Ixperia

Rock, Scissors, Paper

2006-12-08T11:07:00.000-08:00

Facebook

2006-11-14T23:16:00.000-08:00

Facebook: another version of friendster.
It's getting to be impossible to keep up with all these internet trends.

So I've signed up for Facebook and started to search for friends to add to my profile. Well, you know you're getting old when you can't even find anyone who has graduated in your year! Everyone on Facebook graduated from highschool at the earliest in 2002!

Anyways, if there are any of you out there who are on Facebook - you can find me there under Jackie Pastrano Tan.

Our Wedding Day

2006-10-04T12:08:00.000-07:00

It's incredible that our wedding day has come and gone! We had an incredible time of celebration with our family and closest friends... especially making the intimate marriage committment before God.

To see all our pictures (by both our professional and "amateur" photographers) come visit: www.flickr.com/photos/daveandjackie

Bridal Showers Galore

2006-07-18T11:29:00.000-07:00

Yes... this is certainly a year for wedddings.

Both my cousin Mae Pastrano and I are getting married this September to men who have the same last name!

I wanted to quickly posts these pictures of two Pastrano-Tan bridal showers.

Renovating Westport

2006-07-18T10:50:00.001-07:00

A friend of mine gave me this piece of advice yesterday, which was given to him before he was married: "Don't do any home renovations in your first year of marriage."

Well, Dave and I have broken that rule by doing home renovations BEFORE our marriage.

Our summer has been one whirlwind after another... I can't wait for the honeymoon (ha! though we're heading for the Carribbean, hurricane land!)

I'm quite excited about the work we've been able to do with the Westport condo! Take a look at the transformation.

Kitchen:

Living & Dining Room

Master Bedroom & Bath

Patio

Engagement Photography

2006-05-13T10:01:00.000-07:00

After searching through the plethora of Vancouver wedding photographers with a fine tooth comb, critical questions and much bargaining(!! DAve's expertise) we found a great photographer who is wonderful to work with and does a great job! His name is Michael Rathjen.

Come visit our flickr site to view our engagement shots (or click on the flickr zeitgeist on the right side)

A Wonderfrul Reunion

2006-05-13T09:40:00.000-07:00

It's been 3 long years since I graduated from SFU. Those were good times. I can't exactly say I've found a group of friends like the ones I met at Campus Crusade and from the English department that challenged me with their love for people, life, learning and having fun!

Yesterday, at Justine's birthday, was one of the rare times I was able to reconnect with many of them! Unfortunately, I didn't take pictures to show you proof of who was there (this might be of interest to some of you!)

Most of us are graduated, working, getting married and now well on our way into our 30s!:P

I'm still learning the balance of cherishing old friendships, but keeping an open hand in letting them go.

Panama.. I miss that country

2006-04-06T16:02:00.000-07:00

I thought I would mention this on my blog, although this is old news now! I went to Panama for 2 weeks with Campus Crusade for Christ. And we had an amazing time.
The Panamanians we met became dear friends and they're just crazy over there!
If you want to see pictures of our trip visit my flickr site: Panama Spring Break Project

We took along with us about 20 Canadian university students (UBC, U of S, York, Carleton, Ottawa U, Montreal) and had a blast!

One day I hope I will get to go back to Panama with Dave... till then I'm glad to be back in Vancouver and planning our wedding.

We're Engaged!

2006-04-05T16:35:00.000-07:00

Wow... so yes its official (it's been official for over a month now), Dave Tan and I are getting married this coming September. Dave proposed to me at the airport when I got back from Panama.

To get the whole story visit our wedding website

Click here to visit my flickr site and see more pictures

xinyidai

2006-01-23T15:39:00.000-08:00

新一代 OR 新世代

In Retrospect: My Life in Pictures

2005-12-08T09:55:00.000-08:00

September

C.S. Lewis: A Man of Faith and Imagination

2005-12-06T16:46:00.000-08:00

The Land of Narnia
by Dr. Anne Carson Daly

"In the Trinity Term of 1929 I gave in, and admitted that God was God, and knelt and prayed: perhaps, that night, the most dejected and reluctant convert in all England." So writes C. S. Lewis, who later became one of the twentieth-century's leading Christian apologists. An author of brilliance, clarity, humor, and charm, Lewis wrote successfully for scholars, theologians, the man in the street, and perhaps, most surprisingly, for children. None of his works is more beloved by them than The Chronicles of Narnia. This seven-book series begins with The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, a symbolic re-telling of the Christ story. The much-anticipated movie, which bears the same name as this first book, will open in theaters in the United States on December 9.

