Young Buddhists

I am glad to find another young Buddhist here.

Both of us felt that most people always think Buddhists are old folks who are supersitious.

Maybe only staunch Buddhists, regardless of ages and races (most Indians are Buddhists and vegetarians too!) would understand.

But one thing I had to agree with my friends and family is that the burning of joss paper, money and other paper products are NOT actually necessary. The Buddhist Sutras which I had read do not teach us to burn such stuff. Another alternatives would be to be a vegetarian or an occassional vegan, offer vegetarian food or fruits to temples or monks and maybe to donate generously to the poor and needy.

Simple and basics for Buddhist-wannabes :

http://www.buddhanet.net/e-learning/basic-guide.htm

http://web.singnet.com.sg/~yongmeng/Buddha.htm



Yours faithfully,

little miss sacred

What would You Do If I Die ?

The Taiwanese match making show 非常男女 on last nite has this question to ask its participants : 如果我死了, 你会怎么办?

One of the male participants answered "If you die, I will brace up, be strong and carry on with living".

The old bf once told advised me to look for another guy should he ever die.

There are some love interests who came along but they are either too old, too selfish or simply too unappealing.

I'd rather remain single than to just grab any Tom, Dick or Harry to ease my loneliness.

But I guess for most men, their initial thoughts would be to find another woman as soon as possible to "forget the pain" of losing his loved one.

Face it ! Men and women are different. Women love their men with all their hearts and mind but men can love their women for limited periods only. Coz there are always more widowers than widows who remarry. Some men even remarry within months or a year after their poor girlfriends or wives passed on.

Why ? Why ? Tell me why ?

Amore Fitness Centre

Amore Fitness Centre's exercise (yoga/pilates/kick-boxing etc)-cum-gym-cum-steam bath sessions cost SGD304 for 24 sessions.

Worth it or not ?

Tired (again!!!) like The Maid

Fatigue is really getting into me lately.

Every day, I wake up with precious sleep interrupted and rushing through with more than 10 over hours at work before dashing home for a quick bath and my daily fix of those addictive 10pm Ch U Korean or HK drama serials before retiring for the night.

Phew ! So busy that I don't even have time to surf the internet (used to be part of my nightly routine before going to bed every night !), meet friends or indulge in the comfort of my comfy bed at 7pm most evenings, having self-made dinners, with my eyes guled to the telly set !

At least, that's better than being idle and bored, I guess !

TGIF, ah-me-tou-fo !

WARNING !!! The entry below is going to be a rather (yawn !!) long and repetitive diary of my day-long events on the 15th day of the lunar seventh month....

I became sleepy myself while typing and cracking my brains on the spelling, grammar and other errors, narrating out all these....

It's the 15th day of the lunar 7th month on this good bright Sunny day today. I woke up (not) bright and (not that) early at 7am to prepare for work. I usually get up at 7.20am or half past 7 coz I start work at only 9am and I work relatively near my office in the town area.

The reason behind my slightly earlier wake time was to get some fruits and flowers to offer before the Mighty One in the ever famous Waterloo Street's Kwan Im Thong Hood Cho Temple(观音庙).

I got home at a quarter past 7 and started to arrange all the "goodies" I have bought as food offerings. Nope, I didn't buy anymore joss paper or products coz there are still plenty left from my past maddening shopping of joss paper and paper artifacts. I can't imagine I am becoming more and more like an auntie these days, buying bags of vegetarian bee-hoon with 3 types of vegan dishes, fuji apples, 1kg-cum- SGD2 worth of longans and 3 packets of strawberries with chocolates at only SGD5 for all 3 boxes ! I ended up purchasing more and more fruits and buns upon reaching home and I was like jostling both arms with heavy iron bags ! They are so damx H-E-A-V-Y and I could feel my arms giving way anytime.

Later, without any rest, I got all the fruits and food and hot drinks (coffee and Chinese tea) ready and began to lit up a bundle of joss sticks and offering them to my ancestors and late daddy at home.

The wrapping of the joss paper into 2 big paper red bags made me spend quite sometime and by the time I wanted to start burning these paper offerings, it was already nine at night.

Everything was settled by 10pm. Gosh ! It felt like another long day at work too though I reached home early today -_-

Come this weekend, I might be expecting a really long-lost friend whom I have not seen for 1 or 2 years. Be catching up on our lives and maybe catching local movie, The Maid perhaps ?? I have been wanting to watch this Singaporean Chinese ghoul sorta based movie with an intriguing story like the latter but sadly, none of my good friends wanna watch it with me :( They said that show isn't worth the SGD9.50. It didn't help much either when TV mobile or the good old telly at home kept playing its scary trailer, over and over again....

