My Very Special Xmas Gift~

Just saw the exam result I was very satisfied.

Thank you Jesus, thank you St Joseph of Cupertino for giving me a very special Xmas gift!

;) 

Have a merry, blessed and joyous Christmas everyone~!!

Putting Our Trust in Him

photo source: here

It's the Advent Season and what is a better Christmas present than to share some good news with my brothers and sisters in Christ, right? For all ye Christians especially Catholics, the knowledge about Chaplet of Mercy or Divine Mercy is crucial.

The Chaplet of Divine Mercy (or the Divine Mercy Chaplet) is a Catholic devotional prayer based on the visions of Polish nun Sister Faustina Kowalska. In the 1930s, Sister Faustina had received visions from the Lord asking to spread His message of mercy throughout the world. She also received instructions on how to pray the Divine Mercy Chaplet. The Catholic Church teaches that anyone who recites this prayer at the hour of death will receive great mercy. Jesus also promises that anything can be obtained with this prayer, provided that it is compatible with God’s Will. This prayer can be recited with or without a rosary. 

 (source of information: here)

I did recite this prayers occasionally when I had the motivation, but after reading about the outcome of this prayer, I regret not reciting this prayer diligently like I should. Chaplet of Mercy is best recite at 3 am, but since I am at dreamland that hour, my family and I would recite it at 3 pm in the afternoon.

I remember, during this holiday, me, my mother and my sister Mel were reciting this prayer and we made a petition so that our beloved cat Kitty, who did not come back since the day before, to come back to us. (Yeah, we sometimes dedicate prayer to our pet). That same afternoon, about 4 pm, one hour after we prayed, Kitty came back and meowed to us. Imagine our gratefulness to the Lord that moment for answering our prayer that soon~!

There are a lot of miraculous and great effects of this prayer shared by Brother Stanley C. Villavicencio of the Philippines about this prayer. I will share with you on the coming post. Right now, for those who are not familiar with this prayer, I would like to share with you how to recite this prayer.

 photo source: here 

1) Begin by touching the crucifix and make the sign of the cross.

2) Start by reciting one OUR FATHER, one HAIL MARY  and continue with the one APOSTLES CREED. 

3)  By referring to the picture, pray this at the center medal.

ETERNAL FATHER, I offer You the Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity of Your dearly beloved Son, Our Lord Jesus Christ, in atonement for our sins and those of the whole world.

4)  On the 10 beads, recite this prayer:

FOR THE SAKE OF HIS SORROWFUL PASSION, have mercy on us and on the whole world.

5) On the red beads (refer to the picture) where we usually recite the Our Father during the Rosary, you recite the same prayer just like at no 3. 

ETERNAL FATHER, I offer You the Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity of Your dearly beloved Son, Our Lord Jesus Christ, in atonement for our sins and those of the whole world.

6) Continue the pattern of praying ten clear beads followed by a red bead until you come back to the center medal.

7)  On the center medal pray three times:

HOLY GOD, Holy Mighty One, Holy Immortal One, have mercy on us and on the whole world.

8) Include this prayer after step 7. 

'Eternal God, in whom mercy is endless and the treasury of compassion inexhaustible, look kindly upon us and increase Your mercy in us, that in difficult moments we might not despair nor become despondent, but with great confidence submit ourselves to Your Holy Will, which is Love and Mercy itself.

 

9) End by touching the crucifix and pray The Sign of the Cross.

SOURCE OF PRAYING STEPS:  HERE

Enjoy this Christmas gift from me and don't forget to share this gift with your other brothers and sisters in Christ too yeah~! Have a blessed Christmas in advance~!

If You Really Knew Me...

If you really knew me, you would know that ....... (fill in the blank)

If you were to utter those words out, what would you fill in the blank?

This is a phrase adapted from a programme called 'Challenge Day' , a workshop which was conducted  by an organization (Challenge Day Org) at high schools around USA. I first knew about this programme through  the Oprah Winfrey Show, oh yeah my favourite talk show of all time. Now it is aired on MTV with the title 'If you really knew me'. 

"On March 5, 2001 at 9:20 a.m., 15-year-old Charles Andrew Williams pulled a .22 caliber pistol from his book bag at Santana High School in Santee, California and fired more than 30 shots into a crowd of students in and around the boys’ restroom." (source: here, a report prepared by Richard D. Reo, Jr.)

"According to The 2003 National School Climate Survey, more than 800,000 students are verbally harassed every year in American high schools because of their race. "Last year we had a whole bunch of fights between black people and white people," says Dorian, a junior at Monroe. "They had the police at the school." (source: here, regarding Monroe High School and the other high schools in USA)

Challenge Day programme was created to curb high school killings (which involved shooting), suicide,students' depression, bully and racial tension. To curb this,  the wall that separated  the students through the typical labels such as 'popular clique', 'class clowns', 'athletes', 'nerds,' and  'emo kids' has to be broken.

