Changing attitudes

I can't believe I've been here for 3 weeks already! Once again, time flies. We're officially done with Toolkit - the training sessions - well, almost. We still have one week of classes every month where everyone comes back to the base and we have a big reunion. They divided us up into teams on Thursday - there are 6 teams in total, each with 4 people, and they're all spread out over the surrounding towns.

 Our base

When they told us our team arrangements on Thursday, the atmosphere was tense. We all get along, yes, but obviously some of us click better than others, and there are some people we would rather be on teams with than others. So when they revealed the teams... there was a lot of mixed emotions. I think most people were disappointed, because they put us all in teams with people who weren't necessarily similar to ourselves, mostly because I think they wanted to stretch us and challenge us to work with people we might not get along with. Christian love will come into the picture a lot in these next few months, I'm sure.

So yeah, I was kind of disappointed too, because my team was my last choice. I mean not the people - well maybe some of them - but the location. We're stuck here on the base because they haven't found a house for us, so we sent everyone off on Saturday and now it's so empty and sad here. We're working with a local church about 20 minutes away from the base, which I was pretty frustrated about initially, because I wanted to move out to another town, live in a flat of our own, explore different places... but no, we are stuck here. God really has a sense of humor. And that is why I dread group placements - I feel like I always get stuck in the worst group; it's just my luck.

But after I got over the initial disappointment and frustration and sadness, I started realizing maybe this isn't so bad after all, and I really wanted to start off the ministry work with a good attitude, so I tried to see the positives and push away the negatives. The hallways and rooms are still lifeless and empty, but we still manage to have fun with the remaining people.

On Friday we stayed up late, played lots of games, went to someone's house for yummy Indian food, played truth or dare, had a dance party, played more games... and then Saturday we said tearful goodbyes (some girls cried while the guys looked on awkwardly) to the teams who were moving out. After that, I went shopping at the tiny local mall with one of my teammates, and that cheered me up some. At night, the remaining 20 of us (our team of 5 + another team who are moving out 1 week late + the 5 English-learning people + other random stragglers) hung out at the lounge and watched movies + played games.

Today my team went to the church we're working with for the first time; before that, they told us the church was tiny (about 20 people) and filled with old people, so I was expecting a traditional boring church, but I was wrong (thank God). Yes, the people were older, but they weren't in their 90s and about to keel over and go to heaven any moment, like I was expecting. They were probably in their 60s and younger, and they were incredibly friendly and welcoming. We also sang several contemporary songs and they had a full band, which I was excited about because of the drum set! On the whole, I really liked it, so I'm glad we're working with them for the next 3 months. They gave us a schedule of stuff we're doing with them, and it seems pretty relaxing, at least for this coming week, which is good. The past few weeks have been so hectic, it'll be nice to get a chance to breathe.

After church, we all gathered at someone's place to cook lunch - mexican chilli and rice - and it was so good. Then we hung out for a while and headed back to church for the evening service, which was filled with older people than the morning one. But it was pretty cool. There was no structure for the service - people just sang songs or prayed or read from Scripture as led by the Holy Spirit. I liked it. In the evening we went to a local pub and sang karaoke. It was ridiculously hilarious because there's this American guy who went absolutely crazy dancing to every song. He danced like mad by himself in the corner, and his dance moves were so original and funny and so unlike his usual self! All 20 people in the tiny pub had a blast watching him.

Tomorrow marks the official start of our full-time ministry work. I can't believe I'm a missionary. Never thought I would be called that. I mean, it's only for 4 months, but still... it's weird hearing people call us the 'm' word. In a way, I feel like I'm not holy enough to be a missionary.
Anyway, pray that we will be good servants for God's kingdom work, and that my team will gel well together (there are a couple of... interesting characters), and that we will be able to help the church in any way needed.

