In today’s marriage prep class, I hear a very good sharing from an old couple married for 47 years.  Unlike Protestant churches, especially the Chinese ones, the Catholic church does not forbid catholics marrying not catholics.  The wedding will be blessed by the church as long as they agree to raise the children as little catholics.  In wife of the old couple is a very typical religious old woman for all of her life.  She sharing is funny to listen, but the content is not very relevant, typical along the line of good faith helps bonding in marriage.

On the other hand, the husband’s sharing is very interesting and I find much connection with his story.  He was not a catholic when he was married, he never go to church many years into his marriage.  Like others in western culture, he appreciates Christian value, so he is happy seeing his kids go to church on Sundays.  Moreover he can enjoy some quiet time of his own when the wife and the kids are away in church.  Things changes when the kids grow into teenagers, start getting rebellious and stop going to church with mom.  He figured that he can’t force the kid go to church if he doesn’t go to church himself.  He calculated it will be only a few more years before the kids turns into adult and move away, so he won’t have to suffer the boredom of church for long.  In order for the kids grow up with good value, he set an example himself and start going to church.  After being many years of non-Christian, he finally accept the faith and baptized as a Catholic.

The moral of the story is that his wife never force him go to church, she just let God do the work.  Couples have different faith can live a happy marriage, going to church together or not is irrelevant.  God always has his plan, it could be better for them in those years letting the husband escape from church.  When the time comes, things will happen on its own.  I don’t mind going to church, I will probably do the same thing as the husband to force my kids to go to church.  However, I want to retain my right to doze off on boring priests.  After all, it is not my fault falling asleep, why can’t the priest talks more interesting?

Today I went to a friend’s wedding.  The wedding follows the typical PMC style, ceremony in CMCC, banquet in Kirin.  Somehow almost everyone working in PMC have their banquet in Kirin, including myself.  Just like every other wedding, I bump into some long time no see friends.  One of an old friend I come across is the ex of the bride.  I am quite surprise seeing him show up in the wedding.  He flew all the way from HK just to attend the wedding.  I know him from connection through my Waterloo friends, so I am kinda neutral on whom the bride pick as the groom.

Somehow the best man has the same first name as my friend, and both of them flew from HK for the wedding.  When the groom read his thank you list, we who know the history but not aware the name of best man, almost dropped our jaws, wondering why would the groom want to thank the ex of the bride.  Of course, it turns out it is just a misunderstanding.

Chinese wedding has silly games.  One of the game is the bride has to find the groom among the guests.  The MC prepared masks with picture of the groom’s head, asking one guy from each table wearing the masks, trying to confuse the bride.  At first, we want to make the ex wears the mask, but he refuse indistinctly.  He said it would be really embarrass if the bride pick him by mistake.  I think the real reason is no guy want to pretend to be the guy marrying your girlfriend.

In Chinese wedding, the guests toast with the wedding couple and force them to drink some alcohol.  The wedding couple are very easy going, don’t mind having a toast with any guests come forward to congratulate them.  Any guest, except the ex.  Somehow the groomsman refuse the toast from the ex and he is quite upset.  At the end of the banquet, he manage to have a toast and take a photo with the bride quietly, while the groom is away busy doing something else.  Probably the bride want to stay away from the ex in front of her husband.  But if she cares, why invite him in the first place?

Why the bride would invite her ex to the wedding and why would the ex come?  I can never understand how a couple break up and still be friends without feeling weird.  Maybe they just pretend to be normal.  I don’t think invite your ex to your wedding or going to your ex’s wedding is a good idea.  Why take the chance to be humiliated or reminds yourself once again the bad memories.

回味逝去的童年﹐慨嘆成年的顧慮。
恐怖的是我竟然可以說得出MTV中每一套卡通的名字﹐是不是我小時候看得太多電視呢﹖

Most people think shooting is a men’s sport, as women don’t usually associate with guns. Today I just learn that women are better natural shooter than men, since women can shoot more accurately. In my shooting club, the best shooter is a woman and some experience shooters said they have a hard time completing with women.

The difference is not due to skill nor training, it is due to the body structure of the two genders. Women has a low center of mass, while men has a high center of mass. When aiming a target, higher center of mass makes the body less stable. Having the body stable is the most important key factor determine where the bullets will hit. Since women has a natural advantage in shooting, we should correct the stereotype that shooting is men’s sport. Shooting is a sport suits well balanced for both sex. Where women have more stable hands, men have faster reaction time.

Today is the mid autumn festival.  In Chinese tradition, people suppose to look up the sky tonight and adore the roundness of the moon.  To me, today is just a normal work day and then have some church function in the evening.  I am not even aware it is the day of mid-autumn festival until Pat gave me a moon cake.  I didn’t bother to raise my head and check out the moon, since the shape of the moon is none of my concern.

A traditional festival loses its meaning if it doesn’t come with a holiday.  When the meaning is hollowed out, people will move on and slowly forget the festival.  The festival may has some symbolic in the past, but in the this post-modern world anyone can associate any meaning to any symbol or associate any symbol to any day.  Mid-autumn symbolizes thinking about far way family members in the past.  Now you can simply call them up to say hello at any time.  You can make any day carry the same meaning of the  mid-autumn festival.  The traditional festival has lost its meaning, what’s left in a festival is just an excuse to give us a day off to enjoy ourself.