So have you ever bullied someone, hated someone, or loathed someone just because he or she is different from you? Have you ever teased, made fun of someone merely because of the way he or she looks?

photo source: here

  The picture depicting students from different cliques opening up to each other.. ;) 

So if you think you have done the things above, you should watch this programme. It is aired on MTV, but you can also watch the video online at this link or know it briefly through this video..

The effectiveness of this programme to change the students can be found here.

Pursuit for Career HappYness

 photo source: here

My mom always tell me not to be too choosy while looking for a job.

I know that. I know I am considered choosy because the first priority for me in choosing a job for me is whether I like that job or not. Not the salary nor the classification of the job whether it is blue collar or white collar [I am even clueless which job falls on which category (-_-") ].Whether people will classify the job as good one or not, as long as I like it and it's a clean job, then I'm on for it. I don't give a damn about what others think of my job because it's my job, my career and it is for me to decide whether it is a right job for me (or not).

I am already feeling the heat of job hunting cause I will graduate next year. Most of my peers already had their own careers and I realized that I am going to join them in the real adult world soon - the working world. No institution like university to protect you anymore, no privilege of getting student price for the services that you want to purchase, nothing.

My mom suggested me to continue with Master and she told me not to worry so much about the school fee but worry more about my future. It's nice to hear some comforting words like that but at the moment, I am done with studying. I mean, there's more to life than education, right? Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against education but for me, education is not only gained at class and lectures, but experience in the real world is an education itself.

I would like to continue Master if I can make time for it, but it won't be right after my degree I guess. I have not decide what I want to Master in, which field I like the best, so why indulge myself in something which I am still unsure of, right?

Personally, I would like to gain experience in a job first before I go for my dream career. My dream career is to be a writer, columnist or a journalist - anything to do with writing or being creative. Then again, before pursuing for this dream career, the job that I would like to experience first is the job that my senior is doing, which is to serve the community. I mean, what job is cooler than to get paid for doing good deeds for others right? Some would even do it for free. 

Still, I have to think it over. I want my future career not to revolve around earning money or getting promotion alone, but something which is more important like it involves my passion, gives me personal satisfaction and not to forget, giving back to the community. 

So, what is your definition of a career happiness? Is it a stable job, stable income, promotion, or doing what you enjoy doing? I hope it is the last one.

Whatever it is, I hope your pursuit for career happiness will meet a good outcome.

Every Boy's Got One...

 I'm in my book-maddening mode again this holiday - the only time where I got the mood to spend times with novels and such.

photo source: here

The novel I just recently finished reading was 'Every Boy's Got One' by Meg Cabot. This is the third title in 'The Boy Series'. This third title was just as good as the previous title - Boy Meets Girl. The way Cabot narrated this story and the other stories in this series was truly creative - she was using the medium of notes, diary, e-mails, sms-es, etc to tell this story from different characters - which gave us the chance to know the viewpoints of different people. It was hilarious - I mean the diary and the e-mails' contents. I guess Cabot was convincing when writing some notes from the viewpoint of the male characters. That's what I call a good author.

This story is narrated mainly from the viewpoint of Jane Harris - the maid of honour/best friend of Holly the bride. Jane was helping Holly to elope to Italy with Holly's boyfriend, Mark Levine, who also brought along his best friend Cal Langdon to be his best man. Jane and Cal had totally different view about the elopement, Jane was totally supportive of the marriage while Cal, thinks that it's too early for Mark to settle down. 

Actually, this story was inspired by Cabot's own elopement back in Italy too, but creative Cabot was not sticking to the cliche of having the bride as the main character or narrator; instead she narrated this story from the viewpoint of the maid of honour.

About the main characters, both Jane and Cal are very different but yet very similar - Jane loves cats and Cal (though he won't admit it) actually loves cats too. They are both very successful, Jane is the artist who created and drew Wondercats while Cal is a journalist who wrote best-selling nonfiction book. 

When will Jane change her negative view about Cal? And when will Cal start to believe in love and marriage again? 

Ah.. I won't give you the answer to the question above. You have to find out yourself by (duh!) reading this book..

If you are into romance and comedy, this is the perfect book for you. ;)

Surreal Moment in my Blogging Experience

Interframe (credits): Thanks to Cik Kiki for teaching me how to grab and save picture from the web.. Thanks to sis Mel for updating my edit post so that I can use this canceling function.. ;)Without you guys, I would be left in the dark of how to blog in an advanced manner lol.

If only words can be used to express what I felt after receiving this e-mail...

Look who won on week 1.. *wink2*

The adjectives like speechless, unbelievable, superexcited, can't breathe, Xmas feeling mode on, sure would come out...

I WON A BLACKBERRY TORCH 9800 (!!!!) 

For my blog entry for a contest held by Nuffnang and Digi - one of my privilege to join this competition for being a Digi angel.




A few minutes later, after digesting this news from the e-mail, ahem,  it's a must for me to announce share the good news and spread the joy around on facebook. Thanks for all who congratulated me and were happy for me. 

