ŽħēŃ Ĥāŋ

my beloved life

Friday, June 30, 2006

hey people!.. ok, I know I better stop starting my post this way, getting a odd too cliche.. anyway, I stumbled upon this wonderful story, and I want to share this with all of you! Here goes..

The Man and His Son
After a few of the Sunday evening hymns, the church’s pastor slowly stood up, walked over to the pulpit and, before he gave his sermon for the evening, briefly introduced a guest minister who was in the service that evening.

In the introduction, the pastor told the congregation that the guest minister was one of his
Dearest childhood friends and that he wanted him to have a few moments to greet the church
And share whatever he felt would be appropriate for the service.

With that, an elderly man stepped up to the pulpit and began to speak.

"A father, his son, and a friend of his son were sailing off the Pacific Coast." He began, "when a fast approaching storm blocked any attempt to get back to the shore. The waves were so high, that even though the father was an experienced sailor, he could not keep the boat upright and the three were swept into the ocean as the boat capsized."

The old man hesitated for a moment, making eye contact with two teenagers who were, for the first time since the service began, looking somewhat interested in his story.

The aged minister continued with his story, "grabbing a rescue line, the father had to make the most excruciating decision of his life: To which boy he would throw the other end of the life line. He only had seconds to make the decision. The father knew that his son was a Christian and he also knew that his son’s friend was not. The agony of his decision could not be matched by the torrent of waves."

"As the father yelled out, ‘I love you, son!’ He threw out the life line to his son’s friend. By the time the father had pulled the friend back to the capsized boat, his son had disappeared beneath the raging swells into the black of night. His body was never recovered."

By this time, the two teenagers were sitting up straight in the pew, anxiously waiting for the next words to come out of the old minister’s mouth.

"The father", he continued, "knew his son would step into eternity with Jesus and he could not bear the thought of his son’s friend stepping into an eternity without Jesus…

Therefore, he sacrificed his son to save the son’s friend. How great is the love of God that He should do the same for us. Our Heavenly Father sacrificed His only begotten Son that we could be saved. I urge you to accept His offer to rescue you and take a hold of the Life Line He is throwing out to you in this service."

With that, the old man turned and sat back down in his chair as silence filled the room. The pastor again walked slowly to the pulpit and delivered a brief sermon with an invitation at the end. However, no one responded to the appeal. Within minutes after the service ended, the two teenagers were at the old man’s side.

"That was a nice story," politely stated one of the boys, "But I don’t think it was very realistic for a father to give up his only son’s life in hopes that the other boy would become a Christian."

"Well, you’ve got a point there," the old man replied, glancing down at his worn Bible. A big smile broadened his narrow face, he once again looked up at the boys and said, "It sure isn’t very realistic, is it? But I’m standing here today to tell you that story gives me a glimpse of what it must have been like for God to give up His Son for me."

"YOU SEE --- I WAS THAT FATHER AND YOUR PASTOR IS MY SON'S FRIEND."

How can you read stories like this, and not put a 100% faith in God..

Anyway, today is my dad's birthday, so HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAD!! =P

1:21 PM

Tuesday, June 27, 2006

hey people!.. this is a special update of the Round of 16 matches finished.

Germany 2-0 Sweden
I shall not comment much about this match, simply because Germany was a clear winner in this match. Only 12 minutes on and Germany was two goals up through a brace from Podolski and seem to be playing with school boys as Sweden was totally outplayed. No more goals were to follow though as Germany was contented to defend their two-nil lead. A missed penalty from Larsson pretty much sealed a terrible night for Swedish fans and sends Germany through to the Quater-finals.

Argentina 2-1 Mexico (after extra time)
This match burst right from the start. End to end football with lots of flair from the two sides, though surprisingly Mexico was dominating the early exchanges and their efforts were rewarded when captain Marquez scored through a flick on from Borgetti from the free kick. However, Crespo's(its an own goal la friend!) goal pulled the score level. Many wave of attacks came from both teams but they just could not apply finishing touches to all the fine passes. Thus, extra time along, and as the story goes, Rodrigues scored a wonder goal to book Argentina's place in the Quater-finals.

