Sunday: Snow! Lots of snow! Huge wind! Sunshine! Cloud! More snow! More sunshine! More cloud! More wind! That’s the kind of weather it was in the morning… The snow was beautiful for the most part. It’s a good thing, though, that driving wasn’t so difficult, so that’s a good thing when I drive all over for Sunday services. Interesting how the huge wind and snow greeted us just as we were going into the kwcac service, and the sermon talked about the huge storm in the Sea of Galilee…heh. When we got out, however, the wind has calmed, and the snow was gone, and that was indeed a miracle… After the service, took Sophie and Kai to dim sum at Cameron (yes, we did get dim sum this time!), and it was good. I actually bumped into Jeff from the office there…and initially I didn’t recognize him, which was sort of embarrassing… Later went shopping at New City, sent them home, got to mom’s place, brought a ton of stuff back to my place, and I was exhausted… There was an evening prayer meeting, but I was kind of reluctant to go since Wilfred’s not going and I’m uncertain how to get keys for him…I went, though, with the plan that if I see people there waiting, then I’ll try and get the key. Well, I didn’t see anybody waiting, but somehow decided to get the key anyway, which turned out to be a smooth operation. When I got back up, I saw Miriam waiting there already, and then Lisa came as well, so we had a 3-person prayer meeting. We shared a lot about mccf, how God has blessed this fellowship despite the chaos within…we also shared our personal spiritual struggles, and it was just a surprise to all of us that we all were going through similar difficult experiences this year. Somehow that was kind of comforting, and it became the best prayer meeting this term. Played squash with David Betty afterwards, and of course I still suck, but at least I’m hitting the ball with higher probability now. It amazes me how David could just keep going like that, hitting the ball with great force and making it seem like he’s doing it effortlessly, and not get tired at all… Anyway, good exercise, even though I still don’t like squash… Sent my mom home, and that ended this long day.

Monday: Supervisor meeting day. And again, I left everything up until this day to do the research. And again, I had no appetite whatsoever for research. Perhaps it was the distractions elsewhere, or it was the lack of interest for the research, or most likely, I was bothered by a lot of harmful thoughts, dominated by hate and jealousy in relations to sports and stuff. I guess it’s always been there, but was never elevated at this high a level before…and I think that’s a sign that I should deal with this now. I really didn’t do much for research, and even got called back home to let my mom into my place, so that wasted even more time. The meeting was not good…and now I’m assigned a task that I will not be able to do in just 5 hours. So…I need to actually work during weekdays…yikes. Meanwhile, there’s a Bible study to prepare, there’s the things associated with sending mom home, there’s more mental confusion that’s causing me to be depressed again…what is going on? I was dead tired in the afternoon, and tried to make it to the evening Bible study, which was ok, I guess, but I certainly wasn’t able to focus… Sent my mom home, and here we are, typing away while being miserable for no good reason.

I’m grateful to God for…

• His protection in the driving Sunday amidst the wild weather;
• the clear presence of His Spirit in the prayer meeting;
• the enormous blessings that He has given to the mccf;
• carrying me through this tiring day today; and
• revealing another weakness in me to deal with.

Ah…playing catch-up again with the postings… Friday: All day (sort of) marking of the midterms. I got pretty simple questions to mark, so it’s all tedium rather than taxing. We did three switcheroos with the rooms, which is kind of funny. Went to mccf to report the bad news to James (I docked 7 marks from him) and the good news to David (he only got docked 1 mark so far). The Bible study was kind of interesting, I guess, mostly dealing with joy, and somehow mentioned many testimonies of other people. But the thing that shook me the most was during sharing when David said that he’s basically going to be in Vancouver next term for coop. I didn’t know this would affect me so much, but I was tremendously depressed by it…like I’m going to lose touch with quite a few good friends next term. Sigh…I guess I need to treasure these times a lot more… Dinner at lunch box with the fish tempura was slightly painful. It was just cold and rainy, which makes it not so pleasant. By the way, an innocent little email to Georgi (and apparently I like to use the word “innocent” for no good reason) meant that the link for the wpc photo gallery is now on the wpc communal weblog…heh. So now I get hits from all over the world (sort of), like Germany, Finland, Czech Republic, Turkey, Belgium, Bosnia, and even the chemistry department of Harvard (Hi Thomas Snyder!). So that was kind of interesting.

