Sweetkat's Weblog

So when a Prime Minister goes against legislation he enacted about set election dates, something is fishy.  I had two possible reasons as to why he was calling the election.

My first suspicion is that this year the government is going to operate under a deficit.  We haven’t had a deficit in at least ten years so this would have a negative impact on the electorate.  Even more so, now that the economy is in trouble.  I still think this is one of the reasons.

My second suspicion has now been confirmed.  PM Harper is suing the Liberal Party for libel over accusations that he and his party made a bribe offer to now deceased candidate INdependent Mr Cadman.  The Liberal Party had a damning tape that indicated that Harper was aware that financial considerations were being considered.  Harper tried to suggest the tape had been doctored.  Experts had indicated that they hadn’t so Harper brought in his own US former FBI forensics expert.  That move backfired.  So Mr Harper had his lawyer detain the results till after the election.  Again another damning move.  If the tape was doctored as Mr Harper had indicated, he wouldn’t have stalled the results.  Unfortunately, even Mr Harper’s expert has indicated the part of the tape in dispute has not been doctored.  The end portion has been taped over.  But the first part indicates that Harper did have knowledge.  This indicates that Harper lied under oath in court.  It is one thing to lie about having sex with an intern.  But this is government business.  Mr Harper is wasting taxpayer’s money on a libel case that has no grounds.  Furthermore it appears as if Mr Harper is also guilty of trying to bribe someone into voting in his party’s favor.  No matter how you look at it, Mr Harper is not confident enough in his own abilities to lead, he needs to bribe votes.  This is not a man with Canadian values.  Definitely not someone who should be governing Canada.

So…Harper is finally starting to sweat.   For the first time in the campaign, and only 3 days left to go, Harper is in danger of actually losing his government.  His gamble to go against his own legislation may have backfired.  For all Canadians, I hope it does.

He is starting to become desperate.  He is doing what Kim Campbell did in 1993.  Using personal characteristic attacks on the Liberal leader to drum up support for Harper’s vapid campaign.  He has no response on how to fix the economy.  His advice to Canadians is to buy stocks.  Definitely not a man for the people.  He is so out of touch with Canadians and it is really starting to show.  I hope that its in time.  For if the Conservatives are in office for any longer, who knows how long it will take for our economy to recover.  Last time the Conservatives were in power for 9 years and it took us 13 to fix it.

Signs of desperation include having pictures of him walking his daughter to school, bringing up his mother at every opportunity and using a comical interview involving language barriers and Stephane Dion to suggest Stephane Dion can’t run a country.  The first two he has refused to do in the past.  The fact that he is doing so now is one fo the first cracks in his arrogant exterior.  

A man who isn’t sure of himself, is not a man to run our country.  Vote him out on October 14.

Before I went back to Canada in August, I was strung out about money.  I had debt.  I had inherited money that people were pressuring me to spend.  By people, i mean my parents were begging me to give it to them..well demanding I do actually.  The won was higher and I was all wound up about any type of discussion about money.

Then i had six weeks of doing nothing but spending money in Canada.  I had time to relax and think.  As I have mentioned in previous posts, I have everything I need now.  This is different from everything I want.  I am debt free now.  i have savings and i still have money in the pension. I spend when I want to now and not so tight about budgets though that may change when I get my first paycheque since coming back. but not much really because I have nothing to spend my money on..other than people.

So why do I think my attitude change came just in time?  Because if it hadn’t changed, I’d be having a nervous breakdown at whats happening in the markets around the world.  One thing I am definitely glad I didn’t do.  I didn’t invest my inheritance in stocks. I put it safely in a savings account.  Thats why  it pays not to be greedy. I have lost money in my rrsps which I am confident will go up.  And any money here is just bonus money.  SO at some point it may be worthless but it will cover my cost of living here and really thats all that matters.

Making sure money and materialism are not idols is a freeing exercise.  This is what God wants from all of us.  He doesn’t want to be enslaved by the lure of possessions and what money can buy.  As can serve as a testimony to that, just observe the stock market patterns around the world.

Thank GOd, I got out of that mentality just in time.

*** disclaimer  *** in no way am I contemplating this for myself.  I am happy with my life.  No matter what happens, I am happy.  I have God, that is all i need. ***

This has been something that has particularly bothered me this year.  It normally bothers me anyways.

Before I came here, I read a blog of some guy I think in Korea or Japan.  He killed himself…and it had something to do with the blog haters on his site.  i thought how sad that is.

There have been four actors in South Korea that have died in the last month.  Its almost becoming fashionable to kill yourself.  On top of that South Korea has the second highest suicide rate.

