Things I must do before I start work

1. Spring-clean house till it is like new (an on-going mission that requires more going).
2. Read more books and papers on business and relevant issues to my area of (potential) work.
3. Revive interest in the arts by actually going out of the house for exhibs and such, and also finally painting those ideas.
4. Exercise again; that is what glucosamine is for.
   
5. Resolve all things I am not happy with in the surrounding areas of my life.

awake

I am tired enough to now call it a night, and go to sleep, especially for it is past two in the morning. But I sit here so inert, doing everything else except get ready for bed, despite my eyes closing, and my goodnights. It is as if I am not really here, doing as I ought to, such as sleep. I do this often, lapsing into my alternate consciousness that does something else altogether. Sometimes I come back, one hour later, sometimes, two years.


So I lapse between my extremes, like a messenger through a portal into different worlds, still here, yet not. I am hard to understand because I am extremes. I am anti-social, but I like to talk to people. I hate people, but I love them enough to want to do as much as I am impassioned to for them. I am outgoing, but I like silence; music and television are extra and not to me necessities of life. I am logic, but I am irrational. I make acquaintances easily, but I have few friends whom I truly love. I am all of these things.


I am not here now because I feel somewhat bothered. Because I hardly like people easily: I see through people too quickly - every lie, each layer of pride, character flaws, their belief system - each becomes apparent to me sooner than they get to know me, or even themselves. (It is almost like how people see things in the spirit realm, whilst others bask in preferred ignorance.) And because I am still not in the mood to explain things about me, and because I am also part hermit. So when a friend I love little, talks to me about me, I oblige, but I am bothered. Hence, I am here inert now in its after-effects. Hardly a proper reason for my catatonia, but still. I am irrational.


Maybe I just love the silence. The sound of the cold. The whirr in my ears, for there is naught to make an audible sound. Hence I stay awake to enjoy this quiet, instead of sleeping to it. In this silent state I hear everything: my God, my heart, every thought that passes through me. It seems the provocation to staying awake does me some good.

tony tay breaks fans

Daffy, me, C and Kelvin

pooh!

Science eludes me, like water over a plastic sheet. It is absolutely baffling to me how people know about cell structures et cetera and not find it overly profound, in the realm of expert, or similar. The motivation behind wanting to know all that, escapes me even more. To me, the study of electricity concerns itself with housing initiatives for the people who need it, instead of resistance and all that. Resistance? Civil war you mean?


Why do I need to know so much about how things work? Life is much more than that. The study of societies and why we alienate one another, perhaps, instead of how some compound is formed. How innately boring. Would you not rather find out how to stop clinical depression from becoming a health threat in 2010? Or study (ugh) the speed of light?


I don't like scientists. Not unless they are also clever, and demonstrate it in their understanding of how societies work.

lol, how did they know?

You Belong in 1979

If you scored... 1950 - 1959: You're fun loving, romantic, and more than a little innocent. See you at the drive in! 1960 - 1969: You are a free spirit with a huge heart. Love, peace, and happiness rule - oh, and drugs too. 1970 - 1979: Bold and brash, you take life by the horns. Whether you're partying or protesting, you give it your all! 1980 - 1989: Wild, over the top, and just a little bit cheesy. You're colorful at night - and successful during the day. 1990 - 1999: With you anything goes! You're grunge one day, ghetto fabulous the next. It's all good!

What Year Do You Belong In?

You Are a Chimera

You are very outgoing and well connected to many people. Incredibly devoted to your family and friends, you find purpose in nurturing others. You are rarely alone, and you do best in the company of others. You are incredibly expressive, and people are sometimes overwhelmed by your strong emotions.

What Mythological Creature Are You?

inner monologue

Waiting produces the fruit of patience, or perhaps frustration and restlessness. In the grand scheme of things I suppose pockets of time that occur between seedtime and harvest can be spent wisely on activities that contribute to the said grand scheme. But many of these things require money. I choose inertia to save money, and energy. Not the best of ideas.


