"We Are Singapore, We Are Singapore..."

Had an awesome day today...though now I feel kinda fat...=.= Probably because we just came back from dinner at Deluxe along Broadway (we had creamy fettuccine with grilled chicken, a tomato cream soup, and a cheeseburger with fries!!!), plus we just dropped by West Side Market to get some groceries after that. We'll be attempting to cook rice tomorrow--yippee!!!--with our new Ang-mo brand rice-cooker. Hopefully the rice that comes out won't be Ang-mo-fied *horrified*!

We went to this Singaporean potluck lunch at TC today, and made so many new Singaporean friends---yay! You have no idea how happy I am :D It's nice being around people from home...*warm chummy feeling*. And eating Singaporean and Malaysian food... But for me, the best part of the interaction is not having to cook up a pseudo-American accent. I just find myself code-switching very naturally when I speak to Americans. Some of my lab-mates actually told me they like my Singaporean accent. Heh, it sounds refined because it's the Queen's English. I'm trying very hard not to code-switch now; it can be effortful trying to think of how Americans would say something and focusing on the content of the message, but it's just so natural to do so when you hear someone speaking with that accent to you. I'm proud of my Singlish accent, and I use it when I speak up in class! (: But of course not the cannot-make-it, super broken kind-lah! Our slangs are cool though...Haha! Anyway, I was so exhilarated. There was so much to talk about cos' we didn't know what course they were in or what backgrounds they came from. It was so easy just making conversation and speaking naturally. Then some of us stayed back to play Cranium. That was so much fun-lor! We'll probably register ourselves with the Singapore Consulate in NYC. Apparently, they hold events where they'll invite Singaporeans living in NYC to attend. There could be free dinners. We heard that recently George Yeo came down, and many tried to take photos with him heh...

After having a whale-of-a-time, we headed downtown to Times Square Church for the evening service, which was as usual, AWESOME. This time the choir did not have their choir robes on, so it was a pretty sight with so many diverse colors among the group onstage. It was the same choir that ministered in the mornings. Woah! They practically spend a whole day in church I guess. The worship-leader was excellent; female powerhouse. She was also new to us. They started with a series of upbeat Jewish-type songs. So catchy that I couldn't help dancing along. As usual, Pastor Conlon spoke brilliantly, though at some point I was really sleepy. He just speaks so much hope and truth into people's lives and I just find it so amazing. Every week I just can't wait to go to church to praise and worship the name of the Lord, and to hear the Word preached to us. The service always ends with a time of worship, which is great. And the choir would minister in song during the offering collection. The song they sang tonight was absolutely beautiful: Total Praise composed by Richard Smallwood. 

The weekend's over! Time flies man! Life here has been a wonderful experience so far. There's so much to look forward to and I'm so glad I'm alive. All because of Jesus man! I'm just soaking in all the cultural experiences here. There is so much diversity and I'm glad to contribute to this diversity as a Singaporean. U'know, being a minority here makes me so attuned to the ethnic mix here. Though we have all these implicit ideas about the different races, there is so much within-group variation that we often ignore. Nonetheless, you just pick up certain tendencies of different groups. Whatever the case, we'll all be singing the same tune in Heaven! Oh maybe not...we'll have some singing Country, some doing rap, and others doing opera! That'll be lovely!