England 1-0 Ecuador
Has the England side not criticised enough? Based on this performance, the clear answer is NO! Shaky defense, toothless attack, what else is left to say in this England side? Nothing positive can be said of this performance. Only a Beckham free-kick saved England from being humiliated by Ecuador who largely dominated the attacking part of the match and went close several times. And England are still talking about winning the World Cup!? MADNESS! Questions that were still unanswered would be, 'When will Lampard ever score a goal, or even hit the target!?' and 'Is the England attack ever gonna score again!?'. Unless something happens in the England side, they would be elminated in the Quater-finals.

Portugal 1-0 Netherlands
One of the most entertaining matches so far, and its not because of football! On paper this match is dubbed as the biggest match in the competition, with both the rivalry and style of play clashing. No one had predicted that this match would be pretty, but this? out of this world! It started of brightly for Portugal when Maniche scored from some superb passing by Deco. Chances came by for Netherlands but they failed to convert it. At the end of the first half, Portugal's Costinha was the first player to be red carded from a delibrate hand ball. Second half was a complete mess, players lunging tackles that were clearly aiming for the legs instead of the ball, fights were going on between players every time a tackle is being made, all this and the referee had no control over them, thus he resorted to flashing yellow cards at every player. Red cards came for Boulahrouz(63 minutes), Deco(78 minutes) and Van Bronckhorst(95 minutes). As Dutch coach Marco Van Basten said, the referee was poor and the second half was poor as the match was largely played by the player's mouth and hands instead of the ball. A nice match for wrestling fans but a poor match for football fans.

Italy 1-0 Australia
Italy was suppose to win this match comfortably, but Australia put up a resounding effort and showed to Italy early on that they are not going to just give way easily. Even though Australia had attacks early on, it was Italy that had come close on several occasions to take the lead. Australia however had been very discipline in their defense and look as sound as the Italian defense. Australia had a huge advantage when Materazzi was given a straight red card from a reckless tackle on Bresciano. However, Australia did not capitalise on it and was punished dearly when at the last minute of regulation time, Italy was awarded a dubious penalty in my opinion. Grosso sprints into the box and fell on Lucas Neil's body. It was not like Neil had challenged and tackled Grosso, but it appears to me as if Grosso had intentionally fall on Neil to earn the penalty. Nothing can be said about the quality of Totti's penalty though as he slots it home and Italy to the Quater-finals.

Switzerland 0-0 Ukraine (0-3 after penaly shoot-out)
Not much can be commented about this match. It was largely played in the middle of the park as both teams fail to really create chances. After 120 minutes of football, it was to be decided by the first penalty shoot-out of the tournament. Shevchenko made the worst possible start for Ukraine as he missed the first kick, the second consecutively in a penalty shoot-out after his miss in the Champions' League final against Liverpool. It did not matter though, as the rest of the Ukraine kicks sailed into the net. Switzerland penalty takers however had possibly the worst 10 minutes of their lives as all of them failed to convert a single penalty!! Now how often do you see that happen?? However, Switzerland bows out of the World Cup creating history as the first team in history to exit the World Cup without conceding a goal in regulation time and also as the first team in history to exit the World Cup without scoring a penalty in a penalty shoot-out!. So, Switzerland may have thebest defense, but they also had the worst possible penalty takers. Ukraine through to the Quater-finals.

Ok, I know most of these news are in the newspapers already, just want to write in my blog for people to read, haha!

P/S: These comments are entirely my opinions, and if it offends anyone, I would thereby apologies before hand.

1:57 PM

Monday, June 26, 2006

hey!.. yes yes, I know you guys will be thoroughly surprised that I am updating my blog so often, haha! understandable, given that sometimes I don't update for a full month.. Maybe coz its holidays, and I have nothing else to do, so might as well blog!

