BHB creative retreat: arrival

So I am exhausted. But it's a really good exhausted if that makes sense. I was undecided about whether I would blog this whole trip, but I think I need to because so much is happening I can't keep it all in.

After a pretty good flight in a comfy Virgin business class seat, eating rather delicious food, I arrived in Bali.

I had to take a photo of the salt and pepper shakers in business class because I love the design of them. And how often am I going to fly business class? I could have kept them I suppose, but I was proud of myself for not collecting more clutter and just taking the photo as a memory. Also, do I really want to be that guy?

I then stood in the customs queue for about an hour, but I just happily checked social media to while away the time, and read my book. (The worst thing about being in a long queue is when the people around you in the queue complain about being in the queue, but you're all in the same situation. What's the point of talking about it? For an hour?)

I met up with the driver and E who were waiting for me outside. It took us another hour or so in crazy Bali traffic and winding back streets to get to our accommodation – Villa Gaia in Ubud. I've been worried about what I would say to her, a total stranger, for an hour but thankfully we got on pretty well, and she was very conversational so I just had to ask a few questions and the conversation never hit an awkward quiet patch. 

By the time we got there, dinner had already started because we were late. But there was still plenty of food, mostly vegetarian and so tasty. It was pretty overwhelming walking into a room about 23 people, all excitedly talking. But there were lots of smiles.

Not long after that it was sleepytime yoga with Jessie, which was blissful, and then we all went to our rooms. It felt really late because of the travel, but it was only about 9 PM. 

Here is the gorgeous room and huge bathroom (with an outdoor shower!) that I'm sharing with T.

It is so nice having a shower outside :-)

on the edge of something

So tomorrow I fly to Bali for the Big Hearted Business Creative Retreat.

I'm excited and nervous. I started watching videos and listening to interviews from the Big Hearted Business members' site, as I sit here at work stuffing envelopes. Talks about plugging away at creative work, about taking risks, about tipping points and the importance of letting creativity out. It's revived all those feelings of being on the edge of possibility that came up when I went to the Big Hearted Business conference.

This one in particular is great. If you have a spare 50 minutes, or you need something to listen to while you're doing something else, watch this talk from Darren Rowse (of dPS and Problogger fame). It's inspiring and funny and practical, if you want to work out how to get dreams out of your head and into reality.

Darren Rowse from Chris Guillebeau on Vimeo.

Dream big. Take a step towards realising them every day, no matter how small. I imagine my coming week is going to be filled with moments like these.

Cross cultural mourning

This will be a long post, but I need to recap the last few days, just to process it myself, so writing it down helps.

I flew back to KL on Thursday night. Thankfully the flight wasn't full at all and I could move away from the two little wriggly boys I had been seated next to, and could sleep at least a little bit. I caught a taxi to the funeral parlour, where the first of three services was being held for my grandmother, Lee Ah Yin, who we called Mama. I got there after the service was done and people were sitting around, eating (there's always food).

The funeral parlour is an old, pretty run down and frankly quite depressing complex. There were Buddhists having a vigil in the front parlour, and my family's wake in the back parlour. The body was laid out in the coffin, surrounded by dozens of flower arrangements sent by people all over the world, business colleagues and friends and family. Mama looked the most glamorous I'd ever seen, in her brocade blouse, and all made up. It was so strange to see her so still.

The next day I went into the city with dad while he went to work for a few hours, and wandered around the fabric shops in Little India (and bought some fabric of course). In the evening I met up with my cousins and a couple of people from my aunt's church to practise the songs for that night's service (Because he lives, In the sweet by and by, Amazing grace and How great thou art - it was an old songbook and those were the only ones we all knew (or could fake)). Just quietly, my cousins and I made a pretty good band, with Chi Ming on cajon, Ken on guitar, Jon and I singing. I was glad I could serve the family and God in this way.

Dad led the service. My cousin Vanessa and I read the Bible (John 14:1-7 and Romans 8:38-39). The pastor gave a rambly kind of sermon, but the thing I liked was how he talked about how our hearts are troubled when we are uncertain about things, but we do not need to be troubled about what comes after this life - we have certainty about where we're going if we know Jesus. 

After the message my aunts Christina and Honey got up and shared a few things, and Honey talked about how Mama became a Christian. She had been baptised in 2011 after her dementia had already started taking hold, so I had always wondered how much she knew about what she was saying. But Honey said that she had actually become a Christian in 2005 on a church retreat that Honey had sent her on to Cameron Highlands, and this was before her mind had gone. It brought a reassurance about her last years, that even though she couldn't remember who her family was, her faith was simple and childlike and real. Her character had certainly changed in the last several years; she was no longer the fierce, stern woman she had always been, but seemed much softer.