I say, I MUST watch The Maid by hook or by hook ok !!

It's Getting Difficult

Work, like a new relationship, is always at its honeymoon stage in the beginning. As time progresses, the flaws and mundane start rolling in.... Suddenly, it becomes more and more challenging and the wolves-in-disguise begin to unshed their lamb skin.

Maybe life itself is difficult and plain, especially so for me :(

Singapore's 40th Birthday Today !

You know it's National Day when at around 5.30pm Singapore time, every local (Ch 5, 8, U, Suria, Tamil etc) channels are ALL showing the National Day Parade (NDP) celebrations.

Yesterday, somewhere in town and Toa Payoh, I saw seas of red tops worn by patriotic Singaporeans, young and old.

HAPPY 40TH BIRTHDAY, SINGAPORE !

My Gifts to my Dad...

On a hot, sunny Saturday afternoon today, I went to Bright Hill Temple's Hall of Gratitude to pay my respects to my dad....

Here are some of the gifts I bought for him, my very 1st 7th month presents for him




I do hope he duly receives these...

Hungry Ghost Festival in Singapore

Every year at this time, on the 1st day of the lunar seventh month, we see joss sticks, fruits and other offerings being lined along the streets and side roads of many housing estates in Singapore. This is especially so for many older populated areas like Chinatown, Bugis, Toa Payoh and Bukit Merah.

Like many other youths my age, I seldom or should I say, never really treated this Chinese festival seriously or solemnly. Not until this year's, now that I have loved ones in BOTH the nether and in the human world. Seems like I have ripped off this line from some silly HK comedy yah ? It may seem silly but is is oh-so-real for myself.

Nah, I did not go buying the whole joss paper shop this time. I just bought 3 seemingly juicy mandarin oranges, 4 small Chinese prunes and four dragon fruits as offerings for my Ancestors' altar.

As tomorrow's a Saturday and Bright Hill Temple is closed by 4pm every day, I would have to rush there after work at one. No problem with that so far, as I had been doing this ever since I started work in my new office a couple of Saturdays ago. Just a bit rush coz I still have to buy some vegetarain meals and other offerings before making my way to the Temple.

Here are some tips for people who are going to get some offerings for their ancestors and loved ones this lunar 7th month (in Singapore) :

1) Get your fruits dirt cheap along Bugis Village's 2 fruit stalls. There are durians, mangoes, longans, dragonfruits, rambutans, fuji apples, mandarin and normal oranges, grapes and some other non-seasonal fruits going off cheaper than most fruiterers ! These fruits are rather fresh and sweet too !

2) There are many cheap vegetarian food stalls selling economical beehoon, Chinese hot and cold desserts, claypot rice, chicken rice, wanton mee etc, for those who have to buy vegetarian offerings for their ancestors.

3) I found an all-purely-no-eggs-used vegetarian cakery just behind Bugis MRT station, below a block of Rochor Street HDB flats ! Their in-house chocolate, raspberry and pumpkin seed muffins taste deliciously rich with flavour but are sweet too. They even have cute durian-shaped cakes there ! Interesting !

4) DO NOT BUY joss paper and other joss offerings around the Rochor and Bugis Village line of shophouses (near Sim Lim Square) as they charge rocket high prices ! I may be a bit too young for such papery offerings but I am definitely not a novice in this ok ! There are around 3 or 4 joss paper shops selling most paper items at double the usual prices for exactly the same items I see elsewhere ! :(

Hope the above tips may help you (if you do believe in this Chinese tradition) and happy shopping !



Yours truly,

little miss sacred

Getting fatter and fatter

I feel that I am getting fatter and fatter these days !

There are many temptations in my new office !

One day, they offered banana cake, another day, durian puffs !

Somemore I see people eat their MacDonald's breakfast at their desks ! Makes me even more hungry but luckily, I did not give in to the delicious but fatty food.

My Manager and fellow immediate colleague kept asking me make myself some coffee / milo / tea whenever I feel like it !

I have been consuming mainly vegetarian food lately, as a mark of respect for my recently deceased father and a colleague said that actually, eating vegetarian food can make people plump or fat too ! Coz the artificial meat contains mainly gluten and starch!

However, if I eat purely those greenies, potatoes and rice or noodles, I should be able to detoxify my body and system right ?

However, I ate fish beehoon soup for lunch today ! Really had some craving for that and it is one of my fav local food ! Healthy and very nice ! Not as many hidden calories as oily carrot cake or mee goreng.

Glee ! When one is working in town with plently of good and inexpensive food and desserts, I wonder how she/he can not be fat. :(