Can't believe I received two phone calls right after sharing this good news on facebook. My bestie Amanda called within 5 minutes  all the way from Kuching after I posted this status on my facebook just to congratulate me on this winning. That was so sweet of you to call in the midst of study week. All the best to you girls on your exam yea. Pray to St Joseph of Cupertino. After the phone call from Ada, I received another call from a friend of mine, Mark (bukan nama sebenar)  who happens to be a Blackberry and gadget geek - who called all the way from Penang to confirm this and asked me how I won it besides congratulating lol. I guess the aura of Blackberry Torch 9800 must be that big for a Blackberry maniac expert to call me to confirm this. Mark, iboh jeles k.. (itupun kalo ko baca post ini hua3) I will let you see it secara live when I finally got it later. Hahah. Ok kidding. 

OMG. Okay, enough with all that excitement. I hope I am not gonna jinx this. *paranoid mode on*

I hope no bad luck will come after I became so happy for this. *superstitious mode on*

Thank you guys! *touched mode on*

I felt like just hitting a first prize lottery or getting straight As for my public exams.

Thank God for all the blessings!

Thank you Nuffnang and Digi!

OMG I gotta do some charity (like washing the dishes and clean the gates) after this.

Legacy (Private Series) - Book Maddening Mode

photo source: here

When I looked at the cover of this book, I knew that this book is going to be another typical popular rich girls involved in sorority drama + scandal + mystery + power and all the elements of students attending private school. The good thing about reading a typical genre is that you know what it's going to be like, it may not give you so much suspense like Sidney Sheldon books but it's not going to bore you to death either. Reading some typical book is like ordering that dish that you already know how it taste like but still you order it for the sake of eating it again and to make yourself full. And that was exactly what I was doing. I have expectation towards this book, but if it doesn't meet up to my expectation, then that's the downside of reading something typical. And I digressed...

So let's get back to the main focus, which is to give my review on this book.

Okay, so this book, LEGACY, is one of the PRIVATE series.

I guessed by reading LEGACY, I've skipped the earlier PRIVATE series and left blur blur with all the characters mentioned in LEGACY. That's the thing annoying about reading book series. You skip the first volume or the other volumes before that particular volume that you are reading, you are going to be left in the lurch.

The story revolves around Reed Brennan, a scholarship student who entered the prestigious Easton Academy Private School. Coming from a middle class family, she is not the typical private school rich girl type, and of course SO TOTALLY not the Billing girls type. Billing House is the sorority house for the posh and rich girls who are the member of the Billing underground society. The society is so exclusive, you have to be popular, rich and daring to be one of the Billings, but in this volume of the PRIVATE series, Reed is elected the president after the death of Cheyenne Martin, the previous Billing president. I guessed in the previous series, Reed had proven herself to be worthy of being Billing girls. In this volume, Reed could not get over the fact that Cheyenne sent her an e-mail blaming Reed for her suicide before she died.

And during this year, it was the first time the Billing girls and the students from Easton Academy were not invited to Legacy, a very exclusive and grand party that got people talking. Only the third generation of private school attendees are eligible to be invited to this party. Thus, as the new president of Billings, Reed had to find a way to get the girls and her friends to the party, though she herself was sure she was not eligible to attend it herself.

At the same time, in the midst of all that troubles, Reed felt that she was being watched, but by who?

So how did she manage to get the girls to the party? And who is that mysterious person who threw the LEGACY party and deliberately left Easton students out of the guest list? And was Reed dreaming or being a plain paranoid when she felt that she was being watched?

Read this book and better, the whole PRIVATE series, and you will find the answers. Or else you will left hanging with no answer like me for just depending on this one book to read. Hmmph.

Dear 208 binti Harapan 25

Dear 208,

I am leaving you tomorrow. I have lived with you for one semester. And you are really a warm haven for me. I'm sorry for filling you up with rubbish. Or junks. Whatever you call it. But for me they are treasures. Treasures I've been keeping since my first year. And now bit by bit, I am throwing them away. Because I realized, that without these 'treasures' I can still lived. Ugh, and I digressed.

When I first heard your name at the registration office, I felt that you are kinda familiar. No wonder. You were my senior's (Matthlessa) haven too. And I began to know you more when I started to live with you and in you.

It's tough at first. Whenever it's time to sleep, I could hear guys screaming insanely from the opposite, where your mother's twin brother, Harapan 26, stood. I know, as one of the approximately 300 children of Harapan 25, you have no say in this matter. You are usually gentle, and tolerate towards Uncle Harapan 26. Thank God too I am an easy sleeper. I could fall asleep easily, anywhere, anytime, regardless of how many noises and distractions there are.

At first, I treated you with care. Biasalah kan, kalau baru berkenalan, memang layan sehabis baik. Then, when I am getting busier and lazier, I began to neglect you. And bring more junks that may harm your health, 208. I am truly sorry 208. I never realized that too many junks can be harmful to you too, though you're not human.

Then, I began to complain about your mouth. Sometimes, it's hard to shut your mouth. I had to pull hard to make your lips closed together. And that made me pissed-off cause I thought it's easy to open and shut your mouth when I have the keys. But still, it's not guaranteed.

