Life’s So Beautiful

Archive for the ‘Meaningful Living’ Category

In 2003, police in Warwickshire, England, opened a garden shed and found a whimpering, cowering dog.  The dog had been locked in the shed and abandoned.  It was dirty and malnourished and had quite clearly been abused.

In an act of kindness, the police took the dog, which was a female greyhound, to the Nuneaton Warwickshire Wildlife Sanctuary, which is run by a man named Geoff Grewcock, and known as a haven for animals abandoned, orphaned, or otherwise in need.

Geoff and the other sanctuary staff went to work with two aims: to restore the dog to full health and to win her trust.  It took several weeks, but eventually both goals were achieved.  They named her Jasmine and they started to think about finding her an adoptive home.

Jasmine, however, had other ideas.  No one quite remembers how it came about, but Jasmine started welcoming all animal arrivals at the sanctuary.  It would not matter if it were a puppy, a fox cub, a rabbit or, any other lost or hurting animal.  Jasmine would just peer into the box or cage and, when and where possible, deliver a welcoming lick.

Geoff relates one of the early incidents.  ”We had two puppies that had been abandoned by a nearby railway line.  One was a Lakeland Terrier cross and another was a Jack Russell Doberman cross.  They were tiny when they arrived at the centre, and Jasmine approached them and grabbed one by the scruff of the neck in her mouth and put him on the settee.  Then she fetched the other one and sat down with them, cuddling them.”

“But she is like that with all of our animals, even the rabbits.  She takes all the stress out of them, and it helps them to not only feel close to her, but to settle into their new surroundings.  She has done the same with the fox and badger cubs, she licks the rabbits and guinea pigs, and even lets the birds perch on the bridge of her nose.”

Jasmine, the timid, abused, deserted waif, became the animal sanctuary’s resident surrogate mother, a role for which she might have been born.  The list of orphaned and abandoned youngsters she has cared for comprises five fox cubs, four badger cubs, fifteen chicks, eight guinea pigs, two stray puppies and fifteen rabbits - and one roe deer fawn.  Tiny Bramble, eleven weeks old, was found semi-conscious in a field.  Upon arrival at the sanctuary, Jasmine cuddled up to her to keep her warm, and then went into the full foster-mum role.  Jasmine the greyhound showers Bramble the roe deer with affection, and makes sure nothing is matted.

“They are inseparable,” says Geoff.  ”Bramble walks between her legs, and they keep kissing each other.  They walk together round the sanctuary.  It’s a real treat to see them.”

Jasmine will continue to care for Bramble until she is old enough to be returned to woodland life.  When that happens, Jasmine will not be lonely.  She will be too busy showering love and affection on the next orphan or victim of abuse.

Pictured from the left are: “Toby”, a stray Lakeland dog; “Bramble”, orphaned roe deer; “Buster”, a stray Jack Russell; a dumped rabbit; “Sky”, an injured barn owl; and “Jasmine”, with a mother’s heart doing best what a caring mother would do…and such is the order of God’s Creation.

On April 1 1961 (yes, April Fool Day), a Scottish girl was born to a couple who already had nine children. At her birth, her mother was 47 and during the difficult childbirth, the girl was briefly deprived of oxygen and was later diagnosed as having learning difficulties. She was often bullied as a child and was nicknamed “Susie Simple” at school.

After leaving school with few qualifications, she took singing and acting lessons. In 1995 her audition for Michael Barrymore’s “My Kind of People” was filmed. The amateur video shows Barrymore was apparently more interested in mocking her than in her singing ability.

After winning several local singing competitions, she was urged by her mother to enter Britain’s Got Talent. She almost abandoned her plan to enter the show as she believed she was too old and that it was a young person’s game. Her mother’s death motivated her to go on Britain’s Got Talent as a tribute to her mother.

In August 2008 she applied for an audition for the third series of Britain’s Got Talent and was accepted after a preliminary audition in Glasgow. She sang “I Dreamed A Dream” from Les Miserables in the first round. When she first took to the stage, the initially cynical attitude of the audience and the judges was obvious….she was “prejudged”  because of her appearance. This cynicism was transformed into a standing ovation when she finished her rendition of “I Dreamed A Dream”. Her initial demeanour and homely appearance caused the judges and the audience to be “waiting for her to squawk like a duck”.

A new superstar was born and the world came to know about this Scottish lady Susan Boyle. Boyle’s first album “I Dreamed A Dream” was released on November 23 2009 and has enjoyed phenomenal success worldwide, racking up sales of a few million copies so far! Her album raced to the top of the charts in US, UK and many countries worldwide.

Boyle’s story is a like a fairy tale about overcoming adversity and prejudice and a rebuke to people’s tendency to judge others based on their physical appearance. Her performance is a victory for talent and artistry in a culture obsessed with physical attractiveness and presentation.

