The Bronchial Ab Workout

The first step is the tricky part.

FIRST, contract bronchitis. Whether it be viral or bacterial is of no significance. You can loiter in hospital corridors hopefully or sleep with the windows open with an industrial size fan blasting your face or anything else that you can concoct. Whatever. You just need to get bronchitis.

SECOND, wait for the innocent tickle in your sternum that is a precursor to the loud hacking, dry gagging, body rocking, convulsive bouts of coughing coming your way.

THIRD, do not take any cough syrup or antibiotics to maximize workout duration.

When you dread the next bout of coughing because of the accompanying pain that ripples through your abdomen you have successfully completed the bronchial ab workout.

*Side effects may include limited speech abilities, weird looks from strangers in public, ostracism in Toronto because people think you have SARS.

Resolution

They got them.

I'm going down on Monday to the Police Department.

And THEN the Car Stopped Working...

and stopped dead on, in the middle of the exit ramp of the underground parking garage. Go figure. The rear wheel had been squealing the whole time in the garage, but hey it worked...until we hit the incline.

LUCKILY! I, in my profound wisdom and foresight bought a premium CAA membership back in December in preparation for such damsel in distress moments as these, so patting myself on the back I quickly called CAA- only to find out that they could not and would not tow a car whose license plates have expired, which presented quite the conundrum because guess where I was going?

To Canadian Tire.
To have my car checked and re-certified so that my plates would be a-ok again.

At this point, panic was starting to rise a little bit, but BEHOLD! there is another company who would be very willing to tow me for a small fee, which just happened to be slightly over my debit card's limit. DOH! And seeing how I was just mugged oh...16 hours ago, that was not enough time for my brand new spanking credit card to arrive in the mail.

Cue emotional and nervous breakdown. Joking. Sort of.

Me + Car Trouble = Agony

I needed help. Badly.

I mentally scrolled through my list of trusty Torontonian friends only to realize that those who can actually help in a practical manner are all out of town...except for a saint named J who called around to look for other towing companies with no success who then called upon another saint, Ethan.

While all this was happening an angel in the form of a helpful man drove through the garage and actually stopped to help. GASP. Whereas four or five cars before just drove on past. A modern day Samaritan that man was.

He not only got my car out of the precarious position it was in, but got the rear wheel to start working again. The axle apparently was stuck.

Providentially a parking spot opened up nearby and I was able to park permanently and most importantly SAFELY, laying to rest my imminent plans to stake out my car tonight.

Ethan helped me figure out a plan of action for tomorrow, and I returned to my apartment relieved.

Mugged

Speaking of firsts...

Tonight Lydia and I were walking home from the subway station from the Brooke Fraser concert, and we got mugged.

I am still in shock.

I lost my purse, my wallet, my keys, my makeup, a friend's book aptly entitled Evangelism and the Sovereignty of God, my camera with 2 months worth of pictures from Tanzania, and my ipod.

The thing that I am MOST upset about losing is my two months worth of pictures and the picture of my DG that we took as a family at Sears three years ago that I had in my wallet. Those can never be recovered.

Nothing happened to us physically for which I am really thankful to God for.

Creepy Man (Canadian Edition)

This year is definitely a year of firsts.

My FIRST proposal happened this year. That would be Creepy Man (Tanzanian Edition). More to come in the next post. But for this post something a little closer to home.

On Tuesday I was sitting at Yorkdale Mall on hold with Fido renewing my service agreement. It was a long hold. There I was sitting, daydreaming, when an old, old, OLD man of about 50-60 with a FULL head of gray and white hair comes up to me.

"Excuse me," he says. "Might I just say how lucky your husband is to have such a gorgeous woman as you as his wife."

I smile awkwardly.

"I'm not married," I respond. First mistake.

"Your boyfriend then."

"I don't have a boyfriend." Second mistake.

"Then if you don't mind me asking how might a man like me get a date with a beautiful woman like you? I treat women very well."

No. way. I just got asked out for the first time in 6 years by a CREEPY OLD MAN with A PICK UP LINE. By this point I was in complete shock and disbelief that this guy had the audacity to approach someone 40 years his junior. It was hard to choke back a full fledged laugh as I told him I wasn't interested or looking.

