owww, oww!!! mozzie bites everywhere!!! oh well... nevermind... ;p anywayz, today, had a lesson in country driving!!! decided to head off to see the famed conargo pub (and have a coke there, since i had to drive) and the mythical "treeless plain", jus a bit further than canargo... about 120km from berrigan... anywayz, went up via jerilderie, and about 5km out of berrigan, we were bombarded with locust and grasshopper swarms!!! you'd jus feel like u were driving into a minefield, and these creatures, millions upon millions, would jus swarm thickly and splatter all over the windscreen, haphazardly distributing their yellow haemolymph in such a way that u could hardly see anymore... by the time we'd passed thru canargo and up the dirt road to the treeless plain, i only had a small window left, and trails of smeared splattered-bug were left by the wipers after my vain attempts to clear a bit more viewing space...
anyhow, the view when we got there was quite amazing, hardly a tree in sight!!! the ground was as flat as anything, wild and uncultivated, but teeming with grasshoppers and locusts... i can only think that, had they any sense of emotion, they would've looked upon my car in disgust and mourned the most unceremonious losses of so many of their own kind... it's a wonder that the lot of them didn't jam the radiator and cause the car to overheat... they do say that's a major problem with driving around here, when u're hurtling along the highways and squishing bugs at over 130km/h (insert guilty admission)... popular science also has it that if u drive at 80-90km/h or below, they jus bounce off instead of splitting open...
at least, managed to find a service station on the way back to make the windscreen somewhat more permeable to light and more respectable from an aesthetic viewpoint...
who knows?!? i might be doing the country a service... the locusts and grasshoppers are seen as plagues, quite unstoppable, unfortunately... this is a worry that they're coming down as far south as berrigan and terrorising the farms around here... they've been worried about them for six months or so, and only a few km left before they're in the town... i wonder what the repercussions will be for the local industry...
but i think the bugs are angry at me... i mean, if i were a bug (of the insectoid kind, quite apart from the fluffy kind), i'd see it as a declaration of war to be ploughing thru my territory and causing massacre like that... i guess i shouldn't be surprised then, that the mozzies are out in force to cause me as much misery as they have...
signing off, your fluffy bug at war in the country... ;p dave
Tuesday, February 22, 2005
Monday, February 21, 2005
Country Life...
feeling like on the set of mcleod's daughters or similar, out here in the middle of virtually nowhere, in a lil town called Berrigan... ;p nice place tho, really, been lodging with ian & inara fox, a really lovely couple... they own a 30 acre property and an american-style house made from imported american pines and things, but it's soooo comfy!!! jus now moved again, staying with lorraine & rob beard, who live jus across the road from the fox's, it's really nice here too, tho they're renovating their driveway atm (so my car's living outside now under assault from the beating sunrays) ;p but it's all good... soo nice of them to billet me here!!! get treated like a king by my wonderful hosts!!!
it's a nice lifestyle actually, once you overcome the isolation... get woken in the morning by the crowing of the rooster and the beams of sunlight piercing the curtains... the beds are so comfy u jus don't want to rise, but then the idea of a nice warm shower and cooked breakfast beckons, as well as a day's duties to attend to at the hospital... - well, for us, could hardly call it duties ;p more like tourism...
amongst other things, been out to horse farms: some famous horses and breeders came from up here around berrigan... seen the extent of primary industry around, with rice crops traditionally being the dominant industry in the area (though in the last few years, because of the drought, wheat and maize have become the favoured crops of some of the farmers)... there's also some dairy, grain milling, and the basic amenities available in the town... there's not a whole lot more to do, except get involved in community activities - had a lion's club meeting on wednesday (where a few young ppl from the area got up to talk about issues - the one who ultimately won put together a well-woven speech about the rural community and what it means to live here...), and the swimming pool was kept alive with a fundraising swim-meet on friday night...
outside of berrigan, there's the nearby towns of finley, tocumwal and barooga, the latter two being situated on the banks of the murray river... finley had a huge tractor pull event on saturday night - wow, the dust and noise were incredible!!! the machines had to pull weights that redistributed themselves in such a way that as the tractor pulled further, more force was required to drag them... it's a rich man/woman's hobby, with hundreds of thousands of dollars being poured into modifying and supercharging the agricultural engines, which guzzle a tankload of aeroplane fuel over their 100m or so course... it's quite interesting, but a day close to the action is pretty well guaranteed to wreck your ears for at least a few days... and probably do some permanent damage too... at the end of it all, there was a humorous demolition derby where the final two cars left alive battled it out at speeds under 10kph, their engines were so shot by that stage!!!
in contrast to the calamity of the saturday night, so much of the stay here has been spent observing the peace and docility of country life, and the beauty of nature... always reminds me of God's amazing creativity to see such diverse plant and animal life so richly abundant, and without rigorous structure and routine to follow... such a beautiful change from the hustle and bustle of city life... even decided to take a glider flight (at sportavia) and see the landscape so wonderfully expanded out below... the weather, unfortunately, wasn't ideal, and there were some spots of rain... and my camera ran out of film... so i jus hope that the shot i have from up in the glider turns out well!!! but the breathtaking scenery from the glider will probably draw me back to tocumwal to take a glider course sometime in the future!!! ;p the aerodrome is also planning to start hang-gliding instruction in a few months' time...
anywayz, will update properly when i get the chance... country life is really enjoyable, but at the same time, really looking forward to returning to melbourne... really missing friends (especially missing u, sal)... - but will be back in not too long!!!
God bless,
dave
ps... in future blog, will talk about the state of healthcare in this town... since this is the major reason why we get posted to rural areas... coming soon ;p
it's a nice lifestyle actually, once you overcome the isolation... get woken in the morning by the crowing of the rooster and the beams of sunlight piercing the curtains... the beds are so comfy u jus don't want to rise, but then the idea of a nice warm shower and cooked breakfast beckons, as well as a day's duties to attend to at the hospital... - well, for us, could hardly call it duties ;p more like tourism...
amongst other things, been out to horse farms: some famous horses and breeders came from up here around berrigan... seen the extent of primary industry around, with rice crops traditionally being the dominant industry in the area (though in the last few years, because of the drought, wheat and maize have become the favoured crops of some of the farmers)... there's also some dairy, grain milling, and the basic amenities available in the town... there's not a whole lot more to do, except get involved in community activities - had a lion's club meeting on wednesday (where a few young ppl from the area got up to talk about issues - the one who ultimately won put together a well-woven speech about the rural community and what it means to live here...), and the swimming pool was kept alive with a fundraising swim-meet on friday night...
outside of berrigan, there's the nearby towns of finley, tocumwal and barooga, the latter two being situated on the banks of the murray river... finley had a huge tractor pull event on saturday night - wow, the dust and noise were incredible!!! the machines had to pull weights that redistributed themselves in such a way that as the tractor pulled further, more force was required to drag them... it's a rich man/woman's hobby, with hundreds of thousands of dollars being poured into modifying and supercharging the agricultural engines, which guzzle a tankload of aeroplane fuel over their 100m or so course... it's quite interesting, but a day close to the action is pretty well guaranteed to wreck your ears for at least a few days... and probably do some permanent damage too... at the end of it all, there was a humorous demolition derby where the final two cars left alive battled it out at speeds under 10kph, their engines were so shot by that stage!!!
in contrast to the calamity of the saturday night, so much of the stay here has been spent observing the peace and docility of country life, and the beauty of nature... always reminds me of God's amazing creativity to see such diverse plant and animal life so richly abundant, and without rigorous structure and routine to follow... such a beautiful change from the hustle and bustle of city life... even decided to take a glider flight (at sportavia) and see the landscape so wonderfully expanded out below... the weather, unfortunately, wasn't ideal, and there were some spots of rain... and my camera ran out of film... so i jus hope that the shot i have from up in the glider turns out well!!! but the breathtaking scenery from the glider will probably draw me back to tocumwal to take a glider course sometime in the future!!! ;p the aerodrome is also planning to start hang-gliding instruction in a few months' time...
anywayz, will update properly when i get the chance... country life is really enjoyable, but at the same time, really looking forward to returning to melbourne... really missing friends (especially missing u, sal)... - but will be back in not too long!!!
God bless,
dave
ps... in future blog, will talk about the state of healthcare in this town... since this is the major reason why we get posted to rural areas... coming soon ;p
Tuesday, February 15, 2005
Country towns
;p this is really going to be a short blog - need to sleep, coz morning i go to Berrigan, my small town placement, which is in NSW!!! only about hour and a half drive, though, i think...
country here is nice!!! in shepparton atm, been here since sunday, tho celebrated really wonderful valentine's day with sal ;p u are so special and full of pleasant surprises!!!
country towns are so clean compared with melbourne, went for a run around shepparton earlier and around the lake - lots of nice ducks and things... hospital is nice too, apparently servicing all the surrounding townships, as far as some places over the NSW border...
anywayz - better go... - shall look forward to writing interesting tales from Berrigan!!!
country here is nice!!! in shepparton atm, been here since sunday, tho celebrated really wonderful valentine's day with sal ;p u are so special and full of pleasant surprises!!!
country towns are so clean compared with melbourne, went for a run around shepparton earlier and around the lake - lots of nice ducks and things... hospital is nice too, apparently servicing all the surrounding townships, as far as some places over the NSW border...
anywayz - better go... - shall look forward to writing interesting tales from Berrigan!!!
Friday, February 11, 2005
Perth Journal!
Wednesday 19th January – Early rise from bed, complete packing, continue sleeping in car on the way to airport. Only had about 4 hours of sleep previous night, so could hardly keep neck upright, let alone pay attention to anything that was happening. Before long, was on plane, neither able to sleep nor think, but got through a large chunk of Stradivarius, awesome book! Was quite strange, though, to notice pages of book curling up on being exposed to low air pressure. Presume something to do with moisture on exposed surface of page being lifted into the sparse atmosphere. Book’s pages now look as wavy as my hair and as wrinkled as the skin of someone much older.
Arrive in Perth, met up with my Uncle Ricky at airport. It’s nice to see him, although he’s much thinner than I remember. Quite possibly, he thinks the same about me! Perth weather is wonderful, so sunny, and so pleasant… so predictable – you could just say “about 30 degrees, sunny”, and you’d have been right for pretty much every day I was there. The breeze is pleasant and cooling too, so one welcomes the flow of air across face, unlike hot Melbourne days when the hot air tends to be anything but refreshing. We’re soon on the road, Ricky commenting on how heavy the traffic seems to be. I look around, thinking, “what traffic?” for, clearly, he must have been imagining things. Grab a bite, and proceed to house, and then to ice-cream shop that my Uncle owns (New Zealand Natural in Morley Galleria), to meet my aunt Agnes and cousin Val (who was looking as beautiful as I remember her from all those years ago!).
Mmmm - Ice cream!
Mmmm, ice cream is delicious! Part of brain that fears putting on weight is now dreading prospect of free ice cream for next two weeks. But said part of brain is positively silenced by the yumminess of said ice cream, smoothies, fruit floes, juices, practically everything in the shop! (except bananas) Dopamine receptors stimulated presumably by the chocolate part of ice cream, was feeling happy again.
Saw The Incredibles with my cousin, pretty fun movie, tho for kids. Wasn’t in much of a thinking mood, so just the right thing for me! Not a whole lot to comment. Looked around shopping centre, which was quite big for a city where light traffic is considered heavy. Had a nice dinner in Perth city’s equivalent of Chinatown, and after returning back to the house, felt utterly exhausted and in need of sleep – but ended up watching a wonderful match of tennis instead, where the Japanese 207th (or so) ranked player in the world managed to play a really entertaining, skilful match with the world number 1 (no need to name who!). Should have slept much earlier, but ended up finally getting to bed at what would have been 3.30am in Melbourne.
Thursday 20th January – Practically unable to move, but still woke up early in order to catch ride to Morley again. Had lunch at a bustling, beachside array of restaurants, stalls and cafés, some distance north of Perth. Entered into discussion with cousin’s parents (Val was at the shop) about their views on lots of things, including their view of young people’s culture. Discovered they were remarkably similar in their attitudes to my parents!
Afternoon, went north to Yanchep and the coastal township of Two Rocks, hoping to see the caves at Yanchep. The national parkland, though, had been recently devastated by fire, apparently the work of an arsonist. Why would anyone want to set fire to the parkland, honestly? It was one of two attacks in the space of not much more than a week. So the caves were closed, owing to continuing disruption to the power supply to the cave lights resulting from the fire. The landscape was reminiscent of another planet, with the vegetation consumed and leaving only bare skeletons of what was, previously, a feast of green, playing habitat to a wonderfully diverse ecosystem. This is merely another example of what man has been doing to God’s creation since we were given dominion. Quite sad, indeed.
