Taking a break.

Really...I am taking a short break from figuring out the Kanon Und Gigue (or Canon by Johann Pachebel 1653-1706). It's my teacher's way of "throwing" the score at me to figure out and play then she will correct the playing usually the rhythm Bowing technique and the evenness of my fingerings / tone and er...sometimes my notes!!!!! Horror of horrors!!!!

This approach forces me to learn to sight read and I actually like it a lot, though it can be rather frustrating at times. To counter that, one needs to play phrase by phrase slowly first, sometimes even forgetting the slurs and staccatos then slowly put back the embellishments. I also find it useful to practise the difficult portions first. Then with time, some patience and God's blessings...BRAVO.

Rachel is now packing her toys before I will let her use this computer to do her Jumpstart Numerals For 5-8 years old. This morning, shortly after I had woken, I had a call from my late mum's foster aunt/mum and it turned out to be a 45 minute conversation concerning my late mum, her idiosyncrasies, the circumstances of her illness, the dying episodes and post mortem etc etc. Actually it's kind of depressing to go all over such details again....especially my mother, who battled colon cancer and had chemotherapy for 4.5 years post surgery to remove the diseased parts, well she had died almost 2 years ago.

Still the 85 year old relative who cared for my mum, an orphan, and supported her through secondary school was still coming to terms with my mum's early death and reminisced much the good old times they had. Unlike my "pantang" or superstitious mother, Grand old Aunty had her will drawn up, funeral wishes like ashes to be scattered at the sea, funeral photos and clothes all ready when she was 80. By God's grace she is still in the pink of health.

Naturally as with all elderlies she feared the exit part. To which I encouraged her, almost 50 years my senior that as believers in christ we can request the good Lord for a good, peaceful, comfortable death when the time comes. After all, in my christian life, i have read and heard of cases where many elderly passed on sans the pain and the fear, some were even escorted by heavenly beings which I had the chance to glimpse once. (we'll talk about that next time).

Its now Rachel's turn to use the computer,yes she's done with packing her toys and now I should return to "entertain" the renovation workers upstairs, thank God mainly carpentry work, with my working version of Kanon Und Gigue.

NOT IT SAVVY

I had wanted to enhance my blog, to update the photos since Rachel is now 5 but really other than no time I am also not that IT savvy. Ha

I remembered my first computer lesson in Dunman High and we had those floppy disks and soon had to save our assignments on Wordstar then Word Perfect 5.1 instead of hammering away at the two Brothers typewriter, the second one being more advanced you could actually delete before you type etc . ya go ahead LAUGH. BOY!!!! I am that ancient.

In time to come, I managed to persuade my parents for a computer. It was Datamini along with a noisy Epson dot-matrix printer. I kinda like the sound of the printing at times. By then, no more floppies but the square diskettes. Before I know it, I had to submit university assignments on those disks along with a bound Hardcopy research called THE FINAL YEAR PROJECT (FYP)-HR practices of Giordano??????. Frankly at that age 22??? I was more keen to find my life partner!!!! I was all for ROMANCE.

These days kids as young as pre-schoolers incorporate the computer in their everyday life. At 3, rachel started to help me start and shut down the computer, she's good at loading cds, dvds. Now she knows how to click "Internet Explorer" and then access the youtube or youku.com to watch cartoons and movies. My sister, 3 years younger belongs to the next generation where they submit university assignments online.

I still remembered in NTU, where during IT lessons, we were discussing "how one day computers will connect and control everything". Before that we need to login into As400 and program another computer's remote address to get the two or more computers to "Talk" to each other like MSN Messenger minus the emotion icons, sounds etc. The IT world had come a long way with indispensable Mircosoft systems and products and increasingly favoured APPLE applications.

I hate IT subjects!!! It's a miracle I passed the IT management and IT systems and design. They were so boring and without my gang of great male friends, I would definitely fail to graduate. Kudos to them for lending me their notes and explaining over coffee in layman's terms the many stuff that I don't quite understand. I was so much better in the law and literature subjects as usual. I love papers that required me to write on relentlessly and ask for more papers (I did, all the time) during the exams but tend to fair averagely for all the calculator required subjects and statistics...it kills!!!!

Yesterday I chanced upon this:

It's a fellow schoolmate Paparazzi shot of James Franco, my current favourite American actor, director, screenwriter, film producer, artist, and poet...etc sleeping in grad school Columbia University where he studying Masters in poetry amidst his hectic work schedule.


