Jen Lee's week 23 (21 – 27 jul 2010)

hey folks,

sorry to gross u all out with a picture of sandfly bites on my hand - they are part of my life, warts and all :)

They were a mystery to me at first because I didn't realise that sand flies, also called midges, are not only found along the beach - they can be in the forest as well.

I think I first got them while bushwalking in blue mountains - and I also got some more when I went to the beach...I went to the health clinic on Monday and the nurse told me that the midges URINATE on people's skin and that causes the irritation.

so i was itching all over (sometimes I would wake up scratching and have trouble gg back to sleep) because some flies made me their pit stop?!?? That's so gross, it's almost funny.

But in fact, the nurse was wrong. I did some googling and found a government public health brochure that countered the myth that midges pee on us - actually, like mosquitoes, they squirt their saliva as an anti-clotting agent before sucking our blood.

I really don't know if I would rather be peed on or spit on by 1-mm flies, but anyways, in future I will be a bit more careful - insect repellent will have to come on if i'm going to any nature area with pockets of standing water.

The nurse prescribed me some oral anti-histamines to be taken once a day because they are triple-strength. She said it would be good to ease the itching as my scratching could cause skin infection and lead to more problems. I was totally happy with that, but then about 6 hours after taking the medicine, I had the strangest giddy sensations.

I couldn't type on my handphone and walk in a straight line at the same time. When I read the information leaflet with the medicine, I realised that dizziness is listed as a possible side effect.

So now I've decided to only take the medicine a few hours before I sleep and hopefully i can sleep off the dizziness - that's what I am doing tonight, I hope my experiment works out because the bites will take a couple weeks to stop itching so I really do have to take the medicine.

Would appreciate your prayers on this :)

Other things that happened in past week:

1. I saw three whales (2 adult and 1 baby humpback) when I went whalewatching last wed :) but the sea was very rough so we only saw them spouting and coming up for air, no acrobatic acts. in fact, the waves were so bad that I threw up, which I have never done before. I did see a huge rainbow sometime during the trip so that was nice :)

Yesterday, yahoo news had a segment on an amazing whalewatching trip where the whale came right up to a boat that had stopped near it.it even touched the boat with its long flippers and did breaching etc. and this was the same company that I had gone out with... :( oh well, hopefully i will get to see whales when I go diving :) Which i might go next weekend, yay!

2. On Friday i was supposed to travel back to brisbane from Sydney on a train - but I missed my train by 2 minutes!! I had given myself 30mins to get to the station, 10 mins waiting for free shuttle (frequency was published as every 10 mins), 10 mins travel time, 10 mins spare. Well, the free shuttle didn't come and I waited too long before buying a $2 ticket to get to the station. Funny thing was that my luggage, which i had checked in that morning, was on the train! Thank God, i was able to get on a train the next morning with only a $5.50 rebooking fee and I got reunited with my luggage eventually :)
I got the cheapest accommodation near the train station, I wasn't going to risk missing the train again the next morning - it cost me $33. i learnt my lesson, in future, don't wait too long for free buses :) as my mum put it, don't be penny wise and pound foolish :)

3. School has started this week but I only have to attend classes on Thursdays for most weeks, except for when my 2 intensive courses are on. For those, i would go to school 4 days a week for 3 weeks straight and that would be it. my schedule is so free because I only have one "normal" course, the 4th course I'm taking is a self-directed one where all materials are provided online. I need lots of discipline to do my readings and plan out my assignments so that I don't pull all-nighters when doing them. Pls pray for me on this :)

4. Finally, this is orientation week and i am helping out to talk to new students and invite them to join Campus Christian Movement. I thank God for favour with quite a few students who gave us their contact. Please pray that we can continue to be in touch as the semester goes on :) Tomorrow is going to be Market Day where all the clubs and societies will have booths for the new students to check out. So I'm going to bed now to have enough energy for it :)

Good night!