Is this Earth, or Mars?
Bald hill! Fire-damaged, but surrounded by surviving greenery.
The local Indigenous tribes had some interesting legends to tell, as evidenced by a large serpent woodcarving and accompanying plaque.
Waugal monoliths legend - click on the photo, you can read it if you squint!
After passing through the Swan Valley region, dominated by wineries, including Houghton’s, and large fruit plantations, we returned to Perth. Went shopping at Koorong, my cousin’s family were kind enough to buy for me a leather-bound Life Application Bible! Thanks so much, it’s such an awesome present! Dinner was a value-for-money Japanese affair with huge servings of rice, meat/fish done in whatever style, sushi, and miso soup. The meals were almost too generous to finish, and the price makes you wonder how the owners could possibly be making any money. There’s little wonder the place was so popular.
Friday 21st January – Struggle to wake up, this day went to Fremantle. Not far from the house, we wandered around Fremantle, having a peek inside the maritime museum (which had one really great painting of the landing at Fremantle) and the Fremantle prison. The prison is no longer functioning in that role, but is now a historic site and tourist attraction. Some of the artwork produced by the prisoners was quite fascinating, and one could almost sense the hope and purpose that creating the artworks gave to the prisoners. It was as if, through the dots on the canvas and the messages they wrote, they were releasing a voice that had once been repressed and ignored, and there was at once a collective sense of freedom. Ironically, they only found their expression from within captivity. A large proportion of the prison art had been produced by Indigenous Australians, somewhat reflective of the disproportionately high number of Indigenous people who find themselves in custody.
Decided to stroll through the markets, a myriad of colourful stalls selling fruits, clothes, bags, various bits of art. Wistfully looked at some of the stalls selling ornaments, thinking about close friends and family, and wondering whether I should get something. Was almost on the verge of getting something when the shopkeeper, who’s actually quite nice, took it upon herself to give me advice to concentrate on studying hard (seeing I had told her I was doing medicine), and not to worry about other things in my life, like relationships. According to her, that would sort itself out once a stable career was established. This struck a hurting nerve, because it was so similar to what my parents say to me, and completely different to the way I think! I ended up not getting anything from the store. Resolve to keep trusting in God re: everything, and to view things like that under the illumination of God’s word. After all, God is, and always will be, first priority in my life, ahead of everything, including my career/study.
Saturday 22nd January – Found a wonderful ally in my cousin, who thinks very similarly to me! She taught me a lot, about patience, about endurance, about prayer and submission, as we dined on a scrumptious lunch at the Blue Duck Café over the beautiful Cottesloe beach. Once again, the servings were massive, and we could barely make it through our mains, let alone the thin fries and chilli! Took a lazy stroll on the beach, and found Perth sand much to my liking, not coarse like Melbourne beaches generally are.
Beautiful scene at Cottesloe!
Went to Subiaco, more markets, bought some fruit to chew on slowly as a jazz duo transported us to lazy New Orleans for a little while with some classics. They were so talented, their crooning voices were woven in effortlessly with thrilling trumpet countermelodies and sublime sax solos. A dad and his little kid were dancing, their eyes sparkling as though lost on another planet with nobody to watch and not a care or worry to think about.
King's Park - view of Perth
King's Park - the glorious rays of sun shine through the canopy!
The rest of the afternoon was spent taking in vistas over Perth and the Swan River from the vantage of King’s Park. If Melbourne only had parks so beautifully maintained, and beaches and water so pristine as Perth, it would indeed come very close to being the perfect place to live!
Sunday 23rd January – Went south to Busselton and Mandurah. Armed with two thermoses of double-strength espresso, and energised by the preaching of a pastor from New Creation Church in Singapore (about righteousness through faith – brought miraculously to our car by cassette tape), we travelled all the way from Perth to one of the longest jetties in the world (if not the longest) at Busselton. Imagine a jetty so long that most people rather take a train from end to end rather than walk! In any case, we decided to walk – whether to save money or to work off the obscene amounts of food we’d been eating, it doesn’t matter – twenty minutes or so to cover the almost 2km from beach to jetty tip. The end of the jetty had an underwater observatory. Schools of fish and divers were seen hovering around near the glass panes.
Panorama of Busselton Jetty
A column of smoke was to be seen rising up from the land just across from the jetty, begging the question, “was this the work of yet another firebug?” Fortunately, this was just a small fire, and within a couple of hours, fire-fighting vehicles were seen heading towards the fire. Not much more was heard of it over the following few days, so presumably it was controlled and extinguished before it had time to cause too much devastation.
Around sunset (which happens much earlier in Perth than in Melbourne, about 7.30pm), we found ourselves waist deep in an estuary near Mandurah, scoop nets in hand and plastic basin floating behind, to catch crabs! The blue manna crabs to be found at the southern end of Western Australia aren’t as big as the huge mud crabs normally seen in restaurant tanks, but they’re far more active and quick to run. It’s cute just to see a skittering of movement on the sea floor, and watch the crabs scurrying around, scared for their lives (rightly so), only pausing to contemplate their next move. The males are distinguished with bright blue across their claws, while the females bear no such resplendence. Crabbing is something that anyone able to wade around in the water can learn in a matter of minutes, and it’s a whole lot of fun! Success, though, requires many of the qualities that take you far in life. Patience, for example, is essential. If you scoop too quickly without waiting for the crab to lie still or move into your trap, you’ll do no more than knock its shell and allow it to run far, far away. Practice and perseverance are also vital for catching crabs. It takes some time getting used to visualising the depth of the water properly, and it’s a little disappointing to those who take pride in their hand-eye coordination when those first few crabs get away. But as with all things, simply treating the experience as a lesson and enjoying the failures as well as the successes makes crabbing a fun sport!
Destined for the dining table - Crabs scooped off the ocean floor at Mandurah!
On return to Perth, we feasted on the seven crabs we caught (we actually caught many more, but the rest were not large enough and were to be put back in the water – probably to be caught again and eaten once they grow to legal size). The crab meat was nice and sweet, but not being used to eating so much, a small battle was being fought between my complaining stomach and my brain, which was given to politeness in front of my relatives who kept on insisting on feeding me more. Note to self to rectify excess consumption by eating less from now on.
Monday 24th January – Trip into South Perth to eat at the Boatshed with Val. The restaurant overlooked the south bank of Swan River, and outside were surf catamarans for hire. Only one pair were out on the river at the time, but the river later became busy with a whole busload of tourists turning up to go on the river with the surf cats! Meals were nice, mine being juicy chicken breast (which turned up with wing as well) with mango sauce, avocado and salad. It was a delightful combination, and balanced well with the acerbic taste of the Balsamic mushroom dish my cousin ordered.
With my cousin at South Perth!
After relaxing a while and observing the opulent dwellings that seemed commonplace this side of the river, we headed to city and spent the afternoon shopping.
As if the crabs from the previous night weren’t enough, crabs were again to be our big meal for the night! This time we travelled not nearly so far, just down the road to Fremantle. The night was chilly, and we had to (for the first time) wear thick jackets to brace ourselves against the stinging cold wind at the jetty. We rigged the nets with baits of lamb neck and fish head and cast them out, waiting a few minutes at a time before hauling them in and examining the catch. In the meantime while waiting, we baited and cast our rods, hoping for some fish as well as crabs. Though quite a passive affair compared with scooping crabs in waist-deep water, this was still fun, more for its relaxation value than anything else. Another group were there, and they had to keep borrowing our measure to work out whether their crabs were legal or not.
The baits seemed to be working wonders this night! Not infrequently, a net would be hauled in with more than one crab quivering and struggling. Most were too small and had to be freed from the net and thrown back in. But some were quite large, one even ferocious enough to claw sharply and deeply through my uncle’s flesh. But that was just an act of desperation on the part of a crab doomed by its size to be taken home, cooked and eaten. All in all, fourteen crabs of legal size were caught, and made for another tasty meal! My thought to eat less never stood any chance. Instead, resolve to exercise furiously on return to Melbourne!
Fourteen crab feast!
Two male crabs among the crustacean harem. Males have a vibrant blue streak to distinguish them.
Tuesday 25th January – Shopping again today. Spent some time looking and very nearly being tempted by chocolates in the many chocolate shops in the city. Came across a really pretty alley, known as London Court, mostly white-coloured but decorated with coats of arms and flags, cobblestone paving and small boutique stores on either side, bustling with activity. The scene takes one back to 19th century London, and all that was needed were the horse-drawn carriage, bearded men with canes, top hats and suits to complete the time warp.
London Court!
While randomly entering shops around the city (and spontaneously buying things, as one of you will know), came across a clearance bookstore, where amongst all the unsold books and this year’s calendars was a treasure of a book called The Peoplescape. Based on the event of the same name that happened four years ago on the grassy slopes of Parliament House, the book had photographs of all of the thousands of montages put together to celebrate the lives of remarkable Australians. My brother’s cross-country coach from school featured among them, and so decided to buy it, remembering my brother’s key involvement in making the montage. Hopefully another thing to add to his growing memory box!
Wandering around the north side of Swan River, found several nice parks and walks to wander around. Took some pictures of the Glass Tower, a futuristic, but quite purposeless curiosity.
Perth's glass tower!
Nice meal of “violin duck” for dinner – the name was far more intriguing than the cuisine, though. I still wonder why it’s called what it is. If we were in a restaurant, perhaps its presentation would give the name some meaning. But since this was take-away, the duck had further been sliced into numerous little pieces, leaving no semblance to a violin. Thought of my own violin being sliced and eaten had to be fought off. Missing my violin heaps at this stage, sitting in its case all lonely and unplayed for eight days now.
Wednesday 26th January – Visited the monastery town of New Norcia. Long drive to get there, and felt completely paralysed with tiredness – meanwhile Switchfoot kept blaring in my ear, “dare you to move”. By the time we arrived, I’d had quite a long nap! Formed in the mid 19th Century, the monastery settlement readily took in indigenous people to learn and to work. The abbey would have housed a quite a number of monks, and there were a couple of lodges for lay people. Alongside the chapel, it was quite interesting to see a shed full of farm equipment and wine presses.
One of the college houses at New Norcia.
The museum was the highlight of the town. There was an upstairs art gallery, which contained so many interesting depictions of various facets of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Evidently, many of the paintings had won competitions before ending up in the gallery. I was filled with awe at the glory the depictions gave to God, and the many ways in which each painting identified at once both the complete humanity and complete deity of Jesus.
The neighbouring room was filled with splendid regalia that once adorned the monks during services, all very elaborate, in stark contrast with the simplicity of the settlement’s buildings. But some treasures were to be found, including several violins and related instruments made in the 17th and 18th centuries. The configuration of the instruments suggests that they were updated for modern playing during the 19th century. Music books (hymn books) were also on display and contained some original compositions by the monks themselves. It strikes me as odd though, how they could make music books so large, with each side about A3 size, or perhaps even larger.
The violin exhibit in the monastery museum!
Downstairs, more historical musical instruments were to be found, as well as agricultural tools used to manage the surrounding farmland. An apothecary cabinet from the period was also on display, with everything from gut sutures to strange elixirs. Although some of the bottles appeared half full, their contents were probably nothing like what the label proclaimed must have been inside a century or so earlier.
After a meandering drive back to Perth, we took our dinner at the Sizzler (haven’t seen these around Melbourne for years!) and taking an early night’s sleep.
Thursday 27th January – Back to Melbourne! Must say, there’s loads of stuff I have that I hadn’t anticipated I’d be bringing back home, including things such as badminton racquet, extra toiletries bag, a couple of bottles of eau de cologne, chocolates etc. Spent the flight back watching and snapping photos of a gorgeous sunset from well above the clouds, and mused about the impending storm in Melbourne (this was about 5-6 days before the storm arrived in Melbourne – presumably the storm we saw from above was a precursor to the freak storm, or perhaps it was the southerly system that mixed in with the west wind to form the storm that eventually arrived to wreak havoc). From above, the system looked almost cyclonic, but so calm and fluffyTM at the same time. Once again, I was in awe of the sheer beauty of God’s created nature, at once both unnerving and seductive, and forever unparalleled by anything made by man.
High above the clouds, where the plane doth fly...
Really, it was quite a beautiful closure to my trip west, to a beautiful city. Would love to visit again, and must say so much thanks to Val, Ricky and Agnes for making my stay there such a great experience!
