7 Quick Takes Friday Vol.49

- 1 -

This year's Ash Wednesday coincided with the eve of Chinese New Year. It's a big thing in Singapore, while in Indonesia my family's celebration is not so big as my family is mixed already (my dad is half-Indonesian Chinese).

- 2 -

I slept a lot last week to compensate last week's roses-business sleepless nights. Here's my reflection on roses and the little things!

- 3 -

Packing to go back to Indonesia and choosing good clothes to wear for Chinese New Year makes me think again about challenges in practising modesty. I have not been a good example in the past and sometimes now too, but I think it's good to encourage each other and keep trying to dress well.

- 4 -

I've been wondering on how I can encourage my friends to go for spiritual formation. I always use the Indonesian phrase "tak kenal maka tak sayang" ((if you) don't know (then you) don't love), we need to know the person well to be able to love the person. Isn't that true? Recently I've noticed that even though my boyfriend and I meet almost every day, there are always things that we don't know about each other. We do need to 'learn' more about each other. I believe that this is the same with the relationship with God. How do we know if the God that I know is the God who wants me to be active in ministry or church activities a to z without spending time in prayer? How do we know that God is happy with us 'just' by going to church on Sunday and a few minutes before going to bed?

And these questions woke me up again. Sometimes even if I think I pray, or even if I think I attend spiritual formation, I may be trapped in a just-do-it mentality. At the end of the day, the main struggle is really to love God more, through prayer, through the commitment for spiritual formation, through my nine-to-six-thirty job. It is a challenge to bring it to consciousness that this is for God, I do this for God as a sign of love.

- 5 -

Money and financial problem is a real problem.

Well, I that, but I don't think I ever feel the pinch of balancing between 'dream job' and money or (future) family and money as how I felt a few days ago. I remember once my Indonesian friends did the calculation of salary & housing down payment. I did that recently and the figure is (still) shocking. Thank God my mom told me to pay my loan little but save a bit of money since I started working. Initially I was thinking to pay my loan as fast as I can. Apparently I do need the money (and it's not enough).

I guess one thing I will share with my future children is to save money wisely. It's so easy to go for frequent budget travel each year, but now I realize that 'do things that I want to do when I am still single' won't work. I mean...when you finally find your Mr or Mrs. Right, the money won't come directly and immediately from the sky!!

- 6 -

Speaking about deeper things

Have you ever felt how beautiful it is when you talk to your friends about deeper things?

I feel very grateful that I have a few close friends who can share about values, family, relationships, spiritual life, even since we were in university. Sometimes I may take them for granted :( Apparently it's not so easy to find friends like these.

- 7 -

Update about my reading:
I finished reading To Kill a Mockingbird =) As for spiritual reading, "Testimony of Hope" was really a glimpse of hope for me. Hahaha. This book contains the spiritual exercises of Pope John Paul II given by Archbishop Francis Xavier Nguyen Van Thuan who was imprisoned by Vietnamese government for thirteen years! What I like from the book is even though there are things in my current situation that I feel unbearable, the 13 years imprisonment that the archbishop experienced was not even a reason to give up. This book really reminded me on things that really matter in my life!

I'm waiting for my boyfriend to find his Hobbit. that's my next reading.
As we are in the middle of Lent, I'm very happy to start reading "Does suffering make sense?" by Russel Shaw.

More quick takes at here.

Have a fruitful Lent! =)

It's in the little things

One week has passed since the crazy Valentine's weekend. Oh no no, it's not that I threw party or something like that. My friends and I sold roses for Valentine's Day. They are soooo talented.

This flower arrangement experience really reminds me of the power of the little things. When you buy the roses, you literally just see the top of the roses and filler flowers. However, we (the florist *cough cough*) saw the roses from various angles. You may think that the roses come instantly in good shape. Nope, they do not. Now I understand why other people sell flowers at a high price. It takes a lot of effort to make sure that the roses last long and it takes a lot of time to prepare the flowers.

This roses business is not only about money. I also learn the power of little things from my dear friend who still had the time to prepare dinner for us on the eve of Valentine's Day. Not only dinner, but a healthy dinner for a fussy-eater like me.

Now that we experience the 'hardship' of selling roses, I really believe that no good things come instantly. I don't think life is about 'being convenient'. Other people may just think that this kind of business is 'easy' as you 'just' need to sell the roses. However, it's not true. You may not believe it, but those bouquets are not 'anonymous'. Even though they are all similar, when we arranged the roses, we really thought of whom the roses are for (not only about whose order it was). One of my duties was to write the message and I really prayed for the person who would receive the flower. Be it for the reason of celebration, or reconciliation.

