an unexpected kiss

Halfway through his meal, he suddenly grabbed my hand. I thought he had something to tell me, so I leaned closer and positioned my ear next to his mouth. To my surprise, he gave me a peck on my cheek! This gesture of affection sent such joy to my heart. That was little Maverick, LiLing's 3-year-old nephew.

That's the way little children show their love for you - without any hesitation, without any pretence. Little children are just so expressive in their love language, so generous to shower you with hugs and kisses. I am touched by Maverick's way of loving me. When it was time to say goodbye, he hugged me so tightly and refused to let go of my hand.

Somehow, this incident reminded me of how God loves us - so unconditionally, so abundantly, so generous. And how joyful our Father in heaven will be, only if we respond to love him back in little ways - spending time with Him, talking to Him, singing to Him.

the rainbow on Sunday

The past week has been an extraordinary self-discovery such that I dare to declare it as the turning point in my life. Attending the Basic Training from AsiaWorks has changed my life. Life will never be the same again.

Thanks to Cherlene who brought me to the guest event last year December. I remembered her exact words... "Trust me and just do it. It will be a rollercoaster ride from Wednesday to Saturday, but come Sunday, you will see the rainbow." I had no idea what she meant by that last year when I heard it, but now I do. Just because I have experienced it myself.

I would like to thank the trainer Ken Ito, all the staff, and all my fellow graduates of SB83 for being with me on that rollercoaster. It was well worth the ride and I know we will be there for one another through our life journey.

bangkok here I come!

Dear blog readers,

By the time you read this post, I'm probably already performing my multitasking shopping task at Bangkok! My long awaited break. Don't miss me. I will be back on 12 August.

Woohoo! Bangkok, here I come!!!
Shopping shopping shopping shopping....... eating eating eating.... shopping shopping shopping...

Love, Jerl.

fireworks

From a mad rush to a relaxing dinner to an exciting night.

My day started with a mad rush from one place to another and yet another. I had to like re-register my IC and there was a long queue resulting in unexpected extension of waiting time being wasted. Since my whole family were out, I did not drive my car out, and had to rush home to get my car and then zoomed to Hougang Mall to meet Barry for lunch. It was already 1pm and upon reaching there, I realised there was a queue for cars going into the mall. Quickly, I called Barry and decided, he should hop on my car as it was pretty late. I had to pick Patricia up from her place at 1.25pm. By the time he hopped one, we decided to go fetch Pat first before we eat lunch. Then I rushed back to judging at contests and hurriedly left before the results were being announced as I had made a appointment with David to pass him the toastmasters badges at Central Mall. I literally zoomed from one place to another non-stop.

I was like half an hour earlier than my appointment time with David, but my phone rang right after I finished parking my car. David was like equally early!!! So happy because I was not really looking forward to like another waiting period after I had spent 2 hours waiting for my IC to be done this morning. Decided to have dinner at Subway and how right was the choice. Not only that I get to eat my favourite sandwich, there was live jazz performance like right there. What a nice unplanned surprise! It was a wonderfully relaxing dinner with some interesting conversation and the jazz performance was a bonus.

After dinner, we went shopping but since Central Mall is rather small and there are more restaurants, cafes and eateries than anything else, we finished shopping in a whizz. We sauntered along Riverside, people watching and all of a sudden, we heard loud bangs ringing in the air! We looked around to try to see where the sound came from. At first, we could not see anything, then David pointed to the reflection of one of the taller buildings and shouted, "It's fireworks!" Like excited little children, we ran towards the bridge and lo and behold, beautiful fireworks were dancing right before our very eyes! The sky was brightly lit up with sparkles and the slowly trickled down like fallen shooting stars, leaving a trail of rising smoke in the air. With every ear-piercing bang came a differently designed fireworks! Some of which has the letter "S" right smack in the middle and of course, some of which were inverted.

The fireworks were awesome! My very first time seeing fireworks in such proximity. The experience is just amazing. Wow! We were there to enjoy that moment in the right timing! Such unplanned surprises! What an unforgetable night of fun!

birthday surprises!

I've got a few birthday surprises this year.... and I think that I'm expecting a few more to come... Wow.. all of a sudden, I feel so loved. Maybe this is the "fruit of my labour"? For the past year, I have made more friends than anything else, and living up to my daily motto of "A friend a day". I remember one close friend exclaiming that she was really surprised that I have so many friends and true enough whenever she goes out shopping with me, we will always bump into one of my friends. Sometimes, we can bump into a few of my friends. Oh well, you must agree with me that Singapore is really small!