After the service there was plenty of food, but I didn't feel much like eating. I went and patted the cat that hung around the area, waiting for scraps. There was a lot of sitting around while people ate and talked. Felt kind of weird to be sitting in a room with a coffin in it, eating and drinking. I ate a lot of kueh lapis...kind of the only comfort food I felt like (it doesn't taste as pink as it looks).

We were back again first thing in the morning for the small family service. We sang some more (What a friend we have in Jesus and Because he lives (again)). We read the same passages as the night before and the pastor said similar things.

Then the coffin was put in the hearse (really just a van), and everyone walked slowly behind it, to the crematorium next door. Ken played guitar and Chi Ming and I sang In the sweet by and by and How great is our God as we walked. It was very hot.

Then yet another message from the pastor, and we all took a flower and laid it on the coffin. Unlike Australia, where there is usually a curtain or at least some doors that close on the coffin, at this place you just stand around and watch the coffin go into the actual furnace.

We went out for yum cha at this surreally empty mall (it was still quite early in the day). We had so much food, and it was delicious. My cousins and I sat together; even though we're all in our late 20s and 30s, we will always be at the kids' table, being clowns.

So then it was time to go and collect the ashes. In four hours. So fast. I assumed that we would just go pick up an urn. But no, that's not the Chinese way. This next bit might be a bit morbid sounding, but it is how they do it here. And I actually found it quite fascinating, when I stepped back and observed it. It completely demystifies the whole process of death and dying.

Back at the crematorium, there was a table with two metal boxes on it. In one box there were the remains of the coffin. In the other box were Mama's bones. Beside the boxes was a piece of newspaper with pieces of bone the attendants had separated; these were fragments of skull, set aside because they were the most special pieces.

Each family member had to select some bones with chopsticks and put them in the urn, then pieces of skull. The attendant ground down the contents of the urn with a stick (that was pretty much the sort of thing they muddle mojitos with), then he went and ground the remaining bones into ash in a machine, and the family poured the ash into the urn together. Of course everyone photographed the entire process.

I'll spare you the photos of the bones themselves, but this is my dad (in black) and his siblings in the last stage.

Afterwards I got in the car and said to dad, "well that was weird." And he said, "what was?"

The whole trip has been an eye opener in terms of cross cultural experience, made weirder by the fact that this is half my culture and yet I am so unfamiliar with it.

It has been a strange time of catching up with family, of remembering my grandmother, of trying to bond with my young half siblings, of eating. Dad and Janice have kindly put me up, but my dad and all the kids are unwell and I'm starting to feel a bit headachy myself...I'm hoping it's just tiredness and I'm not getting their colds!

Me and Ethan

Celine, me and Ethan...somehow I didn't manage to get a pic with Matthew!

Tomorrow morning I get back on a plane and go back to Australia and straight back to work on Monday. I'm exhausted. I'm not really emotional, just tired and dazed and a bit spun out from everything that I've been a part of these last few days. I wonder if it will hit me later. Hopefully the plane is not full again and I will be able to sleep the day away.

Travel diary Friday: aquarium day

On Friday I farewelled dad at the unholidaylike hour of 5:30am, and went back to sleep while he flew home to KL. I had a most civilised checkout time of 1pm, so I ordered blueberry pancakes for breakfast and lazed around, listening to John Mayer and reading.

I thought I should probably venture out, but the soundproofing is so good in the room, and I hadn't looked out the window so I didn't realise it was absolutely bucketing down in only the way Singapore can (it makes the most intense rainstorm in Sydney feel like a drizzle by comparison). So I, er, got a bit damp.

After changing into dry clothes I met up with Poh Teng, one of dad's colleagues, for lunch. She is a lovely, friendly and very helpful woman and her husband works at Resort World Sentosa (where we were staying and where the theme parks are), so we got a big discount on tickets into the S.E.A. Aquarium. It was an incredible experience; sitting in front of the giant viewing window for about half an hour watching the divers feeding the creatures felt like I was sitting on the bottom of the ocean. I just wanted to get in the water. It was wonderful.

More pics here.

After a coffee I headed off to the airport. The plane trip home was uneventful, except for me having an emotional meltdown for no reason after watching The secret life of Walter Mitty and Her. No idea what happened there; both movies put me in a slightly melancholy mood (though I enjoyed both), and saying goodbye to mum and dad, and being tired, and being premenstrual and...yeah that's a few reasons. I was just surprised that I just started crying and couldn't stop. Thankfully it was after lights out and my seat mate had an eye mask on. The crew saw me come out of the bathroom with red eyes and face and were very kind; they made me some hot lemon and honey to drink and said I could come back and talk to them if I needed to. I was very impressed all around with Singapore Airlines actually - the plane, the food, the staff, everything.

