Exam

I have just passed my EMC Cloud exam and I told my wife. If I failed the exam my sadness level would go to -70 but as I pass the exam the happiness is only +10.

I wonder sometimes why do I need to take all these certs?

After that I took my last MALC ITIL exam to achieve the ITIL Expert. I passed. There was a sense of thrill. I waited for 5 years to patiently collect all the ITIL credits and now finally .....

Then a sense of emptiness creeps in. What are all these for?

Uang, nyawa dan BPJS

#True Story, Kisah Nyata di sebuah RS di Lippo Karawaci

Wajahnya tegas. Terlihat dingin tanpa emosi. Mungkin seperti sedikit kesal. Dokter wanita muda di depanku, memanggil kami.

Aku tergopoh-gopoh berlari menghampiri beliau seperti murid hendak disetrap kepala sekolah.

"Pak, begini ya saya bukan mau ngusir, tapi ruang ICU-nya penuh. Bapak kan tahu, kondisi pasien ini parah setelah operasi harus langsung masuk ICU dan kalau sudah masuk ICU, tidak ada yang tahu berapa lama akan di sana."

Aku tergagap. Bingung. Tercekat.

"Saya kan sudah bilang dari tadi apa adanya, kondisinya parah. Kalau pun dioperasi jalannya tidak mudah. Mendingan Bapak sekarang buru2 cari RS lain yang ada tempat ICU. Bapak tahu ICU kan? Bapak lihat seperti yang di film2 itu loh. Mumpung sekarang masih subuh, belum macet, cepetan Bapak cari RS BPJS yang lain. Bapak tidak bisa menunggu di sini.."

Satu detik seperti satu abad.

"Kalau ke gedung sebelah yang bukan BPJS ada tempat ndak, Bu?"

Mukanya berubah sedikit. Antara kesal dan heran.

"Pak di sana Bapak mesti bayar. Bisa puluhan juta. Per harinya di ICU sana, 15 juta, dan bisa sehari dua hari, seminggu dua minggu, saya tidak tahu....." Kalimatnya berhenti di situ, tetapi air wajahnya melanjutkan, " Elo bisa bayar kagak??"

"Tolong Bu, dicarikan ada tidak ruang ICU di sana?" Aku memohon dengan air mata bercucuran membasahi pipi seorang pria.

30 menit kemudian, seseorang yang saya kenal membantu menelpon kenalannya yang kebetulan duduk sebagai Direksi RS tersebut.

30 menit berikutnya, petugas rumah sakit-nya memberitahukan bahwa tiba-tiba ruang ICU-nya jadi tersedia di situ, tanpa harus pindah ke mana-mana.

Uang, nyawa dan BPJS. Tiga hal yang berlainan, kadang bersinggungan.

Satu malam

Satu malam dini hari

Di depan ruang gawat darurat

Duduk di luar semilir dingin angin

Bersama bau got menyengat dan seekor tikus mengendap juga nyamuk-nyamuk bernyanyi

Wajah-wajah lelah penuh kuatir menemani

Sebagian tidur lelap di bangku halaman

Angin dingin menusuk karena terburu- buru aku lupa bawa jaket

Ah hidup... Di dalamnya ada tawa dan bahagia, juga sakit dan pedih 

Water and ash

Then a man who is ceremonially clean is to take some hyssop, dip it in the water and sprinkle the tent and all the furnishings and the people who were there. He must also sprinkle anyone who has touched a human bone or a grave or anyone who has been killed or anyone who has died a natural death. (Numbers 19:18)

Being well

God wants you to be well more than you want you to be well

17 May -JP

Movie Reviews

I have noticed that most of the times I will always like the movie that has bad reviews from movie critics or even that failed box office. Then some movies that got many stars like 4, I really wanted to puke inside the cinema. Really, this is not hyperbolic.

Ok, let's see some movies that I like very much even though they failed in the market

1. Strange Magic
It's the masterpiece from the maestro George Lucas. I like the plot, because it gives us the courage to always see things differently and dare to decide what you think and your heart decide is right. Love is found in strange place, and by itself is a strange magic.

2. Jupiter Ascending
The plot started with a boring mundane terrible life and it ended with the same mundane life of cleaning toilet, but it's no longer terrible. Reminds me that we can live like a royal, act and behave like one, no matter our circumstances are.