My biggest surprise was one that was hand-delivered right up to my office in person. How sweet can that be? It was not how expensive or how delicate the gift was, but the thought and effort that was put into it. It is amazing how someone whom I met only a few months back can know me so well to choose a gift exact to my taste. This is definitely not something that could happen by chance.

My next biggest surprise was the gift from my colleagues. The gift was a gaming software that I was looking for since last month. I only ever casually asked my colleague once on whether he knew where I could get it from. The effort and thought was something that touched me, given that I had only been working with them for less than a year. They are the most positive, enthusiastic and fun-loving people I had ever worked with. The positive synergy is what kept the team alive! It's a place I'm going to stay on for a long long time. My source of motivation comes from the people I work with and not really the work itself. And I finally found the place where I belong. My colleagues rock. They're really a cool bunch to work with and hang out with even after work. I feel so blessed. Thank God.

Guess how I spent my birthday?

I visited Masters of Eloquence Toastmasters meeting from 12 to 2pm, joined them for their exco meeting. Then rushed back home to change out of my suit to something more casual, rushed out to meet my mom for a movie -- 10 Promises to my Dog! It was a fantastic show. Had desserts. Sent my mom home. Then got a message from my Division Governor David to say he's visiting Pico Toastmasters Club. Looked at my watch, thought for a moment. Since it would only take me 15 mins to drive down, I decided to pop by and take a look and pass the namecards to David at the same time. And guess what, I met Sau Ying there, and decided to like discuss with her how we can organize our area contests together. Kill three birds with one stone!

And I feel so awesome. Such is the accomplishments I had packed my time to the brim. I'm so proud of me. Lol. I love me. Happy Birthday to me.

a chimera no more

So exciting. Tomorrow I will be running the first class of the new module that I have co-written and developed over the past few months - Buyer's Psychology in Insurance Sales. It feels like planting a seed, watching it grow and now, the flowers have bloomed and awaiting the fruits of my labour ripen. That is a wonderful feeling. A euphoric achievement. Nine months ago, the mere thought of having written my own course would have been a chimera.

Yes, tomorrow. A chimera no more. A dream comes true.

new sparks and synergy

When different people meet, you get new sparks and maybe synergy.

I always get very motivated, especially when I receive a positive feedback. These encouraging words always warms my heart and ignite that spark in me to keep going. I love my job.

Recently, there was this participant in my class who actually stayed back to help me pack up and gave me much encouraging words that he really enjoyed my class. Subsequently, I met him yet again at a toastmasters club meeting and he introduced me to his new friends as his favourite trainer and went around telling others that I'm the best trainer that he has ever met. He went up on stage for the first time for table topics and actually dedicated his speech to me.

I'm literally swooned. Being a true blue peacock, I love this kind of attention I'm getting. Ahem.. My apologies if this post sounded too cocky. But who cares? I'm proud of my achievements. As a new trainer (for 6 months already), I have received at least a dozen compliments and thank you notes in my mailbox. I have participants calling me to thank me for spending time to give them extra lessons on a topic they could not understand. I have participants asking me for my personal contact numbers (both guys and gals) and have since become my friends. The kind of job satisfaction that I savour with much pleasure and delight is beyond what words can describe.

And of course, life is but just a bed of roses, you get the delightful velvety crimson petals as well as a bed full of prickly thorns.

I do have times when I thought that I could have done better or when I thought the transitions could be improved for a better flow. Training is not like blogging, where you can type as fast as you want, then if you think that the sentence structure sounded a bit wierd, you can always hit on the "Backspace" button, think, and re-type until you are satisfied.

For training wise, it really depended on your actual performance, the synergy with the participants for that day, and your ability to think on your feet and stay on your feet (literally to balance on my 4-inches heels for the whole day. It's a real feat and I'm not joking!)

Anyhow, I'm looking forward to my class tomorrow!!! :)

life is great!

I guess my blog fans must be missing me so much! I'm back!

Just a quick update for the 4 months that I had been missing... I've finally found my dream job as a trainer since last October and I had been busy with my new appointment. I have great colleagues, great bosses, great environment and basically life has never been better. Ever since I had graduated, I've always wanted to be a trainer and it is really a dream come true.

Thanks to Toastmasters Club, I've established my passion in public speaking and indeed the club has paved the way for me. My interviewers (my current bosses) were really impressed by my passion for Toastmasters Club and they could see that I really love what I do. I guess my sincerity and drive touched them. I love to be able to be a stand up trainer, to be able to impart my knowledge to other people, to be able to motivate other people, to basically make a difference in other people's lives. Sometimes, someone who is spiritually on the low just need a word of encouragement. Sometimes, people have negative or depressive thoughts just because nobody pointed to them the direction of light.

