=((((((((((((((((((((

the sad face looks like it's got zilliple (one zillion) chins.. uber FAT!!! hahah
arghghghghghhggggghhhhhgggghhhhhhhhhhh........
so siannnnnnn................
it's been nubbad till now but the last paper is just killinngggggg..........
why must wait for so loooonnngggggg......
no more stamina larhh.............
boo.
i need more pressure!!

ok c'mon!

always

I just realized that the word 'always' probably came from 'all ways'... like in all ways.
think it adds a lot of meaning to the word whenever I use it

family

I was watching Singapore Dreaming earlier and it was quite an experience.. I've never watched a movie that felt more real than this before.. it was indeed quite a truthful portrayal of many singaporean lower-middle class families, striving so hard to move up the social and financial ladder. and everything was so familiar. the lifestyle, the people, the mindsets.

there was a lot of hurt going around the family. i thought it was really quite insane.. throughout the time i was watching them, the biggest thing i'd felt was their entrapment. entrapped by expectations, inferiority, deeply rooted hurt, disappointments, and a huge dose of insensitivity. i think many singaporean families are like that because it's not the asian/chinese culture to express affection and love. we hear it so often that it has turned into an accepted justification for the lack of expressed love within families. yet it is not.

and it was too familiar.. the hurtful words, the disappointments, the anger, the frustration, the yelling, the hurt. all swirling viciously under our roof. last weekend, i was talking to my father and i told him he was overworked. but he replied me saying that i may not be able to see it, but he's happy. he doesn't need the overseas holidays, he doesn't need a car or a fancy home, or to eat out at nice restaurants even on an occasional basis. he's happy working because he has my mom for company while he works, and he's happy because i'm in his life and he sees me and hears my voice. i couldn't believe my ears. and i couldn't believe my joy. Just 3 years ago, I would have never ever, even in the most promising moments, dreamt of this family. when i see my dad and mom care for each other, and hear words of tenderness passed between them, I am so sure that God is with us. It is an answered prayer, a prayer that was begged and begged before God through unending tears. I'd just asked Him to keep us together and not to let us part. That was more than I could've asked for. But He'd given so much more, so much so much more. It is a miracle before my own eyes and it is His love for me and my family abundantly expressed and felt.

as i was brought through the family's journey in the movie, i couldn't help wishing so hard that they could have the opportunity to have God in their lives as a strong and everlasting pillar of their home. A God in whom they can rest their financial burdens upon because He is a God who provides tangibly, as we strive as best as we can. A God in whom they can lay their disappointments and fears to rest because He is a God of forgiveness. To have their hearts yearning for the love of God and the love of a family, rather than pride and the material that is immaterial. To have a God in whom they can share a deeply-seated joy.




on a separate note, i saw this picture in an email.


and i realised i can't imagine what it is like waking up wanting to die. and then i realised that actually, you could be in a bed like the little girl's and wake up wanting to die or be in a bed like the starved and homeless boy's and wake up wanting a future. it's all in the heart. yea it's called hope.

Blessed Be Your Name
In the land that is plentiful
Where Your streams of abundance flow
Blessed be Your name

Blessed Be Your name
When I'm found in the desert place
Though I walk through the wilderness
Blessed Be Your name

Every blessing You pour out
I'll turn back to praise
When the darkness closes in, Lord
Still I will say

Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your name
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your glorious name

Blessed be Your name
When the sun's shining down on me
When the world's 'all as it should be'
Blessed be Your name

Blessed be Your name
On the road marked with suffering
Though there's pain in the offering
Blessed be Your name

Every blessing You pour out
I'll turn back to praise
When the darkness closes in, Lord
Still I will say

Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your name
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your glorious name

Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your name
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your glorious name

You give and take away
You give and take away
My heart will choose to say
Lord, blessed be Your name

-by Matt Redman

"'Blessed Be Your Name' stems from the story of our lives," Matt explains. "Both Beth and I had tough upbringings--a lot of different
issues to do with fathers--and over the years we've come to realize that worshiping God is a choice, and the best choice we'll ever make."

"Trust is a beautiful act of worship," Matt says. "It says to God, 'I believe in You--in Your unfailing goodness and greatness--no matter
what season of life I find myself in.'"

I remembered sometime ago while I was struggling to keep afloat in my faith and felt as though i was walking in a vacuum, al encouraged me to pray and to worship even though i barely felt like doing any of those. It means a lot, a lot, when we pray and give praise even though we don't feel like it. Worshiping God is a choice. Believing is a choice.

i think being cynical or jaded is not an indication of maturity, or 'having grown up'.. at all. and it barely places you ahead of the curve.. like the joker in batman thinks he is. in fact, i think it throws you backwards and it's like weed in your garden. being critical of something doesn't instantly place you above what you critique, although it sure does feel like it.

anw on the same note.. i was wondering too why, in people-to-people relations, do we value intelligence so much.. as though it's so important to be smart. or seem smart at least. it has absolutely nothing to do with the depth of a person.

lost and found

" It’s that way with God. He’s there, patiently waiting for us. He assures us, “I did not say . . . , ‘Seek Me in vain’” (Isa. 45:19). Why, then, do we often have trouble finding Him? Probably because we are looking in all the wrong places.

