Last weekend left me rattled, unhinged, even devastated

Feeling these are good. They are apocalyptic. They point to the truth, about us, about the world, about mankind. We need a Saviour. This place is a mess. I think the reason I've become so obsessed with this now-extinct Kowloon walled city, is the stark visual picture it grants us of the human condition. Thought we (mankind) spiritually live in deep darkness, everything looks so shiny and new (here in the U.S. and much of the "West"). So pretty, so styled, so manufactured. The abject nature of this forsaken, desolate city made obvious what we try to conceal with our "white-washed tomb" perspective on our lives. We are lost. We are so astray. We are broken, dirty, and poor. The fact that people still live in such conditions of physical squalor all over the world is evidence of our refusal to accept this truth. How easy to forget that people are murdered, sold as slaves, forced into the sex-trade, and starve to death every single day on this planet, which we exploit and take for granted. Our quiet, self-righteous living is only possible through chosen ignorance of this suffering. God's ear is not deaf to the cry of the downtrodden, and neither should ours be. We need something to wake us from our excess of comfort and startle us to true gut-wrenching compassion. Jesus, open my eyes!

The Office comes back April 10!!!

I can hardly wait! Actually it's Providential since I gave up TV (including internet and DVD format, and especially including KDramas!) for lent, and Easter falls early this year:) Any sooner would be too great a temptation. He really doesn't give us more than we can bear;) {see 1 Corinthians 10:13}

coalesce

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/03/opinion/03kristof.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

And even I'm getting tired of these useless desires

Matthew 6:32-33

For the pagans run after all these things, and you heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.

slept with that dealer all summer the ecstasy is still in my spine

"Square buildings folded up into one another as thousands of modifications were made, virtually none by architects or engineers, until hundreds of square metres were simply a kind of patchwork monolith. Labyrinthine corridors ran through the monolith, some of those being former streets (at the ground level, and often clogged up with trash), and some of those running through upper floors, practically between buildings. The streets were illuminated by fluorescent lights, as sunlight was rare except for the rooftops...
...By the early 1980s, Kowloon Walled City had an estimated population of 35,000. Being a lawless land, the city was notorious for its excess of brothels, casinos, opium dens, cocaine parlours, food courts serving dog meat, and secret factories. The Kowloon Walled City was also infamous for its high number of unsanitary dentist clinics, since this was where unlicensed dentists could operate without prosecution....
At that time, it had 50,000 inhabitants on 0.026 km², and therefore a very high population density of 1,900,000 / km². At its height, it was one of the most densely populated urban areas on Earth"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kowloon_Walled_City






http://www.tofu-magazine.net/newVersion/pages/KWC.html


"murky interior... Every nook and cranny within its tiny acreage was expanded out, and crammed into, until its intricate labyrinth of thoroughfares and pathways received not a ray of sunlight, even at high noon. The health authorities kept away. So the City just developed its own legion of ad-hock clinics and dental surgeons. In the absence of telephone and utilities companies the City’s inhabitants just by-wired their own electricity and connections. The same nick-it-yourself approach applied to plumbing and water. As a result a tangled network of pipes and wiring dripped and hissed above the city’s dark, dank walkways...A lone European venturing into its midst would most probably never be seen again, no Chinese went in without appropriate reason...finally evacuate the Walled City’s stubborn population between 1988-92 and then destroy its derelict, decrepit, rat infested shell. It was only in these final years of gradual abandonment that a few journalists, photographers and investigators were able to wander unchallenged, around the Walled City’s uncharted labyrinths"



"Are your brothels full, Oh Babylon, with merry Middlemen?
Never peer out of their periscopes from those deep opium dens
All this death must need a counterweight always someone born again"

Isaiah 59

1 Surely the arm of the LORD is not too short to save,
nor his ear too dull to hear.

2 But your iniquities have separated
you from your God;
your sins have hidden his face from you,
so that he will not hear.

3 For your hands are stained with blood,
your fingers with guilt.
Your lips have spoken lies,
and your tongue mutters wicked things.

4 No one calls for justice;
no one pleads his case with integrity.
...

5 They hatch the eggs of vipers
and spin a spider's web.
Whoever eats their eggs will die,
and when one is broken, an adder is hatched...

