Went for a Christmas party at Felicia's place on the 27th. It was really quite a nice party, with good food and lots of people. Most of the people were from USP but I only knew a handful of them. A lot of them are those who are more socially active in the USP community. I got acquainted with a few new people, but stayed largely away from the crowd, choosing instead to join small pockets of conversation here and there.
A curious thought struck me yesterday: Part of the reason why I'm not that comfortable with that crowd is perhaps because they were largely the ang-moh-pai type. Me? Well, it's true that I tend to be a little anglophilic when it comes to things like music and other parts of popular culture (I think they have more character and depth than the Americans). Coming from Chinese High, I have also come to loathe the Chee-na label - especially since I belonged to the English-speaking clique of the class. It isn't a bid to distance myself from indicators of Chee-na-ness, but 1) I prefer to converse in English, 2) I listen almost entirely to English music (however, I'm fairly familiar with Chinese evergreens since my father tunes to FM95.8 on the car), 3) I'm an Arts student. Of course, I doubt these are sufficient to become ang-moh-pai. But it's not as if I need to be so anyway. I guess I'm one of those not-here-not-there ones. Anyone begs to differ?
Anyhow, I guess this is why it's so comfortable with the people from church. There is quite a mix, but I think we largely fall into either the cheena or the not-here-not-there categories. Strangely, I think we have very little of the ang-moh-pais. Yes! A church with a young yet non-ang-moh-pai population. A minor miracle in itself, IMHO. On a serious note, though, I think this reflects a trend where we tend to reach out to people who are like us. Oh, but imagine church-planting - everyone will be different from us!
They still haven't come and fix my ceiling fan yet. It's so hot in here! Argh ....