23 and sick

I turned 23 on wednesday, and I was down with a cold, so it wasn't the best birthday ever, but it was pretty cool. The girls (all 12 of them) woke me up at 7am, chirpily sang happy birthday to me, and gave me breakfast in bed. It was really sweet of them. Not the waking up super early part (although we have to get up at 8 anyway), but the whole breakfast in bed part because they knew I was sick. Piled high on a tray were oranges, strawberries, plums, milk, tea, croissants, donuts, and chocolate. Obviously I did not finish it and shared it with everyone - except for the chocolate because no matter how much I love chocolate, I don't have the desire to eat it at 7 in the morning.

We usually have 4 classes a day, but they decided to cancel one class for no reason, so we had extra time, which was a nice and unexpected surprise on my birthday. We also have to do chores every morning, but since it was my birthday and everyone was being ultra nice to me, they offered to do the dishes in my place. People here are so sweet!

Throughout the day people gave me little presents, which was really nice because I wasn't expecting anything. To me, it was just another day. But I got little cards from people, chocolate, tea, candy, and more chocolate. They even knew my favorite chocolate :) So I ate a lot of chocolate even though I was still sick. And they sung happy birthday to me at least 5 times and also prayed for me as a group. I don't usually like to be the center of attention, but I guess it's nice once in a while. Although I think singing happy birthday is always an awkward thing for the birthday person, because you never know what to do with yourself while others are singing - so I just smile awkwardly and make awkward eye contact with people and count the seconds till the song is over.

In the evening, after classes, they sang happy birthday to me again and we ate chocolate cake and lemon cheesecake - yummy. They got two cakes because there are too many people here so one cake is not enough. Then we went out to the town for pizza at the restaurant we always go to for a girls' night out (the people there look at us with a mix of terror and joy whenever we step in because although we buy lots of food from them, we also make a lot of noise and take up all their space).

We went around the table and talked about which guy (out of the 5 guys here - lame!) we liked the best/thought was the cutest, and 2 names kept coming up (because there are honestly only 2 guys here who are pretty attractive inside and outside). But no one really had a crush on either of them - they're more like brothers to us. Plus there's the SP (social policy) here that doesn't allow any dating or exclusive relationships for the 1st year.

Then we walked around the town center, took lots of random pictures, came back to the base, and played hilarious games until unearthly hours in the morning. It was a good birthday :)

5 steps of out my comfort zone

The last 5 days our entire team traveled to a town about 2 hours away to embark on our mini mission trip. We slept on the hard, cold floor of the church that hosted us (they were incredibly warm and friendly and made such yummy meals for us), shared 3 bathrooms between 30 of us (getting ready in the morning involved brushing teeth, washing face, and changing - no makeup or any other luxury), and showered only every alternate day. We only got to sleep at midnight every night, and we had to wake up at 6am because our days were packed full with activities, and at least 5 girls snored every night, so... needless to say, I hardly slept at all.

And now I'm down with the flu. I guess I was expecting it, because the flu bug has been going around here, and since we all live together, eat together, shower together, go to classes together, and do everything together, everyone has been falling sick one after another. So it's my turn now. I just hope it goes away soon because I hate being sick. Today I ate 3 oranges, 2 bananas, 1 apple, and drank lots of tea.

We've hardly had any down time to ourselves since we've been here. The only free day we got was last Saturday, and we spent the entire day in Birmingham city, so really we haven't had any time to relax. And it's taking it's toll on me - all this rushing around and doing things everyday. Today we got to sleep in late, which was nice, but we still had seminars in the afternoon.

One seminar was on Time Management, and we had to take the 'Urgency Test,' and I scored the lowest in the class. Most people had about 30+, and I scored 18. That's why my life is currently going nowhere. I have no sense of urgency! Why don't I have a sense of urgency?? People always tell me it's good that I'm so laidback, but maybe being too laidback isn't so good after all.

