20th August 2007 ++ 40 hours of starvation
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Every year I "starve" myself for 40 hours to raise money for children & families in Africa. It's nothing new to my friends and my family ~ heaps of people do it here as part of World Vision's '40 hour famine' because it goes towards a good cause' & it's more than just handing over your month's allowance. It's about compassion & understanding what's happening to children & families all over the world who are starving & don't have enough money to scrounge up a simple meal. This is where the 40 hours of not eating any food comes in to play.

The idea is that you don't eat because it's similar than putting yourself into their shoes. In fact, it's not even really putting yourself into their shoes -- it's more like slipping your feet into strange shoes, realising they don't fit or that they don't suit you, and taking them out in disgust. Why? Because we do it, complain about how we don't have food, how we're starving *durr* & how everyone around us is so lucky & crap -- basically all the features of a self-pitying child fishing for attention -- and it's like our heart isn't really in it. I usually act like this -- though i'm not particularly proud of it --, but this year i decided to change my mindset. After all, it really only is 40 hours, not 40 days, 40 months etc etc. I could do it, easy.

And I did. It was easy.

But you know what? [Sorry, i keep doing the whole rhetorical question thing.. =.=''] My mum disapproved. The whole time she was ranting & putting me down about it. Her excuse was that she 'hated to see me suffer'. I do love you mum but when someone hasn't had food for 40 days, they don't want to be discouraged that what they did was all for nothing. She kept going on and on about how not eating didn't make a difference to the people in Africa blah blah blah *inserts unreasonable arguments*. Actually people sponsor me to do the 40 hour famine & i raise about $100 from friends etc etc & that money goes towards supporting them.

I don't know, maybe a concerned mother has her reasons but the way i see it is that 40 hours is NOT a long time, and not eating for *only* for 40 hours is a small price to pay for a large magnitude of piece of mind.


13th August 2007 ++ the greyish parts of friendship
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It's not an especially well known fact that i'm a Christian; i don't hide it & i'm not ashamed of my beliefs but i don't go around telling the whole world unless put into a context.

"You have a W.W.J.D. wrist band? Cool, me too!"

don't hold up signs in the city saying "Heaven is real" & "Jesus loves you" so when people are against this sort of blatent behaviour etc etc, I get it. No one wants to be sold a religion because religion now a days has lost its meaning [to an extent] and has become more of a man-made concept. They are meant to be a set of beliefs that go deeper than just actions of charity; they are core values that shape your perception of reality. So when people are complaining about this, which some of my friends often do, I don't feel particularly sensitive to it because I know that their insults are shallow & don't really mean anything, at least to me because my 'religion' isn't really what I think most of the uninformed society judges it to be. It's just like trying to critisise something you don't even know about, which is frankly -- ambitious !

But when someone looks me in the face and says "the Bible is a crock of shit", how do you think I'd feel, how any Christian would feel? And I'm not saying it's not just about religion. So get to the point: what am I saying? I'm saying it's about respect. Something that we all crave for, we all need, and not necessarily from the whole world but the fact that everyday people complain about 'don't judge me' blah blah blah, but then so easily vomits their views on other people -- JUST because they can, because they feel better doing so; feel more superior or even without even thinking the impact of what their saying. -- sickens me. Yes you can have your opinion, yes you literally say whatever you want -- depending on what country you live in -- but don't ever expect people to give you the same rights that you just denied them. The right to be treated fairly, be respected etc etc, because the next time you say something so insensitive & utterly disrespectful, you will be judged the hella outta. I'm sure you don't need a lecture ; i'm not doing it because i'm a "good Samaritan" or even, if you're thinking, because i need to stand up for something I feel strongly about and feel that other people have been too scared to say, I'm saying it because too long have I made "room" for such insensitivity ; swept things under the carpet when really -- I shouldn't.

I should have looked the perpertrator in the eye and said that it was NOT alright. Instead, I was stupified, shocked, stunned. Such an uncalled for comment I would expect coming from, let's make the imagery easy: an angry youth who is unreasonably against everything in the world. But not my friend, my good friend, Emma. You would think I would jump up and down, waving my hands crazily in the air & start defending my beliefs like there was no tomorrow -- that makes sense, i have every right to.

I guess what i'm trying to convey here is that even though I value her friendship & love her so much as do I, all of my close friends, it just seems like there's always going to be this horrible, unspoken area or "grey patch", if you like, in your friendship where you just can't venture into. I mean you can, but it's hard-- what do you do? I don't even know where i'm heading with this whole entry anymore haha X-DD. It's gone a bit too um.. no, 'deep' simply by itself isn't the word i'm looking for. It's more like 'deep-thought', 'pensive-Mookxi-re-evaluating herself-&-her-life-time' >.<. It was fun for the most part of the day though. Just saying.

Pictures from the day --
1. Tan! 2. Sars! 3. I was holding up a brush that says "tester" [ewwewewewew! -(>.<)-] 4. I'm looking at Tan's poser pics on her mobile 5. from left to right: Emma [she doesn't believe in serious pictures ;-x], Cait & me


Thanks to commenters: Luke, Megan & Mika.

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