One-day Durian Tour in J.B. on 25 Jul

My PKI colleagues: ZhangYu, Yuko, Alin and Jasmine

Chocolate Shop

Durian and fruits farm

Seafood Restaurant

Praying for my family...

My 1st sister is pregnant with a baby boy. She is scheduled to give birth latest by 4 Nov. I am still finding an English and a Chinese name for my very first nephew. I will travel back to see her in Nov.

My 2nd sister still could not rent a furnished eating shop to start her business. Shop owners do not rent out their furnished shop because they are still doing well in their business. So she is still continuing to look out for a suitable shop through asking people and reading newspaper advertisement.

My dad is taking care of my grandma at home. He still needs financial support to pay for business tax and to maintain the new car.

My mum is working in KL now. She is well. She has three more assignments this year after finishing the present one.

Dear God, please protect my family. Please provide for all their needs. Use me to love and support them.

Loving self is right

The second greatest commandment reads "Love your neighbor as yourself". Jesus seemed to assume loving oneself is so basic that he does not even have to command us to do so. How do we love our neighbor if we do not even know how to take care of ourselves? Therefore, loving oneself is not wrong, it is natural and healthy. More importantly, it is the right thing to do.

To me, loving ourselves is

• Eat healthy food and exercise regularly to maintain our physical health
• Prioritize our life, our resource, and select our activities wisely. There is time for everything, a time to say YES and a time to say NO.
• Purify our minds, hearts and motives to grow our relationship with God
• Don't intentionally sin against God for temporary pleasure. We don't love ourselves enough as we allow temporary things to master us and damage our relationship with our eternal God.
• Feed and enrich our mind with spiritual nourishment, knowledge & understanding
• Don't be unnecessary burdened by things of the world. Cast away our burdens to God and let him do life with us. He would not ask us to do something that his grace can't reach us. Matt 11:28-30
• Don't look down on ourselves and feel low self-esteem. We are all unique and equally loved by God.

Loving God is...

Loving God is...

Choose spending money on oversea mission trip over an oversea holiday
Choose spending money on a brother in need over beers
Choose giving to God over eating an expensive meal
Choose loving people unconditionally when our feelings say otherwise
Choose respecting and honoring our leaders, praying for them and supporting them when they are stressed rather than being disappointed with them
Choose doing the right thing in our job when no one is seeing

I am ready!

What had happened in the past 6-week of my journey with God is a miracle. I have never felt so complete in my life before. I have tremendous peace and joy in my heart amidst the up-and-down of life.

Yesterday God whispered to me on my way to church corporate prayer meeting. He said that He is a God of miracle. God healed and restored me completely. What had happened in my life is already a miracle. He is going to perform more miracles in the second half of this year in all areas of my life. People will be amazed by God's work in me. They will praise God for what he is going to do.

Pastor Jeff mentioned that the devil will seek to destroy, deceive and distract. I sensed that all of us can flee from the devil's scheme if we allowed Jesus to reside in our hearts. He is powerful and has authority over the devil. In the gospel we knew that Jesus cast out demons. The devil don't dare to touch us or go near to us at Jesus' presense. Therefore, we don't have to fear the devil. We can call on Jesus.

Another thing I sensed very strongly is the love of God especially his equal love. God's love for all human is the same - it is so vast and immeasurable. He loves the guy who is robbing a bank as same as the pastor who is preaching at a church now. He loves the strong as equally as the weak. He loves the rich and the poor. He loves the righteous and the unrighteous. We can never outlove God. The door of God's love is open to all. And it is up to us how much we want to know His love.

More than a friend

Opposite attracts. This is true in the law of physics as well as the law of boy-girl-relationships. Certain individual of opposite gender may captivate us with their particular personality, physical appearance, character, interest, and life vision. It would be a perfect if the person make good friend with us and compliments us to make a power team, i.e. 1+1>2.

Alone and lonely

We can be alone yet not lonely, we can be lonely yet not alone...The key lies in whether we have Jesus in our heart...

How to stop loving people

1. Pride - When we have pride or think more superior than others, we are ugly at its most. Pride is really the ugly side of human. Pride is an anti-love. We can't love when we are prideful.

2. Lack of prayer - When we stop praying for someone, we stop loving the person. How can we love when he/she is not constantly in our mind or prayer? Humanly we can't give what is best for the person. When we pray, we are hoping God the mighty provider would give the best to the person.

Starting a F&B business in Singapore?

My two younger sisters are quite blessed.

The first one is married to a family who is doing food business. Her mother-in-law cherished her very much. Recently their noodle shop at Cheras became famous after they were interviewed for a TV program. Their noodle is special because they use their own recipe. The number of customers is increasing day by day.