We landed at 6am and I was so happy to have Kel and Huff meet me. It's so nice to have a smiling face waiting for you at the end of the walkway! We grabbed a coffee and nutella doughnut for breakfast and then I pretty much crashed. Oh first I picked up the cat from the cat hotel and she has been extremely affectionate and cuddly all day while I zoned in and out of consciousness.

So it's just me and her for the next few weeks while mum is in the UK. The extra special treat is I get to sleep in mum's super comfy bed and my bedroom can be my work room instead of my Bec Cave. Hurrah!

So so so grateful for the time away and all the lovely things that happened!

Travel diary Thursday: spa heaven

We had one more night in the Goodwood Park Hotel, then headed over to Sentosa. Sentosa is a little island off the bottom of the mainland that was used by the British as a military fort in WW2. When we lived in Singapore, you got there by cable car to see a museum and a monorail and not much else. Now it has had a bridge built out to it, and is home to a massive resort with a whole bunch of hotels, restaurants, Universal Studios (we went there last year), the SEA Aquarium and a casino.

We were booked in to the Hard Rock Hotel, which was very different to the colonial, restrained, neutral palette of the first hotel; it took me a while to get used to it because it was so over the top in comparison. The room was all purple and black and chrome and mirrored surfaces. They did have a much more comfortable bed though. And photos of Jimi Hendrix on the walls.

even the lifts are blingy

They didn't give us a twin room, so dad said I could have the bed and he took the couch. He went off to a business meeting in the city and I wandered down to ESPA for my booking. I had wanted to get a massage while I was on holidays and done some research - I guess I was looking at the places linked to hotels so they are always going to be more expensive, but whoa. Pampering is serious business in Singapore. Anyway, I found ESPA had a Mother's Day package, but they didn't say you actually had to be a mother to book it and although still expensive, it came with a meal, a free gift, and was cheaper than just booking a massage on its own.

And oh my goodness. It was seriously the best spa and massage I have ever experienced (not that I've been to that many spas, and certainly not the top end ones). Just walking in, everything was calming and quiet. The staff were courteous and discreet. I sat down to fill out my client card, drank some cold lemongrass tea and then was given a tour of the facilities - well stocked showers and dressing rooms, a quiet tea room with a huge picture window, an onsen bath, a hot and cold outdoor bath surrounded by perfect tropical gardens, a wet sauna with crystals (!), a dry sauna with a beautiful view of the gardens. I happily wandered from bath to bath, sauna to sauna for about an hour, delighting in the sense of total relaxation and nowhere to be. Being the middle of the week, it was pretty quiet so I only had to share the facilities with two giggly Chinese women, and I managed to avoid them mostly.

This is from the ESPA website - I don't have a white bikini, but this was pretty much me

Selina the therapist came and got me from the tea room. She took me up to the treatment rooms, completely separate to the spa facilities but with the same dark wood floors and pale walls. Unlike most massage places I've been, where the therapist has hardly any room to move around the table, this room was spacious.

Selina asked me how I wanted to feel at the end of the massage, then gave me a choice of two oil blends based on my answer. She filled a bowl of steaming water and added the same oil blend to it, and placed it under my face as I lay on the table. The massage was just perfect; perfect pressure, she attended to the areas I had mentioned as being sore, I felt totally mentally and physically calm by the end of it.

If and when I ever open my own massage practice, I want it to echo this kind of idea, aesthetically (just on a smaller, ever so slightly less expensive scale).

Then it was time for my complimentary meal at the Tangerine restaurant, which prides itself on extremely healthy food to match with the whole wellness aesthetic of the spa. The restaurant was surrounded by Japanese style gardens, and I was the only one there (until a gay couple arrived and carried on between themselves because they hadn't realised it was a healthy restaurant...I caught them outside later having cigarettes). The food was sensational. Light and delicious and perfectly balanced.

Then back to the room to meet dad, and we went off to meet his colleagues and watch X Men: Days of Future Past together. Loved it! A study in brown leather jackets and gorgeous men.

Travel diary Wednesday: changeover

The second day of a holiday can be less exciting than the first. You're a bit more tired, and if you walked around the whole day like we did on day one, you have massive blisters (or at least very sore feet) and you don't feel like doing much (I had blisters on the balls of my feet that were the size of my big toe. Owie.). 

