These are not necessarily on order.
Jesus
He saved me.
Coke
I just love this drink.
Bible
The book of Jesus – see point one.
Friends
Good Company helps bring a good life and experience of it.
Work
I enjoy my work.
Internet and Computer
Enjoy my various pastimes with these – websites, Blogs, etc.
Wilderness and Camping
I just love getting away and enjoying the bush.
Reading
I love to learn.
Music
I love a good modern ballad.
Photos
I love to remember good past experiences.
Two weeks after release, Christian vanishes while in police custody.
DUBLIN, May 7 (CDN) — Gao Zhisheng, a Christian human rights lawyer released by Chinese officials on April 6 and missing again since April 20, is “definitely in the hands of Chinese security forces,” Bob Fu of the China Aid Association (CAA) told Compass.
“We’ve heard the reports and we’re investigating this closely,” Fu said. “Right now nobody has been able to locate him. The Chinese security forces need to come up with an explanation.”
Gao, initially seized from his home in Shaanxi Province on Feb. 4, 2009 and held incommunicado by security officials for 13 months, was permitted to phone family members and colleagues in late March before officials finally returned him to his Beijing apartment on April 6.
In a press conference held in a Beijing teahouse the day after his return, Gao said he wanted to be reunited with his family, who fled to the United States in January 2009, and he claimed he no longer had the strength to continue his legal work. He also said he could not comment on the treatment he received while in captivity.
Gao also told a reporter from the South China Morning Post (SCMP) that he expected to travel to Urumqi within days of his release to visit his in-laws.
Witnesses saw Gao leaving his apartment sometime between April 9 and 12 and getting into a vehicle parked outside his building, SCMP reported on April 30. Gao’s father-in-law reportedly confirmed that Gao arrived at his home with an escort of four police officers but spent just one night there before police took him away again.
Gao phoned his father-in-law shortly before he was due to board a flight back to Beijing on April 20. He promised to call again after returning home but failed to do so, according to the SCMP report.
Fu said he believes that international pressure forced authorities to allow Gao a brief re-appearance to prove that he was alive before officials seized him again to prevent information leaking out about his experiences over the past year.
During a previous detention in 2007, Gao’s captors brutally tortured him and threatened him with death if he spoke about his treatment. Gao later described the torture in an open letter published by CAA in 2009.
Gao came to the attention of authorities early last decade when he began to investigate the persecution of house church Christians and Falun Gong members. In 2005 he wrote a series of open letters to President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao accusing the government of torturing Falun Gong members.
When the letters appeared, authorities revoked Gao’s law license and shut down his law firm, sources told CAA.
He was given a suspended three-year jail sentence in December 2006, following a confession that Gao later claimed was made under extreme duress, including torture and threats against his wife and children. Gao was then confined to his Beijing apartment under constant surveillance – forbidden to leave his home, use his phone or computer or otherwise communicate with the outside world, according to a report by The New York Times.
A self-taught lawyer and a Communist Party member until 2005, Gao was once recognized by the Ministry of Justice as one of the mainland’s top 10 lawyers for his pro bono work on human rights cases, according to SCMP.
Report from Compass Direct News
Nine Gospel for Asia-supported missionaries were arrested August 10 after an encounter with a group of anti-Christian extremists in Orissa, India, reports Gospel for Asia.
The missionaries were handing out Gospel tracts and talking with people when the extremists began harassing them. The missionaries stood firm during the incident. They were taken to the police station and held there until a local Gospel for Asia leader could arrange their release.
One condition was placed on their freedom: The missionaries must refrain from preaching for the next two months to allegedly maintain law and order.
The nine missionaries refused to agree to this condition but were released anyway. Before being freed, they assured the police that they would not do anything to disturb the peace. They also made it clear that they were distributing tracts to people who wanted them and not forcing people to convert.
Christians are under constant scrutiny by other religious groups after the mass persecution that occurred in Orissa last fall. The death of Swami Laxmanananda Saraswati, who was a top leader of the VHP (World Hindu Council), ignited an outrageous persecution of Christians, even though Maoist rebels claimed responsibility for his murder.
As the anniversary of Saraswati’s death approaches on August 23, security has heightened. Followers of Saraswati plan to hold processions in observance of his death. No threats have been mentioned, but fear still lingers among some Christians because of past experiences.
Some Christians in the community plan to balance out the potential danger by observing the day as a day of peace and harmony.