Arrive in Perth, met up with my Uncle Ricky at airport. It’s nice to see him, although he’s much thinner than I remember. Quite possibly, he thinks the same about me! Perth weather is wonderful, so sunny, and so pleasant… so predictable – you could just say “about 30 degrees, sunny”, and you’d have been right for pretty much every day I was there. The breeze is pleasant and cooling too, so one welcomes the flow of air across face, unlike hot Melbourne days when the hot air tends to be anything but refreshing. We’re soon on the road, Ricky commenting on how heavy the traffic seems to be. I look around, thinking, “what traffic?” for, clearly, he must have been imagining things. Grab a bite, and proceed to house, and then to ice-cream shop that my Uncle owns (New Zealand Natural in Morley Galleria), to meet my aunt Agnes and cousin Val (who was looking as beautiful as I remember her from all those years ago!).
Mmmm - Ice cream!
Mmmm, ice cream is delicious! Part of brain that fears putting on weight is now dreading prospect of free ice cream for next two weeks. But said part of brain is positively silenced by the yumminess of said ice cream, smoothies, fruit floes, juices, practically everything in the shop! (except bananas) Dopamine receptors stimulated presumably by the chocolate part of ice cream, was feeling happy again.
Saw The Incredibles with my cousin, pretty fun movie, tho for kids. Wasn’t in much of a thinking mood, so just the right thing for me! Not a whole lot to comment. Looked around shopping centre, which was quite big for a city where light traffic is considered heavy. Had a nice dinner in Perth city’s equivalent of Chinatown, and after returning back to the house, felt utterly exhausted and in need of sleep – but ended up watching a wonderful match of tennis instead, where the Japanese 207th (or so) ranked player in the world managed to play a really entertaining, skilful match with the world number 1 (no need to name who!). Should have slept much earlier, but ended up finally getting to bed at what would have been 3.30am in Melbourne.
Thursday 20th January – Practically unable to move, but still woke up early in order to catch ride to Morley again. Had lunch at a bustling, beachside array of restaurants, stalls and cafés, some distance north of Perth. Entered into discussion with cousin’s parents (Val was at the shop) about their views on lots of things, including their view of young people’s culture. Discovered they were remarkably similar in their attitudes to my parents!
Afternoon, went north to Yanchep and the coastal township of Two Rocks, hoping to see the caves at Yanchep. The national parkland, though, had been recently devastated by fire, apparently the work of an arsonist. Why would anyone want to set fire to the parkland, honestly? It was one of two attacks in the space of not much more than a week. So the caves were closed, owing to continuing disruption to the power supply to the cave lights resulting from the fire. The landscape was reminiscent of another planet, with the vegetation consumed and leaving only bare skeletons of what was, previously, a feast of green, playing habitat to a wonderfully diverse ecosystem. This is merely another example of what man has been doing to God’s creation since we were given dominion. Quite sad, indeed.
Is this Earth, or Mars?
Bald hill! Fire-damaged, but surrounded by surviving greenery.
The local Indigenous tribes had some interesting legends to tell, as evidenced by a large serpent woodcarving and accompanying plaque.
Waugal monoliths legend - click on the photo, you can read it if you squint!
After passing through the Swan Valley region, dominated by wineries, including Houghton’s, and large fruit plantations, we returned to Perth. Went shopping at Koorong, my cousin’s family were kind enough to buy for me a leather-bound Life Application Bible! Thanks so much, it’s such an awesome present! Dinner was a value-for-money Japanese affair with huge servings of rice, meat/fish done in whatever style, sushi, and miso soup. The meals were almost too generous to finish, and the price makes you wonder how the owners could possibly be making any money. There’s little wonder the place was so popular.
Friday 21st January – Struggle to wake up, this day went to Fremantle. Not far from the house, we wandered around Fremantle, having a peek inside the maritime museum (which had one really great painting of the landing at Fremantle) and the Fremantle prison. The prison is no longer functioning in that role, but is now a historic site and tourist attraction. Some of the artwork produced by the prisoners was quite fascinating, and one could almost sense the hope and purpose that creating the artworks gave to the prisoners. It was as if, through the dots on the canvas and the messages they wrote, they were releasing a voice that had once been repressed and ignored, and there was at once a collective sense of freedom. Ironically, they only found their expression from within captivity. A large proportion of the prison art had been produced by Indigenous Australians, somewhat reflective of the disproportionately high number of Indigenous people who find themselves in custody.
Decided to stroll through the markets, a myriad of colourful stalls selling fruits, clothes, bags, various bits of art. Wistfully looked at some of the stalls selling ornaments, thinking about close friends and family, and wondering whether I should get something. Was almost on the verge of getting something when the shopkeeper, who’s actually quite nice, took it upon herself to give me advice to concentrate on studying hard (seeing I had told her I was doing medicine), and not to worry about other things in my life, like relationships. According to her, that would sort itself out once a stable career was established. This struck a hurting nerve, because it was so similar to what my parents say to me, and completely different to the way I think! I ended up not getting anything from the store. Resolve to keep trusting in God re: everything, and to view things like that under the illumination of God’s word. After all, God is, and always will be, first priority in my life, ahead of everything, including my career/study.
Saturday 22nd January – Found a wonderful ally in my cousin, who thinks very similarly to me! She taught me a lot, about patience, about endurance, about prayer and submission, as we dined on a scrumptious lunch at the Blue Duck Café over the beautiful Cottesloe beach. Once again, the servings were massive, and we could barely make it through our mains, let alone the thin fries and chilli! Took a lazy stroll on the beach, and found Perth sand much to my liking, not coarse like Melbourne beaches generally are.
Beautiful scene at Cottesloe!
Went to Subiaco, more markets, bought some fruit to chew on slowly as a jazz duo transported us to lazy New Orleans for a little while with some classics. They were so talented, their crooning voices were woven in effortlessly with thrilling trumpet countermelodies and sublime sax solos. A dad and his little kid were dancing, their eyes sparkling as though lost on another planet with nobody to watch and not a care or worry to think about.
King's Park - view of Perth
King's Park - the glorious rays of sun shine through the canopy!
The rest of the afternoon was spent taking in vistas over Perth and the Swan River from the vantage of King’s Park. If Melbourne only had parks so beautifully maintained, and beaches and water so pristine as Perth, it would indeed come very close to being the perfect place to live!
Sunday 23rd January – Went south to Busselton and Mandurah. Armed with two thermoses of double-strength espresso, and energised by the preaching of a pastor from New Creation Church in Singapore (about righteousness through faith – brought miraculously to our car by cassette tape), we travelled all the way from Perth to one of the longest jetties in the world (if not the longest) at Busselton. Imagine a jetty so long that most people rather take a train from end to end rather than walk! In any case, we decided to walk – whether to save money or to work off the obscene amounts of food we’d been eating, it doesn’t matter – twenty minutes or so to cover the almost 2km from beach to jetty tip. The end of the jetty had an underwater observatory. Schools of fish and divers were seen hovering around near the glass panes.
Panorama of Busselton Jetty
A column of smoke was to be seen rising up from the land just across from the jetty, begging the question, “was this the work of yet another firebug?” Fortunately, this was just a small fire, and within a couple of hours, fire-fighting vehicles were seen heading towards the fire. Not much more was heard of it over the following few days, so presumably it was controlled and extinguished before it had time to cause too much devastation.
Around sunset (which happens much earlier in Perth than in Melbourne, about 7.30pm), we found ourselves waist deep in an estuary near Mandurah, scoop nets in hand and plastic basin floating behind, to catch crabs! The blue manna crabs to be found at the southern end of Western Australia aren’t as big as the huge mud crabs normally seen in restaurant tanks, but they’re far more active and quick to run. It’s cute just to see a skittering of movement on the sea floor, and watch the crabs scurrying around, scared for their lives (rightly so), only pausing to contemplate their next move. The males are distinguished with bright blue across their claws, while the females bear no such resplendence. Crabbing is something that anyone able to wade around in the water can learn in a matter of minutes, and it’s a whole lot of fun! Success, though, requires many of the qualities that take you far in life. Patience, for example, is essential. If you scoop too quickly without waiting for the crab to lie still or move into your trap, you’ll do no more than knock its shell and allow it to run far, far away. Practice and perseverance are also vital for catching crabs. It takes some time getting used to visualising the depth of the water properly, and it’s a little disappointing to those who take pride in their hand-eye coordination when those first few crabs get away. But as with all things, simply treating the experience as a lesson and enjoying the failures as well as the successes makes crabbing a fun sport!
Destined for the dining table - Crabs scooped off the ocean floor at Mandurah!
On return to Perth, we feasted on the seven crabs we caught (we actually caught many more, but the rest were not large enough and were to be put back in the water – probably to be caught again and eaten once they grow to legal size). The crab meat was nice and sweet, but not being used to eating so much, a small battle was being fought between my complaining stomach and my brain, which was given to politeness in front of my relatives who kept on insisting on feeding me more. Note to self to rectify excess consumption by eating less from now on.
Monday 24th January – Trip into South Perth to eat at the Boatshed with Val. The restaurant overlooked the south bank of Swan River, and outside were surf catamarans for hire. Only one pair were out on the river at the time, but the river later became busy with a whole busload of tourists turning up to go on the river with the surf cats! Meals were nice, mine being juicy chicken breast (which turned up with wing as well) with mango sauce, avocado and salad. It was a delightful combination, and balanced well with the acerbic taste of the Balsamic mushroom dish my cousin ordered.
With my cousin at South Perth!
After relaxing a while and observing the opulent dwellings that seemed commonplace this side of the river, we headed to city and spent the afternoon shopping.
As if the crabs from the previous night weren’t enough, crabs were again to be our big meal for the night! This time we travelled not nearly so far, just down the road to Fremantle. The night was chilly, and we had to (for the first time) wear thick jackets to brace ourselves against the stinging cold wind at the jetty. We rigged the nets with baits of lamb neck and fish head and cast them out, waiting a few minutes at a time before hauling them in and examining the catch. In the meantime while waiting, we baited and cast our rods, hoping for some fish as well as crabs. Though quite a passive affair compared with scooping crabs in waist-deep water, this was still fun, more for its relaxation value than anything else. Another group were there, and they had to keep borrowing our measure to work out whether their crabs were legal or not.
The baits seemed to be working wonders this night! Not infrequently, a net would be hauled in with more than one crab quivering and struggling. Most were too small and had to be freed from the net and thrown back in. But some were quite large, one even ferocious enough to claw sharply and deeply through my uncle’s flesh. But that was just an act of desperation on the part of a crab doomed by its size to be taken home, cooked and eaten. All in all, fourteen crabs of legal size were caught, and made for another tasty meal! My thought to eat less never stood any chance. Instead, resolve to exercise furiously on return to Melbourne!
Fourteen crab feast!
Two male crabs among the crustacean harem. Males have a vibrant blue streak to distinguish them.
Tuesday 25th January – Shopping again today. Spent some time looking and very nearly being tempted by chocolates in the many chocolate shops in the city. Came across a really pretty alley, known as London Court, mostly white-coloured but decorated with coats of arms and flags, cobblestone paving and small boutique stores on either side, bustling with activity. The scene takes one back to 19th century London, and all that was needed were the horse-drawn carriage, bearded men with canes, top hats and suits to complete the time warp.
London Court!
While randomly entering shops around the city (and spontaneously buying things, as one of you will know), came across a clearance bookstore, where amongst all the unsold books and this year’s calendars was a treasure of a book called The Peoplescape. Based on the event of the same name that happened four years ago on the grassy slopes of Parliament House, the book had photographs of all of the thousands of montages put together to celebrate the lives of remarkable Australians. My brother’s cross-country coach from school featured among them, and so decided to buy it, remembering my brother’s key involvement in making the montage. Hopefully another thing to add to his growing memory box!
Wandering around the north side of Swan River, found several nice parks and walks to wander around. Took some pictures of the Glass Tower, a futuristic, but quite purposeless curiosity.
Perth's glass tower!
Nice meal of “violin duck” for dinner – the name was far more intriguing than the cuisine, though. I still wonder why it’s called what it is. If we were in a restaurant, perhaps its presentation would give the name some meaning. But since this was take-away, the duck had further been sliced into numerous little pieces, leaving no semblance to a violin. Thought of my own violin being sliced and eaten had to be fought off. Missing my violin heaps at this stage, sitting in its case all lonely and unplayed for eight days now.
Wednesday 26th January – Visited the monastery town of New Norcia. Long drive to get there, and felt completely paralysed with tiredness – meanwhile Switchfoot kept blaring in my ear, “dare you to move”. By the time we arrived, I’d had quite a long nap! Formed in the mid 19th Century, the monastery settlement readily took in indigenous people to learn and to work. The abbey would have housed a quite a number of monks, and there were a couple of lodges for lay people. Alongside the chapel, it was quite interesting to see a shed full of farm equipment and wine presses.
One of the college houses at New Norcia.
