Happy 22nd to me :)

The day started with SK texting me, "Omg, are you at NS Macs?!"
I was like no ... I'm at a meeting. Since 11pm. And then he replied, "Omg no wonder she was so daoooo" and I almost died imagining him saying hi to a girl he thought was me LOL.

Turns out that was just his (v smart, v snaek) way of finding out where I was hahahaha. They charged into the meeting room with the cake and song and it was slightly awkward cos my groupmates just kinda stared at them ... but thank you my friends. I appreciated it. My heart was warmed :')

Then ... meeting ended at around 2am, walked back to hall with Fel, and had a looong hobo kerb sesh till it was 5.30 help us. It was pretty nice, brought me back to our Year 1 days when we would HTHT like this. But wow, so much has changed since then. She's definitely grown a lot and I'm happy for her ... I'd like to think I've grown too but I can't be certain that it's been for the better? I'm definitely more jaded and more stubborn than I was 3 years ago. I don't like that. But anyway, back to her - will be praying for her, for her fam, for all the subsequent decisions she will have to make. Leaving Singapore and all her friends and family behind, literally leaving an entire life behind ... Not easy lah. I don't think I can understand, but I can see that it's bringing her great joy like no other!! And!! That makes me happy for her :')

Next day, got up to go for DG and had more cake (hehe) and Wai Ling gave me a pencil box!! And Steph gave me a packet of milo HAHAHAH and the rest fed me food :') Then video called Chicken + Arielle hehe. Then my cramps were bad so I went back to take a nap, oh yeah and I met PX for dinner and talked for a long while. It's strange, talking to her now because I can see that as I advance in my Christian walk our thought-paths seem to diverge further. Sigh. She's still my friend, of course, just ... There are a lot of things that I can't share because I don't know how to make her understand? Does that make sense? At the same time, I always question myself, am I really a Christian??

I'm sorry if that last question scares you, my mysterious concerned reader, but know that whatever questioning and spiritual warfare I am going through will only be for the better. Was talking to Fel about this too, because we have some mutual friends who have been in the process of 'deconversion', as LW puts it. Ernest and his 3 month ultimatum with God, LW of course leaving the church, Chiilek who goes to church only to appease his parents. And James whose faith I still worry about from time to time, though out of all these people I know the least about his situation because he's (understandably) more closed off to me now. Thing is, them questioning their faith has made me question mine too, because it has made me realise that I've always allowed myself to be dumb when it comes to religion. I have always been content with mindlessly following, which I don't think is a good thing. I want a fervent and convicted faith, a faith like Daniel's. But to even hope to achieve that, means I will have to start from ground zero.

In Ernest's words - "Prayer is like talking to a brick wall." I feel that way too. I don't have that personal relationship with God, so how am I even convinced that He exists?! Truth is, I don't. I really don't. I only call myself a Christian because I go to church on Sundays and cru on the weekdays. And because I have Christian friends ... but do I really believe? Had my starting point not been my Christian parents and upbringing, I would probably say oh definitely not. But Christianity has become more of a habit to me than anything, and that is why the lines seem blurred and everything grey. From here, I will have to embark on a journey to find that fervent and convicted faith that I want. To me, it's all or nothing. If my faith isn't fervent and convicted, there is no faith at all. (<- Okay contentious statement, will revise in the future) I don't agree with what Fel said, that going to church faithlessly is better than not going at all. God doesn't judge us according to how often we go to church, but according to the contents of our hearts ... no?

Anyway, let's move on from this heavy topic hahahaha.
In the evening, Cheryl Eric and I had mala and now apparently he's laosai-ing. Then Justin wrote me a birthday email because he can't pass me a card. Will post it here under the cut for posterity's sake. It was a very thoughtful letter and it makes me thankful for him as a friend, no matter how awkward we are irl. Gws and God bless u Justin :)

Faith,

Most people I know and are still in contact with largely stayed the same in terms of their outlook and philosophies after a certain age. That age in my anecdotal experience, normally comes around university time, and more or less solidifies after they start working. However, in my fourth year of association with you, I find that I cannot quite say that I actually know and understand you – emotionally and intellectually – in a linear, incremental fashion. I generally try to make a model for each of my friend’s thought life, especially people in my inner circle such as my CG members and so forth. I do so because I need to know the emotional context of the event that say e.g. upset said person, worries said person. Normally I have a rough idea of what the other party needs to hear. But I find myself not ever knowing for sure as far as you are concerned. I thought about this for some time, and my best guess is that it is because you are growing as a person, and also perhaps relatively rapidly.