A GFA correspondent said police are being very careful to not allow any situation “that would escalate the communal tension” from occurring. The district administration in Kandhamal has taken some precautionary measures “to avert any untoward incidents and violence.”
Report from the Christian Telegraph
The U.S.-based National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality (NARTH) has just released its long-awaited comprehensive review of over 125 years of scientific research on homosexuality, reports Family Watch International.
This groundbreaking report, “What Research Shows,” dispels the myths that are commonly used to promote the legalization of same-sex marriage and the mainstreaming of homosexuality throughout society and in the public schools by force of law.
NARTH is a professional association of scientists and mental health professionals whose stated mission is to conduct and disseminate scientific research on homosexuality, promote effective treatment, and to protect the right of individuals with unwanted same-sex attraction to receive effective care.
While one might think that such a mission would be viewed as both commendable and relatively non-controversial, the reality is just the opposite. Homosexual activists try to suppress research on same-sex attraction because one of the pillars of homosexual advocacy is the falsehood that homosexuals are “born that way” and cannot change their orientation. Since the NARTH report proves that homosexuality can be changed through therapy in the same way conditions like alcoholism and other addictions can be changed, the whole case for mainstreaming homosexuality into society crumbles. Another myth the NARTH report disproves is that therapy to help people with unwanted same-sex attraction is ineffective and even harmful.
The extensive research and clinical experience reviewed by NARTH makes it clear even to a layman that these claims are false. Homosexual activists spread these misconceptions about homosexuality and even persecute their own who seek treatment because they know that public opinion polls show that people who believe homosexuals are born that way are more likely to support the homosexual agenda. NARTH is one of the very few credible, professional organizations anywhere in the world that is successfully challenging this propaganda.
Specifically, the NARTH report substantiates the following conclusions:
1. There is substantial evidence that sexual orientation may be changed through reorientation therapy.
“Treatment success for clients seeking to change unwanted homosexuality and develop their heterosexual potential has been documented in the professional and research literature since the late 19th century. …125 years of clinical and scientific reports which document those professionally-assisted and other attempts at volitional change from homosexuality toward heterosexuality has been successful for many and that such change continues to be possible for those who are motivated to try.”
2. Efforts to change sexual orientation have not been shown to be consistently harmful or to regularly lead to greater self-hatred, depression, and other self-destructive behaviors.
“We acknowledge that change in sexual orientation may be difficult to attain. As with other difficult challenges and behavioral patterns—such as low-self-esteem, abuse of alcohol, social phobias, eating disorders, or borderline personality disorder, as well as sexual compulsions and addictions—change through therapy does not come easily.”
“We conclude that the documented benefits of reorientation therapy—and the lack of its documented general harmfulness—support its continued availability to clients who exercise their right of therapeutic autonomy and self-determination through ethically informed consent.”
The NARTH report warns that “The limited body of clinical reports that claim that harm is possible—if not probable— if a person simply attempts to change typically were written by gay activist professionals.”
3. There is significantly greater medical, psychological, and relational pathology in the homosexual population than the general population.
“Researchers have shown that medical, psychological and relationship pathology within the homosexual community is more prevalent than within the general population. …In some cases, homosexual men are at greater risk than homosexual women and heterosexual men, while in other cases homosexual women are more at risk than homosexual men and heterosexual women. …Overall, many of these problematic behaviors and psychological dysfunctions are experienced among homosexuals at about three times the prevalence found in the general population—and sometimes much more. …We believe that no other group of comparable size in society experiences such intense and widespread pathology.”
You can read NARTH’s executive summary of the report on our Web site here.
Report from the Christian Telegraph
Some of the nation’s leading journalists gathered in Key West, Fla., in May 2009 for the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life’s Faith Angle Conference on religion, politics and public life, reports Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life.
Francis S. Collins, the former director of the Human Genome Project, discussed why he believes religion and science are compatible and why the current conflict over evolution vs. faith, particularly in the evangelical community, is unnecessary. Collins, an evangelical Christian, talked about his path from atheism to Christianity and his belief that science provides evidence of God. He cited the Big Bang theory and the fact that the universe had a beginning out of nothing. He added that the laws of physics have precisely the values needed for life to occur on earth and argued that would seem to point to a creator.
Barbara Bradley Hagerty, the religion correspondent for National Public Radio, discussed how the brain reacts to spiritual experiences. She talked about the current debate over whether transcendent experiences are merely physiological events or whether they reflect encounters with another dimension. Bradley Hagerty said she believes that “God is a choice,” that people can look at scientific evidence and conclude that everything is explained by material means or that they can look at the universe and see the hand of God.
