2015 Week 20 Update

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Another ho-hum humdrum week! I did escape a fire drill at work by working at home and I think quite a few did the same!

Update on the position I applied for – on Tuesday I got a call fixing my phone interview with my boss on Thursday. I slightly panicked, but then got a reprieve on Wednesday saying he’ll do this after he is back in Singapore in the first week of June. Now I need to just prepare for this interview.

I think I’ve said this before – not only do I lead a boring work-home-children life, I am the sort who prefers to curl up with a good book rather than go out! What does that say about me?

On a side note, I’ve been having some real weird dreams lately! For someone who does not dream normally, I wonder what this is all about. When I google the meaning, it does seem positive – a foretelling of the future perhaps? Fingers crossed!

Have a great week folks!

PSLE Week 20 Update

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We’re in the last week before the June holidays which for any P6 student is the month of intensive drilling for the PSLE!

GG & BB got their marks back from school and I can only say this – they can do much better! GG had atrocious marks in Maths, but other than that not bad…

They have Hindi special lessons at the DAV HQ for five days which my helper has to go to and then a week or so of special lessons in school.

The year is speeding away and I can only hope it ends well for us!

In My Hands Today

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Disco for the Departed (Dr. Siri Paiboun #3) – Colin Cotterill

Dr. Siri Paiboun, reluctant national coroner of the People’s Democratic Republic of Laos, is summoned to a remote location in the mountains of Huaphan Province, where for years the leaders of the current government had hidden out in caves, waiting to assume power. Now, as a major celebration of the new regime is scheduled to take place, an arm is found protruding from the concrete walk that had been laid from the President’s former cave hideout to his new house beneath the cliffs. Dr. Siri is ordered to supervise the disinterment of the body attached to the arm, identify the corpse and discover how he died.

The autopsy provides some surprises but it is his gift as a shaman that enables the seventy-two-year old doctor to discover why the victim was buried alive and, eventually, the identity of his killer.

Dr. Siri Paiboun Series:

  • Book 1: The Coroner’s Lunch
  • Book 2: Thirty-Three Teeth

The Power of Prayers

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I usually start the morning with prayers to the Lord and am trying to inculcate the same with BB & GG too!

As you probably know from my posts, I am a Hindu and am also bringing up BB & GG in the same way. I am weird in the sense, though I have rock solid belief in God, I am not a very big beliver in going to temples. I firmly believe that if you believe in God and don’t go out of your way to harm someone, then even a heartfelt two minute prayer in your heart to God will give you the same results as going to the temple. You do not need the outward manifestation of your belief to God. I posted about religion some time back, but this post is more about the power of prayers.

GaneshaLike I’ve said before, I have a very personal relationship with God and my personal God is the Lord Ganesh.

My daily routine is do a string of prayers in front of my altar at home. Hindus usually light the lamp in front of God twice a day and I do this in the morning after bath and in the evening after I am home. Once I light the lamp, I say my prayers. After this, I try to meditate for a couple of minutes and then have my conversation with him. The evening prayer is a much shorter one with a quick prayer after lighting the lamp. But I do have my conversation in the evening too, especially if the day has gone well for me, or I see his hand in something that happened during the say!

So does praying to God worth your while? My answer is an equivocal YES! Prayer is the vehicle with which you reach out to God or the higher divinity. It allows you to focus on the divine and helps a human being to become one with that one Universal Divine Being who can be called by various religions as their Gods!

Prayers also allow you to push your stress and desires on to your preferred God. This releases a lot of tensions in your lives when you move your stress to God! I remember there are days when my mind is full of things and I can’t sleep. Those days when I say a short prayer to Ganpati Bappa (Lord Ganesh) and tell him now it’s his responsibility to ensure that my problems are solved; I am able to sleep quite fast!

Do you believe in the divine and pray?

In My Hands Today…

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The Godfather of Kathmandu – John Burdett

Sonchai Jitpleecheep–John Burdett’s inimitable Royal Thai Police detective with the hard-bitten demeanor and the Buddhist soul–is summoned to the most shocking and intriguing crime scene of his career. Solving the murder could mean a promotion, but Sonchai, reeling from a personal tragedy, is more interested in Tietsin, an exiled Tibetan lama based in Kathmandu who has become his guru.

There are, however, obstacles in Sonchai’s path to nirvana. Police Colonel Vikorn has just named Sonchai his consigliere (he’s been studying “The Godfather” on DVD): to troubleshoot, babysit, defuse, procure, reconnoiter–do whatever needs to be done in Vikorn’s ongoing battle with Army General Zinna for control of Bangkok’s network of illegal enterprises. And though Tietsin is enlightened and (eerily) charismatic, he also has forty million dollars’ worth of heroin for sale. If Sonchai truly wants to be an initiate into Tietsin’s “apocalyptic Buddhism,” he has to pull off a deal that will bring Vikorn and Zinna to the same side of the table. Further complicating the challenge is Tara: a Tantric practitioner who captivates Sonchai with her remarkable otherworldly techniques.

Here is Sonchai put to the extreme test–as a cop, as a Buddhist, as an impossibly earthbound man–in John Burdett’s most wildly inventive, darkly comic, and wickedly entertaining novel yet.

Book 4 of the series featuring the half Asian, half Caucasian Bangkok inspector Sonchai Jitpleecheep

The books in the series:

  1. Book 1: Bangkok 8
  2. Book 2: Bangkok Tattoo
  3. Book 3: Bangkok Haunts
  4. Book 4: The Godfather of Kathmandu
  5. Book 5: Vulture Peak