gua tempurung trip (and reminiscing about fraser's hill)

i've come back from the caving trip - very much alive, and even can say that i enjoyed it quite a bit. i've been reporting to everyone that i'm not such a girly girl after all. coz i didn't squirm or scream or shudder in fear when we had to slide down like a couple of meters, then crawl into a hole to get to the river adventure and then going down on all fours in the water.i actually thought it was rather fun, and was game to do watever the ranger asked us to. time passed really quickly too - we were in there for more than 3 hours, but it felt short. my students turned out to be really sweet, most of them were guys, and in the end, they were the ones looking after us! hehe....

so i've concluded that i actually don't really mind outdoorsy stuff - as long as they do not test my stamina and endurance (which needs a LOT of work :P) i remember going jungle trekking in Fraser's some time ago and because there we needed to go uphill quite a bit - i felt so breathless (i also discovered i have asthma not too long before that - and i was afraid i wud run out of breath) and wanted to just give up there and then. my knight in shining armor was mike lee - it was the first time i met him, he was really sweet and took me by the hand and helped me along the way, encouraging me to go on until we came to a rest point.

a few of us gals (diana, adeline and myself) decided not to go all the way and chun haw accompanied us back after we rested and had some food. it was raining, i remember, and i felt utterly miserable all the way back out. we had a better time after going back to the lodging. we had packed dry clothes in our bags, so at least we could change out of the wet ones and then we decided to go on a drive around Frasers.

the most hilarious thing was that chun haw actually locked his car with the steering lock, without realising that he didn't bring the key!! of coz, at that point, it wasn't funny to him :P we ended up praying coz there wasn't anything else we cud do. a while later, another group who didn't go hiking (victor's gang) came back and vic helped chun haw detach his whole steering wheel and then they broke the steering lock and fixed the steering back. diana also got to change finally - she had left everything in vic's car, and was wearing her wet clothes all the while.

chun haw was a really good guide - he took us driving around, showing us all the interesting places and houses etc - it was great fun - we even ate durians in the rain and cold :) looking back, i really did enjoy the whole experience altho the trek part was tough for me. the rest who went all the way to the top and back, got back really late and looked so tired and dirty that i was so glad i din follow them. hehehe...

i dun think i'm up to climbing mt kinabalu tho :D my idea of a holiday is still one with comfort and good company ;)

u know what? i really am not a regular blogger (haha- as if i needed to say it out loud!) but yeah, i just don't have the urge to blog as much. not that it has taken over me in a big way since the beginning, but i do like the idea of being able to share my thoughts here if i wanted to. so i guess if u come back here to check for updates about once in 1-2 weeks there's a good chance u might find a new post. hehe...

this week has been pretty standard - my students had their midterm exams and now it's on to marking. i've got a few days (until next Tues) to finish up all the marking plus all the other documents since we're having meeting on Wed. the one interesting thing that wud be happening tomoro - my dept is taking about 20 students to Gua Tempurung for a short caving tour, i wasn't planning to go since we already had 3 other lecturers going but one student persuaded me to go - and went to the extent of paying for me (my boss only wanted to sponsor 3 lecturers) so i can't have any excuses for not going! so anyway, i decided - why not? if i end up hating it, at least i can say i've done it and wud never do it again. haha. no, kidding - i hope it wud be at least a little bit fun, and i'll come back to tell of my 'adventures'.

lately i haven't been sleeping as soundly as i used to - not sure what's the cause of that - i used to sleep like a log and nothing wud disturb me when i was in la-la land. but i've been aware of having dreams altho not really vivid ones most of the time, and i wud wake up knowing i had dreamt, and sometimes feeling less rested. like last nite, i woke up twice and dreamt rather vivid dreams (of which i can still remember some of it - which is quite unusual for me) and ended up being late to work coz i overslept! i have been pondering over some things but nothing really bothering me that much, so hopefully the situation will improve soon...

i've also been giving more thot of where i'm heading in terms of jobs - and i had told myself earlier to stay here in kdu until i've finished my masters, and that prolly will still be what i wud do - but i'm also beginning to prepare myself for changes in this area of my life - which wud naturally affect the other areas of my life quite a bit. i wil prolly take some time to pray and think thru things - before making any decisions. i've mentioned to some of u dat i'm toying with the idea of going for missions before moving to another job, perhaps medium term to cambodia or thailand, if i get the green light from God. obviously, this is not sth i wud do without knowing that it's in His plan for me. it's still quite a long way from now, so at the moment, it's only a seed planted in my heart...

