Life without a blackberry

Can you work with your spouse?

2011-03-14T07:00:00.002+08:00

A common question I get asked these days goes something like this: How do you manage to work with Rob (my husband) all the time? Or if the person asking is being a bit less subtle: How can you possibly work with your spouse?

Rob and I both work for the children's charity Viva, with me devoting 90% of my time, and Rob 50%. The other 50% Rob works on his writing and speaking business, which I help on from time to time. Viva does not have an office yet, so we work mostly from our home, with half of the week spent on meetings on HK Island.

We are both National Directors in Hong Kong, and have different skills and backgrounds. I'm an ex lawyer, with a few years of experience in the development sector, whilst Rob used to be a high school teacher, and has in recent years become a professional adventurer, writer and motivational speaker.

I'm naturally risk averse, conservative (or pessimistic in Rob's eyes) and I tend to over plan. Rob, on the other hand, likes to take risks, is highly optimistic (or slightly reckless in my books) and does not like planning much at all.

And we are both quite opinionated.

So you can imagine our meetings can get heated sometimes! (As my younger sister who's stayed with us can testify to...)

It's a real challenge, but we've found the following tips useful (not saying they're easy to follow...)

Try not to speak in your own natural work language

Don't assume that your way of working is always right

Leave plenty of time for discussion of potentially explosive topics e.g. finances

Sort out your own issues

Play to each other's strength i.e. actively affirm each other's contribution

Forgive each other - no one is perfect

Incidentally, we think these are also the same tips for helping with our marriage!

Do you work with your spouse? Do you have any tips which you can share?

Love146

2011-03-07T07:00:00.001+08:00

I recently came across this moving video, about the story of a girl called Diana who had endured unspeakable trauma but has now found real hope and strength for the future.

Love146 is part of the network which Viva partners with in Cambodia, where scores of children are victims of trafficking and exploitation.

Diana's Love Story from LOVE146 on Vimeo.

To find out more about the amazing work of Love146, check out www.love146.org.

If you enjoyed this post, you may also like Cambodia II: Rehab House, For the Love of Cupcakes.

Escape The City

2011-02-28T07:00:00.000+08:00

If you are or know someone who's considering a career change, you might find www.escapethecity.org helpful - largely based in the UK, this site seeks to provide a forum for people who are thinking of escaping the city (ie the City in London, but it can also apply to other cities!) for "greener" pastures.

I'm featured as a "Hero" on the site (ha!), for having escaped law for the charity sector. Some of the tips and experiences which I shared have been reproduced below - hope you'll find something helpful!

2) What did you do before this?

Well, I did quite a few things!

My first job was with a London magic circle law firm where I trained and qualified as a corporate lawyer. I was with this firm for 4 years. I know plenty of people who enjoy their lawyer jobs but for me I thought life was too short to be stuck in something I wasn't passionate about!

After I left in late 2007 I tried different things in international development and human rights, which included working with an NGO in relief and development (Tearfund) and interning with a couple of human rights think tanks. This summer my husband and I also volunteered on a residential project with street children in the Philippines, which was absolutely awesome.

3) What was your moment of truth?

It's hard to pinpoint to a particular moment which changed everything, though I have to say that having a teacher-turned-explorer boyfriend then (now husband) who was cyclinghalf way across the world just because that's what he wanted to do certainly didn't help!

I was also reading Richard Nelson Bolles' other less well known book How to Find Your Mission in Life and found it rather inspiring.

And I loved what John Eldredge said in Wild At Heart: Don't ask what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive and go do that, because what the world needs is people who have come alive.

4) How did you plan for it?

On one hand I wanted to have had something lined up before I left my corporate law job (I was, after all, a lawyer, so was naturally rather risk averse) but my hours were so long and there just wasn't any physical or head space to think about anything, so I had nothing planned as such when I finished my notice. I was really in need of a break though so was glad to have 4 months off.

During the break I rested and tried to regain perspective, and after that I spent a whole month talking to everyone and anyone who was willing to talk to me about the international development and charity world (I asked my friends for any contacts they were happy to give me) and built up my network that way. I found my first job through doing that!

Taking a few months off might not be a viable option for some, but I was fortunate enough having saved up a bit of money and I didn't have any mortgage or babies to worry about.

5) What have been the best and worst things about making this happen?

The best thing is that even though nowadays I'm still busy and sometimes working longish hours (nothing compared to the City though!), I'm doing something I'm passionate about and I no longer feel chained to my job because of some unknown fear/feeling of loss if I walked away from it.

Can't really think of the worst thing really.... obviously one has to go through lots of soul searching about one's own identity when one jumps ship, and I felt scared and vulnerable and insecure at various points, but it's all part of a very good growing up experience (with the benefit of hindsight I can of course say this now...). I talk about some of my struggles on my blog.

6) What is the best advice you have received?

Try not to give too much weight to people who tell you that it cannot be done - because there will always be people who are pessimistic / risk averse / or for whatever reason think you're mad!

The flip side of this is to talk to everyone and anyone who's happy to chat with you - you'd never know what you might learn or who they might point you to.

Got a burning question?

Go ahead and ask me something.

7) What resources or information have you found really helpful?

What Colour is Your Parachute by Richard Nelson Bolles.

I love Don Miller's A Million Miles in a Thousand Years - a hugely inspirational read, Don talks about living life as a story, which is an excellent way to go about living your life, so you'll be intentional about leading an interesting, meaningful life (which often requires some risk taking!).

If you enjoyed this post, you may also like So What Do You Do?, The Unedited Version and How Will You Measure Your Life.

The Lover

2011-02-21T07:00:00.000+08:00

Recently I read a thought provoking, captivating book The Lover by A B Yehoshua.

Originally written in Hebrew, it tells of a story set in the 70s in Israel and evolves around a Jewish man, his wife, their teenage daughter, a young Jewish man who had returned from France and a teenage Arab boy.

Giving different voices to the different characters in first person, it is a beautifully book with depth, and much nuanced insight on both life in general (love, marriage, loss, identity) and people's lives in Israel and Palestine.

I'm not sure if it's intended to be on a commentary on the politics in the region, but certainly I didn't detect any biases but on the contrary felt that the author was portraying quite a balanced picture (though I'm sure someone is bound to disagree with me on this).

The Israel and Palestinian situation is no doubt an extremely complex and sensitive one, and I don't think the author was trying to side with anyone. It's a really enjoyable book and I would highly recommend it.

Jumping Ship

2011-02-14T07:00:00.000+08:00

An ex colleague recently got in touch to ask me about jumping ship. The pleasant exchange of Facebook messages and other such correspondences made me realise I should probably at some point share here some of the tips and mistakes which I learned from my own experiences in moving to another field.

It would be great to explore questions such as these:

1. How does one decide to really go for it?

2. Once the decision has been made, what next?

3. Would further study help?

4. How does one find a job in a different sector?

5. How not to look back!

Watch this space!

Restarting my blog

2011-02-12T19:21:00.008+08:00

I'm trying to restart writing on this blog, though a silly voice inside tells me I'll probably fail to keep up with my expectations.

One challenge which I had felt (= an excuse for disappearing for months) was that I needed to write something super meaningful for each entry, as otherwise I would just be blabbering. But that means I almost never write these days, as we've been mega busy with setting up Viva in Hong Kong.

But that's a poor excuse, and one that will certainly stop most people from doing anything like this - as most people suffer from over busyness!

So I'll attempt to write again.

Ugly Betty

I'll admit it.

I've been enjoying Ugly Betty Fourth and Final Season.

While I, like many others no doubt, hesitate in accepting her "prettier" self as the final season progressed (she just looked so different without her braces), I (and my husband who normally only likes serious stuff) really like this season so far - it's funny, deep, innocent, and has a clear moral sense - like honesty, fidelity, loyalty, friendship are all good stuff, even if they cost at times!

Saved from Slavery... by a Sandwich Cart

2010-10-27T12:17:00.005+08:00

This is a recent blog post taken from the blog of Viva, the amazing children at risk charity Rob and I are working for in Hong Kong.

Veata’s family live in a village outside Phnom Penh. She’s 15 now, but she’s been working since she was 11. Veata, her mother, and her siblings work as trash collectors to earn money – three siblings work collecting trash while the other three attend school, and then they swap. Veata’s father is a construction worker.

A few years ago, Veata’s mother enrolled her in the Phnom Penh network’s ‘Get Ready’ programme, a project that keeps girls out of brothels by helping them develop skills that will help them get work. That way girls are educated but are still available to help their families earn money –a balance that is really necessary in poor Cambodian villages and families. (For those of you who don’t know, the network in Phnom Penh, called Chab Dai, is a group of projects that Viva helped bring together and continues to support, to prevent girls from being sold into sexual slavery in Cambodia.)

The staff of the network could see that Veata was a good student and a quick learner. She graduated from the Get Ready programme and was encouraged to continue with ‘Bright Girls’, through which she was given an allowance so she could take advanced English lessons. Veata spent two years in the ‘Bright Girls’ programme and became a skilled seamstress and tailor – even earning money above her allowance from the sales of her clothes!

Then the effects of the global financial crisis swept through Cambodia, and Veata’s father found his construction assignments growing fewer and farther between. Even with Veata’s sales and allowance and the hard work of her family collecting trash, there wasn’t enough money to cover the cost of living. They became prime targets for traffickers, who prey on families in financial straits.

A man approached Veata’s parents with an arrangement for her that could relieve them of the poverty that threatened: he said Veata would make a good candidate for a ‘second wife’. A wealthy Asian businessman was going to be spending time in Phnom Penh on business regularly through the year, and was looking for a young live-in mistress. The man offered Veata’s parents £125 up front, with monthly payments of £75 to follow. Although they hated the idea of parting with their daughter in this way, they were becoming desperate - that money could prevent the family from going hungry and possibly losing their home.

Veata went to one of the teachers from the Bright Girl programme for help. Because of the love and care the staff at Bright Girl had shown her, she knew she could trust them with this huge problem. She was immediately taken in to the weekly boarding programme supported by the network to be kept safe from the trafficker, while the network's social workers talked about alternatives with Veata’s family. They were able to arrange a £50 microbusiness loan for the family to set up a sandwich cart. This wasn’t as much as the trafficker was offering, but Veata’s parents were willing to take any option that would keep their daughter from becoming a ‘second wife’.

Veata stayed in the care of the network boarding programme until her family’s sandwich business was set up and she could safely return home. Within four months, she’d even paid off the microloan using her monthly allowance and the income from her sewing business!

Working together, we’ve seen Veata grow from a trash collector in tattered clothes, exposed to the dangers of child sexual exploitation, to a talented seamstress who can help support her family and earns more than most factory workers in Cambodia. And even better than that, her younger sisters are now safe from the danger posed by traffickers, as the microloan from the network has lifted their family out of poverty and created a business for all of them to benefit from.

If you enjoyed this post, do check out Viva's blog for other encouraging stories, and you may also enjoy Cambodia II: Rehab House and For the Love of Cupcakes.

So what do you do?

2010-10-06T19:34:00.002+08:00

This article was pitched as part of a series for a paper in Singapore but it was dropped (sob!) as the paper didn't want to encourage a trend for corporate exodus (!!!)

Thought I should post it here nonetheless for those who haven't got bored of reading about escaping the corporate life :)

So what do you do?

I dreaded that question 3 years ago but it was impossible to avoid being asked precisely that at dinner parties.

In November 2007 I had taken the leap and left my glamorous job as a corporate lawyer in London to instead pursue an alternative career in the charity sector. To my surprise the transition left me shaken inside and I found many things difficult, including how to introduce myself to new acquaintances. I felt embarrassed admitting that I was in transit to an unknown new world, despite the frequent response of admiration (which sometimes was accompanied by bewilderment). The temptation was always there to drop in a line or two about how I used to work for a top law firm.

Equally challenging was the moment when everyone exchanged sleek-looking business cards and I would stand there feeling self-conscious. When my turn came I would apologise that I didn’t have a card, and joke that I should have prepared a homemade one. Perhaps my card would read: “Searching for a Job in International Development Relating to Children, Ideally if Previous Legal Skills can be Used”? And maybe “Ex Corporate Lawyer” should feature at the front, underlined, in case people didn’t think much of the convoluted title?

Having grown up in Singapore in my teens and succeeding all my life in the traditional sense (straight A student, Dean’s list in law school, scholarship to Oxford, high flying first job), I found it extremely hard to actually believe that I as a person was not defined by the parameters of conventional success. For months after I exited the revolving glass doors of Allen & Overy, I struggled not to view myself through the coloured lens by which I used to pigeonhole others: their jobs, their “proven” abilities; their financial status. I was also shocked to discover that I had those biases ingrained in me.

And there were other difficult aspects of the transition to deal with. All of a sudden, I found myself having to check my bank account balance and actually do some budgeting - such was the degree of my previous recklessness with my finances that I never knew how much money I had at any one point! Neither was I aware of the cost of, say, a red pepper in the supermarket, or a starter at a restaurant, as I threw things into my shopping trolley, or ordered from the menu without paying much attention to the numbers. I thought that was normal.

