'Slowly, Miggy paddled my way towards the starting line. It was a sub-foggy afternoon, and the race was just about to begin. He was determined to put in his all, even if it was at the loosing stake, but was wondering if racing through the fog with the
New Tiger was a good idea.
' "Just get ready for anything," he said to his partner, Hao Qing. "You never know what happens in this kind of wheather."
'He then turned around to check if everything was alright at the stern, only to find in shock that Hao Qing was... gone.
' "Hao Qing? That's odd. I'm sure I would have felt it if he went overboard."
'Just then, another canoe was heading towards the
New Tiger.
' "Erm, hello there!" Miguel stammered. "I... I'm looking for my partner. You see, our event's almost starting soon, and we..."
'His explainaton suddenly seized into a mummur when the boat was close enough to see the paddler's face. To Raemi's surprize, the paddler aboard the K1 was none other than...
'...Zeng Rong.'
' "Zeng Rong? What are
you doing here in the middle of Bedok? Shouldn't you be in school?"
'Zeng Rong just kept his eyes on him, holding his boat still despite the medium waves.
' "Bye, Mig," he finally said in a straigt face, and with a swack of his paddle, he sent Mig into the water, along with a few fragments of the
New Tiger's frontman's cockpit. Down to the depts of Bedok he sunk to. For some odd reason, the lifejack he was wearing had no effect to his drowning. Paralised from the whack in the abdomen, Raemi continued drowning motionlessly. He kept his eyes towards the surface, watching the shadow of two vessels partially blocking out the sunlight.
'And just as he was about to reach the waterbed,...
GHAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!! *pant**pant**pant**pant**pant**sigh* Yes, that was a re-enactment of the first part of the nightmare I had last night. At least in the second part (when I went back to sleep), Hao Qing rescued me or something like that and for some reason, ZRong gave me a treat at a nearby FairPrice to make up for me being DQed (disqualified) at the competition for unattendance.
I know, dreams tend to be weird.
But then after waking up for the last time of the day, I went to eat a simple breakfast, cleaned up and packed my bag for the day's activities. I had a Canoeing Training, a Nanyang Funfair and an ex-Classmate's Concert to attend to, so I planned out my route, and so the original plan was to go to Nanyang straight after training, then from Nanyang head for the Singapore Conference Hall for the concert.
I packed clothes, a towel, a plastic bag and a street directory (just in case for SCH) into my slingbag, and headed off for training. During the ride to Kallang, Dad was trying to convince me not to put my 100% in my racing as it'll be bad for me. Hmm, somethin tells me he had a bad encounter with a race(s) in his past - this isn't the first time he's spoken about this, and I doubt it'll be the last...
Once at Kallang, I went to do some chin-ups along with the others while we were waiting for the rest of the team to arrive. That meant only enough time for me to do a 5-14. Ah, well. Once called out to get the boats down onto the water, we all rushed to the sheds to fetch/assemble/launch our boats. Hao Qing and I had permission from Mr. Goh to switch boats with Michael and Shaun, so we had a spin with StingRay for today! (Yay!)
Once on water, we did usual sets (which I've promissed to keep secret since the time I joined canoeing, heh) and just to cut things short today was the first time I capsized out at Kallang! Haha, yayz! After a couple of weeks out here, today's the first time! But the reason for capsizing was because the military speedboats were racing beside our lanes, and thus giving many of the boats present today a hard time tacking the backwash.
(But here's a good secret for those who don't know much about canoeing, sailing, shipping, coxing and physics; the best way to tackle a humongous wave [For a canoe, 'humongous wave' can mean waves the height of your hull above sea level and above] is to face your bow right through the wave. The best way to feel the wraft of waves and strain your stomach muscles to the hardest just to keep your balance, though, is if you face either side of your hull towards the wave. These statements are as demonstrated as by the diagram;)
Yup. So much for preparations for NDP by the military. This also brings me to another advantage of training at Kallang - you get a headstart on what's going to happen at NDP. And I must say, seeing so many giant balloons flying across the waters is rather... odd, for a season like this.
After training, we paddled towards the National Stadium Park, which we invaded and docked our boats along the shore. We then sat along the park and Mr. Goh gave us a relaxed debriefing on the spot. Man, debriefing never felt so... calm. It's an interesting twist to suddenly have a different terrain for a debrief, especially a park we just invaded simply by paddling there.
When we were done, we got our boats back onto the water and paddled back to the Sports Centre to pack up, of which Hao Qing had to stay back along with many of the Juniors and Leon for the 1-Star Test. When the boats were packed, I went to the showers to change into clothes for the rest of the day.