Lewis's admirers are hoping the film will accurately reflect his Christian sensibility and not fall prey to the "dumbing down" and emptying out that often accompany the secularization of spiritual classics. The fact that Douglas Gresham, Lewis's stepson, is deeply involved in the movie's production gives cause to hope that the film will be true to the spirit of its remarkable creator.

Clive Staples Lewis, who as a child re-named himself "Jacksie"–later "Jack"—was one of the best-known and most influential writers of the previous century. Translated into at least thirty languages, his works have sold more than two hundred million copies worldwide—with the Narnia stories accounting for half that number. Nearly all of Lewis's thirty-eight books are still in print, and for decades they have sold more than a million copies a year around the globe.

Born in 1898 in Belfast to a middle-class, Protestant (Church of Ireland) family, he fought briefly in World War I, graduated with a brilliant record from Oxford, and then taught English Literature there for nearly thirty years.

A man of great erudition, sterling prose, terrific humor, and heroic kindness, this intellectual giant was not only an expert in Medieval and Renaissance Literature, but also, as his great friend, J. R. R. Tolkien, put it, "a scholar, a poet, a philosopher" and "after a long pilgrimage," a "lover…of Our Lord."

Lewis's evolution into a one-man army in defense of orthodoxy—was neither quick nor easy. Although raised as a Christian, Lewis had, by his teens, become a "convinced atheist," considering Christianity on the same level as Norse mythology—and preferring the latter.

Through reading G. K. Chesterton and discussions with believers, Lewis became a Theist in his late twenties, but it took an amazing late-night conversation with J. R. R. Tolkien, to convince Lewis of the divinity of Christ. This was all the more remarkable because Lewis had been raised "never to trust a Papist" or a philologist—and Tolkien was both. On September 19, 1931, Lewis finally accepted Christ when Tolkien convinced him that Christianity was not —as he had thought—only a myth, but a story that had actually happened. From then on, Lewis believed that the "myth" had indeed become fact, and as the Gospel of John so beautifully puts it, "the Word was made Flesh."

A couple of years later, Lewis, Tolkien, and some other friends formed the Inklings, a group that met several times a week—in Lewis's rooms and at a local pub, "The Eagle and Child"--to read their unpublished work aloud and to discuss matters of the moment. Many of Lewis's books and much of Tolkien's now-famous Lord of the Rings were first read to and discussed by this highly literate group.

During this time, Lewis, a committed Anglican, began to distinguish himself as a defender or orthodox Christianity with The Screwtape Letters, Mere Christianity, Miracles, and The Weight of Glory. He also wrote a space trilogy, "smuggling in," as he put it, quite a bit of theology.

But how did a childless bachelor immersed in scholarship come to write classics for children? Perhaps listening to Tolkien's Ring Trilogy encouraged Lewis to try his hand at a fairy tale. Indeed, both of them had agreed that since no one wrote the kind of stories they liked to read, they would have to write some themselves! Even as a child, Lewis had loved and written stories about animals performing gallant deeds. A further impetus may have been the arrival of four children who came to stay with him after being evacuated from London during World War II. Amazed at how few stories they knew, Lewis began to write a tale about children who had gone to stay with an old professor who lived alone in the country.

Later he picked up that thread, impelled by images of "a faun carrying an umbrella, a queen in a sledge, and a magnificent lion" that kept coming to his mind. On a conscious level, Lewis also said he wanted to answer the question, "What might Christ be like if there really were a world like Narnia and he chose to be incarnate and die and rise again in that world as he actually has done in ours?"

