HOUSE ARREST

I was quite mistaken that one day would be all it took to get on the mend. It is now sunday and I am still feeling wretched.

I tried to hang out at the skate event yesterday arvo which would have been great with Emi around but I couldn't make it pass the rain so I spent the rest of the day at home too. Have I really been that overrun? Maybe.

23 day till I leave Japan. Maz said, "that means 12 more working day?" Oh My Gawd.

Audio: Sometimes You Can't Make It On Your Own by U2.
Biblio: Finally "finished" The Wind-up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami. That man maybe writing genius but I hate that book! It's "realist" that I cannot stand the mundane passivene plot that speaks for the culture he writes about. Hello, The Circle of Reason by Amitav Ghosh!
Cerebrio: I can't believe I was so dazed last night I forgot to call about Mom's birthday. がくい！

FRUSTRATION MEETS FAITH

Lately, I've been thinking some about the future. I want to say this has nothing to do with the upcoming events cause what I am thinking of seems so much farther than that and the immediate things that are about to happen, I don't know if they will path the way there. I suppose, that is the root of my frustrations. You see, I have a vague idea of where I want to go, where I want to eventually end up but how I am going to do that is ever elusive. Was, is and always will be. Such is the reality we all exist in. I am aware of course, that it is this very ignorance of how that sends me back to seek God's help. There is this point we all want to get to, there are the few hows we know we are to abide in; so you want to be influential in a department, we know you may not kill your boss to get there. We know we are to honour God in whatever it is we are doing, to seek his ways always and trust in the path he has charted for us, but what we don't know if that path will lead us to where we, I, want to get to. "God, I don't know how. I don't know HOW I will ever get to (insert desire), please show me the way."

But, I caught myself one day saying something like this, "God, I don't know how. I don't know how I will ever get to (insert desire), help me trust in your timing, the motions of your will and give me patience to see how things pan out instead of instituting my ways to get there." I always wondered about how people grew in faith and why, how and when I would ever not want my way instead.

I've still been thinking about our worldly nature and our default settings in putting ourselves first and foremost. I see the dark shadow of this problem in dealing with so many personalities at school. How would it be if we could find a way to use that default setting and switch it immediately?

I've found it almost impossible not to put myself first. I think that is the intrinsic flaw in being birthed to the fallen world. I'm not saying God cannot change that worldly nature... its how it might be executed when he does. God does let the bad things happen, the beauty of His system is redemption or retro-demption; taking those bad things in the past and turning them for good into the future. Would it be possible to isolate the very instant of a selfish-thought, acknowledge it and then turn that around? If this is what I want, wouldn't someone else like it to? How could I satisfy the desires of somebody else instead of me?

I tried this out at school as a social experiment with the whole class - including myself. Now that I have been somewhat fred from the binds of teaching solely, I have more time to focus on the character of the kids. If I could locate the moment of a selfish-thought-event, I would try to take the opportunity to put the brakes on that moment and see if we could think through how to put other's first. How could we make our friends happy(ier) in this instance? And by golly, it is difficult to think about someone else, even as a second thought. Even when I did run through the chain of thought in the events in my life, knowingly and wanting to give to another, I found it hard to release my desire and hold over it.

Even when I want to follow the path God has charted out for me, wanting to please him, I struggle constantly in wanting it to turn out my way. It comes down to being my own God and secretly hoping that my plans will be able to over-ride his. I don't think we will ever reach a point so selfless to our every desire. There is no formula to become completely selfless. I may get it sorted for an event or two, but I think this will be a constant struggle that needs working out with God in each instance. Oh God, this you have to change!

Audio: -/-
Biblio: Just finished reading Searching For God Knows What by Donald Miller.
Cerebrio: I'm finally writing this cause I haven't had a whole day free in so long. I think my body finally decided to revolt and go under the weather. So today, I finally have the opportunity to cocoon and be all hermit all day. It would be much nicer to do this without being ill and I'm praying this house arrest will give me all the juice I need to get better.

PIMPIN' OUT MY MAC

It's taken me a few weeks to soup up my baby with all the good lurvin' that it needs. Now this great machine is even better for me.

