keep believing

Because of the LORD’s great love we are not consumed,
for his compassions never fail.
They are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.
Lamentations 3:22-23

i’ve moved into the pantry last thursday, and i’m loving it :) we are the happy pantry friends and we make sandwiches/desserts/salads. my current favorite task is making chicken pesto wrap, though i still don’t know how to make the chicken pesto salad, i’ll learn! i love cutting cantaloupes and honeydews and putting them, and grapes, into small glass bowls too. and of course, sampling the food is necessary (we wouldn’t want to give customers bad melons), and i love that too ;)
this is one reason for lack of entries, i’m still adjusting to my new working hours. also, the internet connection has been really sucky.

just as i’m about to get too comfortable being alone, i’ve made a couple of new friends. my habit of eating meals alone and going places by myself got me new friends. i met this indonesian girl studying in singapore also who turned out to be my junior’s older sister. we called her my imaginary friend since nobody else met or knew her existence, til yesterday. she’s real!
i had a good sharing time with two other new friends on thursday evening, before our bible study, and we plan to do this every week. it’s not another “hi, how you doing?” and my default answer (regardless how i’m really doing) “good, how are you?”.

the john piper book i’m reading is getting more and more interesting :) i’m reading it very very slowly, especially at the beginning of the book. but i enjoy reading this book the mornings i wake up for breakfast or after work in the evenings, and i’m finishing it soon. maybe i’ll write down a few good points that i learn here once i’ve finished reading. the book’s caused a couple of friendly strangers approach me to say that they love the book. and also a couple of friends comment whenever they see me chatting away in msn or doing nothing much on my days off like i did today. don’t waste your life.

people are starting to leave. a friend of ours left last wednesday and four others are leaving tomorrow. we had a good meal for dinner at obsidien dining room last tuesday, and another one later on. i always hate farewells, as in saying goodbyes and all, i have this tendency to avoid them.

well i’ll have to leave too, in less than three weeks’ time. and it’s gonna be a lot of traveling after that!

the sky was beautiful tonight, pk and i were walking to the laundry room, i looked up and admired the many many stars in the sky.. til pk said:
imagine these stars are pimples and the sky is a face. she has more pimples than we do! HAHA.

i went to hike to mallard lake a few days ago. it was rather challenging due to the scorching sun, some part of the trail which was covered by snow or muddy, and i had to climb the rocks and balance myself on a few logs. the lake is one of the ugliest lakes i’ve ever seen, and there wasn’t much to see on the way. but i turned on my handphone’s speaker and played hymns out loud along the way (because i have no ipod and my handphone’s headset is spoilt it can give my ears electric shock once in a while. seriously!). i found out later that this trail might have bears around and doing this could keep them away.
i borrowed the celebration hymnal book from the church. i’ve been singing the same songs over and over again i need new songs.

i walked to black sand basin after work yesterday. and i concluded that walking/hiking is no longer fun anymore. i don’t mind the sun but it is too buggy, there are too many mosquitoes and flying things and other insects/animals. i saw two snakes on my mallard lake hike!

[Since] God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him, then living for the glory of God must mean that we live to gladly make others glad in God. Our gladness and our pursuit of their gladness glorifies God. And since gladness in God is the greatest and most lasting happiness, pursuing it is also love…By gladly pursuing the gladness of others in God-even at the cost of our lives-we love them and honor God.
-John Piper

i worked at the ice cream shop for the first, and probably the last, time yesterday. the shop only sells soft serve ice creams and frozen yogurts with limited flavors. all i had to do was just to swirl the ice cream/yogurt on a cone or cup, covering it with chocolate dip or toppings once in a while as requested. i had to repeat the same exact steps almost every time, but the facial expressions of the customers we served, their big grins and their wide opened eyes, when they received the ice cream or when they first licked it are priceless. especially the small kids’!

the people here, those tourists with their family or group of friends, are on their vacation mood, and thus, usually very happy. i love watching these families or groups of friends, laughing, relaxing, spending some quality time together. it’s heart warming, a rare scene in the fast-paced, stressful, moody singapore life.

when deciding what to do during my free time and days off here, i need to know what my priorities and the main purpose of me being here are. earning money, making friends, enjoying nature, exploring, having fun, knowing myself and God more? what is top on my list things to do?

i work from 10-7 five days a week, and free the rest of the time. i can go walking or hiking, alone or with a bunch of friends, sit down and read or do sudoku, do extra hours which means more money $$, go online and catch up with friends back home, go on shopping trip to bozeman or cody, or on other trips. and sometimes, it’s kinda hard to decide.
actually it’s more like i’ve been so caught up with work and the thought that i should earn more was haunting me. money, money, money.