Many people still think of Singapore as a good shopping destination, but it's not vastly cheaper than Australia anymore (also thanks, internet!), and we learned a long time ago that even thinking about clothes in Asia as larger Western women is just an exercise in defeat. Mum's not interested in looking at tech stuff and neither of us cares about luxury goods. So we decided not to bother with the malls.

Without any real plan (and after a false start when we caught a cab to Clarke Quay and then realised that nothing really opens there until the afternoon and it's all restaurants and bars anyway) we decided to catch the SIA hop-on hop-off bus, which does a loop around the major tourist areas. It was a good way to get an overview of the city, and to be able to go "oh yeah, I remember that place!" Mum marvelled that she had ever been able to drive around, or cope with the heat when we lived there.

ah, nostalgia

Street art in Little India

Not much of old Singapore left these days, just shophouses here and there

We did get off the bus at Little India, but mum was starting to feel unwell, so we didn't explore. We had been keen to go to a good hawker centre for food but settled for a noisy basement food court for reasonable chicken rice. And of course, going where the locals go it is vastly cheaper than any tourist-aimed version of the same dish (about AU$3.80 for a satisfying serve of chicken, rice, vegies, soup).

Back at the hotel, while mum rested and repacked, I wandered across the road to the duty free shop just for a look. More cosmetics and luxury goods. I tried on a $400 pair of Prada glasses that I had pinned on Pinterest a while ago, and managed to get a snap before the saleswoman zoomed over. It was so weird, this three storey glossy shop, divided into mini boutiques for each brand and with no one in them except a multitude of well-groomed staff.

Then it was time for the parental changeover. Mum and I had delicious xiao long bao and noodles at the airport, then she headed off to Manchester and dad flew in from KL. We were all going to have a coffee together but dad's plane was delayed, so it really was a bit of a tag team effort. So good to spend time with each parent, though the flavour of the holiday was very different with each one.

Travel diary: Do what you feel like day

It sounds weird, but one of the great things about travelling with mum is we have a similar energy threshold - she gets tired because of her knees and I get tired because I do. So it's good because you both need to have little rests throughout the day and you don't care much for ticking things off on an itinerary.

Another good thing is we have similar interests and we decided not to do anything we didn't feel like doing. If we wanted to laze around the hotel all day, that was perfectly fine (well if you're paying for it you may as well enjoy it, right?). Though lovely as it is, we didn't just stay in our room for the whole day...as if we would!

We started today with a rather expensive but delicious hotel buffet breakfast, one of the better ones I've had actually. Side note: one thing that I like about hotel breakfasts (in Asia anyway) is they always seem to have pink guava juice. I would never buy it at home but I really like it on holidays. So there you go.

We then took a leisurely stroll up Scotts Road and Orchard Road. The shops are insanely swish on Orchard Road, and there are multiples of high end shops like Prada, Louis Vuitton, etc, almost opposite one another (because heaven knows you wouldn't want to have to cross the road to buy your luxury goods). The buildings are massive, shiny temples of consumerism. It's quite staggering.

We only really went in to Tangs department store, again because it had been somewhere we used to go when we lived here. I think it's much ritzier than it used to be, but then everything seems to be around here. Or maybe I didn't pay as much attention to the ritziness when I was a kid. It was just what it was. Anyway, we wandered through the beautiful makeup section and I wish Elsie had been with us, she would have loved it.

After what was a fairly leisurely stroll up and back again, we were hot and bothered so it was time to hit the pool. It's nice being here mid-week as it's pretty quiet around the pool; there was only one other person there for most of the time we were there. After a deliciously refreshing dip I fell asleep in the sun reading Danielle LaPorte's the Desire Map (incidentally, I feel quite conspicuous toting around a book with a bright pinky purple cover and 'desire' in huge type on the front. But I'm enjoying it, and I probably need to get over the idea that anyone else is even looking).

Our timing was all out and we had missed lunch, and, well, it was afternoon tea time. How could we resist high tea?

After a nap we headed back out and caught the fast and efficient MRT to Gardens by the Bay, a sprawling place with various themed zones (eg Chinese garden, Indian garden, etc) two cooled domes (one growing flowers from all over the world and the other called 'Cloud forest', showcasing rainforest and high altitude plants) and the supertrees, which are gorgeous structures that collect energy in their solar panels and made me feel like we were in Avatar or something.

(Those are part of the supertrees on the right and the Marina Bay Sands complex in the background - that zeppelin-looking thing on the top has restaurants and an infinity pool. From the ground, it is impressively large and a little scary actually.)