Then I bolted for the subway. Immediately.

Home Sweet Home

East, west, home is best.

I was dreading going back to Toronto at the beginning of project because I feared the loneliness that awaited, but it has never been so good to be HOME. Coming back to MY apartment was pure relief. It really is home, and I feel very blessed to be living in such a sweet pad. Travelling around has really made me count my blessings.

I was ready to be back a few weeks ago even though Paris and London were fantastic experiences. Now I know that my travel max is two months. Glad I figured this out before I bought a Round the World ticket (they exist) for a year. I might still do that, but not for a year.

5 Good Things (Paris Edition)

1. The pastries.
Oh mhhmm...the pastries. I'm salivating as I type this. Words cannot express how delicious they were.

2. The monuments. Eiffel Tower, Versailles, Notre Dame, Louvre....
Sigh.

3. Walking along the Seine.
It's just so beautiful, romantic, and...funny.
I went to Pont St. Louis, apparently the most romantic place to watch a sunset...to watch a sunset and there was this man there with the weirdest contraption protesting something or another, but he was serenading the passerbys with "Fly Me to the Moon." The juxtaposition was too funny. I couldn't help but smirk and chuckle.

4. The streets.
I love the windy, narrow streets with quirky, unique shops in the them. The architecture is so quaint.

5. The fashion.
Everyone is dressed to the nines. Coming back from project, that made me feel uber grunge. And the guys know how to dress well too!

Paris

In Shakespeare and Co. a famous bookshop located on the Seine across from Notre Dame, there are nooks and crannies where visitors from all over the world leave their marks. A few words here and a few words there. So I thought, 'Why the heck not?'

On a ripped piece of paper I wrote, for the lack of a better imagination:
It is better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all. Dreams come true in Paris.

Not that I've had a GREAT romance the pass few days in Paris, but I think it sums up all that Paris means to me, the embodiment of childhood dreams. As a child I dreamed of Paris. Of its famous monuments, of its paintings, of its streets, of its history and I thought to myself one day I will go to Paris.

And now I am in Paris, and I love it. Every minute of it.

Tanzania

Well here I am safe and sound in Tanzania. It feels so good to be back on an international project. Fish back in water. But it's definitely different being staff on a project though.

Campus cycle starts this week. I'm leading a team with Jamie Strickland, Tim Lee, Vanessa Fabish, Zoe Klintberg. Love the staff and love the team. Everything is going swimmingly.

Health is a bit wonky. Perpetually fatigued all the time. Hopefully this will pass.

Curbside Centerpieces

Wedding Guest: "So where did you get your centerpieces?"

Irene: "From the curb."

And that my friends is how conversations will go at Irene's wedding.

We were thinking of having branches as centerpieces, but the problem was where to get them. As we were discussing this during lunch, Terra, Irene, and I, Terra remembered seeing newly pruned branches on the curb...somewhere during her drive earlier in the day. So off we went after sushi to find centerpieces on the curbside.

Sure enough there they were on the curb calling to us: "Pick us up!" Use us!" So we opened Terra's hatchback and shoved it all in and took them home.

April Shmapril

I will never again underestimate April.
It's pwning me like no tomorrow.
Who knew? Who knew?

The City Comes Alive

Living in the city during the winter is dark, dreary, and depressing. It's also claustrophobic. But now that spring/summer is here, it's as if the city woke up. Suddenly everything's bright and cheery. There's so much to do. I've already started making a list.

Things I want to do in the summer.
1. Take a swing dance workshop (not exclusively a summer thing, but still...)
2. Explore and window shop in:
a) Upper Village (Eglington W. area)
b) Yonge and Eglinton
c) Fashion District
d) Roncevalles
3. Blade along Harbourfront (no blades though...)
4. QT at Harbourfront
5. Eat out at a restaurant with a patio at Harbourfront
6. Go shooting (with a camera not a shotgun) around the brickworks.
7. Sit in Dundas Square and people watch.
8. Go to a Jazz Festival
9. Play beach volleyball at Ashbridges Bay
10. Last but definitely NOT least: Shakespeare in High Park (although I hope seeing a Shakespearean play at the Globe in London won't ruin me for this.)

