Strange Magic

Yay!!! It's a good movie. The songs, the plots, the voices are so wonderful

I cant help falling in love with the movie when it just started - when I saw and listened to the beautiful rendition of 'Cant help falling in love', the moment the movie opened. 

The song straight away brought me to the memory of 25 years ago when I for the first time wandered leaving my home town for my study at Semarang. 

I was stressed, as I remember. I was bald as all the newbies had to cut our hair. I was really feeling like stranger. The dialect accent was strange for me and I could not speak Javanese. I was homesick. I had the feeling people hated me for no reason because I am Chinese. I was worried of the 'orientation' period where the seniors would put us into tribulation and a mini nazi camp. I stayed at temporary boarding house and needed to find a place to stay. The city is much bigger and crowded than my home town. I was not used to travel long distance for daily commute. The weather is too hot compared to my home town. 

I really felt like a refugee in Babylon. 

As I looked back. How I regret that I harbored those feelings. Why worry of the orientation? It could not be that bad like a torture right? I should have taken it lightly. Some people whom I thought anti Chinese becomes good friends now. Why bother about room rental? Anywhere got a bed and roof was happiness. Can't speak Javanese? I ended up picking it up quite fast actually. Had I taken things lightly then, it would have been more wonderful moments. 

So - what is it with all the problems I have in office now? One day I would look back and regret - why I did not take it lightly then ... Ha....! 😝 

Give me Jesus

Recently, I have been listening to this song, Give me, Jesus, that my wife told me. The version I recommend is from Fernando Ortega. I bought it from iTunes. 

Nice song. Very simple. But deep and weighty.

The song is an old hymn song from the Negro Spiritual. So it was written and sung by the slaves.

I try to imagine, how could you arise in the morning and say 'Give me Jesus' when you were a slave ? In view of that, the sufferings I have from my job and the stress on Monday morning, is really pale in comparison.

I am wondering, how could the African American became Christian? The religion of their masters who enslaved and took their lives.

So in their lives and even after many generations they still sang the song. There was no panacea nor solutions for them. All they have was Jesus and they told their masters, you can have all this world. And for them they had Jesus and still their slavery even until many generations.

Can we sing on our days, whatever happens, the same song?