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Tuesday, January 29, 2008

In Christ Alone..

I received a miss call this afternoon while I was away from my desk, together with an sms that did not bring very good news. Beeks contacted me to say that our JC classmate, Su, had passed away last night in a car accident. I was momentarily struck for a moment to let it all sink in before I asked the typical questions of what happened. It seems the accident was reported on the ST website but asiaone.com didn't appear to have any news.

On the bus ride home, I thought about my JC days, all the fun times we had together as a class, the stress and painful times we spent together that only sought to bring our class closer...and I am once again reminded about the brevity of life on this planet. The last wake I attended was in Dec and it was one of the most very heart wrenching wake I've ever been to and I told myself there and then that I'm going to live this life in a much better fashion. However, when Jan 2nd came and all the crazy buzz of work dawned upon me, I guess I lost sight of that vision I had for myself at the end of last year.

Maybe Su's passing is a timely reminder once again that my life here is only momentarily and indeed, In Christ Alone, my hope is found, He is my light, my strength, my song.

May God grant me wisdom and strength to continue pressing on..to live my best life here on Earth, to appreciate my family and close friends, to show them how much they mean to me..until He calls me home.

Sunday, January 20, 2008

Weekend is here!

I almost forgot I had a blog this week as work has been piling up and while I labour tirelessly to clear outstanding work, blogging is really not on my list of priorities. I'm glad I survived another week since Jan the 2nd and I just need to hang on for 2 more weeks till Chinese New Year .

On a happier note, on friday I had lunch at Toa Payoh Lor 4. We kind of have this thing for the food centre there, even though it's quite old and the variety of food is limited. The dessert stall owner knows us pretty well and can even remember the stuff we usually order. Thereafter, I decided to go to Far East, and kept deliberating if I should (re)cutting my hair as I thought the first one wasn't that great and did not turn out entirely the way I wanted it to. After alighting from Orchard MRT, I headed to Far East and wondered around, still pondering if I should do a second cut. Then I decided to just go for it and I must say, I'm pretty happy with the results. Rachel really did a good job..and I think I'm going to make Far East my next permenant place for cutting my hair. The salons there are really quite good and I think they really know what they're doing (I borrow this line from H-the the expert in hair styles). Met V and Ed for dinner at Great World that night, we went to Bangkok Jam which served quite nice Thai food, not forgetting that Ed had 50% off the ala carte menu-guess that made the dinner even sweeter and better :)

Went to Chinatown yesterday with the intention of walking around before heading to Spizza @ club street for dinner. Didn't know that it was the light up ceremony for CNY and it was rather crowded and packed with people. Thank God we were not really affected or inconvenienced by the crowds. Also explored some shops at Ann Siang Hill which I've heard so much of but never really been to check them out. Was quite interesting to go into small shops and see the intricate and exotic things that they have on display while half the time I'm secretly wondering how the shops actually survive in such a quite area that does not seem to attract many customers.

After dinner, we headed for Marina South to the roof top garden at the pier. The scenery there is fantastic and almost breathtaking, complete with benches and a grasspatch on the rooftop for star gazing (i think so!). there's even a mini cafe where u can order drinks and thanks to the cafe, we had soft music playing in the background that completed the whole experience. We agreed to go back again with our full gear some time soon, lie down on the grass to soak in the moonlight and admire the beauty of the skyline at night. We talked for quite a bit, shared about our lives, our half baked plans for the future, our current work life and past relationships. It's always nice to have a friend u can say everything to and feel comfortable even in the midst of silence. And moments of silence are not awkward pauses but are opportunities to just appreciate the scenery and each other even more.

Thank you for a lovely dinner, an even lovelier time at Marina South and for the loveliest company I could wish for.

Sunday, January 6, 2008

First weekend of the year..

I'm more than glad that after the work year started on Wed, the weekend came pretty quickly and I'm sure that all of us need that breather amidst the hustle and bustle of work life. There has been so much work to do since 2nd Jan, not to mention many meetings and changes in work structure for 2008.

On a lighter note, we had fun yesterday at J & L's place while sorting out clothes for our proposed garage sale 2 sundays from now. Some of the gals tried each other's clothes and did mutual swops along the way..each one happily exchanging clothes among ourselves before the real sale. I hope we will be able to sell the rest of the stuff on the actual day!

Then we went to this food centre at Bedok North for dinner and I had this pretty unique bak chor mee that was soup based and a good change from the typical ones that you find in most other hawker centres. And the stingray was good too, although my mouth quickly came on fire after being over zealous in taking in bite after bite without realising I was consuming way too much chilli than my threshold could endure. So I ended up having to suck ice in my mouth to mitigate the burning sensation but it was quite effective in quenching the fire.

Another week of work looms by and I can only hope we will all get through another crazy week...

Thursday, January 3, 2008

Fear, Faith and Foundation

Last Sunday Rev Steven spoke on the passage in Luke where Peter attempts to walk on water and used the 3Fs above to describe how God sometimes builds us up through very difficult moments because he wants us to get to a place where we can trust him completely for our lives. I really liked his sermon because he reminded me of what I've always known in my head-but found it very hard to apply in my life.

I mean, this Christian path I've chosen many years ago has not been an easy journey and I still struggle at many atimes to even try to understand the greatness of God and His plans for my life. Sometimes I feel that God has been too silent in my life and how I long for Him to say a word to me or just be ever so real in my life. But something inside keeps telling me that this faith that I have is REAL and I know that God does exist and has a wonderful plan for my life-even tough I can't see it now. Hanging in there has not been easy for the past few years but I always remember Doc John telling me that the secret to a successful Christian life is to keep hanging in there, no matter what happens.

Lord Jesus, I pray that you will always give me strength and encouragement to keep persevering in my journey with you, even through very difficult moments when I am tempted to throw in the towel, for I know that you can do immeasurably more than I can ever ask or imagine. I also ask you to cover me with your mighty hand for I know it's the safest place I can ever be in. And please help me make Jerimiah 29:13 my daily mantra......

Wednesday, January 2, 2008

A new year ahead!

Been very busy lately with getting ready for the start of a new year and thus haven't been able to update this blog for a while. You know how the start of a new year at work means (more) meetings, (more) changes and more work. Thank God that today, being the first day, went pretty well and there were no major hiccups. We were supposed to have committee meetings at 2pm today but Boss had to rush off for another meeting outside so he condensed our meeting to like 15 mins..which went down very well with all of us cos no one likes having meetings anyway. I went for a hair cut after work today..salon was pretty empty (which is so good!) so there went the long hair i kept for 4 years..and now it's a short bob. I shall not say too much about it..let's just see everyone's reaction tomorrow at work- guess that will be the true litmus test :)