You've been so kind to me 208, but still, that doesn't mean I've forgotten about your half sister, 339. Though 339 is not as reachable as you are, the atmosphere is quieter when sleeping, where I faced the lake of Harapan instead.

And now, last but not least, I want to thank you, 208. And a deep apology for what you are experiencing now. I'm causing you to be dusty and messy now. I hope you don't mind 208. After tomorrow, perhaps you will new faces, whom I am unsure whether she will treat you nicer than I do.. Take care dear.



Regards,

Maureen

Daring You to Document...

It's that time of the year again...

for...

*drum rolls*

Yeah baby.. Freedom Film Festival 2010~!

And yes, I am now a KOMAS crew. Though temporarily.. ;) hehe.

Don't believe? Here's the proof. Me and my two lovely seniors.

I got to know about this volunteer thingy from a friend of mine, Man Lee. Though it was in the exam season, I could not lose this opportunity to participate in something happening like this. So voila, me, two seniors and two juniors jumped up to this opportunity to volunteer in Freedom Film Festival 2010 at Kompleks Penyayang Pulau Pinang, and the rest of the process, as they say, is history...

The two of us with Sarah, one of the organizers.


Counter girls in action!

Me and my seniors & juniors kept switching roles and taking turns in our duty so that each of us could have the opportunity to watch the movies.

We switched between the duty as registration receptionist and the usher - which is also a good thing to train us to be more versatile (hak3) besides being not bored to death to stuck with one job the whole day.

The three winning films for this year are namely;
1) Pilih (by Loo Que Lin)
2) Hak Dinafikan (by Abri Yok Chopil & Shafie bin Dris)
3) Kisah Tauke Mancis & Minyak Tumpah (by Sheridan Mahavera & Siti Nurbayah Nadzmi)

Pilih is briefly about the student body election in Malaysian campuses and how the AUKU (Akta Universiti and Kolej Universiti) had put a boundary to the students' freedom and rights in decision-making.

Hak Dinafikan, on the other hand, portrayed how the orang Asli protested against a proposed new land policy, and among the faces there I recognized is Kak Tijah, one of the orang Asli active spokeperson.

Kisah Tauke Mancis & Minyak Tumpah depicted the story of the extremism regarding the relocation of a temple - and how some intolerance occur among neighbours in a neighbourhood. This film is somewhat daring for portraying a little sensitive issue regarding races and religions.

Among the three, I liked Pilih the best because it was something I can relate to, which is the student body election. I never really knew my rights as a university student until I watched this film.

There were a lot of other films but I did not get to watch them because it was about the overseas countries.

Quite a crowd turning up during the night of 13th November. ;)

Last but not least, say hi to the friendly usher, my junior Vera. ;)

Actually, KOMAS did come to Sarawak for this FFF screening at Miri but the feedback was cold. Not many who turned up for the screening. Perhaps the issues being shown were not that relevant to Sarawakians compared to here at Peninsular. Thus, we Sarawakians were encouraged to propose and idea for short films to document it back there so that the other Sarawakians can relate to it. Issues? haha. I have no trouble looking for issues as the first issue back in my hometown Sibu would be about gangsterism. How many of us Sibu people are daring to do some short film about that? Hmm..

What I can conclude from my experience here was that there are many issues around the country but many do not dare to document or even to speak about it. Most of us just kept quiet, since it did not affect us directly. Well, I am one of them. When I saw injustice, I rage and vent my anger over it but I did not do anything which may lessen or even make a little difference to that injustice.

Wow you may say that I start to involve politics here but that was not it. I want to talk about social responsibility. Since I couldn't do something about it, all I can do for now is to blog about it.

And yeah, I had fun volunteering at FFF for the priceless experience!

PS: Thanks KOMAS (as if they are reading my blog lol but anyway) for the free t-shirt, free food and the pocket money lol. Thanks for rewarding me for doing something which I would do for free!

DiGi BlackBerry Torch 9800 – Hotter and Smarter

Greetings people~

I am in the mood of story-telling now.

Let me tell you about a story of a vain queen and her magic mirror. The setting for this story is during this current period, this current era. But this particular queen never watches Miss World or Miss Universe, thus she was very delusional and thought that she indeed was the hottest creature in the planet. She was so outdated, and so was her magic mirror.

Photo source: here.

Every morning, the queen would stand in front of the magic mirror and said
"Mirror mirror on the wall, who's the hottest creature in this world?"

Because the magic mirror was totally outdated, it would always answer the queen with the same "Yes, your majesty. You are indeed the hottest creature in the planet."

And after hearing that particular utterance from the magic mirror, the queen would be happy and contented - because her aim to be the hottest creature in the planet was fulfilled.

One day, after her plastic surgery, the queen upgraded her magic mirror because she wanted to be sure that she was still the hottest -even among the creatures of all the other planets. To upgrade her mirror efficiency, she subscribed to DG Smart Plan, after the advice of her surgeon of course.

The queen was very excited to use her updated version of her magic mirror for the first time.
And now, she asked the mirror

"Mirror mirror on the wall, who's the hottest creature in the galaxy?"

Suddenly a yellow man whose appearance looks like a member of the Teletubbies came into the view of the queen.

