Sunday, 25 May 2008

Don't forget to smile!

I'd like to introduce you to a luverly couple from UK, but I don't happen to have a photo of them with me right now. *regrets* Anyways, their names are Keith and Ruth Holt.
Something happened recently, which made me think about them. I remember back in my Uni days in Birmingham, this wonderful couple would welcome us foreign students into their home and feed us with gorgeous, fantastical tasting, and deliciously good homemade food. Being the poor (relatively... we're talking British pounds k?!!), and perpetually hungry (also admittedly greedy) Chinese (Malaysian... and Singaporean too!) students that we were, we were deathly grateful to them for their hospitality. I miss them so.

And no, it wasn't the thought of good food that made me reminisce. No, in fact what I remember most about them was the warmth they radiated from their hearts.... the perpetual smiles on their faces... we always knew we were loved... and they gave us a place we could call home away from home. *Sigh* I miss them so.

Let me get to the part of the something that happened that made me think of both Keith and Ruth. Just the other day, through the exchange of emails with some old school friends, someone commented that I reminded them of the season's American Idol Runner-Upper! That was a shocker. I never heard that said before. Here's a comparison:


That's David Archuletta! I like him!

And that's me! I like him too! hehe...



See a resemblance? If anyone dares say it's the 'sunshiny-ness', I'm gonna smack them on the head with a smelly fish!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Well, my friend explained that she thought we had the same smile!


And that really struck me! I used to smile a lot. Like, really really a lot. So much so that Keith (Aha! Now you see the connection!) called me his favourite smiley person! *Grin* Haha!

Yeah, I know he was just being sweet saying that, but I really really did use to smile a lot. I've forgotten why I stopped though. Must've been some hard knocks of life... I dunno. I just wish I can remember to do that again.


I think we all need to have a favourite smiley person. Better yet, I think we all need to be someone else's favourite smiley person.





Thanks Keith! Even now, you can always put a smile on my face! No wonder I smiled so much around you...

Saturday, 24 May 2008

Brethren Gathering

Hey! This time, we were taught a song in Hebrew. In fact, we learnt TWO songs!!! Cool!

Well, at least I thought it was cool la...

First song:
"Hihneh matov uma-naim, shevet achim gamyachat."
(and repeat it for three more times). =_=' *aiya, had to start off easy mah...

Translation:
"How good and pleasant it is when brothers live together in unity." (Psalms 133:1)

The second song sounds nicer:
"Lev tahor berali elohim,
Lev tahor berali elohim,
Veruach nachon qadesh bekirbi,
Lev tahor berali elohim."

Translation:
"Create in me a pure heart, O God,
and renew a right spirit within me." (Psalms 51:10)

*Sigh* left me with a nicey-nicey feeling... was thinking of teaching the songs to my church congregation...

until the guys in the dorm kept screaming (really. Quite literally. Sceaming!)(Okla, some of them were) the song over and over again. *groan*

... how good it is, when brothers live together (in peaceful non-screaminess) harmony.

(deviantart)

Friday, 23 May 2008

I hAVe A PiMP personal promoter???!!!

erm... maye that didn't sound so right. I take it back. Sorry.

Actually, my blog has a pimp personal promoter! Haha! Thanks (I think) for the introduction Adino. But sorry, you're not gonna find any hunky topless photos in this blog...


Hmm...


Hmm...


Hmm...


Maybe...


Hmm...


Hmm...


Hmmmm...


NO!


But I WILL show this picture! Brings back some really wonderful memories.



Morning of Adino's wedding. We were the heng tais.

Joh! (Change of subject)

I accidentally deleted my entire Documents folder the other day!!! GRR!!! ARGHHHH!!! STOOOPEEEEEDDDOHHHNIEEE!!!

It's gone! All goneeee!!! All my documents!!! I only meant to delete one folder which had some videos in it... but I was using the touchpad on my laptop and I must have somehow selected the entire Documents folder!!! Arghh!!! Ughh!! PAIN! PAIN!!!