:) jen lee

Jen Lee’s weekly update #22 (14 – 20 jul 2010)

Hey folks,

Howdy from Sydney again...after spending a few days in Melbourne, I am back and I just had an AMAZING day at Bondi Beach where I encountered a celestial "stalker" - the most beautiful and ephemeral of them all, the rainbow :) now once, or twice but three times, this rainbow reappeared and its colours were so brilliant that I wished I had a better camera to capture it...the picture I've attached is probably one of my best ones :)

God knows how much I love rainbows and it was just so special to see them, and multiple times too :)

It was a lovely sunny day at Bondi Beach, blue sky, white clouds, fantastic patterns in the rock cliffs due to erosion...i was going to just spend the morning there and head to the australia museum but the great outdoors seemed a much better place to spend time in. I will leave indoor stuff for when the rain comes.
In fact, the rain did come right after sunset...and oh what a marvellous sunset it was...I am so glad I was at this bus/train interchange at the right time and I had been there before so I knew where they had big windows with a great sky view :) hope you like the sunset pic too...no modification except that it was taken using the sunset mode on my canon s90 :)

It got me thinking about beauty in its many forms in God's creation...you know how last week i talked about the Jenolan Caves where astounding underground structures have formed over thousands of years due to the meeting of water and stone...that beauty takes a very long time... whereas the beauty of rainbows and sunsets exists for only a few minutes...yet in both, there is the unmistakable handiwork of God...only He can be so patient...only He can be so creative that no rainbow or sunset has been exactly the same since the world was established...what a mystery that such a infinitely great God would love us, mere finite mortals...

anyway...i am thankful for the chance to reflect on my own...that is the benefit of travelling alone in the last part of my journey to sydney/melbourne... and I do thank you for reading so that I have people to share my thoughts with :)

Here are other things that have happened in the past week:

1. Thank God for clear weather last wed when Priscilla and I went horseriding. Altho the horses went very slowly throughout due to rain the day before, I guess it was a good thing because we are not very experienced riders. we couldn't take photos because we had to hold onto our reins the whole time, but it was nice to just take in the sights of the eucalyptus forest and cliffs as the horses ambled along. We were also greatly blessed that one of the other riders, Robin, who was riding with her young daughter Fynn, agreed to give us a ride, not only to the nearest town, but right back to Katoomba where we were headed. That saved us over $30. She was really kind, and we learned that she is a tap dance instructor and part time actress. She used to be in musicals too - including Cats! that is one hard musical to be in because there is pretty much continuous movement throughout.

2. On Thursday, Priscilla and I head back down to Sydney and she went on to fly back to Singapore while I was to go to melbourne on a 3pm flight. but at noon i got an sms that said the Jetstar flight had been cancelled! They said it was a technical issue and that they could either refund me/put me on a flight the next day. But I had no accommodation arranged and neither Jetstar nor my student travel insurance covers that. Thank God that my friend's sister, Emalia, with whom I was going to stay with AFTER my melbourne trip on the 19th, was fine with me turning up on the 15th. She and her husband kindly let me sleep on the couch as the room i was to stay in had not been cleared. It turned out to be a blessing in disguise because I could leave some of my stuff which i didn't need in melb at their place so my luggage wasn't too heavy.

3. I had asked to be put on the earliest Fri flight available and there was one at 7.10am so I was at the airport before 6am (there's a direct bus from Emalia's place). But the irony is that I almost missed the flight! what happened was that I didn't know that Jetstar was in another terminal and I had asked a qantas personnel about my flight. she asked me to wait, along with a whole bunch of people who were there as my name was not in the system yet. I waited until 645 and then discovered that I was in the wrong counter - another jetstar flight had been cancelled that morning and the people waiting had been put on a qantas flight so the qantas lady thought i was in the same group but actually my replacement flight was still jetstar. I was really afraid they would close the gate while I rushed over so i asked another qantas staff to call jetstar and thank God, she got through immediately without having to be put on hold or anything. They kept the gate open for me, my bags were put in with oversized baggage as regular baggage check-in had closed. So i got to my flight, but just barely...phew! anyway, in future, I will be very careful if i ever book jetstar flights again...