I could spend time on my pleasures as one does during her holidays. But I suddenly rather feel otherwise, for some of these hobbies. For one, I hardly feel like playing WoW very much now, and my DVDs sit there in wait. I could visit the museums and galleries, but there is no urge to. I still love reading, oh! Shopping too, but that requires money I am trying to save. As such, I have become rather bored, especially seeing that I devour books much too fast.


I don't suppose boredom and pro-inertia go very well together. Must be uppity.

fruit

shard.
Like floating slivers
of infinite spirit
bound towards
my heart

pierces.
Cuts the heart
from its lifeblood
and veins, twigs etc.
just so it hangs low

"It is Man who convicts me of my sin,
and gives me this weighty feeling:"

brokenness.
For your anger
destroys me
for I know not what
And I never will, again and again.

Let the sun of your sleep
set on your anger.
and condemn me
to Man's hell

where heart does not rise longer
blood runs running dry
my body breaks, and weeps
for my smile and love no longer.

is there such a thing as intelligent chick-lit?

Actually, yes. Marian Keyes, to me. Or Helen Fielding's Bridget Jones Diaries, and two-hit wonder Emma Gold.


This book I just finished, was a disappointment. The story is actually passable, but the characters' details are splayed out much more like nutritional facts and figures on a tin can or cereal box, instead of the way good writers do it: introduce them to you like these were real people, just like you are, and then you become friends with them. Definitely not easy, but I suppose one could publish when such is achieved and not before.


It has been disappointing trying to find new chick-lit authors that are actually good at what they do. Hence I continue almost completing all of Marian Keyes' collection with my next exploit.


(Don't judge me for reading chick-lit: what is an intelligent life without tireless entertainment?)

categories

worlds upon words has been arranged, posts-wise, into categories:



arts: which lumps visual art, film, theatre and music into the same
books: about books, read, thinking of, quoted from
c: about the last boyfriend I had
fictitious: stories
journeys: travels
me: petty revelations about myself
pleasures: happenings, parties, meals, and the like
share: all things seen and quoted and not first created by me
state: all my status reports, things going through my mind at the moment
trivia: even more useless revelations about myself, through memes, quizzes and random lists
words: poetry, otherwise known as cryptic short sentences not in paragraphs
worlds: opinions, introspection, reflections

claustro

crowded places, like town, or the train;
small corners, like squashy seats or bookstore aisles;



"Claustrophobics may suffer from panic attacks, or fear of having a panic attack...a crowded city square might trigger claustrophobics and agoraphobics alike."


My heart beats hard and fast, just thinking about Singaporeans squashing in my way.

Illywhacker by Peter Carey

Just at the end of oh-six I borrowed this from the library, but as yet am only through the first few pages. It is a bit dry for me at the moment, more like an admirable language-skills display than an entertaining story so far. Perhaps I should keep trying.


I am still a Peter Carey fan although the only reason why, is because of The True History of the Kelly Gang. Carey is a superb writer, that I cannot deny. I also read Theft, but though it was about Australia (I love reading about foreign cultures), and about art I found it a bit unsatisfying.

snobberies

straight long hair with no shape at all
almost every shade of purple
musicals: unless Bollywood, no random singing out of nowhere please
crowds, public transport, people walking near me
broken English especially when people have to hear you
stingy Singaporean SME bosses
accountants and civil servants
Taiwanese variety shows
messy floorcloths and wet sink areas

e's 2006

inspired by Syl.


Best food: oysters from that restaurant along Bondi Beach, foie gras from Memoir, fried oysters from Old Airport Road, ice-cream, all with C.

Biggest moment of fear: none, save the times I have had to investigate weird noises outside my flat when I am alone, or when my parents try to call me 'urgently'.

Best holiday: Sydney.

Most stressed holiday: none, but Yangon comes close since it wasn't a holiday.

Nastiest incident: nothing that wasn't dealt with, mostly through a lot of shouting at the top of my voice.

Most expensive purchase: new laptop, but C paid for most of it.

Best surprise: none.