since the past week as well, i'm being challenged to confront my weaknesses anew - the thing that brought it about are some small incidences with my colleague which i think God is using to show me that i need to learn again the meaning of humility, dying to self and facing the ugly sides of myself which i'm so good at avoiding :P it's not an easy process for sure, and last friday ingching commented that i wasn't my usual cheery self. it was because of my encounters with my colleague, which led to me feeling like i was snubbed at. but anyway, this is still work in progress, maybe when it's already dealt with i'll share more.

in the meantime, i'm looking forward to my break next week. i'm taking 2 days leave so i'll hv thurs - sun (4 days of no work!) and i've got plenty of things i wanna do. haha. then i'm going to attend MELTA conference on 5th & 6th June and then it's back to work proper on the 7th. final exam papers are due again *groan* so i have pretty clear idea of wat to expect after the break. oh well, it's just work and work is work. haha.

oh, and i'm also gonna start giving private tutoring to a fren (she used to come for the free english class at xroads) in june - and i haven't prepared for that too. so i've got loads of stuff to do already...

hmm, this is turning out to be quite a long post...so till next time folks. ciao!

bloggable things

i've taken longer than usual to update - usually i blog about once a week - reason being, i'm plain lazy. Haha. There have been some bloggable stuff - like church camp, but i just didn't feel like blogging. So i didn't. i thoroughly enjoyed the camp and it was a really refreshing time.

i stayed over at Diana's last Friday after our excursion to town where Diana and her cousin, Hazel hunted for earring parts and swarovski crystals. i went along for the experience and managed to amuse myself without too much effort ;) i even bought crystals which Diana so obligingly used to make a pair of dangling earrings for me. i joined them for an early Mother's Day dinner, and it was fun just to be part of a family for a short while.

On Wed nite, i did my first teaching for KLTI on Mark 6-10. Paulina had approached me about 2 months ago about trying out teaching, so i decided to give it a go. During camp, when we broke into groups of 4 to pray and prophecy over each other, lei wah said i have the gift of teaching, and connie chee saw a picture of me standing in front of a group of people, teaching. i took it as a confirmation of what i was about to embark on, and it encouraged me to take a step of faith to do the teaching.

i started preparing for the teaching about a week before i was scheduled to be on. since i had not done anything quite like this before, i did have fears that it wud be a flop and concerns about how the students wud receive the teaching. i asked god to take those expectations and fears away, and help me to focus on Him, and really trusting Him because all that matters is that He is pleased.

paulina suggested i meet up with her to run through things but one thing after another came up, so we got together for dinner on wed before class and prayed together. i did not rehearse what i was going to say, i just felt strange to be practising in front of invisible people :D

i wrote some notes, went through the reading guide and tried to collect my thoughts. when paulina asked me what was the one thing that spoke to me, i told her i dunno coz i'm trying to remember everything! hehe. the moment of truth came, and amazingly, i didn't feel very nervous. perhaps all the experience teaching english in college really helps. i think i surprised even myself :)

i just shared from my heart, trying my best to give the students some background and continuity to what they are reading, and the significance of certain events and etc. there were so many things that i felt was deposited in me but i was afraid i wud not be able to articulate them, but the holy spirit really led me through it. i taught for about 35 mins and funnily enough, did not refer to my notes at all. it was a surprisingly satisfying experience, and i'm eager to do it again.

i'm really happy that the students looked like they got something from it, and the feedback was mostly good. for me, this is a beginning in a journey of learning to share God's word with others, and now i can say that when i took up the 'challenge' i can see how faithful god is to lead and to give wisdom, and i look forward to seeing Him work even more in the future.

i do know that it takes a lot more than just being able to teach to make a good teacher. i need to have a heart for my students, to be genuinely interested in their lives, especially in their walk with Him and just being there to encourage, share, and even correct when needed because its not just about being able to share, but wanting God to work fully in each student's life.

i'm really grateful to have paulina and pat who are so willing to guide and impart, and prod me on. thank you, for your faithful commitment to teach klti.