7 Quick Takes Friday - Vol.9

- 1 -

My friend said that "Apostolate is like having another child." It's time consuming and demanding, but it's part of our vocation. We must use the time now to do more apostolate. Of course when we're married next time we'll also do apostolate (especially with our own family!), but the time and the form of apostolate as singles now is very unique too.

- 2 -

We had a farewell tea party for Megan last Thursday. Time flies!! I do learn a lot from her. She's very enthusiastic! She found this freeware that could create a graph for social network analysis. Cool!

- 3 -

Another farewell game night with housemates. Two of my housemates will move to their university hostels. We played UNO and other card games last night. So we said to each other, we must have this kind of get-together more frequently! It's been a challenge to gather 6 of us at one time!!

I forgot to say UNO!!!

- 4 -

I was so happy that I found this liquid that could unclog the drain easily. (The sink has been very disgusting recently). However, it seems like I still need to learn how to use the pump to unclog the drain next time. Just in case!

- 5 -

Last Sunday the Legion of Mary friends came to my house to prepare boards for the Matriculation Fair this week. (It's when all co-curricular activities do their recruitment). Hopefully we have more younger members this year.

Last year's board!

Without Our Lady, the route is sooo long and the route has many obstacles! (See the dino?)

- 6 -

Tomorrow one of my friends will get baptized (in a Protestant Church). While I hope she's opened to the way to the true Church, I believe perhaps this is what God wants for her for now. So talking about baptism, I asked her a few weeks ago, "Do you know what does it mean to be baptized?" Sometimes we also forget about the meaning of baptism, so I think this is a good occasion to remind me that I become of God through baptism. It's a been a struggle for me to get up when I make mistakes, so thanks to my friend's baptism, this is a reminder to foster the sense of Divine Filiation :)

- 7 -

Going home in two weeks!!!! Yeay!!!

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World Youth Day and treating Pope as celebrity?

This is a sharing from Paul about his World Youth Day experience in Madrid. One of our friends was skeptical that World Youth Day (WYD) is like admiring Pope like celebrity. The pope goes around and waves hand here and there to the youth.

The truth is...
It's not the case.

Paul said that that when you see the Holy Father passing the crowds, you can see that he looked to every eyes that he meets and he is contemplative. You can feel that he's praying for each person that he looks at. Isn't it beautiful?

Another beautiful truth about WYD is many people find the vocations through WYD. Sharmini has been a volunteer in three WYDs (this is her third one!) and she told me that she really witnessed her friends found the special path that God wants in WYD. For Paul himself, he learn more about the path that God has prepared for him through the people he was going with in the last WYD.

So........
pray for the fruits of World Youth Day :)

Is going to university a luxury?

This week I had an interesting chat with two interns from the US. One is Megan from University of South California and another one is Rebecca from MIT. They told me about the tuition fee cost in their universities and I can't close my mouth afterwards.

It was sooo expensive :(:(

The funny thing is, Megan said that her parents have saved lots of money for her to go to university. Because of that, she can get any other grants / financial aid because they are need-based, not merit based. Another issue about tuition fee loan is also the high interest rate. So yeah...they told me about the "untold story" of the various financial aid provided by the universities. She has a friend who is very smart and this friend was accepted in the Medical School of John Hopkins university, but because this friend could only get lower class of grant, this friend went to other school that has lower quality, but provides more financial aid. So she said, "I don't trust university rankings because there are people who are so smart and talented, but they go to lower quality of university because they cannot afford to pay the tuition fee". :(:(

This reminds me of my mom's advice that she always repeats over and over again, "You should be thankful that you can study in the university without worrying too much about money." My uncle went to university for 7 years because he worked in the morning and he was too tired when he attended his class. He's the only one who gets university degree in my mom's family.

