Daring to be different? Or am I just retarded :P

Well, let's see what the week might look like... hmm...

Tues night, going to do all I can to FINALLY make it to a hip hop class! There are several things I entered 2007 with the hopes of developing, and the continuance in the search for co-ordination was one I'd decided on early, early on; I WILL be an ok dancer! I will!! If any are interested in joining me in convulsive epileptical fits, it's $17for60mins@DanceFactory@Richmond@7pm...

the being different part would be the going to see miss potter @ 9:40pm @ glenny... most are going to see happyness @ 9:10pm, but me, me, I'm seeing peter rabbit... :S Am just not a big fan of seeing movies with lotsa, lotsa people... that said, knowing that lotsa, lotsa people don't read this blog, any of u r more than welcome... but not if u bring lotsa, lotsa people...

Wed night - sk8er punking the streets of g'wavery...

Thurs night - midsummer's night dream production in the botanical gardens; have gotten tickets, it's gonna be 28degrees&fine, gonna prepare a picnic, am going with the hottest girl in the world, and she happens to be mine... it's going to be the best Thurs EVA...

Fri night - appears to be rock clambering at this point in time, with details still being fleshed out...

Lettuce know (get it, "lettuce"? "lettuce" = "let us"??? :D) if ur in the areas on any of these nights (EXCEPT THURS!! NO one call me THURS night!!); u know the drill, u know the number ;)

Oz day :)

Going to skip the temptation to just blog about everything that happened over the w'end, but to instead just note down some of the stuff that made my weekend pretty unforgettable :D

... a beach day, a summer day, but all the more brilliant in the way it capped off by watching Talladega Nights with Mikey, a few assorted others & a 'particular' girl... beer in a bottle... just brilliant...

... a night in the botanical gardens, fending off waves & waves of cute possum attacks, using nothing but bottles of mt franklin & a picnic rug... priceless...

... a random church visit, the bumpage of a dear, dear 'nome and a night talking, snuggling, & barely watching the tennis :)

... the memories of the w/end blessed... yeah... that's an amazing amount of inspiration that will get me through this week :D

snapshots of the week in passing...

When the going gets rough...

In light of all the recent postings on blogs that I frequent, I've decided to dedicate this post to all those going through a really, rough time, whether it'd be about work, finances, unrequited love, people not understanding you, or broken cameras...

Little Miss Sunshine was recently nominated for 4 Academy Awards; yet, when it first came out, I only knew of it because of christop, and likewise no one else in my other friendship circles were aware of it either

And in the age of movies with production budgets of $200-$300 million, this one was completed for $8 million

I don't know much, and in full awareness of it, I won't claim any sort of authority about what I think, but here are some thoughts, and I hope they might perhaps help u to see even a sliver of light @ the end of the tunnel

LMS had heaps of witty quotes, but one particulary apt, for the rough times that I had personally been through

Dwayne: I wish I could just sleep until I was eighteen and skip all this crap- high school and everything- just skip it.

Frank: You know Marcel Proust?

Dwayne: He's the guy you teach.

Frank: Yeah. French writer.

Total loser.

Never had a real job.

Unrequited love affairs.

Gay.

Spent 20 years writing a book almost no one reads. But he's also probably the greatest writer since Shakespeare.

Anyway, he uh- he gets down to the end of his life...and he looks back and decides that all those years he suffered-Those were the best years of his life, 'cause they made him who he was.

All those years he was happy? You know, total waste. Didn't learn a thing.

So, if you sleep until you're 18... Ah, think of the suffering you're gonna miss. I mean high school? High school- Those are your prime suffering years. You don't get better suffering than that.

---

To throw a little christianese (this is for you karen, sue; mikey should prob cover his ears...) into the fray, David doesn't become David without a Goliath :)

I've been through a lot the last couple of years, have seen a lot, and they've ALL conspired to make me who I am today

And even in light of the failures and anguish I've endured, I wouldn't have it any other way :)

Trivia: In case you were wondering, Proust really did exist, and really is a significant literary figure...

sk8er bois

... and I should get that half-a-night tonight, hopefully! The evening part will be spent grinding on ferraris and lambos in the Glen carpark with mikey-destroyer-of-the-world; if any1 else is up 4 being a sk8er punk, or going to be in the area, give us a shout out... just don't run us over, yeah... even if it's ur ferrari we're jumping off... :P

Geez... slow down Nate :P

Hahahahahaha... after a year or so of learning to be intentional and to, in the midst of a bustling world, slow down, I still found myself trying to figure out if I should go to hip hop class, clean my room, see a movie... trying to figure out what's important to me, what to build into my life as a regular rhythm...

