Excitement is the essence of life – the spice that gives rise to all glories. It is one element that propels you to great height of achievement. To start with, it gives you a sense of purpose and direction.
As it is, we are all the products of excitement. We are born as a result of two people falling in love and getting excited about each other. Once that excitement ebbs its magnification wanes.
But excitement taken to another level is even more of a potent force. This according to Dr Napoleon Hill, the author of “Think and grow Rich”, is referred to as the “transmutation of sex”. That is to channel all those sexual urge, drive and passion to a more intangible motivation of magnificent obsession. It’s been noted that great men of the past were all highly sexed and who had been able to convert their sexual energy to achieve greater legacies in life.
Chronological age may be a hindrance to your sexual performance and satisfying your sexual partner. However, you can redirect and channel your sexual desire for achieving other areas of human endeavour. Like focusing the sunlight under a magnifying lens, it’s got to be well focused and concentrated. It will burn right through. In life this will be the spark that triggers off the “Towering Inferno”.
If you wake up each morning feeling blue and unexcited about life, then life will similarly treat you likewise. With excitement, you’ll wake up with the break of dawn feeling great and ready to go and face life’s challenges. Remember the time when you fell in love, everyday was a glorious day for you. You could promise moon and stars and do anything. Nothing is impossible.
When Mark Twain was asked the secret of his success, he merely said, “I was born excited!” Our two grandsons Daniel & Matheson demonstrate daily that life is great. They are always excited and doing things. Lets hope this excitement dies not as it always does with the growing of years. Children are generally excited!
Matheson & Daniel
Life is great. Be excited about yourself. Be excited about the things you do – be it a chore or a hobby or a sport you love. Develop that great passion that will drive you to immeasurable heights.
(A person who helps at a difficult time is truly a reliable person.)
With three score & ten years behind me, though a dimmer prospect of another score ahead of me, I have lived a life where the word “friend” takes on different perspectives with the passing of time.
The essence of friendship is a connection or bond undeterred by time or space. It’s a love that knows unlimited boundaries & true friendships last a lifetime.
You don’t need to have friends in high places or in senior positions who are able and willing to use their influence on your behalf. What you need most is, in times of need, a friend whom you can count on anytime, anyplace, anyhow – dependable, responsible & reliable whatever the circumstances. This is what’s all about of the proverbial saying of “a friend in need is a friend indeed”. It is someone who has collectively all the wonderful qualities in him which he puts at your disposal without the least worrying about his own self interests.
He has with you a bond of mutual understanding, love , affection & respect.
He ‘s a strong supporter of your cause – be it personal or otherwise.
He’s always on your side – friend rather than foe.
Over the years when you were growing up, you were & are constantly making friends. After all, we are gregarious creatures, social beings, who need to mix & congregate. You have it heard being said that no man is an island. For all intent & purposes we find ourselves living in nests, be it social sharing common interests or professional as in the same line of work or employment. In school, we have classmates & schoolmates as friends. In college, we have college mates, & at university, university mates.
In our working life, we have colleagues & work mates – some closer than others, distinguishing through degrees of same interests. For the ambitious ones, they move outside the sphere of their own environment by joining clubs & associations to extend their friendship circle. Some join service clubs with the noble idea of rendering service to the community or the sheer opportunity of meeting people in higher places. Some take to playing golf for in most Asian countries golf has a snob connotation attached. Others use it as an avenue of closing deals or negotiating one. Sports like tennis does provide an avenue of advancing one’s social circle & ladder, rendering a touch of class & social grace. Church going is also a way of socialising.
Whatever & however friendship is cultivated, friends of such category seldom last. The Chinese have a saying about friends who will wine & dine with you while you are able to lavishly throw parties around. While the going is good, that friend is around but not otherwise. “Hey, there’s nothing in it for me!”, so he drifts away.
So will all your friends drift away one way or another. Some sadly enough through the misfortune of untimely demise. They are never around you forever however close you might have been because of circumstances or job locations. Out of sight out of mind is a natural human phenomenon. If you value friendship as much as you value your life, stay in touch, particularly those who are really your friends.