So one thing I asked Megan and Rebecca was, "How long must your parents set aside fund for your college degree?" I asked the same thing to my boyfriend. He told me that there's an article in newspaper that mentioned how expensive the university tuition fee and how parents must set aside money so early. However, at that time, I innocently told Paul that, "Oh well... I'm on study loan now. I think it's still okay in Singapore to let your kids pay their own study loan. Or parents can pay half of the tuition fee." (I heard that the study loan interest in Singapore is the lowest in the world, even though after I start working, I realize that it's still lots of money to pay just the interest of the loan)

I don't know...
I'm just curious, what's the safe borderline on how much people MUST save for their kids' education? I don't think that people should have the mentality of "I must have this amount of $$$$$ before having another kid" but I think many people now tend to have this mentality. *warning sign*

On a positive note, I'd like to share two interesting posts on: Why having big families is good for you (and cheaper) and Feeding Children on a Budget. Now I realize why the Gospel reflection that I use keeps emphasizing on "writing letters to influence policy-making" because there are many policies that can either destroy or improve family life. (I seriously say "destroy" because I think that's what's happening in Singapore). For example, housing policy. When a couple purchase a public house, it will only be ready 3-5 years after the purchase time. So what's happening in Singapore is most people people "wait" until they have 'stable' career and 'enough' money to buy a house (or a resale house). Some choose to do the civil registration much earlier (perhaps before they are really ready for a marriage), so in-between this process, apparently things do not work out well and they break up and there's complication because the house is already under both names. While it's quite 'normal' for me and my parents to think that "It's okay if you can't afford a house N.O.W", not many people think in the same way. This (the mindset of I must have a-z before getting married) is another mindset that needs to be challenged in Singapore (in Indonesia too. People start to think like this too! :( ).Oh maaaan, I should write separate post on this.

Nevermind, the moral of the current post is, please study well because it's a form of being grateful that we have opportunities to study!!!!

7 Quick Takes Friday - Vol.8

- 1 - 

I had weird dreams in three consecutive days. On Sunday night I dreamed that there was a horrible flood in the kindergarten with whom I'm working with. Monday night - skip - this dream is too weird. Tuesday night, I dreamed about the R freeware (statistical package) and how it could simulate how people can go back to the past. These are super-tiring dreams!!

- 2 -

God talked to me through flowers on the way to my office and poisonous mushroom outside a kindergarten. Hahaha. I mean, somehow I was really amazed by the beauty of the flowers and mushroom.

Poisonous!

- 3 -

I attended the recollection at the Church of Holy Spirit because I couldn't attend the usual recollection on second Saturday. Actually the recollection at the Church of Holy Spirit was attended by mostly married women. Nevertheless, I've found that the topic of the meditations was still useful for me. The first one was on making a bright and cheerful home. The second one was on penance. The spiritual reading was on Holy Purity. What a good start for mid-year of 2013. When I said meditations, I did not mean that we were all sitting down with cross-legs, but it means a priest will talk about a topic to guide our prayer. So the main purpose is not to listen to the priest, but to use what the priest says as a conversation topic with Our Lord.

- 4 -

Last Saturday was my friend's sister's wedding, right? It seems that the priest who celebrated the Mass has known the couple for a long time. He gave practical advice to the couple. Oh well, I think the homily was very useful for me too. I always have this thought (okay, not always, but sometimes), that guys are only sweet/romantic/whatsoever-extraordinary at the beginning of courtship. One thing the priest said that "Even though the guy doesn't bring 12 stalks of roses anymore, it doesn't mean that he loves you less now. It's just that his expression of love has changed." Good reminder not to complain! (anyway, for me, my boyfriend gave 1 stalk of rose is already an achievement :P Happened only twice so far, but the effect was very powerful because he rarely does it. Hahaha)

the middle is my friend, the bridesmaid :) Pretty! Three of us are high-school-friends :) My friend's sister who got married used to teach the guy at the left before our university entrance exam.

- 5 -

I can't imagine working without having spiritual formation. In the midst of "brainless" work this week (cross-checking excel file with the hardcopy of questionnaires, photocopying questionnaires, editing slides, etc), one thing that keeps me persevere is a constant reminder to offer up my work for some people. (Even with this thought in my brain, it's still difficult to finish my work well!)