Although my time in melbourne was shortened by a day, i still had a good and meaningful time. I stayed with a former church friend, Ruth, for one night and for the other two nights I was at the home of my mum's friend, aunty nancy. Ruth orientated me to the city centre on my first day where I had an enjoyable time taking pictures as the light was good and I also took the free tourist shuttle bus - hurray for all things free :) For dinner I met up with a JC friend Huey Huey, and we had so much fun talking about the past, laughing at the ridiculous things we remember etc. it was special :)

4. The next morning I went to the Tim Burton Exhibition at the Australian Centre for Moving Images - i hv always found his work fascinating and i enjoyed the exhibition. in the afternoon i went on a tour to phillip island which has the Little Penguin Parade - wild penguins coming to shore after sunset to go to their burrows in the last remaining nesting site of the island. I have seen these penguins before, even handled them as a volunteer worker in Jurong BirdPark. i had to transport them to their swim "tub" when they moulted and could not b part of the main exhibit which has a pool - they are small but not docile by any means.

But seeing these wild ones is a completely different experience. When they emerge from the crashing surf, they really seem so tiny compared to the ocean's vastness. And yet, just as the Bible says God feeds the sparrows on land, I believe He also feeds these littlest species of penguins in the water. And they have learned to band together as they come into shore so as to have greater protection against predators like dingoes and feral cats. So it's not just the Emperor penguins (as shown in the great documentary March of the Penguins) who find strength in unity :) We humans have much to learn from them eh?

5. On Sunday I attended church with Aunty Nancy and met up with Aunty Pam, who has known me since i was a baby because she was one of my mum's close friends. We were in the same seremban church until i left for singapore to study...and her family migrated to australia after that. So I have not seen her for years, but it's so nice to hear her comfortable gentle voice again. They took me to yumcha - it was yummy indeed! A new believer, Aunty G also joined us and we had a deep time of fellowship, lending a listening ear to Aunty G as she recently lost her brother who died suddenly and she is also going through a very rough time with her husband. we ended by praying for each other. It was really a privilege to be able to build up one another...that is what believers are called to do :) As we talked I gave all three of them hand massages - haha, i have to keep up otherwise the muscles I develop from working those first few weeks will disappear and I'l have a hard time getting back to work.
For dinner, Aunty Nancy took me to eat pho, vietnamese noodles, and the restaurant we went to just happened to be the same one that her daughter and husband and 2 young daughters were eating in! Her daughter Michelle invited me to her home and it is probably the most luxurious home i've ever been to.... wallpaper from europe, mini cinema in the basement which has those chairs with a drink holder compartment and a screen that has a remote-controlled curtain!, a professional coffee maker in the kitchen - the type they use in starbucks, chandeliers everywhere...and the children's toys, wow - they could film Toy Story - The Infinite Series with them i think...and much more. I was snapping away with my camera, it's like walking into a house that's straight from a interior designer magazine. quite a unique experience, not something I can go on a tour for :) But i did have a thought...that if anything were to happen to the family's wealth, i do hope that the kids will be able to adjust to leading a simpler life...

6. Monday I came back to Sydney and spent an enjoyable afternoon snuggling on Emalia's couch and reading as it was cold and rainish outside.

7. Today was glorious tuesday at Bondi beach :) actually i was supposed to go whale-watching this morning but it was postponed til tomorrow because the sea condition was too rough. I am so thankful for this because I would have missed seeing the rainbows and the sunset :) I also got to take lots of pics of flowers and marine animals like anemones and sea stars in the tidepools, and I also have many pictures of the waves crashing and splashing (and wetting my shoes and socks - but it was a good excuse to buy a pair of rainbow socks in remembrance of what I have seen today :)

I do hope to see whales tomorrow - do pray with me that there will be many of them and that they will breach, jump out of the water, sing, and inspire us all as only God's creations can :)

Will definitely write about the experience in my next weekly update...til then, take care, God bless and please take time to look at the world around you - it is full of magical beauty...as one of my favourite writer Roald Dahl wrote: “And above all, watch with glittering eyes the whole world around you because the greatest secrets are always hidden in the most unlikely places. Those who don't believe in magic will never find it.”