Socially, it wasn’t easy either. When going out with friends who also had lucrative jobs, it became necessary to have awkward conversations about how to split the bill. I had to muster all I had to fight the feeling of “losing face”. Also, I couldn’t attend the dinner at my best friend’s birthday bash at a posh restaurant but could only manage to join the party for a drink afterwards. For a natural people pleaser (with a delicate self esteem), all this proved to be very difficult, but these situations forced me to examine some of the deep seated attitudes in me and the motives behind what I used to do.

Looking back, it was a tough period of time, and writing about it has even depressed me slightly, but if you asked me if I regretted my decision at all, the answer would be an irrevocable no. There is no way I would exchange now (and the excitement of what is to come) for anything from my previous life.

Can Bling Bling be Fairtrade too?

2010-09-30T18:29:00.003+08:00

Remember the film Blood Diamond? I never managed to see it properly; the only time I saw it was on a speeding coach along the coast of Negros in the Philippines this past summer. We were on our way to a beautiful island where one of the CFA staff was from, and were most thrilled when the bus driver decided to show it on the small TV screen at the front of the bus. Feeling hungry (we had got up at 5am), cold (the AC was intent on freezing us) and slightly nauseous from the bumpy ride, I strained to follow the exciting plot.

The film, if you don’t already know, is set in the late 90s in Sierra Leone and tells a tale of a family being broken up by civil war, and about how the father sought to find his lost son who has now been captured by the rebel groups to become a child soldier. The film also showed something that has been happening for decades now – the conflict diamonds which feed many bloodthirsty civil wars in Africa. In such instances, rough diamonds are mined for by civilians who have been captured by rebel groups and sold onto the next stage of the diamond chain for large sums of money, which in turn finance the continuing warfare.

Obviously no one would want to knowingly buy or own any diamond that might potentially have been tainted by “blood”.

The Kimberly Process is an initiative that has been set up since 2000 to ensure that diamonds in the world market are properly accounted for, by imposing extensive requirements on members to shipments of rough diamonds as “conflict free” and thus prevent conflict/blood diamonds from entering into the legitimate trade.

However, the Kimberly Process does not certify individual jewellers. According to their website, as a consumer, you can play your part by requiring the jeweller where you’re purchasing from to answer the following questions:

How can I be sure your jewellery does not contain conflict diamonds?

Do your diamond suppliers participate in the industry’s ‘System of Warranties’*?

Can I see a copy of your company’s policy on conflict diamonds?

*The diamond industry has set up a 'System of Warranties' that complements, but is distinct from, the Kimberley Process. You can find out more here.

I came across a further question about 2 years ago whilst I was working at Tearfund. During one of the lunch time seminars, we were introduced to the ethical jeweller CRED. CRED, I found out, is a jeweller based in the UK which only sells conflict free diamond, but it even goes further to ensure that the diamonds and metal (gold, silver, stainless steel) which they sell are sourced in an environmentally friendly manner and that the workers involved in the exploration and refining are paid a fair wage!

How awesome is that!

Thankfully, when Rob thought of proposing 1.5 years ago, he had kept the mass email which I sent out about my new discovery of CRED, and he went to CRED and got me a beautiful, conflict free and fair trade diamond ring! (Apparently they had to source the diamond from Canada – as that’s the only place where the stones are definitely free of conflict as well as exploitation!)

CRED makes very beautiful and classic jewelry and has a wide range of engagement and wedding rings too.

For those of you who are married, I’m not suggesting you to go and change your engagement and wedding rings, though I would love to encourage those who have not got rings to please consider CRED (or any other such jeweller, just do a Google search!), and do your extra bit in making our world a more ethical place.

Cambodia II: Rehab's House

2010-09-22T22:41:00.010+08:00

This blog post is part of a series where I'll be sharing about what we've seen and experienced in terms of the anti human trafficking work in Cambodia.

Another project just outside Phnom Penh, Cambodia, which really moved us was Rehab's House.

Until several years ago, Rehab's House used to be a brothel where scores of under 18 girls were kept to service the sexual needs of customers. Men typically paid US$10 to 20 to sleep with a girl if she wasn’t a virgin. In a culture where (at least for some sections of society) sleeping with a virgin is believed to bring good luck or, on the extreme end, able to purge one’s HIV, a virgin at this brothel was priced at US$300 and her price can go up to $700 if she was pretty.

I say her “price”, but she would not have received a single penny of what was paid as all the money went to the brothel owners.

At the brothel, children were kept in individual “rooms” (which was no more than a 5 feet x 7 feet cell) with a wooden bed where the sexual acts would be performed. On the wall outside each room was painted, in red, a number. The children were known as the numbers outside their rooms. Two rows of rooms ran parallel to each other, with a tiny corridor in the middle. The children were not allowed to go out of their rooms except for using the toilet etc, and if they tried to escape they would suffer grave punishment, and in the few cases of children who tried to run away they were brought back by gangsters in the vicinity who were connected with the brothel.

In 2002, International Justice Mission, working with the local police, raided the brothel, rescuing all the children who had been held in captivity, and went on to persecute the perpetrators. The children, who finally saw the light of day after living in what could only be described as hell, were then placed in an aftercare shelter operated by Agape (who also runs Rehab's House), where they could be counseled, cared for and educated so that they might have another chance at life.

The building where the brothel used to operate was subsequently majorly restructured, with the cold, dingy cells demolished (except for Room no. 9), and turned into a community centre providing supplementary schooling to children, vocational training (sewing lessons!) to women and girls, and healthcare to all in the community. The women and girls taking the sewing lessons are now able to make pillowcases as a livelihood to provide for themselves and their families. Livelihood is an extremely important key to preventing trafficking in the first place, as many who are poor and desperate to survive are often extremely vulnerable to traffickers coming along to entice/trick/persuade them into so-called “employment opportunities”.

The community where Rehab's House is located is not without lingering problems – 70% of its inhabitants are Vietnamese (and hence stateless and illegal, according to the Cambodian government, despite the fact that they have lived in the country for many years and their children were born in Cambodia; they are particularly at risk as the state does not protect them at all), most people living there are still very poor and uneducated, gangs still operate in the area and pedophiles still travel from Phnom Penh daily to transact with children.

Walking through the streets and seeing people not having or doing much, it’s tempting to get all despondent about the state of things in this community. But we’re reminded again of the progress that has been already made as a result of the immense hard work by amazing organisations such as IJM and Agape, and that widespread, long lasting change always takes time.

As we were leaving those dusty roads that evening, through the back window of the window I looked at Rehab's House again, painted in orange and yellow, and the women working on their sewing projects. What used to be a dungeon where cries of children were muffled, Rehab's House is now a lighthouse in its community, giving hope and a future to many.

If you enjoyed this post, you may also like Human Trafficking or For the Love of Cupcakes.

In Spotlight

2010-09-21T02:05:00.006+08:00

Last Thursday, Rob and I were in the spotlight.

Well, for about 5 minutes.

On a stage in front of over 100 starry eyed couples who were engaged to get married, we were interviewed about our first year of marriage.

About one and a half year ago, during our tight engagement period (4.5 months, which apparently is not that short, according to some!), we signed up for the Marriage Preparation Course* at our church, Holy Trinity Brompton.

The people running the course have asked us if we could be the “live interview couple” for the first session this term, the theme of which is Communication. The idea of the interview is for those who are on the course to hear, first hand, from a newly married couple about what they have learnt about being married, the ups and downs and any useful top tips so far!

We could still vividly remember going along to the course on the second week in May last year (as Rob had only proposed to me during the first week, so we missed “Communication”, ironically), seeing so many smiling couples who looked so in love and many no doubt thinking along the lines of I can never spend enough time with you or I can’t imagine having a fight with you ever, you’re so lovely… and then, hilariously, after a very fun and engaging evening having a nice meal, listening to a short talk and doing some discussions on their own, we saw many couples leave the building looking rather grumpy (and not holding hands)!

It seems amusing now, but we too can recall, one week, getting into a serious argument even before the discussion time came along, and not hearing what the speaker was talking about at all. Not sure if we were holding hands when we left either.

Don’t get me wrong. It was a great course. But if one were naïve (which of course many of us were, myself included), one might just get slightly surprised at the different issues that might come up in one's marriage, like how both your attitudes towards money can be very different and a point of serious contention, how best to develop healthy boundaries with parents and in laws (loving as they are, boundaries are good things, as a married couple is one unit and accountable first to each other) and so on and so forth. So it’s good to have a chance to talk about these important things, before one actually takes the plunge.

It’s also interesting to hear many couples say that it’s a precious time for them together, away from the manic (or mundane) wedding preparations which can sometimes take up so much of one’s energy and time, if not skewing one’s perspectives on life too.

In case you’re wondering, what were our top tips?

Rob: I’ve learnt not to give advice or react when Christine is trying to process her emotions externally and just be patient and listen. (Now boys you don’t have to go too crazy here)

Me: For me, it’s not to be afraid of conflict. Keep talking through the issues until you have resolved them. We have found that though it’s painful, we come out the other end closer.

*One does not have to be a Christian to be on the course at all; the course is based on Christian values, but many couples who go along to the course are not church goers.

The Marriage Preparation Course and the Marriage Course are run in many locations around the world.

If you’ve enjoyed this post, you may also like Love and War.

For the Love of Cupcakes

2010-09-08T07:00:00.009+08:00

Have you ever thought of how cupcakes could help victims of sexual trafficking?

No, I'm not talking about cupcakes sold in a booth in some market somewhere to raise funds for a charity that works to combat the problem of sexual trafficking - though that's awesome in itself.

Two weeks ago, Rob and I visited several projects in Phnom Penh, the capital of the Kingdom of Cambodia.

One of these projects is called Bloom Cafe, a cafe which has been set up to help girls and women who have been previously trafficked into the sex trade. Bloom Cafe helps them by training them to bake and make cupcakes (and other kinds of cakes, all ridiculously beautifully decorated) and sell them at the cafe.

We had heard about Bloom Cafe the whole week when we were in Phnom Penh, and on the penultimate day we decided to swing by quickly to have a cup of tea and some impossible-to-eat-because-it-is-so-beautiful type of cupcakes!

The cafe has a lovely, relaxed atmosphere, and scattered around the ground floor are plush sofa seats, all colour-coordinated with matching cushions, and some wooden tables sitting bigger parties.

There are also three glass cupboards filled with displays of decorated cakes - in the form of a stylish luggage with a tag for Paris, a swish lady handbag, Noah's ark (complete with pai

rs of animals), and about 25 other designs. They were so good even Rob was impressed!

(We couldn't take any pictures of the decorated cakes so you'll have to go there yourself to check them out!)

Having never spoken to anyone who's been through unimaginable trauma, I was a bit unsure what to expect when I ordered a set of three cupcakes (and had huge difficulties choosing which three out of the 20+ designs), a pot of Fairtrade Chai tea and a cup of Fairtrade cappuccino. The ladies behind the counter were friendly and professional, and were gracious and smiling as I couldn't stop expressing my wonder and admiration at their work.

Trafficking is a complex issue. One thing which we have learned from our time in Phnom Penh is that huge efforts need to be made in different aspects of anti trafficking work. For example, whilst rescuing trafficked girls and women from brothels is critical in protecting them, they also need to be given appropriate care and counselling afterwards in order to have a chance of being healed or at least coming to terms with the trauma and pain which they have suffered. But it does not stop there - after an appropriate time of aftercare, these girls and women need to have alternative means of making a living, as otherwise, driven by poverty and lack of options, they may fall prey to trafficking and enter that world again.

So Bloom Cafe (and many others) is providing a great form of training and livelihood which gives real, long lasting hope to many who have just emerged from a dark world of unspeakable horror and pain.

In the next few posts I will write more about what we experienced in Phnom Penh, the different kinds of amazing projects that are going on and what we can all do to help combat the evil of human trafficking.

Love and War

2010-09-05T07:00:00.007+08:00

A year ago today, Rob and I got married at Holy Trinity Brompton Church in London. Many friends had warned us beforehand that the wedding day would simply fly past, and that we should savour each moment.

True enough, that day came and went. When we cycled off (yes, on a bicycle!) into the street in Sloane Square trying to find our friend's hired car which was waiting for us, our adrenaline levels were still soaring high. We kept laughing our heads off as we dragged our luggages towards the train to Gatwick Airport at almost 1am, me in my turquoise Chinese cheong sum, and Rob in his T shirt and jeans (for easy cycling).

Friends (mostly girls) have asked me over the past months - so, how is it like being married?

They almost always get shocked when they hear my answer, which goes along the lines of:

Marriage is the most amazing thing that's ever happened to me, but it's also the hardest thing I've ever done.

(Now, before any male reader gets a bit defensive for Rob, I can confirm that he agrees with me too)

Marriage is hard. And I'm not sure why we (most people) still find that surprising.

Perhaps it's because of the far too often endings in romantic films, where the hero returns from somewhere and gets united with his beloved, or when the confused young woman finally chooses the "right guy" (by ditching her boring fiance for the exciting new kid on the block) and they proclaim their everlasting love for each other, and so on and so forth.

You get the idea.

