Updates...

Just a few updates on what's been happening the past few weeks.

Holidays started on the 18th of September, whoohoo! Had a fun Saturday, and did the City-Bay run on Sunday, 17th Sept. It was a 12km jog from the city (Elder Park, running down King William Street) to Glenelg Beach, via Anzac Highway. It was an amazing experience, with more than 60000 people participating in this huge event. Lots of people were strolling, walking, talking, jogging, and running. There was a wonderful variety of people from all different age groups, ranging from the young disabled children moving themselves in their wheelchairs, to the chatting bunch of housewives who were there for the exercise, to fathers carrying their little daughters on their shoulders, letting them have a bird's eye view of the crowd! Absolutely fantastic.

I tried running continuously, but only managed to do it for about 9km, before I stopped for a cup of water, and tried to run the rest of the distance. It was a really bright and sunny day, great weather for the run, but a little on the scorching-desert side though, so I felt extremely dehydrated especially in the second half of the run. Along the way, there were many groups of people supporting the runners, like school bands playing their instruments, teenage rock bands singing, residents coming out of their houses and cheering for us, spraying us with water from their garden hoses.

It's great that the event is dedicated to charity, and all proceeds will benefit many non-profitable charity organisations.

On the first monday of the holidays, we had a majong-pizza-beer-poker party at our house, and quite alot of people attended! Eugene made delicious chocolate brownies, and I made interesting strawberry cookies. Yum.
It was really entertaining to play poker, though I lost most of my money to Fang. After that, played a drinking game, with us drinking water and seeing who can resist the urge to rush to the toilet for the longest amount of time. We had lots of silly rules for the game, and it was great fun. Luckily, they decided to stop the game after awhile, cos I really really really had to pee.

During the holidays, I went to meet Graham, a 62 year old man who was paralysed waist down due to multiple sclerosis, and had weakness in both arms and a speech inpediment. He was part of my St John's community care program, and I would be visiting him regularly to talk and chat with him. He was a friendly old man, but it was really hard to understand him due to his speech problem.

I visited him a few times over the holidays, and found it really interesting to find out about his life. He smokes like crazy, and regularly smokes marijuana and drinks white wine. At first I tried to ask him to quit, but then I realised that he doesn't really have much to live for, and all these are just means of providing him relief with the pains in his life. Caretakers come and clean him and help him prepare food three times a day, and nurses visit him occassionally to check on his general health.

I guess it's quite sad to see someone in that state, but it just makes me appreciate my life even more, and not take the things I have for granted. Sometimes, when I'm complaining about why I'M the one having all the problems, I just think of him, and it just hits me that my problems are really trivial and minor, compared to alot of other people in the world. So why am I whining so much about my life, when others are trying their hardest to cope with theirs? Why am I complaining that life has treated me unfairly, when all I've had so far is a really comfortable life with great family and friends?

I know I've been blessed with so many things in my life, that I think it's time I spent some time and effort to help those, whom life has -really- been unfair to. Shouldn't you?