A month since

It's been a month now since I last blogged and my life has taken on a lighter, exciting new dimension.

Just to update, things are getting better at work and the problem have been dealt with, at least superficially enough for me to cast aside this blanket and start smelling the flowers again!

Work has been mundane so far, which is more than I can ask for. I recently did my first presentation in the company and was happy to say that there were no glitches. Work for me has been a series of obstacles to overcome. And after crossing one successfully, I am soon looking on to another. It doesnt sound as dreary as it may read, because I'm kind of like a long distance hurdle runner. I jumped over one hurdle, then run, even walk a bit before I pick up the momentum again to jump over another one. Yeah.. something to that effect. Not sure why I'm writing about hurdles now.. haha..

I went to Hong Kong recently with a couple of friends and enjoyed the sure dynamism and energy of the country. Its beautiful store displays, magnificent skyscrapers set against a picturesque landscape of mountains is quite a nice blend.

So, looking forward to the future, it is now 8 weekends to our wedding. The pace is picking up and I am so hyped up about it that I'm typing this having woken up at 5:30am on Saturday morning. I went to my first fitting yesterday and this is how my hair will look like, roughly.

I show you others in a bit when i have more pics..

Finally.. a respite

After a fairly hectic week, finally, the weekend is here and I have clocked up an extra few hours of sleep today to make up for the lost hours during the week.

The hectic few days went well, I think. Feeling more relaxed among my overseas and local colleagues - a sort of comaraderie has built up. And the number of press I've met - it's all a big eye opener for me. They're all very friendly, though I feel that the mood in Hong Kong just seemed a little more practised and perfunctory, compared to the genuinity in Beijing. I barely ate and slept these 3 days, but I left with a little satisfaction that I haven't done too badly for myself this time round and that the hard work was worth it.

Now the weekend is here, and what am I going to do? Going to catch a movie with Thomas later - as usual, what do we do most saturdays anyway? I like this slowed down state, though it is just a tiny tad boring. I realised you do have to work on your friends. If you took the easy route out and settled down by yourself most of the time, it's not so easy to call them out as and when you please anymore.

I feel happier, and I hope this feeling will last for a while...

cheers!

An OK day

I started the day with my heart weighing ten thousand tonnes.

By the mid day, I've almost decided to stop working.

2 hours later, my heart lifted a little as the unknown burden started to fall off.

And by 6, I was ready to call it a day.

All in all, today could have been worse.

Thank you God, last night's prayers was worth it!

Looking at the week ahead

Although the last post was an attempt at seeing last week in a slightly positive light, I'm still filled with trepidation at the week ahead.

What unpleasant encounters, stress, uncontrolled situations, fraying tempers will befall me this week? I'm off to 2 countries in 3 days - both new situations that I will have to manage in double quick time. Can I breathe a sigh of relief when I'm back, or will it be worse?

Pray. That's the lifeline God gives us when we're overwhelmed by our situation. I've forgottem that I can pray. Pray that everything will miraculously turn out fine, or even if it doesn't, that I'd be equipped to go through with it. And apart from praying and worrying, there's really nothing much I can do for now.

I swam fifteen laps just now and all I could think of was work. That's how much it consumes me. This little upset at work has thrown my life into imbalance, and I am much disturbed by it. I'm libran, and represented by a pair of scales, I aim to balance everything. I wish someone will tip my scales back to equilibrium, because right now, I'm in a very uncomfortable state, as if everything has been tilted severely to one side and I just cant bring myself back to balance.

So what's next? Pack my suitcase, prepare a list of what i am going to do tomorrow, and pray that the day passes as fast as it can.

A Trampled Week Part Two - Counting the Blessings

I don't want to look back at this week as being all bad.

There are good things.

I went to lunch with a colleague from America. What at first started out a trifle awkward soon became very comfortable. I always thought I have trouble communicating with Caucasians, and I have long attributed that to the fact that despite I look a little Western, I'm very very Asian inside. We had a lovely discussion and I learnt many things and felt enriched.

But hey, now the two most comfortable colleagues I have are Caucasians, plus a couple more from overseas. Maybe I have grown into a new level of sophistication when it comes to making friends. In this increasingly global environment, race sometimes rears its ugly head but melts down after goodwill persists in its universal fashion.

It's also reassuring that people have noticed the problems I've been facing at work, so I'm not that alone with the problem as I thought I was. I've always worried that being me, I will never be able to defend myself really well even if the truth of the matter is on my side. Therefore, fear often overtakes me when I feel oppressed and unhappy. But it's nice when I know that some people are watching out for me, when people notice a particularly downcast face, strained expressions on a peculiarly bad day. It doesnt solve anything but it makes me feel stronger, as if by their little act of notice, they impart a little strength to me that things will resolve itself according to the natural order and rule that God has created. Thanks very much to them!