At the outreach

So anyway, at the mission trip, we planned an International Night for the town community, and it was super stressful because everything was so last minute and disorganized, but the program went really smoothly, which was a relief. We had to go door-to-door in the village and give out flyers to people in the community to invite them to the event. It was a little bit intimidating at first, but we were in pairs (I was with a Finnish guy who spoke English as a second language, and it was interesting to get to know him better), and British people (in towns/villages, not cities) are ridiculously friendly.

Those who were home smiled and took the flyers with some interest, and the one guy who declined said to us with a smile, 'I'm an atheist, I'm alright.' I don't even know what that means. How can he be 'alright' if he doesn't believe in the one true God??? I felt really sad for him, but there was nothing we could do because he closed the door and we had to leave.

We spent the hours before the International Night practicing our program for the first time. I was involved in the Korean song, the 'I love Jesus' dance, the opening costume act, and I was in charge of food and decorations. So basically I was running around like a headless chicken the entire time. But it was great bunches of fun - the dance was hard to learn at first, but when we finally got it down, it felt good. Not a lot of people turned up for our event, but those who did really enjoyed it. Everything turned out really well, even the food from all different countries (we had rice crackers 'from' Singapore), and we got to talk to the people after the event as we bonded over food and tea (British people sure do love their tea - they drink it in the morning, before lunch, after lunch, before dinner, after dinner, all the time). So it was well worth all the planning.


On Saturday

We went to another town to do street evangelism, and it was a little more than terrifying. We set up shop in the town square and did drama, Christian songs, face painting, and ballooning. The responses we got were varied - some people ignored us, some sang along with our songs, some listened intently to our dramas, some talked to us with interest. And then we took Christian tracts (those tiny pamphlets with information about Jesus written in a non-threatening, interesting kind of way) and gave them out to passers-by.

Most people took them with a smile and a 'thank you', others shook their head and smiled. I only got one guy who shook his head and told me he was a Buddhist, and another smiled and thanked me for the tract before tearing it up in front of my face. Ouch. I felt like he tore a piece of my heart. And then I felt sad for him because his heart was so hardened. But I guess he's one person out of many (we gave out about 3000 tracts altogether that day), and most of the people read the tracts with interest, so I tried not to dwell on that guy and be too disappointed.

On Sunday

We split up and went to different churches to lead their services or share our testimonies. I went with two other people to a tiny congregational church (and by tiny, I mean there were 8 people in the church, not including us), and shared my testimony with them. It wasn't as scary for me as it was for the other guy, because English is my first language (I have to say, I really admire the people here who don't speak English as their first language. Some really struggle but they're so positive about it and willing to learn). The people in the church were all over 60 at least, but they were really nice and attentive and appreciative of our presence and willingness to share our life stories.

One lady told me, 'I'm so glad you came to share your testimony. It's so hard for us here because our church is so small, and we get very disheartened by the lack of response from the community. We try to reach out to them, but they don't really respond. So it's so encouraging to see young people from all over the world on fire for God. Thank you for coming.' - something like that.


I was so encouraged by her gratitude. I realized that we all think England is a Christian country because of its Christian background and Caucasian citizens, but it's really not. Lots of people here don't even know who Jesus Christ is, and they've never been to church, the party scene here is even more trashy than in the US, if that's possible. Tons of churches here are tiny (less than 20 people) and not growing and full of elderly people who don't have a clue how to reach out to the younger generation. It's really sad to see so much emptiness in the people's lives here.

Tons of seminars... and some fun time.

It's only been a week, but I'm kind of really exhausted from all the seminars, hanging out, going out to town, and sleeping late + waking up early. We wake up at 7am everyday (I wake up at 7.30), get ready by 8, do chores like clean the bathroom, lounge, conference room, corridors, etc (each group rotates between these duties and lunch/dinner dishes), have some quiet time, and then have Refocus at 9.10 where everyone on staff gets together for devotion. By the end of that, it's only 9.30am and I feel like I've been up for ages already.

