This was such a joyful weekend I felt like I had to make a post about it. Encouraged. :)

Campus Retreat, Spring 2009


Our awesome log cabin in the woods. They were pure play cabins, so none of those silly heating systems that city folk like. Woke up at 4 am from the sound of my teeth chattering in the bunk.


With Kiara. This girl's morning ritual is...amazing. ;p


Ever seen 274 people gather around and try to play dodgeball? Go Philly! (I, unfortunately, had to sit out due to a minor skiing accident from the previous weekend. But that has to be reserved for another post.)


The Hampton Road sisters! Meeting 34942 new people is on of the things I love about Retreats. There were Michael-Cera-in-Juno types, people with tattoos and multiple piercings, aspiring rappers, sports jocks, goth kids...all sorts of people, but with a commonality amongst them. :) It was amazing to just hang out with all these people and listen to the lessons.


On the road with the resident clown. I don't think I've heard a white boy do such an uncanny impression of a black gospel singer before. The four of us had a crazy time in the car. (Discounting all the times I peaced out after stuffing myself.)

By His grace, all this was possible. I don't know about the others, but I was encouraged. Now it's time to get to the living it out part. :)

Yet another awesome Sunday, Amen.

Was pretty discouraged in the morning, cos I witnessed a caustic little argument between my parents and realized that my father can be a difficult man to be married to. And when I got to church, things were a little frenetic and people were generally irritable. (Mostly due to feeling sick I suppose) But then I heard an absolutely cutting lesson from ZQ, and I'm thankful that there are always people who really give it to be and tell me what I need to hear, although I don't necessarily want to hear it.

ZQ started off by asking if we think God meant to deny certain things from us, by giving us so much, but yet forbid us from eating from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Then he said that as much as God loves us, there are certain things he reserves for Him and only Him to define for us - mainly the prerogative to define our moral framework, to give a truly universal definition of Good and Evil, because we obviously don't know how - as evident from all the wars people are fighting over controversial issues, where each side thinks they are doing the "right" and "good" thing. Then he just said that we are so stubborn in living our lives in our own terms that we don't want to follow God's will for us.

Man. Just what I did NOT want to hear. Since I've been pretty much self-absorbed and neglecting other people. Timely reminder indeed.

Cookies were generally well received, save from a brief moment when I caught someone trying very hard to bite into one. Ahem, since I baked them in different batches, some were unfortunately not up to standard. Hee. Ohwell, there were some good ones from the other batches though! ;p

Then I headed to Ahyi's house for Simin jie's 21st Birthday Celebrations. Woot! Had sooo much fun just catching up with my cousins, cooing and fussing around my newborn nephew, getting advice about stuff, listening to my uncles talk shop and of course, stuffing my face silly. :p On the menu: Ee-fu noodles (good!), Cereal prawns (juicy!), Breaded fish (good!), mango pudding (sweet!) and other stuff. Generally had a good time just letting my hair down, talking about girly stuff (boyfriends, or the lack thereof (but we agreed that we are generally nonplussed about that:)), hair, shopping, traveling, studies, work). I like my extended family (well, most of them anyway...). And Daddy managed to coax Mummy with some very shiny birthday presents. ;p

Ok, back to prepping for tomorrow's presentation :)

Just came back from an awesome Sunday!
Had Bible study with Sen after service, and as usual, Joyce was working her magic. Thst's why I love sitting in studies - getting convicted all over again.

Then I managed to spend time with Van in the evening. Makes me miss the days when she was, errr, more "available". Hee. It's been a while since we just had a sisterly couple of hours together just chatting and catching up. I think I really needed that, so, Amen!

Have resolved to blog more regularly so as to give myself an avenue to reflect, cos I think I tend to be too focused on activities and filling up my time with things to do that I forget about the initial purpose. Plus I may be feeling alot for a moment, but because I don't spend enough time on reflection, the issue just whizzes past and I fail to learn anything from it. And when I look back, I can't remember exactly what happened, what my reactions were and so on.

And also because my linguistic skills are deteriorating. (See, had problems spelling that...)

Anyhoo, just wanted to explicitly remind myself to remain Christ-like in all areas of my life, especially in school and at home, and to really live out a life that is presentable to God.

Things that I NEED to accomplish this month:
-Continue with bible study
-Finish Stanford Research paper
-Blog and reflect regularly
-RAG
-DND
(and all the other things on my Resolution List at the beginning of this year.)

Hm, ok, Reflection of the Day: I think I am a goal-oriented person, who also cares about feelings, which leads me to be arrogant in my frustration at the way meetings are being carried out, whether in school or in church. As to how I am going to respond to this trait. uh. Don't know yet, but I have an inkling of the direction I need to take ;)