Dinner was at Satay by the Bay, a hawker centre within the gardens. We had satay and popiah and lots of fresh orange juice. We were seriously flagging by this point. We ended up doing a lot of walking, but I was proud of us that we didn't give in and catch a taxi back to the hotel but managed on the train and walking.

Then Ben and Jerry's in the hotel room and turning in to read and blog and just be quiet. This holiday thing is pretty rad! I should do it more often...

(PS If you want to see more photos of the gardens, check out my Flickr photostream)

Travel diary: Up and away!

I love travelling. Maybe it's partly because I have been doing it since birth, with family living in another country and moving overseas during primary school.

I like good airports. I like getting on planes. I love the rush of the takeoff. The squished into your seat bit is less enjoyable, but the plane we were on yesterday (a Singapore Airlines A380) was pretty comfortable, the food was actually tasty, the cabin crew were really polite and efficient, and there was lots to watch (I was remembering what it was like when there was only one screen up the front of the cabin (or worse, a couple of TV screens mounted above the aisles), and the entire cabin had to watch the same thing at the same time. That wasn't so fun.).

I watched the Lego Movie - how is it possible for such a silly idea to be so perfect? - started American Hustle but found it far too depressing (I didn't want to spend any longer with those unpleasant people), laughed out loud at repeats of Miranda, loved Tangled and can't decide whether I prefer it or Frozen, so I watched the first hour of that again as we descended in to Singapore. I also listened to Lorde and read and enjoyed the ribbon of sunset that seemed to go on forever as we headed north west.

I realised I was quite energised when we got off the plane in Singapore. Mum was wiped out, and I had expected to be, but I was taking it all in. A country that I loved growing up in and yet is almost unrecognisable to me. 

We are staying at the Goodwood Park Hotel because this trip is kind of mum's semi-retirement celebration and she decided she wanted to stay somewhere absolutely lovely. I remembered coming here for high tea when we lived in Singapore, my first high tea fancy playing ladies experience, I think. Mum said last night part of it was also that this hotel was one of the few things she remembered that she could rely on to still be here - everything changes so fast in Singapore. She hasn't been here for 20 years, but even in the year or so since I've been here, things move on at a rapid pace (and last year we were basically at Sentosa and didn't see any of the rest of the island).

And the travel fairies were on our side, because we got upgraded without even asking (not that I ever ask, unless there's a major problem) - to a junior suite! We have two bathrooms! And a sitting room! This is so great.

And now I am starving and we are going to go and enjoy an expensive breakfast. Semi retirement celebration, hurrah!

Big Hearted Business unconference: part 1

So it's been a week since my fantastic, wonderful, exhausting weekend in Melbourne at Clare Bowditch's Big Hearted Business (un)conference. Work's been so busy I feel like I've hardly been able to reflect, but now's the time on this lovely sunny Sydney day.

I've decided I'll post a bit about my experience and vibe of the thing, and then do individual posts about the main ideas I took away from the weekend, rather than conflating them all in one mega post, because there was so much good stuff I want to savour it!

But if you're a tl;dr person, the short version is: it was wonderful and worth every cent and you should totally come next year.

So I flew in to Melbourne on Friday night, checked in to the Jasper Hotel (just next to Queen Vic Market). I had decided that as I was on my own and already feeling a little trepidatious about the whole thing I would take the path of least stress wherever I could, and planned to just catch taxis everywhere (except to and from the airport - I could manage that on buses). Although Melbourne's public transport is excellent and Karen had loaned me her Myki card, I just knew that trying to figure out how to get around and the extra time it would take to get everywhere would stress and tire me out.

First thing on Saturday I went to the Queen Vic Markets and bought coffee and a pastry for breakfast from Market Lane Coffee and then some olive bread, delice de Bourgogne cheese and shaved ham - this would form my yummy hotel picnic dinner for the next two nights, and I'm so glad I did it because by the end of the day I had no energy to go out foraging for food (there was a McDonald's right next to my hotel and I was determined not to set foot in it so I needed to be prepared).

My taxi driver was the kind of guy you want in a taxi driver, friendly, gregarious and interesting. We chatted about all sorts of things on the way to Northcote, which was kind of like a warm up for me in talking to strangers for the day, and unusual because I don't normally engage in much conversation with taxi drivers.

I arrived at the Regal Ballroom and joined the long queues of smiling women (and a few gents) going round the corner. The interior of the 1912 ballroom was lovely; a soaring ceiling, old fashioned chandeliers, a stage under a proscenium arch, framed by trees, and with a cosy looking couch in the centre. Clare said a few times during the weekend that they had deliberately chosen a space that wasn't a cold, sterile convention centre, so in exchange for the character of the space there would inevitably be things like AV issues, unexpected sounds (like the sound of our lunch being prepared in the kitchen behind the stage), and bathroom issues (there were only six toilets, one of which got blocked) - but nobody minded.

