Amcorp Mall. The flea market wasn’t around so Amcorp was very empty. Then, we put on our thinking caps and thought of watching a movie since we’d be back in uni soon and won’t have opportunity to watch a movie anytime soon. And since all the hype over ‘Night at the Museum’, we decided to watch it at Smiles Theatre at Amcorp Mall.

So, we got up to the third floor. Went to the ticket counters and realise there was no one at the counter. So, we desperados stood there for about 15 minutes calling nobody in particular but hoping that someone will attend to us. A man came out, apologized and gave us our tickets and this is how our tickets looked like. Yes, old school. Tear yourself. Chop date. Tickets with serial number.

We rushed through our lunch, which was of course the Prosperity Burger in MacDonalds. Got into the cinema late. No one to tear our tickets. How cool is that? Haha. Next best thing was this: It’s free seating! Oh gosh. Sam was kind enough to allow me to drive Joan back to church. And from there, we went our separate ways.

At night, there was VBS Thanksgiving. Oh, watching all the videos was so fun. The kids are so cute! Teaching them brings so much joy. Wished I was part of VBS. Ah,the dance was so cool and funny.

Then there was Watchnight Service in church. It was good. Got a specific word from God and a good time just reflecting and thanking God for what has happened over the past year. God’s grace, love and faithfulness truly surpass my understanding. After which, I drove Joan to Sam’s house and we then picked Joshua and Yueen San and headed to Asia Café in Subang for our mamak. Of course, this year we break our tradition of drinking and eating at Lotus. It was good meeting Chuen and Kat too.

That’s about it.

There’s no picture for this one, but I met up with Jon on the 2^nd of Jan. It was good meeting him because friendships are hard to keep and now it’s a challenge to keep the friendship going knowing that there’s no other thing that would draw us together other than our position in Christ. But, friends that I treasure, like Jon, are always a gift from God.

So the night of 2^nd January, Weng Yan, Yueen San, Joshua and I met up. It was going to be our last night out before Yanni, Josh and I go back to uni. So, we went to Giant in Kelana Jaya to shop for Yanni and Joshua’s things for uni. And then we wanted to go for a drink but thought it a better
idea if we just hang out in Yanni’s house. But as we were on our way to her house, the playground in her neighbourhood attracted us. So, like kids, we ran for the swings, played on the slides, some tried the see-saw. It was really nice. We shouted our hearts out as we were feeling depressed needing to go back to uni. Yanni and I had stresses in our hearts over the coming semester and the challenges that are ahead of us. But, it was a good way to relieve stress man. We had a really really good time. Joshua finally learnt how to swing really high. Haha. We spent our last hour in the playground taking pictures. Oh how thick-skinned we are! Hehe.

For all the good times we have had, I wish I was with you guys and that holiday never ends. But, I can’t.
For all the arguments and misunderstanding and pressing each other’s wrong button, I cherish it because through it, ties are strengthened, we get to know ourselves better, we get to know one another better.

Whatever it is, I thank God for you guys. Because friends, as cliché it might sound, are gifts from God.

Sometimes, I get sad by the fact that we’re drifting apart but I realise that no matter how far apart we are physically, you guys are always near my heart. Cheesy yes! But it is the very thoughts in my mind and heart. Because if I laugh with you and for you, if I cry with you and for you, then I know you mean a lot to me still….

I'm ready to go. Am I?

I'm leaving soon and although it's just Singapore, there's a great amount of hesitance.

The way I feel when I'm home. When I spend time with friends doing the stupidest of things and laughing at each other. When I spend time with family doing the things each other love and stabbing each other with nonsensical stuffs and doing nothing. These things I will miss the most.

Yeah, I've gotten use to Singapore but I'll never get use to missing home and how much I wish I was home, at comfort all the time. It's sad la. And i'm even more sad after the time we had yesterday and just recalling all the things that has happened throughout the whole month. Too much has happened to pen it all down or rather, blog it all. But, i guess, memories will always be memories.

All good things must come to an end. And so, my time at home has ended.

There's so much uncertainties in the things ahead and I wonder does everyone who goes through their last semester in uni feels the same way. But the thought scares me so much. It adds to the reluctance of going back to Singapore. But, at the end of the day, I know what needs to be done should be done. The fact of life is that I have to go back to Singapore. Life goes on. Time can't freeze. Only memories can. And even that, we can't be sure it will always be that way.

So much to see. So much will happen. I feel so unready for the future. And I've never felt so scared and so vulnerable before. So afraid.

But, above all this, I have to remember that I'm not alone and that there is a God who loves me beyond what I think or feel. And that God has promised to never leave me nor forsake me.

I wish with all my heart that God be close with me because that is what I really really need right now.

I've gotta go now. Bye Bye peeps.

Christmas - not X'mas

Christmas isn’t Christmas till it happens in your heart
Somewhere deep inside you
Is where Christmas really starts
So give your heart to Jesus
You’ll discover when you do
That is Christmas really Christmas for you

My all time favourite Christmas song. This year, the gang went for shopping on Christmas eve because some of us realise that we haven’t gotten presents for some of our friends. I got a bit depressed when I can’t think of anything to buy for a friend. Felt like such a loser. How can I call myself a friend when I can’t think of anything to buy for her? Oh gosh. So, left The Curve bout 6pm. Went for family Christmas dinner at 730pm. Put on a really fake smile all the time till it ended. Got home and stayed up till 2am preparing all the presents and even cut myself. The joy of preparing for Christmas day.

Oh this year we had a pretty interesting Christmas carolling time. I enjoyed it even though I joined in unintentionally. You see, I was out with Weng Yan for lunch. After dropping her at her home, I was thinking of going to Ikea. And since I was alone, I thought it would be fun to go together with yueen san la. Since I barely spent time alone with her this holiday. But when I called her she told me she was in an orphanage. Only then did I remember the YF was having a whole day carolling session at orphanage and old folks homes. And since I was in the area and Yueen San asked me to go, so I went la. Join them and sang and got bitten by mosquitoes. But, it was reli fun la…..Really enjoyed it all….The whole day was fun. Eventually went to Ikea with Josh and San. Our luck to be in Ikea when the power went off and no air-cond and only emergency lights on – woah, it was terrible. Then, the time spent catching up with Aliza was fun too. Ahh….so fun

Christmas day…hmmm, it was rather ordinary feeling to me. I didn’t feel like there was something to dress up to…Went to church and seeing it packed was something quite nice la. Choir did well. I’m so proud of them la. 3 weeks worth of practice and they can come up with something that well. It’s really God’s grace man! And then I came to realise, hmm…Chris can be pretty charming too, when he did his solo, erm, side profile la. Haha. I think Joshua did very well for his narration. His lines, postures, gestures, emotions, all went pretty well. Ah. So happy.

After Christmas service was over. Went to Joshua’s house for Christmas lunch and then all of us got to say hello to Charity and Cherrie. Hehe. Sorry ar Charity, I camera shy la. Hehe. Still, Merry Christmas!!! Went back and slept. And of course, as it is our Christmas Day tradition, we met up at nite and stayed in Sam’s house till 5:30am. I got back at 6:15am. I rather drive at 6am than at 3 or 4am lor honestly!!!

So overall, Christmas wasn’t exactly very super extra an emotional high for me. But being able to celebrate with friends and family was really exciting. Friends more than family I think. Whoops. Hehe.

Sigh. God, help. God, sorry. God, forgive me. God, help.