Becoming Closer to God in Malaysia

This breaks the sequential order that I was gonna establish with the Hong Kong events and pics, but I feel it's important. Plus, this is my blog, get over it. LOL...

Yeah, this entry's title is strange and almost oxymoronic. I know. But it’s true. Before coming here, I had no idea what to expect going to a Muslim country. I try not to give in to believing stereotypes of Muslims too much; such as the religion being so objectifying and abusive of women or being a training ground for terrorism. However, to stay considerate I did leave all Christian/religious paraphernalia behind. I wanted to avoid any possibility of things being taken or having problems entering through customs or immigration. However, a few weeks after arriving I met students who attend a Christian church near where I work. I started out attending out of convenience because the service was immediately after work and nearby my job. Also, there was an added element of guilt. After all, I had been slack on my church going during my 5 years of college primarily because Sunday morning was usually spent either resting on the way back from a track meet or recovering from partying and socializing Saturday night. So I started going and found that Saturday night service was a fairly small service of mostly African students and was focused mainly on simple and applicable lessons from the Bible; the pastor was even Malay, the biggest surprise. From there, as I met more people through the church, I was introduced to an Indian who lived and studied in America who hosts Bible study every Wednesday evening. Bible study provided an even more intimate environment, usually about 10 people or so, and it very interactive and revolved around lessons usually made by college-aged members of the bible study class. I never doubted that Christianity would always be part of my life. But somehow, being here has provided me with a new sense of purpose towards it. I had gained a procrastinating attitude instead of truly taking action towards this goal. But being here around these African and Indian Christians, has made me look at things a little differently. They are much more spiritual and aware of the presence of God in their everyday lives that I would have guessed. They truly do use the Bible as a source of strength and encouragement through their troubling times. So although I’m not a huge fan of what organized religion can become such as the business mentality, competitive spirituality, and overwhelming theatrics that can take place. However, these are flaws with man, not flaws of God. Therefore, whether done in a mega church, normal church, small church, or at home alone with a Bible and a friend, I want to work on my spirituality. I have seen what faith can do for people and even though I admit I sometimes question the events of the Bible or warped applications that men have applied, I want the positive affects that faith can have; the strength to overcome tough times, the gratitude for things often overlooked, and the overall optimism that relieves stresses in life. Now, I doubt I’ll ever be a “holy roller” as my brother would say. But I feel I can do better and am trying to stop standing still and believe that I want to. In my spare time, of which I have a lot, I try to read from my Bible Reader iPod touch app instead of dosing off or listening to songs I’ve heard 500 times. Baby steps, but steps nonetheless. I’m blessed, as far as talents, abilities, family, achievement, and more. I want to fulfill my full potential.

Hong Kong Getaway: Part 1, The Culture

I had the glorious opportunity to escape work for 4 days and take a vacation to Hong Kong recently. I needed a change from 60+ hour work weeks plus who doesn't wanna see Hong Kong? I met up with a college friend of mine who is teaching in South Korea and wanted to see Hong Kong too. It was a marvelous trip. I'll be talking things I took away from the trip in a few different pieces, don't want to overload the pictures or the information. Gotta keep it organized. LOL. This first segment speaks to their culture.

One thing I usually marvel at when going abroad is the seamless integration between culture and society. I'm used to the US where ppl are from everywhere, so culture is kind of what u make it to be personally. There aren't universal rituals and traditions built into the culture. It's different in a country like China, which is thousands of yrs old and has a population mostly made of the same race and religion. We saw the Giant Buddha at Ngong Ping. This Buddha statue is about 40-50 feet tall and built in top of a mountain far up in the mountains only accessible by either a 45 minute cable car ride or (if u're dedicated and slightly insane) a walk that has to take the better part of the day. It's also surrounded by praying ladies making offering to Buddha. It's amazing to me that a country's people take such pride in their religion that they would build and regularly travel so far to see such a sight and often to pray. I'm not Buddhist, but I had to go see it. It's a testament to their character. On a similar note, we visited several different temples all over the Hong Kong area. Many are very old but still very impressive and magnificent inside. The golden statues, artwork, models, decorations, and incense are a very soothing environment. They also have spiral incense which would be very nice burning in my living room when I get my own place. LOL. Also at Ngong Ping, we saw a walkway lined with The Twelve Generals, which serve as a symbol of protection in their culture. They are also pictured. Once again, no suitable American equivalent. Can u imagine the fire storm which would start in America, a land of so many religions, if one religion wanted to build such a statue and complex. It would become and competition of which religion could do it the biggest.
Also pictured below are the infinite statues, basically tall wooden totems in the shape of a giant infinity sign, once again very high up in the mountains. Each totem has it's own distinctive carvings in Chinese. I wish I could enlighten you with the knowledge of what each was saying, but I have no idea. Sorry.
Moving on, I also included pictures from the district of markets. There is a Flower Market, a Jade Market, and most interestingly a Bird Market. They have full markets - meaning like a block or two of storefronts or big rooms full of stands - selling their specialty. I'm not into flowers, but the store pictured below with the deep green plants and the glass waterfall at the store front was very calming. It amazes me at the bird market to see ppl just chilling with their birds at their sides in cages. It was just as natural as I'd sit my brief case on the ground beside me when I sit. Any kind of bird (normal birds anyway, no condors or anything obviously) or bird-related item is available for u. And it was packed, ppl give em love there. The Jade Market is the one that got me excited, unfortunately my card didn't work overseas so I had to monitor my cash and couldn't splurge when I got there, but it's a great place to get nice and distinctive gifts. Jewelry, statues, paperweights, etc., if it's made of jade or a distinctive stone, it was there for u.
Last but not least, pictured directly below, was our trip to the Wishing Tree. The Wishing Tree is rehabbing at the moment. Apparently it was falling or something, because it's being supported by stands as pictured, but nonetheless, people come and visit the wish lady to write their wishes in Chinese on the parchment pictured and hang them on the stands near the tree. We followed suit. Once again, although I am from a different religion entirely, I see the value in faith. Not saying the US doesn't have faith, that's not true at all, but I can tell a difference in a homogeneous society where u can build faith from thousands of years ago into your everyday life. To be continued with another aspect of my trip...