Because filling the room were over 500 people (apparently around 470 women and 30 men) who were eager to be inspired, encouraged, filled up and who wanted to change the world...in big ways and little ways. A room full of big hearted people.

If I had to choose one word to sum up the vibe of the weekend, I think it would be GENEROUS. Every speaker gave of themselves and their life experience in such a real and honest way. We were encouraged to share our own skills to help others in their creative business by donating a skill or item on the sharing tree, and people gave lavishly (and those who donated a 'leaf' were allowed to pick one...though I don't think anyone picked mine. But that's okay).

The sponsors donated such wonderful gifts for our goodie bags (I'll do a sponsor post later). The food - oh! the food - yes, it somehow felt generous too. Not measly little shrink wrapped portions of stuff like at most conferences, but abundant, delicious, fresh and waste-free (everything was served in jars, which were washed and reused). I loved that when Joost Bakker was talking about it, he said he had picked a lot of the food we would be eating himself, and even his kids had helped pick the chestnuts.

Basically I wanted to take the essence of the weekend and just live in it forever.

Part of the idea of gathering us all together was that we would make connections with each other. Now that's something I was a bit nervous about, and I don't think I 'sold' myself very well to the few people I talked to. But I sat next to lovely women who were easy to chat to, and we agreed that the great part about it was that everyone was in a different place on the journey - it wasn't like it was a roomful of highly motivated people who all knew how to be successful and were networking (ugh). There were people who didn't know what they wanted to do, but were exploring; there were people who were already striving in their chosen field but needed inspiration; there were people who were full of experience and willing to help.

One connection I made that was more than 'so what brought you here' was with Nerea. I had seen her in the room on the Saturday, her fiery red curls unmissable in a crowd. When I went to the sharing tree on the Sunday to pick a leaf, it was really hard to decide, but when I saw her leaf offering a sterling silver pendant and signed off with a smiling face topped with red curls, I knew that was the one. I found her in the crowd and really enjoyed meeting her. She so generously agreed to have a go at creating my TalulaMei doll logo in sterling silver (and she's already done it! I will show you when it arrives). Fittingly, her brand name, Rulitos, means 'little curls'!

As for what the speakers actually said? I went over my pages and pages of notes while on the plane back to Sydney, and circled the words/ideas that kept recurring across the various speakers' talks (or the ones that resonated with me, anyway). I came up with:

• gratitude
• authenticity / honesty
• clarity, both of why they did what they did and how they wanted to feel in life
• connection / relationships
• self care
• just starting something, even if you're not sure it's the right thing

I'll do individual posts on each of those with tasty quotes from the speakers.

I'm definitely going to go next year (if they hold it next year!). It was such a refreshing drink for my creative self, and an encouragement to keep going and exploring and learning and doing. Time to start my savings plan now!

If you want to come, you should put your name down on the BHB mailing list - they send out excellent inspiration bombs and positive emails, and you'll be the first to hear about any events or cool things they're doing (like a creative yoga retreat in Bali with Clare Bowditch and Jess Neave...oh how wonderful that would be!).

That's all for now...more big hearted business very soon...

Pointless worrying about the unknown quantity (aka sometimes I get tired)

Something I often get anxious about is not knowing what my energy levels will be like on any given day. If you've never experienced a bone wearying exhaustion that seems to come for no reason (ie, the tiredness comes not because you've been running a marathon, or just moved house, or been awake for 72 hours straight, but because you've just been...alive) then that worry might seem completely alien. Or you might say, "just make sure you get plenty of rest!" and think that plenty of rest would help.

Yeah, not always.

Sometimes the tiredness is so acute that I don't know if I ought to be on the road. Sometimes I have the appearance of being awake and alert but my brain is basically on screensaver and my limbs feel like lead. Sometimes I sleep and wake up even tireder than I was before I lay down. Sometimes I'm so tired, all I can do is cry.

Working against me are two things: thalassemia (which is a genetic blood disorder that basically means I don't get enough oxygen going round in my blood, so I can get tired very easily) and depression (which is an inexplicable bastard of a thing that basically could bite at any time, so I can get tired very easily). And also, to a lesser degree, having an introverted personality where I recharge by being alone rather than with groups of people. That doesn't mean I don't enjoy groups of people, it just means that my capacity for interaction is limited, and rapidly drains me rather than energising me.

