hakuna matata

the realization of graduation

i think i'm over this for the moment, but mommy asking me about wacky walk and papa telling me to make sure i've finished my university requirements and my logging onto stanford epay and seeing the following notice:

"ATTENTION UNDERGRADUATE SENIORS: You have reached the stage in your Undergraduate career at which you must carefully review your University Requirements (GERs, PWR, Language) in Axess in order to prepare for graduation. Please be aware that you must review your course, grade, and GER history in Axess and resolve any outstanding, unreported, and /or incomplete grades no later than April 12, 2009 (or March 1, 2009 if you are graduating Winter quarter). You must complete your remaining University and department requirements during your final quarters at Stanford."

it has such a final ring to it that is so depressing. it's like pearline's song. "(x & y place) will be so empty without you". it has the same kind of feeling. i guess graduation is supposed to be a happy occasion, that i survived (not yet, but soon, hopefully:p) and got a college degree and made friends and all that.

and then it brings me back to my brother's graduation. when i was wondering why all his friends were asian/asian american (now, i think i kind of know why), and wondering how he felt to be leaving a place after spending 4 years there, and wondering what sort of sadness it was. now that it's the year of my graduation, i'm beginning to wonder. but the reality of not living at stanford anymore won't set in until packing, i think.

and i still don't know what path lies ahead for me. although, jackie did tell me about this very interesting live-on-an-island-for-6-months thing which sounds very exotic! hahaha. it's weird though, i really don't feel the urge to make sure i stay in the US anymore. i'm not quite sure why either. maybe i'm just taking life in the US for granted now.

alright, back to my 60-notebook-page dschool assignment, of which i've completed about 1/2 of and spent at least 5 hours on so far.. ahhh. help me! limited time and so much stuff to do.

from my reading for organizational behaviour...

'Then there was Ambrose Vollard, the sponsor of Cézanne's first one-man show, at the age of fifty-six. At the urging of Pissarro, Renoir, Degas, and Monet, Vollard hunted down Cézanne in Aix. He spotted a still-life in a tree, where it had been flung by Cézanne in disgust. He poked around the town, putting the word out that he was in the market for Cézanne's canvases. In "Lost Earth: A Life of Cézanne," the biographer Philip Callow writes about what happened next:

Before long someone appeared at his hotel with an object wrapped in a cloth. He sold the picture for 150 francs, which inspired him to trot back to his house with the dealer to inspect several more magnificent Cézannes. Vollard paid a thousand francs for the job lot, then on the way out was nearly hit on the head by a canvas that had been overlooked, dropped out the window by the man's wife. All the pictures had been gathering dust, half buried in a pile of junk in the attic.

All this came before Vollard agreed to sit a hundred and fifty times, from eight in the morning to eleven-thirty, without a break, for a picture that Cézanne disgustedly abandoned. Once, Vollard recounted in his memoir, he fell asleep, and toppled off the makeshift platform. Cézanne berated him, incensed: "Does an apple move?" This is called friendship.' - from Gladwell's article on Late Bloomers.

hahaha. i have to say, i was quite amused.

new discoveries

certainly a very exciting year.. it's kind of funny to answer people who ask "did you go home for break?" and i'm like nope, i went to florida, bahamas and tahoe three times. exotic indeed. although it cost a LOT. actually i'm sure europe cost a substantial amount too, i guess i just had more money in my account at that point in time.

okay my train of thought derailed along the way cos it's been a day plus since i typed the above paragraph and my browser died on me -_-

BUT. we shall do a little update on my classes/roommate situation and .. whatever else i remember. my biblical hebrew class is rather exciting, although i was quite shocked when i walked into the first class and she started teaching us the vowels and part of the alphabet. so many squiggly lines! i told my pastor that, he laughed and said "but you learn chinese!" and i was like but it's different.. chinese has more strokes so it doesn't look so pictorial/sketchy... i don't know how to explain it.

anyway, we read the first verse of Genesis 1 on thursday (in the beginning, God created the heaven and earth). it was SO cool... as hard as it is to decipher hebrew in small font, it sent a delicious shiver down my spine. can't really explain it. i guess i felt like i was discovering how God spoke to people in the old testament or something. that was the language!!! i guess i've always been somewhat of a purist. only somewhat though... the original is always nice.

