del.icio.us

How many of you use del.icio.us? Don't know what that is? Click here: http://del.icio.us/

Basically, it's an online bookmark site. Bookmark all your favorite sites no matter what computer you're on.

Anyways...I like going in once in a while and seeing how many other people have bookmarked the same thing as I. When there's only one other person, I feel like we have some sort of a special connection! =D Do you do that? Or am I the only one?

Montreal?

So, I've been considering the city of Montreal. One of the five largest french-speaking cities in the world.

Why? I'll get into that on another entry. When? I'll get into that on another post as well. :)

For now, I want to know if you've been there or lived there. What your experience was like, do you like it, love it, hate it, bleh...

The people, the culture, the atmosphere. I wanna hear first hand from you.

So...if you liked it would you consider going on a road trip there with me this summer? And if I end up living there, would you like to come visit?!

My baby cousins in the P.I.

Sooo, while I brainstorm an entry about my trip to the Philippines, I thought I'd post a short clip of my cousin's babies playing around in their living room. If you notice the background, you'll see the kind of place my family there lives in and where I stayed for two weeks. By the way, aren't they just adorable?!!! The little boy, (we call him Pao Pao), was shy at first, but then he started following me around. I was watching him and his sister play with their toys. I was reminded of how spoiled we are here in the U.S. All their toys were simple, broken and dirty, or way outdated hand-me downs..and there were few of them. Yet they were content with what they had. Probably because that's all they know.

I'm still here!

So, I reallllly wanted my next blog post to be about my trip to the Philippines. And I've been holding out on posting anything until I did so.

But, alas, I still have not written anything about that trip. So much has been going on in my life since then. I'm just going to have to continue blogging and get on with it!

Is anyone out there listening (reading) anyway? Hello! Here I am! Woohoo, hiiiiiii.

madaling-araw

Madaling-araw means "dawn" or "sunrise" in Tagalog or Filipino, the national language of the Philippine Islands.

This morning I was riding the train to work earlier than usual. With a pale pink sky in the background, sun rays were shining in beams out of the clouds over a section of the city I was riding through. I saw beauty in the brokenness, somehow. I looked at the run down row homes and old buildings, and each represented a family--a life that God cared deeply about. And for some reason I felt like I had just arrived in a city that was new to me, beaming with hope and promise for a people unaware of it.

I wondered how God would reveal that hope to these people, and how I could be a part of that. I felt insignificant and helpless within myself just thinking about it. Not only that, Philadelphia is a huge city with a deep history. It is not a new city at all, and the issues have been here for years. But the mission of my church is "Renewing Lives in Christ to Transform Our City and The World." And if that is the heart of God for Philadelphia, then it will happen with or without my help. Only, He has chosen to include me in the process--to include all of us!

There's so much to pray for, and so much to do. For now I'll let that sense of hope and promise for this land sink in.

"The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands. And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything. Rather, he himself gives everyone life and breath and everything else. From one man he made all the nations, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he marked out their appointed times in history and the boundaries of their lands. God did this so that they would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from any one of us. 'For in him we live and move and have our being.' As some of your own poets have said, 'We are his offspring.'
Acts 17:24-28 TNIV

Word of the Day

Dictionary.com's word of the day today is "sine qua non"

\sin-ih-kwah-NON; -NOHN; sy-nih-kway-\, noun:
An essential condition or element; an indispensable thing.

Sounds romantic! I'll try to drum up a blog entry where I use this. :-)

FriendlyBird wants these! :P

Every day my Microsoft Outlook reminder reminds me to go to www.hungersite.org and click to feed the hungry for free. (do it, it's great! aslo www.freerice.org is similar)

Hungersite.org also sells products that in turn of your purchases feed the hungry. Lately, there are these two shirts I just absolutely adore because they are so totally friendlybird!!! :)

Check them out!!!