Tip 211: Apply for something & document your life

I just had time to relax after a busy day filling forms. That's the life of a daddy who runs the family abroad and relocates his beloved wife and daughter from their familiar territory. I guess I can't complain too much as my daughter is growing up well and mummy is taking good care of her. I just finished documenting all of the information I have entered in the forms I filled earlier into my personal library. I looked into my folders and see tonnes of scanned documents in folders named Malaysia, Japan, Hong Kong and Singapore. All of this forms part of my wealth of experience and knowledge. It defines my life. I reflect back and can only attribute this to the act of applying. It can be for a new job, a university course, a contest, a home loan, a scholarship or even for entry into a country.














Only by applying, will you seek for information and if you are diligent like me, you could document them. Then, the next time, a form requires you to answer your Student ID and addresses of all your universities, or your previous company addresses and salary amounts, or your children birthcert numbers, you have them all ready. Unlike some, I never need to go back to search for my passport for its expiry date because I have them all at my finger tips.














I can say that I am quite an application guru now. To a certain degree, applications can cause some stress when you have not established a base where you started gathering information since young. For instance, do you keep information about your vaccination history during childhood on the types and dates of vaccination? The less you have tracked since the start of your education, the more likely it may haunt you one day when you start making applications.














We live in a mobile world these days and different countries have different information requirements we thought unlikely. Even if we do not start documenting our own life records, we may want to do that for our children to keep thorough records of everything. Or would we want to disappoint our grandchildren one day simply because we are not as savvy in keeping track with our life records and unable to stay with our children to care for their children? :)














Ok, I do think too far ahead for my age. Its hard to suddenly start documenting. As mentioned, make more attempts to apply for something. It can be for a new credit card, an exam for a new language or a new club association if we think that further education and migration are for the adventurous. It is because when we do start applying, our life grows and it may never stop growing as we document and reflect whenever possible. Of course, God is behind our every longing to grow as we seek after His grace in such applications.














(Photos show Haruka sitted at a sofa at church having her photo taken by pastor Keigo Ohtani, her latest fan and second photo showing Haruka with sunglasses at the Marina at Keppel Bay, and next along Clarke Quay riverside admiring a cute dog and being admired by the dog's owner).