This mother-in-law wants my 2nd sister to look for a shop house in Banting to franchise her noodle food business. The plan is to teach my sister how to make the special noodle and share the profit from the business. According to my sister, they will need to hire at least 5 person to run the eating shop. Now she is looking for a fully furnished shop house with affordable rental price.

I am thinking: If the franchised food business is successful, I may be interested to franchise the business in Singapore. F&B franchise brands like Secret Recipe, Yat Kun, Breadtalk, Pontian wantan noodle, etc. also expanded their business in this way.

Reaching the marketplace for Jesus

I asked God to guide me in my career during adult camp 2009 and my objective was met. God taught me a couple of things about the right perspectives I should have on serving God in marketplace.

1. Work is a spiritual activity. We need to draw close to God to do our work. God is the originator of work and he wants us to enjoy our work. He is the creator of all things in the universe and he created human in his own image. We can be as creative as God if we have the spirit of God. So it is important that we know him and are close to him.

2. We influence people for Christ through doing the right things at the right time, in the right place and right situation. Having higher position does not mean having higher influence on people for Christ if we don't have a heart for God and people. We solely serve ourselves and our selfish desire. This should not be the case. We serve God fully in the marketplace by reaching out to people. This should be our heartbeat and ultimate aim of our career. Career is only a mean to serve God and not an end in itself.

3. We should never get a job that would always make us feel stressed. If we can be more effective for God by being in a lower position, then we are okay with it. I don't mind to be a road sweeper than being a CoE if that makes me more influential for God.

4. A lot of times we struggle with God because we hold on to our career very dearly. We try hard to climb up corporate ladder by our own strength and selfish ambition. We can achieve it one day but we lose the grace and favour of God. Many times God withhold his blessing in our career such as higher income, position and power because God does not want to let these things destroy us.

Col 1:16,17 All things were created by him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.

Something about girls

I witnessed an major change in a female colleague's life since the end of last year. I noticed she smiles a lot more despite facing pressures in the work place. She also dresses more new and beautiful clothes with brighter color tones.

What event caused her to change so much? I believe it is after she was proposed by her boyfriend. The happiness must be coming from the sweetness of engagement and the preparation for marriage, from knowing where she belongs and from the security that she is loved.

When a girl feels loved, she is at the top of the world. A girl looks beautiful when she feels loved.

My First Love

My first love is Jesus, who saved me from all my sins, who suffered so much for all my wrongs, who took away my shame and brokeness, who showed me amazing love and grace, and who gave me a new life and purpose through faith.

But how many times I had forsaken my first love? Countless times! I had loved Him half-heartedly. I had always unconsciously and consciously started to chase after worldly things such as money, power, people's approval, ability to do certain things and etc. These things are good in the eyes of the world but they never satisfy my soul nor make me a more complete person. When I surrender one of them to God, I unknowingly start to chase after the other worldly thing. It is like a vicious cycle. After all these years of loving Jesus half-heartedly, I concluded that it did not lead me to anywhere. I concluded that I need a paradigm shift of mentality. I must know that the biggest loss is never losing the worldly things which will not last forever. The biggest loss is losing my first love - Jesus.

When we lose Jesus, we lose everything. When we gain Jesus, we gain everything! So I must love Jesus and I must not be distracted by the love for worldly things. We must constantly ask ourselves (or ask people to remind us) who is our first love especially when we feel troubled by worldly things. We must remember the following verses:

Matt 22:37 - Jesus replied: " 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.'

John 16:33b - In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.

Now I appreciate what apostle wrote below in Phil 3:7-11

But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith. I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead.

Don't make enemy with talkative aunties!

It is very common to see stall owners of hawker center make enemy with each other in Singapore. This is particularly evident for drink stall owners. I always feel very amused by one particular drink stall aunty in Geylang East Central hawker center. She mainly sells deserts but does sell a few type of drinks. When we sit near her stall to eat chicken rice, we usually order drinks from her neighbor stall. She will always grumble about her neighbor (just 3 stalls away from her stall) in sarcastic manner. In one ocassion, she told us her neighbor would not bother to keep their drink fresh. She quoted an example saying they keep their longan (龙眼) overnight for many days and use it to sell to their customers. She asked us not to drink from her neighbor stall as the water is taken from "drainage". Whether it is true or pure slander, some of us who heard her comments dare not order drinks from her neighbor anymore. I think this aunty must have told many people about the same thing.

Today I ate at the hawker center again after I finished swimming. I decided not to order any drink from the stall due to psychological effect or just in case something wrong with their drinks. How her neighbor's business is impacted by her slander or sarcastic remark? It is immeasurable!