Saturday: The day revolves around the lunch and sports thingie in myf, which I’m not a fan of, obviously. I was tired, really, which is also an obvious thing. Lunch was strangely ok. Sports was not ok. They played dodgeball, basketball and badminton. And may I reiterate that I really hate these kinds of sports? Anyway, I really should be getting some exercise, but instead I stood around watching things, including how Tim accidentally hit a girl near her right eye with the dodgeball (oops). I was playing a Jenga-knockoff thingie on the side, which wasn’t that interesting. I was hoping that somebody would play the Scrabble and Trivial Pursuit that I brought, but no luck there. Eventually got around to see Forest and Bryant (was that his name?) play chess. I didn’t know how to play chess (but somehow I didn’t do too badly with the chess battleship puzzle in the wpc)…so I can only watch from aside…Bryant didn’t know how to play chess either, so he was basically slaughtered by Forest. Later on, I learned a bit and played with Bryant, and got only half way through before people started to leave, so we had to leave. Anyway, so now I have half a game of experience in chess under my belt… Came home, had some sleep, and then proceeded to fall into temptations…sigh… I really felt hopeless there… And that ends the day. Oh, and by the way, mom decided to go back to Taiwan early, like next week…so that will be a great relief for me. But, she also made me go to Taiwan in December, which is peak season…and that’s going to cost me a bunch…

I’m grateful to God for…

• leading me through the marking of the midterm;
• the wisdom that He gave us in the mccf Bible study;
• making me realize the significance that I have placed in the company of the guys in mccf;
• the connection with Forest Saturday; and
• somehow keeping my body intact in the cold rainy weather.

Another morning of disappointment…who knew? Ah…but the afternoon got interesting. By browsing through my logs for today, I made a discovery that somehow (most likely through Google), my innocent little post on October 15 got picked up by puzzleratings.org and had spread around already. I don’t know how many people got here and downloaded the hastily put-together powerpoint slide I made for the devotional sharing, which wasn’t entirely on the wpc… But anyway, somehow it blows me away that this obscure post would get picked up, and it occurred to me that I should put up my trip photos as well, so there it is. Somehow I managed to postpone uploading the photos until now…been procrastinating quite a bit, I guess. It seems like Byron has already got to it, though, so maybe it’s a bit too late for him…oops.

Went to school eventually late in the afternoon and did nothing. Well, nothing of significance, I guess. The evening was spent proctoring, where I took the opportunity to do some puzzles (instead of research…doh!), and that ends another tiring and strange day.

I’m grateful to God for…

• this strange event where the devotional sharing slides get picked up elsewhere…;
• keeping me from panicking wildly about things in life;
• continuing to remind me that His grace is indeed more than enough for me;
• not giving up on me (I hope) even as I fail repeatedly; and
• making the proctoring go smoothly.

It was yet another day of incredible tiredness…and I didn’t do much, really. Sleep and stuff in the morning, went to the office for office hours (2 people came, and it took a lot of energy to explain the stuffs that they were asking), came home, sleep more, brothers prayer meeting with only 2 people, home again, somehow managed to talk to Scott for over an hour, and that’s it for the day.

Random notes…

• Thinking of a familiar verse…”Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.” So familiar…yet so far from reality for me. Living by the word of God…I can’t even grasp what this means…it’s like without having the word of God, I would die.
• So I guess I’m kind of disappointed with only two people for the brothers prayer meeting…but then again, I got so tired today that even I didn’t want to go… It just felt like a bit pathetic in a sense…
• It was kind of fun trying to figure out how to do some of the puzzles from the wpc with Tony. And we actually managed to get some progress on the seemingly impossible “breaking the loop” puzzle…

I’m grateful to God for…

• holding on to the brothers prayer meeting by a thread;
• helping me deal with the office hour;
• providing a good roommate for me;
• His stern warning in thinking about the verse above; and
• His never changing love for me.

