jam - no jam ?

tuesday was THE jammest (if there is such word) day of my coming home from work drive in this company. it usually takes me 20-30 mins to get home but tuesday it took me 11/2 hours.
on wednesday, it was back to normal and although i still complained when it took longer than expected to reach home, yesterdays jam was like 'dream jam' (if there is such thing), jam but moving.

works calls.....

MPO

malaysian philharmonic orchestra, i went to watch them yesterday courtesy of one of my sisters. traffic there was light and parking was easy (v expensive though). perhaps most people have enough of the traffic jams during weekdays, so they avoid KLCC during the weekends, making it totally jam free and jam up places like 1U and Ikano instead.

walking up to the lobby, it was indeed spacious, but there were lots of attendant to help you out. 1st thing i did was to check out if i over or under dress. i only wore a long sleeve shirt and docker. looks like i was save, a short sleeve shirt would do.

a quick round of intro whit my sister's friends and we were ushered away. what a pleasant surprise! our sittings were not the normal sitting but we had a corporate hospitality suite. there were quite a number and each one had an attendant standing by to assist. when we reached ours, we were shown our sitting... che wah, like in the movies pulak (balcony sitting), then back to the room. sitting for 8, with a tv set, in case you don't want to be out there.

we were told when the performance starts the doors to balcony would be locked and there's no way to get back in. so the ladies made their was to the wc first.

the acoustic for the hall was excellent, just before the performance starts, there was a moment of silent while waiting for the conductor to come out, it was so quite it was deafening. i've only experience such 'quietness' in voice recording booth but they are normally 12' by 8' or slightly bigger.

being the first time, we (maybe it's just me) clapped when only when other audience clapped. kampung a bit mah, if clap at wrong time, malu-lah.

after 2 performances, intermission for 15 mins and then the rest of the show. all in all the show was only about 1 hour + but it was quite an experience. maybe when they play pieces from my favourite composers i'll go watch again.

we got to find out quite a lot about MPO,
you'll get to watch a performance from only rm 10 pengsan, better than watching a b grade movie. ......most expensive tickets are at rm 500. was told in overseas, at least 70 Euros, some more probably must wear jacket.
all the musicians are foreign nationals (i might get this wrong coz now malaysia boleh already wat).

the hall was squeeze in, an after thought, that's why it's relatively small.

the ceiling is retractable moved higher when there is a session with pipe organ

largest pipe organ in south east asia.

ok already, ppl will think that i'm promoting it.

eat this

Ewww......when my colleague passed me this, it's like i was expecting it emit some foul smell....you get what i mean.

nope, no smell at all. of course if you're any decent malaysian you'll know that it's asam jawa. i have not seen them sold like this before, it's usually in processed form.

break the shell (pic on the right) and eat it's contents minus the root looking thing. it's nice, not as nice as if you cook it with prawns, asam prawns - my mom used to cook that, it's one of my favorite dish. yum...yum.

i did a search on the net and found that it is claimed to be able to cure quite a lot of ailments. Asthma, dry cough, fever and a few others.

no will do

sometimes just a simple "no, we can't do it, but we'll help find someone who can." is better than a 30 min beating round the bush.

i told one of my friends of a 20k project and asked if they (their company) can do it. hmm...we don't really have the facilities to do that but i'll find out for you. later when i called to check he asked me out for tea to talk about it.

so i went with high hope....why else would he want to talk further about it. so we met up, had a chat, he didn't say no, but gave lots of example where 20K jobs doesn't cut it anymore.

hmmmm.....i know you're trying not to offend me by not telling me no,.... but i guess beating around the bush for 35 to 40 mins to do it really upsets me.

it's a 'business' proposal, i thought of them coz i thought they could make some money out of it, not because i thought they're 'hadap'* for jobs or that they're low on business or that i was going to take advantage of them. plus the beating around the bush, telling how some others with such low budgets were told off..... it's like telling me,'if you are not my friend, i would have given you the same treatment!'

phew.... good thing got blog to lepas geram ** .....

all said they're a nice guys, and guess they just want to break it to me 'gently'....i suppose sometimes we do not how to behave when we need to say 'no' to people we're close to. we fear they will take it the wrong way and we end up making an enemy.

1 john 4:18 - ...but perfect love casts out fear...

(sub plot)

these editing 'job' are/will be taking more time than i expected. things are not as easy as it looks and lots of stuff to sort out quickly. how did i end up with all these again ??


