chronicles of young

"I do believe, help me overcome my unbelief!" (Mark 9:24b)- the cry of a father begging Jesus to heal his possessed son. The past week has been difficult emotionally. I am exasperated at emotionality, (yet the prayer Break my heart for what breaks Yours is surely pleasing to You, Abba Father), at how weak I am, at how self-glorifying I am. I have realised, unbelief is also a temptation. Is God really real? What has a baby born in a blip of time in Israel got to do with us today? Is God really working in this world? These questions came up and I guess they gave me an excuse to slip into despair which is terrible, but perhaps easier to confront then the task of faith and trust in God's working, together with it's call to obedience. How do I engage the world? How do we, as Christian university students in Singapore, studying <insert major/discipline> engage the world we live in? I know, from personal experience and Christian counsel- I can't address all,...

I have been praying that I can cry everything (whatever that is) out for sometime. Since last Friday after I slept through the quarrel between Dragon and B. in the car and realised 我累了, I have been feeling like I need a whole day at home. Just to be at home and perhaps read, pray, or do nothing but look at the flowers on my table or the sun casting it's light on the opposite blocks. Somehow, today I did. Started my quiet time with hymns. At It is Well (Bethel), I teared, remembering how I sang it in Mongolia when I was dealing with stuffs. Reminded to be quiet and trust. The next song Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing was what opened the floodgates. "On that day, when freed from sinning, I shall see Thy lovely face // Jesus sought me when a stranger, wandering from the fold of God" I was crying and crying because at that point my soul longed for His kingdom come so so much. And simultaneously, I heard from Him that there is redeeming work to be done here, now. I wa...

In the Altai Mountains, Bayan-Ulgii, Mongolia I don't know why, these past 2 weeks have been filled with so much emotional thinking, which translated to a compulsion to create content. The mountains. There is a felt heartache as I look at pictures of them. I long to be in the mountains again. Why though, I was asking myself. I am a city girl who failed her physical fitness test because she lacked the stamina to complete the 2.4km run. But the mountains, they stir in me a sense of quiet, almost-sad joy and a feeling of connectedness. In the mountains, I find that I rather be alone or not talk. There is a sense of theophany perhaps. Shepherding the yaks In my second time in Mongolia, I hiked through the forest of trees and settled on a plateau. There are no photos of the mountains I saw because I had intentionally left my handphone behind. I sat there, alone, for maybe a hour. Just singing hymns, gazing out at the mountains and letting my heart be filled. So so tha...

This symbol has been featuring in my thoughts for the past 1 month plus ever since I read that article . ( ) used to be B, the second best friend I had and possibly the oldest friend I am still pretty much in regular contact with. That sass, that humour, the way boys like her. In no small way, as I was reflecting after Disgraced , in no small way has how I present myself been shaped by her. Even till now. ( ) is still sometimes "one of those chicks that look like they have it all". What came back to me again and again was this paragraph: "It's kind of beyond me how someone can have their life so sorted. Maybe I should start comparing them allegorically to filing cabinets. Each file section is a subdivision of life. Academics. Family ties. Extra-curricular activities. Social stature. Looks. Boyfriends/ girlfriends. Socioeconomic state. Mental health. Physical form. With a person like ( ) , not only is every section perfectly organised, but also each...

Mostly unedited comments from the play Disgraced by Ayad Akhtar, typed out during the post-play discussion: A turning in on yourself. Of realising that you are not who you are and yet you are who you are trying to hide yourself from. A part of yourself that you are secretly proud of if you dare to throw away the social norms and morality holding you back. The caricatures are so relevant because they connect to people in a not always explainable way. In some way we can see ourselves in these characters but yet there is a simultaneous rejection. The whole awakening to white privilege, to orientalism, to racial/religious profiling also seems to turn in on itself because it endorses a kind of stereotype also. So I guess at the same time the play is brilliant because it shoves the stereotypes up your face and declares SO WHAT F**K YOU (and I realise, maybe this curse word is a played out stereotype in itself). Because at the same time it is easy to draw causality rather than just obs...

是一个美好的一天。睡到9点，赖在床上想着昨天也真是美好的一天。唱着歌与神父说话，再用彩色笔记下心中的感触。 发电邮给社工系其中最喜欢的教授，做一点admin，哦，是午餐时间了。肚子饿了。 把最讨厌吃的香蕉切成片，放进烤炉里要烘干，便出去了。 在口福吃幼面，不知为什么特别好吃。去Giant买做蛋糕的材料回家，啊，好久没烘焙了。打着牛油的声音好好听，扑鼻而来的蛋糕香让我知道味道一定不错。 是真的很不错 😙   把蛋糕切了放进盒子里准备明天带给朋友和家人，想到他们吃的样子有开心的感觉。匆忙赶到荣耀堂赴约，本来因为第一次和牧师说话还有些心急，不过聊了超过一个小时。感恩。 Banana Squares with Nutella (adapted from here )    2 1/2 cups flour (280g flour) 250g butter 1 1/3 cup castor sugar 4 bananas 1 1/2 teaspoon baking soda 4 eggs About 1/4 cup Nutella 1. Heat oven to 180C/160C fan/gas 4. Butter a 12 inch square cake tin and line the base and sides with baking parchment (if you don't have, just butter will do! More washing up for you) 2. Cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy, then add the eggs with a little flour and 1/2 teaspoon of baking soda. Fold in the remaining flour, baking soda and bananas. Pour into the tin and spread evenly. Use a teaspoon to add dollops of Nutella into the batter and run a spatul...

An irrational number | I wonder when that memory on the bus became significant. Like the never-ending decimal representations, peering into that blip of time that has accrued layers of meanings over time I emerge with a thread with an end that only God knows.  There are still new digits being computed for pi. Pi is not mysterious but is known, yet that depth I do not yet (?) have. It was so hard to write those lines. Sometimes I would put my face super close to the mirror, and it becomes a stranger to me.