An Interesting Convo To Have...

The construction industry in general is one that is dominated by men. There tend to be some women in the headquarters but I work at the construction site office. The management can feature women if they're not scared to work outside in an environment filled with large machinery, safety hazards, and confrontation in the name of compliance and protocol. As far as general workers, the everyday physical demands of the job seem to dissuade women as candidates; especially when all this lifting, moving, hacking, bar bending, carpentry, masonry and everything happens in a place like Malaysia which is summer all year long. Combined with that trend, here in Malaysia, the general workers live in temporary housing on the job site itself. The carpenters have built themselves a village of housing structures and a bathroom facility. This bathroom has become fairly offensive as far as the odors and there is only one tub to wash in. So the guys usually go in their briefs and wash from the tub water. Out of the 30 or more general workers on the site, only two of them are women. As with most of my workers, they don't speak more than about 4 popular words of English so we can't communicate beyond me gesturing and using my tone to suggest what tasks I want them to do at work. But if I could communicate with them, there are several questions I would ask them. How do u feel about working in such a physical profession surrounded by organized chaos? What is it like sharing such a primitive living environment and bathing in an unhygienic bathroom facility with all men? Do u ever deal with sexism in such an environment? What is it like working an unconventional job for women in a Muslim country? Furthermore, and most importantly, how did u end up doing this? I think I'm missing out on an interesting convo...

The Job: What I Actually Do

Here is the answer to the ever-popular question "So what do you actually do?" which I get every time after I surprise people by saying that I'm not an African studying here in Malaysia. Also, the actual words in the title of my position contradicts with my degree and the nature of what I actually do day-to-day. I am Project Engineer for a construction company called Bumimetro Construction. I am working on a high rise condo project called One Kiara; pictured above. The project is in a very high end area of KL called Mont Kiara. Each individual unit has it's own elevator and elevator lobby, the units range from 2000 - 7000 square feet and most cost over 1 million ringgits(RM). As for me, I am vital to ensuring the quality and compliance with the drawings as well as the optimal management of time and money. So on a daily basis, I'm conducting inspections of important members to ensure quality and specifications before they're cast in concrete (which they use for everything here), testing building materials to ensure their strength and quality, calculating and reporting material quantities to reduce unnecessary wastage, helping coordinate my workers (mostly Indonesian and Bangladeshi) as quality control for the work that they are preforming, and lately writing stinging letters to our client or consultants in response to their often irrational or excessive requests or questioning. Also, my project manager has been involving and simultaneously educating me about how the logistics and large-scale coordination aspect is thought out and planned. I can proudly say that I do think my major has done a lot to help prepare me. Being around coworkers who have strictly engineering background, which don't go into the construction process or financial sides, I have knowledge of reading drawings, contract stipulation, human resource management, construction techniques, reasoning and terminology. I also benefit from the fact that I have a strong work ethic and am a fast learner. For the past few weeks, I have been the only engineer on-site for our project. Most of the others on our management team - a surveyor, a clerk, a safety manager, a quality control & assurance person - have no involvement in the actual construction processes ongoing. Those others who are involved - our project manager and site supervisor - call most of the shots but don't handle any of the day-to-day operations paperwork or quality control aspect. That leaves me at this moment feeling like somewhat of a 'One Man Island' on a 150,000,000 ringgit project; on top of the 6 day, 60+ hour work week, it's a bit of a grind. The silver lining is that I'm fairly good at what I do and get respect from my coworkers for my work ethic and acumen. My boss now wants me to stay for an extra year until the completion of the project. I don't know about all that...