For some reason, we human beings have been conditioned to think that when such romantic scenarios happen, they lead to a state called Happily Ever After which incidentally does not involve anything mundane or inconvenient like washing up after a meal, arguing over who should take out the trash, being too exhausted and stressed out to say nice things to your exhausted and stressed out spouse, or the more serious issues (which are very real possibilities) like the pain of rebellious teenage children, long term sickness, infertility, depression...

We have been fortunate that we haven't experienced any serious issues in our first year of marriage, but to say that it has been a cruise like what Hollywood movies and popular music often imply will be a lie.

We love each other, but we have also found loving difficult at various points. Our selfishness, our seemingly never ending capacity to hurt each other, even unintentionally, and the realness of feeling like we're enemies instead of lovers, become increasingly apparent, and painful to face or admit.

We are often amazed at how much happiness we can have in our marriage, but equally how frustrating and hard it can be.

Too often we think of marriage as the end to romance (for men mostly) or the start of eternal bliss (for women mostly). I would say both perceptions are misconceived.

Marriage is the start of the real adventure of life, where in the safety of life long commitment (if you choose to anyway), you grow to know the other person more and more deeply and learn to love him or her above yourself - which is extremely easy to say but fabulously hard to do.

Choosing to live like this definitely comes with a cost, but the rewards are, though they may not be immediate, unimaginably wonderful.

PS In case it's not clear, I totally recommend marriage!

If you enjoyed this post, you might also like My Obsession with Dust, Sweat and What Not

The Happy Lawyer

2010-09-02T10:34:00.010+08:00

This morning I came across another book on happiness - this time through my lovely dad - one which would interest many of my (lawyer and non lawyer) friends and ex colleagues: The Happy Lawyer (a misnomer?)

I'm totally plagiarising my dad, but here's a quick summary of the first half of the book.

The authors looked at the relationship between happiness and dissatisfaction of lawyers and made the following observations:

Public vs private sector: 2 out of 3 lawyers in the public sector were reported as being more satisfied

Age: Lawyers over 50 years old are happier than those under 50

Income: There is a weak link between income and life satisfaction

Sex: Female lawyers have become less happy during the past 35 years

Race: Black and Hispanic lawyers are happier than Asians and Whites, apparently because more Blacks and Hispanics work in nonprofit or government legal jobs, and more Asian and White lawyers work for large law firms.

The authors also suggested 6 keys to life satisfaction:

Security - physical or economical

Autonomy - ability to make your preferred choices

Authenticity - being who you really are

Relatedness - connectivity to others

Sense of competence

Self-esteem

According to the authors, self development towards these six intrinsic goals produces more happiness than focussing on extrinsic goals, such as becoming rich or famous.

I found this echoes what Oliver James says in Affluenza (which is a great book by the way) - that the motivation of our actions is important, that if we are driven by "affluenza-ish" desires in what we do (wanting to be famous, rich etc), we will tend to have less satisfaction, than if we were driven by intrinsic values (like we actually like our job, the job develops us), even if the latter may actually end up making us famous and rich.

And finally, the authors introduced some tips from what they called the Happiness Toolbox:

make your job matters to you - choose meaningful projects - become a key player - make you job affect other people - identify how your work has bettered lives - strive for a work-life balance - discuss work flexibility with sympathetic (!) boss - make your job more secure - know and become friends with those who control your fate (I don't like how this sounds) - meet or exceed company expectation - take control of your work product and work space - develop your own strategy for meeting goals - personalise your work space (like with Hello Kitty!) - connect with people - collaborate - eat lunch with colleagues or clients - participate in company events (eating lunch will be a start) - choose face-to-face work when possible - if happiness seems possible (!) in your job, commit to that job - don't always look for greener grass (water your own) - remind yourself what you really like about your job - think about projects that have "made time fly" - look for challenging tasks - avoid when possible, too easy tasks (hmm) - avoid making upward comparisons - choose when possible, projects that benefit the less fortunate - find out what experiences have made your colleagues or work-friends happy - know your strength and what gives you pleasure - align your work with your value

Have you got enough ideas yet?

---

I don't think I agree with many things proposed by the authors, but there are definitely some interesting observations and some useful tips.

Although I am no longer in that world, I am still deeply intrigued by how lawyers / corporate people are finding their jobs.

One thing that popped into my head is what about the question of purpose - both in terms of one's own purpose in work/life and the corporate purpose of where you work. Do these matter to you?

As usual, I would love to hear about what you think of any of this!

$$$

2010-08-23T07:00:00.000+08:00

Last week I read another interesting article in the International Herald Tribune - this time on consumer spending - which I'd like to share with my readers!

Stephanie Rosenbloom wrote about how consumers in the US are beginning to rethink about their spending pattern (cf. spending amount). The crux of it is that research (plus some people's own experiences) has shown that buying things will not bring as much happiness / fulfillment as spending money on experiences - so going to see a play, enrolling in language lessons, going on holidays etc, as opposed to buying, say, a Gucci bag, another i-phone, a leather jacket of the latest style.

I suppose there are many reasons why people (in the developed world at least) naturally like to accumulate things (some of which may be, strictly speaking, unnecessary) - there is the intense in-your-face advertising everywhere, things are a more tangible form of "reward" for one's hard work.

But it is not surprising really that spending on what Rosenbloom called experiences would generate more satisfaction.

If you're the sort who likes theatre/art, going to a play or an exhibition increases your appreciation for what you already like, it probably makes you feel good about developing your interests. You might even come out of the venue feeling like you don't need to buy too much stuff, that you're quite satisfied.

If you are into learning generally or have a burning desire to learn a new language, taking lessons can be fun (as well as frustrating I suppose!) and may give you a sense of money well spent, as you're gaining a new kind of knowledge - and it doesn't really matter whether it is a useful language, as there's intrinsic value in learning something.

If you like travelling or just going somewhere to take a break, enjoying a holiday usually (or should, at least in theory) improves your mood, helps you relax, takes your mind off the usual stuff which stresses you, and possibly broadens your horizon too depending on where you go and what you do.

Such "experiences", like many others, enhance our appreciation of life.

Things, on the other hand, which continue to scream out at us "BUY ME!", are more alluring in a way (especially if you're accustomed to a capitalistic society with tonnes of advertising), and they do seem to provide immense satisfaction (in my case, lasting for anywhere between two minutes to two days within the purchase), but such good feelings don't seem to last for very long, and the worst thing is, they seem to require constant "feeding" i.e. making another purchase!

Do you find all this quite perplexing? Because I do!

Off to Phnom Penh

2010-08-20T07:00:00.001+08:00

I'm really excited about our trip to Cambodia tomorrow (despite the ungodly departure hour - budget airline hours).

We're going to be visiting several local projects run by members of the Chab Dai Coalition network which is the partnering network of Viva in Cambodia.

Chab Dai (literally “joining hands” in Khmer) aims to bring an end to trafficking and sexual exploitation through coalition building, community prevention, advocacy and research. There are currently 40 members in the coalition.

During the next week we will be learning first-hand from project workers on the ground about the issues of and solutions for trafficking and sexual exploitation in Cambodia.

For the past few months we have been hearing many good things about Chab Dai from friends and contacts outside Viva, so we're really looking forward to seeing their excellent work in one of the most hardcore, difficult fields in international development.

I hope to write about some of the projects next week.

Rob on Breakfast TV on Channelnews Asia

2010-08-18T07:00:00.001+08:00

Rob will be appearing on Primetime Morning on Channelnews Asia at 8.50am tomorrow, Thursday 19 Aug 2010.

If you have cable or are in Singapore, please switch on your telly if you can!

He will be talking about his 3 year, 30,000 mile solo bicycle expedition Cycling Home From Siberia on which he went through wild places such as Siberia, Papua New Guinea, Tibet, Afghanistan and Iran.

The second paperback edition of Rob's book Cycling Home From Siberia, which has received glowing reviews from the UK press, is now out and available from all major bookshops.

Rob on Radio 3 (RTHK) on Wed 18 Aug

2010-08-17T07:00:00.001+08:00

Rob will be on Morning Brew on Radio 3 (RTHK) at around 11am tomorrow, Wed 18 Aug 2010.

Please tune in if you are in Hong Kong :)

The show's host will be chatting to Rob about his 3 year, 30,000 mile solo bicycle expedition Cycling Home From Siberia on which he went through wild places such as Siberia, Papua New Guinea, Tibet, Afghanistan and Iran.

The second paperback edition of Rob's book Cycling Home From Siberia, which has received glowing reviews from the UK press, is now out and available from all major bookshops.

How Will You Measure Your Life (by an HBS guru)

2010-08-16T07:00:00.004+08:00

Recently a good friend in Singapore forwarded a very interesting article written by Clayton M. Christensen who is the Robert and Jane Cizik Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School.

In his thought provoking article, Professor Christensen draws on his experiences in senior management and applies management models to one's personal life, and suggests some seemingly unconventional and useful approaches to life - I say seemingly unconventional as the principles sound like they go against the grain, but when one sits down to think about them, they make perfect sense!

He looked at the following questions:

1. How can I be sure that I’ll be happy in my career?
2. How can I be sure that my relationships with my spouse and my family become an enduring source of happiness?
3. How can I be sure I’ll stay out of jail? (it's a real question!)

I thought this particular paragraph addressing the second question was very poignant and challenging:

When people who have a high need for achievement—and that includes all Harvard Business School graduates—have an extra half hour of time or an extra ounce of energy, they’ll unconsciously allocate it to activities that yield the most tangible accomplishments. And our careers provide the most concrete evidence that we’re moving forward. You ship a product, finish a design, complete a presentation, close a sale, teach a class, publish a paper, get paid, get promoted. In contrast, investing time and energy in your relationship with your spouse and children typically doesn’t offer that same immediate sense of achievement. Kids misbehave every day. It’s really not until 20 years down the road that you can put your hands on your hips and say, “I raised a good son or a good daughter.” You can neglect your relationship with your spouse, and on a day-to-day basis, it doesn’t seem as if things are deteriorating. People who are driven to excel have this unconscious propensity to underinvest in their families and overinvest in their careers—even though intimate and loving relationships with their families are the most powerful and enduring source of happiness.

I'm suddenly struck by how we can often be shortsighted and, though not intentionally, neglect paying attention to that which has a long lasting impact on our lives.

Does anything from the article echo with you? Do you think it's possible, in our hectic lives, to not under-invest in what's more enduring and longer term?

Grooveshark

2010-08-13T07:00:00.001+08:00

My dad recently sent me and my sisters a link to Grooveshark, a free online streaming music site.

I wasn’t expecting my dad to be that up-to-date with music and streaming and what not, so initially I didn’t think about the link much. But after checking it out we really love it!

It’s easy to use, you can find pretty much any song, the streaming works perfectly, and the most amazing thing is there doesn’t seem to be any ads!? We used to use Spotify (which apparently doesn’t work outside the UK) but got a bit annoyed whenever they blast unwanted ads in the middle of a song.

So do check it out (and let me know if you have any other recommendations)

And thank you to my dad, I’m impressed!

Pains and Joys II: The Art of Resting

2010-08-12T07:00:00.003+08:00

I’m not sure about you, but I certainly experience considerable difficulties learning to take a proper break, rest and relax completely.

Yes, I’ve resisted the temptation to get another Blackberry, or one of its less-sinister offspring (like i-phones and the like) despite the fact that everyone on the planet seems to carry one of those. So one would have thought I should find it easier to “switch off” during the weekends, breaks or holidays. But I don’t.

I blame it on the fast pace of life in a place like Hong Kong. Like New York, Hong Kong is a city that never sleeps. The moment I step out of the building where we’re staying, I see scores of people walking at top speeds up and down the escalator, crossing the road (traffic lights become an annoying personality when I’m in a hurry), dodging in and out of queues, checking their phones, Blackberries or i-phones for messages. It’s not exactly the most relaxing picture.

I blame it on the Checklist Tendency in my working style. Like my dear friend Vicki who I worked with at Tearfund, we have both been profiled as the sort of worker who doesn’t feel good about the day of work unless we’ve checked a whole list of boxes for the tasks we’ve done/things we’ve achieved. With such a tendency (called “Achiever” according to Strengthsfinder), I’m always on the lookout for things to do, in order to “tick the box”. So, even when I’m not working on a Viva matter, say on my way down to post a letter, I think of the other 5 things I could also do on the way – turn on the washing machine, take out the rubbish, get stuff from the store, call my friend about dinner tomorrow, text my other friend to thank her for a great dinner last night, whilst also having a think about how to pitch Viva to the lunch party today.

Some people say it’s the inability to live in the present that prevents us from resting or pausing (and a load of other things). So even when I’m supposedly having a nice weekend doing nothing much, my mind involuntarily goes elsewhere, thinking about the coming Monday, or what should we eat for dinner tonight.

It seems like a disease, this inability to live in the present. It feels natural though, and is alluring and comforting to many, especially those of us who like to plan ahead. It feels like a disease because unless I get rid of it, it actually robs me of real life, of real living. If my mind is always in the future, I’m not really living now, am I?

