expectations vs desires

Today Ps. Graeme preached a really good sermon. Not your typical everyday, boring one. It was about marriage, quite funny he chose that topic as there were probably only 3 married couples at Cityside. But many potential ones coming up, so that's useful. It was about expectations vs. desires.

He talked about why most marriages fail: when you turn your desires into expectations. For example, you DESIRE a husband who earns big bucks, you DESIRE a big-as mansion, you DESIRE a husband who cooks, bla bla bla. And when desires are not made, you turn those into expectations that SHOULD HAVE been made. As a result, a covenant of love turned into a contract of obligation. Such a simple statement but I wonder just how much a difference it would make if people stop expecting people around them to serve them...

***

My parents are mean.

They're "complaining" about the warm weather back home in Kuching.

Plus, they're going away for an ahem shall we say, exotic holiday next week.

How encouraging that is for me. -___-



Would you rather live here:

...or here?

P.S. I'm running out of pictures to post. My camera haven't been used in almost a month now. How sad. Exams are driving every one crazy.

MU forever <3

I didn't feel like blogging, but this special day calls for a post for itself.

Scholes (18, not the eagle dude) - an oldie but still my fav =)

Congratulations to Manchester United on winning the Champions League yet again!!!

I can't believe I was so engrossed in the reports I didn't even bothered to find a way to watch it- sneak into Unicol to watch the live match...

Bummer.

Anyway glad that they won. =) Though it has been a bad day in general. I wore boots today (bad idea since it was rainy and the grips on my boots are practically non-existent. Worst case scenario: slipping and falling on my knees on the side of the road where everyone can see me. Yeap, that happened. I know, pity me. I grazed my knee pretty bad, had to brush it off (despite holes in my leggings), and try walking without limping to lecture.

Bioc report class presentation tomorrow. Eeeeeeeeks. I freak out during public speaking.

Then here comes the weekend... well one of the last weekends before finals. Scary.

Laughing all the way

I almost went crazy today because of micro lab.

But thank God it was just a scare.

For the past 3 weeks of micro lab, our aim was to do a transposon mutagenesis. Boring stuff, won't explain all that but anyway should see 3 bands and 5 bands alternatively besides the marker DNA on the first lane of each gel photo.

The results of 13 hours of HARD work.

Anyway, took the 1st photo and got the scare of my life when I saw that there wasn't any bands at all for the first few lanes. The lab demonstrators said it could be contamination- meaning I would have to repeat 1 week's worth of experiments all over again. Which means extra time at lab, less time to write report, extra brain cells dying due to stress.

But I still ran the 2nd gel anyway hoping for a miracle. And guess what? It worked! (see 2nd gel). The bands were perfect!!! Then I realised I had made a serious, crazy mistake: throwing out the 1st gel into the rubbish bin, as I could have just stained it longer to get clearer results. So one little mistake costed me more than 3 hours of extra lab work. But yeah, final results were good, which meant I don't have to go into micro lab tomorrow! =D

*crosses fingers and hopes all goes well for bioc lab too!*

We had a 3rd year pHD student from micro department come in to talk about her research and life (or lack of) as a post grad student today. Very insightful. She has the brains, and got a full scholarship including a 25K funding for her research (a potential lead on TB disease? hmm), 10K for travel to a conference of her choice, and full tuition fees paid. Very very nice package, eh? Downside is, she stays at the lab from 8am to 7pm every day (sometimes weekends too). And though it's been 3 years doing same research, but still not sure where it'll lead her etc. It got me thinking quite a bit: on whether I would consider doing postgrad or not and where it'll lead me- industry or academics. The latter is just not for me: facing students and lecturing whole day. Oh well, time will tell.

A certain miss from IMB still isn't replying me!!! So frustrated since Ron got a reply from her ages ago, yet I sent an email to her first, TWICE!!! Discrimination! Very annoying since I'd even gotten a letter of endorsement for IMB, and really hoping to get accepted there for work placement end of this year.

If only accommodation in Singapore isn't that expensive...

Anyway, had a very good bday dinner (Ben's) at blue blue de sky tonight. It was almost like everyone sniffed some laughing gas: we couldn't stop laughing at the slightest things and talking about very random things, some quite gross. Like when some rice fell into a glass, the convo turned into drinking barley. Felt like we were kids once again. Ahhh, what a warm and fuzzy feeling that is. :P

3 weeks to finals. Eeks.

Hustle bustle

Guess who? Hehe
Actually, guess WHERE.
See, Chyi Mei, this is being random.
Need to take more photos.

Amongst all the labs, surprise birthdays (Happy burpday Ben MOK!!! sorry if we spillled chocolate stuff on your bed ;P) and writing up assignments, MORE time is needed for the mission of looking for the bridesmaid dresses.

