Tuen's Blog

In the last few months, I’ve been going cycling with a bunch of guys. Tony and I got ‘convinced’ to sign up for Melbourne’s “Around the Bay” ride in October, and the 210km route to boot!

So we’ve been doing about 60 to 80 km each ride about once a week. Each member of the group (4 of us at present) had fallen at least once, and some more often, with the exception of myself (up till last Tuesday). In fact, Tony had even broken his collar bone in a rather nasty spill.

So last Tuesday, there I was, pretty smug in being the only one who had not fallen. I even recall some rides back when Frank told me it wasn’t a matter of if, but when, I would fall, and I had told him that “I’m pretty skilled, so I’m not so sure about that prediction”. Well Tuesday morning, Joo Ann was commenting about how he had damaged his cycle computer in a fall and how he did not want to get another one. I smugly quipped “Well, don’t fall so often”.  I was joking of course, but the man upstairs has his own brand of humour; because 2 mins later, I found myself sprawled on the ground, with some painful cuts and abrasions!

The whole thing was quite funny, but when something like that happens to you; it actually strengthens your faith in an almighty yet very personal God. Yes, I was joking about being the only one who hadn’t fallen, but deep down, there was some pride and arrogance about that fact too. So when He took me down a notch, it was actually quite a faith experience. And I realised that there was a lot of care taken in his ’strike’. I was hurt just enough to suffer some pain and to realise my arrogance, but not enough to cause serious injury or permanent damage, which could have easily happened as well!

The Lord truly works in mysterious ways.

I found this story to be very sad, but inspiring:

http www.theage.com

Yesterday, after 3 practice sessions over the last two weeks, we went to carol for the residents of Wahroonga Home.

The idea for this activity came from Henry, and was of course strongly supported by the rest of us, especially since we had organised similar activities when we were in Singapore.

For two Saturdays, we gathered, first at the Chongs’, and then at our home, to practise for this activity.  Henry and Alexius were the guitarists, and Henry was the choir master.  We chose common carols that didn’t require too much practice and we also bought and packaged lolly bags for the residents of the home.  The whole activity was most uplifting for all of us, and it was nice to be able to get all the grown up kids together in one room for a common activity with their ‘old folks’!

We were by no means great singers, but I think the residents enjoyed our singing, or at least tolerated it well, until they could get their hands on the lolly bags.  :)  I believe all of us enjoyed practicing and performing for the home, and we will most likely do it again next year. Apart from the Chias and the Chongs, we also had James joining us. He’s kinda like our adopted, older child, since he spends a lot of time with our kids as their  ’big brother’ and mentor in spiritual affairs as well as less lofty activities such as ‘Texas Hold’em’.

After the performance, we had an ‘after party’ at the Chongs, and that evening, we all went for a reconciliation service at St. Christoper’s church followed by dinner.  All in it was a most fulfilling weekend.

More photos can be found here.

The songbook can be found here.

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For the last few months, I had been busy preparing and attending events relating to World Youth day 2008 in Sydney.  I was on the main support committee for the Pallottine Youth Encounter which took place at Milgrove, as well as for organising our youth to attend the main event at Sydney.  I had been in charge of registrations, accommodation and other stuff, and the amount of work that had to be put in during the last 2 months was surprisingly huge.  Had I known I was going to get myself so bogged down with the work and responsibilities, I might have tried to evade this committee earlier on; but Fr. Pat Jackson, our parish priest and inspiration for our youth encounter, has a way of getting people to do what needs to be done!

Anyway, the Pallottine Youth Encounter at Milgrove was a stay-in encounter for youth, and we had participants from Canada, USA, Belize, India, South Africa, Brazil, and a few other countries.  The Milgrove encounter was from 4th July to 9th July and most of the participants found the encounter to be very beneficial, in terms of spiritual renewal and community building.  We had a very large number of priests, and it was refreshing to see a mass con-celebrated by 7 or 9 priests.  My 4 older kids attended the Milgrove encounter, and I was there most of the time as well.

After Milgrove, the participants were then provided with home-stay with hosts from our parish church.  And for the next few days, we attended some organised church activities as well as activities of the Melbourne days in the diocese, in preparation for WYD in Sydney. 

The group then travelled up to Sydney by bus and was there from 14th July to 21st July.  Tony and I drove up in a car, as we needed the car to run various errands whilst in Sydney.  We had some last minute accommodation and transport hiccups, but thankfully all problems were solved smoothly and on time.  Tony and I had a chance to spend a few nights at my cousin, Daniel’s home.  The rest of the time, we spent it in classrooms with the rest of the youth, at St. Patrick’s primary school at Sutherland.

I have very mixed feelings about this whole project.  I had attended the WYD as a support person, rather than as a pilgrim, so I was not exactly in the pilgrim frame of mind.  Nevertheless, the events of Milgrove and WYD touched me in a special way.  It was quite amazing to see half a million people gathered together to attend mass celebrated by our spiritual leader, the Pope.  With that many youths gathered in one place, you would have expected chaos, rowdiness and nonsense; yet everyone was relatively well-behaved and a proper sense of reverence pervaded all the events.  Can you imagine half a million silent worshippers gathered at one place?  Quite incredible and moving.

The other experience I had was how things seemed to just fall in place, despite my concerns and worries over problems etc.  Don’t get me wrong; I did have to scramble and take action to solve the problems, but the results were always good.  It was as if the Spirit was guiding and taking control of all the things that had to be done.  Yes, you might say it’s coincidence, but so what?  For those who have faith, coincidences are planned by the Spirit, and when you have many coincidences in a row, you can’t help but feel the Spirit moving. 

Having said all the above, I don’t think I want the same role for any future World Youth Days.  My kids are looking forward to the next one in Madrid, but I hope that if I do attend in future, it will be as a pilgrim/tourist, without any responsibilities for any youths except my own kids!

Some photos can be found here:

http://blog.tuenproductions.com/photogallery/index.php?/category/318

This was taken by my brother when he was here last week.  He used Photoshop.  Isn’t technology amazing?

Before                          After

I found this story, emailed by Bruno, to be very touching.  I used to work in a non-profit organisation assisting people with disabilities to find jobs.

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