In my opinion, the aunty's sarcastic remark is > 50 % due to their bad relationship rather than the unhygienic practice of her neighbor. Next time, if you run your own drink/food stall business in hawker center or any other small businesses, the last thing you want to do is make enemy with your neighbor esp talkative aunties. Guess what is the first thing you should do?

The curious case of a special friend

I know a friend who just uncovered the history of his family. Most importantly, he got to know who his real mum is and what happened to his mum. For the first time in his life, he asked his father about the events that took place twenty over years ago. His father married his mum many years ago and gave birth to him. He was a very difficult baby to look after in the first 6 months as baby. He kept on crying and crying all days and nights. It was the mum's first child and she didn't have the experience taking care of a baby. She was so stressed that she cried together with the baby. His father visited home once a week as his work place was far from home. One fine day, his father was informed his wife had committed suicide by jumping into the river in the town. At that time, the baby was only 3-month old. His father didn't quarrel with his mum. Nobody knew the exact reason she killed herself. According to his father, his mother was very gentle, quiet and submissive girl and she was deeply loved and treasured by his grand-parents.

His father married his step-mother 6-months later to take care of him. The family had been concealing the matter under the carpet all these years. His grandma does not love the step-mother as much and has prejudice against her and her two step-sisters. The matter would be briefly or accidentally brought up when there is heated argument in the family. This friend would not investigate the details further and he would continue to treat his step-mother as his real mum (though he knew in his heart she was not). He did not dare to ask the true story because traditional Chinese culture does not encourage people to discuss or mention about bad things that happened in the past.

This friend had always felt something missing in his life. He had constantly felt he was short of real and tangable mother's love. However, after he uncovered the true story of his mum, he felt as if he has just found his true identify. He was touched simply by knowing his mum had ever loved him in the first 3 months of his life. It must have been tough for his mum to take care of him. He felt that his real mother's blood is in him and he wants to live his life well to love his deceased mum. His deceased mum would want him to live well and be loved. Thank God this friend is a Christian and he is deeply loved by Jesus. When he goes up to heaven, he hopes to meet his mum and ask her what exactly happened at that time. Unknowingly he has lived longer than his mum now if count by the number of years they lived.

Mother's Day Home Trip - Part 2

Before departure to Singapore At KLIA

Karen at 友明seafood restaurant her Proton Saga as backdrop

Maggie rubs the bell to create humming sound at Jenjarom Thai Buddhist Temple

Ah Bi with flower adorning her at Jenjarom Thai Buddhist Temple

'Dim Sam' breakfast at Jenjarom

Honey Crab at 日夜兴

Mother's day dinner at 日夜兴 seafood restaurant

Mahjong at my house

Peanut toast at Lavender Cafe

PengKiat and MengLee at Lavender Bread Cafe at Bukit Tinggi Shopping Mall

Everyday is Mother's Day to my dad

View from right side of my house

View from left side of my house

My humble house and car in Banting

Mother's Day Home Trip - Part 1

I went back to my hometown last Saturday and returned lastnight. It was a last-minute arrangement. I felt I could tap on the Vesak replacement holiday on Monday and spend extended time with my family. Overall, the trip was good though it was a little too long. I was getting very bored on the last day and could not wait to come back to Singapore!

My bus ride on Saturday was terrible. It took me 9 hours. This is how - 6 hours from SIN to Klang, 2 hours stuck at Klang area, 1 hour from Klang to Banting. They changed the long-distance bus interchange to a new location at 中路. I've got to take a cab to go to old bus interchange to take another bus. It is so convenient! According to my cab driver, many people protested and are still protesting about the authority's move. Furthermore, the traffic congestion and road/bridge condition is very messy now. They are still constructing a new bridge to smoothen the traffic flow and it will not be finished soon. I decided not to take bus ride anymore in future.

I met a couple of old secondary school friends who live in Klang. One of my friends is very established in his career and life now. He started his own business in the U.S five years ago and is expanding his enterprise across the globe especially the European continent and the Middle East. He is hiring 7 persons to work in his office in Klang. One and a half year ago, he only hired 2 persons. He has a business partner in the U.S. who is in-charged of the operation there. They can execute their businesses and operations around the clock. Their customer orders keep coming in from all over the world and they hired Fedex to ship their goods everyday in contract agreement. The growth potential seems to be huge and unstoppable now.

My friend also mentioned about the hardship he went through in the first 2 ~ 3 years. After his graduation at Kansas University, he worked for other people and designed website for them. He learned the business model his employer used, got to meet clients and grasped the opportunity to run his own from there. Besides his career, he also acquired one shop house for his warehouse and office, one 2 and 1/2 storey house at Bukit Tinggi and two cars. His achievement really caught the attention of my other friends who do not meet him for longer time. They are amazed and wondered how this guy did it.