In the end, I stayed @ home and continued cleaning... and it felt good to be @ home, continuing to get the very basic foundations (my room!!) right :) To settle 1 thing @ a time, esp in light of what's shaping up to be a busy long weekend, rather than have a billion things up in the air at the same time :P

As for my room, it's almost there!! Another half a night, and I think it should be just right...

noooooooo... it's mooooooonnnnnddaaaayyyy...

... thank goodness I'm already half way through the day; sooooo buggered from the w/end - like LC, am similarly looking forward to a night of lazing around @ home (& cleaning my room :D); feel like I've chronicled the week & w/end in passing in adequate detail, minus the all important juicy details, but hey, I need to keep some secrets, don't I :P

Time to get back to work, & get back to helping world vision help others help make this world a better place...

... continued...

Fri night or Sat morn:
Either ikea shopping or bibi-birthday-present shopping (if one happens on fri, then the other will happen on sat morn) - this could probably evolve into a kick-on to the city (as ikea is in richmond), movie or at the very least, vietnamese food!! Let's see how this one mutates as we get closer to the night :P

This one turned out quite weirdly; a lot of people started re-responding with negative rsvps, and so by COB Fri, I had no idea who was coming :S Me and biki headed down to ikea in the dad-rav4-mobile, found a donald there and proceed to buy cool shelving :D

Due to a mix up in comms with LC, she didn't make it to tea with us (*sob, sob*) @ Thy Thy (so good!! Cheap and dirty viet, I luv it :D), and we ended up meeting Al & Karen @ Airstream afterwards :)

Sat arvo:
Bibi's birthday party :D

This was a mega day; went back to ikea in the morning (with about 5hrs of sleep) to pick up some more stuff, dropped by the Glen for bibi's present, raced home to change and unload, picked biki up an 1.5hrs later than I said would initially, and eventually found ourselves in croydon for bibi's, which was really, really nice

thoughts from bibi's... hmm... maybe call biki ahead of time to ensure we're NOT both wearing entirely matching outfits... if I give myself the time to prepare for peoples presses, maybe they'll turn out as creatively as bibi's, which I luved

the night ended up @ the parents, assembling shelving and in ikea fashion, giving names to my furniture (andy, ben and bob)... saturday was a pretty brilliant day :D

Sunday morning:
Visiting the NGV with Aloysius - both the Tezuka ($8) and sneaker exhibitions (free) are what we're after :D

Somehow this actually organised, and somehow I managed to find myself there :S Was good value, where Tezuka I'd already been to, but we were also able to catch a hip hop act there that was promo-ing for the sneaker convention, which was likewise really funky!

Notes from the weekend: Still haven't seen Dgirls OR Happyness... Had forgotten about how cool wandering around Ikea could be; might be an idea to spend a half a day there another time, just for fun and to inspire ideas; as it was, we barely made it through half way before we had to "finalise our purchases"...

so much to blog... no more time tonight :)

UPDATED

After spending the entire night blogging, resizing and uploading photos, I'm still yet to cover so much!! But in the intermission (which some call sleep), here's the week that will be:

Tuesday night:
Beginner hip hop class @ dance factory in richmond!! I can't wait, it's been ages since I attended class...

Cancelled!! Had gone home after work to change, all keen and everything, to have my lil sis call to say that the class had been cancelled due to the power outages :( Ended up @ Airstream with a bunch of people talking about how me and Al want to organise the next "networking" meeting :D

Wed night:
Skating in carparks with Mikey! Also can't wait; it's life-giving to catch up with ur best friend, and just punk to skate ;)

This one actually happened, and I have a 50c-sized bruise to show for it on my knee :P But if I ain't falling, it means I ain't jumping, and I want to jump :D Sitting out in an empty glenny carpark with ur best bud, sore ankles and all, just watching the traffic go by and the speed cameras flashing... life is pretty grand sometimes :)

Thurs night:
Rock climbing with Don!! Go, go spider nate!! For those interested, give me or Don a call, it's @ 7pm in Nunawading...

