People like to ask me, why do I do what I do?
Why do I choose a life that has "no life."
The feeling I get whenever people ask me that is somewhat sour-sweet.
But believe me, it's nothing like our all-time favourite sweet and sour pork side dish.

Good question!
Because it's a question I continue to mull over once in awhile.

I do know what my commitments are costing me.
Ofcourse I do, cos it hurts.
I feel the pinch when I stay up late to finish up my duties,
I feel the pinch when my average waking time this holiday is 7.30am,
I feel the pinch when I have to miss family dinners and only half-enjoy them even when I'm there.
I feel the pinch when I spend the first few hours of Christmas doing work, and singing carols alone to fill up the silence of blissfully sleeping people.

One day as I was snoozing on my favourite pool-ball bean bag,
it dawned upon me, how rare, and therefore precious such moments have become to me.
And I realise they used to be a taken-for-granted thing.
It felt like I had been drinking bitter tea for so long, a sip of water tasted like sweet honey to me.
School used to end at 1.35pm for me,
I'd go home and TV my entire afternoon away.
Now, that kind of lifestyle seems to belong to someone else from another planet altogether.

I still feel the unexplained pang of excitment when I happen to glance at my clock at 1.35pm now and then.
They say humans are creatures of habit, I guess the magic of 1.35pm has been permanently etched into my sub-conciousness.

The actual post- 1.35pm enjoyment however, have long become history.

Why then?
Surely I miss those days?
Why live such a hard life, when life can go easy for a student?
Why have bittergourd and pickles for breakfast when cereal and milo awaits you?
In a strange way, the answer is delicately and vaguely related to the BIGger, more worrying, and increasingly pressing question of all our lives.

What do I want to do with my life?
How do I want to live my life?

Call it growing up,
call it coming to terms with existence.
I call it the inevitable question of life, that is incidentally the pivotal question that decides your life altogether!
And these questions have been bugging me for awhile now - at first a gentle knock on my door, but gradually turning into loud and rude raps that are harder to ignore.

I guess I'm just looking for myself.
That makes me lost. Nah, I prefer to call it "looking for the me," so that's what we'll call it.

My answer to the question today may apply only to the Yi Ling of today,
since she realises the world is a very fluid place.
So for the here and now, the belief is in a spirit of excellence.

It's called the "best-foot-forward" policy.
Or the "I will do everything to my utmost" plan.
To put it simply, what kind of a question is that?
How to live my life?
Is that a question? What a silly question that is!
Will anyone be fulfilled living a life akin to a half-filled glass of water?
What is anything you do unless the product, born of your hands, is something you can lay claim to in the full confidence that it is indeed the utmost labour and therefore rightful pride of body, mind and spirit?

We are all created for great things.
Beautiful things beyond our wildest imagination.
That is the truth.
Because the word of God tells us that.
There is nothing "maybe," nothing "possibly," about it.
We are all, without exception, fearfully and beautifully made, for great things.
Who else but ourselves, hold this greatness back, trap it within us so that it remains gargling piteously, perhaps never unleashed, perhaps never revealed.
Laying undiscovered by the master himself.

While I live, I want to make my life worth the living.

How sad are our lives if we live for ourselves, and only ourselves.
If our lifes are like sparklers, we are but humble little sticks that occasionally burst into a wondeful display of light and colours at the tickling of a flame.
How sad it is if a sparkler sparkles on its own - it's light and colour alone in the darkness, it's chuckle of cackling sparks singing alone in the silence.
That's how our lifes shall be if we live for ourselves and ourselves alone. Each man a lonesome little sparkler.
Wouldn't it be that much more magical if one sparkler would give the "kiss of life" to surrounding sparklers so that they can all leapt up in a joyful chorus of light and colour and life?
How beautiful fireworks are, and aren't fireworks simply sparklers in coordination?

So why do I do what I do?
Why do I choose to work on a Research Module?
Why do I choose to slave for orientation 1?
Why do I choose to be the Yi Ling I am today?