To read the event transcript, click here.
Report from the Christian Telegraph
Defectors’ descriptions add to evidence of strong but severely persecuted church.
DUBLIN, April 24 (Compass Direct News) – Eom Myong-Heui of North Korea was a loyal communist in the Workers’ Party of Korea before she became a Christian under the influence of her business partner – a missionary who was later arrested and tortured into revealing that Eom was a believer.
Authorities placed Eom into a detention center in her hometown of Moosan and tortured her into denying her faith – but her incarceration continued under appalling conditions. Officials eventually released her due to her previous national loyalty. Now an assistant pastor at a church in Seoul, South Korea after a harrowing escape from her home country, Eom relates a journey that is part of a growing body of evidence of a strong – and severely persecuted – church in North Korea.
“A lot of people ask me if there really are people in North Korea who believe in Christ,” she said. “Do you really think that the missionaries who were there and all the believers who meet underground are all dead?”
Even as the North Korean government this month allowed two high-profile, U.S. Christian bands to perform at a music festival in Pyongyang, the fear of punishment authorities have instilled in North Korean Christians keeps most of them from publicly revealing their faith. As many as 400,000 Christians are estimated to worship secretly in the country, and Suzanne Scholte, head of an association of some 60 groups campaigning for change in the country called the North Korean Freedom Coalition (NKFC), estimates that more than 200,000 North Koreans are held in political prison camps for various perceived “disloyalties” to the regime, including adherence to Christianity.
Christian support group Open Doors estimates that of the 200,000 people incarcerated in political prison camps, at least 40,000 are Christians. Under North Korea’s policy of juche, or self-reliance, citizens may worship only President Kim Jong Il and his late father, former ruler Kim Il Sung.
Jung Eun Hye, one of several North Korean refugees expected to speak about conditions in the country at events in Washington, D.C. next week, said that freedom of religion is stipulated in North Korea’s constitution, but that “Christians have to risk their lives to have a secret service away from the oppression of the government.”
Jung, who faced severe persecution after authorities caught his father and aunt with Bibles in their possession, said he did not know that any churches existed in Pyongyang until he escaped from North Korea. While a handful of government churches do exist in the capital, Jung is one of many refugees who believe that these churches exist only to “deceive the outside world.”
“Here is my question,” said Jung. “If North Korea has freedom of religion, why does the government arrest, kill or imprison Christians in camps from which they never return?”
Testimony from various sources confirms that the government actively seeks out Christian groups and meeting points and imprisons Christians solely because of their faith. The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) last year reported refugees saying that Christianity remained a key factor in the interrogation of people repatriated from China to North Korea. Border guards reserved the harshest punishment for those who admitted having any contact with Chinese or South Korean Christians.
“There is no freedom of belief or religion,” one refugee stated. “[We are taught] that if one is involved in religion, one cannot survive.”
Former police and security officers interviewed for USCIRF’s report admitted that their superiors had instructed them to play the role of Christians and infiltrate “underground” prayer meetings in order to incriminate, arrest, imprison and sometimes execute believers in North Korea.
‘Abyss of Death’
A delegation of North Korean refugees recently described their experiences ahead of events on Capitol Hill from Sunday (April 26) through Saturday (May 2) as part of North Korea Freedom Week.
Kim Young Soon, a refugee who spent nine years in a prison camp, said North Korean ruler Kim “is pushing the people into the abyss of death. In such a society, no one can trust anyone.”
Authorities sent Kim Young Soon and her family to prison camp No. 15, otherwise known as Yodok, after she made a seemingly innocent comment about the regime.
“Every mountain and field in Yodok was covered with dead bodies because of malnutrition and hunger,” Kim said. She described waking at 3:30 a.m. to run six kilometers (nearly four miles) to her assigned workplace and surviving on a diet of unripe, salted corn. Her parents and two of her sons died during their incarceration; border guards shot her third son when she fled with him to China shortly after their release.
Former prisoner Jung Gwangil said prison guards sadistically controlled inmates through collective punishment.
“If I did something wrong, all the members of the group I belonged to were punished,” he said. “When guards withheld food or switched off heaters in the middle of winter, fellow prisoners would sometimes beat the responsible inmate to death.”