Looking at pictures of one funeral, I cried.  I normally don’t cry at the death of strangers but this one just affected me.  What must it feel like to have no hope at all?  i contemplated this after reading the bible.   I can’t imagine what it must feel like.  I have been some really hard times, to the point where I lost almost everything important to me.  Yet, I never lost hope, I just couldn’t feel it for a while.

The reason this year suicide is bothering me is because I am 33.  This is the age my cousin killed herself.  She was very beautiful.  She had a smile that would light up the room.  She had a lot of friends and a loving husband.  She was also very wealthy.  But at the end..she had no hope.  It makes me wonder.  If someone who had almost everything could have no hope, whats going to happen to me?

I know people say its a mental illness.  But unless you’re schizophrenic, or suffering from dementia, you usually have a little knowledge that something is wrong.  My cousin did.  She was seeking help but she had no hope it would help her.

Then there is the inevitable question a Christian must face regarding suicide.  ‘Am I going to hell if I commit this act?’

Suicide is not permissable, of course.  Suicide is deciding to play God and control your own life.  But it does say in the Bible that once you believe in Jesus Christ as your saviour, it cannot be taken away.  But that if you continue to sin, God will remove his blessings from you with your life on earth.  Is this still true if one turns away to another religion?  And can suicide be included as sin that will not take your salvation away.

I am glad God is on my side.  I hope I never lose the hope that keeps me going when times are tough.  If you are feeling without hope, seek God for your comfort, not anything worldly.  Because everythign in this world dies.

Perhaps chocolate was never an addiction for me.  I was just too blind to give it up.  I have managed..and this shocks me to this day…to still have reeses peanut butter cups left over after purchasing them on Saturday.  Perhaps elimination is not realistic.  Control might be the better word.

In any case, I have had a couple setbacks.  This morning, angry, I ate one.  I meant to ate two but was so busy I forgot.  In any case, I am happy that I forgot.

Some may wonder why I keep writing this. It is to keep myself accountable.

Who really benefits from anger?   The person who is angry?  Does it make that person feel good to be angry at someone else.  Or is it just causing that person undue stress.  it’s been my experience that half the time you’re angry, the person you are angry at doesn’t even know, or if they did they wouldn’t care.  Isn’t it then a waste to be angry?

Anger in other areas of life is also dangerous.  Anger causes violent rages, wars to be started..bitterness to be sowed.  It is such an unproductive emotion.

I am human.  I do suffer anger.  i believe that anger arises from unmet or unrealistic expectations about someone or something.  I would say then that anger is a singular emotion.  The person who is angry should deal with it on their own and not involve anyone else in their fits of pique.  If after the anger subsides you feel the need to talk to that person, do it in a kind way and explain about the misunderstanding.  Most of the time anger is caused by a misunderstanding.  Of course there are exceptions.

If someone is angry at you, my advice is..let them cool down.  If they dont’ talk to you again then they havven’t resolved their issues.  Otherwise when they talk to you again, let them bring up the anger not you.

This morning I was angry for unrealistic reasons. I am glad i walked it off and saw sense again without making an ass of myself.  Definitely must work on my temper…though it doesn’t flare up as much as it once did.

While anger is catalogued quite often in the Bible, it is not a godly emotion.  We are to surrender our anger and anxieties to God.  Worries and anxieties I can surrender..now I am working on the anger part.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper is more and more resembling an ostrich during his election campaign.  He definitely has his head in the sand, or up somewhere else that I am too polite to mention.  First he says Canada is a conservative country, when since 1935 it has been mostlya liberal one.  Second, he says that if there was going to be a stock market crash it would have happened by now.  And there have actually been several.  Daily reports are coming in with further and further slipping of stocks.  And now, he completely ignores calls that a recession, possibly a depression is near.

With all these denials, can we possibly rely on such ignorant leadership to see Canada through economic downturns?

He has provided no ideas as to how to handle the economic crisis.  His current policy of doing nothing is not sitting well with Canadian voters.  One can only hope that his arrogance has left such a bad taste in the mouths of voters that come October 14th, that smile of arrogance will no longer be on his face.  In its stead, hopefully a dose of humility and admittance that he was wrong.

i know i said once a week.  But I need to hold myself accountable. Not that I have gone overboard.  Its those reeses peanut butter cups I should never have bought.  Perhaps I am starting to go through withdrawal.  My sleep is terrible.  WHen i get up in the middle of the night, if there is chocolate around I will eat it.