It took some times for my mind to accept this 'changed' friend. Upon further reflection, I realized it is not so much about his great ability that he achieved so many successes. It is the environment (the U.S) he lived in that made him so enterpreneurer. The environment encourages people to take risk and being open-minded. It is about grasping opportunity whenever or wherever it arises. I guess it is about living our life fully as if there may be no tomorrow. If we view life this way, we will wipe off all our unwanted worries and prepared to take on opportunities.

'Holding' the audience - the art of communication

I am not a very confident public speaker. I often feel trembling when asked to give a presentation or speech to large group of people. In the past few weeks I evaluated and improved this area in my work place and caregroup. I attend my company's weekly meeting with seniors and managers. I participate in the meeting to report the KPI of my function, review other function's KPI and discuss ideas to solve problem. In the church, I led discussion and chaired caregroup program. Though the group size is smaller, I consider it as good training ground before I speak to a larger group of people.

I learned something about 'holding' the audiences when we speak to them. Holding them means we are fully engaged with them during the delivery. Here are some tips I discoverd:

• We have to be very clear of what we want to deliver and what we want the audience to receive. Planning is required most of the time.
• We have to connect with the audience by being relax, friendly, be ourselves, humorous and personal if possible.
• Observe and pay attention to the audience at all times!
• Be self-confident!
• Finally, it is not about ourselves; it is about others. No matter what happened, take it easy and see the bright side of life!

The Beauty and Power of our Five Senses

One of the greatest gifts God has given human is their five senses: ears that can hear, eyes that can see, mouth that can taste, nose that can smell, and skins that can feel. All these senses receive information constantly and send it to our brain. Our brain is like the CPU (Central Processing Unit) of computer. Once our brain receives the information, it interpretes it and responds to it.

The senses we use frequently are hearing and seeing. But do we maximize the usage of these two senses all the time? I think no. Our mind may be idle or asleep even when we are physicall awake. As a result, we are not very alert and sensitive to the surrounding, happening and people. This will eventually affect our effectiveness to achieve something great in life. We need to constantly be alert, watch and observe by hearing and seeing in order to help ourselves and others. Do not waste this precious gift given by God!

Love vs. Fear

By nature all of us have fears. We fear for different reasons such as below:

• Health deterioration
• Money not enough/Losing our job and income
• Loneliness
• How people perceive us
• Losing our ability, power and influence
• Failure and defeat
• Weakness
• Uncertain future
• Many many......

Fear is harmful. Fear controls and cripples our lives slowly even without our notice. Fear limits us to live life to the fullest. Fear makes us lose our patience easily. Fear causes us to take matters on our own hand. Fear induces us to make rash and unwise decision. Fear is a trap set up by the devil. Once we fall into it, we are in its vicious circle and it has no end to it.

I thank Jesus for saving me from the chain of fears. His unconditional love always satisfy my deepest needs. When I fall in love with Him, I feel as if I have overcome all things in life, even death. When I feel fearful, I don't allow fear to control my mind. I call upon Jesus who will never leave me or abandon me, who loves me and knows what I am going through - my struggle, my pain, my feeling, my thought, my burden, my everything. He really cares for me.

1 John 4:18b - But perfect love drives out all fear. This verse summarizes everything I said above.

Something about my hobbies

Swimming is a very good sport. It helps to reduce stress and refresh the mind. MM LKY at one period of his life swimmed very morning. No wonder his mind is always so sharp despite living in his old age. I am determined to swim twice a week to exercise my body and refresh my mind.

I really love the DSLR camera I bought two weeks ago. It can shoot photo incredibly fast - in less than 20ms. I love to capture the funny shots and eye-catching moments of event. Picture really speaks thousand words so I posted many pictures in Jedi's blog. I bring it whenever possible so I can utilitize the equipment for maximum "investment return". As I am a beginner, I still have tons of knowledge to learm about photography. My room-mate, shepherd CN, many colleagues and friends also know photography better than me. I can tap on their experience and knowledge in my learning journey.

Footprints

Below is a Christian poem that I like a lot. I shared it with the people when I led praise and worship last CG.

Footprints

One night I had a dream--I dreamed I was walking along the beach with the Lord and across the sky flashed scenes from my life. For each scene I noticed two sets of footprints, one belonged to me and the other to the Lord. When the last scene of my life flashed before me,I looked back at the footprints in the sand.I noticed that many times along the path of my life,there was only one set of footprints.I also noticed that it happened at the very lowestand saddest times in my life. This really bothered me and I questioned the Lord about it. "Lord, you said that once I decided to follow you,you would walk with me all the way,but I have noticed that during the most troublesome times in my lifethere is only one set of footprints. "I don't understand why in times when I needed you most,you should leave me." The Lord replied, "My precious, precious child,I love you and I would never, never leave youduring your times of trial and suffering. "When you saw only one set of footprints,it was then that I carried you."