The museum was the highlight of the town. There was an upstairs art gallery, which contained so many interesting depictions of various facets of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Evidently, many of the paintings had won competitions before ending up in the gallery. I was filled with awe at the glory the depictions gave to God, and the many ways in which each painting identified at once both the complete humanity and complete deity of Jesus.
The neighbouring room was filled with splendid regalia that once adorned the monks during services, all very elaborate, in stark contrast with the simplicity of the settlement’s buildings. But some treasures were to be found, including several violins and related instruments made in the 17th and 18th centuries. The configuration of the instruments suggests that they were updated for modern playing during the 19th century. Music books (hymn books) were also on display and contained some original compositions by the monks themselves. It strikes me as odd though, how they could make music books so large, with each side about A3 size, or perhaps even larger.
The violin exhibit in the monastery museum!
Downstairs, more historical musical instruments were to be found, as well as agricultural tools used to manage the surrounding farmland. An apothecary cabinet from the period was also on display, with everything from gut sutures to strange elixirs. Although some of the bottles appeared half full, their contents were probably nothing like what the label proclaimed must have been inside a century or so earlier.
After a meandering drive back to Perth, we took our dinner at the Sizzler (haven’t seen these around Melbourne for years!) and taking an early night’s sleep.
Thursday 27th January – Back to Melbourne! Must say, there’s loads of stuff I have that I hadn’t anticipated I’d be bringing back home, including things such as badminton racquet, extra toiletries bag, a couple of bottles of eau de cologne, chocolates etc. Spent the flight back watching and snapping photos of a gorgeous sunset from well above the clouds, and mused about the impending storm in Melbourne (this was about 5-6 days before the storm arrived in Melbourne – presumably the storm we saw from above was a precursor to the freak storm, or perhaps it was the southerly system that mixed in with the west wind to form the storm that eventually arrived to wreak havoc). From above, the system looked almost cyclonic, but so calm and fluffyTM at the same time. Once again, I was in awe of the sheer beauty of God’s created nature, at once both unnerving and seductive, and forever unparalleled by anything made by man.
High above the clouds, where the plane doth fly...
Really, it was quite a beautiful closure to my trip west, to a beautiful city. Would love to visit again, and must say so much thanks to Val, Ricky and Agnes for making my stay there such a great experience!
Wednesday, February 09, 2005
Chinese New Year!!!
wishing all a happy, blessed Chinese New Year!!! ;p just a short blog today... around this time every year, there's lots of eating to be done, thus ruining any chance of me sticking to my self-imposed resolve to eat less and exercise more... not to say i haven't been exercising... went for a 14km run yesterday (my usual run) - but it turned into a 10km run + 1km walk + 3km run... not a good sign, since i don't usually have trouble getting through the course!!!
but yes, food!!! ;p too much of it, in fact... huge home dinner last night, prawns, ham, mushrooms, vegetables, rice, hmmmz... even curry, but i didn't have any of that since i had far too much on my plate already... there was a huge juicy rockmelon afterwards... so tired, after having run and then eaten, i could do nothing but find my bed and sleep!!! ;p
fortunately, i'd recovered by today... Chinese New Year!!! the rooster crows, and it's another reminder that my mother's going to be turning a multiple of twelve this year (i shan't disclose) ;p since she's a proud rooster herself... enjoyed a nice dinner and movie tonight with Sal, although we were caught up running after trams and running to the kino, to ensure we weren't locked out!!! saw Vera Drake, a movie that tackles the issue of abortion and its complex facets in the setting of post WWII England... quite impressed actually, by the way that it doesn't try to oversimplify the issue, nor make any loud statement on an issue that's clearly not black and white... it's littered with ironies as well, and the characters are neat caricatures, conveniently tied in a web of relations for the sake of the movie, diverse enough to cover a range of viewpoints... recommended viewing!!!
;p anywayz, before i sign off, shall leave you with a psalm that is very thought-provoking... it talks about "bloodguilt", and says "surely I was sinful at birth", which some would say is referring to soul ties that are handed down from generation to generation... it goes deeper than soul ties though, since we are all sinful by nature ever since the first man, Adam, and none of us can declare ourselves on our own to be without sin... this psalm is a very strong reminder of our need to remember God in our lives first, that our sin is against God, and that we need to submit ourselves to Him... but our God, in His infinite love and mercy, has granted us a way to come back to Him and receive forgiveness, through Jesus Christ... so shall rededicate life to God, and be submissive to Him in all things, for we need God, as always, and forevermore, and in Him we shall find our dwelling place!!! ;p
God bless,
dave
but yes, food!!! ;p too much of it, in fact... huge home dinner last night, prawns, ham, mushrooms, vegetables, rice, hmmmz... even curry, but i didn't have any of that since i had far too much on my plate already... there was a huge juicy rockmelon afterwards... so tired, after having run and then eaten, i could do nothing but find my bed and sleep!!! ;p
fortunately, i'd recovered by today... Chinese New Year!!! the rooster crows, and it's another reminder that my mother's going to be turning a multiple of twelve this year (i shan't disclose) ;p since she's a proud rooster herself... enjoyed a nice dinner and movie tonight with Sal, although we were caught up running after trams and running to the kino, to ensure we weren't locked out!!! saw Vera Drake, a movie that tackles the issue of abortion and its complex facets in the setting of post WWII England... quite impressed actually, by the way that it doesn't try to oversimplify the issue, nor make any loud statement on an issue that's clearly not black and white... it's littered with ironies as well, and the characters are neat caricatures, conveniently tied in a web of relations for the sake of the movie, diverse enough to cover a range of viewpoints... recommended viewing!!!
;p anywayz, before i sign off, shall leave you with a psalm that is very thought-provoking... it talks about "bloodguilt", and says "surely I was sinful at birth", which some would say is referring to soul ties that are handed down from generation to generation... it goes deeper than soul ties though, since we are all sinful by nature ever since the first man, Adam, and none of us can declare ourselves on our own to be without sin... this psalm is a very strong reminder of our need to remember God in our lives first, that our sin is against God, and that we need to submit ourselves to Him... but our God, in His infinite love and mercy, has granted us a way to come back to Him and receive forgiveness, through Jesus Christ... so shall rededicate life to God, and be submissive to Him in all things, for we need God, as always, and forevermore, and in Him we shall find our dwelling place!!! ;p
God bless,
dave
Psalm 51
1 Have mercy on me, O God,
according to your unfailing love;
according to your great compassion
blot out my transgressions.
2 Wash away all my iniquity
and cleanse me from my sin.
3 For I know my transgressions,
and my sin is always before me.
4 Against you, you only, have I sinned
and done what is evil in your sight,
so that you are proved right when you speak
and justified when you judge.
5 Surely I was sinful at birth,
sinful from the time my mother conceived me.
6 Surely you desire truth in the inner parts;
you teach me wisdom in the inmost place.
7 Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean;
wash me, and I will be whiter than snow.
8 Let me hear joy and gladness;
let the bones you have crushed rejoice.
9 Hide your face from my sins
and blot out all my iniquity.
10 Create in me a pure heart, O God,
and renew a steadfast spirit within me.
11 Do not cast me from your presence
or take your Holy Spirit from me.
12 Restore to me the joy of your salvation
and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me.
13 Then I will teach transgressors your ways,
and sinners will turn back to you.
14 Save me from bloodguilt, O God,
the God who saves me,
and my tongue will sing of your righteousness.
15 O Lord, open my lips,
and my mouth will declare your praise.
16 You do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it;
you do not take pleasure in burnt offerings.
17 The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit;
a broken and contrite heart,
O God, you will not despise.
Tuesday, February 01, 2005
Argh - long time, no blog!!!
i really ought to update this properly... sometime soon (hmmmz - that's still quite nebulous) i'll write up a perth blog, as i now have photos...
yes, that means, i'm back in melbourne!!! ;p have been since thursday nite, actually... had a nice flight back, took pictures of the sunset from high above the clouds, and saw the melbourne nightscape...
was wonderful to spend time with sally again, after 10 days, missed u heaps!!! ;p
today - some good news, some bad (well, not really bad... jus surprising...) - good news, the paper i did some work for has been accepted for publishing, and should be out in 3 months!!! ;p it's been a long time coming, but was a rather extensive investigation into the perception of pitch using various strategies in the cochlear implant... and comprised several long experiments (over the course of a couple of years) - so good to see it's finally going to be recognised...
the (kind of) bad/surprising news - as some of u know, i'm going to shepp on rural placement the week after next... i have my timetable, and it included postings to places i hadn't heard of... - berrigan, robinvale... - turns out these places are both interstate, in new south wales!!! i guess it'll be interesting, but expensive/long, tiring drives... and having to go so far... oh well... ;p i guess i can enjoy the scenery on the way, perhaps spend some time on the murray river... hehe...
speaking of crossing rivers, i'll finally suggest a reading from Joshua 1:1-9... we are told to always be courageous, to trust in the Lord, to meditate on His word and His ways, and through our God, we can be confident to gain those blessings intended for us by Him... ;p love this passage!!!
yes, that means, i'm back in melbourne!!! ;p have been since thursday nite, actually... had a nice flight back, took pictures of the sunset from high above the clouds, and saw the melbourne nightscape...
was wonderful to spend time with sally again, after 10 days, missed u heaps!!! ;p
today - some good news, some bad (well, not really bad... jus surprising...) - good news, the paper i did some work for has been accepted for publishing, and should be out in 3 months!!! ;p it's been a long time coming, but was a rather extensive investigation into the perception of pitch using various strategies in the cochlear implant... and comprised several long experiments (over the course of a couple of years) - so good to see it's finally going to be recognised...
the (kind of) bad/surprising news - as some of u know, i'm going to shepp on rural placement the week after next... i have my timetable, and it included postings to places i hadn't heard of... - berrigan, robinvale... - turns out these places are both interstate, in new south wales!!! i guess it'll be interesting, but expensive/long, tiring drives... and having to go so far... oh well... ;p i guess i can enjoy the scenery on the way, perhaps spend some time on the murray river... hehe...
speaking of crossing rivers, i'll finally suggest a reading from Joshua 1:1-9... we are told to always be courageous, to trust in the Lord, to meditate on His word and His ways, and through our God, we can be confident to gain those blessings intended for us by Him... ;p love this passage!!!
1 After the death of Moses the servant of the LORD , the LORD said to Joshua son of Nun, Moses' aide: 2 "Moses my servant is dead. Now then, you and all these people, get ready to cross the Jordan River into the land I am about to give to them-to the Israelites. 3 I will give you every place where you set your foot, as I promised Moses. 4 Your territory will extend from the desert to Lebanon, and from the great river, the Euphrates-all the Hittite country-to the Great Sea on the west. 5 No one will be able to stand up against you all the days of your life. As I was with Moses, so I will be with you; I will never leave you nor forsake you.
6 "Be strong and courageous, because you will lead these people to inherit the land I swore to their forefathers to give them. 7 Be strong and very courageous. Be careful to obey all the law my servant Moses gave you; do not turn from it to the right or to the left, that you may be successful wherever you go. 8 Do not let this Book of the Law depart from your mouth; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful. 9 Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be terrified; do not be discouraged, for the LORD your God will be with you wherever you go." - Joshua 1:1-9
Wednesday, January 26, 2005
Still in Perth ;p
still here ;p lots of fun, nice sceneries, long drives, huge meals, laziness, attacks of spontaneity while shopping, haha... unfortunately, not able to upload fotos yet, most of them are on film... will post some when i have time (hmmmz - how much of that will i have?!?)
speaking of which, i haven't any time really to post now... kinda posted some thoughts here and here in sal's blog... so read them instead, hehe... ;p
sal, hon, missing u heaps!!!
fluffiness, dave
speaking of which, i haven't any time really to post now... kinda posted some thoughts here and here in sal's blog... so read them instead, hehe... ;p
sal, hon, missing u heaps!!!
fluffiness, dave
Friday, January 21, 2005
Strange...
for those who don't know, i'm in perth now!!! staying at my cousin's place at the moment, and discovered she has a blog, which is cool... been pretty good so far, after having adjusted to the jetlag, it's been interesting to observe and partake (minimally) in the workings of an ice-cream shop... ;p my cousin's shop... the varieties of things on offer is pretty huge, in fact so much so that some customers are put off and simply decide not to get anything because they are confronted by too wide a range to pick from!!! for those who were hoping, am sad to report that the loyalty card offer is no longer going, so no free ice-cream...
anywayz, of course, that's not all we've been up to... been to beachside, ate at some nice restaurants (and i shouldn't forget to mention the best value japanese take-away/cafe i've been to)... visited some of the fire-damaged areas too... some plains appeared reminiscent of a surface from another planet... it's sickening to think that the destruction of nature to such an extent might be the result of an arsonist somewhere... humans can be so difficult to understand sometimes...