- 6 -

The result of my relaxing weekend last week was the discovery of this interesting post on children who were adopted by same-sex "parents". This post answers the question that I have for a long time on "What happened to the children?" and it's a piece of evidence of the deception of statistics that show that "there's no negative impact on children with same-sex "parents" ". In fact, there have not been any longitudinal study on these children and same-sex couples were not sampled randomly. (The sample is not representative).

- 7 -

Today I used new strategy to teach Paul's 5-year-old cousin. We did 15-minute-reading + 15-minute-playing + 15-minute-reading + 15-minute-playing. The blessing of the fact that he was bitten by ant: I could teach him the word "itchy". Hahahaha.

We revised "i", "u", "a". Today's emphasis was on reading.

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Lumen Fidei: part I - personal reflection

I have been postponing to read Lumen Fidei (Pope's Francis first encyclical) till today.
It's really..beautiful. It's something that you can relate to your personal life.


Take a look at this:

 This is the most common misconception about faith, something like "leaping to a place that you don't know". A friend of mine whose faith was shaken once told me this, "Well, if I don't know if the medicine can cure my sickness or not, I'd rather not take the medicine because taking the wrong medicine can kill me." He also said it's like "I don't want to walk on this road because I don't know if the next thing in front of me is a steep cliff." So there he goes. Stop mingling with Catholic friends that will bombard him with "one-sided story" about Faith and the Church. This paragraph reminds me of him.

However, faith is really a light. Okay I'm bad at recalling exact quotations from great people, but Frank Sheed mentioned in Theology and Sanity, that faith is like the sun light that illumines the view of a mountain. The mountain stays the same, all objects that we see do not change, but faith gives you a different perspective of these objects, eg., our life, our joys, our sorrows. Faith does not take out my suffering and problems, but helps me to see them with a 'light', that there's a meaning of things that happen in my life.

It seems that some of my friends have been having "quarter-life" crisis. While we who have faith sometimes take our faith for granted, I witness two friends that clearly tell me that, "I don't have purpose in this life. I just work for money, that's it." So it's not our imagination that people who do not have faith are seeking Truth and meaning in life, they're confused, they need something 'more'.

The second thing that struck was this following points:

Isn't this what happen again and again in our life?
That's what God does when He calls me to a particular path. It's not only a 'call', then God will leave you to walk the path alone, but there's something great waiting in front of us once we follow the path. Then, God also always walks with us. At difficult times, I always imagine Our Lady helps a one-year-old girl going up the steps. Yup, that's me, the one-year-old girl.

I've been reading Haley's NFP series. I think this call for openness to life is exactly the same like God's words to Abraham: it contains both a call and a promise. Scott Hahn's encounter to Catholic faith was started from how his wife studied this "covenant" between God and the people of Israel. One day, the wife said, "Oh... I think the Catholics are right about not-using-contraceptives".

Contrary to popular beliefs that Catholics do not use contraceptives, that's why they 'end up' having lots of kids, this understanding of God's call and promise tells us that individuals, couples, families, just can't live without God. We need to constantly pray and ask God, how to live the path that He's prepared for us better. One of the writer in the NFP series mentioned, that's why women are blessed with "monthly cycle", not 'annual cycle'. If what God wants is to delay the pregnancy, so be it. If what God wants to expand the family, so be it. If what God wants is to give 'surprises' (see Christy's post), so be it too! With this light of faith, everything is possible.

Have a great Sunday! :)

7 Quick Takes Friday - Vol. 7

- 1 -

Today I went to NUS commencement to meet up with a friend of a friend because I need to record her voice for my experiment stimuli. It's quite weird!! While every one else was at the lobby taking photo, this friend was "kidnapped" by me to the museum (next to the commencement venue). I was quite surprised that the University Cultural Centre has changed a lot. I don't know what new building they're trying to build now, but another part of the building will be the future Lee Kong Chian Natural History Museum (where the dinosaur bones will be exhibited in 2015).