okay now we shall rewind to what happened before i got back... my last tahoe trip was certainly very eventful. it was snowstorming as we drove up. actually now that i think about it it's quite amazing that we didn't need chains at that time. anyway it totally reminded me of the first trip this season, snow blowing into the windshield and all. although when we got up there it was dark already at that time... anyhow. yes, snowy windy day, boarding was slightly miserable, i don't know if it was just as cold or a little better... but only a few lifts were open. kinda sad :( but boarding with pearline is so interesting, she is definitely v adventurous. tree-skiing, going down blacks (which i was certainly NOT contemplating and was mostly falling-leaf-ing down).. after the last run i was like i am NEVER going on a black again... and then wait to hear what happens the next day:

second day @ heavenly was good! very clear and pretty.. yay for ridge run and lake tahoe view. i looove that run. anyhow, we had a good time with the other cornell ppl, i was just amused at how huangyu kept sitting down. and he's a skiier! ah.. so, the concluding run - we were coming down roundabout and having experienced the pain of having to unstrap and walk over some flat parts, yuanxiang was like eh, let's do gunbarrel instead. the sign said it was a black. and i clearly remembered the pain of unstrapping etc and i thought it was a black, should be manageable albeit not the best, so.. i said okay! and then we started going down the slope and it was CRAZY. why?? we discovered later (after surviving down the slope i.e. sliding down as best as possible) it was a DOUBLE BLACKKK. i kept blaming yx after :p and we only realized how long the slope was after we'd come down because, as yx said, we were focused on short term survival while coming down.. absolutely ridiculous :p

oh, we went to the outdoor hot tub in the hotel.. it was pretty good! despite the slight shivering before getting in and after getting out..

and then third day we ended up going to sierra. a little bit of deja vu again since i'd been there the previous weekend. but unfortunately.. i think i was kinda tired and for some odd reason somewhat hungry even though i did have breakfast and all.. maybe i really can't do more than 2 days. anyhow. on one of the blue slopes i somehow managed to catch my board and flipped somehow or other and hit my head on the slope... ouch. it was SO painful. my first thought was "great.. this is exactly what mommy told me not to do". second thought "i was praying for safety! why'd God let me injure myself!" (kinda irrational really) and third "crap! i need to graduate!" opened my eyes, saw stars on the left side, decided i needed to close my eyes.

after a few minutes this skiier stopped in front of me and asked "are you okay?" and i opened my eyes and was like yeah.. i'm just going to sit here for a while. and he had my hat/goggles (they flew off when i hit the slope) so i was very thankful. anyhow after that i still had to board down the slope, but carving was giving me a headache so it was actually quite a pain to get down (yes, very tragic). but basically i decided i was done for the day and went to rest.. it was somewhaat cold though.. headache continued throughout the night and jackie almost freaked me out cos she was like GO TO A HOSPITAL IF THERE'S BLINDING PAIN!!! and i guess either i can tolerate pain or i don't like going to doctors when i don't absolutely have to, cos i was thinking that it's a similar kind of pain as if i had just gotten sick and was moving around a little too much than i ought to. but thankfully after sleep it was better..

okay. done with the whole tahoe episode. so i move in, and this girl comes in the door and says "hi! i'm mattie! my stuff is in your room" and i'm somewhat surprised, cos i thought lilianna was going to be my roommate right. but i thought oh, maybe something changed along the way so i shut my gaping mouth and was like hi! etcetc. and then later i find out that there was a mixup. man.. awkward situation. well anyway thankfully it worked out...

and then classes-wise, i was kinda confused about what to take and all but thankfully i was blessed and got into the classes i wanted! although... i had a terrible moment with the dschool class. because i realized, with a sinking heart, that this class has SATURDAY labs. meaning no more boarding for me! well, unless it's president's day weekend. but then i was like heck, dschool classes are hard to get into and i may not get to take one next quarter either (and i'd already been rejected by two, i think). so i'll just apply and if God lets me get in i'll take it as a sign. so.. i did get in and my classes are settled and i almost know all the classes i'm taking next quarter too! not bad...