But the depression is the thing that keeps me focused on the what if? instead of just taking life as it comes.

So this week I have two things which I am trying not to be anxious about. From Monday to Thursday I'll be at staff retreat in the Blue Mountains, with a fantastic group of people, eating food, looking at God's word and thinking big picture things about work. This is all good. And my colleagues are aware of my need for rest, and respect that. But just the nature of being in a house full of 10 other people, you have lots of conversations, you participate and engage, because that's the whole point, and I know that when I come home on Thursday night I'll probably just crash.

Then on the weekend, it flips and I'll go from being in a house full of people I know and who want to engage with me to being in a room full of people I don't know, having to push myself to interact. On Friday, I fly to Melbourne for the Big Hearted Business (un)conference, which I have been greatly anticipating for months. It will be two jam packed days of (hopefully) inspiring talks and activities and being around many creative people who have similar thoughts, dreams and struggles.

I'm going on my own so I'll have to talk to people I don't know. I'll have to explain who I am and what I do, because that's kind of the point. And I'll have to travel around by myself in a city I don't really know that well, so will have to be paying attention. Aside from which, I want to suck the marrow out of this (un)conference! I want to come away with renewed passion and vision for my creative work! I want to launch off into the stratosphere and...

Thud. I keep coming back to "but what if you're too tired? What if you're too tired to take in information at staff retreat? What if you're too tired to explain things? What if you're too tired to get around Melbourne and you get lost? What if you're too tired to interact with people? What if you're too tired to take anything in all week and it's all just a waste? What if..."

Silly brain! Why worry about things you don't know about?

Two of my favourite Bible passages which I feel I should tattoo on the back of my hands (it's okay, mum, I won't):

Don’t worry about anything, but in everything, through prayer and petition with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses every thought, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.
Philippians 4:6-7

and

Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life?
Matthew 6:25-27

Take that, brain. I'm going to have a great week with great people. And there's nothing you can do about it.

longing for somewhere that doesn't exist

I just walked around Hurstville shops for an hour. It's a very humid, drizzling day. I passed the many little Asian food and knick knack shops, the old Asian men and women shuffling along, the dirty shopfronts and the posters advertising noodles with a giant picture of the Merlion in the background. I got the strongest longing for Singapore.

I got home and told Mum, and she commented, "but Hurstville is more like Malaysia used to be, isn't it?"

Yes, true. Singapore gives of an air of being much more modern and sleek and clean. But I guess scratch the surface and it's not that different from KL really. Get away from the tourist hubs and to where people live everyday life and it's a lot less sleek. And for some reason I just longed to be back there.

I know that the Singapore of my mind is very different from the reality, and it's very much tied to being a 10-12 year old with no responsibilities, living as part of a wealthy ex-pat community. Living there as an adult having to make her own way would be very, very different and I'm not sure I would actually like it.

Still, nostalgia can be a very strong thing, can't it?

audibly reading

Ha! I was writing about this yesterday and Jess beat me to it. Great minds think alike, and all that!

I was never really sure about audio books. It seemed like cheating, somehow. Could you say that you had read something if you hadn't actually, well, read it? Did it count?

As if that actually matters.

Now that I spend around an hour and a half in the car each day (longer if I don't time my departure times wisely), I've needed to find ways to stay alert, engaged and, scarily enough, awake. Often music is fine. Sometimes I listen to a podcast or two; sermons by Tim Keller are my favourite Christian thing to listen to, as he has a great voice (even if, when he gets excited, he sounds like a triumphant Vizzini), has good things to say and his talks usually fit into my commute time. I started off with Mark Driscoll, thinking his conversational style would actually be kind of good for driving, but he gets way too shouty and I'm not able to listen carefully enough to decide whether I agree with what he's saying.

Eventually, I decided checking out audio books could be a good thing. Audible.com has a great range. I think I signed up when there was a free 30-day trial. Then they hook you in with $7.49/month for the first three months, before going up to $14.95/month. The monthly membership gives you one credit a month (one credit = one book). I thought $7.49 per book was pretty good so I signed up. As a member, you can also buy books for much cheaper than the list price.

And, whaddya know, their strategy worked because I stayed on even when the price went up. Listening to books as I drive has kept me focused, engaged and entertained. When I'm up to a particularly good bit in a story, I even look forward to getting back on the road so I can hear the next bit.