Another former prisoner, Kim Tae Jin, described being left naked in a freezing cell and forced to sit on quicklime in the rain, resulting in severe burns to her skin.
“Even now, there are people who cut their own fingers off to avoid hard labor, who disguise themselves as madmen, or who lose their arms from beatings because they believe in a God who supposedly doesn’t exist,” she added.
While she was in prison, she said, a fellow inmate known only as Park formed a small “fellowship” of seven Christians. Prison guards eventually caught Park, beat him severely and asked him, “Who told you about the existence of God?”
“Do we have to be told about the existence of the sun to know that it’s there?” Park replied. “We learn its existence by feeling its warmth.”
Perilous Journey
In such conditions, the journey to faith is perilous for North Koreans – or nothing short of miraculous in the case of Eom, an assistant pastor at Seoul’s New Pyongyang Full Gospel Church (a fellowship for North Korean Defectors associated with Yoido Full Gospel Church).
She was extremely loyal to the regime until she made contact with a South Korean-Chinese Christian businessman.
“It’s very hard to live in North Korea, so if you don’t secretly do business, you can’t survive,” Eom said in sharing her story with members of another large church in Seoul, South Korea. “So for a few days I just kept being polite and agreeing with whatever he said about God, even though I knew he was wrong … but then God started to change my heart.”
Eventually the missionary gave her a small New Testament.
“I enjoyed it,” she said. “The teaching to love your enemy, give him food if he’s hungry, give him water if he’s thirsty. I also took to heart the words about loving each other.”
Eom asked a superior why North Korea didn’t have a religion other than worship of the Kim family.
“His eyes got big and he told me that religion was poison,” she said, “and that if I tried to learn about Christianity I would automatically become a traitor.”
As a teacher, Eom knew what happened to children of traitors and immediately began to worry about her two daughters. When police arrested the missionary and someone warned her that she could be next, Eom packed a small bag and assured her youngest daughter that she would return in three days.
“At the time,” she told the Seoul congregation, “I didn’t realize that this trip would bar me from ever entering the country again.”
Detained by police, she said, she could not understand why the authorities were so concerned about whether she was a Christian instead of asking about her business activities. After her release and unable to rescue her daughters, she escaped to China, where she was arrested twice and told, “If we arrest you again, we will kill you.”
From China Eom made a dangerous journey via Myanmar to Thailand, where she spent six months in a detention center before being granted asylum in South Korea in 2002.
“This is a most critical time for the North Korea human rights movement,” said Scholte, head of the NKFC and president of the Defense Forum Foundation. “We either advance these issues now with the opportunity that comes from a new administration and a new Congress, or we see another decade of death and despair for those whose great misfortune was to be born under the Kim Jong Il dictatorship.”
Report from Compass Direct News
Churches ordered to cease services, stop meeting in ‘unauthorized’ venues.
DUBLIN, January 21 (Compass Direct News) – Burmese authorities last week increased restrictions on Christian activity in the capital city of Rangoon and surrounding areas, including the closure of several churches, Compass sources confirmed yesterday.
Orders issued on Jan. 5 had already forced many Christians meeting in residential homes or apartments to cease gathering for worship. Officials last week ordered several major Rangoon churches, including Wather Hope Church, Emmanuel Church and the Assemblies of God Church, to cease holding services and continued enforcing the Jan. 5 ban on meetings held in unauthorized facilities.
In the late 1990s authorities stopped issuing permits for land purchase or the construction of new churches, leading many Burmese Christians to conduct services in rented apartments or office buildings, according to the Burmese news agency Mizzima.
The Kyauktada Township Peace and Development Council on Jan. 5 invited pastors from more than 100 Rangoon churches to a meeting where they were told to sign documents pledging to cease operation of their churches. About 50 pastors attended, according to Mizzima.
The documents threatened punishment, including potential jail terms and the sealing of church facilities, for pastors who refused to obey the closure orders.
Another local online news source, the Democratic Voice of Burma, claimed officials from the Ministry of Religious Affairs had summoned the owners of buildings where churches met and ordered them not to rent their properties to religious groups.
Mizzima quoted an unnamed Burmese Christian who claimed that 80 percent of churches in Rangoon were affected by the order.
History of Religious Repression
Some local Christians and international observers say the crackdown is related to Christian involvement in relief efforts for the victims of Cyclone Nargis, which hit Burma in May 2008.