And I love my colleagues and fellow trainers. Basically, trainers all have the same traits. They love to talk, they love to socialize, they love to encourage people, they love to crack jokes. They are basically the most hardworking when it comes to work attitude, yet, they can be the most fun-loving when it comes to social functions. In short, they work hard and they play harder!!! I love to work with intellectual beings with positive attitudes. And you can imagine how excited I am to find colleagues who share the same passion as me and are like-minded.

I know that I have found a place that I am really comfortable in and fit in perfectly like a piece of jigsaw puzzle. When you look forward to going to work everyday, you know that you will most likely stay there for a long long time.

I hope that through my testimony, I will be able to motivate you to find your passion and dream in life. If you do not have a dream now, put on your thinking caps and start dreaming! It is never to late!

straight hair or curly locks?

I need a change. Whenever there is a traumatic turn in my life, I need a new hairstyle. Undecided on whether to keep my curls, I went around asking many different guys for opinions on whether they prefer me with straight hair or curly locks. Just for my own consideration and I receive the following responses, which I thought was pretty interesting.

The survey was a question that I popped on individuals on separate occassions alone to make sure they say their piece of mind. "Do I look better with straight hair or curly hair?"

Single guy 1:" I always prefer girls with long straight hair."

Single guy 2: "I think you look nicer in straight hair."

Single guy 3: "Up to you."

Single guy 4: "Straight hair better. Curls make you look old."

Daddy: "Straight hair and curls are two different looks and I think you look nice in both. It also depends on whether you tie up your hair in a pony tail or bun it up. That way you will look totally different in style. I think you look great in whichever style to match the clothes you wear, as long as you have the confidence to carry it off."

Now I know why Daddy is happily married to Mommy for 30 years. =) And why the rest of them are single. -_-

Daddy is simply amazing. =)

family day

I am coughing so badly that my lungs nearly came out through my throat. And this is no joke. For breakfast, Daddy deep fried a portion of luncheon meat and left a few slices raw specially for me. He did so partly because he did not want to aggravate my cough and partly because he knew I love them fresh with white bread.

Daddy is the best. :)

***

Although I was not exactly feeling that well, I obliged volunteered to go shopping with mom to get a gift. Actually shopping anytime. Sick or well. Ok, I admit my shopaholicism. Anyway, most of the time I was so busy with work and never at home till late at night, my sick leave is the only time I get to spend quality time with mom, so I guess it was really enjoyable.

Daddy came and joined us after work and I decided to treat Mommy and Daddy to eat nice dim sum at Mouth Restaurant. Alas, we missed the tea time, but nevertheless, we had a really sumptuous dinner of roasted beef, softshell crab, sze chuan soup, claypot brinjal and minced meat! We were so full that there was no more room for dessert!

And being a true shopaholic, I went home with a new funky black top, hair serum, hair spray, hair mousse, shampoo and conditioner to pamper my frizzied mane. Bliss.

thank you note

Ms Kam wrote a lengthy post dedicated to me yet again in her blog The Oriental Express. I really liked the last sentence where she wrote : "She is a classic example of someone who believes that if anything is worth doing, it is worth doing well." Though we have only known each other for less than a year, she knows me so well. Sometimes friendships are not measured by the length of time you know each other but by how deep you know the person.

***

Hi Ms Kam,

Thanks for such a sweet post on me and for your compliments! I have learnt a lot of life lessons from you too! Your personal testimony really touched my heart and I know that God put you in my life for a purpose - to encourage me and remind me of God's almighty love. It is through seeing how you perserve with the hardships in life that made me work doubly hard this year and I'm glad I made it possible. Thanks to you my dear friend, teacher and mentor.

Cheers, jerlynn

beauty sleep

Bought my favourite hair mask from Natural Source just now! Yippie! Thanks to HJ for her recommendation!

For now, I need my beauty sleep to rest my weary body after a long and extremely rewarding day at work.

Till then.

My dear bed, here I come.

just a side note

Just checked sgBlogs and am elated to find that my blog has moved up 134 positions to my current blog ranking of 368! Thanks to my blog fans for dropping by often! Yippie.

my blog is listed on sgBlogs!

Pretty exhilarating discovery:

my blog is listed on sgBlogs!

sgBlogs is a fully automated, intelligent blog aggregator engine that seeks out the cluster of Singapore blogs within the Internet. The ranking algorithm is pretty complex and takes into account the popularity of a blog as well as the blogs linking to it.

I this is pretty cool, isn't it?

Free advertisement space that I did not even ask for.

*singing a foreign but happy lullaby tune to myself - ready for a sweet sweet dream*

flattered

Wow... Such a flatter... I'm almost bouncing up and down with glee.