* hadap = begging
** lepas geram = lash out

no more msn messenger

my company has blocked the msn messenger even though only a small number of people having it. Yahoo messenger is still ok. ??

was going to say what's the point but better be thankful we still can use it.

do people spend a lot of time chatting on messenger ? i do it mainly for work. saves on phone bill and you know when they're there or when they're away.

another good tool gone down the drain.

scales fell

last Sunday's message by Rev David Shearer was indeed a wonderful one.
it's a simple expounding of Rom 7: 1-6 followed by the 1 Sam 25 story.
of course i would not be able to do as good a job of telling it like Ps David but i still would like to try as i think it's something every Christians should know.

he started off by getting us to identify the 3 'persons' in Rom 7:1-6
the wife = israel / the other man = Christ / husband that dies ? = Adamic nature in us, not the law as thought by many !

If Scripture declares in 1 John 3:9 "Whoever has been born of God does not sin, for His seed remains in him; and he cannot sin, because he has been born of God.", why do Christians continue to sin?.

i've always wanted to know the answer to this question, don't you ?

well it turns out, our nature is now of God but our MIND is still stuck to the old !
our new nature does not sin but our mind is still getting used to the new nature and therefore we're almost always of 2 minds.

that's why in Rom 12:2 / Eph 4:22-23

i've always read 'the old man' not as the mind but as the old nature. so when this was explained i felt as if scales fell off my eyes. that is why suddenly Romand 12:2 came jumping at me !

i know it's terribly compressed, but hope you guys are blessed as well.

(sub-plot)
went for a chat with partners of a post house and it's coming along well. the shoot for a short film that committedited to help edit is near completion which means i'll have to start work on it soon. apple is sponsoring the editing equipments, so i get to put in my wish list ! and am rushing like mad to help put together my church's anniversary video.*
everything is 'moving' except work, it's picking up but still not there yet.

suddenly i'm press for time !


* please ok, i'm not free-lancing, the commitment to help edit the short film were made 3 years ago (yes it's that long) and they've now come to 'claim' it. i'm a man of my words. church anniversary ? my humble contribution to the work of God.

let go and let God

it's always easier said than done. but this morning i did it.

it's no secret that i have not been myself lately due to the VSS and all. so today i resolve to 'pick myself up'. give thanks for all that has happened, affirming that i believe He has my best interest in mind, and put in my best in whatever i do / wherever i am, that it'll all be to His glory.
all these were done while driving to work as it's a good 25 mins drive.

(sub plot)
i've been wearing shades everytime i drive to work but today i did not do it. it's a beautiful day, not too gloomy or bright. everything looked brighter ! (of course not wearing any shades helped, duh??..). and it's just refreshing. guess sometimes we just need to look at thing from a different perspective (miche).

well.... i must say after this morning, things are 'moving'.

romantics

my wife have been watching lots of korean drama series, some japanese as well. i sometimes sibuk* and will sit and watch for a short while.
i wonder after watching all these series will she expect me to be more romantic and sweep her off her feet. i'm not the romantic type,....more of the 'if i told you i love you once, i've told you a thousand times so don't expect me to repeat it a few times a day kind'.

still....maybe a should put in a bit more effort now with her watching all these shows. just the other day we watched pride and prejudice, nice show. guys, if you want to score points with your loved ones this is the show to take them to watch. plus show-lah you're a bit cultured. it's an adaptation from the classic writing by Jane Austen.

lost

feeling a bit lost this new year, there’s no real change at workplace (was expecting one) except that there are less people. not much jobs to look after even though it’s near CNY, the way i see it, the whole ‘old’ system of channeling jobs through to us is down and no new ones to replace it. no news on new job offer although everyone were positive about it, which is ok with me as I was not really expecting very much out of it.

guess the ‘transitional period’ is longer than i expected.

at least i’m not on some island with a bunch of people and some mysterious creatures running around.

fresh and crisp

earlier in the week there were a feeling of newness in the air. could be i woke up early and the rain had cause the air to be fresh, and the good old sunshine made it nice and crisp as well. i'm glad it doesn't rain in the morning anymore. it always spoil the day for me.

this year 2 of my children will be in school and another in kindergarden. my wife still don't get some time by herself as 2 are in the morning and the other afternoon. the good thing is all 3 of them now sleeps early as they need to wake up early for school.

after a long holiday, i really feel like slacking off big time. it doesn't help that some of the 'regular' colleagues are not around anymore. things are still quiet in the office, which is a bit worrying as soon it'll be CNY. sometimes jobs come in 'last minute' and we have to rush it through, i was hoping it would be a thing of the past but maybe it's the malaysian way of doing things.