I just arrived in Adelaide and happy to be united with my family again after 6 weeks apart. However, i experience drastic weather changes, from a hot and warm tropical country to a cool and freezing place. My body need to quickly adapt in this winter to avoid any unwanted sickness.
Suddenly, i miss the weather in Malaysia. It's funny how we value things according to our priority. When we are in a hot country, we seek for cool weather then when we are in a cool country we seek for warm weather. I remember what Edward de Bono's write about value :
"Values give purpose, meaning, enjoyment and value to life. We can also become hostage to our values, just as we become hostage to our desires."
For the same reason, i feel that being in two places changes my value accordingly.I wonder what will other person that travel more than two places in a month value the most? work? family? money?
Its been almost three weeks i have been in Malaysia and last friday i have just arrived at Sabah, my home land.
At first, i was very excited and happy to be in Sabah (meeting friends and relative here) but after few days here especially without my beloved family (my wife and kids) i feel really lonely. My body is here but my heart is there with them.
I wanted to finish my work here as soon as possible and go back to Adelaide. I did not felt this when i was in Peninsular Malaysia. But after coming back to Sabah and looking at my house here- the old memory keep reminding me of them. I will always pray that they will be patiently wait for me and i can keep go on with my survey here.
I owe them for their noble sacrifice for me- being there without any family members except for my sister will not be the same as being here in Sabah. God Bless them.
In this modern world, via globalization and information technology we are inevitably write our daily life not in a journal nor in a dairy book but in a website blog.
Long time ago, we write on wall, leaves and papers until few centuries ago we developed a binding machine to bind a book. Then we write on a book and this practice of writing continue over the years. Until 15 years ago, we developed our communication technologies and created a website which recently have been widely used worldwide. Then, some group created their owned website which they called blogger while other company created special website such as facebook and so on. What ever website emerge during this transition- blogger are increasing everyday. Why most people like to write they personal life in website? What's wrong with dairy etc? Here are my own personal opinion :-
a) Blogging is much more viable than dairy book - so to say, the moment we post our story in blog- we know that it will remain in the website for the next generation to read. Dairy book might not be durable as website- we might loose it or misplace it somewhere.
b) Blogging is much more alive than dairy book- Our writing will not be dull for century- someone might respond to our feeling/ experience or even might quote our life as their guide. It's a two way communication or even more.
c) Blogging symbolizes globalization-Whenever you end up reading other people blogs, you know that someone following these blogs- not someone near but someone outside the country, someone whom we usually call 'stranger' yet this stranger via blogging was transform into friend or even best friend. This what we call world without border- where we express our feeling freely. Nevertheless, we can visit any country easily via blogging.
d) Blogging creates new community-via blogging, we creates new community, new structure of society that come from common objective and idea- regardless of political , society or economic point of view. Positively- we have new nation in the making. Nation that united under one goal and objective, that share every detail information we ever needed in nation building.
e) Blogging updates your family tree and friends- well, it's the unexpected that is most interesting in this reason. By blogging, we may meet or write to our long lost cousins/family in the country or even oversea. Sometimes we don't expect to meet someone we rarely meet in the website but it does happen. Cousins/friends are somewhere out there-it's a kind of marketing also for us and family.
It's amazing to experience what many people would say "something impossible becoming reality."
Last weekend, i was so upset and frustrated with my work until I end up having this gout in my foot. Not sure if there is a significant relationship with stress but it surely feel the same. I was on my way to the clinic when suddenly my phone rang. I picked up the phone and my wife with her strange voice asking me if i ever bought something last week. Surely, i say with our financial constraint in Adelaide, buying something expensive would be quite impossible.
Well, she said that someone has just send us a new double bed complete with mattress. I said who ever it is, it's not me. Then she started to mumbling at me; telling me not to buy things that are not important. You can imagine how i feel with my gout and this news- painful yet joyful.
After i received my treatment, i quickly hop in my car and drove back to my house. I know something was wrong- someone might have mistakenly sent the bed to our house. As i arrived in our house- my wife still with her anger, waiting for my explanation. I looked at the bill and the boxes, my name was clearly written on it. It was strange and funny. I then asked my wife- what does the man said when he delivered the bed. My wife explained that the man told her- the bed was a gift from God. Someone bought it for us, so she thought that i was playing a joke with her. At last, my terrible weekend end up with fixing and putting up the bed for my sons. They were so happy and exited. And When ever they asked me who bought the beds?, i told them that "it was a gift from God."
something that i and my family do not expect at all. Thanks God
This is Dawson favorite story. For this reason I post this story in my blog for all of us to share.
