I'm officially in Lisbon, but due to the hectic schedule during weekdays (and not-so-hectic during weekends), I haven't really had time to sit down and ponder over the happenings of these few weeks. The ups and downs are causing my body to give out frustrated signals to people around me, making me someone hard to deal with. I really appreciated that my group mates are sort of understanding ones. Oh well... I have to sort out how I feel inside asap as it is going to be "inhibiting" my studies progress.
Lisbon - the Portuguese metropolitan capital city. I love the city public transport, and the fact that many shops and tourist attraction spots are opened on Sundays. It's like returning to normality, after 6 months being in a place where everything is closed on the day that I have time to travel or explore. I was frustrated that I couldn't do anything, visit any places or just to buy food in the supermarket because the supermarket was closed on a Sunday too. I like the professors there, but the living condition ain't what I like, and being 29 turning 30 this year, I discover that I have preference of what kind of living environment I want to put myself in and the preference influences my hostility towards the place. Despite not knowing Portuguese, I still like the new city I'm being introduced to live in at the moment.
It isn't easy being the only few Asians in the campus... It's obvious I'm different from the rest - besides the age factor - all other factors too. Yet, I know what is important now is to obtain as much knowledge as I can though now everything seems so disorganized and too many researchers are teaching us the same subject at the same time. Some are really good lecturers too, but some are terrible on imparting knowledge in their brain to people who know nothing about their deep wisdom of their subject. Teaching is a gift, and not everyone possesses the same gift from God. That makes life interesting by the diversity of human race. Yet, it is important to discover what we're good at, and ideally, work in the field which we excel and passionate about. For the professor who doesn't really impart knowledge to me, maybe I have goldfish memory, and that I'm not interested in the field he's trying to teach, hence my lack of luster in his part of the subject. Apologies. I probably would learn better if I understand him better. Hopefully he will improve...
The spiritual part of me is still in crisis, and yeah, I need a great deal of prayers. It's Lenten season now, and 3 weeks into Lent, I'm still unprepared for Christ's resurrection on Easter. I'm in a limbo condition right now, and there seems no one whom I can share spiritual stuff who is near enough. I feel alone journeying in the darkness right now, though I know Jesus is near. I miss going to cell group, bible sharings, and worship sessions. I need to learn to pray once again, from deep within my soul and not just lip service on Sundays...
Time to return to the journal paper I'm reading... Time to do something concrete.