The first class starts at 9.45am, then we have a short break, then the second class starts, then we break for lunch, which is about 2 hours. After that, we have our third class, break, followed by our last class. Each class is like one and a half hours. During the first few days, we were all excited and ready to learn about the Gospel, street evangelism, the organization, kids training, all that stuff. But by now, we're all about to fall asleep during class because we hardly get enough sleep. It's challenging trying to sleep early in a room full of 12 girls. Lights out is supposed to happen at 11pm, but it normally doesn't happen til midnight, and then people are still awake and chatting till 1am.

So yeah, we're all pretty much exhausted by now. But it's still fun, and we're getting along so well. Now we're packing and getting ready to go on a short trip to another town to do a 5-day outreach. I have no idea what we're going to do or what we need to bring, but that seems to be the norm around here. We never know what's happening until the last minute, so we always have to be prepared. We heard this trip is going to be rough, so... I'm prepared to be sleeping on the floor, showering once in 5 days, hardly sleeping... stuff like that.

Prayers will be appreciated.

Oh and here are some random pictures.

This is the town center.

Sunset at the town center.

The church we visited on Sunday. It was so flexible and relaxed - service was held in a room at the cricket stadium, and due to a cycling marathon going on and lots of confusion about parking, service was canceled, so they had an impromptu worship and 5 minute sermon. It was very interesting and everyone was so friendly and warm.

The cricket stadium undergoing construction.

Birmingham city

They have a Venice-style canal in the city where boats go back and forth.

New friends :)

Birmingham Arts Festival

Funny things and funny guys

There are these two guys here that are hilarious. The only thing is that they both don't speak English fluently because it's their second language. If not, they would probably crack us up all the time.

So this one guy, who is from France, saw me eating my thai tom yum ramen noodles today for dinner, and he decided to eat noodles too. He took a packet of one of those western tasteless chicken flavored ramen, and my friend was like, don't eat that, it's tasteless. (Before he came, my friend and I were laughing about how tasteless and bland western ramen was).
So he was like (with a straight face), oh I've had 5 already. And then he proceeded to make the ramen and then cut the noodles up with a knife, a fork and a spoon when it was done. He just looked so earnest and focused trying to do it that we laughed nonstop at him.

And then we asked him if he liked chinese food, and he was like, oh no. So we asked what his favorite type of food was. I said, French? He shook his head. Mexican? He shook his head. So what kind of food do you like? And he said, chicken.

This other guy, who is from Spain, came up to me and asked if I wanted to join the guys' poker game. I was like, no, I don't like poker. Why are you guys playing poker?
And he goes, We watched an action fighting movie just now, so now we are playing poker, because we are MAN! And later... we go punch some walls.

SO FUNNY my friend and I nearly died laughing at them. Plus these two incidents happened one after another and we were in a really giggly mood. It's so entertaining talking to the guys because they're so funny and they say the funniest things in their halting English (not in a bad way) and I just keep laughing at everything they say and do.

First weekend in the UK

I still can't get over the fact that I'm here in the UNITED KINGDOM! Never thought I would be here, doing this. But I am, and I am enjoying it here immensely.

This weekend was incredible, spending time with people and exploring the city. Friday night we went to Birmingham city for the arts festival, and even though it was raining the entire time, we had a blast watching the different reggae bands play and dancing along to the music. The air smelled of cigarettes and weed, and people were standing in front of the stage with umbrellas. Some were moving around to the music, and we started our own little dance cluster among ourselves. It was so much fun!! We made up funny moves, laughed at weird people around us, and just went crazy dancing to the awesome music. I've never liked reggae as much as I did that night.

I know it's not on my bucket list, but 'Dancing in the rain to reggae music in the UK - check.'

It was good, clean fun, but I was honestly struggling quite a bit at the concert because we walked past clubs and bars, there was music blaring everywhere and people all dressed up and ready to party, and every fiber of my being was crying out, 'To heck (I was thinking of another, more crude word, but I won't write that down) with this mission trip, I want to join those people.' 

