CNY.... Bleegh... and other odd things.....

With Chinese New Year coming up and work piling on my desk, the last few weeks, I've been trying to get as much done as possible so that I won't end up being out of breath and stressed up when my workplace datelines get nearer. Sometimes I wonder if I'm the one who is giving myself all that stress :P

I'm kinda glad that I resisted eating most of the Chinese New Year stuff... not only is it not good for me, but also when I see some of my colleagues falling sick, it really isn't funny :P Apparently there's a surge in patient numbers who are falling sick due to eating too much new year goodies and partying too hard over the long weekend.

CNY was okay for me for the most part, except for new year's eve, which is the one day of the year where I get to see the detested relatives from my mother's side :( Actually, I really really dislike a particular maternal uncle who is loud, attention seeking and says stuff that makes no darned sense. Everyone's stopped correcting him years ago, he never listens anyway. I don't mind guys who tell tall tales, but at least they have to be somewhat entertaining... and not incredibly dull and very very badly narrated with lots of stops, pauses and hemming and hawing to see if we are in awe of him or not...:P

And if he thinks I'll ever forget the way he treated my family when he was in trouble some years ago... and how he tried to force us to help him get out of it by showing up at our house shouting at the top of his voice... well... I'm not a very forgiving person... 

Some odd things happened over the long weekend.... for one, I was shocked by my sister's questions about the possibility of there being "half-breed" angels... (ie. half man-half angel)

This happened on Monday when we went out to meet Wolfy after a dinner with my paternal relatives (which I really much prefer actually). My sister wanted to tag along cos I guess she was bored. Over coffee, sometime after 1am, our conversations kinda swerved to the topic of angels...

Now, my sister has NO IDEA at all that I'm on a non-Christian spiritual path... Like the rest of my family, she follows the same brand of fundementalist belief.... however, I KNOW she isn't a "straight arrow" so to speak... otherwise she won't keep visiting facade.com for tarot readings....:P


Soooo... about half-angels.... 


See, the whole thing arose because of a passage in Genesis that my sister and myself have known about since we were teens.....

"Genesis 6:1-4 (NIV version)
When men began to increase in number on the earth and daughters were born to them,
2 the sons of God saw that the daughters of men were beautiful, and they married any of them they chose.
3 Then the Lord said, “My Spirit will not contend with man forever, for he is mortal; his days will be a hundred and twenty years.”
4 The Nephilim were on the earth in those days—and also afterward—when the sons of God went to the daughters of men and had children by them. They were the heroes of old, men of renown."

The phrase "The Nephilim" is not seen in the KJV (King James) version of the bible. It was translated from the original hebrew into the following....

"Genesis 6:4 (KJV Version)
There were giants in the earth in those days; and also after that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them, the same became mighty men which were of old, men of renown."

Now, some scholars theorise that Sons of God could refer to ...
1) fallen angels
2) powerful human rulers
3) godly descendants of Seth intermarrying with wicked descendants of Cain

The problem with 2) and 3) is that, well... ordinary humans + ordinary humans = more humans and not "giants" as indicated in verse 4. So many people tend to view 1) as the most likely possiblity.

Well, when I was much younger and still in the religion, I did ask certain pastors if "sons of God" could refer to 4) "aliens" but they pooh-poohed the idea. Aliens apparently don't exist in my family's fundementalist world view. I also asked about possiblity 5) "proper angels" well... needless to say they were shocked..... most people in the religion tend to think of angels as spirit beings without gender. Also, its stated in the gospels that angels don't marry... as evidenced by the following...

"Matt 22:30 (NIV Version)
At the resurrection people will neither marry nor be given in marriage; they will be like the angels in heaven."

However, as some wily minds... (my sis included)... conclude... it doesn't say that angels don't make out. And angels have been known to take the form of human men.


I was a little bit surprised by my sis actually. I wonder what might be nibbling at her brains... because she was so insistant for me to answer her questions about this particular bible passage. I wondered why she didn't ask a proper minister instead. In fact, she pressed me for an answer if it might AT ALL be possible for there to be a half-angel to the point of asking if there is anything in the scriptures forbidding angels to mate with humans.

In my limited knowledge of theology.... the answer is "No". I have never come across any passage that indicated that proper angels are forbidden to mate with humans.

After that, she asked me what kind of superhuman powers a half-angel might have that might indicate their status. I don't think she was too happy when I told her that the only indication is size... the word "Nephilim" is roughly translated into "giant"... presumbly in terms of stature... but some scholars have suggested it might also refer to mental might.