Because I love life.

Because I am excited about the "kiss of life"

Because I realise I live once and only once.

That's all I need to know to get out of bed at 7.30am in the morning,
all I need to know to miss my favourite TV programmes,
and all I need to know to smile about the "no life" that I have.

Our greatest fear is not that we are inadequate,

but that we are powerful beyond measure.

It is our light, not our darkness, that frightens us.

We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant,gorgeous, handsome, talented and fabulous?
Actually, who are you not to be?

You are a child of God.

Your playing small does not serve the world.

There is nothing enlightened about shrinking

so that other people won't feel insecure around you.

We were born to make manifest the glory of God within us.

It is not just in some;

it is in everyone.

And, as we let our own light shine,

we consciously give

other people permission to do the same.

As we are liberated from our fear,

our presence automatically liberates others.

Merry Christmas to you who are created for great things.
Go out there and be the salt and the light of our world!

Shout your fame

Some say you're just a good man
Some say you are kind
Some say ou are in the grave
But I say you're alive

Some say you're just a prophet
Some say you were wise
Some say you were just a man
But I say you are God
You are my God

I will shout your fame to all the earth
I will lift your name on high
And the world will know your greatness
You are my God
I will shout your fame

I know you're the Messiah
You gave your life for me
And I know you're the only way
Jesus you're my God
You are my God

I will shout your fame to all the earth
I will lift your name on high
And the world will know your greatness
You are my God

Jesus I will shout your fame to all the earth
I will lift your name on high
I will show the world your goodness
As I live a life that shouts your fame
As I live a life that shouts your fame

Jesus I decide to live
Live a life that shouts your fame
Shout your fame

Dinner.

We make dinners out of practically every animal
we see in "our" kingdom.
From chickens to crocodiles,
from whales to snakes,
the list goes on.

Ofcourse, we find ourselves on the menu of several animals as well.
Often, these animals find human meat a pricey choice.
What's the price of human meat?
Your life,
the lives of all your kind.
And probably eventual extinction.
Think Tamanian wolves.
Think mosquito.

Ah yes, tigers too.
We love using the tiger to flank our banners and adorned our enblems.
But having them top us in the food chain?
No.
We keep them where they belong- in the zoos and their pretty cubs as presents to other countries.

This NG documentary I saw last friday featured the Man-eating tigers of the Sunderbans.
These are tigers who know not where the boundaries lie,
residing in the stretch of beautiful flooded forest along the bay of Bengal between India and Blangadesh,
they routinely hunt people- 3 hundred human deaths a year.

You go, whoa!
Grab those guns, set those traps!
These insolent beats need to be taught who's boss on our planet.
Such a fate has yet to befall the tigers of Sunderban though,
they have the protection of the forest,
and the shield of the large Sunderban rivers.
So every year, the tigers of Sunderban continue to make prey of the village people.
Men and women, child and even babies
are devoured almost every other day.
This sounds like the story of nian,
but perhaps this was how nature intended it to be - tigers supreme.

Maybe nature made the mistake of giving homo habilis a high IQ.
We now have not fangs and claws, but missiles and H-bombs.
If the tigers allude to nian,
perhaps the people of Sunderban ought to start making tiger costumes and sound drums and cymbals.
Surprisingly, the villagers in Sunderban rather it be this way,
rather the three hundred deaths each year.
Such is simply because the tigers may owe them some lives,
but they owe the tigers their livelihood.

The presence of the Sunderban tigers makes it too dangerous to clear the forests, and so, too dangerous to rob the Sunderban people of life as they know it.
There you have it,
another inter-dependent relationship, but one with an interesting twist.
The Sunderban villagers offer the tigers three hundred lives a year,
in return for keeping their livelihoods.

Perhaps this says something about their fear of other humans,
over their fear of the Sunderban tigers.

And perhaps nature intended it this way,
So that when we look at the tigers of Sunderban,
we dawn upon revelation.