Now that one week has passed since the Valentine's Day, I really hope these lessons of the little things stuck in my mind (and my heart). And of course, I wish that my two friends ,who did this for a very important cause, will be able to cherish each other more after Valentine's Day (after being busy to help others show their love to their loved ones on the Valentine's Day). Thank you friends for showing me how to love! =)

It's okay to make mistakes *but get up again!*

I don't really like to talk about issues around modesty in public, because personally I've failed here and there too. I sometimes looked back at my past mistakes and I was like, "oh man...such a shame".

However, on the other hand, I feel that talking about these issues has become an affirmation for me. It helps me to think twice or thrice before I decide what I'm going to wear or before I behave in public (even though there may not be any friends that I know around me). It's not about being scrupulous in measuring how many centimeters my dress is, but it's more about whether this dress/cloth is flattering and whether it reflects my personality and my ideals. It's not only about feeling good or looking good, but talking about these issues about modesty actually helps me about the basic philosophy of the unity between body and soul.

I remember when I was an undergraduate, I wore an ugly basketball pants with slippers to class because most students wear shorts to class (but I felt uncomfortable of wearing too-short shorts to class). I also didn't realize that those who wore slippers actually wore branded slippers ($50 for a pair of slippers!) while I wore a bathroom slippers.

Anyway, thankfully I gave up. I realized it's ugly and I went back to my shirt+jeans attire. Since my second year in university, I became a roommate with another Indonesian girl and I noticed that she really makes an effort to dress well to class (especially if she has class at faculty of arts and social sciences because students in engineering faculty do not bother to dress well). To be honest, she looks nice and I want to look nice too! Come on, who doesn't want to look presentable? Since then, the journey of dressing well has begun.

It's a never-ending journey. Learning to dress well is a life-learning process. I definitely don't agree with obsession of owing branded cloth or buying cloth just because it's on sale. However, I slowly also agree that dressing shabbily is not a good thing. It's a whole process of respecting myself and respecting other people that I meet. My family is very thankful to my boyfriend because he is kinda 'speed up' this learning process. HAHAHA.

Anyway, it's okay to make mistakes. For super shorts, I can't do much so I wear them to sleep. As for dresses that have low cut, or backless, I do still wear them with creativity: with tube, with scarfs, with cardigans, as they still look nice and modest if I combined them with other basics. In fact, I recently love the combination of a tube maxi dress and plain crop top (with high heels, cos I'm short)! If you bump into me, you won't know it's a tube dress. =P  It's also good because crop top is cheap (cheaper than cardigan), but I won't wear a crop top because I don't agree that to look pretty you need to show your belly button. =P Some tube maxi dresses are also cheaper than other maxi dresses, so this combination is my cheapest and favorite so far. Hahaha.

ps. the rule of thumb is our cloth should direct people to our eyes and face, not to our other parts of our body as we communicate a lot through our eyes (more info here).

Let's get up again! ^^ Cheers!

Starting Lent with Chinese New Year!

Today is the second day of Chinese New Year. I'm spending time at my cozy home in Indonesia. My dad closed his office for today even though it's not a public holiday. =) My brother is visiting his girlfriend's family and my parents and I are waiting for foot massage time.

At the beginning, it seems challenging to celebrate Chinese New Year (CNY) with a Lenten spirit. However, after awhile, I slowly see that reunion dinner and CNY celebration can provide many opportunities to practice little mortification.

In Singapore, we could replace the fasting and abstinence to another day, as the eve of CNY celebration when big families gathered for reunion dinner fell on Ash Wednesday, especially because the majority of its population is Chinese. Personally, I chose to still abstain from meat at least during lunch. My boyfriend and I did our fasting last week and even though it was quite tough, I decided to give up eating too much snack in his family's house =P

Nevertheless, there's a new discovery that I think may be useful to keep in mind. The most difficult additional mortification sometimes is to keep quiet when I'm tempted to be critical, be it in CNY gathering with his family or my own family. Another challenging thing to do is precisely to talk to the distant relative and ask things that is of his or her interest. I was failed at times, but on Sunday I will visit my dad's side of family as they have left home when I reached Indonesia yesterday, so pray that I can offer up these little sacrifices.