On Sunday night Rob and I went to a retreat centre at the top of a hill on Cheung Chau, an outskirt island about an hour’s ferry ride from Hong Kong Island. We only spent less than 24 hours there, but even 24 hours away from the buzz and bustle of the city helped. We went there to try and quieten down, to spend some time with God – we feel we really need to be guided by Him particularly for our work with Viva. However, I don’t think one needs to have any religious reason for taking a break and doing something like a retreat. Being in a quiet place, away from normality, and practising silence (something I am very bad at) and just reading and reflecting on things, can be really beneficial for your health – physical, mental and emotional.

Again, I know the benefits of doing retreats, but it is so hard to actually get around to doing them. We have decided to put retreat dates in our diary (and book the room), well in advance, as that will help us to keep space for them, and be more intentional in punctuating our lives with full stops. We have found in the past that unless we did this, that months, or even years could pass without taking a retreat.

*a google search will easily find you good retreat places

Pains and Joys

2010-08-11T11:26:00.001+08:00

There are several things I’m trying to “achieve” these days. And for many of these things I have had serious doubts about whether they’re achievable (not whether they are in theory, but in my own book). But their importance keeps hitting home, so I can’t quite ignore them.

The first thing is going running. I know the many benefits of it: health (especially when one contemplates the real possibility that one is aging, albeit slowly), de-stressing, and the feel-good-afterwards aspect of it. But I hate it. I hate the sweating, the pain (!), the stitches, the you-will-never-get-very-far sort of mindset I get into as soon as I start running, the head spinning - basically the price one pays for exercising when one is unfit.

For exercise, I prefer playing tennis – it is actually fun, interactive and sociable. There’s excitement and variation as opposed to repetition and monotony. I think we’ll get into our tennis again soon, after we retrieve our racquets from Rob’s parents’ in London. But at my level of skill, I don’t think playing tennis itself will get me fit or healthy, as most of the time at the end of the first 30 minutes of playing I would normally be panting like crazy, and be reminded again that I need to exercise more.

So Rob and I have started running a bit – my kind husband jogs with me all the way from where we’re house sitting (on Caine Road in Central, Hong Kong) to May Road, a route which involves almost constantly running up steep roads (I usually run the first stretch, and then walk-run the others). At 33 degrees Celsius, perhaps that’s another reason why running feels even more strenuous. Rob keeps telling me that it will get better - that the more I run the easier I will find – say after one month.

One month! That’s a long time. I’m not sure if I can do it, even though each time after I’ve done it I feel good and motivated to go running again, at least before my lazier self starts to throw me a thousand excuses.

The second “thing I am trying to achieve”, I suspect, a common issue for many, is taking a proper break. I’ll write about that tomorrow.

The Unedited Version....

2010-08-09T07:00:00.003+08:00

A few people have expressed an interest in reading the unedited version of the piece "High Cost of High Life" which came out in My Paper last week, so here it is!

Life without a Blackberry

Do you miss anything from your previous life? seems to be the favourite question which people ask me since I left the corporate world about 2.5 years ago. The fast money, the exotic holidays, the nice apartment where we threw many lavish dinner parties? Or the turquoise corporate Amex card, the slight air of importance I felt whenever I shook hands with clients in glass-roofed buildings? How about the Blackberry handheld device which I had carried with me almost religiously (to the point that some days it even graced the loo), with the blinking red light indicating the arrival of an email and consequently, my immediate attention.

Sure, a part of me misses the high life. Some days, a little voice whispers to me that all the perks which I had left behind were what made life enjoyable, that without them I cannot have a good quality of life.

2.5 years later, however, I do honestly question what kind of quality that sort of life really offered. It seems impossible to erase from my memory the hundreds of late nights, of being “on call” at weekends and evenings, the inability to plan any social activities during the week, and missing many important celebrations. The image of me crying on the phone at 5am in the New York office with my then boyfriend who was cycling in Australia remains etched in my mind. I was constantly exhausted and high (on Coke Light) at the same time. I felt like I was incessantly catching up on sleep, or out partying to make up for my loss.

Recently I visited Singapore and saw some old school friends. Most of my school friends had been straight A students and had gone on to various high flying careers. One guy, who I had not seen for 13 years, commented that I was brave to have left my very well paid job in order to pursue an alternative career in the charity sector. He quickly added that he loved his luxuries too much, so he had no choice but to continue to work his ass off. Feeling slightly surprised by his candour, and not wanting to offend an old friend, I smiled and mumbled something non-consequential. Later that evening I did wonder though, were the luxuries what he was actually living for?

A few months back I read A Million Miles in a Thousand Years by Don Miller who is a brilliantly thought-provoking writer. In his foreword, he described how nobody would want to watch a movie about a guy who worked very hard his whole life in order to buy a sports car in the end. None of us would be very inspired by such a plotline, but the sad fact is, so many of us do live spend our whole lives living a story just like that.

The transition has not been an easy ride – having to deal with head-on many deeply personal issues like my identity, insecurities and my attitudes towards money. However, even with all the struggles I have had to face in my new life, I’m not sure I really miss anything from the old one.
And I now read the red blinking light of a Blackberry as Beware, Danger – I am here to take over your life!

Christine Liu Lilwall grew up in Hong Kong and Singapore, and is married to adventurer and author Rob Lilwall. She worked in the City of London as a corporate lawyer until November 2007 and has since worked for several NGOs in international development and human rights. She has just finished volunteering on a project that works with former street children in Cebu, the Philippines, and regularly writes about her experience on her blog www.lifewithoutablackberry.com.

Am I happy and where am I going (on my birthday)?

2010-08-06T07:00:00.000+08:00

Today is a special day for me. It's my birthday. So, for once, I'm letting myself be a little self-indulgent without beating myself up.

(Yes I do give myself a hard time, but that doesn't mean I stop sharing things which I feel are important - which to some people maybe a sign of self indulgence?)

Anyway.

A couple of questions which I naturally ask on such an occasion are:

- Am I happy with where I am?
- Where am I going?

Happiness. This seems to be on the forefront of everyone's mind these days - you see it in the bestseller sections in book shops, you read about it in forwarded emails, you can't help but notice all the appeals to YOUR HAPPINESS in ads and commercials ranging from types of coffee beans to the latest i-phones to your next holiday destination.

I can't say I'm happy or unhappy really, as happiness is a really hard word to use. No one is happy all the time, or unhappy all the time (except I guess for people who suffer from depression - which is really hard). And whether one is happy or unhappy, sometimes, depends on one's own perception and is relative.

For example, I wake up happy because I know today is my day off, but I get even happier when Rob cooks me my favourite breakfast, but if it rains do I then become unhappy or less happy as we may not have as good a day as we could have? It's a silly example but what is happiness? It seems too transient a concept to be meaningful.

So, I guess maybe I should rephrase - Am I fulfilled, and satisfied with where I am?

Fulfillment is a difficult concept too, but I think it's a better measuring criterion than happiness. Of course, fulfillment is never constant, but at least it goes deeper than just happiness (in my opinion at least).

Working in the charitable world is not always fulfilling, contrary to popular opinion. There are frustrations too of course. But I'm really excited about what's about to happen!

We're now in Hong Kong to start working for Viva, an international Christian children at risk charity. Their vision is to optimise what is an already saturated field - the field of charities and projects working with children.

There are many out there helping the world in all sorts of wonderful ways. But often, especially in the case of the many small grassroot projects started by well meaning local people, they are (through no fault of their own) disconnected, poorly equipped and unsupported. Their workers often have little funds to work with, no fancy laptops which may be available to the top international NGOs, and they don't have many opportunities to be trained and supported in this very difficult field of work.

Viva's vision is to help these projects get connected, equipped and supported so that they can do their work better. Viva helps achieve this by finding where projects are, linking them up so they can share tips and know-how with one another. They also provide training and mentoring to equip projects in what they do.

So it's very exciting to see how we can share Viva's vision and passion with the people of Hong Kong, and invite them to join in this exciting venture.

(And writing helps me to feel fulfilled, in a way)

Which leads me to the second question:

Where am I going?

The answer is: no idea.

Whereas most of my friends are busy getting on with their plans of babies, buying their first (or second or third flat) and planning their careers, Rob and I have no idea where we could be possibly heading towards!

We've committed to working for Viva for an initial two years here in Hong Kong. Rob has lots of exciting things on the side - his corporate speaking, his book coming out in the US next year, his other writing, possible new adventures, whereas I'm focussing more on Viva plus some writing which I really like doing.

Where are we going? We haven't got a clue!

Don't get me wrong, I don't like uncertainties. I hate uncertainties so much that they make me break down and cry sometimes. But I've decided (and will have to decide again) that it's okay, it's okay to take risks; in fact we need to take risks in life - we only get to live once, and more importantly, God calls us to take risks for Him.

Daunted but hopeful and excited - it's a good place to be I think.

The Pacific

2010-08-05T09:51:00.003+08:00

Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God. - The Bible

I’m not normally a big fan of war movies.

Last night, after Rob and I finished watching The Pacific DVD, an HBO mini series, we found ourselves sitting on the sofa, astounded and moved. The Pacific is a 10-episode TV series about World War II, focussing on what happened in the islands in the Pacific (between Japan and Australia). History is not exactly my strongest subject, so this was particularly educational for me. I hadn’t realise that a lot more (at least in Western media) has been written or screened about WWII in Europe than WWII in Asia, and that the war in many ways was a lot uglier and horrific in the East. As the Japanese army refused to surrender in all of the islands which Japan occupied then (which the American army had to invade, one by one, in order to get to mainland Japan), the Americans had to fight every inch of the occupied territories and kill every Japanese soldier in the long drawn war.

I don’t normally like movies or TV with too much violence, and I generally find war stories a bit too macho (and dull in terms of colour – jungle colours). But I have to admit that I really liked the Pacific, not least because it was educational in terms of what happened in history, but more so because it showed in a real way the horrors of war, both the highs and lows of humanity, and how war, no matter how justified it is, is really bad for us – the world.

The Pacific does not glorify war, so even as it got to the point of the Japanese surrender, there was no outright display of jubilation (though there was cause for it, as the war had ended). As for the Marines who had been fighting for years, losing fellow men in their platoons, they found themselves wondering what was next – they had known in their prime a life of repeated, senseless violence, desperate survival, death and loss in the most unimaginable gruelling conditions, and now they had to go back to “normal life”, when life could never quite be normal again.

No doubt this mini series has made me appreciate our time of (relative) peace, but it has also reminded me not to forget those who are still at war in so many places. Again, it’s one of those things that can so easily overwhelm us (and in a way, it should, as the problem is so serious and so vast), but we should not lose heart. Let’s urge our government leaders and all those in high positions to work towards real, lasting peace, and in our own lives, work hard towards reconciliation.

Optionless

2010-08-04T11:11:00.002+08:00

The past few months of volunteering in the Philippines have been very educational in all sorts of ways. Two particular recent events made me realise again how difficult life can be for those who are physically unwell or seriously ill in a less economically developed part of the world.

During our time in Cebu, one evening, whilst we were travelling to an event with CFA, one of the children developed a high fever. At 6 years old, J has a petite physique, almond-shaped eyes and curly hair that hung loosely on her shoulders. Her name in Cebuano actually means a particular bird, which I have always thought is very apt, as when J speaks she does sound like a little bird singing melodiously.

J doesn’t normally cry easily but she was whimpering when I tried to help her swallow some medicine. I carried her to one of the vehicles, laid her on the seats and, in the dark, started to wipe her little body with wet cloths. I felt terrible when she couldn’t take in much water.

Her whole body felt like a furnace. Some Nehemiah girls came by the bus and said a prayer for her. I tried to comfort J by promising her some sweets when she got better.

After an hour, the fever subsided considerably. I almost cried when J finally sat up and started sipping some Coke (for the lack of better alternatives) and eating some biscuits. When we finally went home she sat on my lap whilst I held a damp towel to her forehead, and she must have been feeling a lot better as she started chirping away to her favourite Kuya (older brother).

That evening I was struck by how helpless one must feel when a child whom you care about is not well, especially if you couldn’t afford any medical help. And we, including J, are actually the lucky ones – so many don’t have access to any medical help, and even more don’t have access to clean drinking water. One of the feeding team workers told me the same night that when a street child becomes ill, he or she will usually have no choice but to bear it and hope and pray that they will get better. And the sad fact is sometimes they don’t.

Last week, in Manila, in a different context, the staff worker at a project we visited came to us with a different sort of very serious need. Leading us into her kitchen, she introduced us to her frail and pale faced son. Sitting on a bamboo chair and leaning against the window, he had tubes coming out of his nostrils and at the side of his neck there was a big patch of plaster covering a wound. The boy looked younger than his real age, and he was staring, expressionless, at the television.

He needed a new kidney, she explained, showing us several bottles of medicine which he needed to take continuously to stay alive, and to pay for the new kidney and operation would cost several million pesos (several tens of thousands of pounds).

My first thought was: oh no, not another need again. We have seen a lot of need just in the past few months.

We looked at her, and then at the boy who was still expressionless – as if to say that he had seen this scene many times before, where the visitors, though moved upon hearing about their plight, were unable to help.

Our friend said he would try to speak to the board of directors to see what they could do. We then left the little house with our hearts still sinking.

