Bright Glowing Moon This Morning

Today moon is exceptionally bright with glowing halo around it. 

Jupiter is now above the bright Venus planet.

Green Day- Holiday

Just thought of listening to this rock song Holiday by Green Day band today. This song is voicing their anger over the unnecessary America and Iraq war. 

Vesak Day 2022- Remembering Gautama Buddha's Teaching

Today is Vesak day, the day that Buddhists commemorates the birth, enlightenment and parinirvana of Gautama Buddha who left a life of comfort in the palace, searching for the truth. I'll spend the day meditating and watching Venerable Master Sheng Yen and Venerable Guan Cheng dharma talks. 

After attaining enlightening, Buddha had compassionately taught sentient being the Four Noble Truths. He reminded us to think and investigate his or others' teaching before accepting it. 

On the night of enlightenment, Buddha attained the ability to recollect his past lives at dusk. In late night, Buddha attained the second knowledge which is the passing away and rebirth of beings according to their actions and closer to dawn, Buddha attained the knowledge of the destruction of mental defilements and came to be the fully self-awaked Buddha. Buddha had compassionately spent the next 49 years teaching sentients being the path to end suffering with the Four Noble Truths and the Noble Eightfold path. More than 2500 years later, with the advance of technology and past lives regression, it verified what Buddha had taught about rebirths and karma- cause and effect. If you want to read about rebirths, you can read Dr Brian Weiss's book like Many Lives, Many Masters which touched on individual and collective karma and rebirths. 

The Four Noble Truths are

1) The truth of suffering. Like it or not, both rich and poor go through suffering. The suffering of old age, not getting what you want, separation, sickness.

2) The truth of the  cause of suffering (craving, anger and delusion)

3) The truth of the end of suffering. (There is a way to end suffering) 

4) The truth of the path that leads to the end of suffering is the Noble Eightfold paths.

The Noble Eightfold paths which helps to develop Sila (ethical conduct), samadhi (mental discipline or meditation) and panna (wisdom) are as follows

1) Right thought

2) Right understanding

3) Right speech (Refrain from lying, gossip, idle, harsh speech. If one has nothing helpful to say, be silent)

4) Right action (moral, honorable and peaceful conduct)

5) Right livelihood (Honest living, Refrain from making a living that harm others like selling weapons, intoxicating drinks and toxins)

6) Right effort (prevent unwholesome state of mind)

7) Right mindfulness (be aware and mindful of one's thoughts and feelings

8) Right concentration (meditation)

Watch your cause. Watch your thought. Every thing comes because of causation. This I and ego is because of causation. Every cause is because of a thought. Every thought when you habituated all the time becomes your character, your personality. Your destiny is determined by your character.

Love is in the Air: Clouds

Lovely heart clouds yesterday at my workplace.

 

Remembering Beyond: Wong Ka Kui

Beyond band is just never the same without Wong Ka Kui. He was the lead composer and singer of the band. Sadly he left us in 1993, the year I took Primary School Leaving Examination. I cried when I heard of his demise 29 years ago in June. 

I don't really understand Cantonese dialect but I like Beyond songs. Music composed and wrote by Wong Ka Kui is just so full of soul and inspiring. The only consolation is he left behind great songs for future generation. 

Boundless ocean, vast sky 

Wong Ka Kui joined the band in the form of project 

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National Steps Challenge 2022

The new healthpoints reward system for the National Steps Challenge is great. Now you just need to complete at least 10000 steps per day to get 40 health points and at least 30 minutes of Moderate to Vigorous Physical activities (MVPA) for another 40 points. Now you can get maximum of 80 points per day from physical activities. You can also get Healthpoints if you scan receipts if you purchased healthy items. Previously you need to accumulate 750 healthpoints first before getting the points. 

When you have 750 Healthpoints, you can exchange for $5.00 vouchers from one of the participating stores like NTUC supermarket. I think it is fun to exercise and earn some vouchers to buy things too. 

You can visit this website to find out more https://www.healthhub.sg/programmes/37/nsc.

 

Passive Income: Time to Raise Interest Rate in Singapore

I realised the importance of passive income when earlier, the Singapore government stipulated that only those who are fully vaccinated could return to their workplace. I believe in natural immunity and I saw how my colleague recovered without taking any Covid vaccination as he is very health-conscious.I have sinus issue but I don't take flu vaccination and antibiotics. Whenever I sneeze the whole day, I'll just stay in my room and rest and most of the time, I'll recover the next day. 