Biggest announcement: leaving the business.

Biggest lie: 'I'm tired.'

Most painful experience: times when I quarrelled with C, and that perhaps gastro-scope I had to do.

Most embarrassing moment: none that I couldn't live with.

Biggest moment of achievement: having more than enough in the bank.

Most awkward performance: But I don't perform anything!

Best compliment: 'You're pretty.'

Most agitated but composed moment: when I try to reason with C.

Biggest crush: of the year? C! Oh my gosh I am so smitten with him.

Most amusing comment during work: too many to recollect!

Worst and most hilarious dinner: worst dinners would be the ones I didn't want to go for but turned up anyway, the hilarious one has got to be the New Year's Eve party (not actually a dinner) when Kenny turned up in a dress even though he has no boobs for it.

Biggest nightmare in my line of work: when someone turns up too late or almost not at all. Argh! Screw all of them!

Moment of helplessness: when even the simplest things seemed impossible.

Most flattering moment: when Eujin conferred upon me the Best Girlfriend Award. That's recognition, man!

explanation?

When I was seventeen years of age, my good friend Jit asked me, "What is your calling, Elaine?" I did not know of course, but Jit's question made it seem that I had to know; it was of absolute importance for living on earth. Obviously I told him then, that I did not know what my calling was, and he said: ask Him. The naïveté of childlike faith was in my favour, and I went home that night, stood on my chair, and asked: "God, what is my calling?" And God answered, "Elaine, your calling is to be an evangelist."


There have been many scenes passed since then, that answer ten plus years ago. What is an 'evangelist'? It is a multi-dimensional word for a global and eternal career. The answer to my act of questioning my Father precipitated an entire journey of which much now still remains unknown. From that moment of barely knowing, my destiny was shot into orbit and each seeming revolution drove me into light and umbras all the same, again and again.


So, what did it mean? Did it mean preaching the gospel of Christ's love to many many people gathered in tents? Perhaps, but that was all I knew then at that age, and this knowledge, however limiting, scared the hell out of me. All I knew then was that if God said so, it was going to happen, no matter how small and limiting I was and still am.


Turns out that 'preaching to people gathered in tents' was not the definition; to hold the office of an evangelist is more than that: "It was he who gave some ... to be evangelists, ... to prepare God's people for works of service ... attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ." It was about building people up, to fulfill their destinies, enabling them to serve others in their spheres of influence. I may not change this entire world in my lifetime, but the next person I impact might be the one who does. I am but one person, but like a seed that falls to the ground and dies, my life could produce a harvest for this world that God loves.


When I was nineteen or so, I heard another message that changed my life even further. At that age I was hardly an adult, still under the jurisdiction of my parents, poor, that is, no financial independence, still going to school and bound by timetables and exams. If I had wanted to impact the poorest of the poor, I had the sensible mindset that that would have to wait till when God called me, which would be after I have worked and gotten myself some money. My senses were torn to pieces soon after. So many times in our lives we are waiting for the need, waiting to be called, to be touched into action. But God had already called me: He already said, "Go into all the world..." to change it and love every part of it, to share God with people who need to know Him. The time is now, not later.


There is this cliched story about how someone, supposedly a teacher, walks along a beach with a friend, with many stranded starfish on the brink of death strewn along their path. The Teacher picks up a starfish, returns it to the sea, and continues with the next starfish, again and again. The Teacher's friend, bewildered, asks, "Why do you even bother? You can't save them all." But the Teacher full of love says, "It matters to that one that I save." There will always be a place for such dedicated lifesavers. Imagine trying to help one broken-hearted friend that you love. Ever wondered why they say friendships are forever? Helping even one person could be a lifetime's work. But I am not the Teacher. When I see the beach full of starfish, I rush to think, "Let's get as much help as possible down here, now." I may not end up saving many starfish with my own bare hands, but I would want to be responsible for the bulldozer-teams that were brought in to excavate the many starfish home to sea.