I really really hope my sister doesn't end up being attracted to Doreen Virtue and the irk...:P Seriously speaking... I think that she's looking for some kind of power, but the angel folk are where most of the "fluffy bunnies" are. :P I don't think they could really teach her anything useful... and that whole "love and light" thing might cause her to puke.

Sad thing is, my sis doesn't see herself as an individual that might desire power. Truth be told... most humans are.... but like to think that they are "above all of that". She even once said to me that she probably has "few personal demons"....:P Honestly, despite being a pretty intuitive individual for most of her life.... I think this time, she's taking herself for a ride. :(

Now there's nothing wrong with wanting power, but I feel that there should be an acknowledgement by the individual that that is what they secretly desire. If not, things can get pretty skewed... and you get some pretty self-righteous notions coming out a deluded mind.

Mr Kitty Ran Away!

I put up postings in the online classifieds for a potential owner for Mr Kitty, but on the day that some German lady wanted to pick him up from the house, I found out that he was gone! In fact, he was gone for like....2 days by the time I got there... at least that was what I was told by a nearby neighbour who drops by the house pretty often...

Needless to say I wasn't the only one disappointed by his disappearance. I had to call off my meeting with the German lady at the last minute and she called back again like 15 mins later to ask if I managed to find him. I sort of got the impression that maybe she had gotten everything ready for a new cat. :(

I looked everywhere but he was definitely gone. At this point, I remember F telling me that she felt Mr Kitty was only there because I was there and it was probably the universe giving me an opportunity to adopt a cat. :(

I originally thought that was a little bit of an assumption on her part... but now I'm thinking there might be some truth to this whole cat thing. Well... I do miss Mr Kitty and IF he does wander back to the house again now that the not-so-friendly lady F had temporarily rented her house to for 3 weeks is gone, it will make me wonder if he really is meant to be my cat.

Cat for Adoption

An all black kitten wandered into F's home recently and has been staying there for the last few days. F doesn't know how it managed to get into the apparently closed back garden, but she thinks it probably crawled under the locked gate. She can't keep it because she travels constantly and is terribly allergic to cats :(


Mr Kitty (we actually do not know it's gender, but F thinks it is male) is very very cute and now we are trying our best to help it find a home. Potential owners can either leave a message in my chatbox to the right OR a comment under this post with contact details and I'll reply.

I really like this cat but sadly, my entire family hates them. So adoption by me is out of the question. :( 

Holiday That Was Not...

 

It's almost the end of the new year period and that means that I'll be back in my job next week :P I had anticipated spending some time during the Christmas-New Year season getting some rest and getting some stuff of mine straightened out.

That never happened.

The holidays this year was ....  very busy... I ended up meeting hordes of people I did not want to meet......:(

After that highly unfortunate incident with that "person from my past" my folks announced that a family friend had died and we were going to attend the wake and funeral. As he was the minister of a church, well, there were hordes of people at the wake. Unfortunately they were all the people that I grew up with :(

It was also unfortunate that we went to the wake on Christmas day :( I had never seen so many people that I had wanted to avoid.

The minister was a good person and I remember him best as an excellent counsellor. I think he had a good understanding of human nature... (something unfortunately that I did not develop in my younger years... and that resulted in me making the acquaintance of people that I today REALLY want to avoid) he certainly could see the issues in the people that I knew... (something that I failed to see for many years)....

However, it seemed (for me at least), this event was like Fate or Karma or something asking me in abstract terms if I wanted to turn back now and return to where I once was... in fact I had people asking me to come back :P 

Honestly... I hadn't thought a lot about why I left it all behind... When I did leave that life so many years ago, I had done so because I felt terribly unhappy about being where I was. Reflecting on my decision, I realised that being with that particular community did not make me happy because my faith as it was back then was based on fear and not on a belief that this was what I had decided to stand for....

The problem with the community I had come from was that for the most part, it attracted people who talked more about hellfire and brimstone than the love of God. In fact, my own father was of the opinion that Hell was an important concept that was not preached enough in some "modern" churches because he felt it helped to "save souls" :P

I should have listened to Mr Cow in the university I attended. Mr Cow was a lecturer who taught a minor module in my course of study... He was a very very strong minded chap who had his own unique views and did not take any crap from anyone... not even the authorities... He was also a man of uniquely strong faith and I believe his grasp of theology was also pretty sound...