But I am proud of myself.  I have come a long way since when I started and it was easier than I thought to reduce the amount.  All I have to do is be conscious of my decisions.   Plus I have realized that a lot of things make me happy not just chocolate.  I think somehow chocolate was encouraging me to be unhappy.

I feel healthy and energetic, more so than when I first got here.  That pleases me and I hope that it continues.

Thank you God for being with me every day.

His arrogance is shining through.  While everyone in Canada and the United States is panicking over the economy, Harper is ignoring it, nonchalantly.  He hasn’t addressed any initiatives to help stabilize it.  And he is supposed to be an economist.  Or perhaps it is because he is an economist that he doesn’t know how to govern the economy.

Canadians now disapprove of Harper as leader at 51%.  His majority government is slipping through his tight grip of control of his party.  While this development pleases me, as a Harper government during rough economic times is a nightmare for a thought, it is probably too little too late.

There is just over a week left until the election in Canada.  Perhaps praying for a miracle might help but I am sure we will see Harper as PM on October 15th.  However I think his term will be tenuous at best.  Bringing us into an election 2 years after the last one.  Wasting taxpayers money on an election they didn’t call for, ignoring the needs of the nation and genuinely his lack of openness with the media will be his downfall in the next 2 years.

Well, as one google entry said, world teacher’s day went unnoticed, mostly because it was on a Sunday.  Or is it mostly because people really don’t celebrate ‘world’ days.

Anyways, I think all of us teachers, including the slackers and you know who you are, should congratulate ourselves on another year of serving others.

Take a moment out today and reflect on what it means to be a teacher and what you get out of the job, besides money and vacation.

Ok this weekend I failed miserably.  But still less chocolate than on average I was eating a day.

That’s the bad news.

The good news is that since I have been back in Korea, three weeks now, I have lost 7 lbs.  And most of it is because i have greatly reduced, almost to the point of elimination, chocolate.  I do walk for about an hour most days as well.  But i Now realize how much chocolate was harming my healthy weight wishes.  i refuse to say diet because thats what I have been on all my life and really uptight about it.  I have given or in the process of giving up my hold on control, things never work out the way I plan anyways, and it seems to be working in all areas of my life.

The other good news is my chocolate downfall, reeses peanut butter cups, can only be purchased at the Seamen’s club and since I have been quite disappointed with the organization, i won’t be visiting there and thus will not have anyway to feed my fix.

God works wonders when you let him in.

A while ago I posted a blog about how much I loved the Seamen’s Club.

Unfortunately, that has come to an end.

The prices on some of the food have gone up 100 percent.

The waitresses expect tips from foreigners but do not provide service.  They are overly friendly with the Koreans, who are not expected to tip.

The portion sizes have gotten smaller while the prices have increased.

And the ultimatum that if you don’t go four times a month, you cannot get your membership renewed.

And the mentality seems to be that they don’t want foreigners there any more, only Koreans.

It is too bad because I enjoyed the food, loved entertaining my friends there and did enjoy speaking with the waitresses when they were nice.

I probably will not renew my membership.  I can make pancakes and bacon myself for less than the 8000 won they are charging.

I love my students.  I love teaching.  Teaching in a public school is a new experience for me.  Today was my first claustrophobic experience.

During break time, I was on my computer working.  As children are naturally curious, one by one started to come to my desk, curious to see what I was doing.  Then there was like ten students all standing around me.  They were all asking me what I was doing.   I felt like running, I felt crowded.  I love children but I just needed a few minutes on my own.

Has anyone else ever experienced this in the public school system or am I just being too picky?

I was fortunate enough to attend a public school for the first two years of my school life that was 100 years old.  After my second year, it was torn down.  But I still remember how it made me feel.

It was five floors.  It had a swimming pool and a gymnasium with a grand stage.  The classroom floors were wood.  They even had cloakrooms.  For gym class the girls would change in the cloakrooms and the boys would change in the classroom.  The classrooms were big.  The hallways were long and the ceilings were high.  I remember thinking it was like a castle.  Its hard to describe the feelings it invokes inside of me even now.  The best way I can describe it is that the school seemed to be part of a more earnest era.  The teachers were unmarried women, who looked as their students as their children and taught because they loved children, not because of the money or benefits the position would give.

Now, I am fortunate to teach at two such schools.  Big yard, big classrooms.  Everything is much more grandiose than the schools in Canada where I live are now.  The sound of heels clicking on the hallway floors.  These schools fill me with sentimentality and longing for the olden days.

When I see these schools, they are epitome of what I always felt school life should be.  Something that perhaps is lost forever in North America.

As I sit here eating my apple, I am reflecting on my classes of the last week.