I know I'm here to do God's work, but I'm still human, and I still struggle, especially since these struggles are very fresh and recent in my life. So I'm glad that I have this wonderful community to keep me in check, to keep me accountable, because there are all these rules and curfews here, and for once, I am grateful to live under them. I just have to keep reminding myself that there are more important things in life; things like partying may be fun and fulfilling for a night, but the emptiness still lingers the next morning.

Then we went to the gay village and to one of the largest mosques in the city to do a little prayer walk. It was a very sobering experience, seeing all these people who are God's children live their lives in a way that hurts Him.

Lord, I know You still love these people as much as You love us, because they are Your children. I know it breaks Your heart to see their lives go down this path, and I pray that Your grace and mercy will fall freely in their lives and guide them back to You.

Today (saturday) was our first free day, so almost our entire group took one of those double-decker red buses to the city to explore. One of the guys who had been around for a while gave us a tour, and we got to see the arts festival again, a canal where they had boats going up and down (like in Venice), tons of shopping streets, beautiful old churches, shopping malls and markets, museums, and even Chinatown. Birmingham is not as boring as I thought; it's full of interesting people, gorgeous architecture, and really expensive stores. We ate at a chinese buffet place in Chinatown, where the food tasted just like American-Chinese food. Figures. I guess chinese food is the same in every western country. But we got to go to the asian supermarket, where I stocked up on asian food and snacks!

We did some shopping afterward, but it was mostly window shopping because we are missionaries and don't have much pocket money. Plus everything is ridiculously expensive in pounds and even more expensive when converted to SGD. A lot of the shops here already exist in Singapore anyway.
Looking around at the young people here, I've come to the conclusion that they dress very fashionably but provocatively (for the girls). It's pretty bad. They look like they're going clubbing, but they're only at the mall or walking down the street. Low hole-y tops, super short skirts, and high heels were everywhere. And I heard that partying England is trashier than in America, which is already horribly trashy enough (it's about a million times worse than partying in Singapore).

Some girls and I commiserated about our misconceptions of missionaries - we all thought that since we were coming on a mission trip, we wouldn't have to bring much stuff with us, because, you know, missionaries are supposed to be poor and live off two t-shirts and one pair of underwear. So most of us didn't bring much. At all. And now we're living in regret and missing our dresses, bags, accessories, nail polishes, skirts, shoes, and every piece of material comfort we left at home. Oh well. I guess we'll learn to live without them for a period of time.

We ended off today by snuggling up together and watching 'The Blind Side' on the projector screen in one of the rooms. Good ending to a good day.

Missionaries are never (okay, hardly ever) in their own country

Today was Prayer Emphasis Day, and we were supposed to fast from lunch... but I didn't. And neither did a lot of people, apparently. I tried, but I was starving by 2pm, because we eat breakfast at the insanely early time of 7am. So naturally I would be hungry 7 hours later.

But I still prayed. We prayed for missionaries around the world, and some people came up to speak and ask for prayer, like this Korean couple who are going to Syria. It's so cool what they're doing.

But it also made me wonder why God oftentimes gives us a heart for people other than our own. I mean, you hardly see any Korean missionaries in Korea, or American missionaries in America... They usually go to countries halfway across the world. Doesn't anyone have want to reach out to their own people? Okay, I guess I'm making a gross generalization here, but it's just something I thought about. And I guess people who minister to others in their own country aren't called missionaries, but pastors or leaders or just people with a heart to serve. And I guess also God wants us to get out of our comfort zone and minister to people from different cultures and backgrounds so we can learn to depend on Him more.

Okay that's all I wanted to say. Oh, and it's pretty amazing what God is doing around the world :)

Training sessions and culture lessons

The past... 3 days have been full of training, training, and more training. It's a little bit overwhelming at times. I can't believe it's already almost Thursday. I feel like I've been here for months and months already.

So far we have... 

