Star Ferry

I was not aware of the relocation of the star ferry pier until last week. If I knew before, I would definitely use the pier once more during my visit last month. Even though I grew up in Kowloon, due to the couple of years in HKU, I was a frequent visitor of the pier.

I have visited quite a number of cities in europe and the states, indeed western people have a much greater respect to their history. You can always see the combination of the new and the old in harmony. I found the picture from a forum, I like the words written, thanks for the photographer I don't know.

learning from penguins

More and more of my friends have kids now. May be that's why I do think about parenting. In my church, there are many kids. However, the parenting of their parents always kind of makes me sick.
The march of penguins is a moving documentary. The story is, every year, penguins meet at a place for mating, a father and a mother will work very hard together to raise a kid. When the kids are strong enough, each couple will abandon their child and let the mother nature to take care. The whole new generation thus find their own way to go to the sea and have a new life.
May be, we should understand that our kids belong to God, they are not for our own satisfaction.

14年

我是1992年10月23日信主,屬靈的生日將近.
不是我選上了神,而是神選上了我.我是在一佈道會中信主,我會想,那天和我一起信主的人,有多少今天仍然信神?正如以往一齊少年團契的弟兄姊妹不一定仍然在教會.如果不是天父的恩典,如今我又會是什麼光景?
一個跟隨了神14年的人,理應有更好的表現.認識很多跟自己同年的弟兄姊妹,今日已經是教會執事,或已奉獻作傳道.他們是在迦南攻城掠地,我卻仍然在曠野飄泊.
仰望那牧養我一生的神.

愛得太遲

古巨基的"愛得太遲"的確幾好聽,讓人好易有共鳴.
林夕的歌詞帶出愛需要及時,勸人珍惜眼前人.
朋友,家人,妻子當然重要,但作為基督徒,我擔心愛神也愛得太遲....

you have no idea who you are

"Wait till you have been doing it longer, you think you know who you are, you have no idea." This is what in the movie "crash", officer Ryan told officer Hanson. Later on, officer Hanson, who regarded himself definitely not a racist, killed a black guy accidentially as a result of his misjudgement.
The story reminded me Peter in Bible, who promised to lay his life for Jesus, denied Jesus.
If I cannot even know who I am, how could I judge anyone around me?

阿叔 - 林尚義

讀過一篇林尚義的訪問, 百感交集.
阿叔給我的感覺,一個字:草根.
拍攪笑片的糟老頭子,這時面對的,是人生的苦澀.
草根的人很少把痛苦訴於哲學,或無力的宗教(如約伯的朋友),只是承受
訪問透視阿叔的內心世界,處處流露他對亡妻的思念,與兒子關係平淡的無奈,回憶往昔球場上的風光...
訪問提到今年的世界杯,阿叔放棄捧排陣精密的德國隊, 改捧激情的巴西.既然生命不是由人操控,何必籌謀,「有前無後,打死罷就」,的確有些道理.
今年的世界杯決賽,會是阿叔講的最後一埸球賽,未能見証, 一憾.

The team I hated most

From time to time, I heard the arguments whether we should support the Japanese in world cup. On one hand, they are representing Asia, but on the other hand, they invaded China in the past. Personally, I take no side on this issue. But this year, I found the team I hated most, USA.
The reason is not really related to the style they play, may be partially related to the words of the commentators, but deep down, I hate America.
Hatred is something very deep, entangled with so many personal feelings, and honestly I don't know how to resolve, or even understand.

World Cup

I enjoy watching world cup. In a whole month, one could see so many things via football, it's difficult to describe.
I like to use world cup to recall what happened in my life. I like to ask myself, where were I last time? what am I going to do next time?

1994..I was having a summer job. Life was terrible. By the end of world cup 94, I was wondering what would happen in 98. "what would I do after graduating from university?"

1998..I was study master, my research was so bad, I was lost again. By the end of world cup 98, I was wondering what would happen in 2002. "I would have a stable job, but is it my destiny?"

2002.. I was a teacher, but I knew I was going to come to US. By the end of world cup 02, I thought it might not be able to watch it in 06. "am I going to finish my PhD in 06?"

2006..I am here. ..Before asking what happen in 2010, I should enjoy this month first.

