Tuesday, December 27, 2011

Christmas 2011

This year me and my family attended Christmas Eve mass at the Church of St. Laurensius, a 'semi-parish' (in Indo, we call it 'stasi', a stage before parish. It will officially become a parish next January (in a few weeks time!!). The church has a dome structure and the interior is similar with the Church of St. Peter and Paul in Singapore. Hence, despite the smell of new-ness and modernity, it's actually a form of back-to-old-age architecture. That's why I love being inside this church.

We arrived at 5pm, 2 hours before the mass. As predicted, we only got seats behind the pilar. Next to me two kids were fighting over PSP, behind me a high school boy kept talking to his friend. However, when the mass started, I was amazed that the kids beside me paid attention to the mass and even sang very well with their mom while I needed to turn around to my back, gave my super-unfriendly-look to that high school boy and pointed-to-my-ear-plus-showed-begging-hand-gesture which means, "Silence pleaseeee!!!" Anyway, it was a beautiful mass :) In the homily, the priest gave us this story: a man went to have his hair cut and the barber said, "I don't believe in God. If God exists, why are there so many bad things in this world?" The man could not reply him. He went out and saw a homeless guy with shabby clothes and long hair which was not taken care by the owner. He went to meet the barber again, "I think there's no barber in this world." The barber said,"How come? I'm a barber and I did cut your hair." The man replied, "See the homeless guy outside? His hair is long, so no barber in this world."  The priest reminded us that we need to come to Jesus, let Jesus work and 'cut our hair'.

After mass, my family had a nice dinner near the church. Yummy!! My mom was quite surprised that I'm not as picky as before. According to her, I also eat more. *duhh...*

Next day, CHRISTMAS DAY!! As 'usual', I went to the parish near my school to help out in distributing Christmas souvenirs for all kids that attended children liturgy. I actually dunno most people in the youth group anymore, but I still know the leader of that group who is my senior in school so I keep coming back for...hmmm 7 years? hahaha. We, 'oldies' (read: those youth who are at borderline of university and working world) were stationed at the parking lot which means that more children are more likely not getting souvenirs, more patience is needed to tell them to queue and to smile to the parents who insist that the kids have not got the souvenirs. Thank God this year we had enough souvenirs for the kids.

After that, I went to my high school friend's house near the church. It was soo funny. I hugged her at the side of the street, we screamed, "ahhhh loong time no see", while many cars were stopping because of the traffic light. Suddenly one window was opened, and it was our high school friend in the car!! hahaha. We ended up chatting with her for the last 90 seconds of the red light. :P

In the evening, my family and my uncle's family had dinner together. Ahhh so niceeeee :);)

Dear Jesus,
thank you sooooo muchhhhhh :):)

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