The Servant King

This video really reminds me of why I choose to spend my holiday the way I am now.

So let us learn How to serve,
And in our lives Enthrone Him;
Each other's needs to prefer,

For it is Christ We're serving.

To my dear sister

thank you for the best piece of comfort possible.
thank you for not using a single word, but the best show of love from the heart.
thank you for the tears.
thank you for accompanying me.
thank you for loving me.

I wish I could say something
that could give you a glimpse of the way I feel now.
But my vocabulary fails me.

I did the quiet ones,
and you did the loud ones beside me.

Perhaps one day we may come to understand why these happen.
I love you Yi Hui.

2007 has been a year of lessons.

I think what lerchy* said today really surprised me.
Then again, it wasn't much of a surprise.

It wasn't a surprise because that opinion she expressed is scarcely new.
It had been mine,
and I'd long suspected, it'd belonged to more.

Looking back now, I'm really thankful for her honesty.
Surely those thoughts have long been pacing about in our minds for a very long time.
And surely, more than a handful have struggled with barring them in.
A handful?
Let me try that again.
Afterall, a handful is an awful lot more, when you're talking about a pool of a dozen people.
So most of us were thinking it.

There were the occasional exchange of glances between common victims,
the rare snide remarks,
but all pointed to a single ticking time-bomb.
I suppose we were all just waiting.
Waiting, for the right time.
Or rather, for the time to pass so that the stakes are no longer as high.

So what's my point here?
Here's the perfect case study.
To cut the long story short and serve up the moral of the story in bite-size pieces,
here it is:

Autocracy, rarely, and almost never works in a peer-based system.
More than anything else,
even if it gets things going,
the danger of backslash will hang over everyone's heads like latent heat,
and you'll never truly win the hearts of your people.

Therein lies the reason behind an unnecessarily snafued term
in office.
We'll do well to learn from this mistake.

Incoherent

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Salutations.

Today, I am an impatient man.

It isn't uncanny of my typically ubiquitous mind to stray into the realm of melancholy every once in awhile.
It does intrigue me though, the way I stumbled upon this particular phase and even more curiously, the way I now forage in the canopy of my inner-most desires and contemplations.

I have lived long enough to know that there isn't any magic, really, in the seemingly out-of-this world, amazing and awe-inspiring feats that we have come to enshrine.
I have been told that the "giants" as we call them, are simply lay people who stumbled upon the good fortune of possessing uncommon gumption.
To put it nice, they call it "determination,"
to put it crude, they call it "complete ass-likeness"

It is therapeutic to imagine it that way as I've come to assure my insecurities.
The occasional lapses such as this occurs when doubt rears its ugly head.
It shouldn't come as a surprise though,
the lion in each of us needs a stretch once in a while.

I speak of the beast in us that is hungry to devour as far as his eyes bring him.
And giants happen to be "hard to miss"
If indeed giants are simply strong, sturdy lions who have emerged victorious from their rampage,
then there is hope for the minions down below.

The optimist argues that the very existence of an inner lion
is vindication of primary prerequisites.
The optimist argues on the second tier that where our heart and mind is aligned,
our system will conspire to achieve.
The third tier is appropriately the most powerful stance postulating that we were all created for great things.

So here it is again.
We've come full circle.
The story ends with faith as its answer.

And so I'm reminded.
I have to be patient.

New, blissful and blessed
2-in-1

Today I witnessed Mr Boy’s wedding ceremony.
It wasn’t an especially grand affair, but the church service was brilliant, the ambiance pleasant and warm, the food impressive and the strong presence of genuine love heart-warming.

The prayer and praise session was especially gratifying, because I was painfully aware that many of my classmates around me were experiencing their very first.

