woah, 11 days away....... i think no one reads my blogs anymore because i hardly update. Maybe i'm just too lazy or just too boring coz nothing realllyyyy happens in my life that would be really exciting to other people. Life's so short. Everytime you look back on things you always pick out flaws that you regret having done and you wish you could ammend things but alas, we're here in the present and nothing can change the past....... unless ur relative speed is faster than the speed of light........... but yer, i must say that death does really change someone's life. If you think about it, not only in today's society, but back in Jesus' days. His death virtually rocked the world. Because of His death, many people's lives have been changed.
As some of you may know, my grandma passed 2 weeks ago. And a week ago, i went to Hong Kong for a 5 day trip to help with the funeral and ceremonial stuff, sigh and i must say that it's taken a huge toll on myself. Unawaringly, there's been so much happening around me and so much happening within me that i don't know what to say.
Firstly i guess is the amount of gossip that asian families have. O M G...... sigh, i realised this because i was smack bang, in the middle of 10 adults quarreling and yelling about their dissatisfaction of members that weren't at this little meeting. When this happens, you tend to listen in and then form your own "judgements" about the ppl that aren't there. "oh they're like this" "oh they're like that" and for the 10 adults to continuously argue and gossip about it and repetitively at that....... i couldn't hack it. Sigh, but reading soh's posts about hypocritism, it's funny, like, you sorta gossip, but then u tell others not to......... it makes you think 'are you being a hypocrit' or 'are you trying to not gossip' and the first step you're taking is to tell others not to gossip? mmmmmmm Sigh............ as all of those blogs have been saying...... it's quite true, life's getting harder, emotions get complicated because there's an overcrowd of emotions that are introduced into your life because of events that happen in your life, ie work, love, friends, family, enemies.
If you think about each of them, there's so many emotions related to each of them, for example i could name a few. Work has, competition, stress, fatigue, laziness. Love also has hate, jealousy, worry, fear, which also leads to fatigue, stress etc. Friends can be happiness, yet also jealousy, competition, ablablalba.
If you think about the overlapping of emotions as a mathematical sign ^ . Having each emotion to the power of each other and along side others, of course you'll have rollercoaster rides. When you were younger you needn't worry about money, family, work, love etc. All you needed to worry about was if you had burger rings tomorrow or twisties in your lunch box, when your poster assignment is due in, when the next algebra test is. Even if you had to worry about money, you didn't need to worry about where it's coming from coz u know ur mum or dad's gonna spare a few dollars for ur tuck shop lunch.
So back to Hong Kong. So i arrived in Hong Kong, with very low hopes because there were alot of cultural/buddhist stuff that needed to be done for my gran's funeral since she was a buddhist sorta. My family tend to believe "anything that's good for them". I mean, fair enough, but how do you know what's 'good for you'? Isn't that based on everyone's perception? It's hard to see the truth in life, i must admit. And that's when i concur with soh, having to say that the bible is a book containing truly, 'the way of life'. So, i arrived, at around 12 hk time, and straight away, i had to run around looking for the right bus to catch to Tsim Sha Tsui. When i found it, i realised i needed to go get change for the bus, so i had to run and get change, missing my bus, then waiting for the next one. I got to my gran's place all well, meeting up with my mum, then we went straight to the huge place where my gran's funeral ceremony was going to be held.
Before i left melbourne i was actually quite worried about some clashing things that might happen in hong kong with my christian beliefs. I spoke to my pastor and also to some other elders about some customs that i should and shouldn't do, and one of the shouldn'ts was burning incense. I actually didn't know what burning incense meant, so as i googled my way through the web, i found that burning incense is actually offering the scent to the buddha to smell. So, when people buy incense, they're looking for the really scented ones, because u want to 'please' the gods etc. So, before i left, i talked to mum over the phone about it and she was quite strict saying i have to do it because everyone's doing it, part of custom, respect to gran blablablalb.
So, as i arrived at the place, i saw my kau fu (mum's bro) sitting on a seat, reading this buddhist scripture thing over and over again in front of 100 or so candles, and my aunties sitting there folding paper money into what looks like a gold bullion that asians used to use in the old days. And the maidservant burning them into the fire etc etc. So, as i walked in, my mum started burning incense and placing it in front of my gran's picture and the aunty's then started shooing me to go do it, then my mum started telling them that i'm christian and im not doing it etc etc. So to my surprise, i actually prayed quite hard before i left about this and i anticipated and hoped that things would change. Praise God :)
So, yer, to cut things short, since it's 1:30am and i need to prepare for tomorrow's uni etc. I had to walk around the room 50 times, holding my gran's name banner whilst 26 other buddhist/dalilama monks came and spoke out 50 or so passages from this book about 20 so times. The whole preceding started around 3pm and ended around 9pm. It was quite boring and very very tiring, not only on my body but also mentally. The next few days were all the same, until the actual body was moved downstairs into a HUGE room consisting of alot of white drapes etc etc. The reason everything's so overly done was because my grandma requested it and also my kau fu believes not only in buddha but dalilama and all this other thailand stuff, so we were pretty much just following him around.