The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, published in 1950, answers that question by telling the tale of four children who accidentally enter Narnia through a magic wardrobe. With their help, the great lion Aslan (a Christ figure) redeems Narnia by breaking the power of the evil White Witch who has made it "always winter,…but…never Christmas."

Through Lewis's faith, imagination, and humor, his books have won a following worldwide. They continue to win hearts for Christ and have built a bridge of understanding among Christians, especially between Evangelicals and Catholics. In fact, the late Pope paid the author of The Chronicles of Narnia the ultimate compliment when John Paul II said, Lewis "knew what his apostolate was. And he did it!"

That is a tribute that Lewis, whose life and work flowed from recognition that "the Word was made Flesh,” would certainly have been quick to appreciate.

~ Article source, Tothesource

Pride and Prejudice

2005-11-13T00:34:00.000-08:00

Which movie adaptation of Pride and Prejudice did you like? A&E or the most recent release?

Post your comment here.

What is "Easier Than Love"?

2005-11-08T23:13:00.000-08:00

There did exist a time when talking about sex was taboo. Even in the 1950's television programs were prohibited from showing couples in bed together. TV shows like "I Love Lucy" had to show couples sleeping in seperate beds!

Living in a Hypersexual Culture

Sex is currency
She sells cars,
She sells magazines
Addictive bittersweet, clap your hands,
with the hopeless nicotines

- Easier Than Love, Switchfoot

Fast forward to 1991 when songs like Salt and Peppa's "Let's talk about sex" and Color Me Badd's "I wanna sex you up" hit the Top 10. Yes, since then everyone is talking about sex and everything is about sex.

No longer kept to the privacy of the bedroom, sex is used to promote everything from deodorant to cell phones. The sacred intimacy shared between a man and a woman is paraded unbashedly with no one even stopping to think, "What's wrong with our obsession and abuse of sex? How does it affect my soul?"

Where is my soul?

It's easier leave
It's easier to lie
It's harder to face ourselves at night
Feeling alone,
What have we done?
What is the monster we've become?
Where is my soul?

- Easier Than Love, Switchfoot

As put so well in Switchfoot's song "Easier Than Love" (from their new album Nothing is Sound) sex is "easier than love/easier than life" because when the relationship is just about sex it's "easier to leave/easier to lie" and "easier to fake and smile and bribe."

But when you've had your fill of making love, what are you left with? With yourself. Loneliness and memories take over. At this point, where or who is there to turn to?

There are many different "solutions" offered by our world to fill this feeling of emptiness. Sex is one of the solutions. But we've tried that already. Are you willing to try another solution? But before you say "Yes, I want to try another way," are you willing to examine and confront the dangers of our culture's sexual obsession?

Porn Nation

A group of students from three Canadian universities have said, "Yes, we're willing" to confront the destructive nature of our hypersexual culture, especially the danger of pornography over personal, spiritual and relational well-being.

As a result, the Porn Nation multimedia-based live speaker campaign will address every student's need for love, acceptance and authentic relationships. The Porn Nation presentation creates an accurate and intriguing picture of the hypersexual present day culture while being non-judgmental in tone.

Perhaps the greatest power of Porn Nation is in its authenticity and vulnerability. In an increasingly hypersexual culture, porn is big business. With over $57 billion in sales and more adult bookstores than McDonalds, perhaps it's time to ask, are we becoming a Porn Nation?

We all desire love, acceptance and true intimacy. But sex cannot and will never provide that for us. Let's be willing to challenge our personal wrong attitude and thinking about sex.

Visit iamnext.com to read more on the effects of pornography on our mind and spirit.

Looking for a life coach? Or simply need someone to talk to? Talk to the life coaches at iamnext.com

Could it be true?

2005-10-27T13:49:00.000-07:00

I was in utter shock as I read this Newsweek article that reveals the change in Anne Rice's "spiritual allegiance." Anne Rice is a prolific horror fiction writer, the likes of Stephen King, is most famous for the book Interview with a Vampire.
She says in this article-interview "I promised," she says, "that from now on I would write only for the Lord."
Whoa. I wonder what instigated this change in her spiritual beliefs? And furthermore cause her to renounce a cult-like following and lucrative career?
If you're curious to know read the article below.

