William Chong

This is what’s left of my iPod headphones.

I normally use them at work, but they were left on the floor over the weekend, and a cleaner’s overzealous approach to vacuuming has left a mangled mess of frayed wires and broken audibles, and nary a note in sight to explain themselves. Pfft.

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In other news, who remembers Doulos from their childhood? No? Well this was the one ship that got my dad in a ruffle of excitement, back when I was still growing up in kampung-town Kuching. It’s known to many people as “the floating book store” because of its massive collection of over half a million books onboard. One of the few snippets I remembered from my childhood was my dad talking excitedly about a ship full of books, seeds for a lifetime of knowledge – Doulos had docked in when I was just 4 years old, and I recall a jigsaw puzzle with a picture of the almost mythical boat that we bought. I don’t remember what the ship looked like in real life, but the name has always pricked my subconscious once in a while, though I thought no more of it for a long time.

What I eventually found out as I grew older was that Doulos is a ship bringing more than just knowledge – it’s a volunteer-run ship under the umbrella of Operation Mobilisation, that supplies literature resources and the gospel message to , This is a ship on a mission, and the more I think about it, the more I’m impressed about the creativity of this method of reaching out to the ends of the earth.

It’s berthing in Auckland next week, which sounds pretty cool. Apparently it’s the last time it’ll be here because it’s due to retire, so I’ll have to try and set aside a time to go check it out, to come full circle and to finally clarify an aspect of my childhood I never fully remembered.

Big. respect. Hope everyone is well.

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DOULOS – (Gr) from deo?; a slave (literally or figuratively, involuntarily or voluntarily; frequently therefore in a qualified sense of subjection or subserviency): – bondservant.

Have been a little busy with work, worked overtime most every day last week to finish a big job. Consequently felt under the weather Saturday and had to cancel all my classes… but at least I’m a bit better rested now. And this week has dropped back in workload… so much that I’ve been able to catch up on mindless TV series, heh. I can safely inform everyone that Lost is pretty exciting but totally hard-to-follow if you’re not clued in on basically every season before it…

The church visits have been pretty good so far – I’ve been keeping in touch with all the people that go to different churches, and pretty intrigued by the differences in visitor treatment, doctrine and general church stuff. It’s very exciting to worship with people you don’t normally see on a Sunday, and to share and learn why each church operates the way it does.

As you can tell I’ve tried to do write-ups of the places I’ve been, though I apologise because one visit could never totally encapsulate what a church is about. Also, rating a church is never a particularly easy thing to do, since it is to some degree a subjective approach. The best compromise I could think of was to include the “You’ll like/not like this church if…” sections, giving a more balanced view. Ultimately giving an A, or an AA or whatever is a reflection of my inherent bias (as is every review), so don’t take them at face value – visit the church if you want to find out more. At the end of the day, every Christian is trying to build God’s Kingdom in some shape or form – you can either lament the fact that his Kingdom is so disparate and divided, or you can embrace what you do have in common: the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Kim’s got exams at the moment, which is pretty stressful… and everyone around is harrying away at work or study or other lifelong pursuits.

Take care everyone.

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This year I’ve found many things.

I’ve found that living at home this year has really tested and challenged me. Who I am, who I want to be. Who are important to me.

I’ve found that people make time for others only if they really mean it, and there’s no sense in routine for the sake of it. I’ve found that if you seek to satisfy yourself, your friends won’t tell you about it but you will still see that you are left behind. I’ve discovered my love for music currently exists not as a passionless career but a careerless passion.

I like it that way – there is no expectation of fitting a marketable mould and castrating your sound for the sake of selling it. I write music when I can, and I enjoy it. I can record a tune that no one but myself enjoys, and that is my prerogative. This year I’ve had more time to pursue other challenges in my music – ATCL, CCM, other acronyms that translate to metaphor and melody, a tapestry of love and care.

This year I chose to be more of a pragmatist. My dreams are not rock-star fashion, not even town hero. I want a house and a family, to lead and to serve. I tell myself my fantasies are frivolous, and that these are things worth working for, earning a salary for.

This year I learned Chinese. I may not remember my vocabulary, but I remember my heritage.

This year I enjoyed building up friends and family. This year I churned through house and life-work, trying to balance keeping a fractured family reasonably together yet holding firm to who I was and who I stood for. This was hard and sometimes I wished I had more strength and resolve to challenge those around me.  But slow and steady wins the race, and when others fall by the wayside, perhaps you accept they alone chose that path.  So this year I was sad to watch them go.

This year there was great fun in cooking. Gastronomic awareness is a life-long journey, and there are no limits save your wallet and appetite. I am happy to say that I can cook and I would have loved to have cooked my mother dinner.

If you read this, I would encourage you to make one meal. Just one. For your parents, your mother, your father, your step-parents, your bio-parents, your sister, brother. Try it. When you cook for someone else you think of who they are, what they would like. Do they like pepper? What about those tomatoes? You craft a personal serving of humility and servitude for another.

I would have love to have cooked her something today.

As others have pointed out, Jesus is the reason for the season. That’s my Christian plug.

This year I have grown to love the life ahead of me. I like my friends. My family. Writing and singing. Cooking and cleaning. Working, phasing between social circles. People love to be listened to. We all need each other.

This year I have lived.

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