Once upon a time, there is this beautiful family who happened to live far from they other families and cousins. They live and stay in a big and beautiful island. In this family, there are two boys and one girl name Dawson, Daniel and Bridget. Dawson is the eldest son and when his father went to work, he will help his mother to take care his brother and sister. He loves them so much, they played together, went to school together and sleep together. One afternoon, his father come back home early and waited for him with smiling face. His father told Dawson that they are going to have a baby, which mean another brother or sister for Dawson. He was very happy and went off to tell Daniel and Bridget. Every night, they prayed for this baby, prepared the baby bed and clothes to wear. Dawson always recited this prayer “God thank you for the food, family and school. I give thanks for this coming baby, help me to be a good big brother. Amen.” This goes on every night.
One evening, Dawson mother was not feeling well. She was in depth pain and his father was comforting her. That night, his parent told him that his mother has a miscarriage and unable to save the baby- She was bleeding badly. Dawson was very sad and pray to God for this baby. Poor Dawson and his other brother and sister. However, what they do not know that the baby soul went straight up to heaven. In heaven, the baby sitted with Jesus. The baby said “look!look! Jesus, there’s my brothers and sister. They looked sad. Can they joined me here someday?.” Jesus replied “Of course my angel, but you have to pray for them, for your family.” The baby was very happy with the reply and pray for his/her family especially for brother Dawson, brother Daniel and sister Bridget. The baby recited this prayer everyday “Lord God, I give you thanks for life in heaven and blessed you for your love to all of us here. I pray for my family on earth. Let they be blessed with loves and joy, let my brother Dawson, brother Daniel and sister Bridget be faithfull to you and obey your commandments. Send your holy spirit to guide them in what ever they do. Amen.” This goes every night and day.
From that day on, Dawson and family nor have they forget the baby neither do they stop praying and give thanks to God. Even thought sometimes they have difficult times, without any food to eat or any place to go- they stay united in God. They believe that God loves them and will provide everything they need. They faith and hope in God in this big island grew stronger everyday. Thanks to the baby that went straight up to heaven. The End
After this story, Dawson smile and went to sleep. This beautiful story, mostly reflects our real life in Adelaide. Sometimes, it’s nice to make up a story from the real world. We can turn sadness into joy- and bad news into good news.
I was amazed when I watched a documentary movie entitle : the evolution of the cave man. In this movie, the narrator mention few things about the cave man evolution; 1) he said that the cave man move from one place to another- once they arrive to the new place they started adapting themselves with the environment surrounding, 2) the cave man will give gifts to their mate, if the woman accept this gifts, it’s mean that she is belong to the cave man, 3) the cave man start to eat cooked food after 500 000 years. For sure, there are lots of other important information in this movie but for the purpose of this article, I will focus on what these three things mean, it’s merely about the preamble of human kind education.
What is education? Why do we send our children to school? What skills do we expect our children to learn and acquire? Education is the process of learning something (subject) and acquiring skills through various types of knowledge. We distinguish knowledge such as mathematics, science,language,geography and so on. So in the same manner, do we send our children to get all this knowledge? If it is, how can they learned this knowledge - should the school force them to memorize these knowledge and test it with a method which we call examination. When I recalled the documentary movie, I realize one act that may stimulate the cave man education . I realize that they ability to think (in adapting with new environment and so on) that promote their civilization. However, during those time, they tend to act more than think, they want to survive first than to settle down in one place. That’s why it took them 500 000 year to learn how to eat cooked food for thinking was not they priority. But what happen today? Our mailing technology evolve rapidly – we invented telegraph machine but within 100 years we create fax machine and then, less than 50 years we are able to write email in the internet. Now, we are in the (short messaging system) SMS era. The world is getting smaller every days, months and years when invented something new. What sparks these invention? Simply, it’s our ability to think of making new things-creating new way of living-and so on. In this modern world, we are so attached with the sense of settling down-making our self comfortable where ever we are, adapting our self accurately-even on the moon. Our new invention and technology really changes our way of thinking.
