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How to get to Bukit Indah shopping mall by bus

17 October 2013 blogpastor 11 Comments

Bukit Indah shopping mall via second link

How to get to Bukit Indah via second link

I suppose there are people who are tired of the Causeway customs and City Square gamut. That was what I felt and since I lived near the Jurong East MRT/Bus interchange, I went with my wife and some friends by bus via the Second Link to Bukit Indah’s AEON, a spacious and less crowded mall. You may want to venture there yourself and spend a day loitering and chilling out for a day. Here are the steps you need to take if you are taking the public bus:

(1) Go to Jurong East bus interchange (next to Jurong East MRT) to board the Causewaylink bus that goes via the Second Link. Double check with the bus driver that you are on the right bus. Keep your S$4 bus ticket with you.

(2) First stop is Singapore customs checkpoint at Second Link. After clearing that, go look for any Causewaylink bus and board to go to the Malaysian customs checkpoint on the other side of Second Link bridge. Show them your S$4 ticket.

(3) After you have cleared your Malaysian customs go look for any Causewaylink bus that goes to Bukit Indah shopping mall. Ask the driver to confirm as you board the bus, and show your S$4 bus ticket.

Bus stop in front of Bukit Indah (also taxi stand)

(4) You will pass by Leisure Farm bungalows and wished you had bought one long ago. You will pass by Lego Land and wished you had gone there before. Finally you find your bus right in front of the first huge building in front of the Bukit Indah AEON shopping mall. Get off, and get in. The whole journey would have taken you about an hour and a half, including customs.

Keep the bus ticket at hand - 5 Malaysian ringgit — Keep the bus ticket at hand – 5 Malaysian ringgit

(5) Do a tour of the shops and available food outlets and go look at the cinema to see if there is a film you are interested in and can squeeze into your day’s program. Buy your ticket and go for your lunch. Whatever you do try to leave the place by 4.30pm to avoid the traffic jams at that time.

(6) You wait at the same bus-stop you alighted in the morning. Always ask around to see if you are at the right place. Things change in Malaysia and we have no idea at all when its changed. The ticket home is Malaysian Ringgit 5. Pay the driver the exact amount and get your ticket and KEEP IT AT HAND.

(7) Malaysian customs (make sure you have no sugar, oil, rice, or that sticky something else). Look for any Causewaylink bus and head for Singapore customs. Show the driver the ticket.

(8) Pass the Singapore customs and look for the Causewaylink bus that heads to Jurong East bus interchange. Always confirm with the driver and show him your 5 ringgit ticket. It gives you peace of mind.

(9) If you are Singaporean, by the time you arrive at Jurong East bus interchange, about an hour and a half later, you have already asked yourself, “Was it worth going all the way there and back? To shop, to eat, to see a movie, to chill out and take advantage of the superior Sing dollar. Was it worth it?”

If you can answer the question in the affirmative, then I trust that this step by step guide will tease you into making one of these trips, preferably on weekdays if you are an introvert, and on Saturday if you are an extrovert!

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Personal and family Bukit Indah, Causewaylink, Legoland, Leisure Farm bungalows, Second link

Blogpastor on Twitter: follow me

11 October 2013 blogpastor Leave a comment

Its been three months since my son Joshua suggested I went on Twitter. Later a comment from a blog reader added the needed confirmation. I am such a laggard when it comes to digital matters. After all I am not a digital native but more an immigrant in the Web 2.0 world. Suddenly a few days ago I dived in on impulse. I know its free. What held me back was lack of purpose and personal bandwidth, and the nag of more digital clutter in my life. What overcame all these walls was inner knowledge that I need to jump in and get wet. Here begins another journey. I wonder where it will all lead. If you have a Twitter account do follow. I am at Kenny Chee @ blogpastor.

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Writing and blogging

The problem of ageing

9 October 2013 blogpastor 1 Comment

Since I am doing some research on spirituality and ageing, I’d like to share with readers some quotes from a book I am reading, while at the same time store some references that may be useful for myself.

“Modern scholars of aging believe that an accumulation of empirical facts will someday produce total understanding of the natural and social worlds, allowing us to grow old without disease, suffering, conflict, or mystery. The problem with this mythology of scientific management is not that it is altogether false, but that it is only half true. The scientific management of aging fundamentally misconstrues the “problem” of aging. As T.S. Eliot once remarked, there are two kinds of problems in life. One kind requires the question, What are we going to do about it? The other calls for different questions: What does it mean? How does one relate to it? The first kind of problem is like a puzzle that can be solved (though aging is more accurately ameliorated than solved) with appropriate technical resources and pragmatic responses. The second kind of problem poses a deeper range of challenges, which no particular policy, strategy, or technique will overcome. Of course, shaping one’s vision according to the Christian story will not remove the challenges of aging, but it hold the possibility of helping us to understand, accept, and imaginatively transform the unmanageable, ambiguous aspects of our existence.”(69)

