从前有个小孩（二)

那，这小孩以前呢，因为爸爸妈妈都得到外地去工作，所以呢，就托外婆一家人来照顾。小时候，大概到我5岁大吧，都是与婆婆，公公，大姨，二姨，舅舅一起度过的。小时候的天真，无邪；真好。小时候并没有像许多名人，过的很苦、很惨。

记得小时候时常跟着外婆到万山（福建话为ban3 san1,即巴杀、菜市场）去，然后呢，我就会要我的婆婆在报摊那里给我买小叮当。（那时候的孩子真好，都知道小叮当，现在也不知道日本为什么强制性把它改称多拉a梦）记得那时候小朋友们只看两种漫画：小叮当，老夫子。而且，小本的只卖一块钱。

小时的回忆。。我下回再写吧。。。今天很累。。很累

is anyone looking?

Call me an attention seeker, but, i'm wondering, is anyone looking?

Anyways, if you have come across this post, or even this page, drop me an sms, will you?

从前有个小孩。。。

从前有个小孩，他说“我以后长大了，要当医生。要帮那些可怜的病人医病。” 那坐在他隔壁的小同学就抢着说“我呢，以后长大了，要当警察。要把所有的坏人抓起来。” 接着，有着许许多多的小朋友们，各自说了自己的志愿：老师，工程师，护士，消防员等等。

到了最后一个小朋友时“老师，我以后要在街边买汉堡包。因为这样，我就可以有好多好多的汉堡包吃了。” 。。。

这个小朋友今年二十三岁了。汉堡包的梦想呢？应该算是放弃了吧。 大家好， 我是徐世明。。。

「似乎憂愁，卻是常常快樂的。」（聖經哥林多後書六章 10 節）

(this text is in traditional chinese, it's a devotional that i read yesterday. have a read, really.)

　憂愁是很美麗的，她的美麗是月光的美麗。她的歌聲好像夜鶯的鳴聲，她的目光帶著並不期望快樂的神情。她能夠與哀哭的人同哭，卻不能與快樂的人同樂。
　　快樂也是很美麗的，她的美麗是夏晨的美麗。她的目光含蓄兒童時代的歡笑，她的頭髮受著日光的閃射。她的歌聲像百靈鳥的歌聲一般翱翔雲上，她的腳步是一個從來不知道失敗的得勝者的腳步。她能夠與一切快樂的人同樂，卻不能與哀哭的人同哭。
　　憂愁沉思著道：「我倆是決不能合作的了。」
　　快樂說：「是啊！決不能了。我的道路是在充滿陽光的草場上，玫瑰為我開著芳香的花朵，山鳥和畫眉為我唱著歡樂的情歌。」
　　憂愁徐徐轉過身去說道：「我的道路在黑暗的森林中的。但是世上最甜蜜的詩歌 ── 深夜的情歌 ── 卻是屬於我的。再會，快樂，再會吧。」
　　在她說話的時候，她們覺得有一個人體立在她們旁邊；雖然看不清楚是誰，卻知道是一位君王，她們跪倒在祂面前，感覺非常懼怕。
　　憂愁輕聲說道：「我看祂一定是快樂的王，因為祂頭上戴著許多冠冕，手上和腳上帶著勝利的釘痕。我在祂面前，一切憂愁都化為不熄的愛和歡樂了， 我願意把我自己奉獻給祂。」
　　快樂低聲說道：「你錯了，憂愁，我看祂是憂愁的王，祂頭上戴著的冠冕是荊棘的冠冕，祂手上和腳上帶著的釘痕是痛苦的傷痕。我也願意把我自己永遠奉獻給祂，因為有祂同在的憂愁，一定比我所知道的快樂更加甘甜。」
　　她倆同聲歡呼說道：「這樣，我們在祂裡面乃是一體，只有祂能將快樂和憂愁合成一體。」
　　她倆手牽著手同在世上跟隨祂走 ── 有時在風雨中，有時在陽光中，有時在冬日的凜冽中，有時在夏日的溫暖中 ── 「似乎憂愁，卻是常常快樂的。」 ── 選

Things i wanted to write...

Been wanting to post something up, in fact, a few things actually. I'll just make a note here.

1. People at the Sniah Boey market: as the saying goes, at the Sniah Boey market (an old market, partially demolished now i guess, at penang), you can find all sorts of people. "Sniah Boey ban san hamic lang pun oo". These few years have been years of observations too, for me, and there are many many types of people whom i've met, and i do think i've lots to learn from them. Not necessary legends, but they do have gold in them.

2. What about the poor? : a recent Bible Study/ Sunday School teacher (lessons still ongoing), Mr Daniel Soh, repeated the message : remember the needy and the poor. I've also been struggling with this issue, what could we do? what should we do? what is our stand? maybe by writing my thoughts out, would i then be able to iron them.

3. People like me: who am i? what am i like? i guess there's a fair number of people whom i can relate to, and who can relate to me too. People who fail, people who cling to faith, people who doubt, people who cared for others only in their hearts, but not by action, people who succumb to temptations, people who wanted to be a better person.... simply, people.

I hope i can write these down here. (sometimes i dreamed of being an author; but i dream almost every other night).

I read sad stories...