One, he had proposed to myself and some students of similar faith the following notion...

Were we believers because of fear... in particular the fear of burning in hell.... or did we choose this path because it was something that we felt was worth standing for?

He was of the notion that it was a poor poor basis for faith... if the reason it existed was because of fear.

Unfortunately, I had not really understood his reasoning back then because I was too deep into the whole thing... I think I even felt a little bit... surprised that he had even raised that question...

I think I asked him if he wasn't afraid of Hell at all... i think he said that... if his faith was based on fear alone... he'd rather be in the fire .....


If I had understood him earlier... I could have avoided all those mistakes.. years of it... 

The problem about having a faith that is based on fear is that... you are always wondering if you have "made it"... so to speak... Honestly, the standard of holiness that was advocated by the community that I was in is... in today's world... unrealistic... Moreover, as the community was fringe and not mainstream... they held to the belief that the religion as practiced by themselves was of far superior quality than in other groups of similar belief.... 

To most other people... the community I was in would be considered extreme or purist... :P

Naturally, being human and Singaporean... I found it terribly difficult to uphold the standard of holiness that was advocated... (there was one time I remembered a view advocated by some members of the community that - going to the movies was undesirable because most movies weren't exactly moral and the environment of the movie theatre was one that led to people, especially young people engaging in immoral acts... thus, some members did not go to any cinemas at all... since movie-going is a national pastime for Singaporeans... you can see how that presents a huge problem) ....that led to constant failure... and constant doubt regarding my own faith... half of my childhood was spent learning religious doctrine from members of the community and my own father... and because of all these views... I was never ever secure in my own faith... 


Kids aren't dumb... and certainly I understood what I read and studied... unlike many of my peers, I never had a problem with Shakespearean english especially when I started learning it in secondary school because the scriptures I read was in the same type of language... (some members of the community felt for the longest time that the only accurate translation of the scripture was the king james version, and rejected all other modern translations)...


Well... I was a thinking kid and really..... knowing all of THAT... never helped me feel like I had actually managed to attain the whole "salvation" thing...


So what happened was that I ended up wallowing in fear, guilt and doubt for years... and when a person becomes afraid and guilty, they also become extremely zealous... I can honestly say that I probably spent more hours "serving God" than my very faithful father....:( 


Seeing all those people made me remember my own childhood... 

I never want to go back to all of that... it was a terrible terrible burden being in that community... I could never ever really be myself in all of that... in fact, I had to invent this person who never really existed.... just so I could have something to show people on a Sunday....:P 

Now, I don't have anything against the religion in general and I think some of the best people I know are in it... but.... it is certainly not my cup of tea... and certainly not with the community I grew up with.... 

I shared my experiences with F who felt after listening to all of it, that.. well... my community was considered a very non-mainstream sect in christendom... 

F was once an ordained minister... it is pretty ironic that she's the one I talk to the most now about spirituality and stuff...


I think I have a huge hangup over this entire "faith" thing... in fact, F noticed that people who were once monks or nuns in their past lives or who are now in a religious order generally DO NOT like me at all... it's like they can sniff out my hangup without even me opening my mouth... 

well... but that's really something for another time...:P

A Post Before Christmas,,,,

Once, many years ago, this festive season used to be the busiest time of the year for me... but not because of work... I used to have a lot of religious commitments... which is really really odd, because my family doesn't celebrate this holiday at all. They just go through the motions of celebration when invited to other peoples' homes for the sake of politeness (for some people)... or fun (for the rest of us...)

The thing about a having a father that reads a lot about his area of interest is that well, he found out long ago that decorating Christmas trees probably had its roots in ancient druidic practices... (I've wanted a tree since I was a kid but thanks to my father, they are out because he felt it was a heathen practice... ) Also, he felt that Christmas was a christianised version of the traditional pagan holiday of Yule and other similar year-end winter holidays celebrated by ancient non-Christian Europeans, so we have no celebrations at home except for a big dinner IF he and my mother feel like it... In fact, I remember working on Christmas day when I was a teenager trying to scrape together enough cash for stuff in the new year... because there was nothing else to do on that day...

Being a "by the book" kind of believer, my father felt that the only festival worth remembering on the Christian calender was Easter... It commemorating the death and resurrection of his Lord... since, as he said... it was the only thing that was commanded for believers to remember... and he does have a ton of theological knowledge to back his view.

You know, we don't ever have easter eggs or chocolates or bunnies at our house either... :P I wonder why since my father never made the whole Easter - Ostara connection.