...Mary Stevenson

Making Our Relationships 'Fireproof'

The 'Fireproof' movie screening presented by our district lastnight taught me a lot of things about relationship.

1. Love is not a feeling. Love is a decision. When Caleb decided to do anything to salvage his marriage, he followed the suggestion given by the lovedare book to love his wife eventhough he didn't feel like doing it.

2. "Do not leave your partner when there is a fire" the famous quote of the movie. He learned this from his profession - fireman. A broken relationship can be amended. So do not give up.

3. Persevere on when things get tough and when we don't see the expected result. I feel sad for Caleb when Catherine does not respond to his love acts after 20 days or so. The relationship seems to get worse after all that he had tried. The breakthrough came finally when he surrendered all his life to God.

4. Coach people to handle relationship problem and be with them throughout the journey. I admired the way Caleb's father guided him to go through the tough times. His father is so loving and patient toward his son. He prayed for him regularly. He visited his son from a long distance when his son feels very discouraged. What a wonderful father!

5. We can't love more than we are loved. We can't forgive more than we are forgiven. When we know Jesus' love, forgiveness, we know how to love and forgive others.

The Art of Relating with People

Relating with people is one of the most important aspects of our lives, if not the most important aspect. I have come to learn the following principles in somewhat a hard way:

1. Be natural - God created each one of us uniquely. Everyone is so special in the eyes of God and so loved by Him. We don't have to compare ourselves with others and pursue some standards that God do not set for us.

2. Accept others - Before we can build any relationship, we will have to learn to accept people as they are. Do not judge people too early based on their outward appearance, social status, wealth, etc...We will not appreciate them when we start to perceive people negatively. When we know how God accepts us when we do not deserve it, we will know how to accept others.

3. Interested about others - God loves us and he know every detail of each individual. He even know the numbers of our hair! When we know how much God interested about our lives, we will be interested about others as well.

These are very basic principles. But they will bring us a long way.

Jackie Chan Incident

I unexpectedly met Jackie Chan when I went to Vivocity this Monday evening.

He showed up on stage to promote his latest movie Shinjuku Incident. The place was so crowded. He gave some short speeches to the crowd and then left the stage. When I headed to the basement foodcourt, I happened to have close proximity with him as he also walked down to the basement car park. Then I and a few others stood along the barricade to wait for him to pass by. We waved at him at a distance when he passed by. He came over to give a pad on our hands and ran up to his van! I think I was lucky to meet him in real person for the first time and had a chance to get 'close' to him. Sometimes life is full of surprises.

Wisdoms from Ecclesiastes

I am in the middle of reading Ecclesiastes and I really love this book. Below are some wisdoms I extracted which is very relevant to my life. I hope you enjoy them as well.

Eccl 7:10 - Don't say, "Why were things better in the good old days?" It isn't wise to ask that kind of question.
I think this verse is warning us against dwelling in the past - the good old days. We must not love our past. We must always look forward to the next best thing to come.

Eccl 8:6 - There's a proper time and way for people to do everything. That's true even though a man might be suffering greatly.
We have to do everything properly when required even though we might be suffering greatly from things such as personal issue, trouble, bad mood, etc...I know this is tough but by God's help it can be trained. This is especially important in our professional job.

Eccl 8:9b - A man sometimes makes life hard for others. But he ends up hurting himself.
We must not make life hard for others. Otherwise we will end up hurting ourselves. I think this is basic rule for building good relationship but we must be careful not to subtly fall into the trap of making life difficult for others.

Eccl 8:14-15 - Here's something else on this earth that doesn't have any meaning. Sometimes godly men get what sinful people should receive. And sinful men get what godly people should receive. Here's what I'm telling you. That doesn't have any meaning either. So I advise everyone to enjoy life. A man on this earth can't do anything better than eat and drink and be glad. Then he will enjoy his work. He'll be happy all the days of the life God has given him on earth.
I think Solomon is trying to tell us the importance of enjoying and living life to the fullness everyday. Don't ever live our day by comparing our "righteousness" with other people and the "reward" we are supposed to receive for being "righteous". We will end up being very unhappy because God does not promise fairness. He only promised justice. Our duty is to obey the Lord and follow His lead everyday. We must not use our wealth and status to measure our level of righteousness because such formula does not exist.