When you sit and rock in your old rocking chair, & your mind wander into the distant past, take time to think just how many friends you have made over the years, how many are still with you, but more so, how many can you really count them as friends. I wonder!
Sometimes, a friend is but a stranger whom you have not met! You met by chance & by choice you became friends. Good friends endure the test of time & trials. I also remember an old song we used to sing in school:
“Make new friends
But keep the old
One is sliver
The other is gold.”
Friendship demands all due care & attention.At all times, we need to apply all the “Rs” in terms of mutual respect. Friends, more than all the things, must be renewed, refreshed, revived, reclaimed,redeemed & restored that they may be treasured & not discarded.
“There is nothing on this earth more to be prized than true friendship.”–StThomasAquinas
May you always have
Love to Share, Health to Spare and Friends that Care!
How big is Australia? You didn’t have to ask when you look at the two maps above. With a land mass of 7,706,168 sq km compared to Europe’s of 3,483,066 sq km, it is no wonder why Australia has invariably been called “The Lucky Country”. Its population is only 21.8 million (official estimate end of 2008) whereas Europe has 830.4 million or about 11% of the world’s total (as of 2009).
Australia is richly endowed with natural resources, and was acclaimed the richest country in 1885 & 1900, until overtaken & replaced some 50 years later by US & Canada. In terms of climate, recreation, literacy & personal freedom it stands supreme. It rates a perfect 10 for climate & recreation along with France, Italy & the US. Renowned as a great sporting nation, its prowess in swimming is second only to the Americans. It is a definite “S” country excelling also in sand, sea & surf.
Its long-held position as the rich man of Asia has been assailed by Japan, S. Korea including its closest Asian neighbour Singapore and of course the great emerging economies of India & China. Such economic ills prompted the then Federal Treasurer Paul Keating to refer Australia as the “Banana Republic”.
It’s said that one cannot be tied to his mother’s apron string all through life. For far too long Australia has looked towards UK & the West for its trade & economic activities. In a changing world, none so true as the present, we cannot afford to be rigid & fixed in our policies. We need to be dynamic, adapt, adopt & adjust according to the direction of the economic wind. Fostering a closer economic link to China & the other Asian economies won’t be such a bad idea.
Way back in 1982 when I first migrated here in Perth, the country was besieged with recession, “Bottom of the Harbour Scheme”, union strikes, political leadership challenges . . . summarily not the best of times. My thoughts at that time are best portrayed in this poem of mine published in the local press on August 23, 1990 entitled: “Think Big”
In this vast and lucky country
We have yet to be complementary
We should be in the “Think Big” league
But smallness and pettiness we dig.
Traditionally, by virtue of our isolation
We tend to be restrictive in our constitution
We are even confused about our identity
Even finding it hard to accept our originality.
We need to relate well to the Aborigines
Accept and help them towards our destiny
The “Wogs”, the “Chings” are here to enrich
Rather than make the country perish.
Having a closed mind or closed society
Is more detrimental than you can see
There’d got to be unity in diversity
Together shouting to the troubled world of our victory.
It’s said that we can worry to sickness. On the other hand we can will ourselves to health. Whatever the circumstances, our state of health depends upon our frame of mind. With changing times and circumstances we need to learn to tune our attitude positively along.
As the years ahead of us diminish with the accumulation of the years behind us, living beyond the three scores and ten years of age is by the grace of God. We should be thankful for the bonuses ahead, and all the more grateful for the good health that we enjoy. Understandably, health and life are not within our power of control. Therefore, cherish lest you perish!
In the rose garden, people admire the different hues of beauty of the roses. However, there are those who complain about the thorns. But life is never meant to be a bed of roses without the thorns. As a young man, I love roses but never wanted to grow them simply because of the thorns. With love and admiration for the roses, I learnt to accept and respect their thorns.
All things are beautiful, but circumstances and motives of gain, greed, power and control turn them otherwise. For instance, gunpowder initially in the hands of the Chinese was used for celebration purposes as firecrackers. No sooner when discovered by the Westerners, guns and ammunition and other weapons of destruction took over.
