Laugh a little

Yesterday was Sunday......hhmmmmm so what did I do? I was busy as usual with alot of reading and writing .... but didn't seem to getting anywhere. It was pretty frustrating. Anyway trudged through the whole afternoon through the mountain of books till Vespers. Got down to the chapel, sang vespers and then had dinner. Couldn't eat much. Massimo Carlino asked me to take a walk on the terrace after dinner so we went and we talked and talked till like over 10pm! Went back to my room and read a few more pages of a book on Hellenisation and the Jews before falling asleep.

Must have been tired because i couldn't wake up this morning! Missed Mass - the first time ever! Oh ... and Darko is sick. We visited him in his room after dinner and I saw he didn't have enough blankets so I gave him one of mine. He's running a fever.

So now I'm off to the Missionaries of Charity to give them the weekly bible study and then I'll go to the Holy Sepulchre to say Mass.

In the course of my conversation with Carlino, a phrase kept popping up - what else do we need? We have more than sufficient in terms of food, clothing, education... if you look at it, we were never the worse off when we did not have cellphones or computers or tv. Just look back at your life and see how many things crept into your lives that you didn't once have. And they are not technically essential - they help make life alittle more easier to manage but believe me, you won't die without it. So what else do we need? I've been reading about Lydia Sum's death and frankly we all grew up with her. Some papers say she embodied the spirit of Hong Kong. I would rather see her as the spirit BEHIND Hong Kong. When things got bad, people were poor, lining up "under Lion's Rock" for water - she gave HongKongers something to smile about; something to laugh away the pain; she made life more bearable by looking at the funner side of life. The spirit of Hong Kong was flagging but she gave people a reason to wake up everyday, raise your head up high and laugh it all off. The laughter carried Hong Kong through the dark period of the 70s and into the restoration 80s and into the properous 90s.

So what else do we need? A little laughter, a little joy to make the world a little happier.