The Gospel According to Anne Rice
By David Gates
Newsweek

Oct. 31, 2005 issue - Sometimes Anne Rice won't leave her bedroom for days on end—and neither would you. Glass doors open onto a terrace that looks over the red-tiled roofs of La Jolla, Calif., to the Pacific Ocean. A live-in staffer brings meals to the table at the foot of her ornately carved wooden bed, which faces an ornately carved stone fireplace. She exercises in a huge bike-in closet. She's got two computers and enough books to last her a year. Splendid isolation? Splendid, sure. But she's often got family visiting in a downstairs guest suite, she reads The New York Times every morning—"Nicholas Kristof is a hero to me"—watches news "till I can't stand it anymore," and spends up to an hour and a half a day e-mailing with her extraordinarily faithful readers.
Story continues below ↓ advertisement

They've been worried about her. After 25 novels in 25 years, Rice, 64, hasn't published a book since 2003's "Blood Chronicle," the tenth volume of her best-selling vampire series. They may have heard she came close to death last year, when she had surgery for an intestinal blockage, and also back in 1998, when she went into a sudden diabetic coma; that same year she returned to the Roman Catholic Church, which she'd left at 18. They surely knew that Stan Rice, her husband of 41 years, died of a brain tumor in 2002. And though she'd moved out of their longtime home in New Orleans more than a year before Hurricane Katrina, she still has property there—and the deep emotional connection that led her to make the city the setting for such novels as "Interview With the Vampire." What's up with her? "For the last six months," she says, "people have been sending e-mails saying, 'What are you doing next?' And I've told them, 'You may not want what I'm doing next'." We'll know soon. In two weeks, Anne Rice, the chronicler of vampires, witches and—under the pseudonym A. N. Roquelaure—of soft-core S&M encounters, will publish "Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt," a novel about the 7-year-old Jesus, narrated by Christ himself. "I promised," she says, "that from now on I would write only for the Lord." It's the most startling public turnaround since Bob Dylan's "Slow Train Coming" announced that he'd been born again.

Meeting the still youthful-looking Rice, you'd never suspect she'd been ill—except that on a warm October afternoon she's chilly enough to have a fire blazing. And if you were expecting Morticia Addams with a strange new light in her eyes, forget it. "We make good coffee," she says, beckoning you to where a silver pot sits on the white tablecloth. "We're from New Orleans." Rice knows "Out of Egypt" and its projected sequels—three, she thinks—could alienate her following; as she writes in the afterword, "I was ready to do violence to my career." But she sees a continuity with her old books, whose compulsive, conscience-stricken evildoers reflect her long spiritual unease. "I mean, I was in despair." In that afterword she calls Christ "the ultimate supernatural hero ... the ultimate immortal of them all."

To render such a hero and his world believable, she immersed herself not only in Scripture, but in first-century histories and New Testament scholarship—some of which she found disturbingly skeptical. "Even Hitler scholarship usually allows Hitler a certain amount of power and mystery." She also watched every Biblical movie she could find, from "The Robe" to "The Passion of the Christ" ("I loved it"). And she dipped into previous novels, from "Quo Vadis" to Norman Mailer's "The Gospel According to the Son" to Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins's apocalyptic Left Behind series. ("I was intrigued. But their vision is not my vision.") She can cite scholarly authority for giving her Christ a birth date of 11 B.C., and for making James, his disciple, the son of Joseph by a previous marriage. But she's also taken liberties where they don't explicitly conflict with Scripture. No one reports that the young Jesus studied with the historian Philo of Alexandria, as the novel has it—or that Jesus' family was in Alexandria at all. And she's used legends of the boy Messiah's miracles from the noncanonical Apocrypha: bringing clay birds to life, striking a bully dead and resurrecting him.