Tonkatsu

I like eating at Japanese restaurant here. But the names of food in menu are usually direct translation of Japanese pronunciation, I seldom order somethings I don't understand. Today, I didn't know why, the name "Tonkatsu" in the menu caught my eyes, and I asked the waitress what's that. She explained in a couple of words, my bell rang, that's 吉列猪扒.
I ordered it, but then I realized that I haven't eat that for a couple of years. Suddenly, I wanted to cry. Of course I didn't cry, but I neither didn't quite understand my feeling. May be, it's the passage of time which trigger me, or I miss the life before. But when I think deeper, 吉列猪扒 is something so common in hk restaurants, but now I almost forget such a name.
I ate the 猪扒, the taste was not that great.
I know that deep down, I project that hk is good. At the same time, I also know that it's not really true, just like the 猪扒.

What a Game

FA Cup final, liverpool vs west ham.
One year after Istanbul, Liverpool played another dramatic final.
I am not superficious, I am trying to understand the meaning of "luck".
"Something is not right." I thought after the game had started for a while.
The performance of a couple of players are indeed below their standard, Kewell seldom touched the ball, Alonso made a couple of stupid mistakes. The defenders were fooling around. "These shouldn't happen altogether at the same match. The luck is not flavoring our side."
0-2, including one own goal.
Liverpool bounced back, 2-2.
"they are still not in the right track."
Several minutes later, 2-3, once again, it's really weird, 無心插柳的cross fly to the net and became a beautiful goal.
The remaining 20 minutes or so were really hard. one goal behind, the players were tired, no more attacker in the subsitution list (why? Luis Gacia was in suspension, a point everyone thought doesn't matter a lot before the game).
足球就是這樣令人著迷, Steven Gerrard scored the equalizer. A fantastic goal in the extra time.
"How can he do it? The captain, somehow the burden of the whole team is on his shoulder, the camera captured he was 抽筋 several minutes ago, and at the final seconds...." It reminded me the story in the comic book.
"The luck is back." Indeed, in the extra time, west ham had a shoot hit the post, and Liverpool won the penalty.
The game is such a reflection of life. Even though I use the term luck, I am not saying life is a bunch of random processes, as I believe God in charge of our life.
The book "alchemist" makes the following point: Right before someone achieves his personal legend, he/she has to face the toughest challenge. He/she is asked to show all the things learnt in the process, and the challenge is to test whether he/she deserves succeed. May be, that's not a bad way to think about luck.
We were taught something like "fight back; never give up; ...". All these could be found in textbook I really doubt how many of us believe these principles work. A football game opens a window, we are reminded that there is something in life we have to fight for, and those textbook principles are not bullshit.
ps. For west ham, they really played a great game, they worked very hard and actually both sides deserve to win.

Robbie Fowler

Robbie Fowler was one of the most impressive player during the time I first started to watch Liverpool. He started his career as a bright star, but then became dimmer and dimmer. After he left Liverpool, he couldn't return to his top level. Lack of something, I don't know, may be the determination. that's life...
However, life is also kind to him, he recently returned to Liverpool, the fans are still so supportive, and he keeps scoring and gets a new contract. that's life.

Deserve It

I got admitted to a summer school in france, I am going to spend a month in the middle of the French Alpine. On one hand, I am really excited, but on the other hand, I feel nervous and I am always wondering if I deserve all these good opportunities.
I realized that I have a problem: I want to use my "own ability" to achieve and put God in a supporting role.
Say if I work hard and publish a paper, I would thank God. But deep down, I put God as a supporter and I somehow the succeed as my own contributions, and that's why I feel unhappy when I could not see my own part.
It reminds me the prayer of the Pharisee.
"'God, I thank you that I am not like other men—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get." He did good stuffs, but he thought that's his contribution. He deserved.
I am still far away from understanding the meaning of thanks God. I hope I could truly understood everything I got are entirely from God.

