The Maggi Chronicles

Remember this?

So my grandmother actually gave me 3 packets of curry maggi noodles some time back.
Alllll the way from Malaysia from her last trip last year.

Of course, they are special and no one (no no!) would want to waste it on a "normal" dinner.
It's like striking a chemical equilibrium; everything must be just right to savor hot curry maggi noodles. The night must be of optimum temperature, cold not merely moderately cold cuz it just seems more delicious the colder the night is. And goes without saying, the busier the day was at the hospital, the higher the satisfaction garnered from the 2 minute meal.

So I had 2 of such days and was waiting for the conditions to ripen for the one and final packet.....

and waiting...


until I discovered 2 months later on a perfect night that it had expired a week or two ago.

Of course, it goes to show that in life, just like maggi mee, you can't always wait for the perfect conditions to occur because you end up wasting the present day (and a packet of curry maggi mee!!!!).

I hope in life, I will have more capre diem moments than curry maggi mee wasting moments.





Ps don't worry about me, I did manage to stock up on 5 more packets of maggi mee from Malaysia. ;)

Still struggling

the contrast just seems so sharp; having being back and coming to Sydney again.
I don't know if it's just something up with me or that I'm in the wrong place, but I am struggling to connect at church. I guess I'm very Malaysian after all.

And it just gets to me, to hear that my mum's been unwell for the pass 2 days and yet didn't tell me (we talk on the phone or rather VOIP everyday so the omission of information is even more disturbing). I dislike having to find out from other people; yet when I hear it from her myself, I don't know what to say and end up just saying it'd be ok etc.....

It's times like this that I don't even want to evangelize or be a "good" christian, I rather just stay locked up in my room because I can't even hold my life in order......

Do pray for me.
Thanks!

Pictures

ah...so lazy to load up the rest...
till then

Another reason to come to Sydney

Cheap air fares!

In retrospect

Because of luggage weight concerns, I left behind a stack or so of journals and planners, misc cards. But it's been great fun pulling them out and skimming through almost 5 years in writing.

Fretting over matematik tambahan in form 5. Or which uni and what to study after SPM.
Having a best friend who was a Malay girl. Getting angry at being teased with a guy. (haha)
Stressing over SAM, finding footings in IMU...where the 1st entry for IMU was "...I feel so lost because I don't know anyone"

Pulling out cards, the neon green live planner we bought to support Campus Friends.
The names of villages in Cambodia where I went. Remembering the KKB accident. Sheepishly reading how I sometimes felt cf/cg was burdensome or obligatory yet how much I miss and learnt from all the planning and people there. Writing about feeling fat...haha.
Cards from different people. One from Cambodia that I don't dare to reread because it's full of hope yet I've failed him and disappointed their hopes because I'm not going back again for now. (but troy & jonathan's going! always great to hear ppl I know going!).

In many ways, God has brought me through even when I least expected him to.
In others, it's a mixture of both progress and regression.

A reminder that I should start to journal again after being so lazy

Not enough love

Even with two different groups of friends, the same issues keep coming up during dinner/mamak sessions.
Corruption=billions of dollars missing, the rising crime and the horror stories, the state of affairs around, the integrity of courts, religion.



Being overseas have opened my eyes even more; it never bothered me much but being away and coming back, I now notice things I never realized. I never noticed or cared of the significance that everyone in church was of the same ethnicity; on autopilot we just focused on people of our own colour.

It is really sad and sobering to hear of all that's going on.
To know that so much can be improved and yet stay mirred.

Yet are we just merely going to discuss things over dinner, living our comfortable middle class Malaysian lives while plotting for ways to migrate overseas?

I can't answer because I'm not brave enough to say I'll be back.
But I know there's lots to pray for, about.
Forgive me Lord, for I do not love my country enough.

Moments of wow

Was just catching up with one of dumc's conference cds by Dr David Wang.

"They were talking with each other, but they were not communicating with each other"

Wow, so profound. Are we merely opening our mouths with sounds to fill the silence or are we truly connecting when we engage in conversation?



Another wow sentence, love the way it's phrased..

"In many ways, the Dehs — Kwame, Suzzy and Delight — are unremarkable, average. But in their incredible ability to keep mining Africa's most precious resource — optimism — they are extraordinary. Just like Africa itself." Simon Robinson for TIME Feb 22, 2007.

Do you eat the icing first or the biscuit?

It just happen that Yoda asked this question last fri and I saw these biscuits in the pasar malam.



Childhood was indeed the best of times. No worries about calories, carcinogenic food colourings or type 2 diabetic inducing icing sugar.



But yea, looking forward to what now has to offer as well. :)

In His time

It feels so good to be back in IMU, to see things that I wanted or dreamed that it would happen all come to past after I leave...(does this mean I'm so bad that things don't happen when I'm around? haha).

I remember scrambling to arrange transport for everyone to go to church, but now there's a bus from IMU to church
The Cg has raised its own leaders
People from CF going for different mission trips
I remember that we always suggested that CF should change its time but never did it, yet now the juniors have CF on fridays and even go for CF till 2 and then have their summative exams right after. I am humbled because it's a sacrifice and an act of trust I myself wouldn't have done.

It just helps to remind me that dreams do come true.
That God is able.
That His timing is right.
That He does know what He's doing after all.
That He will bring to completion what He has started.

It's Malaysia


Riding the rickety non air conditioned yellow mini bus that charges 80cents to get to Sunway.
One of the few Chinese faces in the midst of clerks, retail sales girls, students, elderly ladies.
Eating in food courts, observing what the man next in line is choosing for his meal; aware that his choice of a huge mount of white rice and vegetable curry plus a red ais sirap is more of an economic decision than a gustatory choice.

Over the past year or so my family has been catching buses and walking because we do not have a car in Subang; and don't really want to spend money on taxis if there's a bus route. Once my mother walked to the dentist in the afternoon, a good 15-20 min walk in the sun, a month or so after she finished her chemo...

It's been a great experience learning to live like how most Malaysians live; different from the middle income lifestyle most of us in IMU/college are used to. And a new understanding in how those with RM1000 a month manage to survive while feeding their families of four or more chidren.

Again

I hardly get ill in Malaysia.
But ever since coming here I've been hit twice with really bad colds that made me lose my voice and now am starting to feel feverish again. I'm just afraid I won't be able to take it when I go back to the sudden change from cold to hot plus the jet lag of a night flight. Won't want to be sick because I have such a short time back. And yea friends who are reading this, I'd love to meet up! Contact me :)


Anyway,

It's great with facebook now that if you don't bring your camera, it's heaps easier to trade pics.
And yea, I love my read coat and it just costs Aud10!