First of all a big thank you to Augustine. Thanks for arranging the meet up and heart to heart talk. I appreciate your taking the step beyond comfort zone to help me make some sense about the direction I am heading towards. It really was a pleasant surprise and blessing!
*Proceeds to speak about all the good things about this brother who regularly plays DotA with me online (that, and Warbook).*
*Back to topic*
Today was a long day; long just in duration but in terms of what had happened.
Why?
Because of 1. Work
Imagine reaching your workplace still blurry-eyed and groggy from the night's *inadequate* sleep to see everyone hard at work. You then offer your help in various tasks (preparation of food and setting tables) before taking a very rushed lunch.
"It never rains; it pours," succinctly summs it up. Today was a full house to the full house. (whatever that means) The whole restaurant was in a flurry of activity; first serving the Yu Sheng, then hastily clearing it up and proceeding with the main course. In fact, it got so crazy that 1 hour into the operation the dishes were piled up so nicely in the kitchen and at the collection container that there was no more space left to place cleared dishes.
And all the while the kitchen was still churning out huge servings of food for more hungry customers.
I just had to take the initiative.
So after hastily putting on (with some help) a plastic apron, I started to help wash the dishes. Soon after, my fiesty co-worker, Selena, joined in.
Honestly, my first impression of Selena was that she is in her mid 20s and is from the mainland because of her accent. And because dear Windez sucks at doing almost any physical-based labour (I
used to hold the family's record of being the laziest son; that record has only just been erased when I recently became the family maid and caretaker), she makes a better dish-washer, waitress, you-name-it than me. Which effectively makes her my Shi-Jie.
Until I realised she's younger than me and she isn't from China, she's a Myanmar citizen which she had been repeating for quite sometime before I got it. *Darn, it's embarrassing when you can't understand Mandarin in front of other Mandarin speaking people
AND your mom calls someone else "elder sister" in relation to you when age-wise you are older.*
Shows how much *little* physical aptitude I have. But anyway, back to the dish-washing.
I think my slow pace made one of the kitchen assistants exasperated. In fact, she promptly stopped her work to help me out, all the while commenting that it was pretty
senang (an easy task) to wash dishes.
So the three of us managed to finish the dishwashing after 2 hours (or more, I didn't get the exact time) of non-stop action. Of course, the kitchen assistant was way more experienced than the two of us so she could multi-task her own duties with that of the dish-washing, a feat which till now I still cannot believe.
I know, I know...
Washing dishes may not be the most glorious task to do and some people may find getting a job which pays good for close to no effort seems a better alternative to having to slog your guts out each day but after trying out several jobs I've come to realise that
I simply cannot stand any job that allows me the time to swat flies. I'd rather quit and work as a (semi)slave somewhere else.
But that's the end of work for today.
And the start of 2. Meeting Augustine.
We were having a heart to heart talk about my previous post, and Augustine shared about his
burden (burden you know, burden) for helping brothers like me. I admit I started off ranting to him about this and that, about problems and my lack of a solution until he reminded me about the reason why I am still here. Not merely because I exist but because of something greater. And the character that comes along with it. To which I remarked, "Who else actually remembers all that?"
And then Augustine pulled out his trump card; he said, "I believe in you."
Die.
Gone case. At that time I was thinking, how, how?! How to counter?! How, HOW!?!
I give up.
Don't want to run away anymore.
To cut a long story short, it was a time of reflection and re-evaluation. Of reminders and refocusing.
3. Relaxing
And then we met Rui Hao, studying diligently at Le Meridien. Biology, brings back memories of the only Biology chapter which I didn't top the class; Reproduction in Mammals. In fact, I scored the lowest in class. Turned out almost everyone but me scored distinction for that chapter. I barely passed.
After a short chat, the guys had to head to the HopeSem lesson at Cuppage (Augustine was whining, but I shan't reveal about what) so I headed home.
Off-topic:
You know, I was just thinking, if I were to explain consistency and diligence right now, how would I do it?
My answer:
Consistency is just like sweeping the floor. Day One, you sweep the floor, Day Two, dust settles in. If you sweep it just once off, you will find that by Day Three, the floor is as dusty as it was in Day One before sweeping the floor. Therefore, you have to sweep the floor daily to make sure the place stays clean. That is being consistent.
Which brings me to diligence. By sweeping the floor daily, the act becomes a habit until it doesn't take conscious effort. That is diligence; repeating a conscious action until it becomes a habit.
Okay, enough of the off-topic chatter.
Me go sleep.