In-Christ,
jen lee

Jen Lee's week 21 (7-13 Jul 2010)

Dear peeps,

I'm writing this from Blue Mountains, New South Wales...about 2 hours' journey from sydney...
Priscilla, my Singapore church friend, is with me...and since Monday we've been staying at this quaint little backpackers accommodation called No.14, because it's on No. 14 Lovel Street, Katoomba (that's the name of the town here...in aboriginal language it means place of shining waters because there are many mountain cascades and waterfalls nearby).

Today we went to the Jenolan Caves - amazing place...you should google it to look at pictures, i wanted to attach a picture but the computer at No. 14 only allows us to do basic email, can't attach anything...

anyway, i find it mindblowing that God's creation is so marvelous that even in the dark, unseen places, deep underground...beauty resides in the patterns and shapes formed by the flow of water against stone...

Tomorrow Priscilla and I are going horseriding for an hour in the morning...it's her first time, we do pray for good weather :)
Thursday we leave here - priscilla returns to singapore and I head to melbourne for about 5 days.

Looking back over the past week, the Hillsong Conference got more and more amazing as the days went by...God used the speakers mightily to speak into my spirit...besides the overarching theme of Isaiah 61, there was also the word on having holy momentum to accomplish things of God...to continue believing despite the storms of life and to nurture the dreams that He has placed in our hearts.

There was also much healing, not just for the past, but also for the future...some of us struggle with the thought that we may have pass down genetic predispositions to our offspring, but God says: There is nothing hanging over our head, He has removed every curse - amen!

On Thursday night, a pun popped into my head, I believe it's God word to me - He said this was not just the Hillsong conference...it was His Heal-song conference...healing us so we can sing about it :)

Another thing I thank God for is the opportunity to get to know some of my Singapore church brothers and sisters better...as I had joined a group of about 15 of them from FCBC. i enjoyed the meaningful conversations...and one sister was so sweet that she gave me a rainbow banner after hearing of why rainbows are special to me (it's a long story, basically they represent God's promise and faithfulness over me, especially during the time when I wandered far from the faith).

That's all I will write for now...going to have an early night because tomorrow morning I have to wake up early for the horseriding. G'night y'all!
:) Jen Lee

Jen Lee’s weekly update #20 (30 jun – 6 jul 2010)

Dear family and friends,
I’m writing this update from a room on the 7th floor of Metro Hotel Sydney Central. I am using the little netbook of my roommate Priscilla who is from my Singapore church, FCBC, the keyboard takes a bit of getting used to cuz it’s so small and cute, so this may well be a short update :)

I am here for the Hillsong conference – it’s been amazing so far. I can’t even begin to really describe what I have experienced since Monday night…it will take some reflection time to process, I think. But one thing that has stood out for me is a renewed sense in my heart of the Wonder and the Miracle of salvation – that Jesus was the lifesaver Ring that was thrown out to us, humanity drowning in our ability to know what is right but having no power to do it.

This IS the Gospel, the good news that is oh so good, but we can sometimes forget that. As speaker Ed Young said tonight (his sermon was full of puns, it made me appreciate my corniness – haha, I should nurture it in case I am ever called to preach :)) – the Ring is the Thing. And the Hope is the Rope. And we are to Pull so that the House will be Full :)

Haha, you can ask for my notes if you are curious to know what the whole sermon is about, but no I am not going to go into more detail here..but suffice to say that I am thankful for God’s refreshing in this area as I have been trying to reach out to the people around me in the past few years and I do sometimes wonder if it makes any difference. After hearing the stories in this conference, I know that it does make a difference, and even if it does not, I pray I will continue to share about the Light of my life, the Lover of my soul – Jesus.

On a more serious note, this conference, whose theme is Isaiah 61 (it begins: The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, to preach good news to the poor…), is very timely because I needed to hear again God’s life-giving words. You see, last Wednesday night, I was suddenly confronted with news that two of my friends had died.

The first was Peter, a newsmaker I had interviewed for a story about locating his family after losing contact for 40 years. After his story got published in The New Paper, he was reunited with his family and we became friends. He came with me to church a couple times and those of you who were at my farewell party in February, he was there. Sadly, he died from heart disease about two months later in April. I didn’t know about this until Wednesday when I got a letter from his stepbrother telling me that Peter had fallen while taking a smoke break during breakfast, and just like that, he was gone. I had been printing out my updates every month or so to mail to Peter as he does not have email – that is how his stepbro got my address.