In this beautiful Psalm above, there are seven meaningful verbs, well chosen to instil a process of hope and positiveness . .. forget, forgives, heals, redeems, crowns, satisfies, and renewed. Let our lives reflect these positives and steer onwards and upwards towards our ever-forgiving God, faithful and true.
A kiss is not just a kiss. It is the universal language depicting love, or an expression of greeting. Depending on which part of the world you’re in, some kiss on the hand or cheeks, some on the nose, others on the forehead and of course on the lips. The last of which is so often dramatised on the big screen or the small screen, and which to a large extent has influenced the modern world to think differently.
Women have always wondered what is like to be kissed by Clark Gable
This beautiful gesture and romantic touch or caress with lips often lead on to a pervasive action. In the world of moral degradation, a kiss means it’s a passport to sexual paradise. In a word, it is defined as:
“The upper gentle persuasion arousing one to lower physical
invasion culminating in the final erotic penetration.”
Sadly enough, the original beautiful concept no longer holds true. Today jumping in and out of bed is like changing clothes. You don’t even wash and wear. You just discard them as disposable. Good and decent girls these days find it hard to protect their modesty. Their “No” is to be taken as “Yes”.
Confucius had this to say in relation to the question of rape:
“Women with skirts up run faster than men with trousers down.”
What a verified truism that is! Caught with the pants down men can hardly run. Mindful of this statement, it goes to prove that the element of consent may ever be present, for women can really fly with their skirts up!
Really, today’s value system has been switched. It’s topsy-turvy. Its price differs on an individual basis. Traditional value takes on the back stage. Modern value fronts the main stage. Where do you stand?
Chinese are known for their culinary skills, and the dominant presence of Chinese restaurants in foreign lands reflects that. It is generally acceptable that Chinese food is tasty and most palatable. In Perth, for example, on a per capita basis there are more Chinese restaurants than anywhere else I know. Eating out in a Chinese restaurant on a Friday evening is a norm among the Aussies.
Perhaps, when you look at the life style in Hong Kong, where living space is a premium, and where people generally work right round the clock, then you begin to understand why Hongkies choose to eat out. The roaring trade of the restaurants here does not in any way indicate that the economy is down. People are still entertaining out or eating out with their families. Most families generally don’t have the luxury of proper dining room or kitchen facility adequately made for entertainment. Seldom you get an invitation from your Hong Kong friends to dine at their homes. Most meeting and entertainment whether social or otherwise are done outside the home.
Shopping in Ikea the other day provided an interesting experience, particularly in the café section. We were utterly surprised to see a great number of students doing their schoolwork there. Considering that the place, public though it is, probably provide a more conducive environment than the home for their studies. The management gladly permit them to linger on. Rightly and profitably too this crowd does form a sizeable clientele. Another venue popular with students is the many outlets of McDonalds and KFC. The availability of community libraries may be a solution for the students.
People are naturally gregarious and habitually gather together or congregate at “mahjong” tables or in the morning favour Dim Sim Houses for “Yum Cha”. Having lived for some twenty-six years in Perth where “Yum Cha” has taken on even with the Aussies, the atmosphere of such Dim Sim places is utterly different. Forget about the limit of noise pollution. In there all rules are broken. Don’t be annoyed that you can’t even hear your own self. Back in 1972 on our first visit to Hong Kong, we noticed that people literally had to queue by your table, waiting to pounce upon your vacating it. Today this may not be so, but people still queue outside with allotted numbers.
Seafood Restaurant Serving Fresh Seafood
Our son and daughter-in-law took us to a rooftop restaurant in City One, Shatin, where full-suit attired male waiters serve on their diners. We had expected a quieter atmosphere, but not so even with all its grandeur. I guess Hongkies are generally loud people. Hong Kong must be the noisiest city in the world. Perhaps, if the floor is carpeted and the walls soundproof . . . but then the authenticity will be altered. All would seem so alien. The busy pressure of serving, the noise generated by the diners, and the impatient diners all contribute towards the “fun and joy” of dining out in Hong Kong. I guess this is one experience quite unlike anywhere in the world. But generally the food is good and the price . . . well, it depends where you dine or what you compare with.