I did the usual proceedure of having a first rinse before taking off my clothes and having another rinse before drying up and putting on the dry clothes. But when I was done showering, I realised that I brought my French multi-pocket long pants. That doesn't seem much, but actually, it is. You see, those pair of pants are actually the right height, but the wrong waist length. So wrong, it feels as if I just slimed down. So much more wrong, that a simple tug and my undergarment would be in the line of fire, if you know what I mean.
In other words, I FORGOT TO BRING MY BELT!!! At first, I was somewhat panicky, but then I calmed down and searched for ways to substitude a belt. In the end, I simply took out my wallet, unchained the wallet chain, slung it acroos my wait and buckled it together. There - a nice belt to survive the rest of the day. Praise the Lord.
I walked out of the shower, thankful to God that the pants haven't slipped off yet. A good achievement, and I'll just have to sustain it for the rest of the day. Winston waited for me, and we both walked to the bus stop to wait for the 67 along with Joshua Tan. (For those who might not know, there's a difference between Joshua Tan and Toj.) Once onboard the bus, I lent my MP3 to Winston so as to keep him from bugging me while I try to search for a route from Nanyang to Shenton Way.
Once at Coronaton Plaza, we made a walk to the old school we both shared in common. Nanyang. Yes, it was still there, and with her clocktower still standing up and proper (and with the clock face finally de-rusted). But this time, there were major-event tents on the basketbal field and the courtyard. The funfair was taken seriously, I guess.
We went in and looked around. My, the place has been turned into a fish market! The entire area was all filled with stalls providing games, toys, souveniers and refreshents. They even had a section to dunk Mr. Ting! I'm amazed at his present level of stooping down.
While I was walking around trying to locate teachers that I knew here and there, Winston was trying his best to drag me along to Mrs. Lee (who apparently appears depressed now these days) and so I was tossed around and pushed and slapped and rammed at towards her direction. The more he tackled, the more I wondered to myself if this was really what Nanyang was all about. If it was, then I din't really think coming back had any value at all. But in good time, I persisted far enough till he gave up.
And at the same time, I was thrown by momentum towards the Monkey Bars. Ah, good memories. But before I could reach the bars to do one of the things I did (and still do) the best, I was dragged again by Winston do walk around more and search for more teachers.
To cut the story shorter again, I guess I made him loose my tail and I finally got personal with the bars. I climbed up and sat on top of the monkey bars, watching from up there the entire carnival at a peak. But then I was soon to be interupted by Winston trying to untie my shoelaces and yanking my shoes off so he could place them somewhere else onto he bars, of which I could easily swing myself to position at and wear my shoes still suspended above the ground. (I guess this is where I got my sense of balance for canoeing from...)
By now, we were being joined by Kevin and Joshua Au. We went aroud for another hour or so and explored more of the terrain before ditching each other, and whne it was my turn to get ditched, I decided to go up to visit 6A again, just to see how the classroom has changed. It hasn't changed much, I guess, but nevertheless not what I left it as.
The lockers now depend on padlocks, instead of the good ol' method of personal keys. Then the shelves were re-arranged at the back of the class, a lot different to the old 'library' arrangement my time left it as. The projector isn't kept in the large cupboard, which I assume now contains new contents, and for a unneccessary detail which I just want to state to bring back good memories, the 'Snow and Jelly' sign has been rubbed off.
Ah, 'Snow and Jelly'. For those unknown to this culture, 'Snow and Jelly' was basically just 'Show and Tell', just that someone rubbed off H's stem, added a curve below the T and an extra Y at the back. This sabotage started off a wave to refer to Show and Tell as Snow and Jelly. And soon, it was classified by the class as a 'reality show', where people display their items in a hilarious way via the choice of The Dip.
When finished observing, I checked my watch and found it to be 1pm. Not intending to spend the rest of the afternoon rotting away without good entertainment, I decided I'd take my leave and go home to rest. Once at home, I got to the papers and read a few artcles on the papers.
Choppy also came out of her room and gave me my Japan present. A pair of fake spect! Aww, she made the effort! Doesn't matter if it wasn't too accurate a gift, but it's just as good enough a symbol to represent that my elder sister loves me! Thanks, Chopp!
After bathing, I realised that my tution teacher sent me a message asking me if I could make it today at 3.30pm for tution. I checked my watch. It was almost 3. It would be good to do my tution today so I could make up for yesterday. So I quickly replied back that the proposed make-up was acceptable, then went to my room to prepare it for tution.
She came, and we did a usually-interesting lesson. She asked me if there was any particular event at my school yesterday, after overhearing from my maid that I went to school in casual clothing. I explained to her that it was my school's Youth Day celebration, and that we were permitted (and by some teachers, commanded) to wear casual.