You’ll find Him right where He is supposed to be—in His Word, in prayer, and in the voice of the Holy Spirit who lives within you. The God who says “seek, and you will find” (Matt. 7:7) also promises that “He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him” (Heb. 11:6). So, you can rejoice that God is right where He is supposed to be, and He’s waiting for you right now. "

I was so amazed (to the max) when I opened my internet browser and found this. because this is exactly, exactly, what had happened to me today. I thought I'd lost my most precious treasure.. gone into hiding?..for what felt so, so torturing-ly long. But I was led to the correct lost-and-found counter, and I found it. Really, right there, ready for collection.

(:

the everlasting treasure.

Planet Shakers and Tim Hughes

The Planet Shakers and Tim Hughes concert was really so wonderful. I really didn't know what to expect because this was my first such concert (a christian band with a huge audience), and it was really so, so wonderful and refreshing. it was so spirit-led and i'd never had such an experience before. it was a really wonderful time that i wouldn't want to ever forget. I'd never worshiped in a mega setting before and it's really something to see a sea of people praising and worshiping. like the speaker had said, it was indeed more than just a crowd at a concert enjoying the fantastic music.. there was something more than that. looking back, it was incredible how He could find each individual in the midst of everybody worshiping. i mean, tt's what always happens anw, He finds each of us everyday in the midst of 6 billion people.

The live music was so great. and tim hughes' pieces really touched me a lot. they're intensely beautiful(my favourite's Everything), and hearing them live was a total different encounter from hearing him on my stereo. gosh, i can't imagine the kind of joy it must be to be called to serve and being enabled to serve so passionately and mind-blowingly well.

mercy me!

it's nearing 7am and I've yet to go to rest. I've just finished the first draft of a long paper. I really can't write long papers.. why do people have so much to say anyway? or rather why do we have to say it in such a long winded fashion? the word limit thing is more like a word target.

i've never been this overwhelmed by work before! what a new height. it's insane i can't bear to imagine beyond the next day because I wouldn't be able to breathe. submission datelines, internal datelines, freaking so many of them!! Right now, I'm learning to take every single bit in baby steps and enjoy my work and projects. I'm constantly reminded that God's mercies are new everyday. they're meant to be refreshed each day, which also means they're meant to only last us a day. how am I to survive a whole week on a single day's supply of mercy?

With Him in the reign, we're able to live each moment. fully. isn't that a great blessing

things in hall are really gonna change so much next year. but what's new? things changed so much this year anyway and it was so great. I have no clue what God'll have installed for me in the next academic year.
i must admit though that i'm really sad that many of my close friends aren't staying on any longer.but life goes on and all of us have a purpose wherever we are. more importantly, we're where He wants us to be and nothing can be better than that.

yeap my stomach's growling it's goin to be breakfast time very soon! k i'll nap and wait for food time.

love~

racial minority

I went to litte india today with wanyi and it was kinda weird cos I really felt as though I was a tourist in my own country. some of the advertisements and signboards were only in Tamil. For once, I felt out of place in my own country. haha aptly, i'm doing this in place/out of place social geog reading. I was telling her that we could be doubly marginalized cos we were 1)chinese and 2)female. everybody around us were male and dark-skinned. I can't recall the last time I belonged to the racial minority in a place. I haven't been to Little India in so long it was fun! we had a good time together(: the food we had was disappointing though. I don't know where the good ones are!

I'd just begun exploring the radio function in my mac's itunes. hahah it rocks la. so many different genres of music available streamed from all over the world. really i love it! and they do not have commercials, how nice! I like listening to music I've never heard of ever in my life because it constantly feels as though there's a surprise waiting cos i have absolutely no clue what comes next in the song. ok nvm i dunno how to describe it.

i'm working on my first paper this semester and i feel like a noob all over again haha. God please help me!

and out of the corner of my eyes I spy a little card from Dan and Ani that just flew down from the top of my speakers. it reads:
"So let us come boldly to the throne of our gracious God. There we will receive His mercy and we will find grace to help us when we need it."
Heb. 4:16

love to all~

:D

greatest fear

...you whom I have upheld since you were conceived,
and have carried since your birth.

Even to your old age and gray hairs
I am he, I am he who will sustain you.
I have made you and I will carry you;
I will sustain you and I will rescue you.

-Isaiah 46

It's hard to imagine it from His perspective exactly what I'd been planned for when He made me. Y'know all the things He always says that we're specially made by him in our mothers' wombs.. I feel very honoured to be, but I sometimes (most of the time) can't see what those special purposes He'd in mind are and I can't see what it is that is so special about me that He'd made and is working on. It's very inward looking, but I'm curious to know. Sometimes it is clear how he is working around me but I usually see a blur. anw I just quoted that verse because it reminds me all over again how much a dear we all are to Him as children of God, for Him to have been always carrying us (like a baby?!) It's insane how confidently He says all of the above in Isaiah.

I was reading Utmost and the author wrote this "Our greatest fear is not that we will be damned, but that somehow Jesus Christ will be defeated. Also, our fear is that the very things our Lord stood for— love, justice, forgiveness, and kindness among men— will not win out in the end..."
I think my biggest fear is that He turns out to be unreal, false, nonexistent, and this whole Christian thing a huge lie.
I find it very strange how I can believe so deeply in Him, have a relationship with Him, know the things that have changed in my life obviously by His divine grace, and feel all these insecurities about Him at the same time. Is it human nature or what?