ah. yes. karo's bday dinner last night was lovely. haven't seen the XA girls in a while.. not in a grp, anyway. twas great fun. although it was rather interesting that half the night was centered around guys..... heh. i guess for different groups (of people) there're different conversation focuses. the only thing was that i didn't do my 280 reading/hw so had to cram it today.. i think it was alright though. i hope. -prays hard-

lazy lazy me. really need to restart the job hunt.. i kinda like my schedule this quarter though. even though i can't believe i reneged on my promise to myself not to take 9am classes! i guess kash is right though, at least it's near enough at the econ building. and it's a midterm/final class so shouldn't be so much work. basically it's mon 4-6pm, tues/thurs 9am-2pm, wed 1-3, 4-6, fri 1-3.

new year's eve!

man, i feel so lazy. i think i've watched like 4 movies in the past 2 days. attempted to figure out my classes (still need to shop), supposed to start looking for jobs to apply to and i really did try this morning but now i've given up due to lack of motivation and am clearing up my computer. haha. sigh... it IS rather important too. why is job hunting so difficult -_- joanna's email is right though, if we don't have troubles we'll forget all about God. funny huh. even though I do see Him in all the beauty that I see...

anyhow. it's been a good break. although i wonder how the next tahoe trip will be.. i hope snow is good. and i can carve down blues properly :p i was reading over my logs from previous breaks/trips and am quite amazed at how patient my friends have been in teaching me. sean, jon, yongji... and i always had trouble with toe-ing. haha. good times!

i kind of wish there was a set path for me to go. so far it's pretty easy, it's been school, pri --> sec --> jc --> college. it's just which school i end up in. now it's the whole wide world! ahhh. would really like some guidance here. although for some reason i suddenly felt like i wanted to restrict my search to california i.e. norcal. i guess i'm not actually that keen on living anywhere else.. that IS rather restricting though. the same way i don't want to do 9am classes and don't want to do anything super-techy which is going to be painful. hmmm. don't know if that's the best strategy.

still missing my rg girls. where's lyd's christmas card?? haha. and my silly bro sent a card to my dorm so it's going to sit there until school starts cos the housing desk ain't open.

can't believe it's my graduation year. like, the actual calendar year. a little scary.

sitting at the denver airport.. yay for WORKING wifi! SJC was a disappointment, they had these signs advertising free public wifi and it wasn't working. anyhow, yay for holidays! somehow today after i was done packing i just felt like i was so ready to leave california and escape from stanford for a bit. maybe i should've gone home after all, get to see all my other friends. but tis okay, i get to hang out with sharon for a week :) somehow having to transit just reminds me of going home though, since usually i fly non-stop within the US (unless its cheaper, like what i'm doing now).

anyhow. i got off the plane and then headed for foood (it was like 7:30PM PST). saw the mcdonald's/domino's area and it was so eerily familiar.. and then i realized it was a replay of sophomore year thanksgiving after we finished 4 days of snowboarding at winter park! bittersweet, leaving a new bunch of crazy hilarious friends.. can't believe it's been two years since then. time flies.

and i realized i have to take 5 classes each quarter to graduate on time. should i take another quarter? i REALLY don't want to though.. weirdly enough. i guess i've sort of had enough of school and taking finals and what not. the end is in sight. even though it means loss of discretionary free time, like daryl said.. and job search. bleahh.. hopefully i have enough motivation to get back to that after coming back from bahamas/florida :p although i now have to update my resume bcos my gpa has gone down.. sigh.

for some odd reason i really really wish i was home. i want to see lyd & chris & pam.. and jackie's back home too. where are people when i need them?! alright, enough with the melancholy. it probably doesn't help that i'm sitting in an airport on my own and everything's closed cos it's 10:30PM. 1 more hour to boarding... and then i'll be vegetating at orlando airport till sharon arrives. hope they have free internet too.. haha.

oh and i just watched this korean dance movie which i got hooked on in freshman winter break on the way back home.. watched it like 2 or 3 times on my SQ flight. so that reminded me of freshman winter break.. and that's been 3 years! such an odd feeling.

i am still eating way too much.. so fat! thankfully serene persuaded me to bring my sports shoes. i shall aspire to workout on the ship, as boring as that sounds. aha. should've brought more shorts along, now that i think about it.. oh well.