• been on a treasure hunt around the town to check out where everything is
• had a professional magician come in and teach us mind-blowing magic tricks (I am now a semi-professional magician who can perform 3 rope tricks.. adequately)
• learned more about the organization and its mission and values
• learned how to give our testimony in 3 minutes, crafted our 3-minute testimony, and shared it with everyone (I just love hearing people's life stories - it's amazing how God works in different people's lives)
• learned tips on how to share the Gospel with complete strangers
• learned a little bit about British culture and how the Brits are reserved, proper, polite, and turn bright red when they go to the beach in their sandals and socks

It's quite interesting, what we've been learning.



And outside of class, we have...

• Gone to the town numerous times to buy necessities, chocolates (a lot of the girls here are obsessed with it), or just to walk around
• Had random worship sessions
• Eaten way too much every day. I did not expect to be fed this well at a mission trip, but it's like we eat at least 5 times a day - breakfast, morning tea, lunch, afternoon tea, another afternoon tea, dinner, supper
  And the food is so good: fish n chips, lasagna, curry and rice, and LOTS of dessert at EVERY meal. Not. Good.
• Had lots of ridiculously hilarious talks about random things under the sun
• Laughed like mad about all kinds of things
• Taught each other how to say random words in our own languages 
• Had a mini dance party in the girls' dorm
• Given each other completely non-related nicknames
• Played random games as a form of entertainment after dinner
• Gone out to dinner in the town at an italian place. They had delicious + cheap pizza. We ate 2 slices of pizza each, a salad, wedges, and then we finished 2 entire tubs of Haagen Daaz ice cream, all 6 of us. That was today, and now I feel like I don't need to eat for the rest of the month

So yeah that's basically my life right now. I like it so far. It's pretty cool :)

Joy in every circumstance

I know this topic has been preached on, read about, contemplated over, written down, and talked about 1001010101010 times, but I think it's something I really want to see come to pass in my life.

We are created by God, loved by God, and cared for by God, come rain or shine. As believers of Jesus Christ, we always have reason to rejoice because of truths that are untouched and unchanged by outward circumstances.

We can rejoice despite circumstances because Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever, whether the church splits, your best friend gives up his/her faith, your leader rebels, or your pastor leaves.

I guess I'm realizing that my faith is in Jesus, not people, because people will let me down (it's just human nature), but God is forever faithful and will never ever disappoint. Christians will come and go in church, they will have all kinds of opinions about who God is, what He is like, what He wants us to do, what He forbids us to do, and all that. But in the end, it's our personal belief in and relationship with God that matters. 

I really get agitated when people try to discuss trivial matters like the other day, when someone brought up the question of when Jesus' disciples were saved. And someone else said they weren't saved until Jesus died, because it was then that he interceded for our sins and blessed us with the Holy Spirit - apparently this is the opinion of numerous Christians in whatever denomination.

Well, I'm sorry, but I don't think so. I believe the disciples were already believers when they witnessed Jesus' power, left behind everything they had ever known, and followed Him to the ends of the earth. And what's more, this may sound horrible, but I don't really care. Does my opinion on this issue affect my salvation in any way? No. Does it strengthen my faith in any way? No.
SO WHY BOTHER?

Anyway, all this to say, what others believe in doesn't matter. I just need to be strong in my own faith to stand firm when others try to influence and sway me.

Perspective

One of the staff leaders here shared something about perspective a few days ago, and I was just struck by the truth of her words.

(

(This photo doesn't really go with what I'm talking about. I just thought it was funny.)

There are a few important points in our lives - the day we were born, the day we accepted Jesus into our lives, the day we graduated from college, the day we got married, the day we had our first child... etc.
But our life on earth is only this --- short. After our soul leaves our body, we will live on for eternity, which is this --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- long.

So compared to our lives in eternity, our current earthly struggles and problems are so temporary and trivial, and what seems to be of the utmost significance right now will not be in eternity.

This wasn't any kind of huge life-changing realization or anything; it just made me think about my own struggles and how important they seem to me right now, when in reality they will probably not matter 2 months, 6 months, 1 year, 10 years or 50 years from now, much less in eternity. So I guess you could say I gained some perspective... on life.