Another morning where I struggled to wake up…eventually fell asleep again as I was praying, so…yeah, not much of praying there, I guess. Went to the office and started to write the students’ midterm (top secret thingie). It was pretty easy (heh…but I won’t say that to others), and when I hit the last question, Li Zhen called and we went out for dinner (at 4pm!) with Chen Jie, skipping the mccf pre-study…oops. There was dinner, there was lcbo, there was xbox, there was pool (where somehow I managed to win 5 out of 6 3-way matches, since Li Zhen and Chen Jie tried to eliminate each other first while I survived…), there was benchpressing 100lbs with Tim (that was hard, and Tim’s amazing), then home. But not for long, as I headed out immediately to find David for squash. Took a long time and a few phone calls, and finally started squashing…heh. This is my first time, so obviously I suck…but look at David and Wilfred…they have quick reflexes and hit the ball really hard…basically with a lot of athleticism… Ah…I hate athletes…(just kidding) My ineptitude in any physical activities is one of those shortcomings of mine that is a bit painful to be reminded of… Anyway, at the end of the day, David looked as if he can go on for another five hours, and I was just about to collapse, expecting a sore body for today…

Random notes…

• So will I go squashing again? Probably…as long as it’s the only form of exercise that I can do, then I have to force myself to do it…
• So was it the right decision to skip pre-study to be with Li Zhen and Chen Jie? I’m not so sure…I find myself not enjoying much with these activities…then again, pre-study was led by Grace, so I probably made the right decision to skip it…heh.
• Apparently Deal or No Deal is making a Canadian version…should I apply? Nah…don’t want to embarrass myself on national television…then again…

I’m grateful to God for…

• the physical exercise;
• the time spent with Li Zhen and Chen Jie;
• keeping me away from tempting thoughts and actions for the day;
• the strange but interesting TA work this term; and
• keeping me calm in everything.

It was a cold day, relatively speaking, in relation to previous days… For some odd reason, I felt pretty “bouncy” yesterday. It’s like I finally had some energy to run up the stairs and do things and stuff. Anyway, it was supervisor meeting day, and I struggled to do research again, distracted by the manifold dividing puzzle… I managed to do some trivial things, and headed off to the meeting, which was ok, I guess…a bit cold, and that’s not just the temperature of the supervisor’s office. Came back to deal with some TA stuffs where I re-marked some of Robin’s papers, turning 5s into 0s, thinking how he was so careless in the marking…only later did I realize that it was my mistake, and I was so careless in looking at it, so it’s a good thing that I changed the marks back before I hand them over to the instructors. Oops. After another Bible study, came home and had a chat with Scott, watched another great eppy of The Amazing Race (they went to Kuwait!!!), and slept for 9 hours straight…I do sleep a lot these days, don’t I?

So for the in-depth Bible study that we do on Mondays, we use mp3 files from some pastor’s wife, talking about a devotional life. She was talking about how a devotional life is being connected with God every single moment of every single day. This time, however, she talked specifically about setting a special time apart with God. And I do feel ashamed of myself for not being able to keep this time of devotion going, only doing it sparingly…I also recalled how during the spring term around May and June, I would wake up early almost every morning and spend around an hour for prayer and Bible study…and it was good. I didn’t fall into temptations at all in those days. And that’s not the case now… I wish I could be like those days, being with God in the midst of a lot of torments…but man, there are so many distractions now. God help me.

I’m grateful to God for…

• giving me patience in waiting for many things, and keeping me from making many sarcastic remarks that may hurt people;
• continuing to pull me back to Him;
• leading me through the research and the supervisor meeting;
• the good officemates that He has put me in with; and
• the rest He gives me in the long sleeps.

So the cfc sermon this morning talks about “why we need each other,” and Ken discusses how we are designed like Lego with the need to reach out to other people and receive help from other people, and how this is totally opposite of people full of pride. I have a lot of thoughts on this…but have a hard time trying to put it down in words. I’m thinking that recently I’ve started to have this desire to reach out to people, but why? Because I want to be accepted? Because I want the company? Or because I see their needs and want to help them? Most likely not the third option, I’d say. So…maybe I’m just doing it all wrong. Also, Ken talked about having vulnerability as part of deep friendships, and how “if you share your joy, you double the joy; if you share your sorrow, you halve the sorrow.” And I can’t stop thinking back to Francis, how most of the time it was the opposite…sharing joy and he diminishes it, sharing sorrow and he multiplies it…sigh…I really don’t want to think about this anymore. Oh well, as always, I still need to move on…hopefully soon…