We only started talking under very coincidental circumstances. Honestly if we weren’t paired up as buddies during orientation, I would not have talked to you very much till we graduate. I think it would have been a loss on my part if that were the case. For starters in freshman year I felt like I was the only Christian in rep r6 other than you. I was still a new Christian back then and I have not really met other Christians from outside my CG. I know its very naïve on hindsight but my model of a Christian was someone who acted like someone from my CG, give or take. It was not really that you were like them though. At first it was because you had a strong sense of humility at first. But later because you did not behave like most of the other people from our batch. I realized that although you were selective of who to be close friends with, you were not like this in terms of accepting people as who they are. I think an incident that left a deep impression on me was when you told me how you were afraid of XX because she was saying nasty things about YY. It was unprecedented for me. I never met anyone else who even remotely disdains gossips. Most use it for their social advantage, a natural, very human action. I trusted you as a person a lot more since then. What I worried for you though was that you were under a lot of pressure to conform, at the expense of values that most other people do not have. I personally felt that perhaps you did on one or two occasions. One time when we were in Bryan/Zac’s room, I saw you as a lighted candle, surrounded by a lot of unlit candles, afraid of your own glow. And so you dimmed yourself, to be like the other candles. It was a very vivid image, maybe from God, maybe not. But in any case that was my understanding of you. I never brought this up, at first because we were not that close so I have no reason to really bother. Live and let live was what I told myself. I also think it is quite controversial, so I never told you about this in previous years. There was never a good time. But now that I won’t see you for an extended period, at least I can say this and hide in my home until Chinese new year, hopefully you forget about it by then when I show face again.

Anyway, I think the general fear of friendship was there for some time. I think there is nothing shameful or bad about this. I think most people are like this save a few exceptions. But you also stood out in the way you behave in spite of those fears. You did not develop a blanket bitterness towards your REP circumstances and fall into a downward spiral like I see some people end up. I think there and now, you in fact proved to be someone with a lot of compassion. Like there was this one time when I gave an opening brief for ignire planning committee. I was not happy with how I facilitated it but I did not remember really showing it. In fact, I was trying very hard to hide it. I was on my dad’s car going back home when you WA-ed me and asked if I was upset and at the end of the convo you told me I did well. You said it was ok to just take a break and let others take over the discussion. You surprise me on many fronts that day. First by noticing, second by what you said. At that time of occurrence, no one really says stuff like this to me as a peer. I just ORDed mind you. I was bullied as a cadet, blamed for a lot of things as officer. I was already used to being criticized for “carrying the rank yet not being good enough”. (Not that I am bitter about it. It is just the way things work there and most of me and my PC pals already got used to it.) To date, there is no one else in REP that can do both of these, maybe other than Howard. He has your level of compassion but you are more observant when it comes to such matters.

I mentioned before that I think you have changed somewhat over the exchange year. I never specified why I think so before but here is my two cents. I think the most obvious change is that you are a lot open-minded with being outside your comfort zone. I cannot say for sure whether it is into your inner circle, but I cannot envision the freshman version of you considering cheryl as a close friend, or even becoming her roomie. Or with lockyin, or with various other people. But you did anyway. I was quite encouraged by it. I myself am very selective of who I hang out with, until much later. It might sound like a small, commonsense improvement. But I think it is just the beginning. I would believe you are in for bigger transformation in the future, if this keeps up. And most importantly, you did not lose the virtues that makes you unique among your peers. You still have an outstanding sense of empathy. When I told you about the crying baby on my flight, you did not respond like how most other people responded. You told me to think of the mother’s point of view. You put me to shame for not doing so. And also the most recent example was reading Sipei’s blog, which you basically didn’t. I think another person would stop because of boredom. Those are old posts anyway, not reflective of the author’s present outlook. But you chose to stop because it was the right thing to do. I have underestimated you, and you surprised me once more.

The TL DR is: you changed, but still kept what makes you stand out among men. I think it is quite comforting to see a fellow Christian achieve this feat in the face of a inner battle against the fear of men. You did not become an unlit candle after all.

Happy 22nd.

Labels: :), hobo kerb, painfully honest, pulau ntu, rep