A car "accident"

An incident happened when I was in Baltimore. One night, we went to a supermarket. While I was entering my parking spot, my car scrape the one in the next space. We got out and have a look, a scratch was made in the car (of course not mine). The car is a brand new honda. Oh......
I was in a kind of dilemma. "Big Big trouble!". "Even more, i am in a new place, rules may be different." "God just helped me in my talk, now he gave me something more." (by the way, the parking spaces in Baltimore are smaller than those in New York. )
To be honest, I did want to leave. Luckily, Stella said we couldn't.
We decided to wait a little while. A minute later, the owner came. We told her what happen. She was very upset (who won't? a brand new car), but she decided not to ask for anything.
We were relieved, but more importantly, we did the right thing.

a conferece

Stella and I went to the APS march meeting. The conference holds every year at march. We went there 7 year ago when we were studying our master degree. This is our first time since 1999. 7 year is really a long time. I tried to recall my feeling in the conference 7 year ago.
In terms of a researcher, I have improved. But in terms of a person, I have got older, and I felt difficult to digest the feeling.
The most valuable thing in the conference was, I met an old friend. We lost communication since we graduated. He came to US right after graduation, and he has just finished his PhD. I understood this as God's "plan", but again, it's not easy to swallow the bitterness. I sensed that he had gone through a tough time. We were good friends in christ, but he no longer goes to church. I was afraid to ask him...

Story of an mp3 player

Waiting is always difficult. For unknown reasons, I have been put in situations where all I could do is to wait quite a lot of time. Recently, I ordered an mp3 player online. On the day when it was supposed to be delivered, I got nothing, but the tracking record online said it had already been delivered.
"Whether I want to do something to improve my life, I'll put myself into stupid troubles."
"Instead of sit down and enjoy music, I have to make thousands of calls."
"I have many things to concentrate on, now I am distracted again."
Negative feelings popped up immediately.
I decided to pray, and forced myself not to be distracted. That's a point I learnt after so many times of waiting.
Life is good to me this time, the next day, my neighbor knocked my door and told me a package was delivered to her, hidden somewhere in her patio, so I got my player back.

Rest

Recently my work is driving me crazy. I have to prepare for a conference, finish a paper, and in I am in the middle of a busy project. For a long time, I keep thinking on fulfulling all the tasks. Probably. this is not the way God want. I was sick last week, fever for a couple of days, and was forced not to work. Once again, I realized I have to rest in God. The only thing I could be is to pray, asking him to in charge of my schedule.

"Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money." Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, "If it is the Lord's will, we will live and do this or that." James 4:13-15

the story of Hagar

The life of Hagar, written in Genesis, is a very touching story. Motivated by a tape I listened to in the fellowship, I read the story again.
I am deeply impressed by the fact that our God showed his care to Hagar, which was just a maidservant. It's not difficult to imagine that Hagar had a very bad self-image. She might had a hard childhood in egypt, else she wouldn't be a servant in a family living in Canaan. As a servant, she had nothing to proud of; she had no choice in her life; she became a "machine", carrying a baby for Sarai.....
Her poor self image is probably the reason why "she became to despise her mistress when she knew she was pregant. Succeed cannot help a person with a bad self-image, on the other hand, it leads to unhealthy responses which deep down in heart, makes the person worser.
Her first touch with God cured her, but might not be fully. After the birth of Issac, Abraham sent her and her son away, she collasped in the middle of desert. I tried to imagine her thoughts at that moment: the bitterness of her whole life floated up in her heart, there isn't any body, in the middle of nowhere, she and her boy, no water...
If God didn't show up, her thoughts might lead her to dealth. "God opened her eyes and she saw a well of water." I guessed the well itself was not a miracle, it was there, but with all negative thoughts in her mind, she was unable to see the hope.
As far as I remember, after the two touches with God, the bible didn't mention Hagar anymore. I think she still suffered a lot in order to raise her son, at least her life was bitter compared with Sarai. However, she probably learnt to look at herself at a new perspective. The love from God helped her to justify herself, and the hope brought her positivity.

Blizzard 2006

A frozen pond near my apartment. 

Patience

I haven't written my journal for quite a week, as I have been concentrating on a project. I awoke at the middle of the night last night. While I was trying to sleep again, many thoughts came up, and I realized that I lost the peace and patience in God. Today, I try to slow down, spend a while on sorting the pile of papers. Suddenly, I feel much lighter, he is the one who knows the progress.