Over the years, we distinguish knowledge into different subject such as math (the skills of counting), history (the skills of understanding things from past experience), geography (the skills of knowing what this planet made of) or science (the skills of knowing how things work in this planet). Eventually, these knowledge once we acquired and understand- complete our reasoning to live in this planet but the most important thing is this knowledge indirectly force us to think -to ask the why, when, what, how and where questions –to develop our thinking skills. However, this basic skill was not thoroughly enforce in education. Thinking was the indirect skill that emerge while we are learning other subjects especially in the primary and secondary level. Eventually, what we care most in this level is the certificate- how many A’s you have achieved in the past examination? And how many D’s you have avoided? Our parents only cares about how good is your achievement in the examination rather than asking how far does your thinking skills have developed? When we investigate further the post-education level - the higher the level of our education goes, the higher our thinking activities ability are needed. When we enter undergraduate degree- we will be exposed with other specific knowledge which come from this big branch of knowledge. For instance, Management can be divided into specific knowledge such as human resource, management function, organization culture and so on. We will study and understand this knowledge. Once we get to the other level which is the post-graduate level, then we start to apply our knowledge- try to put this knowledge to work in the real world (master degree) or even contribute to a new knowledge (PhD degree).
Generally, our main purpose to educate people are not only to pass them these knowledge but to make them actively to continue thinking- to stimulate our brain. Researchers indicate that when we think a lot, our brain cells tend to actively evolve. In other words, even when we are old or retire, we must never stop thinking. In conclusion, in this modern world, our ability of thinking evolve rapidly-our children IQ getting higher everyday- not only because of the education system we have but also relate to the sophisticated technology we acquired. For instance, PlayStation games- stimulate children brain and thinking ability. Simply, if we like to think creatively and actively- we can be as par as PhD holder. The only thing that differentiate between a thinker and a PhD holder is the certificate.
I presumed that each and every one of us have a lots of friend. Have we ever wonder or refresh our selves how we meet them the first time? I am sure it will be an interesting topic to discuss this issue with your best friends or new met friend. I have few fresh memory which i recalled in meeting my friends here in Adelaide.
Firstly, i met one great old couple who are the owner of our first home unit in Adelaide. They were so lovely and kind. They have more than five kids and enjoying they life as the land lord of more than two units here in Adelaide. Since then we became friend even though that we are no longer staying in their unit. So my first experience making friends in Adelaide was when i am looking for place to stay.
The second experience was when my children got lost in some of the units around my area. The home units in Adelaide happened to be in more or less the same design and colour so this scenario makes it complicated for my children and even me myself to identified our own unit especially late in the evening. My children have been playing around our unit for quite some times until one day, i dont hear any noise from them playing outside the unit. It was so quite and peaceful, but after half an hour someone come in knocking on our door bringing bridget (our 2 years old daughter). He was sending her back; he worried that my daughter might play near the road. I was so supprise how my daugther manage to go that far; while her brothers do not even care about they sister. But that event turned to be another blessing in disguise. He became my good friend in Adelaide.
The third experience was when other people children want to make friend with my children. I have three energetic kids and it happens that most of the family here in Adelaide like to have not more than two kids or some even happy with one kid. So what happen when they have one kid? they dont have anyone to play with. In my neigbourhood, there is one family from phillipine that have one daughter. She wanted to make friend with my children but afraid to do so by her self. So her mother came to our house and introduced herself to us; getting to know each other then the daugther came in and play with my children. And after some times, everyday the girl will come and play in our house.
The fourth experience of making new friends was in any parties. One of the party was my supervisor welcoming party. He invited all the master students including us (Phd students). In the party, i met a lot of international students. We exchange information about our country and talk about life in Adelaide etc. The other party was the girl from phillipine birthday party. She invited my children and of course us to come to her birthday party. I met a lot of her parent friend in that party. And i got new good friend which leads me to a new and affordable unit near they house. What happen next? i moved to that unit this december, and able to save my rent money around AUD90/week.
So here i am with my new neighbour which i met from the birthday party. My children have more friends to play with, ample space to play with them, and great memory for me making friends here in Adelaide. I conclude simply that making new friends leads you to other friends, and you would not know what to expect next. It might be blessing in disguise after all. So dont stop making friends.