I bought Susan Boyle’s “I Dreamed A Dream” last week and have been enjoying her renditions of  “I Dreamed A Dream”, “Wild Horses”, “Cry Me A River”, “How Great Thou Art”, “You’ll See”, “Daydream Believer”, “Up To The Mountain”, “Amazing Grace”, “Who I Was Born To Be”, “Proud”, “The End Of The World” and “Silent Night”. You can find the album at Speedy Video in Miri……go buy it and enjoy the music!

I Dreamed A Dream by Susan Boyle

2010 is here!  A very very happy new year to everyone!

In this new year, may God grant you…..

12 months of happiness

52 weeks of fun

365 days of success

8,760 hours of good health

525,600 minutes of blessings

31,536,000 seconds of joy

The last day of 2009 will end in a few hours. It is time to say goodbye to 2009 and say hello to 2010.

Goodbye 2009

As I look back at the past one year, I honestly think 2009 has been a  good year for me. I feel blessed in many areas of my life and I am filled with a great sense of gratitude to all those who have touched my life.

My wife and my two sons have been a source of immense joy for me. My wife has given me full support in what I set out to do and has always been the pillar of my life. My son Clarence has been a source of my inspiration for what he has been able to achieve in his professional career. And my younger son Leslie completed his Bachelor of Commerce in June this year and is now attached to a reputable audit firm. I am really awed by his prudence in money matters. To both of my sons, I just wish to say that I am proud of you two.

This year has seen a few milestones in my life:

1. I started this blog on March 17 of this year so this blog is now almost 10 months old. I am glad that I have persisted in keeping this blog active and updated regularly. In a couple of months, this blog will be 1 year old….I look forward to that day!

2. In April this year, I attended the Global Internet Summit in Penang. That was a real eye-opener for me and I am so glad that I took the initiative to attend it.

3. On October 22 this year, eBay granted me the Top-Rated Seller status. That is a real milestone in my eBay business and I am indebted to all my eBay customers who make it possible.

4. Several of my investments in online investment programs paid off handsomely this year. I am glad that I did my due diligence on these programs and invested in them. Why leave all your money in bank earning a meagre 2-3% per annum when you can get almost ten times that return PER MONTH investing in reliable online programs?

5. I read a couple of books this year that have changed my mentality about money and life, notably “The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari” by Robin Sharma, “The Secret” by Rhonda Byrne and “How To Be Wildly Wealthy Fast” by Sandy Forster. I am learning to have a prosperity conscious mind and it has been an interesting journey.

2010 is just a few hours away.  I look forward to the new year with great anticipation and I am confident 2010 will be an even better year for me. And I wish you all success in whatever you do in the coming year. May you be blessed!

On this day fifty two years ago,  a baby boy was born in a tiny town called Binatang in the state of Sarawak.  Binatang is a Malay word meaning animal. Whoever named that town must have been a animal lover. The town was later renamed Bintangor as the name Binatang has a negative connotation.

Ya, that baby boy is me lah!  I’m really getting old.

I wish to say thanks to my wife and my sons Clarence and Leslie as well as Amanda for their birthday cards and wishes.

Birthday card from my wife

Birthday card from my son Clarence and Amanda

Birthday card from my son Leslie

This morning my wife and I dropped by Jenny Hiu’s house in Taman Tunku to pick up a kilo of “limpeh bahkua” (barbecue dried pork) made in Singapore. Jenny is an ex-colleague of mine in Teck Guan Group in Brunei. She left for greener pasture in Singapore a few years ago and is now attached to an American oil & gas company there. I had asked her to help me buy a kilo of the famous Singapore bahkua (Lim Chee Guan bahkua) a few days before she came back to Miri on Christmas Day for her holidays. Jenny not only bought a kilo of the bahkua that I wanted but she also bought another packet of the “three-storey meat bahkua” ( something like bacon bahkua) for me. And she refused to accept my payment…..okay, Jenny, I owe you a favour.  By the way, your house in Taman Tunku fits the “title” that I have bestowed on you since our days in Teck Guan….I’m sure you know what I mean, hahaha!

Limpeh bahkua from Singapore

Simply delicious...

“Christmas waves a magic wand over this world, and behold, everything is softer and more beautiful.”

~ Norman Vincent Peale

It is Christmas and I wish all of you a very blessed and happy Christmas and may 2010 bring you an abundance of joy, love and peace.

May Your Christmas Be As Lovely As This Baby Santa!

Christmas is about giving. If there is no joyous way to give a festive gift, give love away.

Christmas gift suggestions:

To your enemy, forgiveness.

To an opponent, tolerance.

