ash and ice

according to google, it is rodin's birthday today.




1 I lift up my eyes to the hills.
From where does my help come?
2 My help comes from the LORD,
who made heaven and earth.
3 He will not let your foot be moved;
he who keeps you will not slumber.
4Behold, he who keeps Israel
will neither slumber nor sleep.

5 The LORD is your keeper;
the LORD is your shade on your right hand.
6 The sun shall not strike you by day,
nor the moon by night.

7 The LORD will keep you from all evil;
he will keep your life.
8 The LORD will keep
your going out and your coming in
from this time forth and forevermore

psalm 121:1-8

2003-2012

now and then, i think about what you would say in response to this. i remember bits and pieces of the things i'd learnt from you, the conversations we'd had and issues we'd wrangled with. i remember the many times you tried to help me to see a point, the hours you spent with me untangling all the messed-up thoughts and erroneous beliefs. it was life-to-life (one of the many things you emphasised), a life-to-life relationship of discipleship. and such imprints do not fade easily.

i miss something, but i don't know what i miss. perhaps this is the feeling ST had when she woke up that day, and said she needed to go home. perhaps this is how maids feel when they first start working for a new employer, and they run away from the home in a bid to escape to the embassy.

i know this will pass, and there'll be a settling down, and that on the whole i am glad to have left the place. but in the meantime, i still remember blk 80 and octopus and blk 162 and chai chee (oh god, chai chee) and st helier's and expo. and i remember white chairs and rattan chairs and sitting on carpeted floors and black curtains and brown doors. and hours and hours and hours and hours of words and words and words and words and words.

it's a stevens sort of pain.

open and stuff and close. and
let fall a few

it is good.

"As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today." Gen 50:20

i thank God that he is slowly melting away the bitterness that i have been carrying over my lot. not that i was really stewing in that bitterness or anything like that, but i guess there was always that feeling of unfairness and the "why are things so crap" kind of mindset.

reading this verse today, i felt like i was finally cutting myself away from those negative thoughts. if indeed i believe, as Joseph did, that God is sovereign over all and that he is the one who arranges all things in my life, i am not then complaining against the school administration but against him when i bemoan my posting. and why should i have any cause to feel hard done by, if it was God who did it? for surely no bad thing comes from him, but only good gifts such as a father would give his child.

the knowledge that none of this is beyond God's control has probably always been there, just perhaps overshadowed by the fear that they would judge me harshly if i did not perform well with these classes and brushed aside in favour of the well-meaning consolations of well-meaning colleagues. but i am tired of worrying about my grades, and consolations provide scant comfort when i have to step into class. these insecurities and temporary balms have to go if i am to move forward. i only pray that God will grant me the grace to live this out, and that i would, like Joseph, declare that God meant all this for good, for his own good plans. and surely that is enough reason to give thanks for it.

You are my RO.

"Far above the Ephel Duath in the West the night-sky was still dim and pale. There, peeping among the cloud-wrack above a dark tor high up in the mountains, Sam saw a white star twinkle for a while. The beauty of it smote his heart, as he looked up out of the forsaken land, and hope returned to him. For like a shaft, clear and cold, the thought pierced him that in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty for ever beyond its reach."

Tolkien, Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King



You are my white star.

trading this heart of stone

hard to believe that it's been less than a month.


if there's anything that i'm really thankful for, it's that the experience there has taught me to be more appreciative of my parents and my family. after learning about the family backgrounds and histories of so many of them, i am extremely grateful for the family that i was born into and for all the material comforts that i have enjoyed these past two decades and more.

i have two parents who care for me and work hard to provide for me.
i have more than enough food to eat every day.
i have never had to worry about not having enough money for recess.
i have a comfortable bed to sleep on and air-conditioning in my room every night.
i have a mother who buys the type of bread that i like.
i have parents who supported me through my schooling years by either driving me to/fro school or paying for my cab fares.
i have sisters who share their clothes with me.
i have had maids to cook my meals and clean my house all through my life.


sometimes, it really takes the bad to help you appreciate the good. and even if this place brings fresh sorrow every day, i celebrate that it is breaking this once-unconquerable part of me down.



i love my family.

Titus 338

"At one time we too were foolish, disobedient, deceived and enslaved by all kinds of passions and pleasures. We lived in malice and envy, being hated and hating one another.