“Beginning in the late eighteenth century, the structure of the modern life course was constructed according to changes in demography. Family life, as all of life, began to reflect age-stratified systems of public rights and duties. As the experience of a modern family cycle (end of school, first job, marriage, children, survival of both partners to at least age fifty-five, “empty nest,” widowhood) became increasingly uniform, the boundaries drawn around participation in the adult world, the cultural definition of full humanity. Age-at-death was also transformed from a pattern of relative randomness to one of predictbility; as average life expectancy rose dramatically, death began to occur primarily in old age, not at varied points in the life cycle as had been the case in the past. As a result, fear of aging and fear of death merged. Modern society has now become a fully age-segregated society in which most of the aged do not occupy a vital role. It is no doubt a society that supports a burgeoning aging industry, but one that does not otherwise value the aging of the mind, body and spirit. It not only offers no moral endorsement or meaning to growing older, it fears growing old (identifying aging with loneliness, obsolescence, and death).” (73)

Stoneking, C.B. Modernity: the social construction of aging, in ed. Hauerwas S., Stoneking, C. B., Meador, K.G., and Cloutier, D., 2003, Growing Old in Christ, Grand Rapids Michigan: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company.

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What can we learn from Pope Francis on homosexuality?

30 September 2013 blogpastor 31 Comments

What the Catholic Catechism says about chastity and homosexuality

Homosexuality refers to relations between men or between women who experience an exclusive or predominant sexual attraction toward persons of the same sex. It has taken a great variety of forms through the centuries and in different cultures. Its psychological genesis remains largely unexplained. Basing itself on Sacred Scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave depravity,tradition has always declared that “homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered.”They are contrary to the natural law. They close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved. (2357)

The number of men and women who have deep-seated homosexual tendencies is not negligible. This inclination, which is objectively disordered, constitutes for most of them a trial. They must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided. These persons are called to fulfil God’s will in their lives and, if they are Christians, to unite to the sacrifice of the Lord’s Cross the difficulties they may encounter from their condition. (2358)

Homosexual persons are called to chastity. By the virtues of self-mastery that teach them inner freedom, at times by the support of disinterested friendship, by prayer and sacramental grace, they can and should gradually and resolutely approach Christian perfection.(2359)

Pope Francis’ recent remarks on homosexuality

“We cannot insist only on issues related to abortion, gay marriage and the use of contraceptive methods…. The teaching of the church … is clear and I am a son of the church, but it is not necessary to talk about these issues all the time.”

“I used to receive letters from homosexual persons who are ‘socially wounded’, because they tell me that they feel like the church has always condemned them. But the church does not want to do this.”

“A person once asked me, in a provocative manner, if I approved of homosexuality. I replied with another question: ‘Tell me: when God looks at a gay person, does he endorse the existence of this person with love, or reject and condemn this person?’ We must always consider the person … In life, God accompanies persons, and we must accompany them, starting from their situation.”(Excerpts from Pope Francis’ recent interview with Italian Jesuit magazine)

Has Pope Francis changed the position of the Catholic Church on homosexuality?

In my opinion, Pope Francis’ statements does not represent a change in the Catholic Church’s stand on abortion, homosexuality or contraceptive methods. It represents an attempt by the Pope to reform the image in which the Catholic Church has been perceived: that of an unfeeling moralizing institution without a heart. He is concerned that the Catholic Church insists that abortion is wrong and that homosexuality and gay marriage is wrong, (which Evangelicals agree), and that the only right contraceptive method is the natural rhythm method (which Evangelicals disagree), but it does not seem to care about weightier issues like respecting and accepting the human being, and the pain of poverty, respectively, in those contexts. He wants the Catholic Church to show its gentler side. He wants her to view all human beings with dignity and as persons that God loves.

The Church is to be the face of God. She is to reflect a Christ that mingles with outcasts and has compassion on the marginalized, treating them with acceptance, love and reconciliation. The church is to reflect the message of reconciliation it preaches, which is primarily one of God’s mercy and grace. People will then realize how untrue is their perception that the church is full of upright people of superior moral standing with pointed fingers that upbraid wrong-doing. We are a people with many weaknesses but recipients of God’s manifold grace: a forgiven community welcoming all who also need forgiveness.

Pope Francis does not want the Catholic Church to be perceived as strident and preachy as that would be counter-productive in convincing people of the truth of its positions. He is still a “son of the church” – he still holds to the Catholic dogma, or he wouldn’t be Pope. He is more concerned about harsh condemning attitudes towards wrongdoers and the wrong perceptions the world has of the Church.

We Singapore evangelicals can certainly learn something from this Pope.

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Gunung Belumut trek: challenging and enjoyable

23 September 2013 blogpastor 8 Comments

Kluang, Johor

Hotel Anika had seen better days for sure. Its old. But its reasonable room rate and convenient location was the reason why I stood overlooking a part of the second largest town in Johor state. This hotel was just a ten minutes walk from the Kluang train station. We had arrived from Woodlands by KTM train before noon on a Friday morning. My favorite part of the hotel was the bathtub. Soaking in warm water with bath oils before and after the trek was a ritual I enjoyed. For lunch we ate Chinese food next door at the famous Star restaurant. Their signature dish was their duck and their pork knuckle. After lunch, we bought what we needed for the trek from the supermarket next door and we had our dinner at the Ritch, a Western food joint. By nine, I had packed and was ready to go.