So she continued the conversation by asking what we did for the celebrations, which I replied with 'watching a movie'. On asking which movie it was, I told her it was 'Happy Feet'. She then asked me to give her the main plot of the movie since she, altough heard of the movie, hasn't seen it yet. And thankfully, I was able to do all that with 85% of the conversation being Chinese!
After reading through a new chapter in my textbook and workbook, we finished at around 4.35, which gave me about an hour before I was suppose to leave for the bus stop to take a 75 to the Conference Hall. But a few momments after that, Nick Fung called and informed me that car transportation was available by Stanley, so I agreed to the 6.20 arrangement.
And that makes an hour and 40 minutes.
I then decided I should listen to a sermon to use the time, since the wireless in my house was appparently unstable at the momment. Getting my MP3 out, I flicked my way through the 'Sermon' folders and found one about Fresh Starts.
It was about the story on Ruth, and it was revieling a few truths here and there. For those who do not know the story of Ruth, well I'll give you a brief background about the story. The book of Ruth is the eight book int he Bible (heh, eight. The number of Renewal), and so let me share the things that can be found in Ruth. The sermom's rather long, so since it's 4 chapters long, I'll try to divide the sermon into three days (Chapt 1-2, 3 and 4). Here's Chapter 1 and 2;
Story
(Explainations)
[Message]
Chapter 1
Once upon a time, there was a man named Elimelech, whose wife was Naomi and his two sons were Mahlon and Chilion. (Here's something for non-Hebrew speaking people: Elimelech means 'My God is King', and Naomi means 'Pleasant'. How sweet - My God is King, and He's maried to Pleasance. Something odd, though, is that Mahlon means 'Sickness' and that Chilion means 'Dieing'. I mean, what kind of mom or dad would call their son 'Sickness'? Sheesh.) They were a happy family, and had a good life in downtown Bethlehem, Judah. ('Bethlehem' = 'House of Bread') But one day, there was a famine in the land.
(Here's something I'll have to explain as well. See, God does not send famines, persay. So what was that just now? Well, take note of this: whenever you see the phrase 'The Lord send a ______(Insert suffering, e.g. famine), always remember that if you look at it from the Hebrew translation (the original language the Old Testament was written in), the phrase is not in a causative tense, but a permisive tense. What chim terminology? Let me explain; Permisive tense (if that's really how you spell it) is, let's say, you give me a book AND I allow you to give it to me.
(Now for Bethlehem's case, this story was during the time of the Judges. And if you read the last verse of the book of Judges (the book before Ruth), you'd see that 'In those days Israel had no king; everyone did as he saw fit.' (NIV) This meant that if they felt like murder was necesary, they did it; if they felt that sex was necesary, they did it; if they felt that robbery was necesary, they did it; and so on and so forth. They didn't want what appeared to be an inverted-comma's God's instructions to be enforced in their lives, as they felt that His judgements were wrong.
(And so it is reasonable to assume that Bethlehem was also int he rebelion against God. Now, if you look through the Bible, you'd find that [Rejecting God] = [Voting for satan]. Thus, when Bethlehem said they didn't want God, they'd also be saying that they wanted to trust the ways of the world, that is, the devil's lies.) So God being a just and fair God has no choice but to obide to Bethlehem's request and stop protecting the land, causing the great famine.)
[And so we come to one point in the sermon: God only forsakes you when you reject Him. So don't do it. But don't get the wrong picture. If you're facing a rough situation that seems unbearable, you should know for yourself if you're facing away from God. If you didn't and had always been trusting Him, then it's probaby because God has something better for you than what He took away. ('Ah Seng had to loose his job as a massage parlor shopkeeper, so that he would - later in the future - become the Vice-Chairman of Product Design for OSIM.' Not true story, but you get what I'm trying to say, right?)
[And if you feel like as if there are thoughts in your mind that somehow try to convince you to reject God, just stay calm and rebuke those thoughts; the mind can be at times influenced by the distractions of the devil, but only you (along with God) can have control of your heart.]
And so they went to live for a while in the country of Moab. (If you read through the Bible again, Moab has always been enemies with Israel. Even till this day {Moab then is now Jordan}) But during their stay there, Elimelech died. So his sons married Moabite women, one named Orpah (Another weird case: Orpah means 'Stiff Neck') and the other Ruth. (Yay! Main character is finally here!) After they had lived there about ten years, both Mahlon and Kilion also died, and Naomi was left without her two sons and her husband. [Well, so much for calling their sons Sickness and Dieing...]
[Ah, good. This brings me to another point. Later in the story, Naomi would also say the lines, "I went away full, but the Lord has brought me back empty." Well, if you were already full, why'd you leave in the first place? Another thing to learn from this story is that you must always stay where God places you at.