Another thing that is very encouraging is as we celebrate CNY, my Lenten resolution can also be another new year resolution. It doesn't mean that I add more resolutions, but for the past two months, I have seen where I failed most of the times, which areas I need to improve urgently, and thanks to the retreat, God has shown me how I can love Him more too in concrete ways. So this Lent and CNY celebration is a good momentum to put them into practice.

Happy New Year!! Hope we can start this Lunar New Year with a good preparation for Easter too. I guess it's not only about 'giving up' french fries or sweet drinks only, this Lent is also a chance to pick up positive habits as a sign of love for Our Lord. God bless!

7 Quick Takes Friday Vol.48

It's been a while since I wrote 7QT. I have some things that I'd like to write here and there, but I haven't really written about them.

- 1 -

Worthy Ache

Last week was the week with the most physical exercises that I've ever had. I went climbing twice and I had Balinese dance practice. Phew! I felt fresh though. The good thing that I like about climbing and dance practice is they make me feel tired and I won't have weird dreams (like two nights ago when I dreamed that there were two planes did emergency landing near my office >.<).

- 2 -

Time to Invest on ...?

People at my age are really concerned about money, savings, and some of us, investment. I do not go into high-risk investment like buying stocks, but I do set aside money for savings. There are many types of people with regards to money. Some say that since by the time we get the returns of the money, the value has changed and has been lower than its value now, you might as well want to use the money to travel and enjoy yourself now.

I think with regards to our time, we also have different approaches in using our time. I keep telling myself that I don't have time (and so do my friends!). Now reading 10 minutes per day becomes a habit, but still when I suggest others to read 10 minutes per day, it's not that easy to start! (just like how I struggled six years ago!). Isn't it the same with money? The principle is to set aside the savings first before we spend it on other things. Once the salary comes, set aside money for savings, then allocate the rest for the spending. I think time is like that too. When I see how fast people react to the change of my facebook profile picture (and imagine the unimaginable), I was thinking to myself, "Wow, people do have lots of time!" The question is, how do we invest this time?

- 3 -

Waiting but not in Advent

I love to contemplate on the pain and joy of waiting in Advent because I can easily relate to Our Lady and those uncertainties she had when she couldn't find the inn, and also when she needed to flee to Egypt.

Now is the ordinary time of the year (and Lent is coming soon!). I need to constantly remind myself on the beauty of waiting. Come on, who likes waiting? I whatsapp people or check facebook while waiting for the MRT (even though the wait may just be for 3 minutes!). Even Paul's little niece watches iPad as she's waiting for her grandma to feed her. These are waiting for the little things.

There are many other bigger things that require waiting and patience, thus the waiting becomes more painful at times (though the joy when the time comes will be even greater). There are also people who wait without even knowing if the things they wait will come or not, for example, I've met a lady who has been married for five years and waiting for pregnancy. I've met another strong lady who has cancer and she also doesn't know if she can be cured, yet she still undergoes whatever treatment possible. Sometimes I feel ashamed that my little waiting is soooo uncomparable with these ladies' waiting, yet it's so frustrating and annoying.

- 4 -

To Kill a Mockingbird

I do enjoy reading this book! =) Again, thanks to my 1hour journey to office ^^ I finally reached the part that explained the title of this book. Hahaha. (I've been wondering why the title is like that!)

“Atticus said to Jem one day, "I’d rather you shot at tin cans in the backyard, but I know you’ll go after birds. Shoot all the blue jays you want, if you can hit ‘em, but remember it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird." That was the only time I ever heard Atticus say it was a sin to do something, and I asked Miss Maudie about it. "Your father’s right," she said. "Mockingbirds don’t do one thing except make music for us to enjoy. They don’t eat up people’s gardens, don’t nest in corn cribs, they don’t do one thing but sing their hearts out for us. That’s why it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird.” 

- 5 -

Sensitive Topics

Once I searched on "how to talk about sensitive topics with your boyfriend/spouse" and I found an interesting site. I'm sorry I can't remember the link now, but it's interesting to see how a topic that is normal for one side may be a sensitive topic for the other side! For example, to say "your hair is a little bit messy" is a sign of love from my boyfriend, but it's a 'hu-ha' and a big deal for me. Hahahaha (we used to have big quarrels because of this). On the other hand, to ask "Have you talked to your friend about a b c?" is a sign of love from me, but it's a sign of control for him, he'd prefer the phrase "Don't forget to a b c".

so yeah, it's good to sit down and think, "What are the sensitive topics for us?"