I vividly remember my very first prayer and praise service in Uncle Joshua’s church.
No more than a child then, I was greatly intrigued by the whole event.
When I was told during communion that they were drinking “Jesus’ blood” and eating “Jesus’ body,” I remember asking the silliest question “har? So many people drinking His blood, won’t drink finish meh?”
Haha! A relentless spirit of questioning, and an unabashed gumption for blurting out raw, unadulterated thoughts. All the signs of childhood.
There were many questions I had then, and questions are very dangerous things when it comes to getting the right answers that point you to the right direction.
It was by God’s grace that I had the naïve, trusting spirit of a child; to carry the answers I got on blind, innocent faith.

Come to think of it now, it’s nothing short of a miracle that God has kept me going through all the different phases of my walk with Him.
Sometimes I was running, sometimes walking, sometimes crawling, sometimes tumbling, sometimes flying.
This journey has just been so amazing. The most blessed thing that has ever happened to my life.

And it’s like you’ve solved a mega-tough sudoku puzzle, or built a 100-storey house of cards, you just want to shout it to the world, get them to “come see” and come experience for themselves.
I want others, especially those I love and care about, to know the love of Christ!
As the songs were playing, I prayed fervently for the Holy Spirit to descend upon us all, break barriers and melt hearts.
Having been through this very stage of non-believing myself, I guess I can only pray for God to work in others the miracle he’s worked in me.
If I as a child had so many doubts and questions, how much more so the cynical and self-respecting adolescent mind?
The stakes are high, and time is short.
I pray with all my heart that the seed of life has been sown in all our hearts today.


Mr Boy and his new wife’s union ceremony today inspired much joy in all of us.
Joy in witnessing the love, hope and new life in their union.
Yet to all of us, it’s plainly apparent that the blessed union took place way before the moment they took their first kiss.
The devotion and love they have for each other is apparent in the very way they speak and act. And that is the mark of genuine and blessed love. It is with much excitement that I pray for wonderful things to come out of it.

Dear God, please bless this union between Mr Boy and his wife.
They have allowed a glimpse of your grace, glory and love through their conduct, and in so blessing the many lives around them.
May they grow ever stronger as a single unit in you, covering each other’s weaknesses and amplifying each other’s strengths. May they continue to touch and change the lives of the people you put in their lives,
and their union become a living testimony to your amazing love. Amen.


I wouldn’t say it’s Mr Boy’s big day,
I believe it’s just the beginning.

Do you believe
we've got a picture perfect plan?
'Cos we've got you fooled,
we only do the best we can.
And sometimes we make it,
and sometimes we fake it.
But we get one step closer reaching every day.
And we'll figure it out on the way.

-Lizzie Mcguire Theme song

What angela said really got me thinking.
What do I really want to do in life?
Where am I going?

Time flies past me.
Each and every second whizzes by like a winged horse
Only and unless I harness them all
Can I get them into a concerted effort,
and forge a meaningful purpose in my life.

Life's endless possibilities enthralls me, captures my imagination.
Yet it is this mirade of possibilities that confuses me.
The more I know,
the less I am sure of.
The more I think
the less I know!

What do I want to do with my life?
The dimension of contemplation is littered with even more perplexing questions.
How do I marry different, seemingly incommensurable aspirations I have?
How do I know if I'm up to it?
How do I decide what, where, when,

how?

They say: think! What do you really want?
but then I think I don't really know.

They say: listen to your heart!
but it's not a monologue my heart's in, but a constant dialogue between the heart and the mind.

I guess everyone else must be struggling with questions like these the way I’m struggling with mine.
And I have extracted nothing out of my struggles other than the revelation that the reason for my intense struggle, the reason for all our struggle, is the fact that we only have one shot at this.
1 Life.
1 Try.
No correction tape.

Facts are dead things,
Unchangeable and unchangeable as death.

I'll remember Mrs Serene Ng.
You are
the loving mother,
the cherished friend.
The brilliant teacher that I took for granted.
It's good to know that you are now in a better place.
But for all of us who're still here,
we're missing you.

For all of us who are still here.
The future will continue to beckon with all its mysteries.
And we will continue to do battle with life's constant question of
"what next?"

Do you believe,

we've got a picture-perfect plan?