Well it didn't turn out to be just me and Don like I thought - there were quite a few people, Korea + a bunch of people I'd never met before, but that's half the fun, ain't it, meeting new people :D Well, to me at least :P It was a great night, my fingers were completely buggered and I felt pretty good to be able to get up quite a few walls on my first attempt in like 10 years (or forever?!)

Afterwards korea, don and I met up with aloysius for coffee which was a nice way to end the night... even if it DID leave me quite sleep deficient the next day :( But thanks Korea for the coffees!! You are way too sneaky... :P

To be continued...

please pray

for a close friend & his family, for his dad that's just had a heart attack - things are ok now, so pray for a full recovery, whatever that might look like in God's will :)

a faith restored :)

for most things, I think I can somewhat temper even my most optimistic projections with a good grounding of reality, except for two times of the year - when it comes to the occasions of Christmas and New Year

for what ever reason, call it child-like innocence, call it stupidity, there's simply no way I can stop myself from expecting a resonatingly magical christmas and new year

and it's because of those unstoppable expectations, every year for the last few years has been heartbreakingly disappointing; instances of waiting by myself on the street for a friend to come down from a drug high, being at home by myself in the pit of family fragmentation, to vacuous social occasions...

but who knew? Who would have guessed that '06/'07 would be the year that was different? I sure didn't... and for that reason, I was actually incredibly scared heading into it all... anticipating the extreme heartache that's accompanied each xmas/new year

it wasn't anything big that did it; xmas eve was a cold, soggy, soggy walk along the boulevarde (ivanhoe) for chrissy lights, but the company was beyond compare and to go back to their family home, sit in front of the tree and just be until it was chrissy morn was simply life warming

and to spend the large entirety of chrissy day with my family, opening presents with each other, laughing, grinning, smiling, and then extended family for dinner; there was no better way I could have scripted, for me, my magical chrissy

no, i didn't get the shiniest, most expensive present in the world (altho mum far exceeded the $30 limit for me :D), but i got my family for a day, and in the leung family world of incredible transience, that was the only present that was needed

new years eve was a vespa ride for two to a night picnic beside a lake, with a symphony of somewhat frantically mooing of cows in nearby pastures (in response to unseen-by-us fireworks) :P

and new years day was a drive-and-a-half, and a walk-and-a-half, to an isolated beach with some of my closest friends

none of these things were ritzy and glamourous... none of these things extravagently expensive... but each resonating incredibly and so soundly with the core of me, leading me to the only conclusion I could possibly come to; I'm a pretty lucky sod :P

And just like that, it's next year...

Here's to Sue who's, uh, "firm" "encouragement" has finally gotten me off my blogging butt :P

I've been lucky to have lotsa good things, & lotsa sad things, happen to me over the past month or so, and have been wanting to journal it for the longest time... guess I've just needed the right boot in the posterior...

where to start... well... guess the easy stuff first... and in short...

i finished up @ u/seed, with a credo christmas that restored my faith in christmas :) (pilfered the photo below from christop :D)



After being surrounded by the chaos of consumerism that engulfs the city over the period, to be at a bbq that celebrated intentional simplicity and relevance was perfect

That was the Thursday, 21/12/06... the very next day, straight after the h/coreness of Thurs, three days from christmas, and on a Fri, I started @ world vision as a business analyst :S which I'll prob devote a whole post to in a bit...

BOOM! He's back in the room ;)

After a hiatus of almost a month, I've finally gotten around to updating my flickr (i.e. photos) :D Click the link above or on the right for more snapshots of the past months... will try to soon get some up of my dad's 60th batch too...

Maybe I should rename this blog...

