Wedding season

Today morning my friend Sahar sent her wedding pictures to few people in the office. Seriously, it made my day! I am so happy for her to be married to someone she loves! She is one fo the most beautiful brides i've ever seen! And this picture is one of my favourite! Love you, Sahar!

Smile, Hug, Hold Hands!

Today I learnt something interesting from one of the doctors. I was told that scientific research showed that smile improves your immune system and helps to bring down the stress. Same thing with holding your loved one's hand, it helps to improve the immune system of both and calms you down. Isn't it amazing? I also knew that hugging has a healing effect and is called "holding therapy".

How do we love

How hard it is sometimes to love people simply because some of'em hate you for whatever reason, and how high is the religious standard to develop an unconditional love that is beyond all earthly things. I love you BECAUSE you love me, I love him BECAUSE he is very sweet, I love her BECAUSE she helped me the other day, I love them BECAUSE I have to love them BECAUSE they are my family, I love this couple BECAUSE they're always smiling at me in the morning when I go to work, etc... That's easy, and I would say that's how animals express their feelings, if you pet and feed them, they are nice to you, but if you beat them, they bite and wound you. But we are not animals, then why do we behave like them? How easy it is to return back a smile! How hard it is to keep smiling at someone who turns his face away from you again and again... How about God's love? (I know a guy whose name is Godlove:)) Isn't it amazing that He (God) loves everyone no matter what people do with their lives, no matter how they treat others and no matter how much they care about Him. There is no "BECAUSE" in His love... The only difference is that if they don't love God, they won't ever know how much He loves them. What a loss! It is all about opening one's heart and letting Him work through it. Human's heart is never enough to love everyone, unless God lives in it... Once one experienced the all-embracing love deriving from one's love for God, he will ever fear to loose it and will try to keep it in his heart, through pains and sufferings, through tests, rejections and disappointments, even at times through humiliations; his heart will grow bigger and bigger and the whole other world will be opened for him. What a gift, what a joy, what a blessing...

O SON OF BEING! Love Me, that I may love thee. If thou lovest Me not, My love can in no wise reach thee. Know this, O servant. (Baha'u'llah: Arabic Hidden Words, Page: 5)

O SON OF MAN! For everything there is a sign. The sign of love is fortitude under My decree and patience under My trials. (Baha'u'llah: Arabic Hidden Words, Page: 48)

Some pictures, as promised.

During performance. Sheila Aquino-Birung, soloist for "Ya Baha'ul'Abha" and "O, Baha'u'llah". (photographer Kiyoko Nanni)
During performance. Dancing to our "Bare necessities" song. It is actualy possible to dance and sing at the same time! (photographer Kiyoko Nanni)
During practice. Some basses (lower male voices in the choir) - Adib, Zhenya and Bernard. As u can see, choir can be a lot of fun. (photographer Negeen Sobhani)During practice. Consultation on stage. I think we were talking about our movements for "Bare necessities". BTW, Mandu, the one in the middle, together with Martha, was our choreographer for this song. She is also a very good soprano. (photographer Negeen Sobhani)

During practice. During technical rehearsal in the Auditorium. Some sopranos (higher female voices in the choir)- Mutale, me, Patria and Neva. (photographer Negeen Sobhani)

During practice. Here is our conductor, Franco Aquino, very talented young man from the Philippines. (photographer Negeen Sobhani)