[If you know very well that God purposely placed you where you are - be it a situation, a position, a location or a relationship - DO NOT leave that place. Even Jonah suffered the wraft of fish digestive acids when he didn't go where God told him to go (Instead of going to Nineveh to preach, he went to Spain to run away, only to be stopped halfway through the journey. But that's another story altogether...)
[But don't get the wrong picture again: God isn't threatening you to stay still. Instead, He is just warning you to stay safe at where He left you. You see, God knows best. This applies to all situations and senarios. And he wants you to enjoy the best. So when he places you somewhere, there are two possible things that will happen when you move away;
[1. You'll just miss out on the blessing, and might realise what you've missed out on later in due time, or maybe not even realise it at all. Or 2. You'll be put to risk of a danger, the danger not limited to rationing but nevertheless a danger.
[God will protect you the best when you stay where He wants you to be. For Naomi's case, her family was originally staying at Bethlehem, which as I've said earlier means 'House of Bread'. God made many promises to Bethlehem in the past, present and future about Him protecting the city no matter what.
[And 'no matter what' should include droughts.
[Unfortunately, Naomi's family decided to leave God's promised land when things started to look very dry, and ende up at Moab. Now, Moab had to appear much more successful than Bethlehem in order to convince Naomi and her family to move there. Understand that Samson wouldn't have gone after Delilah if Delilah was ugly. So in the same way, the Elimelech family must had fallen for Moab's profound appearance in order to decided to migrate there.
[Do not be decieved by what looks 'better'. Just stay where you are if God wants you to stay where you are. You would know if God wants you there or not - He always reaches the heart. So don't be afraid to hold on in the harsh times that may come, 'cause they'll eventually go away.
[And besides, it may sometimes take years before the great blessing(s) that God's got in store for you take action. It took Joseph many years before he realised that the event of him being sent to Egypt as a slave by his brothers was all in line with God's plan to make him Second-in-Command of the whole of Egypt, so as to save multitudes from severe drought.
[So to repeat, whenever you're certain that God's placed you at the place where He wants you to be - even if it appears to be the worst choice at first - NEVER leave that place. A blessing may just happen to be right behind you...]
Naomi later found out from others that God was back protecting Bethlehem and was providing His people with food. Thus, Naomi and her daughters-in-law prepared to migrate back home.
Then in the middle of the trip, Naomi turned to her two daughters-in-law and said, "Shoo, each of you, to your mom's home. May the Lord show kindness to y'all, just like how you've shown to your dead husbands and me. May the Lord see to it that you'll have refuge with a new husband."
She then kissed them, and they both wept aloud and said to her, "We will follow you!"
But Naomi said, "Go home, daughters-of-grace. Why'd you want to come with me? Will I get anymore kids that you can marry? I'm waaaay too old to have another husband. Even if I had a hubby tonight and then get twins, would you wait until they're man enough to marry you? Would you remain unmarried for them? No, girls. It's more bitter for me than for you, because the Lord's hand has gone out against me!"
[Look here, and you'll see that Naomi still thinks that God is against her because she missed out on the goodness of God. But she doesn't realise that it's also the goodness of God that brought her back to God. And she also doesn't know that she'll be part of a masterplan God had in store - she was soon in many many many years' time to be the ansestor of Jesus.]
At this, the ladies wept again. Then Orpah kissed her mother-in-law goodbye, but Ruth clung to her.
"Look, Ruth," said Naomi, "Orpah's going back to her people and her gods. Go back with her."
But Ruth replied, "No! I don't want to leave you! *sobsob* Where you go, I'll go! Where you stay, I'll stay! Your girls' night out will be my kinda jazz, and your God my God! Where you die I'll die, and there I will be buried. May the Lord deal with me, be it ever so severely, if anything but death separates you and me. (Sounds familiar? "Till death do us part..." Yeah, it originated from here.) When Naomi realized that Ruth was determined to go with her, she stopped urging.
So the two women went on until they came to Bethlehem. When they arrived in Bethlehem, the whole town was stirred because of them, and they asked, "Can this be Naomi?"
"I ain't no Naomi!" she told them. "The name's Mara, because the Almighty has made my life very bitter. (Another intro: Mara means 'Bitter'. So she actually said something like, "I'm not Pleasant anymore! I'm Bitter!") I went away full, but the Lord has brought me back empty. Why call me Naomi? The Lord Almighty has brought misfortune upon me. Y'know what I saying?"
[Like I said, God does not bring misfortune upon you. You placed it on yourself in the first place. All He tries to do is save you from the misfortune, and what do you do? Run away. Just like the first point, never run away from where God has placed you, 'cause you never know what He's trying to save you from.]