Random notes…

• Perhaps the reason I seem to be always tired was because I didn’t drink any tea (always cold, in the milk or passion varieties) while I was sick? Hmm…does that mean that I have been addicted to tea? Yikes…
• Samuel went to Cuba?! That’s so cool…or warm…
• I do find myself going back to being a fake spiritually again… Like, in the services, I sing without meaning it. In the prayer meeting, I pray the script that I was composing while others were praying… Not good…
• Yeah, supervisor meeting coming soon…and I’m still without work… I don’t like that I’m feeling it’s ok to do work just on Monday, like if it’s the right thing to do…yikes.
• This 3D Logic game kept me up at night for a bit…the bright idea here is turning the usual number link puzzle into the surface of a cube. I’m yet to find out how this is much different from the 2D version… Anyway, this is not the best way to past time, but it had interesting puzzles, like the almost impossible #23…

I’m grateful to God for…

• this sense of lost that’s driving me back to Him;
• the continuing opportunity to drive David Betty Kai Sophie to church;
• His message in the stirring morning sermon;
• having one more person joining the prayer meeting; and
• giving me patience in many things.

Thursday: Barely made it to school by noon, talked to a couple of TAs, went for a short chat with Furino, came back to the office to find myself too tired (still sick, after all), and came home. Once home, took a long nap, woke up to fall into temptations…sigh…not good. Friday: Early morning rush to do a bunch of TA stuffs at school, and by the time it got done, it was noon already. Lunch with Chen Jie, afternoon office doing almost nothing. Still tired. Came home to get mom to mccf, which was at a big classroom this time, and David was leading Bible study…woo… He did a good job, I think. Dinner at Mikey’s…which I haven’t been to for a long time now. Mom stayed overnight in my place…boo… Saturday: I don’t know what to make of it, but somehow I fell into temptations again…what the? Anyway, I was just tired, and the plan was to go to Costco…and mom invited Scott to go as well…woo… So we went to Costco, and just as we were about to go in, disaster strikes…I didn’t bring my card. The thing is, I took the card out before I went to Bulgaria thinking that I wouldn’t need this card there. I never put it back in…oops. Anyway, it was a good drive, as Scott says…heh. Nice 10 degrees sunny weather. We went to New City Supermarket, and surprise! Nathan and several other people from my apartment were there as well! That’s a nice surprise… We were supposed to go to convocation for Ginger and Chen Jie in the afternoon, but I was (gasp!) too tired, so only mom went. And she even left half way through…so yeah. Afternoon myf ok, evening Swiss Chalet for Ginger’s birthday ok (somehow I recovered some energy at SC…). Somehow connected with the new guy Danny, who I still claim that I must have seen before… And that’s the end of three days of tiredness and misery…

Random notes…

• I can’t believe it’s been only one week since I came back from Bulgaria…it felt like such a long week.
• Have I figured out yet another mystery reader? Hmm…shocking…
• I think I have mostly recovered from the sickness by now, which is great. Meanwhile, what is wrong with all the tiredness thingie? Is it really the seasonal change? Or maybe it’s the lack of exercise? Or something totally scary? I don’t know…
• My mom noted that we do bump into Nathan a lot…which is a good thing, to say the least…
• Scott knows a bit of Mandarin, and my mom starts to talk to him in Mandarin…yikes.
• I think I’ve been addicted to puzzles now more than ever…not a good sign…
• I really need to pick up the pace in the devotional reading…it’s been almost a year now, and I haven’t even finished January portion of the list…moreover, I think I started the 18th study (out of 25) for January back in April…so…really really slow… Of course it would help if I actually read…

I’m grateful to God for…

• healing my physically sickness;
• the wonderful time at the fellowship and the dinner;
• helping me get through all the troubles with the TAs with a peaceful heart;
• picking me up when I fell…several times…; and
• the good warm weather He has provided recently.

I was just really really tired the entire day… Got stuck in preparing for supervisor meeting, which was a little bit frustrating, but not too much. The meeting was ok, I guess… Meanwhile, lots of office funnies, like finally having all four office occupants showed up, having a discussion on God, going through some of the puzzles I brought, asking them to solve a series puzzle from the wpc (and after I have given more examples and Berkant and Tony stared at it for a long time, Irene solved it…heh). My sickness was limited to just mild rough throat and physical weakness, so it was not too bad…although the symptoms have now transformed into coughing and runny nose…oops. Anyway, I managed to stay in the office until the Bible study, where I promptly fell asleep much of the time…so that wasn’t helpful. O well…

The Amazing Race is just getting better and better! Wow…five legs totally in Asia already, and an exciting new non-elimination penalty that actually may mean something!

