3 Cases

The past 2 weeks were hectic, as my flat is now in the middle of its renovation. There are so many things to do, to think, to decide, to redesign and to buy, and everything that pertains to the renovation of the flat has to be done during weekends, therefore, there is almost no difference between weekdays and weekends for me, since the nature is the same as what I do for a living. So, I hope to take this occasion to write on 3 incidents that happened.

Case 1
With a 9am to 6.30pm job (not to mention most of the time we work beyond that), I don’t have time to meet up my contractor face to face to discuss about the renovation of my flat except on a Saturday, and it had been so for the past few weeks. In the midst of all the hurly burly, there is always something funny that happens that sort of make people laugh and this is one of those incidents that happen, and that was yesterday.

At 7.45am, I was suddenly awoken by a vibration sound coming from my mobile phone. Over the other line was my contractor, “Are we meeting now? Where are you?” Rubbing my eyes with unbelief, I searched for a watch nearby to confirm the time and I was nearly shocked, thinking that my contractor was joking, because he is staying at Jurong, and my flat is at Yishun (that is really far apart for Singapore context), who in the world will arrange to meet at 7.30am, with no violent objection especially on a Saturday morning? I thought we meant to meet up face to face at 10.30am! Only then did I realize that he heard wrongly, as the pronunciation for 7.30am and 10.30am in mandarin do sound similar over the phone. However, we did manage to meet up at 8.30am. (The other reason for this “misunderstanding” was also the fact that I would normally visit my flat to see the progress at about 7.45am in the morning before I go to work, and to call my contactor at about 8plus to give him more instruction, therefore this also “blur” him up.)

Case 2
Designing for my own flat, and myself being an architect by training, could be both exciting yet “scary”. Suddenly, my flat’s design becomes an art piece to the people around me and things to talk about, although they have not seen it, yet they seem to have such great expectation, that out of no where, undue pressure from friends was felt, it was like it was no longer enough just to satisfy myself anymore. Coupled with my mom and brother’s request and opinions (actually not too much, thank God), the stress seems tremendous. I caught myself, and realized I have fallen into the same trap again, of trying to meet people’s approval and expectation and forgot to enjoy the process.

Case 3
Architects are treated like “kings” to suppliers of building related products. Suppliers will always try to make appointment with us so as to meet us face to face to introduce their products. Whatever we need, they would always try to please us, even bringing right to our doorstep big items such as water closets, chairs, tiles and light fittings when we demand them, and these products are mostly well-known European goods.

Yet this scenario did not seem to happen when it comes to my own flat. Running from one industrial park to another searching for the ideal, beautiful and inexpensive sanitary wares. Walking from one end of Balestier Road to the other end, looking into almost every shop that sell light fittings, and to finally come to the conclusion, most of the lights are from Taiwan, and any Italian light fitting will be 4 to 5 times more than imitation (Taiwan made).

This is not just confined to light fittings. For example, when it comes to tiles, we would normally choose European tiles for our projects, yet now, I have to make do with China tiles (pseudo Italian looking design). These tiles which we always try to avoid using for client, I ended up using without even questioning its porosity, unevenness, etc. What a joke!

There were even times when I felt like stating to these suppliers my profession to hopefully get a better product at a better price…. (I did that for the sanitary wares though.)

Conclusion
These are some of the crazy events of the last few weeks, and perhaps will be so for the next couple of weeks, while I start my shopping for furniture next. (I may continue to bore you all for the next couple of weeks on the progress of renovation!)
Yet in the midst of all this, I really need to be reminded again and again that my trust is in Him, and stop striving so hard, just simply rest in Him. After all, He is truly the Master Architect of the whole universe, and when I start seeing myself with Him in me designing, coordinating, everything seems to look easier. Cast all your (my) cares on Him for He cares for you (me) and He will surely carry you (me) through!