Ah, blogging had developed so much over the years, particularly this two years.. Now, almost everyone has a blog of their own, whether its at blogspot.com, blogdrive.com, myspace.com or even the friendster blog.. hey, if it is able to attract me, it is THAT famous already, since Im always the one that is slow at catching up with time.. like the surge of Counter-strike, it was so popular over the years, but I oni started playing it when the fever had subdued and people had turned to other games.. While I did have abit of a success in playing the game(as in at least I don't die so many times when playing a public server and had actually topped some!), it was a wee bit too late then.. now, the craze is DOTA and online gaming, like Maple Story and all.. needless to say, the fever had not caught up to me yet, wonder when would it be!?

Yes, World Cup has entered the Round of 16, with Germany and Argentina winning their respective Round of 16 matches against Sweden and Mexico.. the match that is on now is England vs Ecuador and later the must watch cruncher, Portugal vs Netherlands.. As always, I had drawn up a prediction of the winners from Round of 16 all the way to the final, and it points out to me that Argentina has the best chance of winning, with Netherlands being the runner-up and Brazil in 3rd place and Switzerland in 4th place.. This is strictly based on statistics, and there is no biasness involved in the process of the prediction.. If there were to be biasness, I want Australia to win the World Cup, Spain in runners-up spot, England third and Argentina fourth!.. which makes more sense? the calculated prediction or the biased prediction? You decide..

Recently, my dad bought a new phone, the latest designer phone from Sony Ericsson, the W810i!!.. Due to some confusion which I will not disclose here, he ended up with TWO W810is!! So he now has a total of 5 phones including the other 3 old phones!.. he allowed my sis and I to pick one phone each, and my sis picked the T610, the red metal covered phone which was the craze among girls awhile ago.. so its left with K700i for me to inherit.. Well, because I just changed my phone, my dad wants me to only choose one, either keep my current phone, or take his K700i, in a condition that I exchange my K300i for it.. At first glance, the decision should be loud and clear, its a K700i boy! wat's there to think?? Benefits for choosing K700i would be that there is bluetooth, flash for the camera and its an original set.. But, there are also some factors that points that I should stick to K300i, like there is the concern of the age of phone, as you all know, the joystick of the sony ericsson is slightly poor, therefore my phone would be better because its still new.. Another factor is that I bought this phone with my OWN money, as you guys may not know, I always have a sentiment towards my things, like all of them have a feeling and connection to me, so by letting go of this phone, I feel like Im disappointing the hope that the phone harbors on me.. DONT LAUGH! Its really how I feel!!

Anyway, the vote now stands at 3-2 in favour of a new layout, will it be a new layout, or would the party that supports this pink layout stage a comeback.. REMEMBER, first to win by 2 clear votes wins, so for those who have not voted, please vote at the tagboard!!

12:36 AM

Friday, June 23, 2006

hey ppl!..yes, as you can see above, I had finally started my Japanese class today!.. Hajimemashite means How Are You.. I have to admit, Japanese is tougher than I thought, just the first class, and I find myself having difficulties trying to understand everything that was taught by sensē(teacher).. I think its even more difficult than bloody Management! at least I understand the English in Management.. But no pain no gain right? If I dont suffer now, I wont be able to achieve greater heights by understanding another language.. PLUS, Im sick of just being able to smile at the Japs when they greet me, I want to communicate with them!

World Cup group stages is coming to an end, soon it will be the killing knockout stages!.. Some surprises have come along, Ecuador's progression to the last 16, France still failing to win in 5 World Cup matches, and Ghana will be going into the last 16 as the only African Nation left in this edition's World Cup.. familiar big-guns however were not troubled, teams like Argentina, Spain and Germany has showed plenty of promise, while the likes of Brazil, England and Italy, though not making that much of headlines, have steadily qualified for the last 16.. hopefully the last 16 will not be disappointing!

The poll for the decision for a new layout or not has been rather poor, but what do I expect when not so many people knows my blog.. Anyway, the poll closes when there is a clear winner by 2 votes, which I think will be hard to achieve, so people, please vote!!

