Looking back on 2015

A first: My first EVER concert (not orchestra or choir) experience, in January, with Bastille.

A brave choice: To stay in England over the winter break. I missed everyone at home so dearly, but in my heart of hearts I knew that to spend this window of time with Grandma would be so precious. It was also a test to myself, to see if I could hold out. I missed Singaporean Christmas, and the reflectiveness of Watch night, and the excitement of Youth Camp, but I got to meet family, see God gently shake the last leaves off the trees, fly to Poland, hug Grandma every day, and learn patience and contentment with where I am and where I’m going.

A reckless choice: THE BREAKFAST PROJECT I don’t know how I even got the notion to somehow wake up every day for a school week when I was no longer in school, run, or be driven, or take the bus to ACJC with a warm Tupperware in my hand to deliver breakfast to Emily. But it was so fun, and so worth it.

Someone I held on to: Throughout this year, Ching has somehow been by my side every step of the way. In the beginning of the year we both worked together in the café, and therefore stepped out of the neat glass jars we’d inhabited in JC to become just someones serving plates of food and wiping tables. Someones who also had good laughs and serious conversations and sneaky waffle scraps. And then Ching was one of the last people I met before Auntie Sheila died - in fact I went for a run with her when she was still alive and when we came back she had slipped away. And Ching came to the leaving party and wrote a most heartfelt note as she always does. And I have one of the letters she wrote me when I was going through a tough patch in JC up on my pin board, to look at when things get tough over here.

Someone I met new: Family in Bath

Crying moment: That earth tremor, face holding feeling in the car on the way to the airport.

Laughing moment: Days in the cafe - when Debbie said 'Forks' strangely, when a boy came in holding leaves, when Kai Jing crowned me 'Queen of Dragonfruit', when Shak visited and sang along to the Taylor Swift songs...

Golden moment: So so many - but the most recent one I can remember was this beautiful cycle back from a Polly supervision

Grey moment: A Monday and Tuesday in my room in college when I was gripped with the irrational fear that my friends would forget me and I would be rootless.

Good Meal: The completely vegan meal that one group cooked during the Chinese Christian Fellowship retreat. I was the only vegan in the camp, and so in each meal there was always a plate set out for me that wouldn't have the meat dish on it. However, the person who was planning his group's meal had misunderstood that there was one vegan in the camp, and instead thought he had to cook vegan. And he just happened to be the best cook in the whole camp, and so we were served vegan cream of mushroom soup, tomato, mushroom and aubergine pasta, and...a vegan chocolate mousse and raspberry tart! Having a dessert at all was unusual, and it being vegan made it oh so perfect. It was especially nice, because Eunice, my room mate who is gluten intolerant, could also have the dessert, which is something she can't often indulge in! We both took seconds.

A defining song: Satisfied in You, by The Sing Team. Ben introduced this song to me ages ago, and I used to listen to it when doing savasana at the end of a Yoga session.

‘Like a bed of rest for my fainting flesh - I am satisfied in You.’

After Auntie Sheila passed away and I was grieving, I listened to that song too.

‘Let my sighs give way to songs that sing about your faithfulness…’

And when I was lonely and scared and tired in Cambridge, curled up in bed and wondering if I’d have the strength to finish my essay or go to a lecture the next day - that song came back and sat me up and made me wipe my tears away and face what I had to do.

‘Why are you downcast O my soul? Why so disturbed within me?... I am satisfied in You.’

Good book: Shackleton's Journey  A Tale of Two Cities  Great House I can't choose just one

Good movie: Suffragette or Far From the Madding Crowd, vastly different, same leading lady.

Gain: So much knowledge through my lecturers and lessons and books. I think one of the things I love most about Cambridge is that I feel like I’m learning something, every single day. I love learning, I love being challenged and having my wells of ignorance slowly but surely filled up by the wisdom and collected anthologies of brain stuff in my lecturers heads.

Loss: Auntie Sheila

A last: My last ballet lesson, when we pleaded Mrs Chong to let us do 'The Happy Dance', which is something we used to do in the lower grades to the tune of 'The Lonely Goatherd' from The Sound of Music. She was reluctant at first, saying we were all too old for it, but everyone said it was so important to do it, and so she relented. Then we realised we had forgotten so much of it, so we tried various permutations of it, and just laughed and laughed at how wonderful it was to do a dance which had so many happy memories, as well as laughing at ourselves at how ungainly we were in our uncertainty and old-ness - it isn't so easy to skip under a bridge made of hands when you are 1.67m rather than 1.2m!

Three trivial things:

1) Threading your eyebrows is a good idea (was so tempted to write 'good eye-dea' but I could just see Emily rolling her eyes and then laughing)

2) Don't ride down a hill on a new bicycle and brake suddenly at the bottom if you aren't wearing a helmet. Even if you are wearing a helmet think twice about it.

3) Rye/Rice Crackers with Chocolate Ice cream and Almond butter and Bananas on top is actually the bee’s knees.

Three important things:

1) When I asked my Dad what his greatest achievement was in life, he said ‘Being a Dad to you three’ which touched my heart - how wonderful when your greatest source of pride is in loving service. Dad, you’re a great Dad and you should definitely be proud of that.

2) Time with yourself, to learn how to appreciate yourself and find it within yourself to give thanks for what God has surrounded you with is so important.

3) The world is so much more than your own 'needs', and God calls us to live beyond ourselves.