Expectations

I made a list of my expectations for my life (for the next 4 months here in the UK).

I want:

• To be less dependent on material comforts (goodbye comfortable home, hello tiny bunk bed, tiny closet, communal bathroom, communal dining room, and shower-head with low water pressure).
• To be more disciplined in doing my daily devotions, so that it will be a joy and not a chore.
• To have the courage to share the Gospel (and my testimony) with others and the wisdom to know what to say.
• To learn different ways of sharing the Gospel: drama, illustrations, music, etc.
• To have greater compassion and love for the poor, needy, disabled, and outcast.
• To see others as Jesus sees them, and to love them like He does, without judgment or reservations.
• To find our or be given some sort of clearer direction of what God wants me to do with my life after this.
• To leave my worldly desires behind and become a woman after God's own heart.

I still have no idea what is in store for me for the rest of 2010, but I trust God put me here for a purpose, and He will provide.

The beginning of the UK chapter of my life

So I arrived in Birmingham, UK, on Saturday, only to be met by no one at the airport. Also, I was questioned a lot by customs, about my intentions for studying in the UK, why I want to study religion, why I can't study that in the US, etc, but thank God it wasn't that bad. Several people before me were interrogated pretty harshly, so I was kind of nervous, but it turned out fine. I guess the UK is really getting strict about student/work visitors nowadays.

Upon calling the guy who was supposed to pick me up, I realized he thought my flight was the day before. But thank God he was on his way to the airport anyway to pick up someone else. He gave me a mini driving tour of the city of Birmingham, which seems to be a little torn down and full of dilapidated buildings, and told me there are a lot of Muslims (mostly from Pakistan) and Asians in Birmingham. We then drove to a city in the outskirts, where the training center is based.

I admit I didn't know what to expect, so I was a teeny bit taken aback to be led into this old building that looked like it might fall over anytime. But the inside wasn't so bad. We have a lounge, a conference room, dorm rooms (I'm living with 12 other girls and sharing a communal bathroom - pretty much same as college), laundry facilities, a wonderful cook, and even a library. I was a little bit traumatized by the showers at first. I thought they were open showers, but it turned out we had shower curtains. And the water pressure was so low the water was literally dripping onto my hair, drop by drop. But then I realized that was the only shower head that was so bad; the other three were not much better, but an improvement at least.

As I looked around at my surroundings, I realized - I am on a mission trip. What did I expect?? So it's taking some getting used to, but I am getting used to things here. I was a bit jet lagged at first, but it's better now. And I was a bit overwhelmed by all the different nationalities here - there are people from France, Germany, Switzerland, Brazil, Spain, Korea, Austria, USA, Australia, Mauritius, Nigeria... everywhere. It's pretty amazing. For most of them, English isn't their first language, so it was and is still a little difficult trying to understand them in their halting English. I think it will be interesting trying to communicate for the next few months with some of them, but I'm sure their English will improve by leaps and bounds by then.

So the first two nights I kept questioning myself - Why on earth am I here?? Why did I fly across the globe to come and suffer in this place with a ton of other people instead of staying in the wondrous comfort of home?? Why do I keep trying to make myself move out of my comfort zone?? Seriously, WHAT am I doing here? 

The thought of going home crossed my mind several times, but I knew I couldn't. I wouldn't. I guess I was a little homesick and exhausted from the traveling (by the way, Emirates is, without a doubt, the BEST AIRLINE EVER. Their TV screens are TWICE the size of SIA, they have tons of leg space, AND they even have twinkling stars in the ceiling when the lights turn off! Plus the air stewardesses have awesome headgear! The food is good too). I was a little overwhelmed by the people here, too, and I wondered again why I left all my friends back home to come here and be forced to make new friends again. All in all, I just didn't know why God wanted me here, but I do know He wants me here, because I am here, and He must have some sort of purpose for me for the next 4 months.