*sigh...* at least I didn't have any unfinished assignments... oh, plus thanks to my brother and also Mun Chung, I managed to recover some of my stuff. Strangely though, it only recovered the old stuff and none of the more recent ones.

*Note to self: No more late night desktop spring cleaning!

Saturday, 17 May 2008

A lesson in Greek

Had a final exam paper on Wednesday.
Topic: Pauline Theology.
I think I died. Twice.
The only reason I'm still alive now must be because of God's resurrection power! Either that or I'm a zombie. Okok, so I'm exaggerating somewhat... but isn't there a blogger's rule book that says you can or something? Oh wait, bloggers don't play by the rules! Haha! Oh pls, oh pls, don't arrest me!!! T_T

So maybe the exam wasn't as tough as I made it out to be, but hey, we had to memorise words in Ancient Greek even!!! Fuiyo! I felt like I was losing my NOUS*, and my SOMA* was all weak after. Oh, my aching KARDIA*! T_T

Okla, enough, enough! If you want to know how the exam went... erm... ask me AFTER I've seen my results. Haha!

*Footnote:
Nous = Mind
Soma = Body
Kardia = Heart (bet you coulda guessed this one if you tried!)
Sarx = Flesh or Sin (Didn't wanna risk using this word and then getting misinterpretation. Can you imagine if I said something like, "Oh, I love the colours of my Sarx"? Err, risky la).

Last thought before I end:
The NIV interprets Matt 26:41 as, "The pneuma (spirit) is willing, but the body is weak."
The TNIV however reads, "The pneuma is willing, but the flesh is weak."
They both carry different meanings. I wanna find out which Greek word it is now.

Monday, 12 May 2008

Help me NAME my new laptop, pls!!

She's almost a month old! How I got her is a wonderful story on its own.

My previous laptop... also a Dell Inspiron (4150)... was already 6 years old. It had served me well, but it was time for a change. It wasn't keeping up with the speed of times. So for months I had been contemplating / looking around / getting opinions... ie. procrastinating.

Old faithful! We have been places together and you have served me well! Kudos to Dell!



One Sunday afternoon, not wanting to wait any longer (I was worried the old one would crash and then all my assignments would be gone!)(Actually, I was just frightened at the idea of having to do them all over again. Lazy mah!), I finally decided on the Dell Inspiron 1420... the truth was, I had fallen in love with the XPS M1330, but my mind kept wandering over to its price tag. *sigh*... nevermind! Gotta be practical.

But the Inspiron still wasn't all that cheap. At the back of mind, I was calculating and budgeting on how to live on as little as possible for the rest of the month... hmm, last Friday at cellgroup, a Bible verse was brought up. Psalm 37:4 reads: Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart. But in class, I had learnt that Psalms are poetry, and you can't always take poems literally.


Fast forward back to Sunday, it was evening time and I had just reached home. My mind was still on the laptop when suddenly, my dad said to me, "My laptop died. Why don't you get yourself a new one and let me take over yours. I'll sponsor it." My heart skipped.

To cut the story short, he asked me if I had any good laptops in mind and I said yeah, I did. But when I suggested the Inspiron, my brother who was there at the time said that it wasn't very value for money, and that the XPS would be a better buy! Dad agreed. My heart skipped another beat. Oh pooh! Who am I kidding? At this point, my heart was already racing la.

I wanted to shout, laugh, cry, leap all at the same time. I couldn't decide. I was so happy! I was so grateful! Thank you! Thank you! My dad's the greatest! But deeper still, I knew that God was speaking to me. My heavenly father knows my heart and was giving me what I had desired in it. I didn't know whether to laugh or to cry. I was so happy. I was so grateful. Thank you, thank you. My DADS are the greatest.

Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart. Psalm 37:4.

SO, on the 19th of April, after loads of help from both Japheth and Christine (I owe you both some icecream... or was it a McD's meal?) my new laptop finally arrived!









These photos don't do justice! She's alot prettier in real life.