Browsers
- Safari 2.0; I tried out Firefox and Mozilla. Sure, its may be great stuff but it doesn't do anything spectacularly different from what Safari does already pretty well.
- SunriseBrowser; The open-source browswer for web-work. So good. We're talking making HTML in a new window with two clicks, (Didn't you say this is a browser?) and translucent windows so you can see what you are making without going back and forth. Simple and to the point. And, japanese!
Instant Messaging
- Adium; I used to use Proteus which was great. But now there's Adium which is open-source. And I love its translucent windows too.
Filesharing
- I still use Limewire cause i've been pimpin' everything else but that, although I might go Acqlite soon.
Video Playback
- VLC; bye bye region-coding!
DVD filing
- Handbrake; nice, AAC, H.264 codec and mpeg4 for Mac and Quicktime enviroments. but limited to read according to the firmware (and hence region coding) of your DVD player.
FTP
- Transmit3.5; This is the way FTP was meant to be.
HTML Editting
- Smultron; I love those little Smulberries. Even does coding in colour!
System Events Utilities
- Growl; everything I ever wanted to know but was too lazy to find out.
Launcher
- Quicksilver; WYSIWYG ASAP, on the mark, fierce heirachy, sleight of hand, computing at the speed of thought, access granted, just your type, also makes julienne fries. The next best thing since sliced bread. What are you waiting for?
At a glance
- Statoo; I like Dashboard and the variety of widgets at hand but sometimes the simple things take too long.
Bible Software
- Macsword; Open-source, based on the Sword Project and Greek and Hebrew lexicons. How many bible translations do you need?
Uninstaller
- AppZapper; Thank you MacZot!

Audio: -/-
Biblio: Searching For God Knows What by Donald Miller.
Cerebrio: And God said, "Open-source is gooood."

FIVE flights, FOUR weeks.

24th May KIX - SINGAPORE
1st June SINGAPORE - PHUKET
5th June PHUKET - SINGAPORE
11th June SINGAPORE - KIX
18th Jun KIX - SINGAPORE

It looks like last summer's flight details! And that had not included the Sydney leg yet!

I DON'T MEAN TO BRAG

but...



Audio: Lean On Me by Kirk Franklin feat. Mary J Blige, R. Kelly, Bono, Crystal Lewis & The Family.
Biblio: Searching For God Knows What by Donald Miller.
Cerebrio: Studio Ghibli Anime fest tonight!

IRONY OF IRONIES

It's been pretty much hectic all month. This week is all Parent-Teacher meetings and working through handover stuff. Then, there was the build up to the Easter Production which went well and I am so proud of the cast and kids I got to work with. Sometimes I forget, but recently I've been reminded of what I have to learn from them despite teaching them.

I got news from Singapore also about my appointment; despite the potential negative vibes I have heard and can expect, I refuse to be beaten. I am actually keen about the scholarship. And don't say "having a stable income" is a bad thing. Yes, I imagine it will totally suck at times but knowing I have a job and can support myself probably puts me in the top 5%-10% of the (real) world's standard of living.

I reckon its a fair trade-off in the end; a full teaching scholarship and certification while I get paid for three years of bond? Really, that is another three years of practicuum which hopefully will help me be a better teacher anyway. What happens after the next four years, is something else anyway. As for how good an education I am going to get - they say the faculty can suck; okay. But, I also say a lot of Singaporean's expect to be spoon-fed. The quality of your education is what you put in. These are just some of the things I've learnt living outside my sheltered comfort zone. A job is a privelege. The Third-world will tell you that. A vocation is a means to an end. Your education is not what other's tell you but what you take in.

Also, after years of procrastinating on webhosting, I have finally decided to cave in. Most of that time procrastinating in the last few years was deliberating on Apple's .mac account or opting for the regular webhosting. In the end, I couldn't resist a really good deal and bought some virtual estate. thechilibuddy.org is almost half the size of my harddrive - for less than $5/month! I'm going to dump all the data I have ever owned there.

Technically, I leave Japan in 36 days. But, two weeks after I move to Singapore, I fly back to Japan again to lead a mission team from the YWAM GoFest Asia Mission Conference and Outreach. Irony of Ironies is that I will pretty much do and show the team exactly what it is that I do here anyway. So I won't even feel as if I left Japan for good. It'll be like I was away on a 2 week vacation. It is also kind of nice to close the door by summarizing all the work I do here.

Audio: King Planet by Fold Zandura.
Biblio: Searching For God Knows What by Donald Miller
Cerebrio: Justin has sourced some rad YoungLife contacts for me in Singapore. I was a bit concerned about the type of company I would miss but now hopefully this is the kind of company I like to keep!

GO FIGURE

... what the kids are trying to tell you.

EXTREME SHARING

When the MNC crew come over for dinner and chat about God and stuff, we tend to be a very tactile group. A few weeks ago, we were talking about sharing and practicing sharing. So, we thought we'd share with you what we get up to when hanging out at my place:

Audio:
Biblio: Searching For God Knows What by Donald Miller.
Cerebrio: When can I finally sleep in!?!?!?