Eccl 9:10 - No matter what you do, work at it with all your might. Remember, you are going to your grave. And there isn't any work or planning or knowledge or wisdom there.
No matter what we do, we must work at it with all our heart and might. We can't do it when we are in our grave. Isn't this make perfect sense?

The Art of Surrendering to God

Surrendering to God means we must learn to "let go, and let God". It's about laughing at ourselves when we make a foolish mistake, face with weakness and failure, feel incapable and powerless. It's about not taking our selves too seriously. It's about acknowledging our shortcomings and inadequacies to learn from each experience.

It's about not dwelling too long in our successes and becoming concerned about our status, recognition, reputation and wealth. It's about moving on to do the next important task God calls us to do.

Surrendering to God also means forgiving others when they offended us. It's about seeking understanding and love instead of judgment. It's about thinking to ourselves, "I know I am a sinful person. Perhaps I did something that created misunderstanding and caused the person to treat me the undesirable way. I must give benefit of doubt to the person. I must seek to know and understand the person better to save and rebuild the relationship"

In other words, surrendering to God is about forgetting ourselves, focusing on God and others.

Proposed Trip to Mt. Kinabalu

Anyone wants to take a break in the second half of this year? Are you interested to get to the highest point (4095.2m) in South East Asia?

According to officials, the wetter season runs from October to February and the dryer season from March to September. Wet wheather is not suitable for climbing. So I propose we go there in Aug or Sep period.

It is one of the easiest mountain to climb in the world. Do you believe it? However, you must be physically fit to endure some challenging areas as steep as 45%. The reward is you get to enjoy a lot of beautiful and breathtaking sceneries throughout the climbing.

4day/3night is needed if we don't want to rush. Further, we also can spend one day in Kota Kinabalu city to experience the local cultures and foods. The total cost of the trip can be as low as below S$500. Accomodation must be booked at least 4 months before to the trip. (I intended to go in May but it seems to be too late to do the booking)

For those who like outdoor activities and adventures, this is MUST GO!!! Drop me a message if you are interested to go by end of April.

The below website contains a lot of details of the Mt. KK climbing.

http://www.mount-kinabalu-borneo.com/index.html

Hope in Israel-Arab Conflict

I am extremely interested in the event happening in the Holy Land. The Bible is originated from there so I feel burdened to read more about the history there to understand the issue better. And I am interested to find out whether the Bible reveals certain thing about what is happening there in the present days. I also have many questions why God would allow so many sufferings happen in the Holy Land.

By reading news through the media, we will tend to blame Israel for the terrible sufferings they inflicted on the Palestinian. The videos and pictures of children and women get killed or severely injured would cause the people to feel sympathy toward the civilians in Gaza instead of the residents in Southern Israel. No body knows what is under-reported and what is over-reported. A lot of things are controlled by the media. I think Hamas has achieved their aim as the world start to condemn Israel for the 'crime' they committed.

Through the webcast of "Gaza: The Case for Middle East Peace" in the World Economic Forum website, I listened to the speech of Peres-Israel president, Moussa-Secretary-general of the Arab League and Erdogan-Turkey P.M. Each share their views on the conflict and the solution to address the issue. They are seating beside each other and their speech contain a lot of emotions. Israel president impressed me the most. His speech is powerful. He told me things that I do not read from the media. He also use facts to substantiate his points well.

He mentioned about Iran. Iran dislikes Israel. Their leader ever says that 'Israel should be wiped off from the map'. Such statement is denying the existance of Israel nation and carries the intention of destroying it. It is perfectly logical that Hamas rockets are supplied and funded by Iran to carry out their agenda against Israel. The official policy of Hamas does not recognize the existance of Israel. Iran did the same through Hezbolah 3 years ago in the Lebanon war. The president says that Iran's ambition is to rule the Middle East.

Israel president also said that Israel does not want to go to war, their goal is to achieve peace. They had done it with Eygpt and Jordan before. Israel has the will to help Palestinian establish a state for themselves. That's why they worked closely and is progressing with the other party in West Bank. Why they can't do the same with Hamas in Gaza?

I think this is not entirely the fault of the Hamas movement. They were selected through democratic system introduced by the West. Why would majority elect them to be the government since they deploy extreme policy toward Israel? Reason being that the people in Gaza is not ready to make permanent peace with Israel. Most of them still have a lot of hatred and bitterness toward Israel due to the burden of history.

I am glad to hear that Israel has been supplying water and electricity to Gaza and they make sure no one there is starving. In order to change the hearts of the Palestinian people in Gaza, Israel has to go extra mile to show their kindness and reach out to their needs. Since Israel are a stronger and blessed nation, they have to love their enemy just like what Jesus taught. They have to help them build their country and give to the poor extraordinarily. Perhaps when the hearts of people are genuinely touched and loved, they will one day forgo their bitterness and hatred. That day, Israel and Palestine will coexist peacefully and become a good friend/neighbor.