Rice's most daring move, though, is to try to get inside the head of a 7-year-old kid who's intermittently aware that he's also God Almighty. "There were times when I thought I couldn't do it," she admits. The advance notices say she's pulled it off: Kirkus Reviews' starred rave pronounces her Jesus "fully believable." But it's hard to imagine all readers will be convinced when he delivers such lines as "And there came in a flash to me a feeling of understanding everything, everything!" The attempt to render a child's point of view can read like a Sunday-school text crossed with Hemingway: "It was time for the blessing. The first prayer we all said together in Jerusalem ... The words were a little different to me. But it was still very good." Yet in the novel's best scene, a dream in which Jesus meets a bewitchingly handsome Satan—smiling, then weeping, then raging—Rice shows she still has her great gift: to imbue Gothic chills with moral complexity and heartfelt sorrow.

Rice already has much of the next volume written. ("Of course I've been advised not to talk about it.") But what's she going to do with herself once her hero ascends to Heaven? "If I really complete the life of Christ the way I want to do it," she says, "then I might go on and write a new type of fiction. It won't be like the other. It'll be in a world that includes redemption." Still, you can bet the Devil's going to get the best lines.
© 2005 Newsweek, Inc.

I miss my computer

2005-10-04T23:14:00.000-07:00

Check out the iamnext "Back to School" issue: www.iamnext.com

I should be going to bed (need to get up at 6:20am to give Dave a wake-up call and get ready for work), but I guess I've been craving to touch a computer and here I am yielding to the temptation. I've been away from my computer for (let me count) 5 days!! Almost a week.

I was in Ontario last week for a conference with 450 (crazy and energetic) Ontario university students (Queens, Guelph, McMaster-olay-olay, U of Toronto, Waterloo, York, Carleton, etc) and had a great time... but there was no internet connection to be found because we were in an isolated camping area in Haliburton (3 hours north of Toronto).

We stayed in beautiful White Pine Camp. Why do I describe it as beautiful? Imagine a tranquil deep blue lake hidden within a woodland and bordered with trees of vibrant hues of green, red, brown and burgandy.

Ontario does not boast of the majestic beauty you find in BC or Alberta, but it certainly has that quaint loveliness that is most appreciated on a peaceful afternoon when you just want time to relax and reflect.

I love nature, but it was killing me not to check my email. I'm so thankful for text messaging!!

Then today (Tuesday) I went to a place called Charis Camp, which was somewhere beyond Chilliwack (goodness knows where it was... we got lost on the day) for a day of prayer. I;m still amazed that my workplace takes time away from "work" to do another type of work. Whoever said prayer is not work does not understand prayer. I have so much to learn in this area of my spiritual life. I was truly touched today by God's presence as we sought His face corporately.

Well, I think I've got my computer fix now. It's time for beddy-by.

Till next time...which may be three months from now (if you look at my blogging pattern). Well I'll try for next. Maybe if some of you would leave me comments I would feel more motivated to respond!!

PS. Thanks to Amy Schmidt for starting a blog... you inspired to write this post.
PPS. I'll post pictures of Ontario next time.

2005-04-19T21:59:00.000-07:00

"Planning for Success" - Watch out for the upcoming May/June iamnext issue

2005-04-19T21:55:00.000-07:00

Fact and Fiction: Finding Truth for University/College Students - the current issue on www.iamnext.com

A Desert Time / "Interruptions" in Life

2004-11-18T13:03:00.000-08:00

I guess this is the prime time to blog. Confined to a bed with the luxury of wireless internet and a laptop: it's a blogger's dream condition. So I begin my exposition on what I call my "desert time."

Last week (starting Monday) I was experiencing intense headaches, which were soon accompanied with "chills." I didn't realize they were fevers because I was in denial that I was sick. On Wednesday I noticed my lymph nodes were enormous. But I didn't have a sore throat. By Saturday I had to cancel all planned events and force myself to go to a walk-in clinic because my body was so exhausted.

On Sunday evening, Dave and I were having dinner at my parents and he was observing how exhausted I was. Half joking, he suggested that my symptoms seemed like mono. After searching online for a description of mono symptoms (many of which matched what I was going through) I was convinced that I had to at least ask my doctor for a blood test for mono.

I hate blood tests, by the way. As a child I almost fainted when they drew blood out of me. Just the idea of a sharp object puncturing my flesh bothers me.