To a friend, your heart.

To a customer, service.

To all, charity.

To every child, a good example.

To yourself, respect.

~ Oren Arnold

Keep this in mind:

“The best of all gifts around any Christmas tree:the presence of a happy  family all wrapped up in each other.”

~ Burton Hillis

Have a fun-filled happy Christmas……….ho ho ho!

If you do not see Santa Claus this Christmas, maybe this is the reason why.

Today is not only Christmas Day but also my 27th wedding anniversary. How time flies! I can still remember my wedding held in Kuching. And the wedding photos we took at Monica Salon in Kenyalang Park now looked really “outdated” compared to the stylish wedding photos we see today.

My 27th Wedding Anniversary

Wedding anniversaries are the remembrance of the most special day in a person’s life when he or she agreed to share his or her life with that special someone. When two persons exchange marriage vows it is a solemn and sacred rite which binds these two persons in holy matrimony for the rest of their lives. Sadly in our modern society these very same vows are not treated with the respect that they deserve. Nowadays a lot of marriages last only for a short period of time. This sorry state of affairs threatens the very sanctity of marriage institution.  Anyway for those few couples who make it through their first year of marriage they have every right to celebrate their wedding anniversary. In fact every year of a wedding anniversary should be celebrated in a special way.

Candlelit dinners, romantic holidays, gifts and bouquets of flowers are all commonly associated with wedding anniversaries. A carefully planned and executed anniversary will no doubt show your spouse how much you still love him or her

As the old saying goes it’s the thought that counts. The most important thing is to remember the wedding anniversary date itself. Woe betides any spouse who forgets this day as there will be hell to pay later.

Here are the corresponding symbols and gifts for each Anniversary:

1st Wedding Anniversary — paper

2nd Wedding Anniversary — cotton

3rd Wedding Anniversary — leather

4th Wedding Anniversary — flowers or fruits

5th Wedding Anniversary — wood

6th Wedding Anniversary — sugar or candy

7th Wedding Anniversary — wool

8th Wedding Anniversary — bronze

9th Wedding Anniversary — pottery

10th Wedding Anniversary — tin

11th Wedding Anniversary — steel

12th Wedding Anniversary — linen or silk

13th Wedding Anniversary — lace

14th Wedding Anniversary — agate

15th Wedding Anniversary — crystal

16th Wedding Anniversary — silver hollowware, peridot

17th Wedding Anniversary — furniture, watches

18th Wedding Anniversary — porcelain, cat’s-eye

19th Wedding Anniversary — bronze, aquamarine

20th Wedding Anniversary — china

21st Wedding Anniversary — brass or nickel

22nd Wedding Anniversary — copper

23rd Wedding Anniversary — silver plate

24th Wedding Anniversary — musical instruments

25th Wedding Anniversary — silver

26th Wedding Anniversary — original pictures

27th Wedding Anniversary — sculpture

28th Wedding Anniversary — orchids

29th Wedding Anniversary — new furniture

30th Wedding Anniversary — pearl

31st Wedding Anniversary — timepieces

32nd Wedding Anniversary –conveyances (including automobiles)

33rd Wedding Anniversary — amethyst

34th Wedding Anniversary — opal

35th Wedding Anniversary — coral or jade

36th Wedding Anniversary — bone china

37th Wedding Anniversary — alabaster

38th Wedding Anniversary — beryl and tourmaline

39th Wedding Anniversary — lace

40th Wedding Anniversary — ruby or garnet

41st Wedding Anniversary — land

42nd Wedding Anniversary — improved real estate

43rd Wedding Anniversary — trips

44th Wedding Anniversary — groceries

45th Wedding Anniversary — sapphire

50th Wedding Anniversary — gold

55th Wedding Anniversary — emerald or turquoise

60th Wedding Anniversary — diamond

65th Wedding Anniversary — diamond

70th Wedding Anniversary — platinum

75th Wedding Anniversary — diamond

To my wife Jennie, I just wish to say this:

After 27 years in this sacred institution of marriage, I can safely say: There is no one with whom I would rather be institutionalized.

Loving Couple Sculpture

A construction crew was building a new road through a rural area, knocking down trees as it progressed.

A superintendent noticed that one tree had a nest of birds who couldn’t yet fly and he marked the tree so that it would not be cut down.

Several weeks later the superintendent came back to the tree. He got into a bucket truck and was lifted up so that he could peer into the nest. The fledglings were gone. They had obviously learned to fly. The superintendent ordered the tree cut down.

As the tree crashed to the ground, the nest fell clear and some of the material that the birds had gathered to make the nest was scattered about. Part of it was a scrap torn from a Sunday school pamphlet. On the scrap of paper were these words: He careth for you.