Photo source: here

"The hottest creature eh?"
the Yellow Man from the magic mirror began.

"It's Jessica Alba~!" he answered excitedly.

Photo source: here.


Upon hearing this, the queen was furious.
"What? I can't believe this!"

"Ah.. slow down. Please my queen, do not be furious. I was just joking. The hottest creature in the galaxy of course is..."

The queen was very anxious and she expected her name -
but instead the Yellow Man uttered..

jeng jeng jeng


"BLACKBERRY TORCH 9800!!"

The queen was speechless while the Yellow Man continued to talk about the hotness of the
Blackberry torch 9800.

"Blackberry torch is the world's first Blackberry with QWERTY keypad and touchscreen. It is hotter than any smartphones ever existed before. Why it's hotter, you may ask, your Majesty. Well, here are the reasons why."

"My queen, instead of letting your hotness be reflected temporarily on this humble magic mirror, with this smartphone, your majesty can do unlimited camwhoring using the 5MP camera and with its capacity of 8GB memory. If your majesty thinks that 8 GB memory is still not enough to store up all your files and vain pictures (ahem), your majesty can expand its memory with a microSD card up till 32 GB!"

"Oh..." The queen nodded. "What else is so special about this so-called hot stuff?"


"Well," the Yellow Man continued. "Besides the camera, you can always update yourself by browsing the net through this smartphone. It has faster and richer browsing, where Your Majesty can manage multiple open websites with tabbed browsing. It also have the hot features, namely 3G, GPRS and EDGE."


"Oh" the queen nodded.

"But gee, Yellow Man, though I am a queen, ahem, I have a teeny problem with my budget. You know, after my plastic surgery and magic mirror upgrade and all that, I don't have much money to buy this smartphone though I really, really am interested to buy it... Because it's really, really hot..." The queen said with a sad face.

"Fret not, your highness. This smartphone though its price is RM 2299, but since you had subscribed to DG smartplan, you can get this smartphone at cheaper price. Let me tell you something. It's better for you, your Highness, to subscribe to this plan for 24 months so that you can buy this hot smartphone at only RM1499, which is RM800 cheaper than its original price!"

"Really?" the queen was very interested to be the owner of the hot stuff.

"Yes, your Highness. I won't lie to you. Besides there are other benefits of signing up for this smartplan as you can see from this magic mirror,"
the Yellow Man said as he depicted these information on the magic mirror.

Why this DG smartplan is the smart plan for you, you and you:

The next thing we know, the queen was spotted by the paparazzi at the nearest retail shop, purchasing her very first hottest stuff in the universe and galaxy, Blackberry Torch 9800 while signing up for the 24 month DG smartplan contract for 24 months.

So, what are you waiting for?

Be SMART, but don't forget be HOTTER, people~.

For more information, it's just a click away!

M for Malash

Daripada tajuk di atas, anda dah tau status aku sekarang - malash tahap cipan (walaupun aku tak tau apa itu cipan sebab aku malash nak ambik tau). Orait. Mungkin sebab nama aku mula dengan huruf M kot, sebab tu la malas. (Salahkan nama dan bukannya peribadi atas kemalasan, bravo Maureen~!)

Walaupun berada dalam keadaan malas, aku tak dapat tidur oh terima kasih kepada teh tarik Kedai Makan Nazri tadi.

Dalam kemalasan ini, aku tengah sibuk stalking seorang blogger yang aku dah pernah discover blog dia, cuma belum sampai tahap check post dia dalam archive satu persatu. Namun entah kenapa sekarang ni aku rajin check postnya satu persatu. Wah alangkah bagusnya kalau kerajinan aku mengestalk blogger ini aku aplikasikan ke dalam Sociolinguistic, Discourse Analysis, Semantics, dan sebagainya. Tapi apakah daya. Blognya memang penuh dengan tulisan dan kadang-kadang I have zero tolerance for tulisan kalau font dia kurang daripada 11.

Time aku malas baca blog bertulis, aku beralih pula kepada blog ini yang ada tulisan tapi kurang tulisan.


Orait, sampai di sini sahaja pertemuan kita. Aku malash mau ca....kap..... lebih..........................

Sedang Merajinkan Diri....

.....untuk membaca blog-blog yang dipromotekan oleh Step (blog yang Step perkenalkan ni biasanya blog yang suci dan berilmiah ahem) dan juga updates yang Hawa mention pasal blog kengkawan yang cool sekalian (ini bukan bodek). Serius aku alpa dalam mengupdatekan diri dengan membaca blog kerana sibuk berfacebook. Dan juga sibuk untuk tidur petang. Dan sibuk untuk menyibuk benda yang tak patut aku sibukkan. Blog sendiri pun update once in a bluemoon. Ok tiada alasan untuk justify kealpaan aku. Aku bersalah sebab malas. Noktah.

Ok, sori sebab ini bukan post yang ilmiah walaupun exam dah dekat. Good luck everyone in your exam.

Erm by the way, happy Halloween? :S

Advanced Wish

Woo hoo~! Come on guys.. Let us play a guessing game~!