I received the results from my blood test quickly - and the result was positive for mono.

So I've heard that it can take up to months to recover. And frankly, I terrified of that possibility. I'm frustrated that I'm physically incapacitated right now.

I'm at another Jabok. Dave and I were recently listening to the recording of Gary Inrig's sermon about Jacob wrestling with God (CCC Staff Conference in Ottawa 2004) and Inrig talks about "wrestling" with God on a hospital bed after experiencing a retinal detachment.

I've never had a face a serious "interruption" to my life's plans due to health or physical problems. Perhaps in the arrogance of my youth, I never thought my life would get slowed down by an illness. I was wrong. I've never outright thought that I was "invincible," but perhaps I've lived like I am.

I have some friends who have experienced more difficult health challenges than me. For example my dear sister-saint Jocelyn Tomkinson. What a fighter! Physical suffering certainly brings a new insight and appreciation for God and life. But that's if we turn our mind and heart towards God, not away from God.

Right now I'm finding it very difficult to give thanks under my circumstances. I have much more to say about this desert time. But I will leave it for tomorrow because its getting late and my body wants to rest.

But as I was lying in bed today I disciplined myself to give thanks to God - and once I got going, it poured out:

Praise God because He is my Heavenly Father.
Praise God because He is in control and has a purpose for our suffering.
Praise God I have parents who love me and who have taken me home to take care of me when I'm sick.
Praise God that I have a boyfriend who loves me madly and calls me his "sickie."
Praise God that I have a best friend who loves me and drives all the way out to Burnaby from UBC to visit when I'm sick.
Praise God for the human immune system that it naturally fights off viruses and bacteria.
Praise God for a wonderful little brother who I can bug and tease and yet still loves me.
Praise God that my mom is an awesome cook!
Praise God that my Dad loves me and drives all the way to Surrey to bring me my "fuzzy sheep" hot water bottle.
Praise God that there will be an end to all suffering.
Praise God that our bodies will be glorified in Heaven and that our earthly bodies will decay.
Praise God that He loves us despite our imperfections.
Praise God that Jesus Christ our mediator sympathizes with our weaknesses.
Praise God that I don't have to live with guilt each day of my life.
Praise God for the freedom His love and grace give me each day.
Praise God for His faithfulness each day.
Praise God that He's in control.

Sex Pays for School

2004-11-11T09:02:00.000-08:00

This is incredible... What have we brought ourselves to....

-----------------

Link~ http://www.peak.sfu.ca/the-peak/2004-3/issue9/fe-sex.html
Sex pays for school: Advice for students in the sex trade.
By Amy Chung

The sex trade industry is often portrayed to be a lucrative but shady business, pursued by people from the "wrong side of the tracks."However, times have changed, and many students are turning to escort agencies and street prostitution as a way to finance their education.
One 22-year-old computer science student turned to escorting as a way to get out of debt.
"It's not what people may think. The money is good and it's pretty fun," he says.

After working in retail part-time, Tommy was dissatisfied with the wages that he was making and finally turned to escorting. One day, I was flipping through Now Magazine [an alternative weekly paper in Toronto] and saw these self-advertisements and I thought, 'Hey, I can do this.' What I make in a day now is like one pay cheque I earned in retail."

Valerie Scott, the co-ordinator of Sex Professionals of Canada, a political organisation fighting for the decriminalisation of prostitution, observes the growing trend of student sex workers over
the years. In the last few years, I have met a lot of student sex workers who escort or prostitute themselves on the street so they can pay for their education," says Scott.

However, there are other reasons why young people turn to the sex trade. "Some people go into the sex trade because they need to, want to, have to, or they're forced to do it," says Dan Lavoie, an advocate for sex trade workers and editorial assistant at Xtra, a lesbian and
gay newspaper.

Lavoie began street prostitution at age 13 and says that as a result, he had to grow up fast. However, he says that he made his decision partly because he needed to do it, but also because of the intrigue of the underworld. "At one point, I was addicted to drugs, living on and off the
streets. Since I didn't have the option like most kids to seek funds from my parents, I turned to street prostitution," says Lavoie. "Although I have a deep fascination with culture and subculture, I was well aware of what I was getting myself into." However, Lavoie advises students that it is a choice and that they should look at all options before getting into this business.