Apparently, Naomi and Ruth came back at around the same period as the beginning of the barley harvesting period, and so Ruth asked her mom-in-law weather she could go out and glean. (To collect the grains that the harvesters had dropped or left behind. This act is just as good as scavenging, and harvesters are usually keen to make sure they don't drop anything and let their profits go into their hands. So take note that Ruth was poor and a non-Jew, so she wasn't even qualified to become a harvester.) Naomi agreed, and so she went out and began to glean in the fields behind the harvesters.
Chapter 2
Now, Naomi had a relative on her husband's side, a very rich and influential man, whose name was Boaz. And it so much as turned out, she found herself working in a field belonging to Boaz. (In the Old King James Version, it says that it was her 'hap' that she was at Boaz's field. 'Hap' is old-English for, if converted to modern-English, 'happening'. Thus here, we can see that when things happen the way you like them to happen, you become happy! (yes, this was where the word came from) And happy are those who obey God's instructions! (Now, doesn't that sound a lot like a set of verses somewhere...)] Around that time, Boaz arrived from Bethlehem.
(Now, as you'll discover later in the story, Boaz is suppose to be the kindsman-redeemer of Naomi's family. What's a kindsman-redeemer? Well, the kindsman-redeemer is the person in the family that inherits any of the following roles;
(a. When the elder brother/relative is murdered, this guy would avenge his death,
(b. When the elder brother/relative sells away a property for aid of finaces, this guy can buy it back for him from the guy who purchased it from the brother/relative, or more importantly to the story,
(b. When the elder brother/relative died married, this guy marries the widow.
[Now, this reflects a lot about Jesus' role in Him paying the price for our freedom. For now, let's focus on the second use of the kindsman. Jesus wanted to help God purchase Man from sin. So what does he do? He acts as our kindsman redeemer. But shouldn't there be standards to meet to qualify to be a kindsman-redeemer? Well, there were. But even better, Jesus satisfied them all! Let's look through the requirements;
(1. He must have the tradable item(s) with him. (i.e. He's rich)) [Of course Jesus is rich! rich enough to buy you from the devil! Jesus has a rich Dad, and through Him so do we!]
(2. He must be related.) [Of course He's related! He was born as a man, so He now has a family relationship wit all of us as well!]
(3. He must be willing.) [Of course He was willing! He streched out His hands to show how much He loved us, and then died there on the cross to settle the debt.]
[So he does satisfy all the conditions! Well, just keep in mind the thought that Boaz represents Jesus for the rest of the story...]
"The Lord be with you, lads!" he greeted his employees.
"May the Lord bless you, boss!" they called back.
Boaz then looked around his field and saw Ruth, so he asked the I.C. of his harvesters, "Wow dude, who's that young lady?"
The foreman replied, "That chick is the Moabitess who came from Moab along with Naomi. She asked if we could let her glean and gather among the sheaves behind the harvesters. Man, she's been working in the field from morning till now. Well, except for a short rest in the shelter, but that's besides the point - she's a tough worker!"
So Boaz went down to Ruth and said to her, "Hey, girl. Listen to me; Don't go and glean in another field away from here. Stay here with my servant girls, watch the field where the men are harvesting, and follow along after the girls. Don't worry 'bout the men, I've warned them not to molest you. And if you need refreshments, go and drop by the water jars the men have filled."
At this, she bowed down with her face to the ground. She stammered, "Erm, Mr. Boaz, sir, why're you so kind to me? I mean, you don't even know me!" (Don't forget, she still doesn't know that they're related by marrige, but Boaz does.)
Boaz replied, "I've heard all about what you've done for your mom-in-law since your husband's death, how you left your real dad and mom and your homeland and came to live with us new guys. May the Lord repay you for what you've done! May you be richly rewarded by the Lord, the God of Israel, under whose wings you have come to take refuge."
[Another point: God is seriously closer than you think! I know you've probably heard this many times, but it's really true! It's just that people these days don't seem to realise how close God is. Society has manipulated the way people se God as, such as religeon.
[Let me remind you that being a Christian is not joining a boring religeon, but rather engaging in an adventurous relationship. But religeon has somehow made it look as if serving God is 100% a duty, inclusive only of greatly diluted enjoyment.
[The popular concept I usually come across with is that 'we should all prevent ourselves from sinning. We must not pressure God withour bad ways and so we should cleanse ourselves before we come to His presence, and make sure we stay clean while in His presence. Whenever we commit a sin, we should ask for another forgiveness.'
[Ya-di-da-di-dah! For one thing, God already knew we can't stop sinning by ourselves. The moment Adam and Eve ate the wrong fruit, earth - along with man - had become the property of satan. And as long as man did something wrong in the eyes of the Lord, satan had every right to punish man.