read sal's blog before... having negative thoughts... very complicated... i suppose, things are rarely straightforward or able to be understood fully... i really don't know... something i'm growing to appreciate tho, is that emotional states and thoughts, although they often seem to correlate very well, they are in fact separate but intertwined aspects of a person's mind-state... thoughts are such that they can be expressed in many ways, to put a positive or negative emphasis on it, and virtually everything can be seen in both positive and negative lights... one's thoughts, therefore, may be very liable to strong emotional influence, and in turn this only serves to positively reinforce the emotional state (whether positive or negative), and subsequent thoughts will be more likely to be positive or negative in turn... thus a cascade of thoughts and emotions to one extreme is explained through cognitive theory... i guess one special case of this is when one's own thoughts are being analysed, and further being subject to doubt, this cascade could be especially dramatic...
i guess one way this can be offset is to realise the separateness and intertwined-ness of thought and emotion, such that emotion can be independently willed through brutal rationalisation and depersonalisation... it's something that helps me sometimes control my emotions, because i consciously separate them from the surrounding thoughts... in a sense, it's really no more than taking a step back from within myself, and praying to be shown the way things appear from the point-of-view that will tell us the truth - that is, God's point-of-view...
i don't propose to have answers to anything about emotion and thought... not even that what i've said has much bearing on truth (rather they are the result of observation and speculation)... but i jus thought i should share because i think that the most important thing when it comes to thoughts and truth-seeking is to desire the truth, and to desire God, rather than necessarily to respond to our emotions, because our hearts can be deceptive...
anywayz, on a positive ending, went to koorong today and got a study bible!!! very happy to finally have one, got the life-application niv study bible... jus a short extract from the end of Psalm 139 (verses 23-24):
anywayz, of course, that's not all we've been up to... been to beachside, ate at some nice restaurants (and i shouldn't forget to mention the best value japanese take-away/cafe i've been to)... visited some of the fire-damaged areas too... some plains appeared reminiscent of a surface from another planet... it's sickening to think that the destruction of nature to such an extent might be the result of an arsonist somewhere... humans can be so difficult to understand sometimes...
read sal's blog before... having negative thoughts... very complicated... i suppose, things are rarely straightforward or able to be understood fully... i really don't know... something i'm growing to appreciate tho, is that emotional states and thoughts, although they often seem to correlate very well, they are in fact separate but intertwined aspects of a person's mind-state... thoughts are such that they can be expressed in many ways, to put a positive or negative emphasis on it, and virtually everything can be seen in both positive and negative lights... one's thoughts, therefore, may be very liable to strong emotional influence, and in turn this only serves to positively reinforce the emotional state (whether positive or negative), and subsequent thoughts will be more likely to be positive or negative in turn... thus a cascade of thoughts and emotions to one extreme is explained through cognitive theory... i guess one special case of this is when one's own thoughts are being analysed, and further being subject to doubt, this cascade could be especially dramatic...
i guess one way this can be offset is to realise the separateness and intertwined-ness of thought and emotion, such that emotion can be independently willed through brutal rationalisation and depersonalisation... it's something that helps me sometimes control my emotions, because i consciously separate them from the surrounding thoughts... in a sense, it's really no more than taking a step back from within myself, and praying to be shown the way things appear from the point-of-view that will tell us the truth - that is, God's point-of-view...
i don't propose to have answers to anything about emotion and thought... not even that what i've said has much bearing on truth (rather they are the result of observation and speculation)... but i jus thought i should share because i think that the most important thing when it comes to thoughts and truth-seeking is to desire the truth, and to desire God, rather than necessarily to respond to our emotions, because our hearts can be deceptive...
anywayz, on a positive ending, went to koorong today and got a study bible!!! very happy to finally have one, got the life-application niv study bible... jus a short extract from the end of Psalm 139 (verses 23-24):
"Search me, O God, and know my heart;
test me and know my anxious thoughts.
See if there is any offensive way in me,
and lead me in the way everlasting"
Monday, January 17, 2005
The hunt is over...
logged on this morning to the Codex Maya chat only to find out the hunt's already finished... did some hunting last night ;p so much fun!!! but this morning, disappointed to find out we didn't win, haha... a team called "physical plant" found the hunt object at 6.35pm sunday (whatever timezone mit is)...
oh well, i guess that means i should start study again... ;p
to let those of u know what kinda puzzles they are - they're really difficult, with many logic steps involved... commonly, a combination of things like ciphers, anagrams, translation, odd-one-out, general knowledge, are required to solve each puzzle... there are over 100 puzzles for the whole hunt i think - and some of them are meta-puzzles, requiring the answers to a large set of other puzzles...
i only really worked on 2 of them, which were quite interesting... one of them involved a crossword puzzle with all words 7-letters long, without any numbers to mark where words would fit... and clues all yielded 8-letter answers!!! it turned out that all of them could have one letter dropped from them to still yield credible words, and that those letters dropped were "u", "d", "l", and "r"... naturally, this makes one think of "up", "down", "left", "right"... so began the painstaking task of fitting these into the only way they'd fit into the grid, in the direction indicated by the dropped letter, and it worked!!! ;p
the other one involved blogs... ;p funny that... there was a mysterious grid of letters, and i noticed early on that the words "xanga", "blog", "journal" and "diary" could all be found in it... but we ditched that after a while and set about trying some cryptography and summing the numbers in base 26 and translating back... things like that take time... we shouldn't have wasted it!!! turns out that the original track was correct... "blog" was part of "modblog", "journal" was part of "deadjournal" and "diary" was part of "diaryland", all other online blog sites... another blogsite that could be found was "blurty"... i hadn't heard of any of these except xanga!!! but when you look at the remaining letters, u get "usermhofive" -> logged into each of those blogsites in turn with username "mhofive", and fair enough, we're presented with a code!!! the code was rapidly unwrapped, and it sent us to yet another blog site... where the clue to the final answer was found... phew!!! ;p what a chase!!!
hehe... anywayz, i didn't get any sleep until 3.30am, this morning, thanx to the hunt... unfortunately there's no consolation prize, or else i think we were 2nd running or something... ;p oh well... it's fun anyhow, i encourage anyone to join next year's one, or do the melbourne uni one when it comes around later this year!!!
;p
ciao,
dave
oh well, i guess that means i should start study again... ;p
to let those of u know what kinda puzzles they are - they're really difficult, with many logic steps involved... commonly, a combination of things like ciphers, anagrams, translation, odd-one-out, general knowledge, are required to solve each puzzle... there are over 100 puzzles for the whole hunt i think - and some of them are meta-puzzles, requiring the answers to a large set of other puzzles...
i only really worked on 2 of them, which were quite interesting... one of them involved a crossword puzzle with all words 7-letters long, without any numbers to mark where words would fit... and clues all yielded 8-letter answers!!! it turned out that all of them could have one letter dropped from them to still yield credible words, and that those letters dropped were "u", "d", "l", and "r"... naturally, this makes one think of "up", "down", "left", "right"... so began the painstaking task of fitting these into the only way they'd fit into the grid, in the direction indicated by the dropped letter, and it worked!!! ;p
the other one involved blogs... ;p funny that... there was a mysterious grid of letters, and i noticed early on that the words "xanga", "blog", "journal" and "diary" could all be found in it... but we ditched that after a while and set about trying some cryptography and summing the numbers in base 26 and translating back... things like that take time... we shouldn't have wasted it!!! turns out that the original track was correct... "blog" was part of "modblog", "journal" was part of "deadjournal" and "diary" was part of "diaryland", all other online blog sites... another blogsite that could be found was "blurty"... i hadn't heard of any of these except xanga!!! but when you look at the remaining letters, u get "usermhofive" -> logged into each of those blogsites in turn with username "mhofive", and fair enough, we're presented with a code!!! the code was rapidly unwrapped, and it sent us to yet another blog site... where the clue to the final answer was found... phew!!! ;p what a chase!!!
hehe... anywayz, i didn't get any sleep until 3.30am, this morning, thanx to the hunt... unfortunately there's no consolation prize, or else i think we were 2nd running or something... ;p oh well... it's fun anyhow, i encourage anyone to join next year's one, or do the melbourne uni one when it comes around later this year!!!
;p
ciao,
dave
Tuesday, January 11, 2005
Phew - hot and clammy!!!
wow, 37 degrees - i forgot what summer was all about until today... - hehe ;p in thin film of sweat and feeling like needing a shower ever few minutes... phew!!! ah well, shall put up with this, i jus hope my computer holds up... it's crashed twice so far today already (while attempting to start games of starcraft - reacquainting myself with zerg... - believing it's still the easiest race to play...) currently listening to a cool lil album, internationalist (powederfinger) - the best, still, 6 years on!!! - i think/hope my computer can handle playing cd and net... ;p
anywayz, last couple of days, been good to hear from friends who are overseas on elective!!! mary and shaz, miss u both so much!!! but good that we have the net to keep in touch... i think i'm one of few who are remaining grounded here in melbourne for elective, but i guess it's not all bad... ;p talking to jim on msn now too - all the way from scotland!!!
tennis on tv again ;p feeling like playing again... hmmmz - watched chinese 19-y.o. peng, who beat myskina!!! hmmmz, such good tennis, so few errors on her part... myskina was a bit out of sorts tho... i think peng's going to be someone to watch in the future!!! haha, she reminds me of holy ;p like twins?!? haha... hewitt too good in men's... i think this aussie open will be interesting in the women's side... but mens - i dunno if anyone can beat federer?!?
this is what summer's always been about for me haha... - jus hot dayz, beach, tennis... lazzzzzyyyyy... ;p
anywayz - change of topic - ;p interesting to see post on sally's blog about grumbliness attracting comments!!! reminds me of how the disaster/tragedy stories are the ones that seem to attract the most attention in the news... but also, how i probably become more likely to take a step back and think about things whenever i'm confronted with a negative mood or situation...
read somewhere interesting, a novel by deepak chopra called "soulmate" (which, interestingly is a very unlikely sort of story about love at first sight and stuff... - haha, something i can't say i identify with or agree with...), something about surrender being about taking a step back so we can appreciate the greater view... surrender to God is indeed a very interesting, but often misunderstood concept... that's what we must do... it's in a way very passive, giving oneself to the Spirit of God... but it doesn't mean it's easy... indeed, for me, it's often really difficult, coz i have to let go of all the things that seem so ingrained that are contrary to the Spirit... and letting go of these is an effortful process... i can't really say it any better than Paul put it in Galatians 5...
while in concept, it's not that difficult to understand, the practical aspect of doing such is plagued by our imperfections... hence we fall into a cycle of periods of surrender and relapse... but through repenting time and time again, and falling back on the hope and assurance that we've gained through our trust in Jesus, we will become transformed... i have to jus remember that it's not something i can do in my own strength... for the cycle will be exhausting and fruitless if i rely on myself... but God lives!!! and with Him, all things are possible!!!
anywayz, last couple of days, been good to hear from friends who are overseas on elective!!! mary and shaz, miss u both so much!!! but good that we have the net to keep in touch... i think i'm one of few who are remaining grounded here in melbourne for elective, but i guess it's not all bad... ;p talking to jim on msn now too - all the way from scotland!!!
tennis on tv again ;p feeling like playing again... hmmmz - watched chinese 19-y.o. peng, who beat myskina!!! hmmmz, such good tennis, so few errors on her part... myskina was a bit out of sorts tho... i think peng's going to be someone to watch in the future!!! haha, she reminds me of holy ;p like twins?!? haha... hewitt too good in men's... i think this aussie open will be interesting in the women's side... but mens - i dunno if anyone can beat federer?!?
this is what summer's always been about for me haha... - jus hot dayz, beach, tennis... lazzzzzyyyyy... ;p
anywayz - change of topic - ;p interesting to see post on sally's blog about grumbliness attracting comments!!! reminds me of how the disaster/tragedy stories are the ones that seem to attract the most attention in the news... but also, how i probably become more likely to take a step back and think about things whenever i'm confronted with a negative mood or situation...
read somewhere interesting, a novel by deepak chopra called "soulmate" (which, interestingly is a very unlikely sort of story about love at first sight and stuff... - haha, something i can't say i identify with or agree with...), something about surrender being about taking a step back so we can appreciate the greater view... surrender to God is indeed a very interesting, but often misunderstood concept... that's what we must do... it's in a way very passive, giving oneself to the Spirit of God... but it doesn't mean it's easy... indeed, for me, it's often really difficult, coz i have to let go of all the things that seem so ingrained that are contrary to the Spirit... and letting go of these is an effortful process... i can't really say it any better than Paul put it in Galatians 5...
