Friday, February 16, 2007

Gong XI Fa Cai!









I am happy to announce SMART - art and design initiative by Amrita and Samanta, if you have not noticed the logo at the bottom right. Here it is...

Wednesday, February 14, 2007

Today is Valentine's Day - what's that again?


Today's Valentine's Day.... what day??? This morning at the basketball court fellow
not-so-old old players, a wise one gave this advice to the younger basketball players:

"If you have love, every day is Valentine's Day"

"If you have money, everyday is Chinese New Year"

Great advise! Guess what.......? We lost to the youngsters today ;0(

Have a great valentine celebration (however you want to celebrate it)!

Sunday, February 11, 2007

Tea Ceremony @ KKBCSDS

This morning, at the KKBC Sunday Dharma School, we had for the first time organized a tea ceremony in conjunction with the Chinese New Year Celebration on Feb 18. In this event, the students of the Sunday School, took turns to offer tea to the teachers (as their elders). When the students have completed offering tea to the teachers, parents who were present were invited to "receive" offering of tea from their children. This is a practice of respect for the elders. A grandmother was also present was invited to receive tea. She reluctantly agreed to join in and received tea from her grandchildren. I could not understand half of what she was trying to say but going by the expression, she was happy. I wish I had time (and the ability to converse in Hokkien) to ask her more about how she felt? Was it a practice during her younger days... etc.



Although, I am third generation Chinese in Malaysia with limited Chinese language capability, I think it is important to understand and appreciate in our roots. Our roots forms our culture and defines who we are. It also tell us where we heading by reinforcing positive values. In the practise of Buddha Dharma, cultural roots are even more important as culture, being the nasis of positive social interaction is the door of which experience the Dharma. This is the rational behind the tea ceremony and the vision I hope it will lead towards. Once experienced in the cultural (social level), the practice of Sila, only will we be able to transcend it to samadhi and ultimately achieve panna.

Overall, I felt the event went well - thanks to all the Teachers - I hope this will be a tradition for our children to follow. May you all be well and happy!


Friday, February 09, 2007

More thoughts and feeback on the NEB

I picked this up from M Bakri Musa's blog. I found this as one of the more critical and articulate feedback of the NEB I have read. Check out A Blueprint or Continued Mediocrity. M Bakri Musa is a Malaysian-born surgeon in private practice in Silicon Valley, California He writes frequently on issues affecting his native land, Malaysia. He also wrote a book entitled "AN Education System Worthy of Malaysia".