[And the only way to avoid the judgement at that time was to follow guidelines to help you not do things wrong in the eyes of the Lord (a.k.a. the Laws, or the Commandments). And if you couldn't follow the guidelines, which God knew you couldn't, then you'd have to be forgiven by God. How? Give a sacrifice. In summary, the sacrifice process is as follows;
[The sinner searches for a sacrifice, as according to his sin. When he finds the animal, he searches for defects. No defects? then he brings the sacrifice to the priest, who examines the animal carefully and searches for defects. No defects? Then he brings the animal into the Holy of Holies, where he kills the animal, probably by using the method of piunishment the man was suppose to recieve but more severe, and burns it in the alter's fire. In other words, the sacrifice gets the heat at expense of the sinner, thus he gets forgiven.
[But God didn't want to watch His creations suffer through these tidious processes. In fact, the original blueprints for earth was to be a Eutopia for mankind, where man did not have to labour or anything and could have direct contact with God. So what does He do? He sends His Son down to earth and uses Him as a perfect sacrifice.
[He was observed by the world around Him and was certified to be sin-proof. Later in life, He was sent to the high priests and examined by them carefully, so they could search for something to blame Him with, only to be able to find reason to blame Him by using lies. And there on the cross, He was crucified. And if you analyse the Bible closely, He actually went to hell after His death to be tortured for every sin man commited in the past, the present and the future.
[In other words, He died at your expense, so you could be forgiven for EVERYTHING! From that first lie you made when you were 2 years-old, to that credit card you stole from your co-league at 53. EVERYTHING was forgiven for! And now that the entire dept has been paid, He just wants you to enjoy life from now on! No need to repay Him with anything - it was all based on unconditional love!
[That's what grace means! God's Righteous At Christ's Expense!
[But many people have developed the theory that we should repay Him somehow. Maybe by being whipped, maybe by being caned, maybe sickness, maybe iron thorns, maybe excesive praying, maybe even getting yourself nailed on another cross. Hello? I mean, that's just stupid in my opinion.
[You want to know what'll please God? Enjoy the life He gives you. Yeah, that's the basics - just enjoy whatever He lays in front of you and keep enjoying His prosperities and peace. But like I've mentioned int he first two points, stay where you are if God has placed you there. You'll know if God placed you there, as God'll lead you there personally using your heart. But if you leave the place, He might not be able to loop His way through your life so as to catch you and get the blessing to you.
[But first things first, you have to trust Him with your life first before He can start work on it. You can't have a construction team to renovate your house unless you give them the house first. In the same way, God can only work in your life unless you allow Him to.
[Sometimes, this could mean saying prayers that sound lame or something, but it'll take time to get use to I guess. I also pray for my training programmes too, and at first I'd wonder to myself on why God would be bothered about a simple friendly race that isn't event he real thing yet. But now, I've come to realise that I shouldn't limit God's abilities. He's God, and He loves me, and anything which I'll concider as a miracle blessing -whether it be beating the Mosquito or gearing up on my grades - He can and will do, just as long as I say the magic words.
[No, not 'Please?'. In fact, it's 'Thank you!'. Why? Because God already prepared the package and is just holding it infront of me, and all I have to do is just acknowledge that I know it's there and that God will give it to me. It's a lot like Messenger, when a convo with God suddenly says;
[Blessings - Accept. Reject.
[And all I have to do is just click on 'Accept'. Just so simple. But sadly, people sometimes make it seen complex.]
"May I continue to find favor in your eyes, boss," she said. "You've given me comfort and have spoken kindly to your servant, though I don't have the quality of any of your servant girls."
[In scale to Ruth, always remind yourself how deep in sin you were before you met God, all you Christians out there. Never say things like, "Oh, I wasn't that bad a sinner." Truth is, you we're that bad a sinner, and you're still sinning time after time. Those high-quality deeds/actions you've done aren't yours, but rather God's, as through Him we can accomplish all things.
[I also remind myself of where I came from. (Friends from ACS(I) may not be able to imagine a perverted and angry Miggy, but believe me there was once a time before I finally got to meet God. But I'll share this story another time.) Then I see where I am right now - the status reputation I've been declared with, the responsibilities I'm trusted with, the priveleges I'm provided with - and I turn it all straight back to God and praise Him for all that He's changed in my life.
[And also remember that God loves to give generously, like I've said earlier. And don't tell me things like, "Oh, but God also demands this this this, and that that that, and..." Even if He wants us to help Him get something, He'll first give us whatever we need to do so!]
At mealtime, Boaz said to her, "Yo, c'mon 'ere and have some bread! On the house! Ooo, and try the dip! It's wine vinegar!" When she sat down with the harvesters, he offered her some roasted grain. She ate all she wanted and had some left over. As she got up to glean, Boaz gave orders to his men, "Let her gather among the sheaves, and don't even try to stop her. Instead, just pull out some stalks from your bundles and leave them for her to pick up, and don't you dare rebuke her."