So yesterday was a good day. We went through orientation, got to explore the tiny town and its tiny mall, learned more about the ministries here, and we bonded as a team, so it was good. And it's funny how movies can bring people together - even though we're from all over the world, we were thoroughly entertained by the movie 'She's the Man.' haha.

So yeah. God is good, all the time. All the time, God is good. I'm learning a lot, and there's a lot to process, but this is a pretty amazing experience, and I'm grateful to be here.

Change the world

I used to have all these lofty, idealistic notions of going out into the world and changing it with a magical wave of my hand. I would speak words of truth, and just like that, bam! Poverty stamped out, abuse annihilated, hate abolished, violence extinguished, disease wiped out...

But now I've realized it takes more than little old me and my hopes, dreams, and visions to change this world that is unyielding in its ways. Even so, I believe every action I perform, as insignificant as it may seem, has the power to bring this world closer to the change it needs. And that's part of the reason why I want to do this (apparently I'm not supposed to be divulging information about what I'll be doing in the next 4 months, so my updates may be a little vague). 

I want to - apart from challenging myself, learning to serve others' needs above mine, finding direction for my life, and reigniting my passion for God - openly embrace the poor and needy with compassionate arms, fight furiously for those who aren't given the rights they deserve, and offer hope and love to the destitute and despondent.

I want You to heal my heart and make it clean.
Open up my eyes to the things unseen.
Show me how to love like You have loved me.
Break my heart for what breaks Yours.

I want to change the world... one person at a time.

National pride

I have to admit, when I first heard Singapore was building its very own Universal Studios, I was pretty darned skeptical. I guess I've just never had a very good impression of this tiny red dot on the map, in comparison to all the other great countries in the world and the beautiful things they have to offer.

So when I made a visit to the almost-completed Universal Studios this week, I was very much pleasantly surprised. The entire Resorts World was simply impressive. I felt like I was in another country or something. From the rows of elegant shops to the majestic hotels to the beautiful infrastructure to the theme park that gave its sister in LA a run for its money. And... I couldn't help but feel a pinch of patriotism.  

That's right - I, the Americanized girl, actually experienced a tremendous wave of national pride swelling up and engulfing my entire being.

Such an unfamiliar emotion. Well, I guess I do feel patriotic from time to time at National Day Parades, but that's about it. So this is probably the first time outside of August 9 that I feel like patting my country on its back and saying, 'good job, good job.'

Maybe Singapore isn't so bad after all. It's safe, clean, there's good food everywhere, shops don't close till 9pm, movies are cheap, and I have a house to stay in for free. Of course, it has its flaws, but this is a positive post about Singapore, so I'll stop here and finish off with photos from the theme park.

Direction in life

I just wish I knew what my heart wants. Or what God wants. Then will I finally be able to stop worrying about the future.

Be yourself

I guess this is some sort of variation of Dr Seuss' quote:

"Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind."

I don't know how true this is. I mean, people who love us will definitely accept us for who we are, flaws, quirks, and all, but are we genuinely 100% transparent with them? I feel like no matter how close we are to people in our lives, we all have some sort of dirty little secret or embarrassing little habit or impure little thought that might not matter, but we insist on taking to our graves anyway.

Maybe it's just me, but I think we all fear rejection; we're afraid that if we reveal every single aspect of our mind, our being, our soul to others... they might see us for the fraud we are and stop loving us. But then again, God - the creator of the universe, the most powerful being to ever exist - already sacrificed so much for our salvation. And even though I never feel like I deserve any of His blessings, love, faithfulness, or grace, He has never failed me or abandoned me.

So I think it's pretty amazing that I can be exactly who I am in God's presence, because He accepts all of me, He approves of my significance in the grand scheme of life, and He really doesn't care if I'm pretty or skinny or have beautiful skin or own the latest branded bag or get the highest grades or whatever.

He just sees me for me, and I don't have to hide behind anything.

Inspiration magnet

God does not put things in front of you that you are unable to handle.