For all its shortfalls, Hong Kong cooks are about the best there is in all China and possibly in the world. Whatever the outcome, people will continue to eat out! I guess this is one of the simple pleasures in life. With the famed roast goose and such seafood paradise as Lei Yue Mun and Sok Kwu Wan, sometimes I wonder whether we eat to live or live to eat!
My article was initially written in 2001. This little island paradise
has one aspect of tourists’ delight that foreign visitors to Hong Kong know
little about – sort of a well kept secret.
Hometown Boy - Chow Yun-Fatt & Granitz
Being of Chinese descent, and though an Australian citizen by consent or choice, you can’t help feeling proud that for the first time among the glitter of stars at the Hollywood Academy Award 2001 ceremony were Chow Yun-fatt, Michelle Yeoh Choo Keng, Zhang Zi Yi and of course director Ang Lee of the famed “Crouching Tiger & Hidden Dragon”. It looks like China is finally awakening and ready to pounce on the world scene with its staging of the 2008 Olympics in Beijing and its recent entry into World Trade Organization after long and tedious negotiations.
A pavilion on Lamma Island – hikers’ resting place & look-out point
Chow Yun-fatt, in the footsteps of Jacky Chan, is also the star of “Anna & The King ” and who would have thought that he was born in a humble and tranquil place like Lamma Island, a half-hour boat ride from the bustling metropolitan Hong Kong. Through the assistance of a young lady by the name of Claudia whom I met at the North Lamma Island Library we located the house which Chow Yun-fatt stays each time he returns from Hollywood. Accordingly, he is most friendly with a ready smile for everyone, ever ready to oblige with his autographs. The true human nature of a person is never ever to forget his roots.
With the interest of the knowledge of the famous Chinese star’s association with Lamma Island, I spent a week exploring this place not too far from the maddening crowd of Hong Kong. Lamma Island is the second largest of Hong Kong’s 232 islands. It is an island with a conglomeration of villages. The one that Yun-fatt calls home is Wang Long Village. The house is newly built, three storeys tall, and I was told two floors are rented to some Japanese working at the Lamma Island Power Station. Most of the villages, like Tai Yuen Village, Sha Po New Village and Wang Long Village sort of merge into one another, mainly three-storied, sitting on the valleys and rising from the slopes of surrounding hills. Yung She Wan is the main town centre with a galore of shops, many of them opening well past eleven at night. Other villages, nearly 20 of them, such as Tai Ping Village, Yung Shue Long New/Old Village, Po Wah Yuen, Pak Kok, Tai Wan To Village, Sok Kwu Wan and others are all linked by cemented Family Trials. The houses all present an air of affluence. There is no motor traffic on the island except the small tractor-type of vehicle, similar to those I found in China, used for multi-purposes like land ploughing, load and people transportation in the rural areas. In China where bicycle is fast fading from the streets, especially in Beijing, mountain bikes here provide a useful means of individual transportation and rambling up and down the hilly scenery.. It’s a walking paradise under the canopy of trees and greenery. For the more ambitious hikers, there are many more unpaved and challenging trials.
Ferry Jetty - Bicycles Galore (Park & Ride)
Lamma Island is far from being rural. It’s well built-up and everywhere you turned there are people around. Ever so frequently teams of holidaymakers stream onto the jetty, making their way to such picnic spots like Hung Shing Yeh Beach with its barbeque facilities, shark safety net on the fringe of the bay, and lifeguards on two watchtowers. Some come just to sample its famous seafood restaurants, lining the Yung Shue Wan Main Street with their display of live-seafood of a good variety of fish, crabs, prawns, shrimps, scallops, oysters and other shell varieties. The best seafood restaurants are found in Sok Kwu Wan, particularly Rainbow Seafood Restaurant and Winstar Seafood Restaurant which offer free ferry services to and from Queen’s Pier and Sok Kwu wan or between Repulse bay and Sok Kwu Wan. Like Lei Yue Mun, the seafood speciality place in Hong Kong, this is the seafood paradise on the Island.