I'm not sure when i started to become a reader of sad stories (i tried using the phrase "lover of sad stories", but felt it sounded a bit masochistic). Probably it started when my brother brought back a copy of the book "The Color Purple" by Alice Walker. Here's a bit about the story from wiki:

The Color Purple is an epistolary novel: that is, the book is written in the form of letters. The central character is Celie, a young woman who is sexually abused by her father (who, she later discovers, is her stepfather) and is forced to marry a widower with several children, who is physically abusive towards her.
When her husband's mistress, singer "Shug" Avery, comes on the scene. Initially, Celie feels threatened by this effervescent, liberated version of feminity - a form that has previously been alien to her.
Like "Mr-", Celie's husband, Shug has little respect for Celie and the life she lives at first and continues in her lover's footsteps, abusing Celie and adding to her humiliation.
In time, however, the two women bond, and Celie gradually learns what it means to become an empowered woman in her own right, through both sexual and financial emancipation and she finds the strength to leave her tyrannical husband.

This happens to be my first "introduction" to sad stories, more follows suit, such as "Angela's Ashes", "'Tis", "Falling Leaves", "青青河边草","Disappointment With God"....

Not a very large collection, but i guess it's good; a good way for me to connect to people from another side of the world, people from the other end of the weighing scale, those stricken, trodden, and cast out. It doesn't need to have a happy ending, nope, not all stories (fiction or non fiction) have happy endings.

Do they teach me to be more thankful? Probably.

But i guess it's more of a sad feeling, that keep me clinging to the books at time.

Ok, more or less for this post, write to me? I'll see what i can remember of the rest of the books, and maybe post them up later on.

Wilson's Bar: Back in business

I remembered the days when i used to listen to alot of jazz music. Just loved the feeling of chillin' out, coolin' down. The ambience, the darkness, the smoothness...

Well, that's part of the reason why i named my msn name to be Wilson's Bar. But it has closed down since the day i came to CeMNet. i'm forced (sort of) to change my nick name back to my real name, i have to face the light again.

There are many many things running thru my mind these few weeks since my last post. My mind is swirling, i'm shaken, but not stirred i hope.

Anyways, it's a good feelin' to be back online, writing something again.

of books, paper and wood

Been doing some reading lately, in fact, most of my days are spent reading. Whether i understand them or not is another matter althogether.

The stuff that i'm reading currently? I'll try to list some down, and what i've learned from them

1. Papers, Presentations, Lecture Slides on "relevance feedback and multimedia" : This is supposed to be my masters area of research. The whole idea behind this is that when you search for something online (via google or some other search engines, using text, images or otherwise), there are bound to be search results that are not relavent to you. So what relevance feedback does is actually to provide the user with a way to "rate" the results as either "relevant", "irrelevant" or "neutral" and thus providing the search engine with more idea on what the user wants.
   on a whole it seems quite ok, my own interest level? i'll rate it as 6 out of 10. Papers wise? can't really understand much, and more time needed i guess, to come up with something new.
   
2. Papers, Presentations, Lecture Slides on "Semantic Web and multimedia" : i'm supposed to be in a meeting for this research group. and i don't know a thing about it. So i started to read about it yesterday, and boy, how sleepy it was (i still am), too abstract, too deep, too conceptual. The meeting's at 3pm today, so i better get some coffee before i go in.
   
3. The Bible : been trying to make it a habit to read the Scriptures every morning. I guess i'm trying it out in chronological order. Currently with the Israelites in exile to Babylon. These past few days (or weeks) of reading has been about God punishing and punishing the Israelites for all their wrongdoings. Why? Why do we need to be beeten? to be cast out from our place? why?
   Isort of come to realise that sometimes, it takes God to strip us from all our abilities, strength, power, to enable us to return back to Him. Sometimes the phrase 人的尽头，神的开始 is very true indeed.
   How many times have we been wrestling with God? How many times have we been taking charge of all our live? I don't even need to count, it's almost "everytime", except... except those times when we are sick, stressed out, troubled, fearfull.
   Only when the boat rocks, do we cling to it more and more.
   
4. Purpose Driven Life: a popular book no doubt, which made me think twice before reading it (the cynic within me says that no good thing is so good). To be honest i really wanted a change, and when something promises a change, i do want to try.
   The book isn't perfect, but it does contain much spiritual insights. We should be thoughtful and careful when reading it. I remembered a few things...
   "The problem with a living sacrifice is that it can climb down the altar"
   The five purposes are worship, fellowship, to become more Christlike, service and mission.
   
   at least, the book tries to be God centred, instead of me-centred..
   
5. It's not about Me : a devotional book by Max Lucado, urging us to be more God centric and less me centric. The way to do it is to ponder on Him more and more.
   
   i guess we need a dose of this book. It's just too much about me, me, me. I'm sick of it too. thinking of this problem from the perspective of my Christian Fellowship. There are a few camps of people:
   
   1. people who put studies first (we should i guess). However, the problem lies where by what do we do with out studies? Do we glorify God with out studies? When can we glorify God with our studies? I guess sometimes it's more of a self standard that we have set--"i cannot get lower then a B", "i'm the top student of the class and must stay that way".
   Ask them about how to glorify God with their studies? i'm not sure about their answers.
   
   2. people who enjoys the CF. This is good i guess, but it happens to be another end of the extreme. Some people love the CF, it's just so much fun to them, Birthday parties, Sister's day, Brother's day, football sessions... i can feel the love. But what happend to the Word of God?
   
   May God help us. to grow each day, day by day, thru Jesus, our hope, our saviour and our way.
   
6. Knowing God: a book by J.I. Packer. Whoa... this one is a deep, hard book to read. Still at the front few pages, need some time before i have something to write about it.
   
7. Straits Time, CNN, Zaobao, Soccernet: not to forget to keep up with some news. although sometimes all i read is the comics and entertainment section (tsk tsk...)

More or less, i guess. Read anything nice lately? tell me, share with me.