Let us guess which girl among these people who made 30th October every year significant?


TA DAA~!

Let me mark her face with love...


Hmmm..

jeng jeng jeng

ta daa~

here she is~

na...

Yeah, so we did spotted the girl who made 30th October a significant date.

And she's our bestie - Stephanie Hermon.

She's going to turn 22 this 30th October (Saturday)

A double number age~!

To Stephanie a.k.a Deng Deng hihi:

Girl, I wish I will be there during your birthday just like in the pictures above, to share the joy during your birthday with your beloved girls (Ada, Sally, Pam, and the rest whom I couldn't list down all the names) :


Since I can't be there to witness you blowing your candles on your cake LIVE during your birthday unless through pics posted on facebook by one of the lovely girls [ you girls know who you are ;)]

And I can't try your cake ahahaha (takde kerja lain kan?) or I can't even be the photographer during your birthday (macam la skill camwhore aku best sangat wahahaha)


so I guess thanks to internet I am gonna do it online... hehe

So dear Step,

(picture grabbed from Pamela's facebook album)

I invite you to blow these candles on this cake which I prepared a.k.a googled
for you...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY GIRL~!

ALL THE BEST~

BEST WISHES TO YOU FROM PENANG TO KUCHING...

Have fun with your girls yea... ;)

So happy birthday Deng~

:)

May God bless u always..

And see you this year-end...

;)


(Gotta post this birthday post a day earlier cause I'm gonna have a sleepover at a wireless-LESS place this weekend so can't online to wish you on your birthday itself huhu)

Kids, I Ain't Kidding You~

Imagine... you have prepared your lessons the night before. You read the Gospel like you never did before just because you wanted to relate your teaching with the Gospel today. You had planned what you wanted to teach, what you wanted to mention during the class. You wanted to do your best in your lesson today, but then, when you entered the class, there was one kid, kept running around the class with noises and gave a lot of troubles for the class. You wanted to ignore him, but he won't let you. When you give him attention, he was rebelling against you. You are clueless what he wants from you.

ARGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!

Meet Ray (bukan nama sebenar) a kid who won't let you teach in peace, and yours truly, a part-time Catechism teacher who is truly clueless about handling kids like Ray.

It was Elo and my turn today to teach the Catechism class to the Standard 2 pupils at the Church of Our Lady of Sorrows. And guess what, I thought Ray could have behaved better today than my last experience with him, but boy I was so wrong. His negative vibes was spreading to the other kids, but thank God, really, really thank God that I had the lollipops that Claire gave to me that kept some of them well-behaved through out the lesson.

I threatened not to give them the lollipops if they do not behave - and it worked *wink2*- but not with Ray. He was oh-so-impossible. (-_-") His little brother, Morrie (bukan nama sebenar) was more well-behaved than him - as far as I remember, and I ain't sure what to do with him. I guess I need help from my sister next year if we met him again.

Well, what we did today was that, I asked Ray to lead the opening prayer by reading the prayer prepared in the text book. He was trying to be funny at first but when I said the word 'Lollipop', he began to behave... but for a little while. (-_-")

Then, after like teaching them about the two lessons from the book, I asked them to write their own prayers - because at the start of the lesson, when I asked them about the prayer they recited before they eat, all the answers I got was Hail Mary and Our Father. So, I wanted them to be creative and try to compose their own prayers. I mean, I want them to pray from their heart, and not from their memory. I mean, how many vocabulary of the Our Father and Hail Mary that a kid really understand? Right? I didn't understand most of the vocab when I was their age. Yea, I am aware that they need to know about the prayers but let's not limit their prayers - let them pray too for what they want from their heart.

Some of them did good job in composing their own prayer while some of the kids' own prayer was kinda cute. Lol. "God, please help me. Please God." -- An excerpt from Harry 's (bukan nama sebenar) prayer. Then there was this girl, Nicky (bukan nama sebenar), where her prayer really was the best among the rest so far. Her prayer was like "God, please help me. Please help the people with no hand, please help the people with no home." I was like, "Wow, look kids. Her prayer is good because she is not only praying for herself but for others too. I want you to include others in your prayer."

The kids in the class, each of them is different from the other. There are hyperactive while there is some who's so quiet.

Overall, my two times experience with the kids were really good, though Ray is kinda out of control. Maybe it's just that phase, that naughty phase of your childhood. Once he grow older, he will be more in control perhaps. *cross fingers*

We were really blessed to have the chance to experience teaching these kids. Hopefully the next semester we will be more prepared to face the children. ;)

Moral Dilemma

I will have an important test tomorrow, but because I need to have peace with my mind, I had to spill out what had been bothering me today. Huh~

On my way to my 3 pm class today, while I was trying to cross the road, I saw a guy on a wheelchair, using both his hands forcefully to push forward his wheelchair at the side of the road. His wheelchair was not the automatic one, but it was the manual one, where you have to use your hands energy to push it forward. I just looked at him, wondering whether I should help him or not. When he finally passed by me, I didn't help me, instead I smiled at him.