i just saw a bird in the airport!!! this is so crazy. wonder how it got in here.. and then it landed on the water fountain and drank from it!

so odd... this somehow reminded me of listening to a particular passage while i was at the gym quite a few saturdays ago and then hearing that same passage during the acappella concert a few hours later, from testimony (the christian acappella group). unfortunately i don't recall offhand what the passage was, but it was so coincidental it seemed like it meant something..

and it happened again today! so i decided (finally, haha) to read some passage of the bible today after lunch, was a little distracted so needed to focus on something. and then i randomly flipped to mark 5:21 - 43.. which talks about a woman who touched Jesus' cloak and got healed of her blood issue (whatever that is), and a synagogue ruler came to ask Jesus to heal his daughter who was dying, when they got to his house the servants said she'd died already, don't bother. but Jesus raised her from the dead. anyway, so i did go for all campus praise night tonight and one of the passages read was luke 8:40-56, which is the exact same passage but just told by a different author. anyway, i was FLOORED. the same passage! (and given that i don't even read my Bible daily this is quite a big thing)

the verses that stood out to me:
mark 5:28 she thought, "If I just touch his clothes, I will be healed." 29 Immediately her bleeding stopped and she felt in her body that she was freed from her suffering.
34He said to her, "Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace and be freed from your suffering."

36Ignoring what they said, Jesus told the synagogue ruler, "Don't be afraid; just believe."

just believe. that is so powerful. anyhow, i took more of the faith bit from it, but osagie was saying that it's about desperation, the two (woman & ruler) came to Jesus cos nobody else could help them. i don't think i'm that desperate. wonder if that's a good thing or bad... hm. two-pronged. but i do think it's a reminder of how powerful faith can be.

well again

so i think i'm recovered from that bout of un-Christendom. it was really quite bad, now that i think about it.. for those 5 days. eep... was quite hellish, really. couldn't sleep properly, thoughts were all messed up and was so stressed out. now i'm back to being myself and not worrying too much (okay, now i'm wondering if i can finish this midterm in time) and can focus on others instead of myself, pray for their safety & well-being & all. feels soo much better. and yesterday's 'run' was good too. can't really call it a run since it wasn't a treadmill, but it was a running sort of elliptical. rather interesting concept.

even though it seems like i've wasted (kind of) my quarter recruiting and have nothing to show for it i'm not all that concerned about it. i mean, it's done and i tried, so that's all there is.. admittedly it sucks to have to tell people that i don't have a job yet, but oh well! ohhh! it was so exciting, one of my friends got an offer today and i was like YAY!!! cos she'd been getting rejections too and now i actually know someone with an offer! so awesome :) anyway, i am somewhat at peace. about this job thing. even though it looks like i'll have to recruit again next quarter (pfft) i don't care, i'm still going to go boarding lots! yippee :)

in the midst

of this crappy interviewing season, i realized i'm very blessed in academics bc i'm actually still doing pretty well for now. i mean, my midterms were spread out enough that i had time to study and catch up, even with all the interviews. although better not say so soon, i'm so lost in this probability class and haven't started on the take-home midterm yet.

and running out frustrations is SO good... man. i pretty much vented all my stress/frustration/anger on the precor machine. haha. and felt good after that. well, physically tiring but i guess that helps... yay!

a hard week

[written on sat] i have to admit yesterday was quite a bad day for me, if not for the church bunch (haha, that's what i call them now) who were celebrating pearline's bday by cooking (yay good food!), playing rockband, playing with barney's & peiying's dogs (yay animals/dogs in particular) and playing cranium (general silliness all around). it is really hard to trust God in such times (slew of rejections on Thurs/Fri). well, just 3 out of 5. and the longer i wait for the others, the less likely it is that I have an offer, I think.