Isn't he cute...still oozing sex appeal when he did the shut eye half way in lecture. Boy...I slept in school all the time. I am often sitting under the ceiling fan (what air-con) and during afternoon lessons mostly chinese I would become a nodding donkey in no time.

It's no fun being a student. I remembered staying late till 3-4 am completing my assignments and then waking early to take the train from Aljunied MRT to Boon Lay and then bus 199???? to NTU for the 8am lesson. The journey was such a torture. I complained much until a brother in Christ, a medical student in the 80s, said he woke at 5am to take the bus from Bedok to NUS pre-MRT days.

Of course, nowadays, we have a much improved MRT network, the NEL line and the upcoming Circle line and best of all, most parents drive us to school, some are chauffeured in Lambourginis even. My mother would grumble much yet drive me all these years from primary school to university especially when i overslept.

I love the passenger seat so much that I never drive after getting my licence in my early 20s. God had blest me with so many faithful "chauffeurs"- mother, Angie, Melina, Wendy, my brothers, Deric, and many other kind hearted males in NTU plus taxi driver uncles, real estate and insurance agents, banker friends etc etc. So environmentally friendly, low carbon emission indeed!!!!

Sleeping in lecture. My most weird experience was having coffee in lecture hall one minute and the next waking up with all the people around me changed!!!!! I had slept through the 2 hour statistics lecture and the next lecture was in progress...some engineering stuff I think.Boy was I totally confused.

So c'mon, give poor Jimmy a break!!!! He's been working so hard post spiderman, Milk, Pineapple express, Howl and so on and I must say I really admire him for his artistic soul-painting, poetry, acting, directing, everything!!!!! He deserves to sleep well and look goodall the time. BTW, this incident happened last year and there are some who are still "condemning" the nap in class, anyway, he's human just like you and me and I know he will surely clinch his masters.


PS: If he is in my class, I will help him take notes ...I will let him have his much needed beauty sleeeep on my lap/ shoulder and kiss him awake when the lesson ends- all for a coffee date!!!!!

Secret passion.

I want to talk about having a passion in what we do. I mean, its true as my pastor had mentioned that the lowest form of work is when one does so for the $$$$$ and not liking any aspect of it. My dear friend is suffering at a post that paid her a whole lot but is robbing her of the joy and work-life balance that she needs like everyone else. Thankfully, she went back to one of her passion or hobbies - singing and already she feels more alive.

I think we all need an outlet to express ourselves and more so the creative types. For me, I love to sing my heart out, whether its worship songs or rock ballads or simply some romantic musical themes or even opera by Verdi, the Brindisi or the drinking song, just the music since its in italian!!!!! Recently, I helped Rachel learn to sing this totally meaningful song (original by Bette Midler) that makes your heart wanna melt.

The Rose Lyrics –WestLife

Some say love, it is a river that drowns the tender reed
Some say love, it is a razor that leaves your soul to bleed
Some say love, it is a hunger, an endless aching need
I say love, it is a flower and you its only seed

It’s the heart that fears the breaking,that never learns the dance
It’s the dream afraid of waking,that never takes the chance
It’s the one who won’t be taken, who cannot seem to give
And the soul afraid of dying, who never learns to live

When the night has been too lonely and the road has been too long
When you think that love is only for the lucky and for the strong
Just remember in the winter far beneath the bitter snows
Lies the seed that with the sun’s love
In the spring becomes the rose

Painting. I love to mix colours mostly acrylic and water-colours. Being a home-schooling mum means I get to draw and paint lots of pictures with rachel now 5. Recently, I encouraged her to freely draw and paint, exhibit and archive her works. She likes managing her own art and she loves it.

Today, I remembered myself as a pre-schooler, making my own string instrument with cardboards and so. My er-hu (ancient chinese instrument liken to a violin) playing grandfather was playing soulfully and had wanted me to try my hand at the old instrument. I shrieked and ran away because of the real snake skin drum that is at the base of the instrument. It was that awful terrifying diamond-pattern python that still gives me goosebumps.

Not many know, in fact, my husband and dearest friend Melina just came to know about this. Ha....my deepest (read most secret) passion is that of being a movie star. Not the celebrity type but the serious method type meaning portraying a certain character and so on. Apart from music, I do watch a lot of movies and often than not, I would re-enact the scenes as I suppose a film maker may, with different camera angle/perspective, another set of dialogue or even setting altogether. Sometimes I would immerse myself into the character that I am drawn to, be it male or female, so far never animal nor alien, vampires (ya that happened before..Hahaha), I pretty much enjoy the movies that i made in my mind. Entertainment.