- 2 -

As we're entering July, I kept thinking "Oh no, I'm going to be 23 SOON!" There's this feeling that 23 is closer to 25 than to 21. It's like... being 23 is equal to another new phase of life. The intern from MIT in my office asked me once, "How does it feel to be an adult?" I said, "Err.. I sometimes forget that I'm an adult." Oh well, now no more excuse to pretend to be university student or "fresh graduate" because 23 feels like totally a different phase of life. I think one of the factors that influence this thought is I grow up in Indonesia, where it's normal to get married at the age of 24 or 25 during our parents' era. The interesting thing is I have a friend who just gave birth and she's 24! I put acclamation mark because initially when we heard that she got married, lots of us were surprised, but now that I think about it again, it's not weird to have baby at the age of 24 because that's what my friend's mom did too! Hehehehe. 

A friend's sister will get married tomorrow and my friends' response was, "Hah? Getting married this year?" It felt fast because she graduated last year, but if we think of her age, she's actually 25, so she's not too young.

So 'going-to-be-23', I sometimes look back on what I used to dream and I look forward on what I would like to dream. At times it just felt "dark". As in...there's no more Ferninda who used to think that "I want to graduate-work for three years-do Master's in Clinical Psychology or try to do Doctorate in Clinical Psychology-then go back to Indonesia", as if everything is predictable. So the thought that I need to consider lots and lots of things before even 'dreaming' sometimes makes me feel old. It's like...you can't think about yourself only anymore, to the point that you sometimes can't recognize yourself now. Ah I think I'm talking nonsense now.

Anyway, lots of things have happened this year. And I really thank God for making me see lots of things this year.

- 3 -

My boss is back from MIT. Bubye "long distance relationship" with boss. Hahaha. It's so much easier to talk face-to-face with my boss. Faster! (but it means working pace is also faster)

- 4 -

Is it normal to suffer when you wait?

- 5 -

Today me and Paul taught English to Paul's 5-year-old cousin. We finally found out that he still has difficulties with the letter "t" and "m". I think English is really a difficult language. I tried to ask him to find the letters that form the word "cat" and when we emphasized "/k/" sound, he kept saying that it's a "/k/" not a "/c/". Then, he really loves playing as "police". I asked him to spell "police" and when we reached "/s/" sound, he kept saying that it's an "s", rather than a "c". I also have difficulties explaining the 'hidden' "e" to him. Anyway, he felt bored quite easily. Today's achievement is he managed to learn the word "chin" and "tongue" from Paul. It's amazing to see how he put effort to talk to me in English (he speaks Chinese most of the time). He could talk very long sentences in Chinese to Paul, than I asked him, "What did you say?" (because I only understood a bit of Chinese), then he would try his best to explain in English or to ask Paul the English translation of some words that he didn't know.

- 6 -

I met up with two of my high school friends last Tuesday. The question that kept coming up is, "Ah Ferninda, most of the people who study overseas do not want to go back to Indonesia, right?" Oh well, now I'm one of those people that do not want to go back my home country. I hope I do not deceive myself, but I really think my case is complicated. Firstly, I really don't know what job I can take in Indonesia. I listen to how my friend works in an autism centre and gets very little supervision, I listen to how my friends "end up" as HR as psychology graduates, and so on and so forth. I think the issue is beyond "I want to be paid very high" mentality. An Indonesian parliament member who came to Indonesian Embassy years ago said that, "Of course if you go back to Indonesia, don't expect that you suddenly get a high position." Well, it's not about wanting high position I guess. Another issue is of course I have my tuition fee loan and it's very hard to repay my loan with Indonesian standard of salary. And last but not least, sometimes there's a higher call that I need to prioritize over my preference to go back to Indonesia. I see myself just like my other teachers who migrate to other towns to follow their husband or just like the priests or nuns migrate to different towns for a higher purpose. Nevertheless, on the other hand, I really think it's very hard to work in Indonesia. Lots of things are really unjust (for example, the unreasonable duration of probationary period). It's also very hard to reconcile what I've learned with the reality (for example, I can't accept the fact that some companies provide very little supervision and training for therapist job).