And then it occurred to me that, if I were the mother, I would have done exactly the same as what the lady did – to ask for help wherever possible. She wasn’t hysterical or breaking down in tears, she didn’t beg us, but she did tell us that she needed help. There was nothing shameful or undignified. She had no choice, nowhere to turn to; all she could do is ask.

Overdose? Part 2

2010-08-02T13:25:00.001+08:00

By Thursday, the second years were looking rather despondent as they examined the roses in Bottle B, while I tried desperately to encourage them to keep making their observations and wait and see what happened in the end.

On Friday, with the Paracetamol roses looking very distinctly the deadest of all, we talked through the experiment as a class, and concluded that we should repeat the experiment, on the assumption that, maybe, the dosage of Paracetamol was too high. For the new experiment therefore, we would use more bottles, with more roses, and also have some bottles with smaller amounts of Paracetamol.

Over the weekend, perplexed, I decided to do what I should have done much earlier – a Google search to find the amount of Paracetamol I should have used! However, instead of finding hundreds of websites with immediate answers I found only one which claimed that rather than Paracetamol, it was actually Aspirin which contained a particular chemical that acts as a plant hormone, the presence of which makes the plant retain water better, and hence the growth process slows down. This site also explained that often people can confuse Aspirin with Paracetamol as both drugs are painkillers available over the counter in pharmacies.

Evidently the textbook, written by some PhD expert in Biology (who had never met, or perhaps never even been a child), proved to be completely unreliable in this instance.

It was already past 7pm on Sunday night when I made this “discovery” so Rob and I made a quick dash to the nearest pharmacy to get some Aspirin. The next morning I woke up with a new nervousness – I had to convince the second years that we were mistaken the first time, and also the second time when we reassessed the experiment, and now we needed to redesign it again. I wondered if they were going to distrust science teachers from now on.

Rob was, on the other hand, cheerful and upbeat. He thought the best kind of experiment was the sort for which you didn’t necessarily know what the result might be. Which I agreed – to an extent – but nonetheless I thought it would be rather unsettling for a bunch of young minds which were beginning to find their bearings in education.

The second years, to their credit, were understanding and their enthusiasm didn’t vanish as I explained my findings to them. They came up with a good set up for yet another experiment and this time we would have two bottles containing different amounts of Paracetamol, two bottles containing different amounts of Aspirin and one bottle as the control.

So, in our last week of teaching at Nehemiah, we launched Experiment Take Two. By the end of the week, whilst all the other roses had wilted, some of the ones immersed in water with dissolved Aspirin, though rather tired-looking, were still alive.

I couldn’t help but notice that the students were relieved to observe a result that made some sense.

Perhaps our next project should be to write to the authors of the textbook with the findings of our Real Experiment. Suggested hypothesis: Aspirin, not Paracetamol, prolongs the life of roses.

Overdose? Part 1

2010-07-29T21:16:00.002+08:00

After my first week of teaching Biology to second year high school (former Filipino streets kids) students in Cebu, it quickly became apparent that it wasn’t going to be enough to teach them theoretical things, and that if I were to try keeping them engaged I would have to somehow come up with something practical for them to do. There were however limitations at Nehemiah – for example, one doesn’t have the normal set of science apparatus which as a science student I had completely taken for granted. There is also no such thing as a science lab – the importance of which I was unaware until now.

And in my Biology classes, I knew it would not do to learn about animal and plant cells by only drawing diagrams on the blackboard without having a look at how such cells actually look. Unfortunately, the only microscope they had at the Nehemiah school is no longer functioning, so short of finding a huge sum to buy a microscope, we would need to be creative and improvise somewhat.

Going through the Biology textbook, dense with long definitions and historical facts which seemed a bit obscure for Filipino students in the 21st century, I was relieved to find an experiment which might just do the job. The hypothesis was this: Paracetamol prolongs the life of plants such as roses.

So, at the start of the second week of school, armed with a dozen of red roses which we bought on the roadside of a church, two tablets of Paracetamol and three empty 1 litre Coke bottles, I presented the project to the excited second years. We got busy filling up the bottles (estimating the same volume as best as we could, though without a measuring cylinder!), cutting the thorny roses (with normal paper cutting scissors) and crushing the Paracetamol (using a plastic bowl and a spoon from the kitchen).

The textbook did not specify how much Paracetamol to use, so I just thought let’s go for the usual human dosage of two tablets (which admittedly isn’t exactly very scientific of me, oh well).

Vaguely remembering that I didn’t use to make much connection between theory and practice in school, I tried to help the class apply what they had been learning the previous week – about scientific thinking and how experiments work, testing them on why they thought a certain way, and keeping the questioning until they gave me an explanation for their answers.

The second years share the chapel area with the first years, the classes being separated by a few blue hand-painted dividers. The chapel was also accessible by students from other classes during recess, so conducting the experiment in their classroom without risking having all the rose petals plucked out by an enthusiastic 9-year-old was impossible. This meant that each day I would have to ask a couple of students to help me transport the bottles up and down from our room on the third floor to the classroom in the basement.

Each day the students examined the roses with excitement and anticipation, but as the week went on, it transpired that perhaps we were discovering a different kind of result than in our hypothesis. The roses in the bottle labelled Bottle B: Experimental 1 – Paracetamol were looking very tired, and it seemed that they would actually be the first ones to bid us goodbye.

Next week I will write about what happened next!

F = m x a

2010-06-29T18:16:00.003+08:00

When the summer ended, we discovered two days before school was due to start that the school here at CFA still had not been able to hire a science teacher, whilst the English teacher was no longer available due to personal reasons. What we also discovered, was that we were to step in to take on these lessons whilst they look for replacement teachers.

Within the next 48 hours Rob and I ploughed through the textbooks given to us for secondary school levels 1-3, only to conclude that the content was way too fact-based (and boring!) for children who may not be the most motivated bunch in learning. Most of these kids come from very difficult backgrounds – they either used to be on the street, or lived with abusive or otherwise dysfunctional families. The fact that the textbooks are in the English language (not their first language) doesn’t help either.

So the new challenge was to think of ways of teaching the subjects (General Science, Biology and Chemistry for me; English and Social Studies for Rob) in as interestingly a way as possible – to inspire the children to learn in the first place, but without compromising on having too little content / actual things that they could learn.

I couldn’t really remember how photosynthesis works anymore, or much about Newton’s laws, and was semi dreading my first lesson. I tried to think of why I had studied so hard in school, what motivated me, and why it didn’t seem to bother me that there were loads of facts to memorize, half of which I didn’t quite grasp until years later. The exercise forced me to rethink from first principles – about what is the whole point of learning about science, and its relevance in the lives of the children.

1.5 weeks later, I feel like I’ve been teaching for a whole month! The kids are absolutely amazing – they do want to learn, they are mostly attentive (with good classroom control techniques, which we term Tough Love), and they are actually very bright. But it’s also been very challenging to convey complex ideas to them as they don’t seem to have much of a strong foundation. I also found it slightly amusing to see how, initially, they seemed to be at their best when they were not listening to anything but instead were copying things from the board – I wondered if I was just the same, having been educated in hugely rote learning environments.

Today I just took over a class which my friend had very kindly taught last week when she was visiting the CFA project. It wasn’t the easiest class, as one-third of the kids seemed perpetually distracted. Despite remembering not liking being picked on by teachers in my school days, I found that paying attention directly on the kids who were not “with me” - working through the task with them whilst still standing at the front of the class and really encouraging them when they got anything right – actually worked, and it was fun!

Today we talked about F = m x a.

Perhaps I could reinterpret the formulae this way:

Fun in teaching = massive preparation x attending to the areas where kids have difficulties i.e. don’t move on until they understand what you’re talking about

Farewell to the Summer Holiday (with movie!)

2010-06-22T12:22:00.007+08:00

Rob put together a video of the shots and clips we've taken during the summer holiday - going on outings with the kids, learning new things together at workshops and eating lots!

The background songs are by Tim Hughes...!

Enjoy :)

Fun Fun Fun!

2010-06-12T14:02:00.032+08:00

Here is a selection of the photos taken of the various summer activities and outings we had with the kids at CFA. Enjoy!

Human Trafficking

2010-06-04T13:22:00.013+08:00

The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.

- Edmund Burke

Last week during a bumpy three-hour drive to a waterfall with some visitors from Germany I listened to an mp3 of a talk which Gary Haugen gave at Holy Trinity Brompton on human trafficking. Gary Haugen, a DC lawyer, is an excellent speaker and his talk brought home to me again the reality of this problem in today’s world. He is the head of International Justice Mission, a Christian organisation dedicated to the rescue of people who have been oppressed or unjustly treated, including those who have been trafficked, and the prosecution of the perpetrators, so that justice may be realised and injustice stopped.

You can listen to the talk HERE.

It’s been said many times before but I still get shocked when I hear that there are more people held in slavery now than more than 200 years ago, before the abolition of the slave trade.

Over lunch, we asked Harald, the German pastor who started CFA some 18 years ago, about the problem of human trafficking in Cebu. Having worked in Cebu for almost two decades, he said the city is actually more dangerous than Manila in terms of children being tricked into being trafficked. He told us the story of one of the girls at CFA. Her family was very poor and lived in one of the feeding areas where CFA visited (and still visits). One day her mother announced, with pride, to one of the CFA staff who was visiting the area, that her daughter had been given a job in Manila. The staff’s suspicions were confirmed as it transpired after much probing that the mother had been persuaded by a stranger to let her daughter go to Manila to work, and in return she would be given some money. In CFA’s experience, instead of the promised new life, the girl would most likely be sold into a brothel. The mother did not intend to sell her daughter into the sex trade, but was unable to support her daughter along with the her many other children. Thankfully the girl was taken into CFA’s care before she left for Manila and she is now a smiling teenager who is petrified of being tickled!

I think the biggest problem that many of us face when it comes to thinking about these things isn’t apathy, but paralysis by despair. We feel overwhelmed by the statistics, dragged down by the facts and helpless because we think the problem is too vast or we don’t know where to begin.

Sometimes I still feel this way, but I’m reminded once and again that:

- if everyone does something, it will count eventually!

- ultimately, it’s a choice that we make, whether we choose to live life as if such things do not happen, or we choose to do what we can to help stop injustice.

So what can we actually do?

Well, I’m not an expert but I think there are at least a few things for starters:

1. We can educate ourselves more about such issues so we can decide what best we can do, and also to tell others about the issues. Here are some good sites - UN Global Initiative to Fight Human Trafficking, Stop the Traffik

2. Stop the Traffik has a campaign where people are encouraged to only buy trafficking-free chocolate (on top of fair trade) and to urge chocolate producers to ensure that the cocoa they use does not involve exploitation of trafficked labour. And you can even hold your own traffick-free chocolate fondue party! See Stop the Traffik for more information.

3. Support organisations such as STT and IJM in their efforts to combat trafficking and other acts of injustice – by telling others about them and by giving financially.

4. If you’re a Christian, I would say PRAY! Pray for God to intervene to bring justice and restored lives out of these places of darkness and despair. Personally, I found that it was as I began praying, I felt more strength to get more involved in points 1-3 above too.

My obsession with Dust, Sweat and What Not

2010-05-29T15:00:00.004+08:00

I think one of the things that most amuse (and infuriate) Rob since our married life started 8 months ago was my (irrational) obsession with dust, sweat, insects and the like. Perhaps many women (and men) wouldn’t find my behaviour abnormal, but certainly Rob has struggled to understand it, whilst over the months I’ve actually found it hard to render a good explanation for it. These “principles” have been such a core part of me that are second nature and hence, to me, the most logical way of life.

Living in a less economically developed country now (albeit in a relatively nice environment), one can imagine that some of these things are even more unavoidable.

Principle 1: If you drop food on the floor (even the cleanest concrete floor), don’t eat it. Depending on what it is, and the state of the cleanliness of the floor, you could possibly rinse it properly under (clean) running water before consuming it.

What is wrong with the floor? Dust? Dust doesn’t kill. There’s dust everywhere.

Principle 2: Don’t sit on the bed whilst in the clothes that you have just worn after a whole day of being outside. The bed should be kept as clean and dirt/sweat-free as possible, otherwise it may attract insects at night!

Again, a bit of dust from the day won’t kill you, and it is nice to be able to relax by sitting on the bed.

Principle 3: The sacredness of the towel. Where we are staying at the moment, there are numerous hooks on the bathroom wall. Dirty clothes should not be hung next to a towel, lest the dirty clothes touch the towel which is meant for drying oneself after a nice shower.

....no harm done by a bit of dust from the day!

Principle 4: If the bathroom is wet and you’re barefooted and your feet are not 100% clean, avoid walking on the wet bits. Instead, tiptoe around them to get to where you want to if possible. If you do walk on the wet bits and start making a mess of the floor (because the water on the floor “dissolves” the dirt on your feet), then please splash some water over the mess and keep the floor clean.

....What a palaver!!

Principle 5: Be on the run as soon as you see any moth/flying ant/flying cockroach/lizard approaching. These are abominable things, and if they land on you, you could get bitten or develop a skin disorder.

These things are friendly and won’t hurt. They are probably more scared of you, this giant human compared to them, than you are afraid of them.