The effects of gran's death hit kau fu the worst. His whole way of life changed. He used to not come home, not worry about anyone else except himself and his work, but he's really changed alot. He's become more warm at heart, and he's been spending alot of time with us. Not only has he been regretting the way he used to treat gran, not talking to her, not spending time with her etc, i think the death really made all of us think about family and stuff. For me to see so many people bowing down and crying about gran's death, and calling out her name as huge houses and cars and stuff made out of material were burnt in this huge ovenlike thing, it made me feel a bit weird. It made me feel a little alienated from my family. As they all were on the ground crying and screaming, i stood there along side the non related aunties etc who were friends etc. I stood there looking at the fire, and the coffin etc, knowing that, God places everyone in our lives and no matter what we do, it's the end when someone dies. There's nothing you can do or say that will change anything.
I only had one day to do some last minute shopping with my mum and my sister. I realised that Australia's cost of living is actually quite high in comparison. Over there, you can eat a nice little simple meal for 3 australian dollars. Here, you'd be lucky to get a cheeseburger for that price. But, life in HK is quite different. No silence. None at all. I like the peace and quite here, but is it really good for you? Does it make you blog more like we're all doing now because our thoughts have more time to develop and wander? I think keeping yourself busy is sometimes a good way to protect yourself. If you're asking what you're protecting yourself from......... for a christian, it's sin. Having your mind wander is a dangerous thing. Thats why the bible tells us to focus on God, and let our hearts and minds think pure thoughts. Keeping yourself occupied with work and uni etc is i guess good because you're always doing something, and not letting Satan have too much of a chance to sneak up on you. But busyness itself can be his work. Too busy to read the bible, too busy to pray, too busy to goto church, blablablalb.
I actually had some time to share with my sister in hk. She asked me what the difference is between a christian and a non christian. I struggled to really pinpoint the difference, but a verse in JAmes helped me. "Faith without works is dead alone" thats how it went. The difference is that some people might do good things, some people might believe in God etc. The point is having both, not just either.
The reason why christians go to church is because they want to be in a community where they will be influenced in an un-evil way. That's probably why parents send their children to church, even if they themselves aren't religious, they're scared that their kids might get into drugs, gambling, gangs blablablabla, and they see church as a holy place, a sanctity from the world's evil. In fact, i think church is a place where christians can really be able to learn from each other. So why can't you do it any other day? you can. Influence plays a huge role in our lives, wer're being influenced by, what we use, what we hear, who we talk to, who we work with abablbala. So having a good influence, at church, is important. Not only this, at church you can really see what kinda track you yourself is on. When you look at others and you see their dedication, their actions, their faith etc, you can sorta tell how you're going as well. The pastor at that church is in charge of guiding the people there so he has quite a stressful job i guess.
Anyhow, so yer, right now my mind's a bit blank. My brain's actually quite tired and i do need rest (for my brain) but physically, i'm alright. I gotta wake up tomorrow for uni but that's not really my biggest concern. I feel a little edgy. I feel dissatisfied somehow. Sigh, i think alot of the times, you feel like there's something wrong but u don't know what, so you worry urself over nothing or something that you don't know. Sigh, i hate that. But i think that's when prayer comes in. I have to remind myself to pray after this blog coz if i pray now, i'll forget what i want to say.
Have you ever felt an emotion which causes you to be upset yet, it's not anyone else's fault but yours? Like, if you saw a bird stop by your window every day and it'd flop around and you found it amusing and it keeps coming back week after week, day after day and then one day it stopped coming. You get upset, angry, cheated, but should you have those feelings? Do you have any right to feel like that? The bird stopped coming on its own account, or it maybe got hit by a car etc. But if that bird never came all the time etc, would u feel those emotions as you'd feel now? In the bible, there's a story like that, God makes a vine grow to shade a man and give him shelter, as the day passed, it withered and died, and the man became angry at God, but does he have any right to be angry? Would he have been angry if there was no vine at all? Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
So, in conclusion to my various wandering thoughts, i think that there's so many milestones in life which shape you. I think that a lot of the times, we should stop and think why we feel certain emotions. I for one, am learning a lot about emotions but i have no idea how to control them =p Life's busy. Sigh, mum's going to be yet another month or so, which makes me also a bit meh, coz i'm a bit sick of staying at home by myself, but i think it'll hopefully help me become more organised, or maybe even less? Sigh, who knows. I'm away for one week, and when i come back it seems like the whole world's kinda a bit down. No one's talking though. Which i guess is a good start to less gossip. But what about the genuinely concerned people. Apparantly, if you're genuinely concerned and the topic is directly related with/to/about you, then it's not gossip. But if it has no relation to you, directly etc then what you're blabbering is gossip. Mmmmmm.
Anyhow, this is a rather long blog.... for my standards.... it's average for soh and all those philosophical dudes out there. Go have a think and try commenting about ur experiences
Agape