With high tuition fees and additional debts that students accrue, part-time minimum wage jobs are often not good enough anymore. "Over the past few years, I have observed an increase in student sex workers because of the high tuition fees," says Scott. "These girls can get a job as a bartender or a waitress and, sure, you get tips, but the hours are dramatically decreased when working in prostitution and it gives you more time to study."

If students do look into the escorting industry, Scott suggests that they work independently as opposed to working for an agency because of commission cuts. "The escort agency used to receive 25 per cent of the commission, but now it has increased to 65 per cent, and this does not include paying your driver. So, if your agreement is $200 for a date, you're going home with $80," says Scott. She encourages women to work independently, not only because of the
drastic commission split, but also for their safety.

"Women may feel that affiliating themselves with an agency would be safer because there's a driver waiting for you, but it's not [safer] because the driver may have to drive another girl after they drop you off." Another important reason why escorts should be independent is to
protect them from a "bad call or date." "Sometimes, female escorts are victim to bad calls/dates and have been assaulted by their client, and the agencies will not help them because their biggest fear is being placed under investigation by police. Now, you are helpless because the agency will withhold the client contact information from you so you cannot report them," says
Scott.

Scott advises sex trade workers to go with their intuition to ward off potential bad clients.
"Trust your gut feelings because that's all you can rely on. Few agencies are good, because they let you speak to the client so you can get a feel of who they are," says Scott.

Although prostitution is legal, soliciting is not. Therefore, Scott advises that people who want to be in this business must be careful about the legal issues. "Advertise in a publication, call on a landline, and agree to meet your client at a hotel which he rents, because if he doesn't, then
you have to cover the tab which [can] then be considered a 'common bawdy house.' If you're caught by police, you may face two years in prison and unlimited fines."

Scott speaks of one woman who came into her office and spoke about how the police stripped her of everything she owned. "They froze her account and assets. They arrived at her apartment with a moving van and took everything, even the kitchen cabinets," says Scott.

Scott also suggests that sex workers get their money up front, so that everything is settled before anything begins. "I had a bad date where the guy just refused to pay me, and I took
him to small claims court and won. Sometimes, women are not likely to report these instances because they're afraid to be prosecuted and they're outing themselves because the courts [are] public," she says. "Nothing is inherently dangerous about this business. It's the way
we're forced to work that makes it dangerous," Scott insists. "If prostitution was decriminalised, like it is in Australia and South Wales, there would be fewer bad dates occurring, and the escort
agencies would be more likely to protect their workers."

"Compared with other jobs, sex work pays quite well for the amount of time you spend. It's a great job for students because you work on your own schedule," says Scott. According to Scott, most of the clients are normal people and the shady portrayal that sex workers receive is mostly untrue. Lavoie agrees.

"It's not what the media portrays it to be. They need to stop the negative portrayals," says Lavoie.

Canadian University Press

Been Missing from the Cyberworld

2004-10-28T18:15:00.000-07:00

I really don't have a creative excuse as to why I haven't been blogging. Thank you to my three friends who cordially reminded me today that I need to get something up.
I'm not used to have an audience :)

Lately I've been busy doing support raising (praise God I'm at 32%!) and spending time with family and friends.

Last week God had to re-teach me some of the basics of my faith - love, forgiveness and obedience. I was particularly touched by the parable in Matthew 18 about the servant who can't forgive his fellow servant even though the king forgave and cancelled his debt of 10,000 talents (1 talent = 15 years wages). I felt like I was that miserable servant.

I'm so grateful to the Lord Jesus that he willing subjected himself to a life on earth so that he could relate to our weaknesses, but not only that, he took upon himself God the Father's punishment for our weaknesses - death. How incredible is Jesus... he overcame the power of death and came back to life. And this is the life he promises to give us - a life that is loving, free and abundant that we can even stare into the face of death and fear and have powerful victory over such monsters.