And I could go on and on, about why we shouldn’t hug when one or both of us are sweaty, washing our feet before going to bed, covering the toilet seat when flushing...

Oh the joys of married life!

I should add though, that to his credit, Rob has made tremendous concessions, and we have both made considerable progress moving towards each other’s position.

And it's worth noting that Rob does not always look like the photo at the top - that was taken after a particularly sweaty day cycling down a dusty road in Cambodia!

Taking the Kids Out

2010-05-10T16:18:00.007+08:00

When we first arrived in Cebu, we weren't sure what exactly we might get involved with, as we arrived during the children's summer holiday, and the school where we were hoping to help out was closed during the break.

Over a week, it became obvious to us that perhaps we should try to see if we can make the summer holiday for the children a bit more exciting - as their current daily routine seems to only consist of watching endless TV and pirated movies! Unlike a normal home with more finances to spare, CFA does not have the resources to arrange for special activities for the children during the school holidays. Also, as many of these children, delightful as they are, still have many issues to deal with, it is not always a good idea to let them go out on their own.

So we wracked our brains and came up with a month of summer activities before the children go back to school on June 14! For starters we will play games like Pictionary, have competitions in Scrabble, Volleyball, Badminton etc, and running some workshops for those who are interested (Christine: painting, Rob: writing, etc!). We also thought it would be nice to take the children out in smaller groups to hang out - and watch a movie or go bowling or something.

Even though the cost of things in the Philippines is much lower than that in the UK, multiplying anything by 60 (kids) will add up eventually! We've been really blessed though that some friends have given us some money for use towards the children in Cebu. This way we can pay for the outings as well as some materials for the summer activities.

The first outing we went on we took our first group of children to see Iron Man 2. It was heartening to see that even though (I think) the teenagers didn't fully understand the plot, they thoroughly enjoyed the experience and were very grateful for our efforts. For us who grew up with so much, it was a shock that the children had never been to the cinema to see a movie before.

By the time the movie ended most of the eating places were shut except the Filipinos' version of McDonalds, called Jollibee! So we went in for some fried chicken, spaghetti and burgers - there was quite a range of choices I have to say. We gave them a budget to work with when ordering their meals. I was taken aback when even the 16 year olds suddenly became incredibly shy at the thought of ordering their meals over the counter - and then I realised that most, if not all, of them, would not have had any opportunity to eat out, and even if an adult took them out for a meal, they might not have been asked to order the food themselves. So there we were, coaxing and encouraging them to just pick a meal out of the 10 meals shown on the board, whilst they giggled, hid behind each other and looked perplexed at the many choices. I was so proud when they finally made up their minds and managed to tell the person behind the counter what they would like to eat, even though they tended to copy each other and ended up ordering the same thing!

Beautiful One

2010-05-03T11:27:00.022+08:00

We arrived in Cebu less than two weeks ago and already I’m feeling as if I had never left in the first place.

It’s much hotter at this time of year than on my previous visits, in the 30Cs, though a bit cooler at night. April to June is also the summer holidays for the kids. The morning rays beam through the windows at about 6am, so we’re getting used to waking up and going to bed earlier. The roosters in the neighbours’ backyards which used to annoy me are slowly becoming part of the pleasant background noise against which we sleep in the early morning.

These few days feel much more relaxed than the first week we were here – the first three days we were thrown into the middle of the kids’ summer holiday camp where the schedule was jam packed with activities ranging from basketball tournaments to worship sessions to jewellery-making classes. We gave ourselves the excuse of having arrived mid-week, so we didn’t get up at 5am like the rest of the camp. Very often the evening sessions of Bible teaching, worshipping and a time of ministry (where we all prayed and waited on what God might be saying) ended past 11pm, so everyone was exhausted. However, the exhaustion didn’t seem to dampen anyone’s mood or enthusiasm, and in between the sessions several of the kids would follow us around wanting to play Scrabble!

It was amazing to see how these kids, many of who didn’t start proper education at the normal age of 6 (many of them have a late start in life), were creative, knew many excellent words, were patient with each other and overall played very well - though the kids were so enthusiastic that Rob and I were rather “Scrabbled out” by the end of the week!

After the summer camp, we went straight onto a 4-day outreach trip in nearby Astorias in the south of Cebu, where we went round with the kids to different communities to share with them the love of God through music, drama, dancing and sharing of the kids’ own stories of being rescued from the streets and of finding healing from their past hurts. It was hard not to be moved watching many of the acts.

On the second day of the outreach, whilst the older girls (teens) were performing their beautiful dance with tambourines (to the tune of Beautiful One by Tim Hughes) in a dimly lit community hall, it suddenly struck me that these girls would not be where they were now if they had remained on the streets. It’s more likely that at least some of them would have resorted to prostitution or have had several pregnancies by now, and certainly they would not be the happy, talented and radiant girls dancing before our eyes – children with huge potential and dreams that could actually be realised.

Tomorrow we will go on a feeding trip in the slums of Cebu which will be our first together.

Back in the Land of Smiles

2010-04-21T11:25:00.003+08:00

For the first time ever I was looking for signs for slums as our plane descended on Cebu City while the sun was setting. It escaped me why I never paid attention in the past, but this time we could see clearly that they dotted the circumference of the islands. You can tell it’s a slum by the tin roofs, usually silvery in colour, but sometimes they’re of rusty red or yellow. The odd thing was, maybe because they were so many, they seemed to blend in with the rest of the islands.
We walked off the plane and into the luggage hall, and whilst waiting for our bags I was slightly amused at the sight of people holding big bags of boxes of KrispyKreme – we had flown in from Manila – perhaps this is the latest fashion in the capital. One woman had three gigantic boxes of 12.

Outside the airport, To To, one of the workers in Nehemiah House and a former street kid himself, was there to pick us up. It has been just over two years since I was last here, when I was taking a career break after the City. I joked about his longer and curlier hair, and we were happy to see each other again.

It felt rather surreal being back on the streets of Cebu again. There seemed to be more lights, more billboards promoting mobile phones, and there are still the endless rows of stalls selling aromatic barbequed meat, and the random long queue of people outside a bank for cash machines. As we crossed the big bridge connecting the airport to the rest of Cebu, we could see a sprawling city lit up in parts by orange lights. Then, suddenly, as we neared the busier streets, we were bombarded by different smells – the exhaust from the hundreds of jeepneys cruising in and out of the undefined lanes, the enticing BBQ aroma, and the occasional open sewage.

Crossing a big intersection with huge blinking billboards just like in Piccadilly Circus, I was suddenly struck by a sense of apathy. The voice inside my head was literally saying – why bother to get involved with anything? The world will go on and the problems will be resolved slowly but ultimately. One can tell that there is a lot of wealth in this country – not least from the billboards, the Krispykremes, the big SUVs with black-out windows, so maybe the prosperity will ultimately save the rest of the country.

What can we, small potatoes as we are, actually do? What difference can we make?

Then, I was reminded of a serious saying – when I think of what tremendous consequences come from little things, I am tempted to think that there are no little things (Bruce Barton - extracted from Rob’s motivational talk!), and a lighter one which I found on the fridge of some good friends – if you think you’re too small to make a difference, try being in bed with a mosquito!

I have a feeling it’s going to a real battle of ideologies as we volunteer on the street children project for the next three months.

Happy Second Anniversary

2009-11-30T20:32:00.004+08:00

Today marks the two year anniversary of my new life without a blackberry. Some friends commented back in 2007 that it was a brilliant phrase, but these days it may not appeal as much, as it’s rather rare for anyone to be without a blackberry – you don’t really have to work in the City to be “blessed” with such devices anymore.

It’s been quite a ride since I packed up my things and exited the shining revolving glass doors of Allen & Overy 2 years ago today. It began with my first ever “sabbatical”, a 4-month career break to learn to breathe again without feeling hyper tensed (which back then was not helped by that blinking red light on the blackberry), to gather up my much scattered thoughts and regain perspective on life and work. This all sounds so dramatic as I write this, but on hindsight I think that was exactly what happened. For the next many months as I went about researching on the charity sector and hunting for opportunities, going from a temp job in a development consultancy to a HR admin job to an HIV project coordinator role in Tearfund, I grappled with identity and self worth issues, which I suppose are common to many who dare to jump ship and try something altogether different work-wise. (I reckon many new mums probably face that too, given how little credit society seems to give to motherhood these days).

It wasn’t easy at all, trying to:

(1) give up the money and many luxuries in life including just walking into any restaurant without looking at the prices (something which I now think was probably not very wise),

(2) redefine my identity, from being one of 4000+ staff of a magic circle law firm – a term which, to my horror after I left, rings no bell whatsoever in many other circles, to err-I’m-still-wondering-what-I’m-going-to-do (and I had to drop in a line to say that I used to work in the City or I used to be a lawyer), and

(3) survive and thrive without the usual sense of security, though very soon after my exit the City (and the rest of the world) got into some serious trouble.

It was very hard work, and I found the redefinition of identity the most challenging of all, as the whole process brings up many deep seated personal issues which are so fundamental to me as a human being. It revealed my biases and the many coloured lenses through which I used to see the world and people generally. It showed me where I placed my hopes and dreams and confidence. It was a shocking, uncomfortable time, and in many ways I’m still going through that, but I think the rougher bits are over now (for this particular stage at least), and I’m happy to say that these days in most situations I don’t feel the need to mention to new acquaintances about me being a lawyer in my previous life, but that’s not to say that I don’t ever mention it!

The Scrabble proposal came, the wedding was underway within 4.5 months (not quite a record apparently, given my previous landlord got married to his lovely wife within 2 months of being engaged), I left Tearfund, we went on holiday to Canada to see my family, the wedding day arrived (which was beautiful and amazing), followed by the honeymoon in southern Spain, and within a week of our return to London, Rob had his official book launch which was a huge success (I felt like an important wife doing all the socialising :))

I continued on with my life without a blackberry by starting an internship with Equal Rights Trust, a small and relatively new NGO which focuses on equality and non discrimination around the world. It’s a brand new area for an ex corporate person (I want to see how I can use my legal background in development/social justice), and reading many of the cases and reports brings me back to law school days when I did care about the freedom of expression etc. For 3 days a week I work for these human rights lawyers, and one day a week I volunteer with Christian Solidarity Worldwide, a Christian NGO that advocates for freedom of religion for all faiths, and puts pressure on governments to release prisoners of conscience. It’s been really humbling to work for these NGOs, as I’m reminded each day of the ridiculously huge range of freedoms and liberties I enjoy each day, most of which I completely take for granted. It’s also been uplifting to work for CSW, which, similar to Tearfund, derives much of their motivation and energy from God, who we believe is a God of the fatherless and the oppressed. Every Friday I work for my third boss, Rob, in his new venture with his book, TV series and speaking engagements. We’ve discovered it’s not an easy task working as husband and wife (especially with a wife who thinks very strongly that the City way of doing things is the only way), but we’re working on it with tears and laughter.

I continue to feel challenged (and sometimes depressed, which signals that I’m probably getting something wrong) by issues of poverty both globally and locally, in both my inability to figure out the solution (I KNOW, how can anyone just figure it out? I must be mad) and in my indifference and inconsistent lifestyle.

Thankfully, I’ve found help (and many challenging messages) in Shane Claiborne’s The Irresistible Resolution: Living as an Ordinary Radical, Bryan McLaren’s Everything Must Change, Steve Chalke and Cherie Blair’s Stop the Traffik, Rob Bell’s Jesus Wants to Save Christians, and many more, but I would recommend these if you are grappling with these issues too. There are no easy answers unfortunately; but I suppose we must keep grappling and keep changing in small ways. I’ve recently been recommended Simplicity, Love and Justice which according to my friends provides practical tips on how you can live simply, do justice and impact your community so I'm looking forward to reading that.

Married life, I’m happy to report, is great, but not without its challenges. We went on The Marriage Preparation Course which was good fun, hilarious at times and very practical, and 3 months into the marriage now, sometimes we still wonder if we remember anything at all from the course?! Rob and I are probably what you would call “relationship nerds”: we went through quite a lot of marriage prep material like Loving Against the Odds by Rob Parsons, Fit to be Tied by Bill and Lynn Hybels and of course The Marriage Book by Nicky and Sila Lee who run the Marriage Prep Course as well - all extremely helpful stuff. Even so, at times we feel completely lost and not very equipped to deal with many issues that come up, especially when both of us think that we’re in the right! What Miles, the minister who married us, said about being the first to race to say sorry is very good to hear but very hard to apply indeed. A friend of ours once said to us before we got engaged that in his first year of marriage (they’re in their 7th year now) he felt that there was always a mirror that’s held up against his face, that he could see all the ugly selfishness which he was not aware of in the past. How true, especially when sometimes we do feel like strangling each other as we feel so frustrated!

One thing Rob and I have found really beneficial from all the books so far is the intentional carving out of an evening a week which is often called “Date Night”, where we set aside the time to “go out” as if we’re still in the dating stage, and where we make a real effort to talk to each other and understand how each other is feeling and thinking these days. We’ve also discovered that, true enough as we’ve been told, if you don’t put it in the diary it will never happen!