I guess its because my folks aren't too much into having "fun". Or maybe its just too much effort to get stuff ready..... I dunno.... I see some gift chocolates on the table now, but I think its just in anticipation of returning someone's gift since it is likely someone will give  my folks something on Christmas day when they go for service... :P And believe me, my folks don't like making social boo-boos.

Anyways... so what does this season mean to me now? Actually its still one of the busiest times of the year for me 'cos for some weird karmic reason, the universe or Source makes it such that I see a huge parade of all the people I've either had issues with or who have issues with me...

In the past week, I met a person from my past I really didn't like.... and fell really really sick afterwards... yeah , I've got the stupid f****** FLU again with the slimy green phelgm. Some people are just "toxic"... as echoed by a friend who works at Da Bear's... I heartily agree.. I think next time if that m***** f****** b**** is gonna turn up at a meeting of old friends, I'll just be very rude and say "I don't want to make it".

Honestly, I have never been insulted in the face as many times as on that Thursday night... by that B****. But in an effort to save the rest of the innocent bystanders and pretty decent folk...from discomfort over me flipping the dinner table and walking out, I had to ignore all of that... I have no idea why that b**** seems out to get me this year since I don't think I ever did anything nasty to her.... :P

F says I am slipping in my meditations and spiritual practice and that's why I met those people... don't say I disagree with her... its been a very very hectic end of the year.... no time to consider stuff which I should be thinking about... I've still got a painting dateline and that sure isn't helping 'cos all I wanna do is sleep :(

But despite all that I'm feeling now about these very short and not very fun holidays, I did learn quite a lot about myself and managed to overcome a longstanding fear. I used to be afraid of meeting or confronting that nasty b**** .. and I really don't know why, since she isn't really anyone powerful or important... unlike some of my other old school acquaintances in the government... but now, seeing her after so long, I find myself laughing at my own silliness... why should a very very bloated, spiteful, lonely person cause me so much consternation? 

Perhaps, as F would say, "it is something energetic she is putting out..."... maybe she is right since none of the other normal people seated at the table said anything in retort when she started throwing her arrogance around... I mean, I used to think I was arrogant and self-absorbed, but now I think I'm pretty normal by comparison.

In fact, I think that in comparison to all the people from my past that I have met these past few weeks... most of my friends now are "normal" by comparison....

Anyways, I anticipate that this Christmas I'll be meeting more people from my past that I do not want to meet. I hope I don't end up punching someone.... cos I really don't have any more patience for people who for some stupid karmic reason, have some kind of issue with me.

Flu again? And this time I'm not even sure..... in listless mood.....

Flu again... and this time, I'm not even sure it IS flu.

It started during the weekend after too many late nights. My nose started to hurt and then my throat. It went away for 1 day and I thought I was okay... but they... "lucky" me, it was back one morning when I woke up with a stuffed nose.... in only 1 nostril!

Unfortunately this 1 nostril has been dripping since Monday and my throat feels scratchy.... soooo I'm gonna treat it like it is the flu. :P Which really really sucks since I have a dateline these 2 weeks and a book I have ordered from Kinokuniya just arrived.... after 6 LOOOONNNNGGGG weeks.... oh well.... but its the same if I ordered it from Amazon...at least with Kino, you are assured of getting it without the book getting lost in the mail...

So yeah, I'm in no mood to read an academic text.... the pic of the cover is as seen below:

Wolfy and I found this one evening when we were surfing around.....  its related to the dream I had about 2 years ago about a medieval witch trial. Well, I'll get around to reading it.... soon. 

Reason for choice of book? Well, coincidentially one of the case studies in the book is of the trial I had dreamt about. After dreaming about this very perculiar case, I had done a bit of "connect-the-dots" and identified the actual incident. 

Naturally after figuring out which historical case the dream was about, I looked up the Catholic Encyclopedia online.... I mean, from all the detail I had found thus far, it seems that the thing I had dreamt about was a pretty famous case in its time. The odd thing about this is that the Catholic Encyclopedia - New Advent doesn't mention this case at all.. in fact, it doesn't mention any of the main people involved in this case. Despite the fact that some of the people involved in this trial were pretty famous individuals.

This is pretty strange considering the fact that they have pretty extensive writeups on other similar infamous figures like Konrad of Marlburg, a witchhunter and (according to secular historians) an individual who had sadistic tendencies who was most likely the main culprit in the death of a beloved female saint.


