Finally a little reprieve from a hectic schedule but it doesnt seem like I will have much rest during the break either. Lots of work to catch up on. It seems like I've been rushing from class to class, assignment to assignment, that I have not really had the time to fully appreciate the readings and lecture notes. In fact, I've ignored most of the readings and I feel that I remain largely ignorant on the subject matter of all the classes I've taken.

Back to journaling prompts:
2. One thing I have always wished for is:
probably a thousand things. But what came to my mind first was:
Watching earth from above aka be an astronaut.

Unfortunately, this is unlikely to happen in this lifetime.
Maybe the second best thing (and a little more realistic) is to own a library complete with a ladder and then have all the time in the world to read and remember all that I read. I guess this in itself are three wishes.

I'm not sure what's happening to me. I feel I am becoming a little too arrogant. I get annoyed and irritated when menial tasks get assigned to me but the thing is I am not even good enough yet to do "bigger" things. So why am I thumbing my nose at such tasks? But somehow I just feel like there's  a glass ceiling above me and I feel stifled. Maybe it's time I pluck up the courage to pursue other paths.

On another note, not sure why I've been getting a sort of telepathy with people I seldom get in touch with. E.g. 3 weeks ago, I got this prompting to get in touch with a girl I am not very close with but I chose to ignore it coz I was "busy". Alas, recently someone told me that the girl has been having some difficulties in life and having suicidal thoughts.
Some months ago similarly, something told me to get in touch with a friend but again, I pushed the thought away. Subsequently I found out she was going through a major crisis.
I wonder how we somehow "know" these things and I wonder why I never act on my instincts.

https://pin.it/nflu6rnta6zwoo
1. Something I’ve always thought about as a child:
Are there aliens? Is there another earth out there where there’s another me with an alternative life. What does it feel like to watch earth from above?

Feel like ive not read anything for ages even though I have been sporadically reading Inferno.
Neither have I been able to write poetries..maybe academics dampen the creativity coz it's just routine and routine and routine.
I really like the LKY/Law campus, it feels a little foreign, as if Ive been transported out of Singapore. to a small, quiet town. Have not had the chance though to just while away the time there with a cuppa coffee and a good book. Maybe after I'm done with stats class.
I really wanted to write something but can't find the words to. Maybe there are some truths/realities that I just dont wish to face/ know.
There's always that insecurity that some things will end, some people will be gone...who can we truly depend on..certainly not human kind.
There was a lunar eclipse, blood moon, blue moon, supermoon tonight but it wasnt too spectacular in Singapore. I wish I could be in the desert with astronomy enthusiasts.

I wonder if I made the right decision overloading an extra module when I’ve absolutely no background in economics. Is it worth risking a better CAP? Do grades really matter that much? Or do knowing a little bit more matters more? At the end of the day, who am I doing everything for? Is there some place I’m meant to be, or do all these things not matter cept for the no 1 priority of God. What is it like for someone without a God ? How do decisions, situations etc take on a different meaning for the atheist? Wouldn’t it all seem a little meaningless if you have no other hopes cept for this one life which ends in 80-90 years’ time?
I don’t know.
Haven’t watched a proper movie for some time. These days I just can’t be bothered with wasting my time at the theatres watching something I’ve not really yearned to watch. Back in the teens years, I just soaked in the theatres watching every single movie there was.
Maybe I should watch a horror movie sometime.

Religion as a business

Been having writer's block for weeks..unable to write properly and piece things together for assignment. Wanted to complete the assignment over the weekend..alas, i've failed. been distracted and procrastinating coz i just kept getting stuck. God, i hate this feeling. Maybe I havent start feeling the time crunch yet. Although the semester is the same length as the last, it somehow feels shorter and i'm getting a little antsy thinking about the list of assignments ahead and my thesis. I just pray everything will go smoothly and things will work out.
I so wish that I have the chance to take more modules but a pity that work is a major hindrance. Would have been a better experience if I were a full-time student and not be distracted by a thousand other things.

Re-reading Dante's Inferno. It started out well but then I started to drift and get bored after a while. Somehow it feels as if something is missing from the poem. I guess when it comes to poems, translation just doesnt cut it. Sometimes a word is used not just for its meaning but for the way it sounds, rhymes, or the tone it lends to a piece. When it gets translated, part of the beauty of the poem gets lost.

Wanted to visit the school's library, gym pool, exercise classes during the sem break but didnt get to do it. Such a perfect waste of school fees...

I dont know what to rant about anymore. Had a discussion regarding the church's direction, strategy, etc today. Honestly, running a cell, church, etc can be very corporate-like and although intuitively it feels wrong to associate religion with business, i personally think it's legit in the sense that a lot of the business/marketing/management strategies can be applied to running a religious organisation. We similarly need a vision, mission, specific strategic objectives, action plans, outcomes monitoring and evaluation, survey, stakeholders engagement, corporate communication, marketing for outreach, financing system for sustainability, grantmanship, and even research to better understand your congregation. I wonder how Jesus did it? Did he possess all these skills? How did he manage his "congregation"? How did his work sustain itself through the years? It's an amazing corporation he has built.