[See, He loves to give you blessings! And Ruth could just go and say, "See? I got so much!", but no, the reason why she got so much was because Boaz made the grains drop on purpose. Just keep on getting getting, and getting getting, and getting getting...]
So Ruth kept gleaning until evening, and when she had beaten it all out, she found it to have tallied to a whoopin' 10 kilos. She carried it back to town, and her mother-in-law saw how much she had gathered. Ruth also brought out the leftover of what she 'tah-pao'ed ('take-away'ed) from her meal with Boaz and his employees and gave it to her.
Her mother-in-law asked her, "Where'd you get all this from?! God bless the man who took notice of you!"
Then Ruth told her mother-in-law, "His name's Boaz."
"The Lord bless hi...wait a minute. Who again?"
"Bo... Boaz."
"Boaz?"
"Yeah, Boaz. Erm, is there something wrong?"
"BOAZ!"
"Oh, nononononononononono! I didn't go out with him! We didn't go for a drink or something, nonononono it was a gift! Honest!"
"Oh, *giggles* nonono I'm not mad at you! Let me explain somethi..."
"No! I didn't do anything! He's the one who gave it to me!"
"No, don't be scared! I've gotta tell you somethi..."
"I... I won't see him again! I'll go to another field! I promise!"
"Ruth! Calm down, I need to explain our customs here to you. Boaz is our kinsman-redeemer."
"Our what?"
"Our kingsman-reedemer."
"Our kingsman-what? He's a king? Well, he's hot and rich, but... he's a king?"
"Let me explain. In our culture, when the eldest son of a family dies, his younger brother marries his wife. And if he dies, it get's passed down the familiy line so on and so forth from the closest male relatives to the furthest. After Chilion, Boaz is next in line! It'll be good for you, young lady, to go out with his girls, because in someone else's field you might get raped. Boaz will protect you for sure."
So Ruth stayed close to the servant girls of Boaz to glean until the barley and wheat harvests were finished, as instructed by her mom-in-law.
To be continued...
After that, it was just the right timing for me to go change up and go downstairs to the lobby of Stanley's block, with an extra remainder of time for me to listen to my MP3. After finding Nick, we both went up to Stan's flat and met up with Lester to wait for the arrival of Uncle Anthony's car, along with Stanley. While waiting, Nick showed usa few magic tricks while Lester gave good statements on warfare.
(Yes, these two were the people who introduced me to the art of warfare, which later got me reading up a lot on Hiroshima, which led to me starting work on my first animation film, 'Nucleoil: The Attack of Hiroshashimi' {which sadly was abborted after less than a month's worth of work.}. But nevertheless, these two guys introduced me to the many things related to war - from World War I and II to military armstrengths of many countries.)
Once Stanley arrived in Uncle Anthony car, we (Nick, Lester, Stanley, Auntie Shirley, Uncle and I) drove out towards the Conference Hall. But during the starting portion of the journey, Auntie Shirley came to realise that Nick, Lester and I hadn't eaten our dinner yet. She then asked us if we could ta-han ('tolerate') all the way till around 9-10 o'clock.
Well, I've always thought that it was normal to end up eating extremely late after concerts, but both Auntie Shirley and Uncle Anthony wouldn't take our excuses. They dropped by at the MacDonald's drive-thru at KAP and bought us each a meal. When it came to ordering the drinks, Auntie Shirley took it that we all could drink coke, so she told Uncle Anthony that we wanted coke. But I, being only able to finish consuming a fresh can of coke over a very long period of time, tried my best to mumble a "Ice lemon tea!" across the car.
Hearing my response, Auntie Shirley quickly asked Uncle Anthony to change my order, but he already made a great portion of the orders and so got annoyed by the sudden change in iunstructions. This led to a slight quarrel at the front of the car, and I was frightened with the uncertain guilt of whether I started the argument or not. I tried my best to say, "I'm sorry" a couple of times, but Stanley later whispered, "Don't take it too hard on yourself, Mig - He wasn't refering to you."
Thankfully, the rest of the journey was more or less controlled and calm, so when we got to the Conference Hall we were all geared up with full bellies and ready to take on the concert. We went up to the hall which the performance was to be held in, and up the seats we met up with Uncle Francis and Auntie Dorrie (the parents of Roxanne), who had helped up to reserve a few seats for us all.
We shuffled ourselves in, and we awaited for the performance to begin. Uncle Francis was on my left, while John Lim (who was here before us) was on my right. Nick and Stan were trying to point out some funny stuff in the booklets that were given to us as we entered the hall, but John found something he didn't want the two of them to find. He tapped me on the shoulder, told me to look at the back of the booklet, then directed my eyes to a radius around Roxanne's name.