Seafood Restaurant
The roads made largely for human traffic and small vehicles are cement paved with the narrower ones known as Family Trials. A network of such trials with proper signage covers virtually every part of the island. It’s a pity that the Islands District Office has not established the many lookout points in Northern Lamma for visitors to enjoy breath-taking views. Perhaps following the norm of international signage, brown signs could be displayed pointing to spots of tourists’ interest. On the trial to Sok Kwu Wan, which leisurely takes about one and a half hours, there are pavilions for resting and serve as points for lookout.
Un-spoilt Beach
The streets are clean and rubbish bins are well positioned and provided. There is a post office, banking facility (HSBC), hotel (Man Lai Wah Hotel), police station and several police report centres, fire station which also houses an ambulance vehicle and primary school. Generally, Chinese are most assiduous in their economic pursuit. Everybody is busy and doing something. Empty lands are covered with vegetable gardening. There is a sizeable portion of European population living on the Island and who made the crowd that frequent the bars at night. Lamma Island can boast of having clean public toilets. Martin Yan, internationally well-known chef, chose Lamma Island as the backdrop of his culinary program.
It may be of interest to folks with rural experience to live in a place like Lamma Island. For the city folks, they might need getting used to be wakened by nature’s alarm clock – the not so familiar cockcrow. Cocks turn on their early musical repertoire as early as 4 am and unceasingly follow it through till the break of dawn. To me this is pleasant compared to the noise pollution of Hong Kong, not just in the streets, the ever-crowded shopping centres or eating in the restaurants. Hong Kong people are so loud! I find the lifts being the only places where people are quiet – not a word is exchanged. Exchanging greeting in the streets is a rare phenomenon. Don’t expect it to be reciprocated! Friendliness is so vital, and the display of hospitality will go a long way to establishing a place like Lamma Island as a top tourist spot. . . . a retreat from the hustle and bustle of hectic living in Hong Kong . . . or just a quiet place to visit and enjoy.
Talking of Chow Yun-fatt having his annual retreat in Lamma Island, what of Michelle Yeoh’s. I well remember her as a young girl living adjacent to Ipoh Swimming Club, Malaysia, playing squash with a group of us. She first came into public eyes as a teenage Queen in our Ipoh Lions Club Motor Show in the 1970s. Hailed as a former Miss Malaysia, she has made it in the glitter world of the big screen. I wonder if she still retains that sweet and friendly nature of her young days. People do change due to circumstances and success and stardom may mean non-association with the past.
“Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding.
In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight.”
(PROVERBS 3:5,6 )
Our life is a yo-yo. It’s a ship that sails in the high sea, sometimes calm, sometimes rough and even fearful. It never runs smoothly. As long as life exists, problems are bound to be present. They only differ in degrees of toughness among each and every one of us. Nobody is exempted, rich or poor, young or old. It is as though we were born to suffer, for didn’t we utter our first cry the day we were born? Right through life we appear to be crying out for things, and when we finally die, we stop crying but others cry for us.
Inevitably, we’ll be confronted with the ”Red Sea” in our life. It may be a career problem that seems insurmountable. It may be our marriage that seems to be failing. Or it could be a health problem that will stamp us with an untimely demise. Whatever the situation, it is evident that our life will always be in a state of flux; nothing can ever remain the same.
Changes are ever present. There is no permanency in life. Sweetness can turn sour. Freshness can become stale. Human beings live by sight and act upon what we see. Life is one big drama and God is right in the midst of it. At the “Red Sea” there was no way out without God, for no one else could claim the glory except God. That’s the way it is.
We tend to rationalise and justify for all happenings. The defenceless Israelites cried out, “Was it because there were no graves in Egypt that you brought us to the desert to die? It would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the desert!” (Ex. 14:11b-12). We are such faithless creatures. The dramatics of life works us up. We begin to apportion blame on God. Like the Israelites, we never learn. If only we learn to turn all odds to God Proverbs 3:5, 6 says it all: “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight.”
Leap for joy!
Matheson & Daniel 
Daniel always excited about his ice-cream
Can you see a kissing couple?
Women have always wondered what is like to be kissed by Clark Gable
Jumbo – Famous Floating Seafood Restaurant
Seafood Restaurant Serving Fresh Seafood
A pavilion on 
Paul Chong's Blog 