- 6 -

Children's Pretend Play

I don't want to go into the discussion whether pretend play really benefits children, but I am concerned about the time that preschoolers lose these days, particularly in Singapore. Children were 'pushed' to read (sometimes way too early) or to memorize flash cards.

It's very interesting to play with my boyfriend's niece. Two weeks ago we carried the 'babies', one is baby Jesus, one is baby Mother Mary (duh...it's her ideas). Then we pretended to go to swimming pool and she said, "The babies will play in the children's pool, we can swim in the adult pool." Me: "Oh we can leave them there?" her: "Yes it's okay!"

Last night, when I suggested that we 'brought' the babies to the swimming pool, she said "The babies are too small to play in the swimming pool". Hahahaha.

- 7 -

I'm going for my retreat!
I can't believe that it's only February, yet I feel physically and spiritually tired.
Looking forward for my 8-hour-sleep (and of course..the peace and silence with God)

More quick takes at Kelly's blog:

When life seems extraordinarily ordinary

Now I'm kinda used to the daily commuting between my house and my office.
Traveling for one hour, gives me not only chance to sleep again *oops*, but also a chance to read novels, work on a little bit of translation, and to think.

It also means that there are moments when I really need to stop because I am down with sore throat and cough (like today).

At these moments, life seems extraordinarily ordinary. You 'just' wake up, eat, work, eat, go home, eat, sleep, etc. Before you can do extraordinary things like let's say...doing parchment craft? The time has shown that it's 10 or 11pm and you'll find yourself 'rushing' to sleep again to make sure you can be 100% awake tomorrow.

Nevertheless, isn't it the reality of this life? That we spend most of our time to do ordinary things, and that the most heroic things to do is to do our ordinary duty extraordinarily well. These are not my words, but the words of many great saints. In the book Mary of Nazareth, the author explained that if most of us do not have chance to do extraordinary things and we don't strive to do our ordinary things well, what's left behind as an offering for God? Thus, our offering is precisely in these ordinary things.

Everyone wakes up in the morning. How about waking up 'on the dot', promptly when the alarm rings? Well, not everyone can do it or at least strive to do it. Thus, it's not an easy sacrifice to wake up on time day after day, month after month.

Most of us go to work every day. How about working without creating distractions for ourselves (e.g., messaging or browsing)? That's the struggle for most of us.

Thus, today's sick leave is a good reminder for me. At times my duty is exactly to rest (even though I don't want to!). At times God's will for me is to stay at home and put order in my room rather than meeting up with a friend and doing apostolate. On another day, God wants me to have dinner with my friend rather than hanging out with my boyfriend.

The constant awareness of presence of God is needed every day, and I need to ask God how I can struggle better in many areas of my ordinary life this year. =)

Rome Sweet Home - Part 1

I was planning to write about the experience in Madrid first  (after the Santiago trip). However, my friend is going to Rome in January, so I promised her to write about Rome as quickly as possible. Here is the first part of the write-up!

Day 1

We arrived on 30^th September and we were amazed that the hotel where we stayed was so close to St Peter’s Basilica. First thing we did was to shower because we had not showered for 22 hours (we slept over at Barcelona airport during the transit). We also washed our clothes and we hang the clothes at the balcony, oops!

We had our first Italian lunch at a small café nearby. I doubted myself whether I could finish the pizza because it was so huge!! And yes, I managed to finish the pizza. Hahaha. It costs only 6.50 Euro with coke! We were so excited to enter St. Peter’s Basilica. The queue was long but it moved very fast. We also said a Creed outside the Basilica. From the middle of St. Peter’s Square, we could see Pope’s apartment and the statue of Our Lady outside that wall. Apparently that statue was only recently added during Pope John Paul II’s time. One of the youth told the Holy Father that St Peter’s square was incomplete without Our Lady. There are statues of many saints, but not Our Lady’s. Pope John Paul II agreed and Don Alvaro asked people that he knows to start designing it without waiting for instructions, so it could be used when the Pope needs it. And it’s true. One of the designs was approved by the Pope and stood there till now.

View from our hotel

The obelisks in Rome were gifts from Egypt. One of them is in the middle of St. Peter's Square

One of our friends in our group, who lived in Rome for 3 years before, explained to us about how just like other basilicas, this basilica was built above smaller church. Similar with Cathedral of Santiago, when they found the body of St. Peter, they also found many other people were buried around St. Peter. This is the characteristics of the first Christians. They want to be buried near the holy people.

After we passed the security screening (we just need to put our bags in the X-ray), we saw the Bronze Gate. My friend later on went there to get tickets for us for the audience with Pope Francis (the one held every Wednesday).

