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i received an unexpected email from Yuki by accident a couple of days ago. apparently he is now in south pole doing what he loves best…. the telescope stuff…i can never understand fully as im handicapped when it comes to physics…i know he wants to be an astronaut and i hope he does…

anyway.. he is visiting australia after his south pole’s posting and probably to melbourne. it will be good to catch up with him after more than 3 years… we did the skype call earlier today, but given the outdated weather satellite down there, we had trouble communicating….he promised me to bring some snow from down there hahha even though he doubted it would be a successful venture..(apparently he tried that last year!)

oh.. of slightly surprising in nature too, i received another unexpected sms few hours after the midnight mass. i didnt know she still did remember me… but i restrained myself from replying after such a bad incident this year… some things are better left as it is…

2006 was full of surprises. In the midst of all the joy, sadness, anger, love and pure silence, I want to think that i have cemented another layer of foundation to achieve what i aspire to be. For some corners are completely unfinished, perhaps untouched, the lack thereof were mainly contributed by my human weaknesses – procrastination, selfishness and for being passive.

This will also be the year when perhaps for the last time, I can ever call Melbourne home.

As daunting as it might be, I want to believe that I have made the right decision and taken that leap of faith many of my peers have crossed ages ago.

There are many individuals i should thank for making this year a memorable one and for sharing it with me.

My appreciation will not be complete though without special mention to you-know-who-you-are who has made me a stronger person especially in the last month or so.

For that, forever I will eternally be grateful.

there’s a mystery about packing your stuffs. i used to be very good at it, after all in the first 4 years i’ve lived in melbourne, i have moved 5 times (hardly a record in comparison to some of my crazy friends). but i’ve lost touched the art of moving as i have lived in the same address for more than 5 years now.

only until recently, when i have to gradually pack my stuff, i have re-learnt and i’m getting good at it. as i was going through the remnants of my past, i occasionally registered quick smiles, remembering various funny events as captured by different clothing articles – the funny things in life.

the nightmare of 8 years worth of cumulative junks quickly subsided. i have donated 6 bags worth of used clothings. and when i finally tried to fill my inventories online, i realised what little left i have. the only significant part of my properties is my book collections. i have given up counting when it surpassed the magic ‘100′.

in the mean time, packing continues….

it’s easy to blame religion as the source of all problem in the world today. but many have failed to understand the true essence of religion.

i don’t claim myself as divine nor devout but i would like to believe that i’m a strong believer. to testify as such require my own personal experience and encounters that can only be attributed to greater power. no matter what people say.

it’s funnie that for those non-believers, their defense is at best to go on offense (i dont blame them for offensive is the best defence). they will cherry pick the bad part of religion and despise everything that’s attached to it. i honestly think that subconsciously it is their own failings that made them so. i’m not saying that people of no faiths are not successful (or will not be), but it’s more of them not being at peace with who they are and what they really stand for. In that process, they tend to find a scapegoat and religion is an easy target.

to them, religion is defined by the physical and pragmatic thinking in which the world revolves around. it’s naive and pitiful. buildings, popes, muftis, conservative laws and rulings are all examples of human greatness but they are also sources of human failings. religion is as such a human concept based on human evolution and with so much examples of human built institutions, they tend to embody human weaknesses and religion is of no exception.

but what they fail to see is the consistent principle behind each religion – faith in a higher being that is always constant regardless of time. a man of faith will never have to defend their religion but those who arent will always be on the offense, otherwise, they feel lost.

go figure.

it’s officially over. I have down my last uni paper (hopefully forever). now is the catching up part comes into play. everybody seems to be going everywhere. those who are still stuck in melb? well… its the most livable city in the world – so nothing to complaint about!

i finished the paper an hour early. had to drop paper off at the solicitor. had dinner with the relieved ex-students in st kilda and a quick coffee with terje as we both were running errands everywhere. terje is off to thailand on the 3rd and back to norway for good.

now im taking a timeout for the eventual night out. i might have to do jumps between groups in different outings tonight (man i feel like a slut). everybody is leavin so you have to spend time and catch up with them as much as you can.

how’s the exam you may ask? my standard answer still stands: “it could be worse, it could be better”.

so i went to the cinema after a long hiatus. my last one was The DaVinci Code. This time, i had to bear with the sight of Hugh Jackman (i bet it was Jelita’s choice). Anyway there were at least 12 of us booking nearly the entire two rows of the cinema. When was the last time i went to such a groupy event? I can’t remember….