This contract I chose to go with a public school.  it is far different from my hagwon job.  I am enjoying it.

One part is frustrating is when i get the students to introduce themselves.  After attempting to say their Korean name, inevitably the class laughs.  As frustrating as that is, I can’t help but smile, trying to hide a giggle.  I am sure if I was Korean I would be laughing at my attempts to say a korean name.

When a child laughs, it is infectious.  You smile, even if you are angry about something they did.

I don’t think people smile or laugh enough.  As mentioned in previous blogs, i have certain things I do to make Koreans laugh.  Laughter is a wonderful feeling, as long as it isn’t at other’s expense. 

Have you laughed today?

Another day has gone by and no chocolate intake.  I am going to start doing this report once a week starting tomorrow.

The classic battle between the spirtual and the worldly.

I am suffering from that right now.  As humans, we love to feel pleasure.  As Christians, we are to beyond the physical to the spiritual peace.

I will admit physical pleasure is wonderful in the right context.  In a loving relationship, where both partners share love and communication and companionship.  In a non loving or casual relationship it is wrong.  It is empty, dark and really no point to it.  Physical pleasure also doesn’t last.  It is fleeting.  The more you have of it, the harder it is to get the same pleasure out of it,

Spiritual peace is different.  It does require sacrifices but in the end they won’t seem like sacrifices.  Over the last two months, I have come to know real peace.  The lasting kind that can only come through the belief in Jesus and God.  The peace that comes from trusting God with your concerns and anxieties.  This peace cannot be obtained from physical pleasure, though I suspect many on this earth, including myself, have tried to obtain it that way. 

So now the dilemma.  I am at a crossroads.  I am about to deny physical pleasure in order to sustain spiritual peace.  I have no doubt in the long run it is the right thing to do and i will be more happier for it.  But in the short term it will be hard and sad.  I guess its not a dilemma.  I have already made my choice.  Many people would nto agree but then how many of those people have been free from anxiety, worries, anger or fear?  Thats what I get with God, pure freedom from the enslavement of these things.

TRUST God for your needs, rather than another human being.  God is love, is always there, will never disappoint. People will not always love, be there and will disappoint.

To the man who helped me, when no taxi would. Thank you so much.

Yesterday i was moving my stuff from my friend’s apartment to my new apartment. I didn’t realize I would need a truck because I knew my stuff would fit in a taxi. I was alone on a street corner with my stuff and noone around me to help. I was tired, sad and disappointed.

Luckily, this Korean man, who spoke very good english, came up to me and offered his help. i explained to him my situation, and he looked at my stuff and laughed. Then he offered to use his car. He not only offered his car he helped me loaded it in and out of my car to my apartment. He even refused payment.

This man is the second man in Korea to help me like this. Its like history repeating itself. The first time was last year during my first week in Korea when I bought more groceries than I could handle and didn’t know my address or to speak korean to use a taxi. I, being the stubborn fool that I am, walked home, but it was hard. A Korean man on a scooter offered me a ride and refused payment as well.

It is refreshing to see especially since most Western people would not do so. After this weeks frightening perv experience, this more than makes up for it.

To the man who helped me, you have a generous warm spirit. I enjoyed our conversation. i wish you well.

the last two days really tempted me with the chocolate.  Emotional turmoil usually causes me to be comforted by chocolate.  And the fact that i was where  I could get my first love, reeses peanut butter cups and didn’t, is a testimony to how committed I am to getting my chocolate use eventually under control.  For now avoiding it as much as possible is all I can do.

I didn’t realize how much chocolate there is in Korea.  I wanted a snack and all I could see was chocolate.  I had to settle for plain ritz type crackers.

As for my emotional turmoil, I leave it with God.  Being a former control freak, it is hard to avoid the temptation to control outcomes.  I have to admit though casting my cares to God and not worrying about it is a refreshing and relaxing feeling.  Why don’t I and others do it more?

Emotional eating is destructive behaviour.  If you are reading this and you suffer from emotional eating, turn to God.  PUt all your efforts in communicating with him and  in prayer with him.  It helps and the best part is it doesn’t cost you anything.

Ok so a while back I wrote about other cards games you could play under what you can do with 10 won.  I have my apartment now and I am almost set up and I am looking to host some card parties.   They are actually quite fun.  To me a bit more fast paced than poker and peanuts if you don’t get your tricks you can screw everyone else up and make them pay. 

Anyways if you hve ever played 31 or know the game peanuts or would like to learn…leave a message

Because its just cards, it can be played anywhere, so if not at my place, we could do it at a bar…peanuts can be played with many but ideal is about 6 people.