I tend to do this when I am too excited or stimulated to sleep even after I had my usual thanksgiving prayer for the day, which by the time I lay down would be the wee hours of the morning. I tend to do this for lots of romantic films and period drama that i loved. I also questioned the choice of actors /actresses or music at times.

Sometimes, I wondered if I had not felt obligated to my parents or my church leaders, if I was allowed my free choice as young as a late teen, would I be the lingerie model, the singer, the actress, the musician that I always secretly wanted. As young as a teen, I fully understood what was expected of me, to study in the university and graduate quickly so as to help out with the family finances. As a youth leader, I was expected to lead by succeeding in academics. So, I did accountancy, worked as an auditor, and then plunged into insurance sales and banking sales when my heart is wanting to express my emotions all the time!!!!!

Now that I am a full time mother, home-maker and I home-school Rachel, 5. I am free to pursue the desires of my heart : music (violin), cooking, fine arts (drawing and painting), learning a foreign language (French) and writing which is the reason why i blog. Writing frees my mind and reading stirs my soul. When I read a good book, fictiton included, sometimes I see myself acting in the particular scene or directing others to do so.

It even shows in my dreams. Some of which are rather bizarre. This morning I dreamt I was in a construction site/pit full of gravel. I was watching the crane cut a huge beam foundation in the sky via laser that is computer-generated. The huge beam was steady but suddenly as it weakens, it fell straight onto the roof of some old church building. OMG!!!! There's ash and smoke as it crashed and smashed part of the old building. Next, I saw weird looking kids scrambling to get out, their skinny, pale bodies in old PJs and their squinting eyes against the sunlight, so full of fear and anxiety. It seemed that they had been held imprisoned in the attic of the old church building for years, judging by their appearances. Many were relieved yet fearful, unaccustomed to the whole new world outside. It's a world of freedom and much light. Thankfully none of them were hurt.

As i tried to stand up from the gravel pit, I stumbled a few times, I felt a knock not once but twice, a sharp pain on the head. It came from a loose granite piece or something like that had struck me on the head. OUCH!!!! I touched my head, fearing a deep gash but there was no blood just a rude awakening and seconds later I woke with Rachel still sleeping beside me on the bed. Yan had gone to work. What a dream.. i thought to myself. Its almost real with all the motion picture quality and sound effects. Any meaning????

Boring Birthday Blog

I've always been hyper excited about my birthdays. I love parties and being the centre of attention and attraction for that particular day and enjoy the company of so many friends along with good food and thoughtful gifts. Well.....not any more. After being married or more so after being a mother, I am more excited about pleasing my child and planning kid's parties. Early this year we had a Winx Club birthday party for Rachel complete with a set of pink fairy wings!!!!!!

I do have a few great birthday memories. I remembered the 21st birthday party at my first church and inviting so many of my university classmates. It was so evangelistic!!!!! I had a total of 54 gifts both great and small and most of them were soft toys which I've passed on to the Salvation Army over the next few years.

The best birthday I ever had was when Yan a close male buddy became God's birthday gift for me when I was 30. It was the best surprise that did not took me by surprise (read shock) and indeed the most romantic gift ever. HAHAHA.

Then at 32, I had my first birthday as a mother, holding Rachel who was 17 days old, also a January baby. I felt incredibly blest.

It was my 35th birthday when yan surprised me with a 80G ipod, (now outdated...hahaha), I love music and i really prefer my own type of music to relax and sleep with -mainly violin adagios, concertos and sonatas.

Yesterday, I turned 37. Yan had to work and I found myself beautifully decked out in matching patent fuchsia new Adidas bag and DKNY wedge sandals with a pink Guess top and nice make-up waiting rather impatiently for my darling rachel to leave the Paragon playground so I may do some shopping. Well, shopping I never had the chance to, since she was so active at the play area I was worried about her accidentally knocking some toddler down or getting into a fight with the rowdy boys etc. All unfounded fears of course!!!! She's pretty well behaved -most of the time, outside but at home, she can be very bossy and difficult to please.

Thankfully Yan was able to take over the parenting in the evening so I could finally relax and enjoy a meal with my most faithful friend Melina. Over the past decade, God had cemented our friendship and given us plenty of opportunites to update each other often, the workings of our loving Father in heaven in our otherwise mundane lives. Needless to say, we've been encouraged and inspired in our own ways.