[written on tues] still finding it hard to trust. i think i am so overwrought i can't sleep past 9am anymore, it's quite terrible. really goes in cycles, for a while i'm carefree and then it comes back to haunt me. !!! bleah. it's so silly too, me worrying about whether they're going to give me offers is not going to change anything. -_- God has blessed me with such an incredible experience at Stanford even though i know there's nothing special really that set me apart from the tons of other Singaporeans who applied here, so I should know that He will always provide for me.

and dayoung's so funny, yesterday morning she finally got a call fr mck and so could finally commit to signing w parthenon and she said she felt SO happy like she hadn't felt this quarter at all, going after her want to work in NY and feeling like it was forced and what not. but i'm so glad she's relaxed now, that's how senior year's supposed to be!

on another note, i remember sean/kevin saying that decision analysis was kinda interesting but some people think it's bs. I certainly think i fall into the latter category... or maybe cos i'm not even taking the class seriously. haha. but honestly, i don't see myself assigning probabilities and preferences and drawing trees and sensitivity analyses and using value of clairvoyance and what not.

although, granted, colin did give me an interesting argument for the existence of God. assign a probability p that there is a God. so let's say that p is pretty small, and so 1 - p is big. and then from that, think of all the good things that happened to you and assign a probability q1 to the possibility of them all happening by chance. it's probably not going to be very high, and when you multiply that by 1 - p, it'll probably be smaller than p*q2 (where q2 is p(good things happen with a God)). although, i need to think about the converse side with bad things happening...

incredibly blessed

wow. so far, my track record is still nice and pretty, all invitations for final rounds! God is amazing. well, not like I didn't know that already. now... i just need the offers. haha. i feel so greedy... i guess i do only need one offer though getting a bunch would be really cool. i'm not sure what would be best either. anyhow... waiting is so hard! bleah. it's like a perpetual game, who's gotten a call, who hasn't.

anyway, this week is crazy. i had two first rounds today (total 3 interviews), final rounds tmr (4 interviews), final rounds thurs (4 interviews, i assume) and final rounds fri (4 interviews). that is almost as many cases as i practiced for BEFORE starting any interviews. i am so cased-out right now. it's not that the problems aren't interesting, but it's just tiring. ah well, by the end of this week i will be such an interviewing machine. and hopefully have offers so i can stop interviewing! eek. and actually catch up on my classes and all.

midterm tmr, pray hard! aaah.

sigh!

have to get up early for akpsi tmr but don't feel like sleeping, don't feel like doing anything. i never realized how much time recruiting takes. first, it's the info sessions. then it's submitting applications. then it's the actual interviews. it's really as good as a 5 unit class, which i didn't realize. and the emotional stress of waiting etc. i trust in Him and His grace as so far He has greatly provided for me. like Misha pointed out to me yesterday at dinner, I have been very lucky (well I would say blessed) in that for all my interviews (besides Bain 1st rounds this morning), I have gotten called back for second rounds. I'm just praying for more favour with my interviewers and trying not to worry/think about it, so many other things to worry about! haha. wellll. I guess I also have to remember "which of you by worrying can add one cubit to his stature?" (Matt 6:27) and a cubit = 45cm. haha.

anyhow i'm tired and i want a break but there is no break to be had until thanksgiving! before then i have 2 final rounds lined up and also a midterm (i.e. 4 classes worth of stuff to catch up on) and then another midterm a week later for which i'm probably even more lost... ahhhh. needs lots and lots of grace and a miracle (or a couple, haha).

but i guess hearing joseph's story about how he ended up doing well in his midterm contrary to expectations does help me restore my faith. yay! now for sleep... plus remembering how i met joanna as i was leaving for my interview and her story about getting so much help for her paper which she was so worried for and really praying for a miracle.. although sometimes i think 'miracle' is bandied about a little carelessly by us, hm.

meeting up with ben was fun, although i realized i've been doing so many cases and dealing with numbers in hundreds of millions that when i see "$28 million" net worth for an individual at 26 years old i didn't even realize right off that it is QUITE a bit of money... hm. so odd.

emotionally tiring day

sigh! first, i decided to recalibrate my macbook. so that involves not having a computer for a while (it has to be in sleep mode for 5 hours and then i can start charging it and while it's charging i'm not supposed to use it).