3:04 AM

Friday, June 16, 2006

hey people!.. just realised that for the last two post I started this way too, so might as well keep up the habit, haha! Sorry for my insanity, post-exam syndrome this.. YES, I officially finished exam! no words can be used to describe how I felt when the invigilator took my script book away from my desk!

So, this month is only about one thing and one thing only in everyone's mind, WORLD CUP! the single sport currently that unites all races of all countries, ask anyone the score and they will tell you first hand like a scoreboard hung out on their faces, in a good way that is.. I did catch up on a few matches, but most of the time my mom would watch her shows during the World Cup matches time, don't tell me how wrong that is, her chinese drama that will probably be repeated countless of times, in her opinion is more important than World Cup that happens every four years! you tell me..

My dad has asked me to predict the scores, not winners of all first round matches, SADLY, i predict an amazing NONE correct in them so far! PATHETIC! well, thankfully the football world is not surrounded by my predictions, or it would be plain boring!..

Ok, now comes my holiday plans.. 1st, I want to train my tennis to be top notch again! Initially I would like to train in order to get into the Monash tennis team for MAPCU, however, they had since told me because of lack of interest from other players, they had decided not to send a team, dashing my hopes of being in MAPCU again, haih!.. the bright side is, this gives me more time to focus on the sports carnival that is to be held in August, hopefully I'll do well then, would like to join badminton and table tennis too in the sports carnival, if permittable..

2nd would be to learn Japanese!.. Yes, I had always wanted to learn a different language, and now that I have another friend who is also interested in learning Japanese, PERFECT! so far, I only know Mushi Mushi(hello) and Sayonara(Good Bye).. yea I know its pathetic.. no worries, three months from now I'll speak Japanese to you guys, i HOPE!

Recently I have been confronted by ADP's Director Pok and Director Dom regarding my pink blog layout.. I would like to post a survey to everyone that comes here, to change or NOT to change my pink blog layout, place ur votes at the tagboard, I will tally them at one unknown point and make my decision based on that.. see, that makes it everyone's blog (hope ADP wont sue me for being the back-up member starting something like this!)

12:26 AM

Sunday, June 04, 2006

hey people!.. I know this is the most awkward time to post, since Im like 4 days away from my first paper, but I am really bored stiff and in need of some excitement..

So, I have been home alone since Friday, For most of you, days without parents may be very heavenly and perfect time to party!.. HOWEVER, it was and IS never the case for me.. Life without my family is like a relief, but I DON'T go around partying till late night, in fact, I do the exact opposite of it!.. I just like to stay at home during those times, enjoy the peacefulness, switching on the hi-fi and listen to some nice music while sleeping on the couch, no humans moving around, no "let's go out for dinner for family together" kinda thing which I totally dislike, since everytime we eat, they would comment on something and criticise it till it frustrates you.. Yes, I prefer to just sit at a restaurant alone, looking at all the different lives move along with theirs, somehow those moments, I love them.. You might say that "geez, this guy is super sad man, loner'.. but I am most certainly happy with that.. of coz, if I have a girlfriend, then I wont be like that la, but now i dont, so im entitled to do so =P

Went with Darren yesterday to Low Yat, man! that place make me sad! not because the place was pathetic, but more like I AM pathetic when it comes to computers!! I used to be super duper good when it comes to computers, especially the hardware part, because I had, HAD extreme interest in it.. and I would search online for all the information on the current hardware.. NOW? im reduced to this guy who didn't know that what the hell are the numbers about in a RAM name, say DDR 400, I din even know what the hell is the 400 about!? sad but true..

World Cup is coming soon, 6 more days to go! which team do you support? the usual big boys like regular winners Brazil, glamorous England, tight shirts Italy or regular failures Spain? Or the underdogs Japan and Australia?.. ME? im sorry, i don't support any countries, period. Hope your team wins and all the best for Monashians who are gonna face your exams next few weeks!

~This blog will be closed until June 13 when I finish my exams, please be patient!~

1:58 AM