I found one whole blog post dedicated to me in The Oriental Express by my fellow blogger and toastmaster friend Ms Kam Choo Choo. Simply amazing.

Since I know her online, we've been bumping into each other very frequently at different toastmasters club meetings. Although we're more than two decades apart in age, we can spend long hours together just chatting with each other. Our conversation topics range from anything under the sun. Ms Kam is a selfless lady who believes in sharing her rich life experiences, time, care and concern with people around her. Her bubbly and cheerful nature never fails to brighten everyone who meets her. She has become a mentor and friend. Even her pet dog Chelsea showered me with affectionate gaze though it had met me only for the third time.

life is full of surprises!

Winning the Best Speaker Award on Division U's Achievers' Day really came as a pleasant surprise as I delivered my 8th speech from the basic communications manual.

I was evaluated by a panel of 5 evaluators. It was not easy when 5 pairs of eyes were really focusing on me during my speech delivery.

Surprises does not come alone.

What surprised me most was when Mark Lee (evaluator for body language) asked me to stand up during his evaluation to commend me on my power dressing.

I was wearing a black suit with grey skirt and a simple strand of pearls, not forgetting my toastmasters pin on my collar. What was more surprising was when Mark mentioned that he was impressed by my matching 4-inches black heels and contrasting silver nail polish on my toes! And how he noticed I used the heels to increase my height to aid in my speech delivery! I never thought that a guy could be SO observant to take note of such details. I'm highly impressed but I blushed too hard to smile graciously back.

I always thought I was the only freaky geek who bothers to put in effort and thoughts on such details, like what clothes and shoes to wear to aid in my speech delivery. Most of the time, I wore power suit during Toastmasters Club meetings as this is a formal event. The only time I did not wear a suit was 2 days ago as my speech topic was on a lighter topic on hamsters. Nevertheless, I still wore a pretty blouse with pants with perfect makeup and hair which won a compliment from Jensen.

***

On a side note, congratulations to Ms Kam for getting the Best Speaker Award from the Advanced Communication Manual and achieving the ACB title.

Also congratulations to Ee Chuan on getting the Best Speaker during Division Z Achievers' Day and achieving the ACB title.

Wow. Bloggers are also yakkers. They can't stop writing and can't stop talking. :)

little town called Kulai

Like a little child exploring a new place, I look forward to my first train ride to a little town in Malaysia called Kulai. It feels like going back through the ages as I admired the historical train station with those beautiful wall painting. Such simplicity as the train passes by kampongs where people live in tattered houses by the jungle I could never imagine living in. Scenary that I never saw as all my previous trips to Malaysia were in a set of wheels where I had the luxury to sleep throughout the long drive.

Was warmly welcomed by my friend's sister who came to pick us up. Along the way, we talked and I was shocked to find out that there are NO cabs in this little town and there is only ONE bus that comes at ONE-hour intervals. Everyone living in this little town drove around in a set of wheels, which is a necessity. There is only ONE hypermart in this town and half the shops have closed down, though this town feels a lot larger than Singapore. I think I will die of inefficiency if I stayed here.

Singaporeans complain when our bus service that arrive only 5 mins late. Singaporeans ought to be less of a pain in the ass and count thy blessings. We should get out to see the world ever so often to be thankful that we are among the most blessed in the whole world.

***

A heartwarming episode of the day is always worth blogging.

Was playing with my friend's baby niece and she is really a cutie. When I first came, she refused to let me carry her as I was a stranger to her. However, after spending an afternoon playing with her and feeding her biscuits, she warmed up to me.

When it was time for us to leave, I waved at her with a bright big smile only to find her smile disappearing slowly and her face twisted to a frown and then, to my horror, sparkly tears welled up in her eyes and she started bawling.

My heart dropped and rolled off a few metres that I nearly died from a heart attack. It was such a heart wrenching sight! I walked back towards the car as her mother wound down the car windows. I took her little hand as she held tightly, refusing to let go. I sayang her and promise that I will come back again. Only then she let go of my hand unwillingly.

I waved hard as the car drove off. Little did I expect her to become so attached to me only in such a short span of time. As always, I'm just too sweet to resist. Lol.

vanity tale

Who in the right mind would travel 6 hours to and fro just to do up a new hairstyle albeit a badly bruised purple butt?

Crazy and moronic as it sounds but I am proud to have broken that record. The extent women go in the name of vanity is simply boundary-less.

With a combination of straight bangs and curly locks, my stylist cleverly dyed and highlighted my hair in 4 colours. It looks surprisingly cohesive and comfortably stylish without looking outrageous. I'm swooned.