Now, the enemy government is ruling the area so to do what I suggested above is extremely challenging.

The spirit of the darkness is at work in the hearts of hardened people. God's people, be strong and courageous! Do what is right!

Work - Back to basic

My cousin is doing extremely well in his career in Singapore. He graduated in 2004 and barely worked for 5 years. But he is now earning big time in the energy sector. His pay is almost doubled compared to his peers' on average in the engineering field. He obtained many valuable certs of his industry within a short time and became a very sought-after engineer. People usually get those certs when they reach their 40s. At the age of 30, he already has a wife, a baby girl, a house and a car. He told me the next goal is to obtain a few more important certs, join a giant energy company to get better pay and bonus and buy a condo. What an amazing guy!


Talking to my cousin leads me to reconsider the meaning of work. I think work means using our skills to do something to meet a certain demand. Let's go back to the basic of work. In ancient time, most of the people worked the land to produce food for their living and survival. Food is a demand in that time. Of course, skills are required to carry out the work. The skills determine the productivity and result which will be translated into some form of return. We call the return wages in modern economy.


I remember the current generation would say things like, "I am not interested in my work". I wonder whether this is a valid statement. When we talk about interest, there are a lot of feelings involved. Our interest may change over time as well. Further, our interest may be not relevant to the demand of the economy. Imagine, a person is very interested and reasonably good at singing but in his village people would not pay him a cent to sing. In order to make a living, wouldn't he get a day time job and treat singing as his leisure activity? A person who truly works would think about whether their skills and abilities meet the job requirement or the demand of the economy. In this argument, interest became a secondary issue. Very few people use their interest as work to make a living. However, many people tend to be too concerned about their interest and ignore what is the demand of the economy.

Recently Singapore government introduced SPUR (Skills Programme for Upgrading and Resilience) to encourage employers to send their workers for training during this downturn period. The good thing is that people get a chance to upgrade their skills and hopefully they come back equiped with better skills to improve their work productivity. The government has to address the two challenges to make SPUR successful and the money well spent. The first is make sure the workers sign up the right course and come back with targeted improvement. The second challenge is ensure the training provided is relevant to the future Singapore economy.

牛 Year '09 home trip

I had a awesome and wonderful trip. For the first time, I feel so trouble-free in taking transport when I visited home. I followed my ex-classmate JinCai's car to go back on the 24th dawn and followed my cousin GuiHui's car to come back on the 29th afternoon. I think I was very thick-skin when I requested them to give me a ride...haha. When I was in Banting, my good friend PengKiat came back and forth (35km) from Klang to pick me. In the evening, he sent me to 1U, back and forth again. I was thankful but he said I was too 客气(courteous)！

On the first two days, I helped my sister sell home-made CNY cookies at 1U. I tried my best to be a good salesman to the aunties and 小姐(young ladies)。We hit RM1700 sales on Sat and RM800 sales on Sun (half-day) which is considered very good. I was amazed by the willingness of the customers to spend on our relatively-expensive cookies. Later on I learned from my sister that they are many rich people living in the area. Another unforgettable event is that my sis 美芳 was interviewed by NTV7 reporter and was broadcasted on the evening news.

My father surprised me by cooking reunion dinner for us (my mum was away during this new year). He never did it for us as far as I remember. The dishes are grilled fish cooked with garlic and ginger (it is slightly over-cooked), veggy soup, 菜花+prawn+pork. He also bought and prepared roasted pork and chicken for the dinner. I was quite touched by his act of love. I also feel that his relationship with my 2nd sister had turned better.

The happiest thing this CNY is I can meet quite a few families and friends whom I treasured. I hope to spend more time with them and keep them in my prayer and thought.

The Conflict in Gaza Strip

I had been following the news on the Israel-Hamas conflict. I am saddened by the many innocent civilians killed during the war. I would not comment who is right and who is wrong. I think both side is equally wrong in many ways.

To Hamas:

1. You smuggled in weapons and fired rockets at Israel to kill innocent civilian is wrong.
2. Your movement policy is to wipe out Israel from the map. You are extremely wrong because you plan to murder a nation.
3. You trained suicide bombers to kill themselves and innocent lives. You disresgard dignity of life so you are wrong.

