Through our connections with unique people ...

Learning is all about connections, and through our connections with unique people we are able to gain a true understanding of the world around us.

--- Peter Senge, MIT-based author, researcher & educator

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This year, I find the connections I have via my blog, LAS networks, painting groups, and other connections at home and other links established over the years have made me understand the world better.

I am able to gain a true understanding of the world around me, be it interesting life experience, misgivings or unfortunate encounters that I had to endure for months/years.

Some are positive and great learning experience!  Others, may be classified as negative and miserable, yet, the worst outcome to me, was the best teacher in life journey!

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I train myself to be less emotional.  I learn to solve problems created by others and move on ...

I never knew that I can be so calm, resourceful, and am able to control my emotion so well and make the most out of adversities.

I just hope that those who have experiences which are not desirable in life, can start to ponder what can be the best route under the worst circumstances.

No one live an eternal life, and within a short span of our time on earth, what is best for us to do is ...

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If we can take care of ourselves, we will create less trouble for others. 

When we are facing trouble, there are still ways to make the rest of life journey great for others to remember us when we pass on...

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At my dental treatment at NUH on 12 Feb, with all the pains that I had to endure while on dental chair, a thought flashed in my mind. 

I thought of my dad's last wish, i.e., organ donation before he was diagnosed with critical disease. 

Now, I would like to explore one step further, i.e., body donation for medical studies.

The student dentist helped me to find the link for the form within second:
http://medicine.nus.edu.sg/ant/body-donation/ 

I am now looking at it and printed it for my reference. 

I think it is good to look at your funeral ceremony and be positive about it. 

To me, body donation is not only a green idea for the environment, it is a good deed too if the body can be used for medical advancement. 

I think it is great too if whatever we can not use can be up-cycled by others physically.  I find it meaningful to do it at the last phrase of my life, and have my future planned that way.

When I look at the journey of life with death as the end point, I see it as an inevitable and irreversible process! This inevitable used to make me fearful.  Even now, at this very moment, I am still uncertain and sceptical about how I could possibly get through the fear...

*fearful about death
*fearful about uncertainty in life
*fearful about the suffering from illness in the journey towards death
 
Nevertheless, whether I fear the process, or fearful about the journey itself, it is there for me to pass through or experience. 

We have life, hence we have death. 

It is like the fact that a coin has two sides. If you are able to live and spin the coin well, life seem to carry on forever, ever though we know the coin may stop spinning and death may come at any moment.

In life journey, we keep our life goes on like the way we toss a coin, we try to strike well, create a balanced movement, and hope the coin will keep dancing in front of our own eyes.

We also admired those who can toss a coin well and make it dances glacially. Yet, we know we will see the dancing coin will come to a stop ultimately.

Despite all these thoughts that haunted me for years, I think I have to plan for it and make my plan known to anyone who can help me fulfil my last wishes!

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Every cloud has its silver lining!

Life is not all the time so negative, thankfully!

There are good encounters too in my journey in life, especially in the beginning of this lunar new year!

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I meet my new "soul-mate-like" friend who travelled from Taiwan to JB and Singapore.  She is an academic staff member in a university in Taipei, married to a Taiwanese and has one 14 years old daughter.

She contacted me after reading my blog on my "Teochew" story and other related postings.  When she sent me an email suggesting the first meeting on the 5th day of Lunar New Year, I was a bit skeptical, yet found it a new experience and liked to see how things develop.

She flew from Taipei, and took one day out of her one week holiday in JB to have a meeting and discussion with me. I felt both weird and honored, and tried to read between the lines ...

To kill my curiosity, I decided to give it a go ...

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Before we fixed our first meeting, we had multiple email exchanges and I could see that she is sincere and was a "real" being!

From the Google search results and information I could gather via the net, I knew I was dealing with an academic from overseas.

With the photo sent before our meeting, and other family details she shared, I am certain that she is a real and sincere lecturer for business course in a university in Taipei. 

We met on 5th day of Lunar New Year. This first full day meeting was a memorable and unforgettable movie like experience.

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Both of us felt that we were like old friends having our re-union meeting.

We shared too many things in common and our life experiences had a lot of similar trials.

The most amazing thing is that we studied at the same UWM in 1990/1991, and we might had met each other in Milwaukee without knowing it!

The way I link with her, her family, i.e., parents, brother, cousin, nephews and nieces, is so similar to that of the links with my long term friends in Singapore and Hong Kong.  We can talk for hours and still continued talking...

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The learning in the beginning of 2014 is all about connections, and I am thankful for all, be it positive or otherwise!

And, I hope, those who have negative experiences, can create positive experience for themselves.

I hope that they are able to walk in their life journey with the right mindset, be it the last lapse, or the first baby step.  We are all capable of making positive imprint when we interact with others, with whatever little means available to us.

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My best wishes to all in my connections!


Dexterine Ho Soo Miang


Notes:
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This post was first published on 11 Feb, and updated on 14 Feb 2014.  In lunar calendar, it is the 15th day of Lunar New Year, the Chinese Valentine day too.

To me, be it Eastern or Western Valentine day, the day is only meaningful if we have great friends to share our joys!

And I am glad, I have a meaningful day today!

For those who are reading this post, I wish you make every day a Valentine day, or a meaningful day worth sharing and living too!
 
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The second revision of this post was uploaded on 4 April.  Thanks to Y C Ko for her hard works this week and spending one hour going through the article on some details with me!