second, i was supposed to figure out where the heck my applecare was. applecare is basically insurance for apple products, and apparently has to kick in by the time my one-year warranty for this macbook expires, which is tomorrow. so... it got delivered on saturday, but manz housing office isn't open on weekends so "a notice was left".
this morning, i go to the housing desk, no notice! she says, go to the post office.
so i did, later, and they said nonono, it won't go to the post office, go back to your housing desk.
back at home (they email when we have stuff at the housing desk) but still nothing!
bro suggests i call usps to find out where it is. and they tell me it's at the post office.
back to the post office i go. the guy asks for the tracking number, so i've to run to the nearby music library to check it on my gmail. they try to look for it, still isn't at the post office.
5pm, i'm back in my room and i have an email from the housing desk at 4:48pm. crap! i run down to the housing desk, but it IS 5pm so the supervisor's gone... sigh. SO frustrating, you can't imagine.

third, i was supposed to hear from BCG & McKinsey about final rounds today, but they both decide to delay telling us until Wednesday! I'm like.. aughhh. Oh, so actually the McKinsey recruiter called me and I was like !!! she's going to tell me if I got final rounds! and then she starts asking about visa stuff instead and I'm like ahhhh.

fourth, i got this book that i ordered off amazon for my class (finally, it arrived like a MONTH late, i don't know how that happened) and realized it was the wrong edition! sigh... i should probably withdraw my claim. anyway, this textbook has been causing me great inconvenience and i was so glad it arrived until i realized it's the wrong edition!!! ugh. i guess it doesn't matter THAT much, but i don't know. baaah. anyway it was vaguely upsetting

fifth, i find out that the founder of the startup i worked at quit a MONTH ago. -in shock- cos my ex-boss decided to email me to catch up and update me on that part of the situation... and i've been talking to pple there on and off and never heard a squeak about it! anyway, i think that was the last straw, cos after that i really was like i cannot do any work at the moment, this is like emotional upheaval (cumulative). he was so passionate about the product and this is like his baby! how can he just leave it?! even though ser said it's quite normal for startup founders to do that... i think it's so different when you know the person though, and how much effort he put into it and everything. coming to office at 6am, not sleeping, working through weekends, etc, ?!!! but anyway...

sigh. time for bed! tmr all will be well again :)

tired..

wish recruiting was over! two interviews coming up and case practice after case practice after case practice.. so tiring. and i still don't know if i'm prepared, exactly. anyhow it felt like i was striving so hard and so yesterday the sermon was helpful. to remember that ultimately God is in control of my life and it may be that consulting isn't right for me anyway, even if i prep like crazy. although i guess it would be kind of annoying if i've put so much time into preparing and nothing comes out of it (again), like last year. but at the same time it's hard not to stress when i see other people prepping and all.. competition is tough. good reminder of clenched fist vs. open palm. one is stressful, not willing to let go. open palm is just.. open! and free.

alright i've decided that the way to look at more cases is that it's meeting people/getting to hangout for a bit even though we're doing cases. that'll make it better. :)

the priestly blessing

so i was listening to the sermon of the week by bethel church in redding, which was by wesley campbell and it was about "the priestly blessing". okay, i didn't finish listening to it but what i got from it so far was that it's selfish to not ask for blessings. because if you overflow, other people get blessed too! haha. so exciting. anyway, so wesley campbell said this is the most-often quoted passage in the Bible and here it is:

Numbers 6
22 The LORD said to Moses, 23 "Tell Aaron and his sons, 'This is how you are to bless the Israelites. Say to them:
24 " ' "The LORD bless you and keep you;
25 the LORD make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you;
26 the LORD turn his face toward you and give you peace." '
27 "So they will put my name on the Israelites, and I will bless them."

and then later, when i went to the homecoming acappella concert with Qianwen, the exact same passage came up because Testimony (christian acappella group) sang it! I was stunned. like, seriously. what are the odds of my downloading this particular sermon and having the key passage come up two hours after at an acappella concert... anyhow, i haven't really figured out why God is telling me about that passage yet, but i'm sure something will illuminate itself tmr at church or something. :)

oh!! and campbell said "blessing" in hebrew means to endue with power for success, prosperity, fecundity, longevity, etc.. kind of powerful.

and some other random thing i never posted. my dorm, kimball has 2 halls on each floor (because we're a weird H-shaped building). and this year it's "kimbroadway" (our theme is broadway, which is awesome :) and my hall happens to be the lion king hall!! so my blog title is particularly apt. as linus pointed out when i moved in, but for some reason i didn't post it. so here it is :)

blessed!