Despite widespread devastation and loss of life, Burma’s reclusive government initially banned foreign aid but finally accepted it on condition that Burmese officials would distribute it. Christians, however, had responded immediately to the crisis, gathering relief supplies and transporting them to the Irrawaddy Delta region. Police or army officials stopped some groups, but many were allowed to proceed. At least one such group told Compass that officials likely feared the conversion of Buddhists who accepted aid from Christians.
The military junta ruling Burma promotes Buddhism at the expense of other minority religions, according to Paul A. Marshall’s 2008 Religious Freedom in the World. The country’s population is 82 percent Buddhist, 9 percent Christian and 4 percent Muslim, with traditional ethnic, Chinese and Hindu religions accounting for the rest.
The church closure orders may simply be an extension of Burma’s existing religious policies, which elevate Buddhism in an effort to solidify national identity. Burma ranks high on lists of religious and human rights violators at several watch organizations, including the U.S. State Department, Human Rights Watch, Freedom House and Open Doors.
Documents declaring the government’s intention to “stamp out” Christianity have circulated for some time. Rights organization Christian Solidarity Worldwide drew attention to one such document in a 2007 report entitled, “Carrying the Cross: The military regime’s campaign of restriction, discrimination and persecution against Christians in Burma.” The report summarized a 17-point document allegedly produced by an organization affiliated with the Ministry of Religious Affairs entitled, “Program to Destroy the Christian Religion in Burma.”
The first point in this document declared that, “There shall be no home where the Christian religion is practiced.”
A military dictatorship has ruled Burma since 1962. Following the takeover, the government renamed Burma as the Union of Myanmar and the capital city as Yangon, but many news agencies and government bodies continue to use the original names. When elections were held in 1988, with the opposing National League for Democracy clearly in the majority, the generals rejected the popular vote and used brute military force to cement their power throughout Burma. A similar show of force met hundreds of Buddhist monks who initiated mass anti-government protest rallies on the streets of Rangoon in September 2007.
While almost all Burmese citizens suffer under the regime, Christians are often singled out for specific attack or repression because of their perceived connections with the West.
Reports from various mission groups suggest Christianity is flourishing under the regime, but believers must be creative with their worship – particularly in rural areas. In reports confirmed by Compass, Christians in one state began photocopying Bibles to overcome restrictions on religious publications. Others baptized new Christians during the annual water festival, where citizens douse each other with buckets of water, ceremonially washing away the “sins” of the past year.
Heightened Security, Control
Rangoon residents say a much heavier security presence has been evident in the city since early January, when political activists began distributing anti-government leaflets, The Irrawaddy newspaper reported on Jan. 13. The leaflet drops may have contributed to the current crackdown on church gatherings, as generals suspect all organized groups of having a political agenda.
At a graduation of military students in Rangoon on Jan. 9, Vice-Senior Gen. Maung Aye, who is commander-in-chief of the army and deputy commander-in-chief of Defense Services, warned students to steadfastly uphold the country’s “Three Main National Causes” to prevent “recurrences of past bitter experiences.” The causes were listed as non-disintegration of the Union of Myanmar, non-disintegration of national solidarity and perpetuation of sovereignty.
The New Light of Myanmar, a government newspaper, reported the general as saying that, “You will have learned bitter lessons from a number of world events, in which certain States have become weaker … owing to external intervention in their conflicts.”
Report from Compass Direct News
Arrest warrant rescinded for woman imprisoned because her father briefly converted to Islam.
ISTANBUL, December 2 (Compass Direct News) – A Supreme Court judge in Egypt on Nov. 22 granted Christian Bahia El-Sisi the right to appeal her conviction for falsification of documents – a charge stemming from her official papers not identifying her as a Muslim.
In addition, Judge Abdel Meged Mahmood on Nov. 25 rescinded a Sept. 23 warrant for El-Sisi’s arrest, declaring that she should be free pending a final decision. Mahmood is the same judge who in January freed El-Sisi’s sister, who had been convicted on the same charges of “forgery.”
The charges against El-Sisi and her sister, Shadia El-Sisi, claimed that their marriage certificates contained false information that they were Christians. Unknown to them, their religious identity officially changed 46 years ago due to their father’s brief conversion to Islam. Both are illiterate.
In the Nov. 22 hearing granting Bahia El-Sisi the right to appeal, Mahmood noted that her marriage certificate made no mention of her religion, according to her lawyer.