*Sniff* Isn't she a beaut? She turns 1 month old in 7 days! I have yet to name her!!! Please help! These are some already suggested: maxine, melanie, axel, sandy, monique, crystal, angel, isabelle, samantha, annette, hannah, lappy... anymore?

Official FIRST Post: A Blog Revived!

Sort of... more like a brand new blog begun. Heh.

Now I can strike it off my Resolutions List. Finally! And maybe those fellas bugging me about it will get off my case. *tee hee*.

Okla, okla. I was only teasing. I appreciate. I appreciate. Really!

Hey, since this is my very first post on my very new blog, let me start off with the journey of how it all came to being! Wahey! BUT... in order not to bore you to tears (Seriously! Longwinded-ness can make people cry), I'll just write up the summarised version la. Hee.

I was so inspired after reading other people's cool blogs, that I decided I wanted to hop onto the bandwagon! But I knew I kept putting it off because I kept thinking that I didn't have the time. So, to prove it to myself that I was gonna do it, I actually wrote it down on my Resolutions list! (Ok, that's the 2nd time I've mentioned this... pls don't laugh at me bcoz I have a list. They made me do it!!! *points at any random passerby*)

Anyway, a number of people then got excited when they heard about it... it would be another blog to stalk, apparently... so they've been "oh-so-kindly" reminding me. My second hurdle was that my laptop was too old to handle the fancy-schmancies of a blog... but that problem was resolved when I got MY NEW LAPTOP!!! Whoohoo! That's another something I can be blogging about! Yay!

I. heart. my. new. lappy. *happy tears*. Mega thnx Papa, Jap and Christine!

So with new laptop in hand, a commitment to keep, and... did I mention excited friends? Fuiyo! There were none more excited than Leishia and Jap! Not only did these two bug *ahem*... encourage... me to start a blog, but they even specially organised a 'laptop partay' so that they could help me get started!

Excited people anxious to begin.
Helped pick out a name: duhdohnie! Like "The Donny", only not. (I think it's pretty cool, pretty funny at the same time! Funky! Leishia just burst out laughing when she saw it. That's a compliment). But we had to sift through so many first. I liked "nevawouldaguessed" or "whowouldathunk" but they said it was too long and hard to remember. Then they suggested "sunshinedohnie" or "dohniesrainbow" or "I can make you smile" ...
=_=" sweat... and double sweat.

It. sounds. soh. geiH. I don't want... But that somehow led to Leishia suddenly announcing, "I'M HAPPILY GAY!" Big Colgate smile included... until she realised we were in Starbucks on a Saturday night and immediately sunk into the sofa. Wahahaha! Sohhh farnieee! I laughed hard. And Japheth even thought it funny to do an imitation of her...

which meant,

that he,

also declared... "I'M... "

I laughed harder. People were looking. My sides hurt.

Nonono! I don't want sunshinedohnie! Kill me now! Urghhh!!!

Okok. Next, select a layout and background colour. Time to personalise the blog. They even designed a banner for me! Aww... but I suspect they were having more fun than me tho. They wouldn't even let me see it... til it was done. =.='. It's no fun being left out. *sob*

"It's his blog, but we're administrators. Haha!"


"I still think there should be a lil more sunshine."


But more than two hours later, we finally got it set up and everyone was pretty pleased with the end result. And since I hardly designed it, I get to boast about how great my blog looks! HAhaha!

Satisfied people.

Yay! It is done! And so a new blog is born into the cyber world. A happy and memorable birth, a successful and humble beginning in a coffee house, but a healthy and long life, we can only hope. Hehee.

Thanks guys!

I can start bogging now... world wide web, here I come!


Sunday, 11 May 2008

Blog under construction...



I was kinda caught by surprise... didn't realise I had already been linked!!!


I don't even have a first blog post yet! Oh well... at least I'm currently working on one... so check back again in an hour or so... and if I'm not done by then... then... well, what can I say? I'm a nube. (Beginner la... previous dead blogs don't count!)

Patience! Not only a virtue, but a Fruit of the Spirit too!