Galatians 5:16-25
So I say, live by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the sinful nature. For the sinful nature desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the sinful nature. They are in conflict with each other, so that you do not do what you want. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under law.
The acts of the sinful nature are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God.
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and selfcontrol. Against such things there is no law. Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the sinful nature with its passions and desires. Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit.
while in concept, it's not that difficult to understand, the practical aspect of doing such is plagued by our imperfections... hence we fall into a cycle of periods of surrender and relapse... but through repenting time and time again, and falling back on the hope and assurance that we've gained through our trust in Jesus, we will become transformed... i have to jus remember that it's not something i can do in my own strength... for the cycle will be exhausting and fruitless if i rely on myself... but God lives!!! and with Him, all things are possible!!!
Friday, January 07, 2005
Instruments of celebration ;p
did some random reading today... came across isaiah 38 - about hezekiah's illness, and how God, in His great compassion, miraculously healed hezekiah from the brink of death, and granted him another 15 years of life...
it's a wonderful thing that we have such a compassionate and loving God!!! who gives us, like hezekiah, chances to live and celebrate His goodness and His majesty... we are truly instruments of celebration, and while we are often so ready to attribute disasters and terrible things to His power, i can so often forget to celebrate the great gift of life that God gave me...
sometimes, a disaster, or some negative event, is what it takes to bring us closer to the Lord... jus as hezekiah saw, in hindsight, his life-threatening illness as a blessing that helped him to live the rest of his days for God (verse 17), our own difficulties are often used in our lives to similarly strengthen our relationship with God too... trials help us see things in perspective, and to be more grateful for the many blessings we receive... and all the more, we should never take things for granted!!!
hezekiah recounted his times and saw the Lord's loving hand in his life... and because his eyes were opened, he could not help but celebrate and praise God, and spread the news of the Lord's goodness...
verse 20 is cool too, especially for violinists like me, "The Lord will save me, and we will sing with stringed instruments all the days of our lives in the temple of the Lord" ;p
so yah, celebrate all the wonderful blessings we have, praise the Lord!!!
it's a wonderful thing that we have such a compassionate and loving God!!! who gives us, like hezekiah, chances to live and celebrate His goodness and His majesty... we are truly instruments of celebration, and while we are often so ready to attribute disasters and terrible things to His power, i can so often forget to celebrate the great gift of life that God gave me...
sometimes, a disaster, or some negative event, is what it takes to bring us closer to the Lord... jus as hezekiah saw, in hindsight, his life-threatening illness as a blessing that helped him to live the rest of his days for God (verse 17), our own difficulties are often used in our lives to similarly strengthen our relationship with God too... trials help us see things in perspective, and to be more grateful for the many blessings we receive... and all the more, we should never take things for granted!!!
hezekiah recounted his times and saw the Lord's loving hand in his life... and because his eyes were opened, he could not help but celebrate and praise God, and spread the news of the Lord's goodness...
verse 20 is cool too, especially for violinists like me, "The Lord will save me, and we will sing with stringed instruments all the days of our lives in the temple of the Lord" ;p
so yah, celebrate all the wonderful blessings we have, praise the Lord!!!
Isaiah 38:10-20
10 I said, "In the prime of my life
must I go through the gates of death
and be robbed of the rest of my years?"
11 I said, "I will not again see the LORD ,
the LORD , in the land of the living;
no longer will I look on mankind,
or be with those who now dwell in this world.
12 Like a shepherd's tent my house
has been pulled down and taken from me.
Like a weaver I have rolled up my life,
and he has cut me off from the loom;
day and night you made an end of me.
13 I waited patiently till dawn,
but like a lion he broke all my bones;
day and night you made an end of me.
14 I cried like a swift or thrush,
I moaned like a mourning dove.
My eyes grew weak as I looked to the heavens.
I am troubled; O Lord, come to my aid!"
15 But what can I say?
He has spoken to me, and he himself has done this.
I will walk humbly all my years
because of this anguish of my soul.
16 Lord, by such things men live;
and my spirit finds life in them too.
You restored me to health
and let me live.
17 Surely it was for my benefit
that I suffered such anguish.
In your love you kept me
from the pit of destruction;
you have put all my sins
behind your back.
18 For the grave cannot praise you,
death cannot sing your praise;
those who go down to the pit
cannot hope for your faithfulness.
19 The living, the living-they praise you,
as I am doing today;
fathers tell their children
about your faithfulness.
20 The LORD will save me,
and we will sing with stringed instruments
all the days of our lives
in the temple of the LORD .
Wednesday, January 05, 2005
Bizarre dream...
haven't written in this blog for quite a few days... truth is, not much has been happening... it's amazing though, jus what tricks the mind can play, or fall victim to, during sleep... was visited by a strange dream last nite... i was surrounded by blackness, in some strange abstract plane with a sense of equilibrium, perhaps there was a surface beneath my feet... my point of view wasn't my own, but a vague sense i was viewing from a third-person perspective, several metres above and behind me, kinda like a computer game... (hard to make sense of it, but i couldn't clearly see myself... perhaps coz i was concentrating on the rest of the scene?!?) there weren't many ppl around, in fact i was probably only aware of the presence of my dad (whom i could see), who was fairly passive during the whole dream, and sally (whom i couldn't see, but simply sense), whose being seemed to be acting entirely in concert with me...
anywayz... strange setting vaguely established, there was a sudden flash of light in the corner of my vision, and a great feeling of trepidation overcame me... despite its being composed of light, my dream-being was certain that the intruder was a demon of some sort, disguised as an angel of light!!! it moved deftly, and silently, its light-spectre imposing and always threatening... each move was made to pull away from the demon, each step full of effort, as if our feet were pushing the ground away to the side, rather than propelling our bodies in any direction... but the effort seemed to be enough to keep the demon at bay... any letting-up, and it would draw nearer... then, my dad's being seemed suddenly powerless, and became increasingly vulnerable, being unable to keep from the closing clutches of the demon... panic!!! not knowing what to do, a simple will of the mind seemed to yank his body out of the demon's grasp... phew!!!
the key to victory lay in knowing that the light-being was a demon... and the name of Jesus Christ was invoked, and the demon shrieked and disappeared from the realm...
at that point, i woke, body covered in a thin film of sweat... i had to rebuke voices in my mind that taunted me, planting seeds of doubt and ill-feeling in my head... couldn't sleep for a while, but in time, God provided comfort for me, and i eventually decided to put on some clothes and grab the early hours of dawn for recuperation... woke again, not quite refreshed, and in a hypersensitive state (things that normally don't cause pain were unusually painful), but returned to normal within a while...
i wonder whether there was any meaning in the dream... i think there are some reminders that can come from some parts of it anywayz... the most worrying bit was the demon in disguise, possibly a reference to the numerous false prophets to come who claim to be the righteous one... or, perhaps, i need not look so far... is there something i'm (we're) not seeing?!? could it be something in my life that pretends to be good, but is actually rooted in evil?!? we are all sinners, after all... and our perceptions and judgment are also flawed... actually, it reminds me of a quotation (from where it came, i can't remember, but i have seen it in someone's signature on gushboard) - "the road to hell is paved with good intentions"... - and it pains me to think that there are probably so many out there who are really good-natured, well-intentioned people by the world's standards, who aren't saved... (and since the tsunami disaster, we have been made so much more acutely aware of how suddenly and unexpectedly the opportunities we've been given can be robbed from us...)
perhaps i am taking God's grace for granted... when i realise that i believe in Jesus Christ and have accepted His gift of life and salvation, and don't go out of my way enough to reach out to other people, i realise i'm being so selfish... yet, i pacify my conscience with excuses like, "i'm not well-informed enough", or "i don't know if this person's ready", or "i'll stuff things up"... i hope that God will work in me to overcome this reluctance...
anywayz... strange setting vaguely established, there was a sudden flash of light in the corner of my vision, and a great feeling of trepidation overcame me... despite its being composed of light, my dream-being was certain that the intruder was a demon of some sort, disguised as an angel of light!!! it moved deftly, and silently, its light-spectre imposing and always threatening... each move was made to pull away from the demon, each step full of effort, as if our feet were pushing the ground away to the side, rather than propelling our bodies in any direction... but the effort seemed to be enough to keep the demon at bay... any letting-up, and it would draw nearer... then, my dad's being seemed suddenly powerless, and became increasingly vulnerable, being unable to keep from the closing clutches of the demon... panic!!! not knowing what to do, a simple will of the mind seemed to yank his body out of the demon's grasp... phew!!!
the key to victory lay in knowing that the light-being was a demon... and the name of Jesus Christ was invoked, and the demon shrieked and disappeared from the realm...
at that point, i woke, body covered in a thin film of sweat... i had to rebuke voices in my mind that taunted me, planting seeds of doubt and ill-feeling in my head... couldn't sleep for a while, but in time, God provided comfort for me, and i eventually decided to put on some clothes and grab the early hours of dawn for recuperation... woke again, not quite refreshed, and in a hypersensitive state (things that normally don't cause pain were unusually painful), but returned to normal within a while...
i wonder whether there was any meaning in the dream... i think there are some reminders that can come from some parts of it anywayz... the most worrying bit was the demon in disguise, possibly a reference to the numerous false prophets to come who claim to be the righteous one... or, perhaps, i need not look so far... is there something i'm (we're) not seeing?!? could it be something in my life that pretends to be good, but is actually rooted in evil?!? we are all sinners, after all... and our perceptions and judgment are also flawed... actually, it reminds me of a quotation (from where it came, i can't remember, but i have seen it in someone's signature on gushboard) - "the road to hell is paved with good intentions"... - and it pains me to think that there are probably so many out there who are really good-natured, well-intentioned people by the world's standards, who aren't saved... (and since the tsunami disaster, we have been made so much more acutely aware of how suddenly and unexpectedly the opportunities we've been given can be robbed from us...)
perhaps i am taking God's grace for granted... when i realise that i believe in Jesus Christ and have accepted His gift of life and salvation, and don't go out of my way enough to reach out to other people, i realise i'm being so selfish... yet, i pacify my conscience with excuses like, "i'm not well-informed enough", or "i don't know if this person's ready", or "i'll stuff things up"... i hope that God will work in me to overcome this reluctance...
Matthew 28:18-20
Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
Sunday, January 02, 2005
Assorted stuff... ;p & some good news
hey all ;p hehe... perhaps i'll start off with the good news bit!!! - boyd & viktoriya are engaged!!! wow, such exciting news from a friend whom i'd kinda lost contact with for a few years... one of my good friends at high school, boyd's always been a natural comedian... hmmmz... i wonder how much of that's due to his half-malay, half-scottish pedigree... ;p anywayz - congrats boyd & vik!!!
anywayz - hehe... ;p today was good... first church for the yr, a nice lil sermon about Abram this morning (see passage below), and how he responded to God's calling - which seemed really crazy... pack ur stuff and go to this land i'll show you... - but he knew God and trusted Him with his life... and his faith has made him father of many nations... - God keeps His promises, and we are chosen among all the people on earth to respond to His calling, trusting Him in everything... ;p it's a scary proposition sometimes... but we are to know that God's plans for us are greater than our own ever could be!!!
thanks and praise to God for everything He has done!!! - and, hoping i can trust better in God for the future... so many times i've doubted, or simply not trusted in the God who loves me so much... shall have no more reason to doubt or not trust!!!
Genesis 12:1-9
anywayz - hehe... ;p today was good... first church for the yr, a nice lil sermon about Abram this morning (see passage below), and how he responded to God's calling - which seemed really crazy... pack ur stuff and go to this land i'll show you... - but he knew God and trusted Him with his life... and his faith has made him father of many nations... - God keeps His promises, and we are chosen among all the people on earth to respond to His calling, trusting Him in everything... ;p it's a scary proposition sometimes... but we are to know that God's plans for us are greater than our own ever could be!!!
thanks and praise to God for everything He has done!!! - and, hoping i can trust better in God for the future... so many times i've doubted, or simply not trusted in the God who loves me so much... shall have no more reason to doubt or not trust!!!
Genesis 12:1-9
The Call of Abram
1 The LORD had said to Abram, "Leave your country, your people and your father's household and go to the land I will show you.
2 "I will make you into a great nation
and I will bless you;
I will make your name great,
and you will be a blessing.
3 I will bless those who bless you,
and whoever curses you I will curse;
and all peoples on earth
will be blessed through you."
4 So Abram left, as the LORD had told him; and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he set out from Haran. 5 He took his wife Sarai, his nephew Lot, all the possessions they had accumulated and the people they had acquired in Haran, and they set out for the land of Canaan, and they arrived there.
6 Abram traveled through the land as far as the site of the great tree of Moreh at Shechem. At that time the Canaanites were in the land. 7 The LORD appeared to Abram and said, "To your offspring I will give this land." So he built an altar there to the LORD , who had appeared to him.