Renormalization & Self-Consistency

Recently, I'm struggling between two methods in solving a research problem. One is called renormalization, in laymen terms, it means to find a particular viewing angle so that one can make your problem 'looks' simplier. Renormalization involves forgetting some irrelevant details of the orginal problem, and of coz, 'irrelevant' is relative to your target research interest. The second method is called self-consistency, naively it means first, assume your problem belongs to a certain simple class of problems that can be solved in standard way, then see where it leads to. In the case where the conclusion is obviously not 'consisent' with the assumption, change certain parameters in the assumption until self-consistency is achieved. A few days ago, I realized these are also common methods for people to deal with real life siuations. Yet, one cannot go back and renew your decisions in the past, so in real life 'self-consistency' is not possible, but its cousin, 'self-deception' is popularly used. Yet, people who use the method of 'self-deception' always think they're just using the method 'self-consistency'! My boss wanted to stick to the method of self-consistency, and I want very much to follow the method of renormalization. If we really understand the problem well, we should be able to renormalize it! Maybe my boss also wants some 'self-deception' to easy the frustration in research !

Chinese New Year

I am not a big fan of chinese new year. But I do miss the crowd in Hong Kong.
Today, b/s shared their testimonies during Sunday service, that's pretty touching. A brother mentioned a point that I found inspiring. God bless us, may not because of what we do, nor even his own mercy, but his promise to the people around us, say God blessed Soloman because of David. In this sense, we should refresh our mind, we owe God for everything we have, in addition, we do owe our parents, our b/s, and many people we don't know.

driver license

I made it.

driver license

Today, Stella have finally passed the road test. We are very glad. To us, it's far beyond a license. Failing in the test, merely a symbolic representation of all the tear we broke into and unhappiness we faced in this stupid country. Those rude examiners, their bad languages sort of summarized many things we have seen.
We are hurt, not by a couple of people, but the whole world (i know it's just a feeling, not true).
A sister I met in church made a wise observation. "No need to envy those people who are in good shape, they are (or they seems to be) just because they have been stuck here for a longer time ." I like this thought, and it's really true. We have been stuck for a long time, therefore we get our license.

Against Manchester United

Liverpool was beaten by Man United, a single goal happend in the 90th minute. It keeps bugging me this week.
"I have seen something else under the sun: The race is not to the swift or the battle to the strong, nor does food come to the wise or wealth to the brilliant or favor to the learned; but time and chance happen to them all."
Football is such a realistic reflection of life. When your team loses, or millions of stupid things happen in life, one still needs to move on...

God should....

We experienced God in many aspects of our daily life. We heard many other Christians' testimonies. These are good and they indeed help us to understand God, but it's terribly wrong if we believe we have figured out sort of protocols of how God works.
Paul and Silas traveled to Philippi after Paul had seen the vision of Macedonia. Just a couple of days, they were put into jail. If I were Silas, I would ask Paul, "hey, are you sure the guy in your dream is really a Macedonian?"., as I expect such a direct message from God "should" lead to an exciting journey.
When I bought my car from a friend, it was possible to reduce (or even avoid) the tax by lying about the price. I decided not to, and spent several hundred bucks. To be honest, I had a feeling that God "should" bless the car and me. Unfortunately, the car did bring me troubles, I spent more than a thousand on fixing it.
Clearly, God is not working according to a manual we wrote, and he is the one who has absolute right to do whatever on us. We are servant and he is the Lord. To bear in mind is, his will is good, pleasing and perfect.

holiday

Monday was a holiday. We drove an hour to visit Ikea. Honestly, I do think that's quite stupid. However, I like visiting Ikea, even there's no need to buy anything. The stuffs are nice. We did a lot when we were in HK. I urged Stella to buy a piece of furniture but she refused. I know that our current arrangement is sort of optimal, but I always love to see something new, some changes...
Monday was our third time to visit Ikea in here, the previous time was almost two years ago, when we started to rent the studio we are now living. I remembered God blessed us in all those arrangements...
After Ikea, we found a cantonese restaurant, we tried a couple of dim sum. That's my hoilday.

Endless

"Of making many books there is no end, and much study wearies the body." Ecclesiastes 12:12

Browsing the large number of different sessions of the APS march meeting, the feeling of the meaningless in endless scientific work came up to my mind again. This few years of living enable me to know better the meaning/meaningless of life. Once again, if I were not here, I could not have the perspective I have right now.

So I saw that there is nothing better for a man than to enjoy his work, because that is his lot. Ecclesiastes 3:22

Winter

 

something new

I can't remember starting from when, I have been trying to do something new. Nothing special, I just want trigger something out there. So, here I am.