The night ended with a scenic bus ride home and I enjoyed the bright lights, the huge advertisements, the all too important brands spicing up my beloved Orchard Road where since I was a teenage, I had spent most of my weekends SHOPPING. I want to live in Orchard Road Lord, i prayed. Unlike my sister who prefer the suburbs, I pretty much enjoy the city's shopping district at a stone's throw away. Most of the residential areas are private and exclusive anyway.

As i lay to sleep at night, i thank God, I often do, for the ordinary birthday. Yes, for blessing me with a great and beautiful kid, a loving and supportive husband and best friend and a dear friend Melina who had known me for a decade, seen me falling in and out of "love", date my best male buddy, married and have Rachel, pick up the violin and so on.

God is the constant companion in my life and I believe in time to come, I will celebrate my birthday in the comfort of a home complete with a lap pool and a garden. We will play the piano and violins and be a patron of the arts. Nothing is impossible with God I know, I always feel that my life is classical music related and I say YES and OUI to the steinway grand and the many antique violins that I will loan out to cutting edge classical performers: Genuine makes and copies of italian violin masters included.

God is GREAT and greatly to be praised. AMEN.

Spidey Trilogy

Hahaha....I just bought and watched the spiderman movies.

Well, I don't really know if I am a superhero fan but I certainly remembered watching Superman movies with my mum, the part where the movie fast rewinded was stuck in my young mind just like the movie Jaws haunted me for life....I actually feared sharks when my canoe capsizes during PE lesson in college. Then there were the super heros cartoons that I watched with my siblings and years later wondered how on earth we understood the "Meanwhile" when we were not yet in kindergarten.

Superman, Batman, Spiderman, Robin, Cat woman, Hawk Girl, ha...Flash Gordon (kinda like him last time) etc...the Joker (only the late Heath ledger version). Superheros abound. Superman wears a red cape sans mask with red underwear (awful lot of material) Batman...I love his mask which reveals the squarish jawline (Michael Keaton's my favourite) and the small but well proportioned Spidey....Rachel's favourite whose mask covers everything. I love the black suit..."it feels good!" Well, if I had to choose I think I am drawn to the Dark Knight especially the nippled suits....HAHAHAHA.

In 2002 I was enthralled by the "computer generated" Spiderman movie. It's so amazing and I truly feel sorry for the nerdy, small-framed Peter Parker who had no parents. I was not keen to watch it but did so at the insistent request of a then close male friend, a spidey fan. He's married to another friend and was crazy enough to named his son Tobey which he mentioned during the show that he would if he had a son in the future. And my tall and big sized friend actually teared at the movies when spiderman cries, afterall, he did mentioned that he identifies strongly with the superhero: being bullied at school??? nerdy??? i believe its likely the low self-esteem, lack of confidence part. Well, I chose not to probe further.

Because I know the "power" that i sometimes have with guys, being able to help them open up and be in touch with their soul, their feelings especially I did quite a lot of counselling of youth in the past and my genuine empathy for others, I tend to be careful about "ministering to male friends" because a few actually wanted to be my boyfriends after that and things gets messy, I had to end the friendships because I don't like to think I gave them the wrong ideas or started it and the guys gets hurt etc etc etc. My fault...etc etc etc

So the minute I sensed whichever male friend had an "hidden" agenda or was keen to pursue me, my built in antenna cautions me and I normally FLEE.......or turned colder towards that person, a self-protection measure. I became less interested in the friendship........guess i just like to hang out with boys per se being the rose among the thorns but when the platonic relationship turns romantic, its kinda of risky and threatening, though the naughty part of me like to see the guys fight over me, which happened in college. HAHAHA and you wondered why on earth do they need to jostle for my attention, or fight for my friendship???? love???????????????OH PLS...........Come on...we are all friends!!!!! Two guys plus me...perfect combi!!!!!HAHAHA

I love the spiderman trilogy story which appeals to most audiences both the young and the old. General themes like good verus evil, revenge verus forgiveness and especially Peter Parker's guardians the old couple that often dishes out wise advices for our young spidey. What I was unprepared for was the sequels that followed. The development of the love triangle between Peter, Harry and Mary Jane (an image of Crocs shoes just flashed before my eyes). There is so much crying in these 3 movies that if I should ever watch them all three in one sitting I think I may have to prepare a box of Kleenex !!!!!What I don't understand is that even the bad guys need to cry. Sandman.................HAHAHAHAHA.