- 7 -

In my research with elderly, there's one part of questionnaire that asks about the elderly's activities. At the end, we try to correlate the scores with the depression scale. It doesn't seem that there's a correlation so far. I guess this is precisely an evidence on how being happy doesn't always mean that doing lots of things. Of course for the case of elderly in Singapore, these activities matter so much because lots of elderly living alone in their house or they do not keep in touch with their families.I really see some elderly who go down to activity centre, but just staring at the table for quite long.

Next week will be a busy week. I hope I'll survive!

7 Quick Takes Friday - Vol.6

- 1 - 

The power of details!
In prayer & formation sessions, they always say the importance of paying attention to little things. They always say, "Love God in the little things! God is in the little things! Fulfill your 'small' duties and do ordinary work extraordinarily well." Unsurprisingly, I think it is really true.

Last night I (finally) watched the videos of make-up tutorial "stylesuzi" that Paul's sister gave me loooong time ago. Previously I also watched Michelle Phan's video on natural make up with Ci Yaya (my previous roommate) and I was like..."wow"! There are so many "little things" that you need to do to make your 'natural' make-up.

- 2 -

This morning I asked Nic, Pril, and Nyz: "Is it only my feeling or time flies faster this year?"
Some hypothesis of time flies faster this year:
a. We're already working adults. Time flies faster when you are working because you constantly have work to do? (Students have more temptations to slack :P)
b. Many changes happen in our life or our friend's life. For example, Nic left Indonesia to study in Guang Zhou (China) in February and 'suddenly' she will be back to Indonesia in August. Nyz will also leave to UK and three of my friends are getting married this year. (These friends are older than me, but I knew them around 2-3 years)
c. We have more awareness that time flies faster?

ARGGGGH!! I only have 12 more chances to fulfill my resolutions to practice cooking twice a month, 12 more chances to fulfill my promises to exercise weekly, and 6 more chances to 'just' eat McDonalds once a month. And.....somehow the past two weeks I failed (again) to attend Mass on time. Restart mode on!

- 3 -

This is a table with four chairs in SUTD canteen. Creative design!!

- 4 -

I was amazed by how my boss could approach a group of elderly and convince them to be interviewed for our research! He said, one way to practice is to talk to one stranger every day and it can be started by talking to person in the lift. Unlike in the US, people in Singapore do not talk to each other in the lift. (It's so hard to start conversation!) Hmm, maybe it can be the second semester resolution.

One lift-conversation that I started last year was, "Uncle, is that durian???" (He brought a huge bag of durian) Hahahaha.

- 5 -

This page is from a kid's Bible that me and Paul bought for his niece last year. I had the Indonesian translation at my home in Indonesia (exactly the same!!) I think this page is a good reminder to start again again again and again. Sometimes it's hard for me to not feel very-very-awful after I made mistake.
Citing Sharmini, after all these experiences, I can't imagine life without Spiritual Direction. Be it a priest or a lay spiritual director, he or she will say, "Then start again!"

- 6 -

Last Tuesday we had a sharing by Evelyn on "Critical Thinking: How necessary it is to get As." Despite all claims that university professors are providing alternative views and that students are trained to be critical thinker, I feel that many of us just swallow the "theories" (or even hypothesis) that our professors teach us. Some of us do not even realize that some materials contradict our values of life (including me!).

It's still a challenge for me to read broadly and to think of the implications of theories that are written on the text books. It's even more difficult to argue and stand for our values of life in our essays and exams. So for me, my personal stand is to detach myself from what I'm writing in the exams or essays, but I'll bring up questions that 'challenge' the lecturer in my discussion or online forum. Sometimes I also challenge my friend, "Do you really think she's teaching the correct thing?" I remember how my friends are made confused after in our first lecture, my lecturer says, "Perhaps sex is a spectrum, perhaps there are more than 2 sexes, maybe six?" T.T I dag my own graveyard by choosing to write an essay that critiques an article on "Redefining Marriage" (no A obviously, I guess I didn't argue it well). I think all of us still need to continue to learn and write about our opinion! Here's my first attempt to write about homosexuality. To be honest, I'm quite scared to write about this.