... to that of something reflecting the sobering beauty of passing seasons, something I've come to realise and been lucky enough to experience so many times during these recent years

So much has happened since my last post, so many things that have been great and that I wanted to blog about. Things like the most beautiful wedding I've ever been to, hunting rabbits and cycling, frequent airport runs and the comings and goings of my family, the offerance and subsequent rejection of jobs, the blessings of new/old friends...

... the cycle of love, lost and found, the hope of what the future might look like (and the stress of it too)...

And the sheer extreme busyness of it all, exhaustive as it may be, with nary a time to pause and blog. But above even all the amazing experiences I've had this past month, the passing weekend has been something that I simply could not let go without trying to capture in words my thoughts and heart

Have just come back from our final, resie retreat, marking the close of what has been without a doubt the most brilliant chapter of my life to date. We started the year with a resie retreat, we're seeing the ending of this fellowship with one too

We spent the night out at Sorrento, at a holiday house that was also populated with 'Nomes' family, eating greek, visiting the early closing Sorrento hotel, beaching and lazing in the sun on a verandah... each one of us slowly absorbing what will be one of the last, significant times of this year we will share as resies

There has been so much we've gone through together, so much we've all shared that goes beyond anything I could possible contain in a blog, and so much more than any human should be blessed to experience

Before we came back, we stopped at spray point... a somewhat empty point over crashing waves into rocks creating immense sprays. An unplanned stopped, we caught the setting sun... and we all sat... in quiet, wind and spray... watching the glowing, red sphere slowly dipping below the horizon... and without fanfare or much word, we all loved... appreciated... cried... in rememberance of the amazing chapter we were all blessed to have

and then there was wed-thurs-fri!!

and in one last burst, what's been up for the last couple of days!!

wed was another nothing day, which was brilliant - Vee came over later that night and we just talked and coffee'd around the kitchen and lounge all the way till 5am!! i love being young :D

thurs day i got my hair cut (in a little bit of a bizar way; i'm not sure if i should let jeff just do "whatever" again :S), the night time saw me and vee watching a documentary that had been compiled about van nguyen called "Just Punishment" - it was pretty sobering, as expected, and quite well made. i think again, it reaffirmed the sort of direction i want my life to go... in terms of actively fighting, or working, to make this world even a fraction better

afterwards me and vee had something to eat, and then went to cookie (on swanston) - on the outside it didn't look that great (had walked by it so many times), but was very cool on the inside!! the atmosphere was great... and the cocktail we tried (which we were prewarned that we would have to wait 25mins for!!) was fun as - an "absinth green fairy"

one last moment

i figured i should probably break up this post, as opposed to one ginormous one :P

tuesday night was... a little magical, and perhaps a little poignant. i spent the afternoon/evening with someone... someone that i'd had to let go of, not so long ago, and was therefore a little hesistant and unsure about what to expect of the encounter

we ended up in a tree (no, NOT kissing 8-)), in a park we'd never been too, climbing and sitting amongst the branches and talking for over 4-5 hours. having conversations about everything... watching life walk by beneath us... and in the cool of the night, the breeze rushing through the branches, moving us powerfully, but gently... closing my eyes and giving myself to the rhythmic swaying of the branch I sat on

for me... the eternal romantic of life... it was a moment. a moment, given the situation with the person, might well be the last i ever see of her, and therefore both bittersweet and harmonious - i hope that i'll be able to remember it that way... a snap shot of possible love... the hope of something special... with the grounding of the reality of it never to be

the week in passing...

i think way too much and way too seriously about questions people ask :P when people ask what i've been up to, i actually try and think about what it is i've been up to... then again... am i meant to quite easily know these things...??? i am, aren't it :S

so... here's me doing a brain dump of the week in passing... so at least somewhere there'll be something i can refer to about actually having done something :P


saturday morning/arvo found me bbq-ing on the front steps of collins street baptist - it was a really nice day to be outside and frying, even against the bizar backdrop of riot police dudes, white aterial block rampagers, and mark serenely reading the newspaper in the midst of it all...