Investigation into the sisters’ religious status began following a visit made to their father, Nagy El-Sisi, himself in prison for forgery. Nagy El-Sisi, who had briefly converted to Islam in 1962 before reconverting three years later, obtained a forged Christian ID because there is no official means for converting from Islam in Egypt.
Under sharia (Islamic law), which heavily influences Egyptian law, the sisters are considered Muslims due to their father’s conversion. They learned that their father had briefly converted to Islam only recently, long after getting married, and had no idea they could officially be considered Muslims.
Both sisters were originally charged with forging official documents and sentenced in absentia in 2000; each was given a three-year jail sentence.
Shadia El-Sisi was not arrested until August 2007, and her first hearing was on Nov. 21, 2007 at the Shobra El-Khema criminal court. Judge Hadar Tobla Hossan sentenced her to three years in prison.
She was in prison until Jan. 13, when Mahmood retracted the sentence because she was unaware of her conversion by proxy and due to legal technicalities that voided incriminating evidence.
Bahia El-Sisi was held for over two months between May and July of this year. She was then released pending a final court decision. She told Compass about her recent experiences.
“There is no rest in prison, and I was tired and unable to get enough rest or enough food,” she said. “Everybody was [left to fend] for themselves.”
For more than four months she was in hiding, moving from place to place to avoid another arrest.
“I can’t go near the house, I move from one place to another,” she said before the arrest warrant was rescinded. “I rarely see my children, I am worried about them.”
On Sept. 23, Hossan ruled that El-Sisi had forged documents and that the three-year prison sentence would stand. In the Nov. 22 hearing, Mahmood ruled that there was no evidence El-Sisi had forged documents, as no such documents could be produced as proof; the marriage certificate in question did not state her religion, said her lawyer, Peter Ramses.
Mahmood ruled that Hossan’s decision was “so bad and so wrong,” said Ramses. “Then Mahmood gave a decision saying to the police, ‘Don’t arrest her.’”
Bahia El-Sisi’s six children anxiously awaited the outcome of the appeal, fearing that, in a domino effect, their religious status may also have to change following a negative outcome.
El-Sisi remained defiant.
“I am a Christian, I will remain Christian,” she told Compass. “Christ in front of me will guide my steps.”
Report from Compass Direct News
My friend died in late June and I still find it difficult to believe that she is gone. It’s probably more likely that I simply miss her I think. In circumstances like this you tend to think about an event or events that took place in the past – a special happening or something like that.
Something that happened with Bec has been on my mind the last couple of days. Every so often Bec would feel a little down – sometimes more than a little down. On this particular occasion she was feeling more than a little worthless – as though she had no value and no reason to feel she had any.
Now as usual, she was wide of the mark on this particular subject. Bec had heaps of value and worth, and I often thought she had more than I. But that is something that was known only to Bec and I – the whole worth and value discussion/s. I have no intention of revealing all of that, but enough to say we had plenty of discussions revolving around the subject which we both appreciated and dare I say it, valued.
So there was this one time when I had been speaking to her on the phone and via text messages – and it was fairly late at night. Bec was a little down and I didn’t want her to stay that way so I thought a little about what I could do. I had a history with Bec of doing silly little things to cheer her up, etc. So this sort of thing wasn’t unusual. Anyhow, I came up with a plan and set about to put it in place.
I knew Bec was going to work the next day so I wanted to do something that she would discover when she headed off to work – to make sure she went to work much happier.
So what could I do??? Well, I collected a whole heap of short garden stakes and made a whole heap of little signs that I tacked to the stakes. Each sign had a little message on it about what I valued about Bec and how much worth I felt she had. There must have been about 30 signs I suppose.
So off I drove to Bec’s place with my signs. Bec’s car was parked on the street as usual and her bedroom window was on the side of the house nearest the car. So the mission had to be a quiet one.
I parked the car up the street a bit and quietly wandered down to Bec’s place with the signs. I then placed them from the gate down to her car, so she would have to see each of them – all over the place on the way down to the car.
Anyhow, to cut a long story short – Bec of course found the signs the next morning and rang me, thanking me for the gesture. It was only a silly little thing that I did, but it meant a lot to Bec and she held onto the signs, keeping them under her bed. It just gave her something to always look at when she felt a little down about her value and worth.
I know it was nothing extremely special and it didn’t cost a lot of money – but it doesn’t always have to be about money. It was about how I felt about Bec and she really valued that. It was just something special that we both shared and always remembered. It meant something to us both, as did other similar experiences that we shared – working both ways.
I miss her.
Random Thoughts 