many times! haha. it was so funny, when tu and porsche (yep, that's his name.. thai pple :p) knocked on my door i was vaguely surprised (cos last year it was just a whole bunch of sealnetters at my door) and wondering what was going on... and i thought they wanted to throw me in the shower immediately cos tu was like take off your glasses and close your eyes! which i refused to. aha. anyhow, it was a very pleasant surprise (and slightly shocking, really) to see so many pple in the kimball lounge! aww. <3 much love. all my favourite people at stanford. well, maybe not ALL, but the large majority. haha. sealnetters + singaporeans. so nice to see everyone :) although it's kinda weird cos as the years pass, the mix of people changes and now i'm the senior! !!! aah. anyhow, i should really sleep. oh, psets... ah well. God's grace is enough. oh, speaking of which, i didn't have to have extra meeting tonight for markstrat (this business simulation), SO glad about that. :)

o ye of little faith

4 hours at the career fair (and in the sun) without food left me feeling oh so drained... when i came back i REALLY did not want to be doing anymore career related stuff or even talking to people. haha. but i still had two info sessions to go to. of which i didn't really talk to ppl, heh. oh well. and then dayoung & connie were doing case studies and i'm like ah... i need to do more prep, given how much i suck at structure.. and it just led me down this path of being negative and still not knowing what i want for a job (i don't really want to work, i don't know if i like studying much either, ...) and ended up convincing myself that this fall is going to end up like all the past winter quarters where i did NOT have a job by the end of the quarter!

okay actually i suppose i could find something else cool to do. but it's just so... aiyah. i hate recruiting so much. alright i should stop digging myself into this ditch. but so i just remembered part of a verse (kind of reprimanding myself - how in line with glen's message last week about how we need to preach the sermon to ourselves more often...) - "o ye of little faith"

and here's the passage:
Matt 6:30 Now if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will He not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?
31 “Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ 32 For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. 33 But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you. 34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.

church insights today

i can't imagine how i didn't understand it, but today at church i got some insights which were quite startling! but before that... one more coincidence to add to the food-happiness of yesterday (although this one isn't food-related). so for some reason this morning i was thinking about who was going to be at church and realized i hadn't seen ih ming in a while (and he also owes me $ for lisa's bday present, haha). and then when we got to church he was there! like, wow. what are the odds, since he travels 2-3 times a month.

so during opening worship i was reminded of dewen's email on his bible class on hearing God's voice. and it kind of linked to how last year sicheng was saying he kept seeing palindromes around and thought that was God's way of telling him He was around.. and then i suddenly had this revelation that this series of three coincidences (or whatever you want to call them - my thinking about certain things and having them happen) was God's way of speaking to me. for now, at least. kind of reminded me of summer too... the humour @ bluepulse + the 1st time i got to hangout w ser after a looong time as a response to how i was thinking about the relative lack of laughter after rgs when reading my diaries.

i was telling lisa about the food thing, and how i was (obviously) very happy with my newfound delicacies, and she said, "God knows how to make you happy" and I was like hmm it is kind of sad that now food makes me happy, i'm quite sure it wasn't THAT important before i met jackie (yes, i blame you. i would NEVER have waxed lyrical about honey butter before spending time with you..)

one other thing: last night i was totally freaking out about how many job apps i have to do this week, plus the markstrat simulation which drove me nuts since friday, but we made our decisions today so just have to write the 1pg paper which i sent a draft out already, so it's up to the other two to edit now.. and fitting exercise in and God-time (although recently i came up with this ingenious idea of listening to sermon podcasts while elliptical-ing, only tried it once though) and case-interview-prac and doing hw/making sure my grades are still good.

anyway, the pastor was talking about mark's journey today and asked us "what is the purpose? what is your calling?" and i had another blinding revelation that school and grades are so small and insignificant if i look at my life from the bigger picture. or from the view of eternity. but not even that, it was/is like an entire universe and this is just one little speck.. even so, it's hard for me to let go of that i guess. still wanna do well and everything. brand names are still alluring. oh, the woes of being raised in singapore and going through an elite education system.

and i've just spent 20mins writing this when i really should've been struggling over econ and philosophy -wry look-. i should be glad that econ is interdisciplinary but i didn't sign up for this when i decided to take this class! -_- psht. philosophy is so incomprehensible sometimes, makes me think of how sean said it required lots of weed. haha.