9 So justice is far from us,
and righteousness does not reach us.
We look for light, but all is darkness;
for brightness, but we walk in deep shadows.

10 Like the blind we grope along the wall,
feeling our way like men without eyes.
At midday we stumble as if it were twilight;
among the strong, we are like the dead.

11 We all growl like bears;
we moan mournfully like doves.
We look for justice, but find none;
for deliverance, but it is far away.

12 For our offenses are many in your sight,
and our sins testify against us.
Our offenses are ever with us,
and we acknowledge our iniquities:

13 rebellion and treachery against the LORD,
turning our backs on our God,
fomenting oppression and revolt,
uttering lies our hearts have conceived.

14 So justice is driven back,
and righteousness stands at a distance;
truth has stumbled in the streets,
honesty cannot enter.

15 Truth is nowhere to be found,
and whoever shuns evil becomes a prey.
The LORD looked and was displeased
that there was no justice.

16 He saw that there was no one,
he was appalled that there was no one to intervene;
so his own arm worked salvation for him,
and his own righteousness sustained him.

19 From the west, men will fear the name of the LORD,
and from the rising of the sun, they will revere his glory.
For he will come like a pent-up flood
that the breath of the LORD drives along. ^[a]

20 "The Redeemer will come to Zion,
to those in Jacob who repent of their sins,"
declares the LORD.

21 "As for me, this is my covenant with them," says the LORD. "My Spirit, who is on you, and my words that I have put in your mouth will not depart from your mouth, or from the mouths of your children, or from the mouths of their descendants from this time on and forever," says the LORD


Isaiah 64
6 All of us have become like one who is unclean,
and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags;
we all shrivel up like a leaf,
and like the wind our sins sweep us away.

7 No one calls on your name
or strives to lay hold of you;
for you have hidden your face from us
and made us waste away because of our sins.

8 Yet, O LORD, you are our Father.
We are the clay, you are the potter;
we are all the work of your hand.

they are smeared and these blurs come in random order

happy hearts









and a mirror is all it can be-
A reflection of something we’re missing
And language just happened, it was never planned
And it’s inadequate to describe where I am
In the room of my house where the light's never been

splendid smattering

and do these dreams have any meaning

jarred awake from sleep yesterday morning by the phone ringing (and the van's leaving let's just... or phone slips from a loose grip..); woke me from a FREAKY dream-- strolling dingy dusk/night streets with charlene, and at times melis, probably "going out"-- I was describing (teaching ) to her about a snake/venomous viper and ended getting so into it that I ripped off his head and venom was yellow/green and spewing and it was so weird, and yet it was fake or something; but somehow the end result was that i wound up with a swollen face/cheeks, vicariously living what I had done to the snake in my imagination/vivid description. so then we were at some market/ liquor-type store buying ice for my hugely swollen and somewhat tender jowls.... then the phone rang with my "you're called off"-psyche!!! phone call-- weird way to start an eventful day..


" no no no i think it's more like a ghost that's been following us both or something vague that we're not seeing, something more like a feeling"

over sidewalk chalk someone wrote in red start over

some images, words you just love. light and darkness, fever/flush, blood, haunt, freezing, ruined, desolate, eyes, longing, cold, hope.. to name a couple, a list to grow. scripture uses a lot of these images. still in the throws of my current bright eyes obsession. i relate on so many levels and am taken by the poetry of his writing. i need to write more. pt today "very grim, so profound a view, treasure, contemplative." love my little old cantonese pt. love the old ones. feel like melis lately constantly having numerous crushes:) this weekend at WCC grew exponentially my love for my asian-american friends and even acquaintances. what a great place I inhabit, for so many reasons. also this weekend awakened some love, gratefulness, closeness, desire to be with God. seek closer after Him and seek to relieve some of the suffering, abject suffering that exists in our world. God let me not forget the poor, despised, enslaved, dehumanized. Help me to CARE to have compassion in the truest, gut-wrenching sense. the kind that is ever followed by action. burdens. funerals. murders. cries. such such brokenness. Jesus heal us, every one.