When I knew that God wanted me to be involved in missions, I asked Him, "Do you want me to go, send people, or mobilise mission teams?" I learnt that though the time is now, how we are placed to make a difference in this world, is unique to each individual. I was willing to go, plant myself in every heart of Asia and beyond, and become a real missionary. I enjoyed impacting my peers at the time, to extending their spheres of influence, to pray, give and go for missions, to letting their lives change others' for the better. But God eventually told me, again at the time rather cryptically, that he wanted me to be a mobiliser, one who initiated and led people into missions. Not just to go, or to to send others, but to go and send others while also inspiring others to also do the same. "To prepare God's people for works of service." This was the work of an evangelist.


We are the sum of our experiences, interests, strengths, and passions. I did not know much at the time, why I had an interest in management and the like, and at the same time, for the arts, for working with people. There were things that stirred me, that broke my heart, that inspired me to change myself, and then the world. I ended up graduating with a business degree, during the dark years post-tech-bubble-burst, doing what I was qualified to do at first, then, founding SW with H. In our early conversations together, H said to me, that missions is his destiny, and education was the first step. In that moment of destiny, everything fell into place, for the years to come.


Aside from work, I ended up also going for mission trips once every year since then: Kazakstan, Batam, Sangklaburi (Thailand), Sisophon (Cambodia), Yangon. Before my trip last year to Yangon, just as I was preparing to leave, I said to God, "This trip, change me." I was richly aware of my sin and weakness, and I really wanted to be more loving and a better person. You see, by this time, something strange had happened. I was already secretly feeling increasingly unhappy with the work I thought to love, that all my friends still believed that I love. Unaware, I turned to things that numbed my lack of drive and motivation (reading, writing, WoW, etc.). I thought I was just lazy or inadequate. Well I am indeed lazy and inadequate, but when I returned from Myanmar, I realised that it was more than my weakness I was dealing with. For a large part of the year just passed, things started falling apart in my heart, as I started to feel that I had to change course. I had been sailing on a wondrous journey since 2004 when I entered into the dream of SW full-time, right-smack straight on course, in the middle of God's perfect plan for me. Suddenly it crept up on me that I had to now steer an almost perfect right-angle change in course, to my horror, and surprise, and bewilderment.


I had asked God, "Change me," and when I was in Yangon, while praying for the forced slums of South-Dagon, tears flooded my heart, and I saw again a vision that I had received many years earlier. It was of a child, povertised, sitting at a doorway in a war-torn village, and I was ministering to this child, bandaging his foot. The vision was in black-and-white, just as I saw it many years ago. I could hardly hold back my tears then, to know that perhaps that scene was to become a part of my destiny somehow. When this same black-and-white vision returned to me in Yangon, I then knew that this was part of the change I asked for, a key to the steering eastwards of this vessel I had already been sailing on.


I came home, and eventually, I let go, and left SW, for the better of everyone I reckon, but with hardly any announcing. So, here I am. I had come to believe all these years, that SW was my work, for now until the day I go. I did not see it as a stepping stone, nor a door to a separate road. It was the road, the dream. Oh what pride! The peace for me to continue at SW was going, gone, and I blamed myself for it, for my distractions, my inadequacies, for my anger, for my loss or love for my work. It is no longer a part of me.


But God said to me, "Seek peace and pursue it," as it also written. If He did not want me to pursue a path any longer, is it not natural that the peace from that previous path would also no longer be there as it once was?


I had asked God to change me, while the compelling desire to do more missions had already been growing in me throughout the past year. The decision as it occurred in reality, led me to feel a little like Jonah. I went into hiding, thinking the change in my life's direction was perhaps my fault, my inadequacy. I disappeared, you no longer saw me. I did not want to talk to anyone; new friends were better than most old, because then I did not owe them an explanation.


I have finally come to terms with my decision. I have to go into missions, and now. Be it Christian spiritual work (of which I am not worthy to do), or humanitarian work that saw to the basic needs of the poorest of the poor. I have to do it now, and this year, 2007, marks the change officially. This is my explanation.