I’m grateful to God for…

• once again rescueing me out of a possible supervisor meeting disaster;
• healing me enough to carry through the day;
• the good interactions with my officemates;
• seeing Harry grow spiritually so quickly; and
• helping me better realize His presence in my life.

Ah…the day of sickness… It got worse before it got better. I could barely talk and stand up in the two services this morning. Came home slightly early to “crash and burn”… Lots of water, lots of washroom visits, and it isn’t too bad right now.

Meanwhile…supervisor meeting…TA madness…ah, all the familiar things of the past…

I’m grateful to God for…

• the rest that I received from all the sleeping;
• healing me physically and giving me enough energy to carry on through the day;
• the unexpected good things that resulted from the God-prepared sharing Saturday;
• the strangely calm mind that He has provided; and
• the wonderful weather since I’ve arrived.

Devotional sharing in myf: So I was scheduled to do a devotional sharing during the fellowship. Prior to this, I’ve only thought about really ridiculously hard things to say, so I put it off during the trip to Bulgaria. On the day, I finally had to face the reality that I really have to do this, so I finally turned to God for help (should have done this a long time ago, but I seem to always be in a mood for last minute things…). Soon afterwards, thoughts started to come in, and I decided to share some photos and puzzles from Bulgaria, and then share a song that touched me greatly while I was listening in Bulgaria (sort of a wide turn of topics that are barely stringed together in the Bulgaria theme), and then sharing about the part of the lyric that says “I want to love like I’m not afraid.” I can only thank God that this went really well, even with the very little prep time. Afterwards, it turned out that this had touched other people, too, which is totally unexpected to me. Wonderful. (Bonus: powerpoint slides.) (Update: Oops, looks like this innocent little post is somehow being picked up by puzzleratings.org and other places…so might as well point towards a subset of my photos from the wpc…)

Getting sick: Yeah, I suddenly felt something in my throat as I was driving towards the fellowship. It then turned into full sickness thingie, which made the sharing slightly difficult. But that went well. But afterwards, the cold got pretty bad, and worsened through the night. Coupled this with the jetlag, it was pretty tough. But, as mom said, better to be sick here and now rather than in Bulgaria last week…

I’m grateful to God for…

• His works of wonder in the devotional sharing;
• being able to connect to some people from the fellowship just based on puzzles…heh;
• a bit of good sleep to keep me going in the day;
• having me sick now rather than last week; and
• continuing to instill in me peace and joy in my heart.

Back from the trip now. It has been just an incredible trip, full of fun, excitement, crazyness, and misadventures, all the way from start to finish. The finish: my flight from Sofia to Frankfurt was delayed for 2 hours due to weather conditions in Frankfurt, hence I missed my flight from Frankfurt to Toronto. After standing in lines (two of them) for like 3 hours, this group of 6 got a free night of hotel, two meals, and flights home the next day. It was frustrating for my Canadian teammate there, but I just thought it was such an interesting experience, even though I was very tired as well. As a bonus, I get to step on German soil! Arrived yesterday afternoon at 1, and was (almost) immediately swept away to do TA jobs and mccf and dinner, until I finally hit the bed at 10, with the kind of tiredness that I haven’t experienced for such a long time. But overall, the timing of the delay is just so perfect that I’m just in awe of what God has done for me… Anyway, I had a great trip, I guess I’ll post things about the trip later…but now, back to reality.

I’ve been gone for only a week, and I came back to see…snow?!

I’m grateful to God for…

• His protection in the safe journey home;
• giving me just enough energy to keep going until I get home;
• the unimaginably impeccable timing in everything;
• giving me this sense of joy and calm throughout most of the trip; and
• sort of preparing my heart to face reality, and hopeful that some of the joys and the worry-free during the trip can be carried over…

Alright, this is a short post saying that it’s been quite interesting
here, especially with the special smack in the head by God… I don’t
have much time to spend on the computer, so this will be short. The
first couple of days, the constant rainy weather dampened the
thingie… Today, puzzles are tough… Anyway, this makes the third
continent from which I’ve posted here…hehehe.