3. Shaun the Sheep
Someone wants to escape from the mundane life, and finally ends up the same, but with different perspective. Sometimes what we are yearning and looking for in life is just right behind our yard.

A Special Day

It's camy's birthday today :)

I feel good today. I was going to a customer for a meeting this morning. I arrived very early so I decided to look for a coffee shop. I asked the security guard, where the coffee shop is. 

I called him 'uncle' - which is an informal friendly calling. 

To my dismay, he looked at me rudely and arrogantly he replied back 'there is no uncle working here, dont call me uncle!'

Straight away my blood shot up and the anger raging inside. 

I was so pissed off. Who does he think he is?

Somehow, something overcame my flesh. I tried to remember that I am a royal descent. So I called him, 'Sir!'

I hugged him ( or semi-hug, just putting my arm around his shoulder) and apologise. I saw him smile wildly and he nodded his head with respect. 

'Don't get offended. I don't mean to offend you. I just meant to be friendly' i tried to explain. 

'Uncle is not friendly' he still insisted but his tone has changed softer. 

I still felt the anger within me with his stubborness. But I pressed on and gave in to him. 

So I walked to coffee shop still feel humiliated and a bit of anger. Even when I saw him again and I smiled and he smiled back. The residual anger was still there. 

After some hours. All the anger was gone and finally I looked back and I was so happy that God helped me! Thank God, I did not retaliate back. 

Thank God, I decided to act like His child. 

As I remembered his open smile, it was like an angel's smile. Maybe it's a test. 

As I wrote this, I was tempted to think, would he still be rude to me if I drove in on Mercedes?

Then I tell myself, I have Jesus. I do not need to be bother of what people think of me.

Were You?

Dear Jesus,

When you were on earth, were you feeling worries?
Anxieties?
Worry how to retire?

What on earth were you thinking?

Were you stress over customer complaint of your wooden craft?

Simply, Ordinary Life

Simple life. No luxury but simple moments. In the morning I brought my family to watch movie in the neighborhood cinema. Then another ordinary evening to do groceries. Walking under the shadow of the trees, smelling the breeze of the wind. The kids walked slowly and playfully.

One day I would fully understand how great that moment was. If I were to come back from future, these were the moments I would pick to go back. 

God's blessings are strange and found in the small little things too. Often. 

In the evening, I walked to a nearby hawker center to share a plate of kway chap with my wife. We walked slowly holding hands as if we were dancing. We chatted from a to z along the way. 

At night, I brought the kids to the bed, prayed for them for the things they shared and worried about. The youngest one slept on my hand clinging onto my arm. I looked at his face as he fell asleep and I could feel his heartbeat on my hand. I saw peace in his sleep, and it beamed into my soul. 

I do not have a million in the bank, nor do I have a portfolio of properties. I only have one job and no business. I have worries and sometimes stress. 

I do not live extraordinary life and noone follows or admires me. Most of the dream I had did not come to pass the way I pictured it on my youth's days. I have things in my mind that I wish I could have to make my life easier. 

I do not achieve anything much or great today. Or I mean, in my life too, that deserves to be proud of. There was a sense of vanity and waste creeped into my mind trying to break into my fortress of peace. 

Then as I looked back the day, I saw love, perfect love, from an extraordinary God woven into my ordinary day, today. I saw His hands. I did. 

I saw Him on those moments today. I saw it that I could not recognised His presence, but really He was there. His thoughts are not mine and way higher than mine. I saw His love is a mystery, like the gems hidden under the sands, slipping into ordinary days for an ordinary man like me. 

As I looked back at my day today, I saw Him smiling at me the whole day. He felt all my worries and anxieties and I also saw how much He wanted to tell me, how long, how deep, how wide His love is to me. But I did not know. 

I saw Him holding the time and the eternity and that He knows the secret of what is worthy to hold, to chase, and to cherish, under the sun.  

In this ordinary life, there is nothing more extraordinary than to know who He really is and how He loves us. 

Singapore's online toy shop

The new Singapore's online toy shop at http://www.4littleboyz.com/.

Low Price. Branded Toys. Happy Kids, Happy Parents.

Birthdays

3 BD at Astra, 1 BD at NUS, 1 BD at AlpanMatrix, 1 BD at ewServer, 2 BD at ST, 1 BD at Computrain, 6 BD at Gtn, 2 BD at DD, 1 BD at Ava, 2 BD at At. 

Oh too colorful ...

Give me Jesus

Give me Jesus @ work desk

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?