8 From there he went on toward the hills east of Bethel and pitched his tent, with Bethel on the west and Ai on the east. There he built an altar to the LORD and called on the name of the LORD . 9 Then Abram set out and continued toward the Negev.
Friday, December 31, 2004
Beautiful sunset...
's the time for wishing everyone a happy new year!!!
i guess not everything goes according to one's plans, but that's alrite... i'm learning to see things from a greater point of view than my own... was at the beach earlier, running, and witnessed the most gorgeous sunset!!! a pale rose halo was the only remnant of the last sun to be seen this yr, and as it retreated behind the horizon, it left its meek reflection on the clouds above... ready to renew its energy to shine forth once more on a fresh year...
the sun is tireless, patient, and bright as ever!!! so my spirit is reminded to forget its current troubles and to march on, knowing that it partakes in greater things than these petty struggles...
anywayz, my run... - i got to see a firework go off!!! jus one firework... ;p but yah... haha... - anywayz, when i came to the top of a cliff (about 10km into my run and about 1.5L of fluid lost by this time, i'd guess) - and realisations about my recent silliness and strangeness began to set in... i'm beginning to recognise those things within me that make things so difficult... my own shortcomings that i'm so unwilling to accept at times... stubbornness, unwillingness to surrender, pride, jealousy, impatience, rudeness etc... - these things are symptoms of a fallen soul... but at least i'm improving in some way, i'm learning to recognise and describe these things in me... - it's a bit like medicine, half the battle is to be able to describe adequately the problem and its context... so, sets forth the tasks for the coming year (resolutions, as many like to call them) - to renew my commitment to Christ, to continue following Christ in the paths of righteousness (going some way to remedying those problems inherent in my sinful nature), to love God, to bear the cross and love those i am called to love (not only those who love me), to study hard and do well in my final year, to improve my relationship with my parents...
some reflections on a year gone by - imho, the best yr of my life so far - grown so much in my walk with God (tho, there's an ever increasing awareness of how much more God has in store for all of us!!!), met so many awesome ppl - including meeting the love of my life ;p , strengthened several of my close friendships, started going to sscoc, witnessed so many awesome things in medicine (from births to cochlear implants), witnessed some tragedies too... i don't think i've ever upset my parents this much b4 either... but the tsunami disaster sure puts a lot of my troubles into perspective...
so much has happened this year... yet, in some ways, so much has stayed the same... i am still here, in my little cocoon, watching God's amazing creation from an amazing vantage point... and i'll still be here in a year's time, and hopefully for many more to come!!!
anywayz - i guess, here i am in a place nowhere exciting by most ppl'z standards, in front of my computer at home on new year's eve!!! but i'm in the midst of God's exciting creation, and nobody can take that away from me ;p - i suppose i'm resigned to a night of quietude... retreat into my cocoon and spend the turn of the year in a somewhat strangely sober mid-summer's hibernation, to patiently await my deliverance... ;p
happy new year!!!
dave
i guess not everything goes according to one's plans, but that's alrite... i'm learning to see things from a greater point of view than my own... was at the beach earlier, running, and witnessed the most gorgeous sunset!!! a pale rose halo was the only remnant of the last sun to be seen this yr, and as it retreated behind the horizon, it left its meek reflection on the clouds above... ready to renew its energy to shine forth once more on a fresh year...
the sun is tireless, patient, and bright as ever!!! so my spirit is reminded to forget its current troubles and to march on, knowing that it partakes in greater things than these petty struggles...
anywayz, my run... - i got to see a firework go off!!! jus one firework... ;p but yah... haha... - anywayz, when i came to the top of a cliff (about 10km into my run and about 1.5L of fluid lost by this time, i'd guess) - and realisations about my recent silliness and strangeness began to set in... i'm beginning to recognise those things within me that make things so difficult... my own shortcomings that i'm so unwilling to accept at times... stubbornness, unwillingness to surrender, pride, jealousy, impatience, rudeness etc... - these things are symptoms of a fallen soul... but at least i'm improving in some way, i'm learning to recognise and describe these things in me... - it's a bit like medicine, half the battle is to be able to describe adequately the problem and its context... so, sets forth the tasks for the coming year (resolutions, as many like to call them) - to renew my commitment to Christ, to continue following Christ in the paths of righteousness (going some way to remedying those problems inherent in my sinful nature), to love God, to bear the cross and love those i am called to love (not only those who love me), to study hard and do well in my final year, to improve my relationship with my parents...
some reflections on a year gone by - imho, the best yr of my life so far - grown so much in my walk with God (tho, there's an ever increasing awareness of how much more God has in store for all of us!!!), met so many awesome ppl - including meeting the love of my life ;p , strengthened several of my close friendships, started going to sscoc, witnessed so many awesome things in medicine (from births to cochlear implants), witnessed some tragedies too... i don't think i've ever upset my parents this much b4 either... but the tsunami disaster sure puts a lot of my troubles into perspective...
so much has happened this year... yet, in some ways, so much has stayed the same... i am still here, in my little cocoon, watching God's amazing creation from an amazing vantage point... and i'll still be here in a year's time, and hopefully for many more to come!!!
anywayz - i guess, here i am in a place nowhere exciting by most ppl'z standards, in front of my computer at home on new year's eve!!! but i'm in the midst of God's exciting creation, and nobody can take that away from me ;p - i suppose i'm resigned to a night of quietude... retreat into my cocoon and spend the turn of the year in a somewhat strangely sober mid-summer's hibernation, to patiently await my deliverance... ;p
happy new year!!!
dave
Psalm 130
1 Out of the depths I cry to you, O LORD ;
2 O Lord, hear my voice.
Let your ears be attentive
to my cry for mercy.
3 If you, O LORD , kept a record of sins,
O Lord, who could stand?
4 But with you there is forgiveness;
therefore you are feared.
5 I wait for the LORD , my soul waits,
and in his word I put my hope.
6 My soul waits for the Lord
more than watchmen wait for the morning,
more than watchmen wait for the morning.
7 O Israel, put your hope in the LORD ,
for with the LORD is unfailing love
and with him is full redemption.
8 He himself will redeem Israel
from all their sins.
Wednesday, December 29, 2004
i can't eat any more!!!
argh, so full ;p had lunch @ king's buffet restaurant in crown today... hmmmz... lots 2 eat, nice food, but too much... ;p no dinner 4 me!!!
anywayz... jus a short blog entry...
60,000 ppl so far in tsunami disaster... ahce was devastated, in particular... such an enormous toll, and little reason to speak of... nevertheless, i trust that in all of this there will be an ultimate justice prevailing at the hands of our God (whose power it is to give life, and take life)...
thanks to God that my parents are somewhat conciliatory now, and a bit quieter (and less inclined to invade my privacy) - even if not really understanding... heaps of thx 2 sally 4 her immense love and support thru everything... ;p and to yi-ning for her advice and fellowship... and to everyone else who has had to bear with my complaints and whinging... time will be a great healer, and i ought to make every effort to learn patience thru whatever circumstances i'm faced with... for God gives us the strength to get thru everything...
anywayz - let's pray for those who really need our prayers, especially those affected by the global disaster... and mayhaps some of us will find it in us to follow yi-ning's shining example of donation to their effort... ;p thx yi-ning!!!
cheers,
dave
anywayz... jus a short blog entry...
60,000 ppl so far in tsunami disaster... ahce was devastated, in particular... such an enormous toll, and little reason to speak of... nevertheless, i trust that in all of this there will be an ultimate justice prevailing at the hands of our God (whose power it is to give life, and take life)...
thanks to God that my parents are somewhat conciliatory now, and a bit quieter (and less inclined to invade my privacy) - even if not really understanding... heaps of thx 2 sally 4 her immense love and support thru everything... ;p and to yi-ning for her advice and fellowship... and to everyone else who has had to bear with my complaints and whinging... time will be a great healer, and i ought to make every effort to learn patience thru whatever circumstances i'm faced with... for God gives us the strength to get thru everything...
anywayz - let's pray for those who really need our prayers, especially those affected by the global disaster... and mayhaps some of us will find it in us to follow yi-ning's shining example of donation to their effort... ;p thx yi-ning!!!
cheers,
dave
Monday, December 27, 2004
Earthquake tragedy yesterday...
i have to say, was a terrible tragedy yesterday that happened with the indonesian earthquake & tsunami disaster... at least 22,000 souls cut off so far from their earthly existence... i cannot presume to understand why such a thing would happen, but it's mind-blowing, the fact that, considering my recent fights and struggle, my problems are nothing compared with what those affected by the earthquake are now having to endure... which are, in turn, again nothing compared with what God went thru for our sake about 2 millenia ago...
;p
praise God that he gave us all life!!! and praise God that he has given us the opportunity of salvation through his son, not only salvation, but the privilege to be called his children!!! i am so lucky and so blessed to be in my situation, and i should not feel so resentful...
found an encouraging verse today... let it be a reminder to us all ;p
;p
praise God that he gave us all life!!! and praise God that he has given us the opportunity of salvation through his son, not only salvation, but the privilege to be called his children!!! i am so lucky and so blessed to be in my situation, and i should not feel so resentful...
found an encouraging verse today... let it be a reminder to us all ;p
"Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all
kinds of evil against you because of me." - Matthew 5:11
Sunday, December 26, 2004
Should i stay, or should i go?!?
post-xmas grumpiness... well, more like, difficulties with my parents... it really hurts to see how much they are disappointed in me... but, like i said once, i can't listen to them... they decide to make unreasonable demands on me and try to force me to give up anything that carries any meaning for me... impossible... oh well... i shall try not to complain excessively...
found some comfort in a few passages i read today... reassurance that justice will ultimately come about (psalm 62), that we should rejoice in our sufferings for Christ... the knowledge that tensions within the family are to be expected in this world (matthew 10), and the calling to love our enemies all the same (matthew 5)...
u mite wonder, would i be overreacting to call my parents my "enemies"?!? i don't think so... a lot of the stuff they say to me lately places them firmly in the camp of my enemies (and i in the camp of theirs)... it's made me think long and seriously about moving out... i really considered relocating myself to a place that's closer to city, closer to friends, and away from the exasperation that i find is my constant companion whenever i'm in my parents' company... no amount of domestic convenience outweighs the demoralisation they hurl at me day after day...
nevertheless - in matthew 5, we are called to walk that extra mile with those who ask us to, reluctant tho we may be... and to love our enemies... does this speak to me?!? perhaps... maybe it's telling me that i should stay at home and bear it... the power of Jesus Christ shall keep me alive and able to withstand everything that comes my way... in that i trust... and hoping that i may only be strengthened thru endurance...
“Whoever acknowledges me before men, I will also acknowledge him before my
Father in heaven. But whoever disowns me before men, I will disown him before my Father in heaven.
“Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not
come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to turn ‘a man against his
father, a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her
mother-in-law – a man's enemies will be the members of his own
household.’
“Anyone who loves his father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves his son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; and anyone who does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me.
Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will
find it. - Matthew 10:32-39
Friday, December 24, 2004
the Lord's b'day 2moro!!!
what a joyous time, celebrating Jesus' arrival on earth tomorrow!!! its significance still baffles me... how a mere human mind can comprehend the salvation of the world's inhabitants thru generations, thru millenia, it's truly mind-blowing... the purity of such love, such grace, and the grandness of God's promises to us, given to us thru Jesus, it's simply amazing and awesome...
something sal talked with me about last nite tho, i find a timely reminder at times like this... perhaps it's got something to do with the purpose for the recent difficult struggles at home, but it's the simple matter of responding in faith to what God has done for us... often, i get so caught up with the love God has lavished upon us, and forget to act upon his commands... if we are to love God, we are to obey him...
it's true, if i am to call myself a child of God, then i am also to live free of sin (1 John 3)... we are called to struggle with sin (e.g. Romans 7), to repent and beg for forgiveness whenever we are steeped in sin... by God's grace, we know we are forgiven, but it doesn't mean that i can continue in my sinful ways... - i still live in sin, i know it, because it's in my selfish thoughts, my impatience, in my rudeness, in my pride, in my envy and jealousy... i'm too far steeped in these things to consider myself anywhere near free of sin, and to move in the right direction, i need every bit of strength God will give me...
this xmas - i resolve to really try and dwell upon God in my thoughts, surrender to His lead, and submit to His will... when we come to more fully comprehend God's character in awesome wonder, then the response to live without sin becomes far more natural... it's never going to be an easy thing... ;p but God's truth will set us free!!!
love-in-Christ,
dave
something sal talked with me about last nite tho, i find a timely reminder at times like this... perhaps it's got something to do with the purpose for the recent difficult struggles at home, but it's the simple matter of responding in faith to what God has done for us... often, i get so caught up with the love God has lavished upon us, and forget to act upon his commands... if we are to love God, we are to obey him...
it's true, if i am to call myself a child of God, then i am also to live free of sin (1 John 3)... we are called to struggle with sin (e.g. Romans 7), to repent and beg for forgiveness whenever we are steeped in sin... by God's grace, we know we are forgiven, but it doesn't mean that i can continue in my sinful ways... - i still live in sin, i know it, because it's in my selfish thoughts, my impatience, in my rudeness, in my pride, in my envy and jealousy... i'm too far steeped in these things to consider myself anywhere near free of sin, and to move in the right direction, i need every bit of strength God will give me...
this xmas - i resolve to really try and dwell upon God in my thoughts, surrender to His lead, and submit to His will... when we come to more fully comprehend God's character in awesome wonder, then the response to live without sin becomes far more natural... it's never going to be an easy thing... ;p but God's truth will set us free!!!
love-in-Christ,
dave
"Dear children, do not let anyone lead you astray. He who does what is
right is righteous, just as he is righteous. He who does what is sinful is of
the devil, because the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the
Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil's work. No one who is born of God
will continue to sin, because God's seed remains in him; he cannot go on
sinning, because he has been born of God. This is how we know who the children
of God are and who the children of the devil are: Anyone who does not do what is
right is not a child of God; nor is anyone who does not love his brother."