Was the script written by a woman??? or a super sensitive SNAG???Or gay??? Actually does it matter??? Its pretty good sequels we are watching aren't we? Though i prefer the edit the Sandman asking for forgiveness with tears in his hard looking very weathered face. Isn't he dead forever after both Harry and Spiderman joined forces to destroy him via those cute flying twin bladed explosive "Pokemon balls"????????? Why is Sandman so indestructible??? Invincible???

Finally, I took a piece of paper, actually two and drew both the original and black spiderman masks. On the original red mask, we had the words GOOD SPIDEY and brainstormed with 5 year old rachel the qualities that made Peter Parker a good spiderman. She actually said "kind, gentle, hero..."Of course I added "respect for others, polite, caring etc" And on the reverse side, the black mask with the caption BAD SPIDEY we placed words like "proud, aggressive, angry, vengeful, destroys, selfish, rude, evil etc" My kid like those of many young ones I had taught before in Sunday school years back loved and aspire to be GOOD superheros. Children naturally responds to goodness, kindness, gentleness and love.

Wow........enough said.

A year of abundance it will be.

WOW.....i started this year with a shopping trip to KL via Airasia. It's great that the airborne journey was too short for us to feel any discomfort. I love the feeling of being above the clouds once again and was glad that Rachel enjoyed her virgin flight without any fuss.

I am not particularly fond of Malaysia. I never was. But after all the bargain hunting at KLCC and my all time favourite Pavilion (think ION + VIVOCITY), I must admit that I will make it a point to return to Malaysia during the YES season- (Year End Sale). Who can resist quality brands at 60-70% sale even though its previous season. Many purchases like wallets, bags and certain shoes are timeless classics.

This trip is also extra special due to Yan's friends having a primary school reunion. ( I don't bother with such things. I can't remember my ex-classmates and will not want to remember any teachers anyway. Also most of my schools were long demolished.) So Anna, his friend Nazir's wife and kid Aryssa,7-8 brought us boutique shopping. To me, Anna is a socialite mum since she appeared often in Malaysia Tatler and Prestige, doesn't need to do any chores and cooking and spends time chauffeuring her precious little princess for school and classes while attending as many social event invites as she possibly could. She's very likeable, speaks very well and does not have much "atas" airs about her.

Rachel enjoys spending time with Aryssa be it in the Play and Learn section of Pavilion, the Lego Free play inside KLCC Isetan or just playing on the various ottomans and luxurious seats in the various boutiques. This is also the first time Rachel get to see her Malaysian cousin, Aerin, 3 who shocked us with her loud shrills and screams when she gets over-excited about balloons, tunnels and whatever.

Thankfully we gatecrashed and planned a "fun party" with jelly cakes (Aerin's Mickey mouse and Rachel's a pink teddy) at a relative's place complete with party hats, plates, cutlery and balloons.It was Rachel's 5th birthday and soon to be Aerin's 3rd. Otherwise, that precious time-wasting journey and visit was quite boring with plenty of elderly who get very active during meals and then they glued themselves to the chairs like in the old folks home-totally inactive, unmoving and breathing slowly as they digest their meals. I felt weird when as a guest, the "host' immediates takes the plates or cups from my hand and washes them vigorously whereas over here in Singapore we tend to leave things in the sink and wash (or put in the dish washer) the dirted dishes after the guests are long gone.

Back to the shopping. The first thing I bought was a pair of Swaroski studded star-shaped DIOR earrings for my sister. Her birthday 07 Feb is coming and this year she has a new chinese name Ying Ying which sounded so nice. I bought a pair of DKNY shoes for Chinese New Year along with a deep purple dress Naf Naf (RM$64) the same costing S$153 at Parkway. A coach chocolate patent leather wallet (more a card holder) and plenty of others. Without the sale, I believe these items will costs less in Singapore due to the strengthening of the Sing dollar.

This morning, my violin lesson had me trying out some 15 plus bows. I really need one good non chinese bow since my current bow is warped. I have yet make a decision. This is my third year learning the instrument and I really would like to upgrade the bow to match the now well played Maggini copy.

2010 is going to be a good year. I can feel it already. I pray it will be full of music and music related practices, concerts, performances, dvds, cds, instruments, accessories, lessons etc Since late last year Rachel had been using Primary one study material on the home-schooling front and I believe we will travel much to buy. buy. buy and dine dine dine. We are also trusting God concerning our lease renewal or getting alternative place on our own. Well, God's unmerited favour in upon us and we will surely be blessed in every way. Thank you Lord Jesus. A year of abundance 2010 will certainly be.