Sufjan Stevens - Come Thou Fount Of Every Blessing

Come Thou fount of every blessing
Tune my heart to sing Thy grace
Streams of mercy never ceasing
Call for songs of loudest praise
Teach me some melodious sonnet
Sung by flaming tongues above
I'll praise the mount I'm fixed upon it
Mount of Thy redeeming love

Here I raise my Ebenezer
Hither by Thy help I come
And I hope by Thy good pleasure
Safely to arrive at home
Jesus sought me when a stranger
Wondering from the fold of God
He, to rescue me from danger
Interposed His precious blood

O to grace how great a debtor daily I'm constrained to be!
Let Thy goodness like a fetter, bind my wandering heart to Thee
Prone to wander Lord I feel it, prone to leave the God I love
Here's my heart Lord, take and seal it, seal it for Thy courts above

Madeleine Peyroux - You're Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go

I heard this gorgeous Bob Dylan cover in one of this year's Oscar-nominated short films, Manon Sur Le Bitume, and it's been my favorite song for the past week or so.

What I've Been Up To Since Obama Got Elected

Spent a fog-free Christmas morning on the Golden Gate BridgeWalked the boho-licious streets of Haight-Ashbury, San Francisco

Hung out at the Hoover Dam

Got to see my dear manatees at SeaWorld, San Diego (pictures of the real ones didn't turn out good)

Marveled at the sunset at La Jolla, San Diego

Got a visual overdose of palm trees

Posed, OC style, at Santa Monica Beach near LA

Felt small against the big blue sky

Watched Blue Man Group in Las Vegas

Pretended to be a Stanford smarty

Re-connected with old friends and made a new one

Received a lovely Hepburn tote from Mark xxx

Painted my dustbin/trashcan/rubbishreceptacle

Painted my table lamp, which now looks like a circus tent/peppermint

Wow.

Has it really been a year and 9 months since I posted this? Just watched three straight hours of NBC's live election broadcast, which culminated in the historic announcement at 10pm Austin time, and witnessed newscasters, celebrities, politicians, religious leaders and supporters alike break down and weep under the sheer magnitude of the moment. We've indeed come a long way, and I'm thankful that I can be here to take it all in.

A (not so) Silent Halloween

I went as a mime.

Beret and White Face Paint: Lucy in Disguise
'Retro Red' Lipstick: CVS Pharmacy
Gloves: Goodwill
Shirt: My own - bought it at H&M in NYC
Suspenders: Borrowed from Dana's Dad
Shorts: Daphne's
Tights: Walmart
Shoes: Some store in Jurong

Getting the mime face on took an hour. Gotta give credit to this girl, who showed me how to do it right. Experimented with a scary face at first, then settled on a sad one.

With Dana aka. Fernando the Pinata. His costume was fully hand-made!

Huiping the Shell Station attendant, Su-May as Minnie Mouse, Chris the peanut farmer, Mei as Spongebob

Lilian the Stepford Wife. I really loved this one... she even baked a pumpkin pie!

Jan as Iron Man/Tony Stark.

A couple of Nerds.

The Streetfighters, Ryu and Dan.

With Pammy the Hot Quarterback and Daph as Audrey Hepburn/Holly Golightly

Wai Kit the white Matrix Reloaded twin

On Sixth Street, where I spotted at least 10 Jokers...

And only one Sarah Palin, who was supporting Obama.

Oktober

And we're back. I suffered from chronic incompleteblogposts-itis over the past few weeks, and so I have a few halfway-done drafts and am starting afresh (again). Who knows if I'll reach the end of this one.
A lot has occurred since the momentous event documented in the post below. First, I have completely forgotten how to drive. However, I do have a license and look very happy in it (they took the picture immediately after the test). Other events of note:
1. Finding a church I can call home. I'm happily settled in Gracepoint Fellowship Austin and I know it's a place where I can serve and grow. Two years of church-hopping wasn't easy, especially having gone to the same church for 21+ years in Singapore, so thank God for these guys.
2. Hanging out with work friends. I love my fellow Peer Academic Coaches! That's me in orange... heh. A few of these people share my passions for The Office, cute movies like Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist and molten chocolate cake from Chili's.
3. Austin City Limits. Hot, dusty, crowded, smoky, weed-y, sweaty and a ton of fun. Was introduced to new bands and got to swoon over familiar ones. Highlights: Foo Fighters, Gogol Bordello, Robert Plant and Allison Krauss and The Raconteurs. Was stupid enough to forget to put on sunscreen all three days, and so...
4. Fell sick for a week. Super-duper-schedule-messer-upper. Do NOT fall sick, ever.
5. Teaching a sixth grade class at Kealing Middle School, a great school in a bad neighborhood. Austin is divided by Interstate-35 and everything east of it is a whole different world from our university bubble. The bus journey to Kealing is quite an eye-opener. However, my teaching experience has been rosy so far, because my cooperating teacher is amazing. She manages to be totally stern and yet cool, funny and warm at the same time. And I love how she incorporates film, music, audiobooks, real life simulations and even food into her lessons. Am learning a lot.
6. Watching UT football games on Saturday for the past three weeks. I've only just begun to understand the appeal of the game, and it helps that UT is THE NUMBER ONE TEAM IN THE COUNTRY! HOOK 'EM HORNS! Wow, I'm surprised that blogger does have burnt orange on its color palette. Nice.
7. Putting together my Halloween costume. Will not say what it is right now, but I will say that all I'm missing is a black beret.
8. Watching Margaret Cho's performance at the Union, which was almost entirely about sex and made me realize what a prude I am. I was under the impression she was going to give a lecture on Asian-Americans.
9. The upcoming election. Seeing people sporting 'I Voted' stickers or Obama or McCain buttons is making me more excited than ever for the outcome. I'm thankful to be in the US at this momentous period of time. But the best thing that's come out of all of this, IMHO, is Tina Fey's Sarah Palin impressions on SNL ("I can see Russia from my house!").
I will stop here, because nine is the square of 3 and is therefore cooler than 10.
Until next time!

Someday I'll look back on this and laugh

I failed my first driving test today in a hilariously humiliating way that isn't so funny just yet. Man, it stings...
Second chance: Wednesday!

** Edit: I PASSED!!! ** :D
Thank you for all the encouragement, guys!