- 7 -

Here's the plant in my office. They nailed the black 'board' to the wall so I don't think I can do it at my house. Landlady will kill me. Hahahaha.



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:)

House vs. Home vs. Hotel

I posted this picture looong time ago. It's the mess of my room in my hostel. Oh well, life has changed. I'm working now and after I moved out from my hostel, I stayed with a roommate who was allergic to dust!!! So yeah...there's a change of lifestyle. And since last November when I moved to another new house where I am staying now, I don't think I can live in that kind of mess anymore.

My room is sometimes (?) still messy, but after 4 years staying in a hostel and 4 months staying with 2 nice housemates whom I rarely meet, but always say "Hi" and "How's your day?", I can't accept "my-room-is-like-hotel" behaviour. I'm so thankful that Priya, my current roommate, used to stay in the same hostel too, so we had the open-door-policy. Hahaha. We hang out in living room, we chit chat in living room, we open the door of our room if we're not going to sleep yet, and we just have a quick chat about the day when any of us go home. After a while, I think each of us can also sense when another party needs her private space and so we'll stop talking quickly when that kind of moment comes.

It's a home, not just a house, or worse, a hotel.

I'm still very far from being a homemaker. When I was in Indonesia, I was the type of person who just studies-goes to English course-goes this activity and that activity-full stop. I didn't iron my own cloth, I just put my uniforms in the laundry bag. The only things I washed were dishes (with complaint sometimes (?) ), socks, and... undergarment. So I do not know lots of things!! Please laugh at me because I don't know some names of vegetables (when I order food, I just point here and there) and I didn't know how to clean bathroom properly until I worked for a few hours per day in a study centre to fund myself to go for the service project in Thailand. There I learned how to clean the mirror, the toilet bowl, the sink, etc. They also taught me how to remove stain from the table cloth and how to clean the toaster.

However, I never practiced those things until I moved to Serangoon with the two housemates. Wahhh, I am literally the dirtiest and the messiest among them. One housemate is a guy, but he LOVES to mop the floor, vacuum everything, etc. My roommate is allergic to dust right? So she wiped the table and mopped the floor almost every day. Since we didn't have any schedule, so I picked the areas that I'm familiar with: bathroom!! Hahahahaha. (also tried to mop the floor once a week). And our house in Serangoon was sooo huge so that cleaning was really a good exercise. HAHAHAHA.

Anyway, I really learned a lot from my two housemates. Four months was enough to make me cry the night after my roommate left to Indonesia. The following day I moved to this current house. Different dynamic. Hahaha. 6 girls!! (So our kitchen and bathroom are filled with hairs soooo easily). Most of us go home very late and some of us do not have the habit to greet each other once we see others' coming home. It's such a simple thing, but I was quite sad the first few weeks because of this. (And sometimes I'm tempted to follow this style too! --> like now --> duh!). However, I thank God that things start to be better now :):)

Time to practice what they told us in circle: Have I put effort to make my home bright and cheerful???
Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.........................

Let's talk about vampire & daddy

During one of my observations, two girls were drawing vampire. Here are some lines of their conversations:

A: We go out at night, okay? So the vampires are sleeping.
B: Hey, vampires are awake at night!! We go in the morning.
A: Okay.
B: You want to go at night ah? You go alone lah, I'll go by myself in the morning.
A: (laugh)

These kids have 'unimaginable' imagination. There's a vampire princess, there's a vampire queen, and so on and so forth.

***

On Father's Day, the kids were asked to make cards. It seems that they just need to fill in the blank.
Here's one cute card:

"My best daddy. You are the best dad in the whole universe. Thank you for playing with me. I love you more than handphone and even more than candy. I think you're funny when you are sleeping. Thank you for being my friend."