2018

First day of the year and I woke with rashes. Not a great start I guess. Been procrastinating with school stuff, trying to decide what modules to take. A part of me wants to learn something totally different from my field, yet the logical side of me wants to take something relevant to "value-add". However, one of my classmates was right when she said since the organisation is not sponsoring my education, I should do it for myself. Yet I sit on the fence.
I dread going back to school even though I had enjoyed it during the last term. All the things I had wanted to do during the break, are left undone.
Looking back at 2017, there had not been much changes, with the exception of school and the waning fire in God.
I guess the less you do something, the less willing and the less drive you have for it. The key then perhaps is to never take a break from important work.
What have I achieved in 2017? scraping past Grade 7 piano and making it to next sem in school? I had dropped perpetually all church-related work in exchange, even with Sunday School, I've been inconsistent in attendance. Dropped out of LCEC as well coz I just dont find it that meaningful yet. Didnt go on any mission trips even though I did have spare time in December.
On the travel front, didnt go anywhere too far this year- Bangkok, Phuket, Bali, chengdu. I didnt expect to like Chengdu but I did enjoy the trip quite a bit, doing nothing much except for eating and visiting museums and the panda research base. I guess the weather has to do with everything.
What do I want to achieve next year?
Complete MPH, better fitness, internship, master the spencerian script, paint better, play the piano better- the tangible things.
The intangible ones, to grow spiritually and not always feeling that it's others' job to help me grow. And the issue of people... perhaps it's better to drift away, since there aren't going to be any results anyway.;there's just no way things can work out the way everyone wants.
https://www.ted.com/talks/ruth_chang_how_to_make_hard_choices
Read the transcript of this video..It struck a chord with me. There are always hard choices to make; I am not surprised if we spend our entire lives deliberating over choices, regretting them, undoing them, making new choices...Some decisions steer us onto a completely different path, some decisions follow us for the rest of our lives...Wouldnt it be nice if we just "know"? I think sometimes we do possess that innate ability of "knowing" but it is oftentimes drowned out by reasons, by the voices of others, by what society values,by what we think is politically correct. Like what Ruth Chang spoke of on her career choice- lawyer vs philosopher. The heart knew what she wanted but reason overthrew that but for how long could you deny the heart of what it truly wants? In her case, she was brave enough to finally give in to her heart and overhauled her life.
Could we really abandon reason, plausible consequences to follow our hearts? Is it always best to follow the heart?

The high mountains of Portugal - Yann Martel

The book contains 3 short stories which are inter-connected; I find this format of writing rather interesting and reminds me of the butterfly effect. Obviously set in Portugal, the first story featured Tomas, a strange man who walked backwards because of his grief over the deaths of his lover and son. At the museum he worked, Tomas chanced upon a journal by a priest- Father Ulisees and was intrigued by a crucifix the priest created in a remote part of Portugal. Tomas was a man angry with God for taking away his son and wanted to find a way to seek revenge-the strange crucifix was the answer. Tomas was bent on locating the crucifix and bringing it back to Lisboa to mock God. Borrowing his rich uncle’s automobile (a strange contraption in that era),Tomas embarked on an arduous journey which became a little absurd and funny, with him getting lice, chased and attacked by horsemen and a village idiot’s mother, the car half gone after an explosion. On the last leg of his journey, Tomas ran over a small boy with fair hair and blue eyes, unusual for this part of the world. He left the boy on the side of the road and drove off.

After not finding the crucifix at several plausible churches, he chanced upon a small church which he had intended to skip and finally found what he was looking for- Jesus depicted as an ape on the crucifix. He was elated at first but then it quickly turned to grief: so what if he had found the crucifix? He was still a man who had lost everything he loved. He ran back to his automobile and cried, “father, I need you!” The priest of the church ran to Tomas and that was the end of the story.

The second story’s central character was a pathologist named Eusebio. In his office one late night, he received a visit from his wife, Maria, who began excitedly telling him of the link between Agatha christie’s Novels and the Bible. I got a little irked when the author got his facts wrong. Maria said none of the 4 canonical gospels ever witnessed Christ and had only written the accounts based on other eye witnesses. However, both John and Matthew were 2 of the 12 chosen apostles! Not sure how he could have gotten this information wrong. Of the three stories, this was the strangest. After Maria left, Eusebio received a visit from an old peasant woman also named Maria. In her suitcase she carried the dead body of her husband- rafael Castro and requested for an autopsy stat. What came out of her husband’s body were strange times like flute, dice, and whatnots, followed by a chimpanzee and a bear cub. The woman later asked to be sewn into her husband’s body together with the chimp and bear. Prior to the autopsy the woman had recounted how their son, given to them in old age, had been killed one day while with her husband for a job. The boy was of fair hair and blue eyes and loved by all. The death of the boy changed everything for the couple, with her husband so ridden by grief and guilt that he started walking backwards (he had seen tomas doing so).  The boy was killed by tomas’ automobile.

The third story although a little strange, was interesting. A Canadian senator, peter was visiting the United States, went to an ape research Centre and found an intense connection with an ape. He adopted the ape and dropped everything in Canada, and moved to the high mountains of Portugal where his parents were originally from. Peter had just lost his wife Clara and this move seemed to be a rash decision to escape grief. However, peter and Odo the ape formed a bond resembling love and were inseparable. As fate would have it, peter later found out that the house he was renting was his ancestral home. In the attic, Odo found a suitcase of strange items- a flute, dice, etc and a note describing the autopsy of Rafael Castro, which he found incredulous- a chimp and a bear in a dead body! Peter and Odo loved taking walks together and on one particular walk, Odo spotted the rare iberican rhinoceros and pointed it out excitedly to Peter. Peter then suffered a cardiac arrest and died due to the strenuous climb. Odo mourned for Peter and returned to the wild. I know I’m not doing the book enough justice. It’s a lovely perhaps obscure read, kinda refreshing.