Busy November: No time for too much fun!

Hah... this week has been a fantastic week. Good food, friends and events. Steamboat, PS Cafe and a visit to Artholic. I like the place a lot. It's the launch of the latest art-toy, Mimobots (a kinda designer thumbdrive), and shaun was there doing his street art again - it's always so inspiring.

Here's some pics of recent events:

7 Nov - Launch of Sticky. This is my friend Kristin & Jamie's new candy store at CENTRAL mall at clarke quay. Nice eh. Live demonstration too. Jamie's the one in pink, in this pic - with his 2 Australian counterparts.



8 Nov - Outing to Marina Barrage
Went here with colleagues Zhiwei & Josline... we were trying out Nikon DSLR cameras as me and Josline are pretty new to it. Haha.. it was a really hot day..




9 Nov - Talk by C.S.Ling for members of the Nikon Club!
I was glad to be here and also this was my first event that I oversaw, being part-host, part-photographer to document the event. It was really fun using the latest Nikon D90, though being in the presence of other better photographers from the club. Gee... I feel like a total amateur.




9 Nov - Discovered Daddy's Old Konica Camera



Steamboat 19 Nov - With Nikon Colleagues. Here's Serene next to me:



20 Nov - Adeline is back from Melbourne for Summer hols! We are at P.S. Cafe at Dempsey here... it has wonderful ambience, food, super rich choco cake and a refreshing cocktail. Nice place!!!





21 Nov - Launch of Mimobots at Artholic @ JooChiat -- with Eeshaun doing a live painting demo. I Luv Shaun's works! Met Caroline too after such a long while... really glad I came. It's one cool event plus Mimobots is probably going to be one of the latest quirky items to get your hands on! Note - Shaun's the one on the left, doing the pink-yellow one.






That's all so far!!! The Christmas Tree is up today in the house.... finally! Yay it's christmas soon! I wanna hear all the christmas songs playing in the malls... hahaah..

Well, I await a busy weekend and week ahead. Gee.. life never slows down. What's happening next? -- YAM BBQ tomorrow nite & before that I have a rehearsal at Cathedral, then going Sentosa for some afternoon beach games, with Zhiwei & Josline also (3 of us seem able to click)... On Sunday, going for a photography outing (organised by someone else) to Hort Park (in Henderson area), Plus a Movie with Mummy on Sun nite... Am playing violin again for OLPS prayer meet (monthly) next Fri, then playing Viola as bkground for a poetry recital during the World Aids' Day mass next Sat.

Field Days and Busy Days...

Had a field day over the weekend taking photos at the Marina Barage with the Nikon D90. My first time touching a DSLR. SO exciting! I felt like a pro.... cept the photos far from pro.. hahaa...

Today too was a field day with Olps youth... just came back from "supper" and a nice long chat with the other youth ministry members like David, Neil, Teresa, Roy, & Van... it's times like these that you feel, the sense of unity - and quells all the worries I have about people's opinions about me. That insecurity. It vanishes. Because when talking to people, face-to-face, you ease all tensions as you create bonds, talk it out, and share and learn from each other. It's a great thing.

Geesh.. too many thoughts, and things to do. I think my list goes up to 20! And can u believe it I am really wanting to do them all, cept there's just not enough time. I am really a workaholic. Maybe it's through the work that I find meaning in life. And I really think so. I mean, my mum and dad are really hard working people. So perhaps, in some ways, I do take after them. And i'm not so different from ju too... I love the finer things in life and want everything the best too!

The list of very important and yet not so important things-to-do:
- Find bowls for Sat Con3 Camp session. Gotta delegate this to someone else man.
- Find song for World Aid's Day Mass
- Send out email to notify youth ministry that we are not doing the fun day in Nov but in Dec instead as a christmas gathering
- Arrange practice this Thursday for Con3 Camp (confirm venue)
- Get old revival seminar pictures & documents and send to Gavin
- OLPS youth minutes for Oct mtg
- Touch base with OLPS youth ministries on Parish Assembly
- Send summary to PPC for youth ministry's update
- Upload marina barage photos into Facebook
- Develop my photos
- Do up cordas-quad website
- PLUS... haha... you're gonna die when u read this ---- watch all my "back-dated" anime -- yes still got backdated ones!!! I am now currently still keeping up with animes like Naruto Shippuden; Bleach; D.Gray-man; Prince of Tennis; Vampire Knight-guilty; Shugo Chara; Nabari no Ou; plus a new taiwanese drama. No wonder I have no time.