He didn't smile back. Perhaps it was because he didn't know me or he was too tired to smile. After I managed to cross the road, I regretted for not helping him. I mean, probably he needed my help, and obviously a smile didn't help. I kept thinking about what if I came late to class? Hmm.. I should be more practical next time, instead of becoming a hypocrite. What's the use of regretting and being sad for not helping someone when I had the chance? He had been pushing his own wheelchair from God knows where, the Aman hostel or another hostel further down.

On my way to the class, everything was blurry, I didn't notice anybody, even a junior of mine, aka my CUS granddaughter, Lia, when she called me. (psst, sorry Lia, I was in a deep thought just now huhu and God knows how many person I had ignored on the way to class) I managed to reply a brief smile. I kept thinking about what I could have done to make a small difference, and I blew it away.

That's not the only dilemma I have for today. In the evening during a dinner with my friends Lee Ying and Kim Hong, I heard the news of the death of my friend's mother. I was shocked. I mean, I just mentioned my friend's name out of nowhere and BAM, I heard a bad news about her mother. I didn't dare to send her a condolence message just yet before I really confirm the news. It was really frustrating. She was probably in a deep sorrow now. And I couldn't do anything about it.

But everything happens for a reason. Haiz. I have yet to find the reason. I wish I could do something about it than just to sit there and contemplate all these things theoretically. And to wheelchair guy, wherever you are, have a safe journey around USM. If we were to meet again, I won't just smile and walk away, but I will try to approach you and to offer a help, provided you need it. And to my dear friend, if only you read this, I want to let you know that we at CUS here care for you. Be strong ya girl.

Only You Know the Answer

Sometimes the easiest, simplest question, which did not require any reading would be the hardest question of all. It became THE million dollar question.

Today, during the sleepover gathering for the Catholic Undergraduate Society at FM house, I was struck by the question asked by Claire to Helen for the snake and ladder game. It was a very simple question, but only a few can answer it honestly and be truly confident to answer it, at least in my case.

The question is not about "Who's the love of your life", but it sounded like this:

"When was the happiest moment of your life?"

It was really simple and direct, but it's hard to determine when it was, either because you have too many happy moments to choose from or it was because you never had a perfect joyous moment in your life. There could be some flaws here and there which flawed your happiest moment.

In my case, honestly, so far during these past few years, I didn't experience one perfect happy moment. Why? How do I determine this?

It's because I still felt the insecurity or there's something missing whenever I am involved in a certain situation. In my own definition of happiness, it's just not about smiling or laughing, or enjoying a moment. Perhaps, enjoying a moment could carry the meaning of happy, but not THE happiest moment. As Claire had stated during the gathering, she described the happiest moment of your life as the flawless moment, there's NOTHING which could annoy or upset you at that very moment, which you could described as rainbow moment.

Though it was Helen who was required to answer the question, I was in my deep thought, trying to recall my own happiest moment. All I could think of was my childhood. During the simplest, most uncomplicated moments of my life. An ice cream could make my day. But now, it takes a lot more than that to make me feel blissful in and out. I guess as we grew older, we needed something abstract more than something concrete as it won't last forever.

When I tried to recall my adult life, I couldn't really determine when I am happy or not. There were times when I pretended to be happy just to erase my sadness, or not to worry my family and friends, and there were times when I am happy but only after a long set of worriness and fatigues. It was like I had to pay a very high price before I get to enjoy. [For example, it's like you had to pay for the roller coaster ride before you can take a ride on them.] In short, sometimes, I too became confused whether I was truly happy or pretended to be happy during certain moments because I was falling into this make-believe so-called happy moments.

On the other hand, it's easier to determine when I am sad than happy cause nobody would want to pretend to be sad but we always tried our best to look happy even though when we were not.

But as I think back, the way to make yourself happy is to just live life simply. Desiring too much and expecting too much out of lives can lead to lots of disappoinments if your desires couldn't be fulfilled.

And to determine the moment when you are really happy, it's the moment when you can't help smiling widely until you cry because you are so touched by the happiness and also because you regret that the moment won't last forever.

And I hope that everyone can find their answers to this million dollar question.

Welcome to "Hate the Coward Anonymous Comment Leaver on the Blog" Club

Just left my blog for two weeks and saw a new comment on my previous post titled "Have I mentioned that..." I got a few positive welcoming back comments from all except for one particular comment, the comment posted by an anonymous coward which sounded like this:

"Hey dont read that rubbish bible.
Nothing holy about it.

Jesus Christ was a jewish rabbi.

People who followed his teaching were Christians. The Catholic Christians believed that u must go through vatican to go to heaven. Can u believe that?

The Pope issued Papal Bull so that the Spanish and Portuguese killed aborigines the world over like in Avatar.

The Catholic Christian is an evil cult. The Pope should be tried for crime against humanity over the centuries even here in Malaysia, the Catholic Christians attacked Malacca and killed Malays.

China and Japan banned Christian missionaries. Good Chinese.

The priest sodomised boys and girls."