after packing up, i rode into the 'burbs and had a quiet night with vee and darius - we watched amelie, sat around talking, whilst darius espoused (not knowing what i'd been doing that day) that protestors are worse than terrorists

sunday morning i managed to roust myself out of bed to check out the morning service @ grace church, which starts at a barnstorming time of 9:20am!! was there with vee, mikey and bibi... and we did a whole church service before 11am - 11am!! went home, pottered for a bit, and then did the acf evening version... 2xservices in one day... yup, was quite holy that sunday :P

monday? i did nothing!! which is always weird for me... after having been consistently frantic for the last few months on end, whenever i get to a break time, it can feel a little unnatural :P i ended up seeing "the prestige" @ village, knox... by myself... doing the whole movie by myself thing in knox... although the movie was a great one... i should have probably picked one with a bit more pick-me-up in it, rather than throw-self-off-building vibes :S

jedi nate!!

the week before, i'd been @ deb's birthday party, where her brother has SIX working replica light sabres!! so here's me being a pink jedi knight...

nate & the G20 Christian Collective...

came down to the office to work a bit more on the project where I bumped into Simon, one of the Seedy mob that works with the education team @ the Den - he was making rice to bring back to the encampment

i'd visited them earlier in the day, and it was a bit ironic that once upon a time I might have viewed such groups as weird and a bit eclectic, and now there i was crossing the road to the peaceful protest morever to visit my friends :P

in any case, in chatting to simon for the few moments he was here, and to the few friends I'd bumped into today, i started to hear about something about media reports... about the radio going on about the 9 or so christian protesters sitting outside the hyatt... so I did a search on the herald sun and age sites, and found this on the age:

Christian collective

G20 Christian Collective spokesperson, Reverend Simon Moyle, said about 10 of members of his group had arrived at the corner of Collins and Russell streets this morning to protest the forum at the Grand Hyatt.

"We're here because this meeting of G20 is not representative of the people it most affects," Mr Moyle said.

"We're particularly concerned about the environment. We've been excluded from (the forum) but we're here to basically ask for tickets on behalf of ... the poor ... to say these people need and deserve a ticket and a place at the table."

Mr Moyle said the group had been asked to move their tent from outside the Grand Hyatt Hotel, despite previous approval by police of the location.
"We're G20 Christian collective and we're part of a whole bunch of churches around Melbourne. We're just a concerned voice for the poor.

"We're here for 60 hours, from this morning to Sunday night and will be maintaining a constant vigil."

and here's another article by the Herald Sun: G20 Christians protest

it's funny, because simon himself was a bit bewildered by all the media attention - he'd thought that at the worst, the Police would tell them they weren't allowed there, and at best they were expecting to be largely ignored. But because they're the only group on the scene at the moment, they're the ones getting all the media airplay :S

christop is there, and is planning to be there for most of it, shunning his bed and his "visions" for the collective and the street - i'm just about to head out to finish buying the rest of the food for tomorrow's BBQ, so i might pop by and see how they're all doing out there

nate & the G20...

it's a bit surreal all the stuff that's sorta escalating seemingly out of nowhere in regards to the G20 - I say seemingly, as there've been heaps of awareness and mediatory activities, some good stuff by the Seedy mob, but me being a little slow on the uptake I'm probably only sorta getting it with the advent of so much police stuff happening at our front steps :S

it's going to be an awesome day, with heaps of events happening for you to both enjoy and be passionate about - my prayer, if any, would be for us ALL to be challenged, and pushed far beyond our comfort zones, by what God might be saying in the midst of it all

Note: I'll be @ the prayer & reflection space on the front steps of Collins Street Baptist

At 7:30am Friday morning A G20 Christian Collective will attempt to set up a "Third World and Environment Ministers Embassy" beside the barricades surrounding the Hyatt as a way of demonstrating the exclusion of the poor and other essential factors in the G20 meetings. This will begin a peaceful 60 hour non-stop vigil in solidarity with the excluded that will extend through to Sunday evening. You are welcome to join in for part or all of it

On Saturday between 9am and 3pm there will be a prayer and reflection space at Collins Street Baptist Church, with a sausage (and veggie burger) sizzle on the steps

Also on the Saturday, Make Poverty History is holding a festival in the Alexandra Gardens between 10am and 8pm. It will feature bands, stalls, information booths, and reflection spaces. For more information, see http://www.makepovertyhistory.com.au