Option 1. Buy raw material, then get it made by dressmaker. Pros: might be cheaper, custom-made to own liking and body shape etc. No need to worry if no sizes available. Con: might not be in time- 5 dresses to be made in less than a month. eeks.

Option 2. Buy ready made dresses from Stax, Principles etc retail stores. Pros: all designs would be the same, don't need to worry too much about details, could be cheaper too. Cons: all sizes available? need to find exact colour (turquoise & silver) to match maid-in-honor's dress, and roughly same material (raw silk: something silk or satin would do the trick I guess).

Time, of course, is the constraint. Raymond & Michelle's wedding ceremony is on the 15th of June, exams end on 11th for me, but much later for others. Still need to worry about make-up and hair, trouble is no salon is open at 9am on a Sunday morning. Oopsy.

And most of us have VERY limited make-up skills. I don't even own a proper mascara except for one my Russian friend bought me 3 years ago.

This is going to be interesting.

Happy Mum's Day!

Hooray for blogging more often.

Hooray for the great shop-around this afternoon after church. I managed to buy myself a pair of white sneakers (old adidas one is holey at the bottom already...), a NZ music month t-shirt, and a waterproof spray for my shoes. Yea I know my last buy is quite random but hey, better have dry than cold/wet feet, right?

Hooray for COLD weather. I get to wear all my thick + comfy jackets! Now all we have to do now is...

Yes Dunedin people, pray hard hard for SNOW this year. Last year it wasn't even snowing heavily. I don't believe Christchurch can have more snow than Dunedin.

Hooray for mothers!

Most importantly my great mum =)

Though you're thousands of miles away, you're never far away from my heart. ;P (all out cheesy) I wouldn't ask for a better mum- who can cook prawns the way I like it?

So I'm taking this opportunity to thank you again for all these little things you'd place in my life:
~a chance to study whatever I want to, wherever I want to
~for going through all the trouble of slicing red onions and deep frying them (my fav)
~for coming to visit me last Feb and bringing along lots of home-grown goodies
~being my role model in so many ways
~showing me how far determination and perseverance can take someone
~understanding me more than I can ever understand myself
~for believing in the best in me
~and also, for just being my mum =)

Ok better stop here in case I start getting teary. Hehe


A tribute to all mums- for their unseeing effort and ever-sacrificing spirit.

Love you, mum

Teach me how to manage time

"I don't have enough time!!!" seems to be my tag line for this week, and probably for the next few weeks too.

It's Saturday: I should be having a good time at Encounter II at Warrington, but I'm stuck in my cold room (with a fan heater blowing right at my face) writing my 2000-word MANT301 tutorial assignment. No more Starbucks this time, I'm writing about Boeing and how they failed in a $10 million project. Poor Boeing.

Don't know why, but it's times like these when I think about how fast time flies again. One minute I'm having the time of my life at National Service in March-May 2005, and the next I was on my first 11 hour flight to a brand new country with lots of sheep, not knowing what I would expect there. And now, being here for 3 years now (has it been 3 YEARS already?!), I find myself graduating next year, then going out into the boring, corporate life.

I come here not expecting much, but right now I can't help but feel SO BLESSED. Being part of the most AWESOMEst cell group in Dunedin =), having friends I can trust my life to (and most importantly fart in front of them without being paiseh anymore)- you know who you are, being given so many opportunities (owning my own flash KORG keyboard, working at ACC etc), and the list goes on and on.

And though this week has been the busiest and most tiring so far this year, I figured it's never too often to count my blessings, while trying my best NOT TO COMPLAIN. It's difficult, but part of my new year resolution I'm trying to achieve.

Anyway, some random pictures from a month ago when we went to the scout camp to look at a potential site for Lighthouse Fellowship camp 08. Can't wait for August to come around!

Cute little mushroom around the camp site. I wonder if it's poisonous?

Posers in the toilet

Abusing the trampoline

Back to my assignment.

*deep breath*

Is it mid-year already?

I feel a little guilty for not blogging, so here goes.

Lighthouse Fellowship group shot. One of my favs.

...and I get to grope the birthday girl. Lucky me

sniff sniff.

so fancy

The lucky guy, haha!

Jacqueline's 21st was held (not too) long ago. Rich girl; she paid for all our meals, had us all dressed up in white, hired a professional photographer for the night, and even gave us our very own pink roses to take home.

Also, she's single.

*cough*

and might I add, very smart (doing her honours now).

Anyway, these few weeks are driving me mad. Probably the busiest weeks ever for me in the last 3 years at uni. This week, I have 2 labs for both biochem and micro, which means 26 hours of lab work in total, plus around 10 hours of work (had to cut down half of the hours), and lots of ocipala errands to run.

I usually get asked "Did you sleep at all last night?" (pointing to my dark circles/eye bags) about once a week, but now I get asked that question almost every day.

Ah, 1 more month to go before exams end. God, please give me strength.