We’ll be away in the US for most of January, and will be leaving for Asia, where first we will be volunteering with the same street children project Christ for Asia in Cebu City for 3 months, and then back to Hong Kong in July. We’re not sure what we’re doing to do in HK yet, but praying and hoping the right doors will open at the opportune time! Our diaries are filling up quickly but we hope to be able to catch at least some of you in the UK before we leave, and we look forward to seeing those of you who are based in Asia very soon.

One year on...

2009-06-27T05:23:00.002+08:00

Been ridiculously procrastinative (no such word) about updating this blog.

One year has flown past since I last wrote anything here. Spent 6 months doing an administrator's job in the international human resources team at Tearfund (which was good fun but felt it was time to move on) and then got an amazing opportunity to coordinate a US government funded HIV/AIDS project in Zambia and now, 6 months on, with my contract with the HIV/AIDS project just ended, my own wedding in 2 months, I'm relaxing in the most livable city on earth, yes, VANCOUVER, trying to catch my breath after such an intense year so far and doing some suntanning! Just realised there are very few commas in my sentences so far.

Been finding it incredibly challenging keeping up-to-date with the latest Facebook, Twitter, and what not technological stuff, and on top of all that complicated new ways of doing life I just discovered my dad has one of those i-somethings! Am not even sure what that's called again.

Rob and I are feeling very ancient at the moment :)

Hmmph.

The new plan (yes, another plan!) is to get married (Sept Sept Sept!) and go on a long honeymoon (but not as long as some people have it, like our friends Dan and Nicola, who went for 3 months!), and hopefully look for a job in October. But then Rob and I will be off very soon in January to the Philippines - yes where I worked with the street children organisation Christ for Asia before - for a few months at least and then we'll head to Hong Kong for a year in April.

Plans plans plans.

In his heart a man plans his course, but the Lord determines his steps - Proverbs 16:9

Lord please guide me!

New Beginnings (with video!)

2008-06-12T20:11:00.010+08:00

In case you're wondering, I haven't disappeared from the face of the earth yet!

I've just been lazy with updating this blog. Life's been busy on many fronts - still doing a lot of thinking (about old and new things!), re-adjusting to life in London (which now includes the wanderer-turned-writer boyfriend), finding my feet in development, moving to an absolutely lovely area called Canada Water... but there's still no excuse.

Cebu II and III are coming, I just don't quite know when! In the meantime please do watch the video I've made using some video clips and photos I took in Cebu (see further below). If you're interested in helping the street children charity, please let me know or go to their website www.christforasia.info.

A quick update on where I am on this blackberryless journey:

Since mid April I've been temping at an international development consultancy in Victoria, London. Funny how I used to think temping is a really strange concept, and probably only for people who "didn't make it", but now I think it's actually quite a good thing to do, especially if you're trying a few things out or you're building what Richard Nelson Bolles (and others I'm sure) calls a "portfolio career" (where basically you set out to collect the skills you think you will need for your ultimate career). Interesting how my perspectives change as I job hunt! The international development consultancy is a firm of consultants who advise government agencies and sometimes NGOs in their development programmes / policies / projects, and are a lovely bunch of people who are trying to make a difference in their own way! I was a bit taken aback at how relaxed and chilled out everyone is here (and they actually like what they do).

Rather miraculously, at the end of May, I managed to get an interview with my top favourite NGO of all times, Tearfund (www.tearfund.org), to get registered on their temporary register. I wasn't too sure how I could get into the organisation without having quite a lot of the technical specs that they normally ask for, so I thought why not try temping first? When I went for my interview there happened to be a job going in the International HR Team so I interviewed for that and in less than 3 hours they offered me the job!! I was probably a bit in shock for a week after that, but very excited and grateful to get a chance to see how Tearfund works from the inside and also get another bit of my foot through the door of development! I think HR is not exactly my thing (what is my thing??), but I'm interested in what they do (esp because the team deals a lot with the overseas based Relief and Development Team) and this will be a really good opportunity to learn and acquire more skills / know how in the field.

The only down side (and seriously it's the ONLY down side) is Tearfund is based in a place called Teddington which I had never heard of previously and according to Transport for London it's in Zone 6!

Gone will be the days when I wake up at 8am to go to work.

Yes I know I'm very spoiled...

Anyway, so this is a new exciting chapter for me, and as a friend was asking the other day, I'm still going to be blackberryless for a while :)

Here's the video.

Cebu 2008 from Christine Liu on Vimeo.

Cebu: Part I of III: The Real and the Surreal

2008-03-25T19:08:00.010+08:00

Each day the feeding team sets offs at around 4pm in a van stocked up with several large pots of steaming rice and the nutritious food that it has prepared, large containers of water, along with plastic plates and cups. When there are two feeding locations (with up to 200 children in each), the day does not finish until about 9 or 10pm.

One afternoon we arrived in a slum area when the rain had just stopped. The area looked like a gigantic dumping ground and was very wet and muddy after the downpour. Even before the van pulled in the children started running towards us and jumping onto the sides of the van like hyperactive monkeys, giggling and calling out our names. I watched with worry as they very skilfully dodged the muddier puddles and hopped around on the dryer patches, avoiding the splashing of the thick grey mud. Soon we were embraced by the smell of sewage; I instinctively held my nose as I got off the van to a growing crowd of smiling, expectant children.

I stood rather speechless at the sight of nine and ten-year-olds carrying smaller children on their backs, not seeming to mind the mud-stained flip-flops brushing against the back of their t-shirts. They took care of them as if they were their babies, taking turns when they got tired. I have also seen older children giving their food to younger ones. Most of them are not even related. The children look out and care for younger ones because they know what it means to be small and vulnerable, and they do this out of sheer kindness and love and not because they have anything to gain from it. It really makes me question my own heart, how often I don’t even share with people I know, let alone strangers totally unrelated to me.

The children were so happy to see the team and eager to sit on the mats which we had brought, waiting to listen to the Bible stories for the day. My sister, who, like me, is not used to noisy and overly excited children, pleaded with them to sit down and keep quiet. They battled with one another for the pieces of paper being given out for them to write their answers to a quiz we had prepared - they were so keen that when the quiz ended they expressed disappointment that there weren’t more questions to be answered! Children do desire to learn don’t they, but so many in the world lack the opportunities to do so.

After handing out plates of food from the candle-lit van (as the light at the back of the car was broken) to what seemed like an endless queue of children we set off for the second feeding location situated at a busy roundabout in the city. The children there seemed scruffier and dirtier and certainly didn’t smell very nice, but again they were so happy and excited when our van pulled in, and they kept asking for my sister’s name as they had not met her before. As soon as they found out what she’s called they were all chanting “Ate (= big sister) Tina” and wanting to play with her (in the form of Tina holding their arms and spinning them around). One girl who didn’t speak much English beckoned me over and pointed to the new bandage on her lower right leg. Barbara, a volunteer from Switzerland, had treated her wound earlier. Many of the street children are often covered with nasty cuts which take ages to heal because of the lack of hygiene and basic essentials such as antiseptic cream and bandages. What Barbara did was a simple act, but it meant so much to the girl.

Towards the end of the feeding, the children and adults started putting the used plastic plates and cups in one of the large basins. I was busy arranging the plates and cups into a pile when a man, wanting another drink of water, picked up a used cup and rinsed it in the basin with the mix of water and leftover sauce from the meal. I stared at the dirty cup and felt sorry for him, but he smiled and thanked me in English as he gulped down the lukewarm water.

The topic of happiness is super hot in the West these days. Some say one’s happiness is dependent on one’s expectations. Is that true? Were those children playing in Mud Land happy because they didn’t expect anything other than mud and sewage smell? Was the little girl grateful and content because she didn’t (and couldn’t) expect anything beyond a small piece of bandage? Did the man wanting a drink of water smile and thank me because that’s all he wanted? I suppose one could argue that one of the reasons why many in richer countries, despite having more in material terms, are still unhappy is because for some reason we are always wanting and expecting more (and more) and we are not content with what we already have.

But is that it? Are monks and nuns happier people necessarily? From what I saw in Cebu it seems that one can be happy even if he doesn’t have much. In fact, it seems that the more we have the unhappier/more dissatisfied we become, though of course that’s not what the world of advertising would like us to think. I suspect many of us probably resonate with this deep within but curiously most of us still carry on doing what we have always done – it seems most natural to do so.

I’m not saying possessions are evil, but if I was honest, I would admit that more often than not possessions do seem to take over me and render me powerless to say no to acquiring more and more. Just two hours before writing this I was walking down the street in central Brighton. As I passed by the shops I found myself drawn to many window displays (of nice clothes, books, DVDs), a familiar desire rising within me crying out for the items. It was almost as if I would be happier and more complete if only I could acquire another skirt (despite being seriously convicted for the past months that I have way too many clothes), or that book, or just those two DVDs. But I know that that’s simply not the case - my heart will actually continue to long for more after being temporarily gratified by my purchases. Oliver James in his book Affluenza suggests some principles as antidote to the modern day “virus” of wanting more incessantly. I have yet to read it, but just browsing the interestingly worded chapter titles I have decided that the book is probably buying (from a second hand bookshop perhaps!).

The Gospel of Matthew records Jesus saying some rather radical things which seem to be words echoed from a distant world. One such thing was: “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where you treasure is, there your heart will be also.”

Where is my heart? Is it with the poor and those without, or the window displays?

Happy Year of the Rat

2008-02-08T13:31:00.002+08:00

February 7th marked the first day of the Year of the Rat in the Chinese Lunar Calendar. As per our custom, all my relatives from my father's side gathered at my grandma's and had a sumptuous and noisy meal. As we are no longer children, my cousins and I restrained from doing what we did when we were little, ie running to the toilet straight after we received our red packets (see further below for an explanation) to see how much money we've got this year...

We still had a good time anyway.

For the curious, here are a few must-haves for Chinese New Year:

Beautiful daffodils - my mum's favourite. In Chinese we call them Shui Xian which translates Water Fairies - what a lovely name! Many families put them in shallow dishes around Chinese New Year. They give out an amazingly pure and refreshing scent.

Everyone's favourite!! These red packets containing a token of money are usually given by married persons to relatives/friends of a generation younger than yours, or younger relatives/friends of the same generation. If you're not married you can escape this duty, and apparently when you first get married you receive a one-year grace period during which you are not obliged to give! These colourfully decorated red packets were given to me and my sisters by my aunt.

Collection of sweets and goodies - sweet lotus seeds at the top, followed by (going clockwise): sweet mellon pieces, sweet coconut pieces, sweet lotus roots, random japanese sweets, sweet melon again, with dried water melon seeds in the middle.

In recent years this particular "dish" has become popular with the general public in Hong Kong, though it used to only be consumed by certain groups of residents in the New Territories. Normally it is made up of: Chinese mushrooms, dried beancurd, prawns, abalones, fried pigs skin(!), dried oysters, dried scallops, sea cucumbers, turnip, all braised in a yummy thick sauce.

It may look small but it can easily fill the stomachs of 15 people!

Glutinous Rice Cake - okay, it may not look like the ones you see in the shops but this is my first attempt of a homemade Chinese pudding, and judging from my parents' reaction so far I think it's quite good!!

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I leave for Cebu, the Philippines on Tuesday for 3 weeks to work with Christ for Asia, a Christian charity that works with street children in Cebu City. It will no doubt be very challenging but I'm excited... so watch this space!

Singapore: Slings and Arrows

2008-02-04T12:25:00.000+08:00

Last month I flew to Singapore for a 2-week visit and met up with old friends and relations. I have always had a love-hate relationship with this place, and with each visit my feelings grew even more complicated.

Love, because Singapore is clean, tidy, relaxed and, most notably, nicely hot. The people (I used to find anyway) seem a lot more down-to-earth than their fellow counterparts in, say, Hong Kong. I felt I could let my hair down completely, wear any random top, bottoms and flip-flops I could find and wouldn't feel embarrassed or inappropriately dressed going to most places. Because I spent 6.5 of my growing years there, I have many good bosom friends from high school days. From memory our concerns were to do well in the O and A levels and know nice boys (in that order), and we didn't seem too fussed about money, fame or even beauty. It's great making friends in that context as friends such as these seem to remain forever as pure and innocent as before, no matter what time has done to us 10 years on.

Hate. Well, hate is probably too strong a word. Reservations, maybe. The usual complaints aside (e.g. the apparent homogeneity of things, the paternalistic governing, the lack of freedom, the extreme competitiveness), I always wished for in the people I met more spontaneity, more outside-the-box kind of thinking and more daring attitudes. I can't say I'm not generalising somewhat. I remember being 17 (i.e. rather naive and idealistic) and dying to express my views on certain rather politically sensitive topics in our General Paper class, and while our teacher seemed slightly pleased to see the potential of a good debate, no classmate of mine raised their hands to say anything in response. Perhaps it was a topic no one was really interested in, but on hindsight I think it was probably either apolitical indifference or some sort of subtle fear that dictated the silence of my class.

