Sunday, December 8, 2019

So many church stuff

I am on the verge of falling sick. On Thursday, I had difficulty sleeping thanks to the coffee-containing shake that I bought after gym. I need to remind myself NOT to order this in the evening. My sleep is normally not affected by caffeine but this coffee used by gym is too potent. I did not know how long I slept eventually but I knew it could not be longer than 4 hours.

On Friday, I attended Holy Hour and I was super tired and sleepy. I was expecting that I would fall asleep from kneeling and praying for an hour. Somehow, the format of this Holy Hour is different from the previous two sessions that I attended. Previously, it was mostly kneeling, praying, and meditating of certain scripture passages. It felt like an endurance test of kneeling. This time, it was more like a homily as the priest directed us what to focus and what to meditate upon. I like this format better as it is more balanced in terms of mediation, scripture reading, as well as input from the priest. Ironically, although I was so tired throughout the day, I ended up sleeping at 3am again. Sigh...

I had difficulty waking up and I had to Grab to attend Novena on Saturday. I had volunteering in the afternoon so if I missed the 1pm Novena, I would miss it altogether. After Novena, I detoured to Suntec with the intention of pre-ordering Natsume Yuujincho nendoroid and postcard books for Gundam SeeD and Gundam SeeD Destiny. As I was reaching the shop, I looked at the pre-order emails again and suddenly I had the thought: okay let's not waste money on these.. I already had scaled figures of Natsume so what's the point of getting nendoroid. Gundam SeeD and SeeD Destiny are not my favourites too so buy for what? -_-" I don't know why the sudden change of mind sia.. I think running out of storage space subconsciously forces me to prioritise :( So it was a wasted trip to Suntec.

My partner did not come for the volunteering session so it was a miracle that I was able to solo complete 41 patients. I also did not lose cool although at the back of my mind, I prayed that I did not make any mistake. Sigh.. I was very worried that I overlooked certain things or what.. I dispensed one in Mandarin and I realised how bad my Mandarin has deteriorated. It was just some moisturiser and steroid creams for dry skin and rashes -something happening on a daily basis in my previous job. Now I cannot even remember what 'dry' is. I think I won't forget it anymore since dry = gan which sounds similar to my only Chinese curse word kns. Hahaha...

After that, I went Uniqlo to get a white short sleeved t-shirt for my duty today. At my parish, there is an exhibition called The Promised Woman - The Mary Exhibition 2019. It started on last weekend and after the 7am mass that I attended, there was a queue to enter so I thought to return after gym. Before that happened, I saw a message that my ministry was tasked to guard the exhibit for today 11am to 130pm. Without thinking twice, I volunteered. It is also special since today is 8 December which is Mother Mary's Feast of Immaculate Conception.

There was no talking required (thank goodness!) and my task was only to ensure that people were not touching the exhibits and accidentally causing them fall apart. Initially I thought I would also be able look through the exhibit but I felt too uncomfortable to 'abuse' my privilege. After all, I was there supposedly for duty. So I decided to take photos and I am happy that at the very least I was able to get all the photos so that I could read the text later on. This made me realise that my camera phone is actually pretty good as all the text is still visible clearly in the photos.

Most of the things are not new to me such as the dogmas, Lourdes and Fatima apparitions, Mother of Perpetual Help, Undoer of knots, the Rosary, the Miraculous Medal (which reminded of my stupidity earlier this week when I accidentally threw mine away), and the Scapular. However, I still learn things that I previously was not aware of such as Loreto (which is believed to Mother Mary's childhood house, where she was born, growing up and when the Annunciation took place, which was transported by angels to its current location), Ephesus (Mother Mary's house until her Assumption), and Our Lady of La Salette. In fact, my knowledge on the Scapular is actually quite limited so it was nice to read more about it.

I took a total of 70 pictures so obviously I will not be sharing everything. Just a few:
This is the welcoming banner at the entrance to the exhibition
This is at the entrance area. They are not covered in the exhibition but it would definitely be interesting to know more of Mother Mary's apparitions.
The exhibition hall. I took this as we were closing the morning session. That is why it is empty but the light for the Mother of Perpetual Help icon is turned off.
Mother of Perpetual Help icon at the center of the exhibition hall
After duty, we had lunch at Hans at Thomson Plaza. The renovation on the first is somewhat completed compared to a few months ago when I saw the whole level 1 was blocked. This was perhaps the second time I ate at Hans in my 17 years+ in Singapore. The first time was with my aunt many many years ago. I think the food feels too 'homecooked'  for that price. After that, someone suggested to go to Christmas food sampling at Fairprice at level 2. I was quite thick skinned to try the cakes, potato chips, ham, turkey, sausage, cheese and all that.

Too bad when I returned after afternoon mass, they were already packing up the food sampling. What followed after was a huge shock, I spent more than $50 in grocery shopping. Initially my main goal to return to Fairprice was to buy coconut milk. I am curious to see a coconut milk that is meant to be drunk as a dairy since usually coconut milk is used in cooking. I ended up with mao shan wang macaroons from Golden Moments ($18+ for just six pieces.. ouch), a store special Kettle potato chips (truffle cheese with sparkling wine flavour) which was my first time seeing, and 1 tub of mao shan wang ice cream from Udders. Like that how to lose weight?

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