A father and his young son were out walking one afternoon when the youngster asked how the electricity went through the wires stretched between the telephone poles.

“Don’t know,” said the father. “Never knew much about electricity.”

After a while the boy asked what caused lightning and thunder.

“To tell you the truth,” said the father, “I never understood that myself.”

The boy continued to ask questions throughout the walk, none of which the father could explain. Finally, as they were approaching their home, the boy said,”Pa, I hope you don’t mind my asking so many questions…..”

“Of course not,” replied the father. “How else are you going to learn?”

Sooner or later, of course, the boy will stop asking his father questions, and that will be most unfortunate. Curiosity and the desire to learn should be encouraged and nurtured.

Parents who want their children to do well in school but who don’t respect learning are deluding themselves. Not many children will be motivated to do it on their own.

The father in the above story should have told his son that he does not know but he will find out the answers. That way his son will be greatly encouraged especially if the father search for the answers together with his son. This will create a strong bond between them.

Christmas is a mixture of secular and religious traditions. At its core, Christmas is a celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ. For Christians, it is the time to renew one’s faith. But Christmas is also a secular celebration of family. It has become widely accepted by people of other religions

Christmas is a bonafide gift-giving bonanza. Desperate parents scrabble over the under-stocked toy of the season. Stores bring out the tinsel and greenery as early as October.

I was in Bintang Megamall yesterday and saw this nice Christmas decoration. It really put you in a festive mood when seeing such decor.

Christmas decor at Bintang Megamall Miri

Christmas is a time for reunion and giving generously. A few days ago I received an email from my eldest brother with this wonderful true story. And with Christmas less than two weeks away, I really want to share this story with you……

The new priest, newly assigned to his first ministry to open a church in suburban Brooklyn, arrived in early October excited about the opportunities. When he saw the church, it was very run down and need much work. He set a goal to have everything done in time to have the first service on Christmas Eve.

He worked hard, repairing pews, plastering walls, painting, etc, and on December 18 was ahead of schedule and just about finished. On December 19 a terrible tempest - a driving rainstorm hit the area and lasted for two days. On the 21st, the priest went over to the church. His heart sank when he saw that the roof had leaked, causing a large area of plaster about 20 feet by 8 feet to fall off the front wall of the sanctuary just behind the pulpit, beginning about head high. The priest cleaned up the mess on the floor, and not knowing what else to do but postpone the Christmas Eve service, headed home.

On the way he noticed that a local business was having a flea market type sale for charity so he stopped in. One of the items was a beautiful, handmade, ivory coloured, crocheted tablecloth with exquisite work, fine colours and a Cross embroidered right in the center. It was just the right size to cover up the hole in the front wall. He bought it and headed back to the church.

By this time it had started to snow. An older woman running from the opposite direction was trying to catch the bus. She missed it. The priest invited her to wait in the warm church for the next bus 45 minutes later.

She sat in a pew and paid no attention to the priest while he put up the tablecloth as a wall tapestry. The priest could hardly believe how beautiful it looked and it covered up the entire problem area.

Then he noticed the woman walking down the center aisle. Her face was like a sheet. ‘Father,’ she asked, ‘where did you get that tablecloth?’ The priest explained. The woman asked him to check the lower right corner to see if the initials, EBG were crocheted into it there. They were. These were the initials of the woman, and she had made this tablecloth 35 years before, in Austria.

The woman could hardly believe it as the priest told how he had just gotten the Tablecloth. The woman explained that before the war she and her husband were well-to-do people in Austria.

When the Nazis came, she was forced to leave. Her husband was going to follow her the next week. He was captured, sent to prison and never saw her husband or her home again.

The priest wanted to give her the tablecloth; but she made the priest keep it for the church. The priest insisted on driving her home; that was the least he could do. She lived on the other side of Staten Island and was only in Brooklyn for the day for a housecleaning job.

W hat a wonderful service they had on Christmas Eve. The church was almost full. The music and the spirit were great. At the end of the service, the priest greeted everyone at the door and many said that they would return.

One older man, whom the priest recognized from the neighborhood continued to sit in one of the pews and stare, and the priest wondered why he wasn’t leaving.

The man asked him where he got the tablecloth on the front wall because it was identical to one that his wife had made years ago when they lived in Austria before the war and how could there be two tablecloths so much alike.

He told the priest how the Nazis came, how he forced his wife to flee for her safety and he was supposed to follow her, but he was arrested and put in a prison.. He never saw his wife or his home again all the 35 years in between.

The priest asked him if he would allow him to take him for a little ride. They drove to Staten Island and to the same house where the priest had taken the woman three days earlier.

H e helped the man climb the three flights of stairs to the woman’s apartment, knocked on the door and he saw the greatest Christmas reunion he could ever imagine.