But when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy.

He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior,

so that, having been justified by his grace, we might become heirs having the hope of eternal life.

This is a trustworthy saying.

And I want you to stress these things, so that those who have trusted in God may be careful to devote themselves to doing what is good. These things are excellent and profitable for everyone."

Titus 3:3-8


the battle starts tomorrow, and these shall be the words i cling on to. for all lies about who they are, who i am, what i am expected to do, and what we are in this for will reveal themselves to be lies when faced with the truth.


bring it on.

wet black bough

too many weights on my mind from one day in that auditorium.

i think the overall feeling was a sense of frustration and restlessness, inspired by the events of the day and perhaps, to some extent, by the experiences of Dagny Taggart in Atlas Shrugged. errors irritate. and there are errors in my own behaviour and judgement too, but comparisons of speck and log aside, it is surely still allowable to just let that statement stand as an expression of opinion, despite how it might not reflect an attitude that is entirely laudable.

if one can say that certain things of uniqueness have become too commercialised, perhaps one can also say that certain things of prosaic-ness have become too advertised. teachers, and the teaching profession, probably fall under that latter category. too much ideology and meaning have been invested into the teacher, such that a gathering of teachers inadvertently prompts one to think potential, outreach, influence, moulders of the future. as magnet attracts iron, we seem to attract people who want to influence the future by way of influencing us. the person has been substituted for a symbol, reduced to an advertised image, a convenient mental projection from which one works when planning conferences such as these. institution speaks to image, and the people protest.

such mind-numbing processes. Dagny and those who understand her mind have the words i do not have.


there are so many things i would like to tear apart. but there is arrogance in that, and perhaps an excessiveness of negativity which, on the whole, should not be indulged in.

but this i will allow myself to say.

in that matter of sin, you are wrong to say that the guy has everything to gain, and the girl has everything to lose. what screwed-up rubbish. both lose. both lose, whether they realise it or not. you speak as though that is a victory for the man, and it is words like these that perpetrate the mindset that men gain when they take the girl, giving them the lie which becomes the comforting thought they take to console themselves or in which they exult, whether or not they dare to proclaim it. you follow the crowd in not making them realise what it means, and what they lose. and i hate rubbish like that. i hate that piece of rubbish and the whole attitude behind it and the injustice of the entire sickening thing.


kill the rabbit already.

"the bellows blow fiercely
to burn away the lead with fire,
but the refining goes on in vain;
the wicked are not purged out."
jeremiah 6:29


i see this and i think, cool verse to use to teach alliteration. but then no. actually another thought came first. and that is, i wish it would burn.


how long. how long more til its over. is it my fault. is there anything i can do, i should do. i think there is, there are, many things that i should be doing. but each time i try, i fail again. i wish i wouldn't. i wish it would stop. i wish i would stop. i wish i knew when this ends. i wish i knew where i end.




bang the bronze and hear it hollo out
all hollow within and hollering now
to bend the air to its wind and will
bring it to the till;
again, repeal; til
something within stills.




"we wait in hope for the Lord,
he is our help and our shield.
in him our hearts rejoice,
for we trust in his holy name."
psalm 33:20-21

tipping the scales

i should demonstrate more love towards those whom i should demonstrate love, and hold back from expressing love towards those whom i should hold back from.


"we demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ." 2 Cor 10:5

luke 9:23-24

since it is the new year, i shall talk about death.

two things come to mind when i think of death - one, the wait at a deserted train station on a winter's evening in arklow, ireland, for a train that i wasn't sure would come; two, the wait at a bus stop outside the clinic where i had just received my blood test results.

those were the two times where i really died in mind and heart. that there should be self-resurrection, that what was once dead should live again, is the bane of my existence. for i should have died and stayed dead, but zombie-like, my old nature insists on unnatural extensions to life and continues to drag its ugly body around. i would pray for execution again, except that the bruises from the last round of discipline are still tender, and fresh enough to inspire fear.

yet i miss the sweetness of death. death is cold, stark, relentless annihilation, and that complete erasure of self is a relief, a release. for it is when we are weak that Christ is strong in us, it is when we are nothing that Christ is all. and nothing beats the peace and joy of living a life in which Christ is all.

and so death it shall be. not death as a goal in itself, but death in order that Christ might be all, in order that the new creation might live.

God help me.