Bronze Gate, where we asked for the ticket for audience with the Pope

Once we entered the Basilica, we could see the beautiful sunlight that went through the windows and ceiling. It could be captured even using a normal camera. The floor was made in mosaic style and one of our group who studied fine arts explained that the statues at the ceiling was not made not in the correct proportions so that when we looked at them from our level, they looked in the correct proportions.

We also saw the huge statues of two angels for the holy water. Our friend always mistakenly called them ‘the two babies’. Hahaha.

Do you see the sun ray?

My head was tired of looking up, but it's worthwhile!

Below the altar was the body of St John Paul II

This one is the comparison of sizes of various Basilicas in the world!

St Josemaria Escriva, the founder of Opus Dei, saint of ordinary life!

These are the two angels that are always called as 'babies' by my friend

The Pieta by Michaelangelo!

The altar where the Papal Chair was located was exactly above the tomb of St. Peter. Unfortunately we couldn’t go down because there was a Mass at the area where the entrance to the tomb was. Behind the Papal Chair was the stain glass with a dove, a representation of the Holy Spirit, which was mistakenly thought as clock by my friend. Hahahaha. 

We also saw a wall with the list of Popes starting from St. Peter. It was really amazing to witness the continuity of the Catholic Church and this is an affirmation that this Church is not merely a social or human institution. The people have ‘problems’, faults, sins, but the Church is still here and God fulfilled the promise of ‘the gates of hell shall not prevail against it’!

We spent quite some time just walking inside the Basilica. We also prayed in front of the body of St John Paul II. 

St Peter's Basilica view in the evening

Enjoying our first gelato!!

Day 2

Audience with Pope Francis!!!

The queue was really really really horrible, but all of us got seats. Our friends also told us to run to where we saw babies because there’s a chance that Pope Francis will stop and bless the babies =P Anyway, we didn’t reach that close, but we were happy to see the Holy Father were much closer than in TV :p We were climbing the chairs and screamed, “Holy Father! Holy Father!” Once we saw him went to our side, my two friends and I raaaaaaaaaaaaaannnn and we could see him quite close. I think around 2 meters away? I don’t mind that I don’t have good photo of him, but to really see him was such a relief. I think this craziness is really different with craziness over celebrity. Even though we screamed, we climbed the chairs, we ran after him, it’s a feeling that is definitely different because it has helped me to pray more to the Church and the Holy Father. It’s a feeling of small kids that don’t see the father after let’s say an overseas trip? I grow up in a totally ‘remote’ areas from Rome, and in Indonesia, we’ve always been a minority. I only heard about the Pope or saw him on TV. At that moment, he’s so real and close! I also met many people who also loves the Pope. It was really an encouraging experience.

He gave a homily about charism and the importance of using the charism for others and God because it’s a gift from God. At the end, I took out all the religious articles that I bought the day before to get them blessed by the Pope ^^

The best photo that I took!

My friend who was really good in drawing (while we were waiting for the audience to start)

After the audience, we went to Colosseum. We just looked at it from outside because there’s nothing much inside. Our friends explained how Colosseum was built in such manner that a large number of audience can go in and out easily.  My friend also reminded us of a story of St Therese of Lisieux who went into a part that was actually restricted and kissed the soil as the first Christians were martyred there.

There again I was reminded on how many people have died for the faith in Rome. 

Colosseum, it is mainly for entertainment. One of the 'entertainment' that time was the killing of many of the first Christians

Afterwards we went to the Church of the Holy Cross of Jerusalem (Santa Croce in Gerusalemme). There we saw the relics related to the Passion of Our Lord: nails that were used to nail Jesus to the cross, the thorns from the crown, part of finger of St. Thomas who wanted to touch the wound of Jesus before he believed that it’s Jesus who resurrected, and the copy of the Holy Shraud which was used to wrap the body of Jesus (the original was in Turin). 

When I saw these things, it was a real reminder how Jesus that I talk to every day is a real person. A real God and a real man and his sacrifice is not a joke. His sacrifice is real. 


On the same day, I also went to Basilica of St Mary Maggiore and Archbasilica of St John Lateran.
Unfortunately I can't really remember which photos are the interior of which churches :( Sorry! (Except one photo that I managed to match with wikipedia =P)

 

Interior of Basilica of St Mary Major

Regina Pacis, Queen of Peace

Mass Schedule at Santa Croce de Gerusalemme