- 1 John 3:7-10
Monday, December 20, 2004
argh...
hi all, i finally got my results... a h3... quite disappointing actually, well beneath what i should have got... am very thankful to God tho, that my results are probably far higher than i deserved, and i'm quite confident that it's not terrible enough to affect my scholarship!!! praise God!!! ;p
but i'm really sorry to all those ppl (especially my parents) to whom i've caused so much disappointment... it's my own fault that i haven't worked as efficiently or in as targeted a manner as i should have, in order to learn for my exams properly... i think i can be blamed for not having taken full advantage of the sample question papers that they supplied to write out model answers for me to recall and put on the page in the exam!!! i suppose i have lots of complaints about the way the assessment of this block has been carried out, but i should not use that, in any way, as an excuse for my hopeless, appalling results that reflect my hopeless, appalling effort...
now, what's happened - my parents, being the concerned, compassionate ppl they are, have begun to "advise" me, belittle me, tell me i don't understand anything, give me accusatory looks... i know i have disappointed them terribly!!! but i should see things from their point of view - they've put so much effort and resources into bringing me up, and now i go and screw up this set of exams... unfaithful child, i am... disobedient, rebellious child who doesn't know any better than to sate his own selfish desires... worse still, i spend all my time on misplaced priorities... i.e. anything apart from eating, sleeping and studying... i should stop spending any time reading anything other than medical books, looking at anything other than anatomy atlases, writing anything other than model answers for exams, going out to anything other than lectures... give up anything to do with religion, give up all my friends... give up everything i care about, basically... and my parents know best, and i have to grow up!!!
- yes, i am a child, who needs to grow up... i trust that God will help me do exactly that... i pray that, through what looks like it'll be a long year or more of struggles with my parents ahead (for whom i pray, that they will come to understand me better, and more importantly, that they come to know the Lord), i will be strengthened, and that i will, by God's spirit, mature into a more holy, diligent, knowledgable student... i cannot do any of these things on my own...
apologies also go to God, whose grace has allowed me to petition to Him for peace... nothing has changed, i still fall so far short of the standards we are called to aspire to and live for, Jesus... God's peace has, so far, allowed me to control myself and keep most of my temper under a lid, thanks be to God!!! and thanks to God also, that we celebrate Jesus' birth in a few days' time, a reminder of the new life, the new hope given to us for the future!!! we have every reason to rejoice!!!
also, wishing to thank u, my friends, for all your support, confidence and encouragement... it is u who help me to experience God daily, and i hold hope for a continuing, strengthening relationship with all of u as time goes on!!! - there is no way i would ever, ever, give up the fellowship, friendship, enjoyment and understanding that u have shared with me!!!
in times of difficulty, i like to remember this, from Hebrews 13:5-6
ps... - today's odb is so uplifting!!! God will bring us through all our trials... there is no question about that!!!
but i'm really sorry to all those ppl (especially my parents) to whom i've caused so much disappointment... it's my own fault that i haven't worked as efficiently or in as targeted a manner as i should have, in order to learn for my exams properly... i think i can be blamed for not having taken full advantage of the sample question papers that they supplied to write out model answers for me to recall and put on the page in the exam!!! i suppose i have lots of complaints about the way the assessment of this block has been carried out, but i should not use that, in any way, as an excuse for my hopeless, appalling results that reflect my hopeless, appalling effort...
now, what's happened - my parents, being the concerned, compassionate ppl they are, have begun to "advise" me, belittle me, tell me i don't understand anything, give me accusatory looks... i know i have disappointed them terribly!!! but i should see things from their point of view - they've put so much effort and resources into bringing me up, and now i go and screw up this set of exams... unfaithful child, i am... disobedient, rebellious child who doesn't know any better than to sate his own selfish desires... worse still, i spend all my time on misplaced priorities... i.e. anything apart from eating, sleeping and studying... i should stop spending any time reading anything other than medical books, looking at anything other than anatomy atlases, writing anything other than model answers for exams, going out to anything other than lectures... give up anything to do with religion, give up all my friends... give up everything i care about, basically... and my parents know best, and i have to grow up!!!
- yes, i am a child, who needs to grow up... i trust that God will help me do exactly that... i pray that, through what looks like it'll be a long year or more of struggles with my parents ahead (for whom i pray, that they will come to understand me better, and more importantly, that they come to know the Lord), i will be strengthened, and that i will, by God's spirit, mature into a more holy, diligent, knowledgable student... i cannot do any of these things on my own...
apologies also go to God, whose grace has allowed me to petition to Him for peace... nothing has changed, i still fall so far short of the standards we are called to aspire to and live for, Jesus... God's peace has, so far, allowed me to control myself and keep most of my temper under a lid, thanks be to God!!! and thanks to God also, that we celebrate Jesus' birth in a few days' time, a reminder of the new life, the new hope given to us for the future!!! we have every reason to rejoice!!!
also, wishing to thank u, my friends, for all your support, confidence and encouragement... it is u who help me to experience God daily, and i hold hope for a continuing, strengthening relationship with all of u as time goes on!!! - there is no way i would ever, ever, give up the fellowship, friendship, enjoyment and understanding that u have shared with me!!!
in times of difficulty, i like to remember this, from Hebrews 13:5-6
... God has said, “Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.” So we sayGod, be my guide... set my ways straight... i am not worthy to be called your child, but through Jesus, we can call you Father... so, heavenly Father, perfect love, thank you for everything, for life, for hope... i have faith that You will take care of everything... i shall march forward in confidence and face the struggles as You would have me do... and, through Your triumphs, may Your glory shine brightly before the world!!! in Jesus' most precious name i pray, amen...
with confidence, “The Lord is my helper; I will not be afraid. What can man
do to me?”
ps... - today's odb is so uplifting!!! God will bring us through all our trials... there is no question about that!!!
Sunday, December 19, 2004
To God be the Glory!!!
hi all u dear friends!!! such a wonderful happiness it is to be at peace with everything, and to know God, and to feel His closeness!!! sundays are always so uplifting... today's sermon revolved around the passage in Luke 2 that speaks of the angels that descended to bring the awesome news about Jesus' birth... we also had dedications of some young children in church to the Lord today!!! ahh, lil babies can be so cute!!! to know that Jesus once took the form of a child, it's such a beautiful image... and to realise that shepherds were the first to bear witness to the great news, we are reminded of God's impartiality and amazing love given to each of us, irrespective of how we measure up against the world's standards...
ah yes, the world... - God's amazing creation... yet some things can still be infuriating!!! i guess i'm referring to worldly attitudes that seem so strongly prevalent and pervasive, yet they go against everything that i believe!!! - hmmmz... i finally get over the fact that i sux at everything (well, most things anywayz... - especially those things that require a brain...) but there's still stuff i can find to complain about...
i can't believe some of the things my parents say to me lately... - well, i can believe it... i jus can't listen to them... it's so hard to honour my parents (as God calls us to do) when they seem to speak out against the things i hold dearest in my life... similar to what maxine was talking about in her blog, society's attitudes to relationships tend to be so selfish, so caught up in consumerist culture (e.g. relationships for the moment) and driven by lust and convenience... they seem to forget the truths about what relationships are meant to be about: unconditional love fashioned after God's own extraordinary love for us, rejoicing, commitment, sacrifice, and giving, all for the glory of our heavenly Father... - well, perhaps that's one reason they don't really understand... they aren't followers of Jesus Christ... i do need to keep praying for them, and unfortunately, i haven't been great at remembering that lately!!!
(...end rant...)
yah, the life of a follower of Christ is not without hardship... but we are called to bear, to endure, to resist temptation and every kind of evil - for God, as our Father, uses the difficulties in our lives, our pain, our anguish, to transform us... - and we may rejoice more in this, and to God be the glory!!! this passage is really helpful, from Hebrews 12:7-11...
anywayz... ;p finally, to pray for sally's operation tomorrow morning, that all will go well, and that she may recover to full health afterwards, pain-free, in a short time!!! - God be with her through everything ;p
agape,
dave
ps... thx kolin, yn, sal for comments!!! kolin - will be happy to discuss 7d universe some other time, tho i won't be very good at it anymore, since i don't believe in it... similarly with other cool models like parallel universe, rebound universe, subjective-reality universe, self-reflective-reality universe etc (disclaimer - these are mostly my own names for these concepts, or adaptations thereof, so aren't really proper scientific models - no string theory and stuff either ;p)... but they're all fun... yn & sal - thx also for ur encouragement!!! always so insightful and able to offer advice and clarification with perspective... God works so strongly in both of u!!! and maxine, thx for ur blog too - encouraged to read about ur journey/thoughts with Christ!!!
ah yes, the world... - God's amazing creation... yet some things can still be infuriating!!! i guess i'm referring to worldly attitudes that seem so strongly prevalent and pervasive, yet they go against everything that i believe!!! - hmmmz... i finally get over the fact that i sux at everything (well, most things anywayz... - especially those things that require a brain...) but there's still stuff i can find to complain about...
i can't believe some of the things my parents say to me lately... - well, i can believe it... i jus can't listen to them... it's so hard to honour my parents (as God calls us to do) when they seem to speak out against the things i hold dearest in my life... similar to what maxine was talking about in her blog, society's attitudes to relationships tend to be so selfish, so caught up in consumerist culture (e.g. relationships for the moment) and driven by lust and convenience... they seem to forget the truths about what relationships are meant to be about: unconditional love fashioned after God's own extraordinary love for us, rejoicing, commitment, sacrifice, and giving, all for the glory of our heavenly Father... - well, perhaps that's one reason they don't really understand... they aren't followers of Jesus Christ... i do need to keep praying for them, and unfortunately, i haven't been great at remembering that lately!!!
(...end rant...)
yah, the life of a follower of Christ is not without hardship... but we are called to bear, to endure, to resist temptation and every kind of evil - for God, as our Father, uses the difficulties in our lives, our pain, our anguish, to transform us... - and we may rejoice more in this, and to God be the glory!!! this passage is really helpful, from Hebrews 12:7-11...
"Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as sons. For what son is not
disciplined by his father? If you are not disciplined (and everyone undergoes
discipline), then you are illegitimate children and not true sons. Moreover, we
have all had human fathers who disciplined us and we respected them for it. How
much more should we submit to the Father of our spirits and live! Our fathers
disciplined us for a little while as they thought best; but God disciplines us
for our good, that we may share in his holiness. No discipline seems pleasant at
the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness
and peace for those who have been trained by it."
anywayz... ;p finally, to pray for sally's operation tomorrow morning, that all will go well, and that she may recover to full health afterwards, pain-free, in a short time!!! - God be with her through everything ;p
agape,
dave
ps... thx kolin, yn, sal for comments!!! kolin - will be happy to discuss 7d universe some other time, tho i won't be very good at it anymore, since i don't believe in it... similarly with other cool models like parallel universe, rebound universe, subjective-reality universe, self-reflective-reality universe etc (disclaimer - these are mostly my own names for these concepts, or adaptations thereof, so aren't really proper scientific models - no string theory and stuff either ;p)... but they're all fun... yn & sal - thx also for ur encouragement!!! always so insightful and able to offer advice and clarification with perspective... God works so strongly in both of u!!! and maxine, thx for ur blog too - encouraged to read about ur journey/thoughts with Christ!!!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