Tomorrow at work will be another day of troubleshooting for this period and following up, and checkin off the list of to-dos at work too. I already wrote it down nicely --- about 7 on the list.. woah. I am becoming a super woman... not.

What fuels me? I should think: my personal passion & commitment 20%, sense of responsibility 20%, perhaps, love for others 10%... and Strength from God 50%.

Tears of Joy

Something I wrote for my friends at Youth Arise Ministry:

For me, I tear when I am both happy and sad. When I laugh too much, I end up crying. The same goes when my heart is "moved" say, during a prayer or song... i feel like crying. It's an ironical reaction and makes me wonder if I've got my emotions all wrong! However, the truth is that I really haven't cried in a long while. So what does that mean? Perhaps... in my case, it's something like for a long while, I haven't had that "moving" experience? so you could say, i've been feeling...kinda numb. You could also say, I'm just being "normal", having no particular high or low feeling.

Well, I could also be the type that buries everything inside and have a big downpour once in a long long while. Coz you can't go crying every week right? Whatever the case, tears are refreshing. When you cry, you become vulnerable, but you are also "washed"... letting go of all the stress, burden, fear,... and just letting it out.

So, finally, today... I "tear-ed". Why? because I received an email tonight, from my host family in Melbourne during World Youth Day in July this year.

And so for the first time, it hit me... that it is God who brought me to Melbourne-Sydney, though at that time, I did not FEEL anything. Throughout the whole pilgrimage, I was pretty much a "sight-seeing" tourist.. haha.. So if there's anything I brought back, it was the love I received from this wonderful family of Kevin & Trish McGlade, my hosts during our stay at Melbourne (before we went over to Sydney).

Through Trish (the mother of 3), I saw the importance and strength of a praying mother. She is a strong catholic in her family, and I believe, is the one who constantly pushes and guides her sons to try to serve or do more stuff at church. They are still finding it tough though! And Kevin McGlade, is a gentle father who is humurous as well as knowledgeable. He always speaks in a calm manner, and has lovely kind and smiling eyes.

Some of Trish's words in her email to me:

"Hello Sam, I've just been going through olps website. It was really wonderful to see you there among the orchestra. It's great that, as a group, you are offering your love of music back to God as a thank you for His gift."

"I have been thinking of you quite often and wondering how your new job is going...."

Of course, Trish wrote much more. But just this email and the effort of keeping in touch even after WYD, made me realise, that I was there simply to experience this little love - coz it's only when we received something, that we learnt how to reciprocate and give back.

Thinking back, I remember the last night after the farewell dinner in the McGlade's house, we presented our hosts - the McGlades - with souvenirs from Singapore... and before we knew it, Trish was tear-ing because she was so touched! Then all of us (4 girls!) cannot tahan already and all began to cry too... of course, Kevin was trying to maintain his composure!






Anyways, through that 5 days staying in the McGlade's house, it was a wonderful time of Grace and Love. I now remember it fondly and am glad I can claim to now have a friend and lovely motherly mentor & family, all the way in Melbourne.



God's purposes reach far beyond what we can even fathom. He has a purpose for each and everyone of us.

Let's thank God for the people whom we have met, and the people whom we will meet and touch tomorrow.

May God Bless You!

Luv
Sam

Study of Orchids

This is a little feature on orchids... why? Somehow, I dreamt of a sky of orchids sometime back, and that dream was really astounding. The image was so vivid, and it stuck in my head as something absolutely surreal and wonderful. And a quick check on dreammoods.com say that to see orchids in your dream, symbolizes gentleness, romance. beauty and sensuality.

And now, every day when I get to my workplace, I pass by the tanjong pagar market & residential houses and there's like an orchid on each of them! (of course, i don't see them this week already coz i changed my travel route to office! hehe).

So these orchids in the picture were from the 11 October performance we had at "Music of the Spheres" a choir concert, where the olps ensemble performed in a 10 minute instrumental segment before the choirs came on. The orchids were presented to us after the concert as a thank you gesture.

Btw.. I added bit of colour & contrast editing here...











I've put them up on Noise Singapore too! See them here!

ATO Meeting

At the ATO Meeting last week (Asia Technical Office), over 30 - 31st October. This was 2 days of training for our latest products and system issues. I was sitting in and trying to absorb most of the time though not sure if it really went in! haha...

So anyway, for me it was 2 days of Good Food at M Hotel and Halia Restaurant (at Botanic Gardens) Pictures are here!!