As time passes by

6 Christmases at Gtn, 2 at DD, 1 at Av, and now 2 at At. 

Managing thru excitement and many unhappiness and sore. 

Most colored by anxiety. 

Why could not we truly believe that there is a pillar of cloud and pillar of fire?

Find my promised land, I hope. The land to live for and to die for. 

~Batavia

The book of Benjamin

My son Benjamin is still upset that there is no first and second Benjamin book, unlike 1-2 Samuel Books for his brother. 

Pretending Faith

So today someone shot (backstab) me. What should I do? Revenge?

I asked Jesus.

What would I do if I am in the state of full trust in Him? That He loves me. That he takes care of me. That he will guarantee my provision.

Why should I be worry of what others think of me if anyway He who provides me owns all the mountains, sea and cattles?

So my perspective changed, even as I 'pretend' to believe

Oh Jesus, I believe in You. Help my unbelief!

The Handle of Life

I have just met a friend, someone I have been knowing for 18 years. He happens to drop by to my city so we catch up. 

We were at the top of one of the stars hotel at Marina Bay and enjoying our chit chat. 

Time ticked and night crawled and we were about to part, when he shared of his life philosophy. 

We, the matter/body we have, is just a form of energy thus energy can be transformed and not destroyed when we die, he said. We are just a small dust in the universe. Through  meditation we can attain peace and free from attachment, he continued. 

I presented him with a realistic case. Say, you are out of job and no money. Your son is sick and you cannot send him to hospital, what would you feel? Hence don't you have to worry on daily affairs of money and have good secured job?  As I predicted,  his calm answer is that our son is not really our son. 

Yes, because in the energy concept in the universe all are just flying dust and we have no attachment.

I explained to him the concept of Christianity in 'his language'; that if we are the energy aka spirit, we are longing to be united with the Source of Spirit the God. And only God can reach us and not we try otherwise. 

That's the problem with Christianity, he said. It's just about get saved, reborn and nothing changed in your life. You do not have the tools to attain peace and mind control, he said, unlike meditation. 

I feel like deja vu. Actually we had something like this conversation 18 years ago. I remember he shared to me that from the TVRI's mimbar agama, the pastors looked like restless but the others are calm and composed. 

The fact now is that he looks much calmer than I am and more peaceful. As he said, if you know you are just energy in the universe you will be from worry. He still believes the existence of God who would also predestined all, though. 

As for me I have spent the first hours sharing my work stress and the worry of city life and money. 

I feel like deja vu. 

I tried to explain that rightfully if one believe in Christ, his mind will be changed and he will attain peace too. But I could not go further as I have no peace to display. 

I conclude that to handle life there are 3 or 4 ways. 

One is if you think the futility of life and the vanity in it and you will feel life is light and just laughter. There is no real pain but illusion and we are just form of energy. Your son is not really yours, he is just energy related to you. Not attached. 

Second, if we think there is something to chase, to achieve and to overcome in life and lucky enough, your last name is Riady, for example, so you can make things happen. 

Third, we think like the second one but our resources are very limited and our strength is weak - we will end up neither here nor there. Life is a constant worry and dissapointment. 

Fourth, we think there is something in life, and meaning and purpose and it's real. And we believe wholeheartedly in perfect faith that the God will take care of us like He does to the sparrows and the lilies - in that perfect faith you will surely be freed of worry. This is also on the basis that such God exists and He will not make the smallest mistake else the faith will be abused. 

So either go extreme left or right. Woe to you if you are in the middle. 

Wake up call

I bought chicken rice today for my dinner, as my wife is away.
The auntie, looked at me as I queued, "Yes, uncle?" she asked...

Ouch.

Time flies. Finally someone "older" than me called me uncle.

What have I done in my short life?

The Treasure

Last night right after I made love to my wife, I suddenly thought of a novel by Coelho, the Alchemy. 

In that story a young man had a dream that he would find great treasure in a far far away place. Fast forward, he traveled with all adversities to the place he was told in the dream. Towards the end of the story he was robbed and beaten up by a gang of thug. One of them laughed about his dream of seeing a treasure in a far far away place, which is the young man's home. 

In short, the young man went back and found the treasure in his hometown. 

Morale of the story - do we ever know where our treasure is? 

And as I ponder, is it gold and property? Money and bank account? To own many successful businesses?  I think the one near to me is my family. The family I always have is indeed my treasure.