Once again, I was tired all day long, along with dizzying head. Must be something really wrong with my body. Lunch with Chen Jie, then bonus office hour where I took over another TA’s office hour to coincidentally make up next week’s missed hour. I might have gotten the bad deal here when 6 people showed up to ask the hard question of the assignment. But at least they sort of know what I was saying, so it was ok. I tried to update the solutions, but got stuck and couldn’t solve a problem. So then I went to Nathan’s office hour, only to discover that he had around 15 students! Wow…and he was running overtime and stuff… At least something he said in there helped me get unstuck, so that’s good. We bumped into another TA Robin, and he had this interesting New Zealand accent…heh. Came home, went and tried to get some euros, which was unsuccessful. Got my mom to the myf mid-autumn thingie…I was dead tired by that time, really wanted to quit and go home, but stuck around anyway. And I didn’t regret it. Good worship music, good message, lots of interactions with people (I even got to talk to John, Tim and Forrest…hmm…), and that’s good. Came home again, and here I am, typing away while still not packing anything.

Random notes…

• One of the things my mom complained about me is that I treat my friends much better than I treat my family…and it is true… Sigh…I feel kind of guilty.
• Apparently my mom has some U.S. dollars for me to carry around…so that solves the lack of euros problem…though I still would have liked to see what euros look like…
• Ah…a few more hours before the trip starts to take place… I’m surprisingly calm, actually, not entirely nervous at all, even though inside of me I may still get a bit jittery… New experiences, I say to myself.
• There’s this extra question of whether or not I should buy an electric socket converter/adapter thingie… Bulgaria uses 220V, after all… I didn’t buy one, and if I couldn’t borrow one, I guess I’ll have to either believe that they have a 110V thingie in the hotel, or I can borrow from someone else in Bulgaria. I need it for my shaver and camera battery charger…
• I assume that I won’t have internet access in Bulgaria, so probably there will be no updates for a while…

I’m grateful to God for…

• keeping me up through this tiring day;
• leading the mid-autumn event from start to finish;
• helping me get through the office hour today;
• the increasing detachment from television; and
• calming me down just before this crazy trip begins…

It’s mom’s birthday today, and I don’t remember ever being with her on her birthday for about 8 years now. And of course I wasted the opportunity by providing no present, no song, not even a “happy birthday.” I did go to the dinner, though, but left early to attend a prayer meeting which ended up having only two people… Anyway, other than this, it was pretty much an eventless day…probably the most exciting thing would be having three people coming to my office hour, and that’s about it.

Random notes…

• This is apparently my 1500th post here. It’s been more than three years, and I can’t believe I still keep this up. It has also been tremendously eventful during this time…
• There was a great thunderstorm happening when I was sleeping last night, which lasted until about noon. It was kind of awesome, actually, even though it might have disturbed my sleep. There was once or twice when I would see a lightning, wondering if it is really lightning or something wrong with my eyes…waited for like 10 or 15 seconds, then heard the thunder. Good thing my eyes are still intact. And speaking of weather, it was pretty warm this morning, but the temperature dropped rapidly from 19 at noon down to 9 right now, with strong winds blowing. Even with my jacket on, it was felt kind of cold…time to bring out the longsleeves…
• The new roommate is kind of cool…even though I’ve had only brief interactions, based on what I’ve seen so far, he’s pretty much into the Japanese culture, I think…even with the food choices. I was surprised to find that he brought a can of powder chicken broth that I also had (which mom got at T&T)…ah…me being silly. Anyway, I’ll wait and see.
• I still have this desperate feeling that there’s obviously something more to be desired…whether it be spiritually, or in friendships, or in life skills, or in knowledge…just finding myself to be lacking in so many fundamental ways.
• 2 days til takeoff…

I’m grateful to God for…

• carrying Harry and I through the prayer meeting;
• the new worship music that I’ve received today;
• keeping me safe while driving with a dizzying head;
• reminding me that attending the wpc is something I’ve longed to do for years, and to realize now that I’m actually going to attend it is just amazing; and
• a roommate who is so far pretty friendly.