Monday, August 27, 2007
Jon is invited as Guest Speaker on 2 September 2007Dear all,
Jon has been invited as the guest speaker for the sharing session at the Rivervale CC Youth Executive Committee Biannual General Meeting. You’ve heard him sing, but have you ever had the chance to hear him air his views on youths in Singapore?
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Date: 2 Sept 2007 (Sunday)
Time: 2-5 pm
Venue: Auditorium, CHIJ St Joseph’s Convent (62, Seng Kang East Way)
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There’ll be a registration booth at the entrance, and the organizers are expecting about 100 participants. There is no need for any pre-registration, just come on down! Finger foods and drinks will be provided!
please visit the forum for more details and how we should go together...
See you all there...
Cheers
Eveline.
please visit the forum for more details and how we should go together...
See you all there...
Cheers
Eveline.
@ 11:04 PM
Monday, August 06, 2007
Jon's 10th Newsletter - Greetings after Reservist!Dear Jonatics,
here is Jon's 10th newsletter for all of you.
If you wanna write a reply to him, you can visit the forum
and just hit the "Messages for Jonathan" Button...
Happy reading..
Cheers,
Eveline.
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Hey,I hope everything is good on your end, its been rather long since I last wrote a "proper" letter to you but I didn't really have anything new to say so I figured that there isn't much point in just writing a letter for the sake of writing one.
Anyway, as some of you know I just completed half a month of Reservist back at my old camp. It was very enjoyable actually, it’s been a long time since I laughed so hard practically every minute of everyday. I actually had a lot more fun during my in camp training than on my very short graduation trip which i took right after the examinations. I figure it to be the company. It was really good to meet up with some of my army pals, the bond is really strong between the few of us I guess because for that 2 and a half years we spent almost every day with each other. The great thing is that with those guys, you can talk about whatever you want, and they can give you an honest answer. This is not something one can find in our society most of the time. Most of the time people are too small minded, petty and place way too much importance on themselves to talk about anything honestly.. haha, but enough about that. Of course, neither am I saying that all my army mates are like that. Its still a teeny, tiny minority. As usual, there was the fair share of unkind heckling from the "small man" type characters in the vicinity but it was pretty much alright on the whole. Can't expect things to go 100 percent well, anyway.
While I was in camp, besides the physical stuff and the catching up with old pals (note: not everyone is my pal so if people claim to be my good friend, most of the time they aren't... I hear countless accounts of how my self proclaimed "good friends" tell stories about me that I don't even know about... guess they know about me more than i do. haha), I managed to squeeze the time in between to finish reading "the alchemist" one more time. It's really a book that speaks to me (I can't say the same for the rest of the author's books as I don't like the rest at all), there are some sections of the book that I would like to share if you are interested, it's funny how adults need so much more reminders compared to children. At least I do.
Here's some parts of the book that very much stuck-
'It’s a book that says the same thing almost all other books in the world say,' continued the old man.
'It describes people’s inability to choose their destinies. And it ends up saying that everyone believes the world’s greatest lie.'
'What is the world’s greatest lie?' the boy asked, completely surprised.
'It’s this: that at a certain point in our lives, we lose control of what’s happening to us, and our lives become controlled by fate. That’s the world’s greatest lie.'
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'We are afraid of losing what we have, whether it’s our life or our possessions and property. But this fear evaporates when we understand that our life stories and the history of the world were written by the same hand.' 'Everyone on earth has a treasure that awaits him,' his heart said. 'We, people’s hearts, seldom say much about those treasures, because people no longer want to go in search of them. We speak of them only to children. Later, we simply let life proceed, in its own direction, toward its own fate. But unfortunately, very few follow the path laid out for them- the path to their destinies, and to happiness. Most people see the world as a threatening place, and, because they do, the world turns out, indeed, to be a threatening place.
'So, we, their hearts, speak more and more softly. We never stop speaking out, but we begin to hope that our words won’t be heard: we don’t want people to suffer because thet don’t follow their hearts.”'
'Why don’t people’s hearts tell them to continue to follow their dreams?' the boy asked the alchemist.
'Because that’s what makes a heart suffer most, and hearts don’t like to suffer.'
'Every search begins with beginner’s luck. And every search ends with the victor’s being severely tested.' The boy remembered an old proverb from his country. It said that the darkest hour of the night came just before the dawn.
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By the way, I’ve been busy trying to write songs and also to get myself more educated musically. Hopefully, my tracks will be good enough to make the cut for the eventual album. My recent purchase was Velvet Revolver’s new album, Libertad. Its great to see that they are still rocking hard and cool as ever.
Take care in the meantime, and warmest regards.
Jon.
@ 4:59 PM