To Israel ruling goverment:

1. You are wrong because you invaded Gaza to advance your political cause. You have an election on February and you want to save your 'face' from the humiliated war in Lebanon 2006.
2. You are wrong if you imposed unreasonable blockade and without providing aid to the Gazans. That caused the people to live in a 'cage' and suffer great poverty.
3. During your operation, you did not exercise your utmost restraint from killing innocent lives. Palestinian death toll is 1300+ (50% are confirmed civilians). Israel death toll is 10 soldiers and 3 cilivians. Your force is far too disproportionate. This is not a war. This is a bully. You are a big bully because you attacked a defenceless nation to show your military might.

Why these two nations have a long history (almost 100 years) of war? They cannot live in peace because they have not overcome their hatred, intolerance, misunderstanding and selfish ambitions. As long as these human weaknesses still exist, we will not see sustainable peace soon.

《赤壁》决战天下

上周六我看了《赤壁》决战天下。我最喜欢的环节是各种阴谋和诡计在战场的应用。印象最深刻的包挂周瑜“反间计”和孔明“草船借箭”的并用使曹操中计，误杀两大水军将领蔡瑁和张允。在戏中也看到了孔明“借东风”和“火烧连环船”的威力。在南方二大军师的精明策划之下，曹操做了错误的判断而输了这场赤壁之战。

最有趣的是当周瑜称赞孔明的发明时，孔明回复说，“什么都略懂一点点，生活也多彩一些些”。我觉得这也蛮有道理的。

这部电影在战争场面的拍摄很不错，我觉得很接近西方电影的素质。

Flipping-card testimony 2008

I gave a flipping-card testimony on stage on 28/12 in the Adults Services. Just as how the ecomony had sank deeply in year 2008, my life had headed to the south in most of the year. I was turned around from "being depressed, in bondage" to "having full of joy and freedom" in the last quarter of the year by the grace of God. I can share with you the "how" part face-to-face if you are interested.

The coming economic collapse 即将来临的经济崩溃

Recently I read a book called “The coming economic collapse”. This book mainly discusses the effect of oil supply on the future world economy. The author views that there will be a severe oil shortage if the world leaders are not urgent on developing alternate energy. In that time, oil price will go up higher than 200USD per barrel, and the consequence will be grave.

Because now we have sufficient energy, we are able to support the present complex civilization. But when the days of cheap oil are over and we don’t have alternate energy, our civilization will collapse and we will be forced to go back to “stone age”. Reason is very simple: when the oil price is skyrocketed without control due to supply shortages, we will not drive our cars to the city to work due to expensive petrol price. We will rather work near our home. In that time, we probably don’t need very specialized jobs such as finance, banking, etc...Instead, we will work the land to produce crops for our basic needs such as food and shelter.

The other interesting point the author wrote is about “collective blindness”. It happened during the dotcom bubble in 2001 and American War in Iraq 2003.

During the dotcom boom, almost all the investors speculated dotcom stocks had limitless potential for growth. Hundreds of thousand investors lost their investment and retirement fund when the bubble burst.

In 2003 when America decided to wage war against Iraq, all the intelligence was pointing the evidence that Iraq have WMD (Weapon of Mass Destruction), but did not attempt hard to find the evidence that Iraq does not have WMD. In 2004, officials announced there was no WMD in Iraq and the decision to go to war in Iraq because of WMD was wrong.

According to study, we will naturally respect the power (or leader) above us and we do not voice out our disagreement easily when we work in the team. It is important the people follow and respect the leader to create unity to complete certain task successfully. However, we may easily fall into a trap that we do not look at things objectively. The leader may make wrong judgment and the team may collectively head to the wrong direction.

Learning: In order to succeed, we have to assess the fact and info by ourselves to make sound judgment rather than following people blindly.

Christmas Gifts

I received two very meaningful gifts last Christmas:

1. The World Map (from Name) - I serve locally and think globally. I hope to have more travelling opportunities in this year.


2. A book titled "Cross Cultural Conflict" (from Florence) - My caregroup is very diversified and exotic. We have five nationalities - Thailand, Singapore, Myammar, China and Malaysia. Yet we can make good friends with each other. This is amazing. The book will definitely provide me greater insight on cross cultural teamwork and conflict handling.
   

I also gave out two gifts I think meaningful:

1. Bible - I bought a quality NIV Bible with good price for Britma - James' brother. It is gold-plated at the pages' surrounding, with reasonably thick cover and quality papers. I was surprised I got it at a much cheaper price at Nexus (after membership discount) compared to other Christian shops in town. I managed to get everyone in the caregroup to write words of encouragement in it. I did all these hoping he will treasure the Word of God.
   
2. Shirt - I bought a red-colored Giordano shirt for Name. I blessed him as he needs it to serve in the church's usher team. He desires to live for God and has been faithfully serving in the usher team.