There are many things I need to learn:

First I need to care less about the remarks people make. I think this boils down to me being a people-pleaser. I have to learn that I can't please everyone and learn not to let petty, snide remarks get to me. This will be an extraordinary project.

Second I need to learn to let go.

Third I should return the favour. Start paying attention to the people around me, in a good way, not bad. Watch out for their silent cries for concern, masked deeply by a business like face. There must be many people like me around, where are they all?

Fourth I must learn to forgive. They say that women forgive, but never forget. I am struggling with the former already, what more the latter. But it can be done. With God's help. Hopefully God hasnt given up on me yet.

A Trampled Week

This week has been one of the worst weeks of my life. Problems at work has reached to a new peak and it affected me so much that I can't take my mind off it, even after work.

Makes me ponder about an issue that may not be of any relevance, but stuck in my mind after I heard a radio program. It was a teenagey program and allows people to send in dedications for songs to be played. Anyway, this female listener called in and what appears to be a fanatic teenager getting all chummy with the deejay, quickly took a more emotional and serious turn, when she confessed to wanting to cut herself on more than one occassion when she was repeatedly bullied at school and once, even beaten up. She was close to tears and sounded emotional. Her unexpected outburst took on a bizarre reality tv turn when she appeared to be swallowing back her sobs all the while emphasizing her gratitude to the deejay for giving her the strength not to do what she wanted to do initially. Then it got a little bizarre when she asked the deejay for her phone number and wanted to be her friend... In any case, I start to wonder what it was like being bullied, and what the victim will feel. Will she be resenting the act, yet secretly wonder if she deserved it? Will she feel helpless that nothing can be done to improve the situation, because she has become so stuck into it that she can no longer take an aerial view of it? No wonder bully victims hardly go public, and will only be discovered once it's too late.

Of cos this shouldnt apply to me, cos come on.. i am too old to be bullied. But people get taken advantage of all the time, when their wish for harmony is mistaken as a sign of weakness.

Coming back to work, I did something about the problems I faced, but whether things will get any better is really still up in the air.. and that lifted a small load off my shoulders, but still a lingering worry remains..Being the perpetual worrier that I am, that's hardly surprising.

I wonder if I have really been taking my work too seriously. More often than not, my ego, pride and self-worth gets tied up into this thing called work. I suppose it's inevitable to mistake it for life itself. I spend an inordinate amount of time working on it, contributing to profits of a meaningless entity that does not get judged for its sins on judgement day. How do I relax and tell myself it's just a job? What do you mean by 'just a job'? When losing it can bring about so much changes in my life and spirits...

Then there's another thing. I was called a very ugly term by someone close to me. My first reaction was shock. No one has ever spoken like that to me before. Though it was later clarified that it wasn't pertaining to me directly, I still feel very much violated. Being someone who has made it a personal mission not to utter a single profanity, it's always somewhat disturbing to me when others do so excessively in my presence. I feel ... as if I've to be subjected to the most horrible things in the world. When I was young, my school principle told me that no matter how one behaves outside, a single profanity will express all the terribleness inside. And I feel as if a torrent of that terribleness have flooded me and surrounded me. And I feel so wretched.

Makes me ponder about how life and control. Sometimes bad things come to you all of a sudden, and being unprepared it always catch you bad, really bad. At the same time, think of how terrible it will be to live life always preparing for something bad to happen to you. You may be prepared but there's still no escaping from the consequences, isn't it?

Let's hope next week will be better.

The unbearable heaviness of being

My heart weighs a ton. It drags the centre of my being right to the ground, making my legs heavy, my heart heavy, my eyes heavy, my face long.

The cause of it, I have mulled over for ages. Such that I am no longer sure of what causes it.
Is it the work, is it the environment, is it the person/persons?
All tumbled dry into one dried decrepit biscuit.

What's happening? A blushing bride-to-be should not be struck by a depression this heavy.

Injustice - I figure, has some part to play. The feeling of being taken for a ride, of having your niceness taken for granted, is not a good feeling to have. Sure, God says that the just will be persecuted. But He didn't say that the just will feel depressed, did He?

I'm hardly Job, but I can feel how he feels. He's done no wrong, why would God test him thus - subjecting him to tortures both physical and emotional.

I walk in a daze through the office, passing people I can't bear to look at, can't be cheered by. I know this is all inside me somehow, and I gotta get out of it. But how? Everytime I think of that source of my pain, my bane, I know that this is not going to stop. I pray for a miracle. Someone take it away and make it disappear. Why is this thing robbing me of my entire joy and spirits in such disproportionate percentages? Somehow, I just can't put it into perspective. Just can't.