Simple Gifts

Have few minutes before lunch, wanted to share how our choir concert went last night. We all looked so smart, in white and black outfits, guys were wearing bowties, so cute! Took a lot of pictures, will post them later. Dr. Varqa was at the concert which made it a very special event. The hall was almost full with the exception of few emtly seets in front. Sometimes people are too shy to sit in front and sometimes they prefer to veiw things a bit from a distance. When Theresa (Kipp) announced the Bahai World Centre Choir, the audience started clapping and cheering us by wisteling and hoohing. We came on stage and my heart was trying to jump out of my mouth very badly. I couldn't sing the first song - needed some time to calm myself down, so i just mouthed it out. The atmosphere was great, the audience was so loving and cheering, our conductor, Franco (Aquino), was very encouraging, always smiling and giving us some hints to support us. I coudn't help crying while singing "Dastam Begir Abdul Baha", i love this song so much, and of course, our soloist "Corinne Padilla" did a great job singing it. i heard so many people saying that they cried:) We danced while singing "Bare Necesseties", it was so much fun and absolute surprise for the audience, they were laughing and clapping to the bit of the song. Children joined us for the prayer "O God, my God", they were so cute in their little suits and girls with their little dresses, trying to follow conductor's movements:) Franco's sister Sheila (Aquino-Birung) came to visit her family here and did a solo for two songs, one of which was a finale of the concert, "O, Bahaullah". We did it with the sound track, it sounded very emotional, especially becouse this is her first visit to the Holy Land and first time she performed in front of the Hand of the Cause and Institution members, she cried when we presented a huge, beautiful bouquet of flowers to her. It was a surprise for our soloists Sheila and Corinne and for Franco as well. Everything just worked out so well, we managed ot collect money and keep the flowers away from their eyes. Amirskiy (my zhanym) helped a lot by bringing them back stage before the last song so we could present them at the end of the concert. Our stage and technical crew worked so hard putting things together, i am so amased by their selfless services. We had a 15 minutes slideshow in between of the two parts of the concert, choir members didn't have a chance to see it properly yet due to being occupied with vocalizing and learning lyrics, but Kevin, who put the slides together has said he will show it to us separately. It consisted of some history of the choir, had some videos from defferent concerts and pictures of past and present. People were so uplifted and happy after the show, indeed music has a great efect on human souls.

"...We, verily, have made music as a ladder for your souls, a means whereby they may be lifted up unto the realm on high;..." (Baha'u'llah: The Kitab-i-Aqdas, Page: 38)

Engaged!

I guess, i can announce to the whole world that i am ENGAGED!!!!!!!!!!!! yea... Thank you, thank you, thank you in advance for your congratulations! He is the most wonderful person in the world, and i am VERY VERY happy and excited to start a new chapter in my life together with Amir.

29

Yesterday i turned 29.
I had a wonderful day, full of surprisees and gifts, many friends sent me their greetings and wishes over the email. The day started with the SMS message of my sister at 2 in the morning, saying how much she loves me and how much she misses me. It was very sweet of her, and i know why she sent SMS so early knowing the time difference, she just wanted to be the first to congratulate me, so sweet. But of caurse, she didn't know that my zhanym called me the night before right after the sunset to wish me a happy birthday ahead of anyone:) i miss my sister a lot, but i was too sleepy to reply. At 4 in the morning i heard another signal for SMS, this time it was my father. Of caurse, i didn't reply either, and two hours later my mom decided to send me a message too. I love my family! I think they were racing who is first to express their love to me:):) in the morning my zhanym called me and sang a happy birthday song in russian (second time), which sounds very sweet with the pilippino accent:):):) he is such a sweetheart:) At work i heard the happy birthday song AGAIN from my office colleagues and according our office tradition everyone gave me a big hug, so at least 25 people hugged me yesterday, isn't it great! And i even had a cake that Mutale made for me. This was a total surprise! It was delicious! Men, i wish every day was my birthday! One of the best presents of that morning was the announcement of my two good friends of their engagement, i was so happy for them! At night my zhanym, my brother and i went to one of my favorite places of Asian food in Haifa that is called "jiraff"(rather strange name for the Asian food place), where we had some noodles and spicy rice with some see food, yummy! the day ended with the Youth Prayer gathering at the Shrine of the Bab organized by the Youth Committee, i couldn't think of a better ending of my birthday! At night, before going to bed i talked to my zhanym, and then thought of how i don't feel to be 29 at all. It's just a number anyway. I felt a bit sad that each year the number grows bigger, but it was not long, next day i felt fine. All my friends and people that surround me here did so much to make me happy on that day! i am so greatful to God that i meet the most wonderful people on my path of service. Anyway, i have to remember next time to say 29 instead of 28 when i am aksed of my age:)