I hope to increase my passive income. One way is to look for banks that offer higher saving interest rate. Looking at the recent stock market, I better not put my cash in there. US Federal Reserve might further raise interest rate. I rather prefer a peaceful night sleep then invest in high risk high return stocks. Even though US Federal Reserve has already raised interest rate to 0.5%, local banks interest rate is still dismally low. One example is the OCBC 360 account. The effective interest rate is only 0.7% for the first $75,000.00 if you credit your salary of at least $1800.00 to OCBC 360 account.

Few years back, the interest rate was higher. Now I'm wondering if I should shift my saving to established foreign banks that offer higher interest rates. I don't think it is right that savers are given such a low interest rate yet bank staff are given many months of bonus. It's high time that they raise interest rates for savers. I hope they revert to higher interest rate of 2% that they offered in 2019. Look at the images below for comparison of 2019 and 2022 interest rates for OCBC 360 account.

Image from OCBC 360 account. Interest in May 2022

Interest in 2019  (Image from OCBC website)

Reminiscing My Primary School Volleyball Team

During recess time in my primary school days,I would rush to the  volleyball court after eating to watch exciting volleyball games by my seniors. They were the Champion in Singapore National Volleyball under the Primary school category. I liked to watch their dynamic jumping serves and forceful spike attacks! It was really exciting to watch fantastic game by my awesome seniors. They were the best of the best in Singapore (primary school) and some of my seniors (from primary 7 to 8 were quite handsome too). Those were the happy days in my primary school days.  

Icurious

I wonder how my alma mater, Yumin Primary School is doing now in the National volleyball competition. Sadly, they are not even in the top 3 primary school teams from 2014 to 2019. Their current bright uniforms also don't look as nice as the earlier blue and white uniforms.

You can find out more about Singapore national schools volleyball results here.

Recently I found my old volleyball which is now soft. Maybe I should buy a new volleyball to exercise my flabby arms. 

Dow 

One of my favourite Singapore dramas in the 80s about the volleyball players.

Singapore National school volleyball competition.

Age is Just a Number

I don't often buy Her World (HW) magazine. Last year, I only brought 1 HW magazine. This Friday, I decided to buy this month HW magazine as I enjoy reading the interviews of 10 women from 20 plus to 86 years old. Haha, I don't feel so old after reading the articles. Actually I'm quite young at 41 years old. Now there is a saying that 40 is the new 30!

Sometimes I feel sad that age is catching up with me. At 41 years old, I have more white hair and wrinkle under the eyes. You can't reverse the aging process. Life is a cycle that we all have to go through. I think I will cut down on sugar and try to sleep early to delay aging. I read that sugar will make you older faster.  

Starting tomorrow, I will cut down on sugar and exercise more. Health is wealth. 

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Mother's Day to all mothers! It is really not easy being a mother especially working mum. I really don't know how working mums manage. I feel so tired after a day work and will go for afternoon nap but working mum needs to look after their child after work. 

Before childbirth, women need to carry the foetus for nine months and suffer from morning sickness. After delivery, they have to take care of babies for almost 24 hours a day. Really hat off to them. 

My mum used to be a seamstress. After delivering my elder brother, she chose to stay at home to take care of the family. I appreciate because I always look forward to going home to eat lunch cook by my mother who is an excellent cook. 

It is affinity to have children. I read somewhere that children choose their parents. Love and value your mother because they carried you for 9 months and especially if they took care of you when you were babies.  

Happy Mother's Day to all mothers! 祝母亲节快乐！

Image from Ah Guo

周杰倫 Jay Chou聽媽媽的話 Listen to Mom

Spice Girls - Mama

 

Shark in the Sky!

 Saw this cute shark this morning today!

Large Golden Fluffy Clouds Today!

Saw this lovely cloud this morning on the way to work.☺

 

Who Can Buy Jay Chou Concert Ticket?

My cousin tried to buy Jay Chou concert tickets but  couldn't get into the system. I decided to buy the tickets but the page is always showing the image below. They should know that there is great demand for Jay Chou concert and thus ensure the ticket system can manage the online booking. After waiting for more than 20 minutes, the page never change. Anyway, we decided not to watch his concert already and just stick to Mayday concert on 3rd December this year. 

Watercolour Practice

Since I brought so much watercolour materials, I might as well use them well and improve on watercolour painting techniques. It's quite fun to play and experiment the various watercolour techniques.

