Tuesday, April 28, 2009

Boys on week long break





With the boys being older, the school holidays seem alot more fun but we're only half way thru this one week holiday trip and I find myself planning for our Chengdu trip in summer.

We zipped up to KL for a few days, the first time I have driven up in some time. Quite an easy drive, the boys will sleep half the journey after having lunch. They seem to remember KL and had a great time with their cousins. Here is Nate holding up a BIG mango that dad brought for dinner one night. Nate and Wei-Wei are now best of pals as they are both quite brave on all sorts of jungle gym type stuff.

Here is pistol resting, some cockatoos (kakak tua as they say here) roaming free and landed to eat fruit at a tree in the boy's school. Nate's painting of Mei hua (plum blossom), he had a very good report card, excelling on all fronts (which makes me think maybe the competitive local school environment may be a good challenge for him?) and still catching up on chinese. Though he got a good report for effort. He likes learning fruit names and seems to be on the verge of reading. When he wants something he can already string together a 14 word sentence in chinese.

Ike seemt to have elongated ie his head doesn't seem too big for his body now. Talking alot but needs a bit of effort to figure out what he is saying. My favourite is, "ike leepy" (ie sleepy).

Wednesday, April 22, 2009

Public Schools vs. International Schools






I have been looking into the possibility of placing the kids into a local primary school... however its a big maze... a rather big process is involved. The standard of public education is very high but there are limited chinese based schools. Priority is given to alumni (we are not), children holding PR (we are not [yet] as that involves the boys needing to serve the army), parents that volunteer (ok this is doable but I will have to start soon if we want to get nate in) and the home must be 1km from the school (hmm I need to go buy a map and do radius circles!). Now add in the fact that we want a higher chinese content and not related to a missionary school, then we are down to less than 10.

Now, even if we save money by sending them to a public school, my friends say that we will spend all the money back on tuition classes just to keep up with the class! (which is then equivalent to private schools)... incredible, so maybe its not the school but all these extra classes that the kids are taking that are boosting exam results? I think Nate would thrive but the chinese content even in chinese schools is 47% (imagine they even know the %! and its only the non-core subjects that are taught in chinese, not even math).

The other day I was at my cousin's house, her son who is born the same year as nate and will go to their neighbourhood school (not even a top "ranking" school), already reads (in some program that my cousin thought is quite miraculous... he could read after lesson 1 and in 10 lessons he is quite proficient, now why go to school at all??? these extra lessons/programs seem to be alot better!) and writes... many by the time they go to primary one can write short compositions.

On our walks we see kids doing their homework at night. Tasks for tomorrow, will buy map to see if our house is within the perimeters of Nanhua Primary. If not... second line of defense... will need to go look for alumnis that can get me an appointment with any headmaster!

For now, they stay in their school. Nate is progressing quite well, here is a pic of him doing his homework, he seems to quite like homework. He comes home knowing the sounds of alphabets like on the cusp of reading... As for Ike... he still whispers instead of talking in school. Today he said "mao" (for cat) before the teacher said anything, they were so thrilled. He also ran back from the toilet, came into class and said to the 2 teachers, "tisooo, TiSooooo", when they gave him toilet paper, he ran with it (a tail trailing) and took it to yuyu (the class helper) as they ran out of paper in the toilet for another kid. He got many stars today.

Here's Max, Nate's best friend. They were both born in Taipei only about 2 weeks apart. Both declaring the other best friend instantly. Nate also likes his cousin, Caden and they will likely take swim and drum lessons together.

Wednesday, April 15, 2009

Nice big playground



that is close to our home... porpor also found a local wet market, less than 5 min drive and now I can order fm the fishmonger, the vege seller, the noodle and tofu man and fruit seller in advance and then have them load my car up on a specified date.

While at the market, we spotted this big playground for the kids, also the community center (yet to check out but looks fancy) and a local PAP kindergarden. Have been feeling like CNIS may not be the right choice for the kids and have some time before they hit primary school to sniff around, am now looking to research the local chinese govt. supported schools.

Our trip to Kamalaya was great, we were the only participants of "beyond daily struggle" so we got alot of good deal as it was one on one and totally tailored to us. They "married" us again, so sorry folks, it was not planned, we eloped for our second wedding. The resort had quite a number of interesting resident healers etc., I didn't have enough time for the shiatsu man but loren did shiatsu and chinese dr did a tuina (chinese massage), I think his shoulder is better. I have been curious about hypotism and so did that... not sure if its truly working but please excuse me if I am talking to you about some triggered subject and my arms start flapping like a bird or something.

They had great plants there, I managed to get a red ginger torch cutting which is now in my garden, hope it will thrive and angel hair, that plant that survives on air and water only.

We got back and were told pistol was severely depressed. He stayed in his little bed the whole time, olivia had to bring his food and water, he only budged when we got back. Today I took him along to the above park and he seems alot perkier. I think I will take him out with me everyday and see if his mood improves. We saw a decline before leaving and are considering giving him away for a better life.

The boys.... they did a little dance when we came back, stayed up for cake since it was dada's birthday.

Monday, April 06, 2009

Classes outside of school...





are quite expensive here (compared to SA), well everything is expensive compared to SA but to NY or london or Tokyo, even Helsinki, I think its must be quite reasonable.

Here's Nate at music class, I found this place called Magic Fiddler that allows him to take 10 sessions and 2 instruments, so he takes 5 lessons in drumming and I think 5 in guitar and there are teachers for about 6 instruments, so he can test them out before committing to one long term. Ike didn't enjoy his music class to much, I wonder if he was too tired.

On sat, they had a superhero party and they discovered... SATAY. Here is the satay man on his bike, his little grill at the back and the yummy BBQ on skewers. The Ben Ten cake of course was delicious as well. They had a strange magician there that would enter a rubber ball, do some tricks and then come out of this big rubber ball again.

2 more days to loren and my trip to Ko Samui! yay, I am all packed.

Today Nate surprised me, he said "please be quiet" in chinese as I was talking to porpor rather loudly. In the afternoon, he started saying about 10 to 15 new chinese words, his favourite being long juan feng (tornado). Today he also did more homework than necessary, practicing the writing of numbers. He is quite numerical.

Ike on the other hand... hmmm may be too young for his class and is ticking off on the lower end of the learning spectrum report card.

Am starting to plan our summer trip, Chengdu it will be. Which will be HOT.

Wednesday, April 01, 2009

Wushu Mushu






Been trying to find a karate type class for nate and found a great one for wushu, chinese kung fu for nate, he did very well in the class except he wants me or dada to be there. So now I have to look for a father and son class which may be private lessons... Ike also did well but for the first 30 mins, then he spotted a playground. I also found a music class for them and they will teach the guitar and let them try out several instruments. Thats on Friday.

Here are the boys cooling down in the singapore heat and they have taken charcoal fm my orchid pots to draw on the sidewalk, nothing a torrential rain can't clean. My pool net is up... now to deal with decorating that pool bathroom and our meditation room.

Quite a number of guests lining up in our visitor list... tomorrow Uncle Peter will be taking the boys to the science center, I get the afternoon off! yay... Ikea here I come...

Nate's rash has calmed down alot, the dr says his body will adjust to the new changes, something triggered it and she thinks could be like the paint in the house. The stitches will come out on monday. His steroid dose has been halved but for another week. The dr thought Ike and him were friends and not brothers, she thought nate was an only child. hmmm...