At the entrance of Gunung Belumut trek — At the entrance of Gunung Belumut trail

The beginning of the trail

We hired a van and it took 45 minutes for us to get to the park entrance where we would begin our trek. The large car park, playground, camping grounds and official buildings around were reassuring. The male toilet was dominated by a huge black circular cistern filled with water up to knee level. Must be for trekkers to clean up with spring water. We had obtained our climb permits but our guide was late. We decided we had to go without him as we were doubtful of our ability to reach the summit before 1pm. He would be able to catch up. So off we went in a trek that reassuringly reminded me of the Bukit Timah trails. At least for the beginning stage.

My wife and I

We have been trekking together for many years now. Its one activity we share together that we both enjoy. At 2 km we were still fresh. We carried about 2 litres of mineral and isotonic water in 4 bottles to distribute its weight. In the back pack were also a torch, our lunch, energy bars, a raincoat, and an additional T shirt and socks. By mid-morning we were walking along a straight ridge. The morning breeze was refreshing as we followed the clear trail. Then it got markedly more challenging: with slope inclines of 60-85 degrees most of the time. The trails were marked by knotted roots that snaked across the path. We had to pull ourselves up with the help of trekking sticks and grip sized tree trunks on both sides of the path. We rested at a shaded clearing before the false summit to have our standing lunch. I had a Kluang bak-chang (rice dumpling) and a fragrant pear and a banana. Even simple food tasted great after strenuous physical exertions. There was the usual banter and sharing of food before we started off again for the summit.

L to R: Vincent, Goh, Joy, Helen, Roger, Simon, Jeffrey, Christine, Linda (leader), Zoe,Jenny, Nellie, Eric

Fourteen trekkers

There were fourteen of us from different walks of life and religious persuasions. Most of us were in our fifties. Some had trekked regularly in different countries. Treks that never needed technical knowledge or skills. One Tan stayed behind at Kluang for he had recovered from flu, so he relaxed and enjoyed Kluang while we trekked. We were together for lunch, but then there would be a faster and a slower group as we trekked, with a leader in the leading pack that no one was to overtake; another leader in front of the slower group and one leader at the rearguard. On the way back down the trail, the groups would become three: one fast group; another at medium speed, and the final one, the “take your time” group.

It’s all about the journey

Somehow that photo at the summit is the proof that your trip had been worthwhile and money had been well spent. This is very Singaporean, perhaps universal. Everything is a cost benefit analysis. Its a groove we have been stuck in for too long. It’s all about the journey not the destination. As we grow older we need to eject ourselves out of that mentality to an inner freedom that also appreciates the process not merely the almighty outcome. I remembered on my first Kinabalu attempt I did not reach the summit. At that point in time it felt okay. But back in Singapore I felt tak shiok (dissatisfied). I went again and made sure I conquered the mountain! What conquer irony. Actually the mountain conquered me, and I kept returning, and still wish to do so. I need to discard all this conquer and tak shiok mentality. Be fully present all the time and enjoy the process as much as the outcome (if you do reach it). All the while listen to my body. The mountain will always be there. If my body tells me to forfeit the summit, I must learn to forfeit it. However, young people can afford to delete such cautiousness. call this a cop out if you like, but this is my philosophy for this stage of my life.

We spent about 30-45 minutes at the tiny summit clearing with other trekkers mostly taking photos and “un-leeching” ourselves and more energy loading. Until the skies warned us of possible

showers and we began to make our way back. Indeed there were showers and for the first time I used the throwaway raincoat I have been carrying in all my treks. A slight drizzle for about 30 to 40 minutes slowed us down as we had to be careful as we went down the steep slopes. Most accidents took place on the way down. At the same time we felt an urgency to cover as much ground before the rain got worse. The drizzle stopped, and after an hour or so, it rained more heavily. In the end, we trekked down. One group arrived an hour before the rest. The other two groups with a twenty minute gap. It was around 6 pm if I am not mistaken when I trudged back and washed up and warmed down. Where were we going for dinner? was the question on everyone’s mind. We ate at BatCity, an open air coffee shop, followed by dessert.

Back in Kluang, a Sunday morning bak kut teh breakfast

The winding down

The warming down was not of our limbs alone. We feasted. I soaked myself in the bathtub with bath oils. Some had massages. Pedicures and manicures. Shopping. The men went on a mini food trail: bak kut teh, followed by you tiau and coffee in two breakfast locations; famous beef kway teow for lunch, and I cannot remember what we had for dinner. Most importantly, in whatever activity we engaged after the trek, we teased and laughed and talked about various incidents and observations during the trek and all that sparkle and fizz increased the enjoyment of the trek, and deepened the bonds of friendship. 🙂

For anyone interested in doing a climb there, I recommend a Malaysian blogger’s detailed entry of her trek to Belumut as it helped me prepare myself mentally for the climb. Go HERE.

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Interests Gunung Belumut, Johor, Kluang, Malaysia, trekking