Typing on Maundy Thursday

Dear Diary,

It is Maundy Thursday today. I am sitting here in front of my computer, typing my blog entry. Only a sister is currently at home with me. The rest have gone out for Maundy Thursday service which is a total surprise since they never were interested when I attended Maundy Thursday services faithfully before I came out into the workforce. Oh well… I badly wanted to pop by a church. My own church’s service is at 7.30pm. I was still working. On my way home at 9.45pm, I was vacillating whether to attend a church service. I sat by the window of the bus and watched. There was Church of the Holy Family, then Church of the Queen of Peace and then Church of St Stephen…. I almost hopped off at Church of the Queen of Peace, but then recalling how lost I was when I once attended the Christmas Eve’s midnight Mass at St Stephen’s Church alone… that held me back. Hmmm… I guess the penned-up interest started this morning when I saw the car-park of St Stephen’s Church and the huge open-air car-park more than two hundred metres away, all filled up with cars. It was 10am and I was actually heading for work! Worshippers thronged the Catholic church. Oh well… anyway, the Holy Week is heading towards the climax of Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, Holy Saturday, Easter Sunday and Taiwan (for me)! Yay! ;-)

I don’t know how to start writing this blog entry. There are really so many things to talk about. Like how a family of three almost wept in front of me when the wife felt so frustrated that her husband was diagnosed with liver cancer so late despite he going for medical checkup every year faithfully. I was already suspecting liver problem when I saw him with a yellowish tint over his skin and I noticed scleral icterus. I stayed back past my working hours that Tuesday evening (11-3-2008) to console the wife and the daughter. Seeing the cross hanging from her neck, I told her to pray and trust in God. Sigh… that incident reminded me never to be complacent in life. On Wednesday (12-3-2008), I uninstalled my ICQ 2002 beta program which I kinda have stopped using since 2005. The removal of such significant chapter of my life also taught me to move on in life and not be nostalgic or sentimental over the past. Met up with a church friend that evening and we had this really long chat over sumptuous dinner at NYDC in Bugis Junction. It was a theological and “anthropological” (so he said, haha) chat. Enjoyed chatting with someone outside of my profession because the topics are really different! ;-) Of course, there was Palm Sunday and we were playing with the crosses made from palm leaves! The palm leaves signify the entry of Jesus Christ into Jerusalem on a donkey and greeted by many waving palm leaves, fulfilling the Old Testament prophecy by Zechariah.

Then it is Holy Week. On Monday (17/3), was uncharacteristically late when I left the house just 10 minutes before my appointment time at a faraway place like Riverview Hotel! I gave up and just hailed a cab. Cost a bomb as it was peak hours and the electronic road pricing (ERP) gantries were all activated to burn more money from my wallet. Arrrggghhh…. Nonetheless, it was a nice Japanese buffet meal at Ginga Japanese restaurant. Nice talking to that two pre-registration pharmacists and that airport pharmacist who were sitting around me, hahaha… On Tuesday (18/3), I sat down at a table during dinner-time and I saw the elder sister of my primary school classmate! She was the one who introduced the word “pharmacist” to me when I was a 15-year-old student? She went on to study pharmacy but never became a practicing one, instead going on to achieve her PhD. Oh man… she got me into this fix, haha…. On Wednesday (19/3), watched the movie “The Spiderwick Chronicles” with a friend and I thought it was quite good! Much better than I have expected! Ate at this “Hot Tomato Restaurant” at the basement of Plaza Singapura and it was really affordable.

Today, Thursday (20/3), isn’t really very eventful. There was a lady who came up to me asking for an eye-drop for her daughter. After evaluating, I recommended Desomedine 0.1% eye-drops. Then she was telling me that she was a pharmacist and I asked if she is still practicing. “No,” she replied. “Why,” I asked. She couldn’t really give me an answer. She told me she married to another “non-practising” pharmacist, and now she is selling milk… I presume powdered milk? Wyeth? Haha… I asked her daughter who was wearing a TPJ college uniform if she wanted to be a pharmacist. She wants! I said, “All the best!” Couldn’t resist that eye-rolling and both of them broke into a huge giggle. I wonder if anyone can really work as a patient-care pharmacist all their lives. Probably not, unless you are super duper interested in pharmacy practice, I think. My classmate from the rival pharmacy came by today too. As he watched me counsel a tall reasonably good-looking lady who was asking about Panadol and Clarinase, he later told me that the lady was making a “pass” at me. He told me that it was obvious but I couldn’t detect it! Oh no… had I always been failing to pick up female hints of interest??? Hahaha…. I didn’t think that was a pass.

Now, it is exactly 12am midnight. It is Good Friday. 2000 years ago and it would have been an unbelievable night. When the King whom everyone was expecting, ended up on the cross, dying. Yet as we examine the scriptures, we know that Jesus was totally in control of the situation. He interceded for those who crucified him. He promised salvation to one of the crucified thief (traditionally known as Saint Dismas). He decided when he should die when he called out, “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit”. He gave up his spirit after speaking those words. The fact that a crucified person can call out in a LOUD voice is already incredible if you know the scientific basis of the crucifixion. As recorded in the gospel according to Saint Mark, the disbelieving centurion who stood guard at the foot of the cross at last admitted, “Surely, this man was the Son of God!” (Mark 15:39)

With the kind of incredible and outlandish claims Jesus made, he could either be a lunatic or the Son of God as he claimed. He can’t be anything in the middle. Yet, with the kind of wisdom he had and the numerous prophecies he fulfilled and the miracles he performed, it requires incredible faith to believe that he is a lunatic. I wish you a Good Friday.

God Bless,

Andrew