I mean, what's the point of stationg all of that to me? What the heck? You think I am going to believe what you written through anonymous comment over my own belief which I had practiced for 22 years on earth?

Get a life, or even, get a religion. I bet you don't have one.

Anyone encounter the same problem with anonymous comment leaver??

How I replied to this?

Hmm... Easy...

Hi unknown coward evil visitor,

you're too naive if u think i will believe all the things u said by being anonymous. if u think you're stating the truth, why don't u put on your link or show who u are?

I may not be the holiest of the holiest, I may not read the Bible daily, but once a person try to challenge my faith or try to say that my belief is wrong, I can be defensive. Though I do not have sufficient Biblical knowledge, I experience God's love, I am happy with my belief, I love Jesus, and I know that He loves me, I am happy the way I am.

To the Anonymous Comment Leaver:
Your agenda to shatter my faith backfired. You just made me realized how much I love my religion and how much lucky I am to be a Catholic. I will try to forgive you since that's what I learned from the Bible. :)

Friends' List..

When I started writing this post, there was a question inside my head 

"Can you count how many friends you have?"

If I were younger, I would definitely answer yes to this question. But yesterday, when I ran into my three of my four closest friends during my first year in university, I began to wonder, why did I neglected them? Why our friendship were merely hi and goodbye lately? Why did I let myself to be controlled by circumstances and just let them go because we didn't take the same papers lately? I felt like such a bad friend. I felt like instead of being friends, we became more like acquaintences lately and I really didn't want that to happen. I still want our friendship to go on and strong because they are really good people and I should give them what they deserved from me, which is a quality time together.

What's a friend?

According to Dictionary.com, a friend is a person attached to another by feelings of affection or personal regard. 

I still remember when I was still in my primary school, I would list down my friends' name and decorated it. The list will consist of almost all the girls' name in my class. That time, to me, the definition of friend was simple. A friend to me, means someone you know and whom you did not fight with. How innocent of us kids back then hehe.

When I entered high school, I entered the smartest class for Bahasa Melayu Medium though I didn't get straight As. So I felt like the underdog firstly because I personally think that I didn't fit in the smart category and I was a very timid girl. I didn't know how to converse in Mandarin back then because in my primary school, we just conversed in my mother tongue, my dialect, which is Hokkien.

It was during high school I always felt very lonely because I only talk to people when they were the one who started the conversations. It was because I was too self-conscious and afraid I might be laughed at for speaking Mandarin inaccurately. So I would do anything just to gain friends - I became the delivery girl by helping my classmates to buy food from the canteen though sometimes I didn't intend to go to the canteen. A small thank you made my day, I felt appreciated, but there were times when I bought things wrongly and got dissatisfied remarks.

During that lonely period of my afternoon session moment in high school, I would list down the number of friends I had in my diary. I became more critical about the definition of a friend, and the list was very short, because there were only a few who was close to me and was kind to me that time. But still, I was sure, somehow someday, I would get out of my shell and be more approachable towards other people. 

But that didn't happen during my high school, because all through high school, whenever I tried to come out of my shell, there were always obstacles from a different level coming for me. I was frustrated with studying life. Because of that, I was finally comfortable with my anti-social attitude and I told my mom I wanted to work right away after Form 5, but well, as you can see, that did not happen. I continued with Form 6. Though I still speak poor Mandarin that time, I felt the sense of belongingness in my Form 6 class. I was considered smart, something that I won't expected to be labelled as after primary school. 

My friends' list became longer than before, and I was really blissful. It was during my Form 6 where for the first time, I began to be involved in religious club such as Young Christian Students. And through my Form 6, I began to know more people and had quality time with my bestie.

Then there was university life. During my first year first semester, I had a gang which consists of Mei Ling, Sook Mon, Christopher, Susanna, Pei Lee and me. When we attended classes, we always go together. But when the second semester arrived, we majored in different subjects and the gang was like, splitted into two. Pei Lee and me were always together, then the rest were at another part. During my first year 2nd semester, I always felt lonely because sometimes Pei Lee fell sick and couldn't attend the classes. Then I started to make the friends' list all over again, counting how many friends I had. Inside the list contained most of my seniors' name. I wasn't really mixing with my peers that time. I felt frustrated with myself, the trauma of being an outcast like what I felt during my high school years came back haunting me again. 

But God was really kind to me. During my 2nd year, He gave me a role to play in a religious club and He met me with Hawa and a lot of other new people I began to became close with. Though I was busy and all that, it was a small price to pay compared to the blessings He gave me. I felt more contented and it was the first time I thanked my mother for forcing me to enter university.

And you know what? It was during that time I stopped making the friends' list.

And only when I stopped making the friends' list that I realized we cannot count how many friends we have cause it's hard to determine which one of your acquaintences is your friend because friendship must be nurtured. Acquaintances can turn into friends and vice versa. If you do not keep in touch with your friends, your friends might turn into merely acquaintences.

[Interframe: And that is why now I want to find a very good timing to reconnect with my first year gang, my beloved friends, Pei Lee, Sook Mon, Susanna and Mei Ling. I don't want this friendship we have turning into acquaintances relationship]