I like learning from various youtube videos like Makoccino as her tutorials are easy to follow. 

First time using negative space technique for the green leaves. Not very nice but at least I tried. It's better than doing nothing and get stuck. Aim for progress. The bottom right purple background effect is achieved by sprinkling salt on wet paint. 

 

Sound of Peace

The last Imee Ooi's Heart Sutra concert I attended was in January 2020. Imee Ooi has really good voice and I like the Heart Sutra song sang by her. She be coming for a Dharma live concert at the Esplanade on 11 and 12 July this year but they are on weekdays. I realised that I need at least 6 to 7 hours of sleep else I have really bad temper and get irritated easily. I need to take afternoon nap to get some rest if I sleep late. I have to wake up at about 5am or 6am for work. I'm not a morning person and if there is no work the next day, I will read, blog or paint till 1 am and wake up at about 8.40 am on weekends. 

If concert starts at 7.30 pm, it will end at about 10.00 pm and I reach home at about 10.40 pm. Taking into consideration it takes me a while to bathe and put on facial cream, I'll sleep at about 11.40 pm and the next day I need to wake up at about 5 am or 6am. I think this year, I will not attend the concert as it is on weekday. Hopefully she will come to Singapore for concert on a weekend.

You can read earlier post on the Heart Sutra concert here.

 

Life is a Gift

I highly recommend this book, "Dying to Be Me" by Anita Moojani, I decided to buy this book after reading an article written by actress Brigitte Lim in the Chinese newspapers, Lianhe Zaobao in 2017. Brigitte Lim shared an inspiring story written by Anita Moorjani who survived cancer. The book, Dying to be Me by Anita shared how she miraculously survived from cancer after near death experience. Doctor had told her family to prepare for her funeral as her organs were shutting down and she was in end-stage lymphoma. However, after experiencing near-death experience and seeing her deceased father and friend, her cancer miraculously disappeared 5 weeks after she woke up from coma. She learned that she has to live her life fearlessly as long as we don't hurt anyone. Life is a gift meant to be enjoyed. We are all just visitors to this planet. Just enjoy this journey. 

Her description of near death experience is similar to Dr Jill Taylor, a Harvard trained brain scientist who survived stroke after experiencing near death experience. She wrote, "My Stroke of Insight" that described her stroke experience and her road to recovery. 

Life is a gift and we should find what we have instead of what is lacking. Please value your life. 

I would like to share the following inspiring quotes by Anita Moorjani. 

"Change your awareness." 

“The way to find your happiness joy is to make a list of all the things that are fun for YOU to do. Then do some of those things everyday.”

“What I really learned was that life is a gift and our only purpose is to be who we are. We all make it so complicated, and try to find our purpose, I learned that all I have to do is be as me as I can be.”

"Our life is our prayer. It is our gift to the universe, and the memories we leave behind when we someday exit this world will be our legacy to our loved ones. The best thing we can do for ourselves and everyone around us is to find our joy and share it!"

Anita Moorjani

Happy Holidays

I'm really happy with the long weekend! I spent the holidays catching up on my art assignment with painting and also reading. Really hope I have more time for the art. I'm glad I finally completed the A3 art task. But I think there is still room for improvement and maybe I'll improve in the next few days. Sometimes inspiration comes and I will just sketch and paint. 

This A4 art piece is still in progress.I'll draw and paint a hummingbird to it. 

With only three primary colours and white, you can create many colours!

 

Happy Hari Raya

Happy Hari Raya to my Muslim friends and readers. To the rest, hope you all have a good rest!

 

Finally Saw the Four Planets!

Yesterday I finally saw the four planets aligned at about 5.45 am. They are more visible early in the morning before the sun rise. From left to right, you see the Jupiter, the brightest planet Venus, Mars and lastly Saturn. In mid-June, we get to see five planets align when Mercury joins in the parade. 

Maybe I should buy a good telescope so I can see the ring around planet Saturn and other planets. 

Any idea what is the star at bottom right?

Mayday Band Concert in 2022 December

I'm happy that my cousin will be watching Mayday band concert with me in December this year. 

Finally, we can watch live concert after two long years of pandemic. I was supposed to watch Broadway musical On Your Feet in 2020 but it was canceled due to the pandemic. Hopefully covid infections can be reduced to single digit by November this year. 

Click here to order the ticket:  https://ticketmaster.sg/activity/detail/20_mayday

I hope they sing this song Perfume.