I giggled, along with promising him that I would tell no one what I saw. I then asked him, in pure wonder, why many of the Cashew Heights people called him a particular nickname. Uncle Francis, who overheard our conversation, came in and told me the story of how the whole lot once went to an overseas trip together (which I unfortunately didn't get to join also) and on one of those days, an animal with that nickname as her name appeared to have liked John Lim, and thus the nickname.
We all laughed together before settling back in our seats and waiting a little longer for the show to begin. I then remembered that Shil was also somewhere in the theatre, so I started to look around the area, time after time getting in the way of Uncle Francis' view of Darren (Roxanne's younger brother).
When I fianlly spotted him, I rose from my seat and started waving vigourously for his attention. A friend of his who he attended the concert with caught me and pointed me out to Shil, of which Shil responded with a light wave and thus me toning down back into my seat.
And just a few seconds after that, the lights dimmered down to a shaded black (is there such a thing?). The show has just begin.
So as to not drag the performance too long, I shall just state a few main points that happened till the end of the show. It starts off with a few items by MGS, which Roxanne was involved in. It was interesting to see how they had to coordinate their bells properly so as to get the right rythem. They accomplished this by bouncing up and down like 'as if they had fits'.
Then also watching what kind of scores they could play, especially so much as complicated as Hungarian Dance No. 5, which is well-known around the world as one of the most - erm - 'steadfast-changing' music score composed.
It was funny watching the girls bouncing around with their bells clasped tight in their hands and whacking them at those right momments to keep the show on the roll. But at the same time, I respected them for the mere fact that they could actually play such a piece. I would be the least surprized if anyone of them told me the phrase, "It certainly is harder than it looks."
I honour that phrase a lot, as I'm also involved in it's meaning (non-canoeists have no idea how complex paddling a canoe can get - it's not all about the rotation, there's weight of the boat, the angle of entry of the blade into the water, the kicking of the legs, the steadiness of your tiller, the level of...)
During the interval break, Stan bumped into the Chinese Girl's School principal! On purpose! He sure had the guts to jump in front of her a second time! All of us were laughing, Nick, Lest, John, Alyssa, and I. We had a rough prediction of what the headlines would read tomorrow; 'Principal In Search Of Rude Boy - Wanted Dead Or Alive'.
After the interval, we watched another few affiliated school's bands play, until we came to the finale whereall the resent schools combined together to play a couple more scores as one whole assemble. t was very impressive, I must admit. One thing that scared me, though, was how hard the base bells were actually smashed onto the table. I mean, you literally see them cave inwards for a split second or two.
But overall, I thingk the performance was very well done (I never knew how many instruments could be replaced by handbells. I always thought bells either went 'ding' or 'dong', but I never knew they could go 'tink' or 'plink' or 'bok' or 'twang' or other sounds I might have missed out.)! Good job, Rox! :)
But after the performance, Nick and Stan felt letargic after sleeping during many parts (heh, am I really that immune to instrumental music?) and so we decided to leave early. Uncle Anthony arrived in his car a few short minutes after we got outside the building, and we drove off towards home.
But just as we were around leaving the CBD area, Alyssa called Stan and invited us guys for a supper at KAP. "MacDonald's again?", we all muttered in a low voice, and we decided we would just give the meal a pass.
But later on in the drive, it was Auntie Dorrie who called us, and she was telling us that she would pay for the whole thing. In the end, we gave in and decided to endure the Mac a little longer. As we arrived there, we were greeted by Auntie Dorrie, Alyssa and a friend of Alyssa.
We then searched around the area for available seats for all of us to sit together. Sooner or later, a series of tables towards the front entrance were at view and we charged our way to place ownership on the territory. We got ourselves seated and started taking down our orders for supper. (Even Auntie Dorrie took out a notebook and wrote down all our orders like a waitress, heehee)
We then engaged in conversation between one another before getting our meals and feasting a little bit while waiting for 'the star of the show'. Soon, when I finished my milkshake, Rox came in with Uncle Francis and Darren, and so we all feasted till the boys turned purple and the girls turned pink (purple because we dreaded to look at another MacDonald product for the next week or two, and pink 'cause they were just laughing at us).
Once done, we divided into our cars and said our goodbyes at a cross-junction (two cars aligned along each other, both cars scroll down their windows, the guys laugh at the other car, which had Lester and all the other girls locked up in a mobil) before going our seperate ways and heading towards the different ends of the Bukit Timah area. Lester now lives at Chua Chu Kang, while John lives at Coronation; two opposite ends of the area, and so we dided ourselve via these two people.
Once we sent them home, we could head back home and get some shut-eye for the next day. Ah, well. Tomorrow is Youth Day, wonder what God'll bring for me! God bless y'all!