So The Prestige was an OK movie…. i would give it 3 stars out of 5… mostly because i feel cheated!!!

spoiler next…………………………………………
(more…)

through conversations in passing over the years, i have learnt a lot of things above love. many have also pointed out that men’s benchmark of the ideal one as that of his loving mother. a mother was the first person you have interacted since you were conceived. the person you have placed your life dependency for the first nine months of your life. among the first person who smiled at you despite her painful labor hours before. among the first person who gave you the hug that you probably wouldn’t even remember. the person no matter what you have become will always love you unconditionally.

my mother is no different. i seldom raise about the influence in which my mom has on me in this blog. but its not because she’s not worth mentioning. Instead, words alone are not equipped to describe her as a person and a mother.

everybody said that his/her mother is the best mother in the world. i wouldnt trade mine for theirs. for my mother has not only the source of constant love that i have been grateful and at times take them for granted, but she has been the source of inspiration. she is the person who has shaped and defined me as a person.

but i used to dislike her as a child. i remembered the times when she was the figure i most feared. i remembered when she used to say a flat NO to the things a child is entitled for being the kid – be it candies, comic book, television, and playing with friends. but what i remembered most is the regular hitting that i received every time i wanted to be around her and using it as an excuse for not doing the things that im supposed to do – like not taking shower in time, being a nuisance when she was at work or when i was in cold war with my dad over my choice to be a Catholic.

those were expected and rightfully so. for she was a very busy person even until now. she was a businesswoman who knew how to be independent and responsible for her family. she was a tough person when things seem to be against the odd. she stood by the family through thick and thin. even though i knew that she put on masks in public to conceal her many disappointments and sadness.

you know you love a person so much when you are happy when they are and felt the arrow struck right in the middle of your heart when they are in pain. you felt a jolt in your normal day when you thought that something must be wrong and you place that call and realise the string of attachment is above spiritual level. you cannot bear the thought of her having to leave you eventually be it for human evolution or just for a temporary goodbye.

i learn to love her more when i’m not around her. i have been living away from my family since i was 14. there was a time when i was on the other side of the world, she called me and we spoke for a near two hours (i have never spoken to her that long over international call before). and she broke the conventional rule among us. she was the first to apologise for not being there for me when i was young. my eyes were swollen with tears when i heard this. it’s not the form of the apology but the thought of her letting me down is what destroyed me.

i just wanna say that Mum.. you are the greatest person i have known in my life and you have never ever let me down for a single second of my life. i might not be able to return a small fraction of the unconditional love you have given to me through all these years and for many many more years to come. but i can only try.

i love you.

the Bible read ‘what has been united by God cannot be separated by human’. really?

Hayden recently confided in me. He fears the overwhelming divorce statistic will become a reality for his parents. Irreconcilable differences are often cited but this is a concept that he did not fully understand – to be honest nor do i. we are not talkin about celebrity marriages here, where seasons and fashions are important variables in deciding whom, when and where to marry. this is about the 20+ year marriages where offspring from the union are able to create new unions themselves. why do they fail after so long and the real question is why do they fail now as they are getting older?

Hayden wanted to believe that his parents were just going through ‘a phase’ but i knew he was in self-denial. This has been a constant theme that i know of for years.

so he asked me a baffling question i have yet to find the answer:

Tedy, i know you are a strong believer. If God doesn’t separate what has been united, who does? Human through their own freewill? Doesn’t this suggest that Freewill is then evil, thus an embodiment of Satan? If the logic follows, God then should be a dictator to ensure that we are always in safe distance from freewill thus evil thus Satan.

it’s mystifying how God always got the incrimination when the going gets tough. But i dont blame Hayden. That’s what you get for being Omnipotent.

it’s been a weird day. it started with me having to wake up after survivin on a 2.5 hours sleep. the apartment i was inspecting was too small to my liking. to my eventual surprise, jelita arrived earlier than normally she would (kudos to her). my usual silence coupled with bad post-inspection mood perhaps perplexed her. yea, it normally took me an hour after i got up to be ‘normal’. those who’ve had the priviledge to interact with me during this period know fully of my silent treatment.

anyway, the wanna-kill-everyone-who-cross-me mood was quickly erased with the overjoy in seeing people bid for PFL up to $2.30 prior to trading time. only to open lower to a more sustainable price of $1.90 – not a bad 8.6% premium considering the last IPO i participated didnt even rise above its listing price. the only complaint i have so far is how little allocation we got given the overwhelming subscription applications they have.

then i got a surprising email. Approx two weeks ago, i was just talking to the leader of the community at my parish about which church in sydney is under the same congregation of blessed sacraments. and today, he sent me an email breaking the news that he will be transferred there starting from next year. i dont know how he feels about it, but Ben and I were clearly overjoyed. Fr Peter has done so much in building and fostering the community. He will surely be missed by many!

and now, with Min’s HP, i sat across this annoying ‘China Man’ whom constant loud sighs and ‘throwing’ of stationeries across the table completely disgust me. Ok, he is studying Medicine, and its supposed to be hard, but come on… have some respects for other people who are studying too! I wonder, what kind of materials those medicine books are made of to sustain his rough and loud pages-flipping.

enough of the rant already. back to spots and futures.

in an overture to the eventual self-ejection of melbourne’s life, i forced an executive decision over jelita to join me in enriching our own culinary experience in this great city (or lack thereof for my part).

our source of inspiration was the good food guide. but that didnt bring us anywhere. either the going rate is beyond what my savings can tolerate or we were looking something not too close yet not too far.

my initial pick was The Grand Tofu but as we were cruising, jelita preferred to remember a place where her doubt on vegetarian food (tofu in particular) was completely shattered – this is in addition to her self-admission to liking TWW after cursing the series everytime i mentioned about it in the past 3 years or so.

we settled on The Tofu Place on Bridge Road which is simply the BEST tofu/vege place in town!

this is one joint i will definitely miss from melbourne.