a fortuitous food day!

no seriously, it's so weird... i suppose it kind of makes up for my not having had tea (sob). was supposed to go to lisa's tea treasures (yes, it IS one of those out-of-a-storybook places) w jackie after her LSAT, but they said they were FULL! man, can't believe they're that popular. but actually in this rich neighborhood it probably shouldn't be very surprising. anyhow, we had crepes instead. (and it was 2:30 by then). anyhow, after eating the galette (savoury crepe) i was like hmm maybe i should've ordered a sweet crepe instead cos i love sweet stuff! but, too late. so, too bad.

so somewhere along the way back jackie & i were talking about sprinkles cos it was one of the things she was really looking forward to while holing herself in her apartment LSAT-ing, and she said she'd probably go sometime... after taking orders from different people and ordering. and then when i got home, dayoung brought sprinkles home!!!! so exciting. she went with her big sib to stanford shopping center. and of course i couldn't resist and i ate half of it (which, incidentally, is 242.5 kcal). it's really amazing how many calories these dessert things are... cheesecake factory is just as bad/even worse.

anyway, so for dinner we went with dawn & friends to go eat dumplings at cupertino. and i know ranch99 is in cupertino but you know, it's asian town so the dumpling place could be anywhere right. but it turned out to be at cupertino village, which is where ranch99 IS! so yayyy i got my hello panda! :) which i was also talking about with jackie while driving her back from LSAT. and then cupertino village also reminded me of how we used to go with sean & joel to grocery-shop/eat there, and how daryl devoured 13 packets of pocky in 2 days, and ... and then i just (very randomly) caught sean online and he & jia'en are coming for thanksgiving! so exciting.

speaking of which i still need to figure out thanksgiving and winter break.... eeks. in the midst of markstrat-ing (this business simulation with TONS of info we need to assimilate) and recruiting (i think i've like 8 apps due this week) i think i'm going to go crazy soon... i so need God's grace this quarter. and i really hope i have a job by the end of this quarter! and that my grades don't go down the drain!

school starts again

it is a very odd experience to go straight from work to back to school... well okay, i did have that dschool thing in between, but that was almost like easing me into the beginning of the new school year. and somehow this year i'm seeing so many differences between working and school, probably because it's not like i'm changing countries (past few years = work in singapore, then chill out for a bit, then fly back to america) and living in the same area.

i finally understand why daryl was talking about how he'd miss having discretionary free time - work is like a huge chunk of your life carved out. classes, on the other hand, don't take that much time and then you have the rest of the day to do whatever (homework, fun, ...)

and the whole experience of sitting in class again (and more often than not, being bored, haha) and getting distracted... okay i've definitely forgotten what i originally intended to say. hm.

oh, i remember. it's kind of weird being able to stay up until like 1am (or 2) and still get enough sleep and be able to go to class. first, it was hard to switch FROM that to making sure i went to bed by 11pm (or midnight) so i wouldn't be too grumpy in the morning (waking up at 730 anyone?) and now it's strange to switch back.... the body is so adaptable.

the end of summer

it's such an odd feeling to be done with work, but today when i got up i felt incredibly free too! i guess it's easy to get used to being restricted to 9 to 6 such that now it's weird going back to being a student when classes only take up so much of your time. hmm. caged bird takes a while to learn to fly free. somehow that reminded me of something i read in a cs lewis book, that people get used to living their current lifestyle, whatever it is, that change is difficult.

anyway, i think i'm getting a little better at saying goodbye, i didn't cry :) well okay almost, near the end of the day, but for the most part i was pretty happy. aha. but it was weird packing up and thinking i wouldn't be walking into that office anymore, etc. it was really nice of CTN to give me a ride home :) although i must admit i think i was sort of preoccupied with the idea of leaving that i didn't make as much of the conversation as i could've.

i'm going to miss them so much, all the jokes and fun times... but it is time for me to move on. or at least, so i kept telling myself. which is partly how i managed to be still quite happy yesterday. aha. wonder if i will keep in touch with them and if so, how many of them... ah well. at least it's easy enough to get up to san mateo :) though actually if they are expanding they will have to move at some point. it's a good location though, all the food and such :p