Audible's got a 48-hour members sale on at the moment, which is almost over (ends tonight at 11:59pm AEST). Lots of books for $6.95 each, which is a bargain really (especially if you were going to buy, say, the audio version of the NKJV which would normally cost you $69.95 (but I'm still not convinced about audio Bibles like these, even if they have awesome actors reading the parts. The music and sound effects are quite distracting)). I found after I checked out and went to my library page, they had a special pop up with an offer to choose another book for $4.95. They're pretty savvy with their offers and deals, I must say.

I've found it frustrating at times if I don't know what I feel like listening to when I get to the end of a book. But at the same time, I have had a few pleasant occasions of serendipity. The free audiobook of Alan Cumming reading Arthur Conan Doyle's The adventure of the blue carbuncle was excellent; I don't think I ever would have read any Sherlock Holmes stories otherwise. Because of reviews praising the performance, I got Beautiful ruins by Jess Walter, which I probably never would have picked up in a regular bookshop, but it was most diverting while driving around the south coast over new year's, and entertainingly performed by Edoardo Ballerini.

I am also developing quite an appreciation for a well-read/well-performed story. It is certainly an art. The best performance so far has been Lenny Henry reading Neil Gaiman's Anansi Boys. His voice on its own is so pleasing to listen to, but his characterisations are hysterical, especially when doing the Jamaican accents.

So if you have a lot of travelling in your week, may I commend the audiobook to you? It makes what feels like a waste of time feel like time well spent. And I've come to accept that hearing a book counts; it's just getting the words into your brain in a different way.

moving auto-style

I know it matters little, but I've moved back to blogger. I just got fed up with my wordpress site getting hacked and not understanding or caring enough to keep on top of things. My move back wasn't entirely painless - I've lost all my comments and photos. There was probably a better way to fix it but as I said, care factor = very low. I fixed the photos on the first few posts so that it doesn't look completely rubbish  and I'll get around to the rest sometime. I'll put my craft posts up here too rather than keeping a separate site for that, because although I had some plans for the other site, I just don't have the energy to do anything with it.

I hate feeling inept about web stuff, but I have to accept that it is not a bad thing to use the tools that make life easier, instead of trying to control and modify everything! It's a bit like driving an auto versus a manual...yeah, it might give you more control and whatever driving a manual, but really, the auto gets me where I need to go with a lot less stress.

Hatter's Hope: sparkle

Hello! Happy period-between-Christmas-and-New-Year! This time is always a bit of a blur for me; I never remember what day it is, I rarely do anything before midday, I have trifle for breakfast every morning...in short, it's proper holiday time!

It also means I have time to post - I meant to do this last week but it got sucked into the Christmas vortex.

The current challenge over at Hatter's Hope is sparkle (why don't you give it a go?). For this one I got out my embossing powders, which I haven't used for a while. So I thought I'd show you how I use them!

These are my embossing powders. I've got sparkly ones, black ones, and metallic ones. The black powder is best used with stamping rubber stamps on an embossing ink pad; the finished result gives you raised lines you can colour inside and a shiny outline to your image. The metallic ones are good for outlines, or having solid blocks of gold or silver. The glitter ones are good for things like this sparkle challenge!

So first of all I coloured up Sammi's Fairy Set. The digi has her fairies, LilyRose and Charlotte Rose, in two sizes, so I did the bigger ones in foresty greens and purples, and the little one in a red dress - like a forest berry perhaps?

Then I coloured in their wings and the little one's red dress with the clear embossing ink. I have a pen for this purpose - looks a little Copic-like with the double ends. I wondered whether the ink would change the colours of the Copics I'd used, but it didn't change too drastically.

You only need a tiny amount of powder to cover the image, but it's hard to be precise. So the best way of doing it is to pour the powder over the whole image, then tip the excess onto a card and pour it back into the container. I've used these powders a lot in the past and haven't had to buy refills yet - they go a long way! Once I've shaken the excess off, I brush over the parts of the image I don't want to be embossed with a small, soft paintbrush, just to loosen any stray particles and give the embossed bits a clean edge.

Lastly, you heat up the paper to melt the powder, which sticks it onto the page and gives it a shiny finish. You can use any heat source that won't burn the paper; I used to use a toaster to heat it from underneath, which was quite effective. I do have this heat tool, which blows very hot air but a bit more directed than a hair dryer. You have to be careful if using something like a hair dryer, that the powder doesn't come unstuck and blow off the page. That would leave you with a very blotchy result.

And this is how they look after their heat setting!

Much less messy than using glitter and glue, as the glitter doesn't fall off once it's been heat set.

Then I put the card together, with the fairies sitting in a tree, daydreaming. I used some cloud stickers and sentiment from a kikki.K sticker book. Now I have it sitting on my bookshelf and I feel quite pleased when I see it as I come down the hall to my room!