One of the last times I spoke face to face with Peter was when I prayed for him in church. I had sensed that his Heavenly Father God wanted to welcome him home, if he would invite Jesus into his heart. But Peter felt that he wanted to see if science could answer the questions of life and my pastor encouraged him to attend Alpha course, which explains the Christian faith to non-believers. Peter declined, saying that he needed to sort out some stuff in his life first, and I left it at that, thinking there would be a next time. Tragically, there wasn’t. I wish I could have told him that science can explain the hows of life (how do we get oxygen to keep us alive?) but it can’t explain the whys of life (Why are we alive?).

Sad as I was about Peter’s death – I knew that God was comforting me, even through the other thing that came in the mail – which was the birthday package from my Singapore church cellgroup. My birthday was in May, so it was very belated, but with God’s timing it was just perfect because the gifts and thoughts on the card cheered me up I also got a sister from my Brisbane lifegroup to pray for me, as well as my blood sister Jean.

But that was only the first death I was to learn about. After I spoke to my sister on Skype, I decided to look up some friends on Facebook or Google. Maybe I was nostalgic because I suddenly realised that friends can sometimes leave you very suddenly. That’s how I came across an online article that talked about how a very good friend in university, Sky, had taken his own life in 2007.

I was reeling as I read of how he had been doing really well in his PhD (getting published in prestigious journals even before he completed his studies etc), how he was admired for his humour and compassion, how he would hesitate to kill a fly but yet he killed himself, how no-one realised how low he was feeling, how he had a great relationship with his girlfriend and had talked about marriage. What happened? What went wrong?

The article said he had always been hard on himself, for not postponing school to take care of his mother when she was diagnosed with cancer just before he went to university. A year later, she died and those close to him said he always lived in regret. This could have contributed to his depressed state but in reality, only God knows.

Sky’s death hit me hard.

Maybe because we are the same age (Peter was in his 60s) and we worked close together in the environmental activist group where he was elected president and I was vice-president.

Maybe because I once liked him and he was the first guy I ever told my feelings to (he didn’t feel the same way but he was so mature about the whole thing that our friendship grew stronger after that).

Maybe because I felt guilty that I had not kept in touch and I had not told him about Jesus (during my university days, I had backslided and I hardly talked about faith matters) – maybe that could have helped, maybe not…I will never know.

I asked a few more people to pray for me online because I felt this could potentially cause me to become depressed…they told me to let myself grieve, that Jesus would comfort me. One of them asked me to read Psalm 23. Even as I cried, I sensed Jesus’ understanding – because He who did everything He can to give us life has His heart utterly broken each time someone chooses death. Also, He didn’t blame me for failing to tell Sky about Him.

It took me a few days to be able to talk about and read more about Sky without crying. The university he was at (Caltech) set up a memorial fund in his name, there is a blog for his friends to share photos and memories of him.

Maybe one day I will write an entry, about the times we had spent gathering petitions for environmental causes, about the salmon fish costume we painted and put on to send a message out on the importance of clean water…I remember little things like how his long black trench coat would flap in the wind when he cycled, the way he would dismount even before his bike came to a stop…But I also wish I had more to hold onto, like a recording of his voice, which had a slight raspy quality…or a photo of his clunky rain boots, or a video of the way he would pinch his little goatee when he was making a point…

For now, I pray that I will cherish the life that God has given me and the people that He has brought into my life.

To all of you reading this, if you ever, ever, feel like life is not worth living and you want to end it, please, please, give Jesus a chance to come into your heart.

He loves you so much that He went through death on the cross for you even though He lived a perfect sinless life, so that you can be in right standing with God without having to pay the penalty for your sins. This is Grace, the unmerited favour that God has freely given to us, at Jesus’ expense.

As someone who has gone through several rounds of depression, being diagnosed with having bipolar, I have felt suicidal more than once. By the grace of God, I am still here and I know that His love continues to heal and restore me. He has also placed me within caring communities who play a critical role in my well-being. God has no favourites – what He did for me, He wants to do for you too.

Amen.

Love-in-Christ,
Jen Lee