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a group of indonesian tourists visited the cafetaria a few days ago. the way they talk to each other, the way they speak english, the way they choose what to eat, the way they react when they find out that i’m indonesian, the questions they ask are somehow.. endearing.. and i miss home just suddenly.

and i dreamt about my mom that very night. i cannot really retell the dream, but i remember seeing her in my dream and thinking that i love my mom.

-

anyway, i posted my mailing address here, for those who miss me and wish to snail mail me, but it’s gone, somehow, so here you go:
General Delivery
Old Faithful Station
Yellowstone National Park
Wyoming 82190

please let me know if you send me anything because i will have to claim and collect the mail myself. i’ll be here for another one month btw.

and a moose too!
i can now leave yellowstone in peace.

grand teton national park is a nice place. it has very beautiful sceneries, beautiful lakes and mountains. the lakes are very pretty, the water glistens due to the sunlight, partly snow covered mountains stand on the other side of the lake. the lake-shores give the beach feeling, complete with the waves, but without the sand.

we stopped at a few places on our way to teton and in teton itself, to enjoy the view and take pictures and for toilet breaks and haagen dazs, before we finally parked the car, and went for a hike. we were ‘hunting’ for bears, walking along the moose ponds loop trail, before a friend of mine spotted a black bear’s cub from afar! we watched the bear moving here and there for some time, til we saw a moose nearby, eating grass and drinking from the pond..
(and i hereby declare moose as my favourite animal in yellowstone, they are sooo cute! )
we were watching the two of them, waiting for a live ‘discovery channel’, for the bear to have her dinner, but it didn’t happen.

and when we drove back to old faithful, we actually saw another bear having her dinner (and caused us to miss our dinner) on the road side! a grizzly bear was feasting on a baby elk. we couldn’t see the elk or anything bloody though.

spotting and watching wildlife here has its own excitement. because yellowstone is not a zoo.

it’s such a pretty day today. the sun shines so bright, but unlike in singapore or jakarta, it’s breezy and cool, it doesn’t feel hot and sticky. and i’m off today, and tomorrow :) hope the weather stays like this tomorrow, we’re driving to grand tetons!

i went hiking today, by myself, past daisy and morning glory, through biscuit basin, to the mystic falls! i think it’s not that mystical, i like fairy falls better, but it was a nice hiking experience. i got to the ‘top of the world’ overlooking the falls, the river, biscuit basins and old faithful. i encountered very steep slopes, and there were some points when i just stopped to rest or think or enjoy the view. people think it’s weird but i love hiking alone. i can hike at my own pace and stop anytime, anywhere, i can talk to myself, i can sing out of tune.. and nobody will complain. i’m quite a loner.

i met a lot of chipmunks today. at least six of them. and a bison, a snake, and a lot of weird insects. so far i’ve seen chipmunks, squirrels, a beaver-looking creature, bisons, elks, eagles, coyotes, a fox, wolves (in captive), grizzly bears (in captive), ravens..

a few weeks ago we had a birthday celebration in the laundry room, with a humongous chocolate cake, leftovers, sambal belachan and alcohols. our bosses attended the party too! and we had another birthday celebration just now by the riverside. we had a campfire with fruit pizza cake, marshmallows, cookies, potatoes, sweet potatoes and corns. the campfire was a lot of fun.
well, i always prefer a warm, simple, small gathering, but i think those people who organised these surprises are really sweet, and these memories will last for sure.

i’ve been keeping things at the back of my mind, procrastinating and not doing them, and forgetting most of them at the end of the day. mental notes don’t work for me. i guess i need to start writing things down day to day again like i do during school term.
i forgot to think about whether to s/u this particular module, and the deadline is already over.

it’s summer today :)