*bound*
You said give me your life and I’ll give you everything
You said give me your heart and I’ll never let you go

~uncle joe

*last week*
pics from the past month are finally up:
mid-autumn's festival



gabby's bye bye party at the point/klong



tony's 60th at china tee club



and the long-awaited uncle joe cd release party at queen's


just look at the emotion glistening on ben's face...


go to my imagestation for more!

*from the towers of this city i can still see all your promises*
i'm taking orders for cds... deliverable whenever johann comes to town. price tbc (usually about $80 hkd/$15 cad). any takers??





*it has begun*
i don't care what anyone in hk says, this is still the coolest game on earth! and is the coolest team in the game!!

*almost over*
the long weekend is almost over. believe it or not, i'm actually ready to go back to work. there are actually things (that i enjoy) to do, and i know my days at kely are numbered. i want to treasure them, and make the most of them while i'm still there. my cousin tonight tried to convince me to wait until the economy gets better, until i find another job, until i really REALLY hate my job, before i quit. i didn't have the heart to tell her that i've already decided.


that's the thing with my family. they are so painfully... chinese. practical, sensible, always says and does the right thing in front of company, holds high esteem for wealth prestige reputation face... but so lost. i couldn't even begin to explain to her that i'm actually relying on God to provide because i've heard a calling, and that i'm not working, even now, for money or stability, but simply to do HIS will. she wouldn't understand. none of that is anywhere near her worldview or frame of mind. it would be like speaking gibberish to her. so i just nodded and 'um hmm'ed and ate my shark's fin soup.... one day...


*light reading*
in case anyone out there is void of anything worthwhile to read, go check out my friend ed's blog. this is not ed read. this is my friend ed ng (or 'buff ed' as derek likes to call him) from vancouver, who works at karen's old school. if you like obscure literary references (or even obvious lotr references) then this will definately entertain you.

*catching up*
yes i suppose it is time for an update. life has been enormously busy... with what, it's hard to recall. work has reared into full-throttle since school started, and it's back to the good old sex and drugs talks! but i've actually really had a blast at the induction days at some of the schools the first week. gave me a chance to connect with some sna-ers out of sna... don't know if they feel the same way though! but it's all good. i have a good feeling about sna this year. God is preparing some big things, and he's already begun to give us glimpses into the changes he's making at sna. changes on the inside, not the surface. i love that feeling of the spirit stirring from beneath... by human eyes all might seem as usual, calm, mundane even. but underneath the spirit is moving...


it's mid-autumn festival this weekend. a little strange observing the festivities for the first time really since i was a kid. i don't even really remember anything from my childhood - just hazy nights of dangling lanterns on the roof with my cousins. but tonight, as i walked through parts of causeway bay i had never before ventured, i actually felt a sense of foreign-ness, my eyes falling upon scenes i cannot recall. i'm looking forward to tomorrow, when i get to really participate in (well, really just wander amidst) the real party on the street, complete with the tai hang fire dragon dance. tonight, i completely lost my head and forgot it was thursday, cell group night. i went to dinner at dpma's eldest brother's flat at illumination terrace with the whole family: a first without derek. it was cool... although i admit i'm still trying to find my niche in that crazy bunch. i think it has something to do with the fact that they're so completely different than my family. the ma's is a family of 3 very loud boys, with 2 very loud parents. they all like to shout at everything, although it's not shouting for them. the tsang's is a family of mostly girls, where we were always taught to eat dinner in silence, and hardly did anything together. i can't even remember the last time we all ate dinner together. actually i can't remember the last time we were all in the same city together, aside from wedding visits... well, that may explain a bit of derek's and my bipolar personalities.


please do pray for him and the rest of the mission team in cebu right now. they need it! they are there working with the peeps at nehemiah house (an orphanage), ywam, and vineyard church (carlos choi) doing outreaches in slums and villages for the next 3 days.

*bare feet*
i lost my shoes today. well, ok... i didn't lose them. they broke, and i had to trash them. yes my $15 kwun tong purchase, incredibly, fell apart. this is the second time this has happened to me. the first time i was in lan kwai fong with fion. i had to hobble home with a half-flip flop on my foot. this time, i was in soho. stone slab street to be exact. i was helping my colleague pick up some things from apres.


the thing was, i was already in a bad mood because i had to put off doing my own work in order to help my coworker do hers. for some reason they had to rush me to go with her because she had to be in tst by 6pm. it was 4pm. we were in central. i was like "HUH?" ok. so i go help my coworker to pick up two bags of small teddy bears. why, i don't know. she apparently cannot manage two relatively light bags of teddy bears on her own. (or perhaps they just seemed light to me because of my massively huge guns... yeah.) so i was already upset. then my flip flops broke. great. i didn't feel like hobbling today, so i just took them off and threw them away. so i went barefeet from soho back to the office, and from my office back to central. i was heading to the church office in hopes of there being someone who just might happen to have a spare pair of shoes with them. hmm. yes i forgot it was monday and everyone's day off at the office. so, no spare shoes. but i found baby blue terry slippers. baby blue terry slippers it was.


once i had time to calm down... i was actually glad that my flip flops broke. they were dead weight anyway. i didn't need junk cluttering my house. and it felt good walking on the warm pavement with my bare feet. going bare feet always make me feel good, no matter where i am. i remember many years ago when i came to hong kong for a visit, my parents warned my sister and i not to pack sandals because the streets were really dirty and we should be wearing fully protective footwear. hmm... no protective footwear for me today. would they have had a fit if they saw me! but i loved it. it just felt so free. walking where i shouldn't be walking. without proper footwear. such a release. if only we could all do that once in a while, i think we wouldn't be so afraid to tread on unfamiliar territory. the soles of our feet would be more accustomed to every kind of terrain.


these FEET were made for walking...