IT FEELS LIKE RUNNING ON EMPTY

So far I've done three loads of backlog laundry this week. It's been an exhausting, long week. And, I will be working six days through April. Not much time for a break.

Meanwhile, been thinking some about leaving Japan. So, have been catching up on the anime selection here. Tricky business since what you buy here doesn't come with English dub and only comes with English sub sometimes.

My List so far includes Grave of The Fireflies, My Neighbour Totoro, Nausicaa of The Valley, Howl's Moving Castle, Steamboy and Innocence. Quite a number of Studio Ghibli.

While watching となりのトトロ (My Neighbour Totoro), I realized I almost understood the movie in Japanese and was using the subtitles to verify what I was guestimating. So, it'll probably be good for me to watch anime frequently to keep my 日本語 (nihongo) up to speed.
 
It's pretty expensive here to get local DVD's and I'm beginning to wonder if it makes a difference getting them here or waiting till I can accumulate the libary when I move to Singapore. Anyone knows what they average in Singapore?

Audio: -/-
Biblio: Searching For God Knows What by Donald Miller.
Cerebrio: I could really do with juicing up my batteries.

THE PASSION OF CHRIST: REBUDGETTED. In 3 Parts.

Crowd: Who is this?
Women & Disciples: He is Jesus of Nazareth!


The 6-year old Roman Ruler, Pilate: Are you the King of the Drews?
Jesus: As you say.


Bruised For Our Transgressions.

IF THERE IS ONE THING I WILL MISS ABOUT JAPAN...

... it is the onsen, the sento and the ofuro. Ever since I was spoiled with the indoor pool and jacuzzi in my Sydney inner city apartment, I enjoyed my daily soak after work.

But coming to Japan took it to a newer level. The hot bath is just sheer pleasure. I don't even mind the nekkid-ness of the onsens or ofuros anymore. It's just so good to get the heat right through your bones.

Today, I had in mind to go to the local sento after work. Andy's gone and Keely's here. So, all day it was on my mind as something to do with Keely. So off we trekked, only to find that today it would be closed. Boo #1

Dissapointed, we decided the walk wouldn't be for nothing so we'd walk to the end of the road to the JR Ashiya station for Indian. And when we got there...

The whole Ashiya Fire Brigade had turned up in force to put out a fire (presumably. We only saw smoke.) Everyone in the neighbourhood, their dog, cat and goldfish were also there. There was no way we were going to get in to the building. No Indian. Boo #2

Right, now that we were in town, we might as well walk around to see what else would interest us. After circling a few blocks, we decided on the local izakaya. At least that would be a safe bet, right? No. It was closed too! WHAT? Boo #3.

Nothing was going to go as planned. (That by the way is how my life generally goes anyway. I really shouldn't have been that surprised.) We finally found an open yakitori joint which had cool atmosphere and was open. Amen! We ordered the usual and being girls, we also made an order for a serve of tomato salad and baked potatoes. I almost fell off my chair when we got six slices of tomatoes and a pinch of salt for salad and 8 slices of potatoes (good) swimming in a bucket of butter (funny, but not so good). 

At least the one thing that I finally did acheive at the end of the evening though, was to grab some sakuras that had started blooming and threw them into the ofuro at home. I sat there happy as a wrinkled pea for a good hour. 

Audio: -/-
Biblio: -/-
Cerebrio: Ofuro... bliss... 

IT'S A GIFT

I don't know when this weekend the word "gift" popped into my head. But it was like a word to me that everything I have had, have and will have doesn't belong to me. "It's all a gift", and I get to enjoy it and God can replace it. So, for each moment, thank you, God.

I guess if every moment I have is a gift and none of it really belongs to me, I don't really have a real say then it neutralizes the arguments of, "...but its mine!" What a concept to get my mind around to!

Audio: Turtle Island.
Biblio: -/-
Cerebrio: It's going quick!

MAKING SILLY FACES

Andy and I making silly faces in the Apple Shinsaibashi store this arvo. It was either that or drooling...

I've been mostly busy this week now that spring term has started at school and we're running full steam toward the Easter production; The Passion of Christ: Re-budgeted.

Along the way, my new co-teacher and understudy has finally arrived (three terms too late!) with just enough time to get a hang of things as we work through Easter and prep to take over before I leave.

It's a week of salutations and valedictions of friends and kids at school. All that and Andy is in town too.

Audio: Extreme Days OST.
Biblio: No time to read!
Cerebrio: Turtle Island playing at the Osaka King Cobra tomorrow!