I was reminded how in I Corinthians 13 God says love always protects, trusts, hopes and perseveres. I think the "life application" of this principle is happening to me right now. And it's a wonderful time to be learning about God's way of loving.

My Sore Throat and New Shoes

2004-10-13T12:15:00.000-07:00

(Because I don't want to get kicked off Stef's (sdot) blogger top 10 list, I've got to keep up with my blogging!)

So what's the connection between my sore throat and my new shoes? Here's the story:

On Monday morning I woke up with a terrible sore throat. I felt like someone scraped the inside of my throat. I haven't been sick with a cold like this since January. Sigh. I've forgotten how vulnerable my body is to weakness... My life the past year has been a constant "go, go, go." But, finally my body said "Stop."

I find my body and my mind fighting with each other. Often side with my mind and ignore my body. Unfortunately, my mind and the rest of me is housed in a body with many limitations. (How I groan to be released from this "house.")

So my sore throat started like this... Recently, Dave, my boyfriend, has been encouraging us to exercise together. And at the beginning I wasn't overly excited about the idea because the word "exercise" connotes the word "discipline." And this rubs against my spontaneous personality that loves to do things because "I feel in the mood." But I'm very grateful for Dave's encouragment because I know it's an area of my life I've neglected. Although my "house" is deteriorating it doesn't mean I just stand aside and watch it go. I can help prolong its usability. But first I need the right equipment to get on this "restoration" project.

So last week I bought a new pair of runners! My first pair since Grade 10! That was 8 years ago!! It was not a spontaneous buy... I checked out three different Sports Chek stores in three different cities and I finally I found a store that had the shoe I wanted in my size.

Excited about my new shoes I hurried home to go for a jog and try them out! But the weather didn't cooperate... A few minutes into my job the drizzle turned to rain and me and my new shoes got soaked.

I got home exhausted.

I think that experience break down my immune system and opened my body up to every infectious bacteria. And because I'm such a generous person who loves to share all I have, now Jon (my brother) and Dave both have a cold.

So that's the story of my sore throat and new shoes.

Pagans in our midst

2004-10-07T22:10:00.000-07:00

I've been editing two new articles that will be going up on iamnext. They are about Paganism and Witchcraft - unveiling their widespread influence in our culture.
I'm very grateful for Hannah Nichols for writing these two pieces (she's our writer who lives in Hamilton, Ont). She has the courage and tenacity to work throught these difficult subjects.
Something I learned from Hannah's articles is that Pagans/Witches believe that there are two nights in the year when the veil between the spirit and physical world is the thinnest. And Halloween falls on one of those nights.
Many of us are unaware of the spiritual implications of getting involved in such activities. When it comes to dark spirituality, I would stay far, far away... you don't know with what kind of powers you are dabbling.

Walking on Water

2004-10-06T16:06:00.000-07:00

I know it's a mean, but it's hard to hold back the desire to mock when you see a new driver abruptly and unnecessarily break in the middle of a busy street. I feel like that new driver learning to manuever my car through the "Artists" neighbourhood. With every word and sentence I carefully formulate in my head, each lose its magic and signficance the moment my hand hits the keyboard, and I hit the breaks "backspace, backspace."

Why do we deny who we have been created to be? I'm still uncomfortable with being labelled "an artist." To be honest, I don't feel worthy to be included in such a community. I admire the courage and determination it takes to pursue a vision and lifestyle that often involves being misunderstood, unappreciated, ridiculed and pushed to the side lines of society. Hmm... sounds like the same qualifications as a prophet.

I do see artists as modern day prophets. Just as there, historically, have been false prophets (those who tap into divination for power and whose teachings lead people astray), there are artists whose art cause people to dwell on their state of desperation and cynicism. As someone who is ascetically inclined, I do not undervalue the role of art that exposes the negative, but I do disagree with art that only gazes into darkness.

The reason prophets and artists proclaim their "message of doom" is not for the purpose of being the societal killjoy, but to steer people away from their error and bring restoration. Because we're idealists in our hearts, we forsee what life "could be like," and it pains us to see the disparity with what life "is like."