I'm not saying Singaporeans can't think for themselves, but certainly I'm not sure if they are really encouraged to, in spite of all those creative writing and thinking lessons they are made to take. Can one create creativity? It seems like most of the time the people don't feel completely free to express themselves. The inability to be free with one's thoughts, I think, curbs creativity and stifles spontaneity, and in turn further perpetuates the bubble of apparent success and security.

A good friend asked me over drinks one evening whether I thought Singaporeans were shallow. I asked her what she meant by shallow. She said: "obsessed with the materialistic, with little culture or history." This time in Singapore I did notice the increasing affluence, how everyone seemed to be all out shopping all the time, and I could hear a lot more talk about huge killings made in the property market, higher wages and bigger spending power, and was even told that government-supported scientific research institutes remunerate their staff based on their profit-making performance (instead of research ability or results). I felt sad seeing Singapore turning into another money-obsessed city, not least because I now felt less relaxed about how I dressed/looked on the street, but my response to my friend was - isn't the whole world going that way too? As for culture and history, given Singapore only has 42 years of history since its independence, can one expect much of a culture at this point? And just when we were discussing this point, a Singaporen version of the song Pretty Woman was blasting in the cafe. That's culture, no?

Home in Glittering Hong Kong

2008-01-15T16:52:00.001+08:00

The other night whilst walking home from Causeway Bay to Wanchai I passed a long row of shops selling trendy clothes and accessories. They were still open. It was midnight on a Monday. I hardly know of any other city in the world where one can find plenty of normal shops still open at midnight.

Hong Kong.

The name in Chinese translates to "fragrant harbour" in English. I always wondered why the word "fragrant" was picked, as Hong Kong does not seem to me to be particularly sweet-smelling, but according to Wikipedia the original area was one where fragrant wood products and fragrant incense were once traded! So much for growing up here!

It feels slightly strange to be home again. In one sense I feel as if I have never left the place at all, but in another it seems as foreign to me as any new city can be. I walk on the streets dodging hundreds of people who seem to all walk into one another in an organised chaotic fashion, I sit in dim sum restaurants hearing conversations the words of which I understand but the substance of which I don't, I wait for my friends in glamorous shopping malls watching every sort of character appear and disappear every two seconds. It seems all so familiar. Yet at times I feel like an external on-looker observing the buzzing city through Alice's amazing looking glass.

I was on the bus one morning. Looking out of the window in the air-conditioned double-decker I could see business people smartly dressed in the latest Armani suits waiting at the crossing (and checking their blackberries). Two people who are probably colleagues heading to the same meeting were silent and not talking to each other. They just stood there side-by-side, expressionless. Perhaps they just had an all-nighter? Further on the road I could see a newspaper hawker sitting on a stool about 10cm away from the pavement. He had probably been sitting there since 7am that morning and would not leave till at least 9pm.

My hairdresser was telling me that afternoon how his assistant often has lunch at 5pm because they are so busy. He himself was off sick the previous day because of his severe sinus. That day he didn't feel too well either but he was back at work, full-swing. In the evening I went to the fresh meat market with my mum. Whilst trying very carefully not to step in any puddle of fish blood as I had my pretty new shoes on, I saw many, many middle-aged butchers, men and women, wearing big black plastic aprons and gloves, smeared with blood, all furiously gutting the fish or chopping up the meat. They had probably worked like this at the stalls since their late teens.

I wouldn't normally say life is hard in Hong Kong, at least not compared to many parts of the world, but these days it struck me as pretty hard. Perhaps it's just a case of my being blind and oblivious to the lives of some who are not lawyers, bankers or accountants. Not that lawyers, bankers or accountants never work hard. They do (I'm tempted to use the word "we"!).

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Qn: Why do people work so hard?

Ans: They need to make a living.

But do people need to work this hard, so hard that one is physically and mentally exhausted, one's health gets compromised, one hardly has time to see his family etc etc?

I can see why in certain circumstances one must work this hard, as otherwise one simply may not be able to feed his family. But I think in the developed world, these cases are rare. My good friend pointed out to me that the gap between the rich and the poor in Hong Kong (and, I'm sure, many other booming cities) is widening, but I have to admit that I was quite shocked to see children living in government flats having the latest mobile phones, trendy clothes and enjoying a huge plasma TV at home. Maybe that is not common, or these families do not represent the poorest.

Nowadays it is a bit of a joke amongst my friends that I'm unemployed. But I did used to work hard. Some would say very hard. Often I was asked why I had to work so hard, to which I would reply with a combination of: (1) well, everyone (in law at least) worked this hard, (2) it is not always like this, and (3) if you want to move up you will need to work this hard. Never did it really occur to me to answer that working very hard (1) paid my bills (which were ever increasing in number and amount), (2) allowed me to have a comfortable (or some would say luxurious) lifestyle (which was ever getting more and more comfortable, or luxurious), and (3) afforded me the potential / dream of acquiring the many, many things I could have in the future, like a nice house, a nice car, a nice school for my children, even more nice holidays... (not that any of these reasons are wrong, or not good in themselves)

I think I was working hard apparently for one set of reasons but the other set of reasons were the real, subtle driving force behind my working hard. So you see, I was rather self-deceived. Or at least not very self-aware.

Is it at all possible to not work so hard and live a simpler and equally vibrant life, but with more time, energy and space? For family, friends, old and new hobbies, mother nature, health, rest, unread books, charitable causes...? Or is this only a luxury for the few with the freedom to choose? Or, do most of us actually have this freedom but somehow just don't see it?

Some Observations about an English Christmas

2008-01-10T10:12:00.000+08:00

This past Christmas I had the absolute pleasure and privilege of spending it with Rob and his family in Shropshire in the UK midlands. (Aussies: yes, it is indeed the Shropshire featured in the coffee ad back home!)

I had never spent Christmas with an English family before so I was very excited just thinking about it (and the many sumptuous meals of which I had heard so much)!

While spending time in the lovely house in Shropshire I became quite fascinated by a number of things:

1. The Aga

Apparently this stored-heat stove and cooker is very common in the UK, especially in the countryside. You can use the oven compartments as well as the "hobs". It runs on gas and seems permanently hot. I loved standing next to it warming myself while waiting for the kettle to boil. I discovered that there is also an Aga cookbook!

The Aga was invented by a Swedish physicist in the 1920s.

2. Walks in the countryside in your wellies

I first came across wellies when I was about 4. They were yellow and there was a cartoon figure on each one facing outwards. I wore them to kindergarten during rainy seasons. I had not seen them since my childhood days.

This Christmas I re-discovered the simple joy of marching (!) through the beautiful but often muddy fields wearing your wellies. This time my wellies are lilac, a lovely pair of Hunters from Rob.

3. Brussel sprouts and parsnips

Apparently you either love or hate these. Usually those who love Brussel sprouts hate parsnips and vice versa. There were lengthy negotiations over how many one must have, deals were struck to trade one for another....

I have yet to decide whether I love or hate them.

4. Stockings

Before Christmas arrived Rob kept telling me about the "stockings". I had thought, from memory of watching western cartoons, that stockings are where you put your Christmas presents. It turned out that you deposit the "main" presents under the tree and what you find in stockings are smaller presents which are either more practical things or fun things. I had become quite obsessed with the stocking business by midnight on Christmas Day and I was thrilled to receive my very long stocking from Father Christmas (Americans: read - Santa Claus) stuffed with 15 presents!

5. The turkey

For someone who is quite into food, I was quite embarrassed to find out that the turkey is actually very big compared to a chicken! I was told it weighs at least 4 times as an average chicken. Because of its size, it was able to feed us for many meals. Rob's mum was most talented in making different dishes out of the same bird! Apart from impressing the family with my lack of knowledge on turkeys, I must have left an equally deep impression having devoured a whole huge turkey leg over lunch one day.

6. The Queen's speech

Rob is a big fan of the Queen. Growing up in Hong Kong meant I saw the Queen on notes and coins and official documents, until the handover in 1997. But there was never much attachment or connection with the smiling and kind-looking royalty.

The Queen's speech on Christmas Day used to attract a lot more audience but with apparently half of the adult population in the UK falling asleep by 3pm due to the excessive consumption of food and alcohol (so I read), I doubt many actually watch the speech these days. However, it is part of the Lilwall tradition so we switched on the TV at 2:55pm! In her 50th televised Christmas speech, she spoke about caring for the marginalised in society, which wasn't exactly very cheery but it resonated with the central Christmas message. So I thought she did really well!

If you missed it, you can watch it at www.youtube.com/watch?v=u0nmkYGCljE

Trip to Scotland, blackberry-less

2007-12-30T06:01:00.000+08:00

On previous holidays there was always the big conundrum of whether my blackberry should tag along or stay at home. I ought to bring it because (1) I could use it to call home or chat on gmail, (2) it has an amazing function of telling you exactly what time it is anywhere you travel to, and (3) I was expected to. There were defiant (and wise!) colleagues who would simply refuse to do that, because you really, and I mean really, don't want your well-deserved holiday ruined by a silly machine. But I was never that strong; I almost always brought the silly machine and ended up debating with myself everyday whether I should check it (and of course I always did).

This time I didn't have a choice. Actually, if I was honest, I was still suffering from blackberry withdrawal symptoms when Rob and I set off for Scotland in mid December. I would suddenly reach for my bag thinking it was still there, my fingers would itch for those tiny and uncomfortable keys (each key represent 2 letters in the model I used), and time and again I would complain to Rob: "If only I had my blackberry still, we can [check the film times/look up the restaurant on the map/find my friend's number on gmail]..." Rob would, without fail, reply in triumph: "Hooray! You don't have a blackberry anymore!"

Oh well.

So, without my usual toy, we set off for beautiful Scotland. We didn't manage to drive around the countryside in the end but rather we spent a long relaxing week in Edinburgh and a couple of days in Stirling staying with some lovely old friends of Rob's. In Edinburgh we did something unprecedented in my travel experience - we stayed 3 nights with a really nice Scotsman whom we had never met before through http://www.couchsurfing.com/! CouchSurfing is in essence an international network of travellers and people with a spare bed / couch / floor space, the latter usually being frequent travellers themselves who have benefited from other people's generous hospitality. It operates on the premise of reviews by couchsurfers who have stayed with the couchsurfing provider. At first I was intrigued but slightly apprehensive, and when we first met Fraser in his living room it really felt rather odd! However we warmed up rather quickly and chatted about everything from Central Asia to music records. Fraser was so sweet he even cooked us a fabulous dinner. It was interesting to steal a glimpse into the life of a complete stranger whom you would probably never meet otherwise, and it saved us quite a bit of cash! I would highly recommend the adventurous to try this sometime.

Travelling without the usual (relatively) big budget also meant that I had to be more flexible with my choice of restaurants/food. Instead of strolling into any random restaurant which I might fancy, I would now have to actually look at the menu first before deciding whether I should go in (I am aware of how bad this may sound to some, sorry!). In the past month I came to realise how I seemed to have had been living to eat as opposed to eating to live - one could tell from how my mood seemed to get quite severely affected by the occasional lack of tasty food! I had wanted to use the convenient excuse of being Chinese (as we love our food) but I think that has nothing to do with it. There's a nagging feeling at the back of my mind - I may be a lot more shallow than I would like to think. Of course there's nothing wrong with loving food, but when one's love for food demands that one always has good food whilst half the world is dying of hunger, that love seems more like lust (and frankly, downright self-indulgent) than a good and healthy desire?

It's quite scary sometimes what one may find whilst attempting self-discovery.

Life without a blackberry - a prologue

2007-12-20T20:46:00.003+08:00

I thought it may be slightly cool to record what happens in my new life in the next few months now that I've quit my lawyer job - a life without timesheets, workload capacity emails, security tokens, endless passwords, logging in and out of phones and, best (or worst, some may feel) of all, my blackberry!

Of course it's also a life without the handsome salary, the perks, the I-work-in-the-City prestige, the free gym (not that I ever used it), the dream holidays, and the corporate speak I find myself missing a little! I also miss those crazy lovely people who work so hard, with whom I shared many late nights and weekends working on the same or different projects.

Before I left A&O many of those well-meaning crazy lovely people expressed their mixed feelings of envy, admiration and horror at my decision to jump ship. I'm still not entirely sure what kind of ship this is but no doubt it is a very different kind of ship from the old one.

Perhaps reality has yet to really sink in, but I am feeling rather liberated and excited about the future. Somehow the prospects of the future unknown (and the lack of incoming cash flow) seem slightly less menacing now that (I think) I've overcome the money hurdle in my head i.e. that I will not be having the kind of life that I was going to have in material terms if I had chosen to stay on in the legal field.

It is way too early to assess whether I will have any regrets choosing the life without a blackberry. I'm sure things will get tough at some point. My plan is to try and always remember two of the things that have helped me get here in the first place:

first, what Richard Nelson Bolles said in his book How to Find Your Mission in Life, that there is really another dimension to life than the materialistic, and

second, what Rob wrote in an e-mail to me when we first met which he often quotes in his school presentations - "Don't ask what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive and go do that, because what the world needs is people who have come alive..." - John Eldredge, Wild at Heart,

and hopefully I will press on!

PS Happy Christmas to all!
PPS for my A&O friends: I know I'm not following the A&O house style... it's okay... :)