Wolfy said he smelled a giant rat (that is to say... giant cover-up)...I mean, why write a big article excusing the actions of one crazy zealot and say nothing at all about another... and apparently both are equally famous?

Da da da da.... conspiracy theory..... heh heh heh

Anyways, since it was an interesting mystery we did a bit of digging and found this book. After reading a preview of the book on Google books, I had decided to get it because it contains a blow by blow account of the trial in question AND does confirm some of the amazing details I had seen in my dream. Also, the author does a great job of referencing all the material she had referred to for the case studies in this book. So we know where all the information comes from... which is great, so we know that the author has not made all of it up.




Well.....





That was like 2 weeks ago, but I forgot to publish this post... My flu is now gone, thanks to Chinese medication and essential oils and being extremely lazy for a few days......

Halloween At The Asian Civilisation Museum

Some people asked me this year if there will be a Samhain ritual like last year... well... the answer is "No" because of the lack of space and this year's infernal rain... which lasted from 6 to after 12 midnight on 31 Oct.

I'm feeling a little bit sad because just a few days before Halloween, I got an email via an email blast from the faeries. It was an announcement for an event and I was kinda glad that they had found a new place.

Initially I had thought that the new space would be near Novena MRT, opposite from the church, however, as it turned out... the new space is a 5 stop bus ride via 21 or 131 from the bus stop opposite of Novena church. The ride itself takes you to somewhere in Balestier, and you stop at Shaw Plaza. The place is opposite of that, in a single storey complex of buildings with an Indonesian name.

I don't think that I'll likely hold a ritual at the Faeries' anytime soon in the next year or so cos well... the space that was rented out was too small. In fact, it is a single room that's slightly smaller than my own bedroom even... haiz :(

I had spoken to one of the faeries about some pretty big shop space at the same building that Da Bear's is at currently, but I think even with the fact that that decrepit old building has pretty cheap rental for the central shopping district ... the rental price is still probably too high for them...

That is pretty sad... its a real waste I think... they did have a lot going for them.

Anyways, the Halloween event as organised by the Asian Civilisation Musem was actually a big success. There were tons of people at the event when I arrived at 6pm + and they actually did have the free drinks and ice-cream as promised in the promotional advertisment. I was really quite amazed because there are usually a lot of terms and conditions when free stuff is involved. Most of the time you don't end up getting what you came for. ... Well, I felt that the drinks COULD REALLY have been better with MORE BARCARDI in the drink....:P There wasn't enough of the alcohol to actually taste the thing.

Apart from the rather alcohol-less drinks, the museum staff really outdid themselves and decorated the entire place with black cobwebs, giant spiders (some people actually made off with them) and severed doll limbs covered in blood. There were also performances, including a rather interesting faery dance and some rather entertaining magic shows.

However, because of the rain, quite a lot of people were not able to make it. In the end, Wolfy and I ended up being the only ones who attended the event. :P 

It's quite a pity because many people were very sporting this year and came dressed up in rather nice halloween costumes. I think that tha local cosplay community also got wind of this event and not surprisingly many of them ended up in the best costume competition. I honestly don't think Wolfy and I have a good chance of winning the bottle of barcardi because there was some really really strong competition.

However, I was quite surprised by the amount of people who requested a photo with us... Apparently, when we went on the museum tour, we found out that the Singapore Paranormal Investigators (SPI) were wandering the galleries dressed up as ghouls to provide a little "colour" to the exhibition area. I think they were supposed to tell us a little bit about the museum exhibits, especially the ones with some kind of supernatural background, but they didn't do that... and I think the people were more interested in taking photos with the ghouls rather than listen to the occult history of some of the museum's objects.

Well, I guess the people thought that we were part of the SPI crew. And I must say we do give a much better background on the supernatural aspects of some of the artefacts than the SPI crew :D

Below are some of the pictures I took at the museum. Unfortunately all the great pictures which we took with the people who asked for our photos were on THEIR cameras and not mine...:P

Tribal book describing magical rituals

Closeup of book pages

Carved bone tribal artefacts used in rituals

Oddly enough they contain some pretty familar symbols.

The Philippine exhibit contained some
pretty awesome-looking religious art.

This is a processional piece
that is about 4 metres tall.
It won't surprise me one bit that the
fittings might be made of solid silver.

Some actual solid silver toothpick holders

Wolfy ninja-fied

Yes, I'm camera shy and I don't photograph well. :P