Can I just say how good life is? It's as if Someone gave me a goblet of golden nectar to drink, and I'm savouring every little drop. What a blessing it is to be exactly where I am right now and I thank Jesus for every day that I get to live.

Pick Up on Day of Prayer

While on a prayer walk today with my roommate in Streetsville (a dinky town in Mississauga), the following happened.

Walking, walking, walking...

Me: Father I thank you for this beautiful day.
We stop at streetcorner.

Random Voice From Behind: Yeah it is.
We turn around. There's this random sketchy looking man leaning against the wall staring at us.

Sketchy Man: But not as beautiful as you.

AWKWARD. Seriously I have enough awkward stories to film two high school chick flicks. I deserve an award or something.

A Salad of Thoughts

1. I use to think that my cooking skills were decent. Now I know better. It's not that they're decent, it's just that my palette got worse. I had the best chinese food these days. It's ruined me for the ordinary (my cooking).
2. All the chinese food and all the ads for the Beijing Olympics make me want to move back to China long-term. Not the best reasons to move. I know.
3. I need to work on my chinese.
4. While watching an ad on TV...
"She's so pretty. I want to be like her. I want to be chinese. Wait, I am."
What the heck? Oooh the power of advertisement.

Culture Shock In My Own Hood

Mom's in town, and that means requisite visits to all extended family members in the area. I love the wining and dining part that comes along with these visits because food that tastes this good and in this much quantity only comes my way every so often. I love being able to converse (loudly) in my mother tongue again. I love hearing old family stories. I love being spoiled rotten and being doted on in a way that only an only child from a chinese family can be.

But this time around there was a bit of culture shock. While there has always been things about the chinese culture that irk me like horking, this time I haven't been able to "slip back in" to the culture as smoothly as before. I feel disoriented like a fish out of water. I can't put my finger on it, but it disturbs me because in the past four years it wasn't that hard to go back and forth between Guelph and the yellow side of the family. And going from burgers and dogs to chicken feet is a pretty big jump.

When I knew that I was moving back to Toronto, I made a conscious decision not to get sucked into an Asian bubble again, but now I wonder if I had gone too far and have actually moved away from my roots....

Savouring Solitude

It's 1:30 at night. The only one up in this apartment is me. The silence and the stillness of night weighs on me, pressing against my skin. The noise and the rush of day has melted away. All the ten million things that clutter my brain have been swept away. I'm sitting on the hardwood floor savouring the stillness, and the silence that comes with night. Solitude tastes so good.

Brush with Black Ice

I was on my way to Harvest Oakville for church this morning with a friend, Emily Terreberry when I had my first brush with black ice and hopefully the last. We were on the QEW going west when all of a sudden Sunday morning traffic turned into Friday afternoon rush hour. It made sense on our side because there was an accident ahead of us, but the lanes going east were also as slow as a snail. This puzzled my mind until we hit our very own patch of black ice and skidded. We ended up at a 70 degree angle to the barricade. Yikes. Providentially we were in the exit lane so we were already slowing down and didn't skid into the middle lane; the car behind us also skidded so he didn't ram into us; the middle lane was empty for a bit so no threat came from the left . Whew. Praise God for safety.

It seems like this winter is the winter for car issues, but I rejoice when I reflect on how much God has grown me over the past few years. If these things happened a few years ago I would really be flipping out, but now I plod on with the knowledge that He will get me through this.

Happy Heart Day

There was going to be an ingenious albeit cheesy card floating around this year with the above tagline, but due to technical difficulties there will be no cards bearing Lydia's and my own brilliance.

That said, Happy Heart Day!*

Funny enough I kept thinking that today was Chinese New Year's. I think it's the hot pot that I will eating in an hour.

.

O-R-G-A-N-I-Z-A-T-I-O-N

Shelly will learn to organize her time better. Shelly MUST learn to organize her time better.

In Love

A couple of friends and I rolled into Montreal late LATE last night around one in the morning. After getting a few glimpses of the city during the wild drive downtown, I fell in love immediately. Today my friend, Lydia is going to take me on a grand tour. I am so excited.