New sleeping arrangement

Ike likes sleeping with Nate and luckily nate likes sleeping with ike too. When they don't sleep together, ike wakes at 4 or 5am and cries and then sometimes wakes everyone up. Together they sleep till 6am.

For a while they have been sleeping on a thin mattress on the floor. I thought I might as well buy them proper beds, maybe even a bunk bed but I think with nate's flopping around, a bunk bed may not be the best idea for now. So I head off to Ikea today and found the same bed that Nate has but in a different color. Voila, the boys are now in the same room, we can downsize our home!

HDB uncle haircut

Wonder if it would be less traumatic if I took them to the Toys R Us haircut but they charge like bandits! While waiting, an older boy spoke to nate and taught him how to look for the Laofuzi comics from under a big big pile of chinese magazines. Several people have asked me if I send Nate to a local school, would I be worried about him picking up Singlish, well no, because I can also degenerate into a really bad version of Manglish (Malaysian English) and its good to speak the local lingo. Just that the boy's features and what they say may cause a bit of incongruence to the receiver?

Not sure if you guys can spot it but Ike had a few chunks of hair shaved off the back as well.

Ike had a "cleanliness" issue... for a long time he was very particular about getting his shirt dirty and so would not participate in art class, will even burst out crying... so I went to buy an easel fm Ikea and after 2 sessions of us painting, his teacher tells me he now paints in class. Well... he also used to be "anal" no pun intended about cleanliness after poo-ing, loads of soap to wash hands, loads of paper etc... this week, he decided to make poo art on the school toilet, urgh urgh urgh. I hope he doesn't head the route of the Damian Hirst type artists and make these wierd yucky art. yucky yucky yucky. Well on the other hand, I guess he is prepared to go to China!

I really hope bubbi survives this trip. So far with the planning I am feeling alot more comfortable that she will make it. We will be renting a furnished apartment (luxury one built by Keppel Land fm Singapore), nice pool, new, spiffy, near supermarkets and amenities. Chengdu is the capital of China 2000 years ago.

The two pics are of the boys at Aunty Vini's house, she made them trains. The vege garden I am building there is not turning out too well. Will probably make them into flower beds. I have bought alot of pots and will build a vege garden in individual pots instead.

More mug shots

So in order to expand my boy's interaction with the world around them, I took Nate and Ike to a very local barber shop, ie at a HDB (public housing) block, where people only speak Singlish there.

I will post other pictures later, but halfway thru the haircut, Ike starts to freak out, I think because the methodology they use for Chinese boys is, number 3 shave then a really close cut on the back bottom bit (which Ike did not like) and thus has a very wierd cut at the back), I think the barber also was not used to hair like the boys where they don't stand up on their own but are softer and stick closer to head.

Well it was only US$ 3 per kid. No girls after nate and ike this week post haircut.

These mugshots I took for their visa application to China.

class photos again

more school photos

Ikes class photo

Holidays...

everyone is talking about holidays.... the public schools break in June, the international schools also mid june, the boy's school breaks in early July for two months.

I have decided on 3 weeks in Chengdu after buying the lonely planet. I looked up the neighboring cities and hiring a car isn't as easy as in India, the best way to go around is by train tho there seems to be no bullet train inter the cities we want to go so they are still rather long rides. There seems to be loads to do in Chengdu itself, from visiting Dufu, the poet's area to seeing the Panda breeding sites.

Also am going to book Club Med and then skiing in Hokkaido. Oh.... I may be in S. Africa in November as loren is there on business.

I got a new mac book and am immensely happy, everything is faster, I cleaned up my files. The printer miraculously works again...

So I got stopped by another mom yesterday, conversation went like this, "my daughter came home and said she doesn't want to marry Makoh anymore, she wants to marry Nate", me: "ooh?", her, "i asked whats wrong with makoh and she said nothing but nate makes me happy...." ooook. I asked nate which girl he likes better, he rates them by the toys they own... so that's why kara has been trying to get him to her house to show him her toys.

Here's Nate and Max doing their phonics class. I have joined the ranks of the Kiasu parents.... well actually nate is on the verge of reading and is sometimes quite frustrated, now am hoping he learns fast so that he can read his own books and occupy big chunks of his time.

Here is Ike eating those red ball fruits that used to grow in our garden in taipei in springtime, then we had a tree full of free fruit, here its like 9 bucks for a small basket.

They had their first donut as well in Aunty Jin's house. Her new place is really decorated nicely, I think if I need decorating work, I'm going to go ask her. Its really nice to see nate and his cousins hang out and play.

Mat Rempit's...

For those who do not know, a Mat Rempit are those crazy bikers in malaysia on their bikes, going as fast as they can and zippy noises in the process, of course being a traffic hazard... well my two boys on the SA plastic bikes are like Mat Rempits when we go for walks. I brought 4 of them along and realised its not so easy for other kids to play with as its a new toy and movement that they get mowed down by my boys, am considering passing 2 to my nephews but as they live on a hill, it feels like not such a great idea.

Por por is down here again and ike was quite cute the first day he saw here, he said, "purple draib to coo", which in Ikey speak is "porpor drive us to school..." They really like seeing porpor and have been counting down the days and also gave her a big hug when she got here. They also insist on sleeping with her... when she leaves tomorrow, we'll start the count down for Zeda.

I went to to the HK art fair last week and it was good for contact building and also meeting up with my friends in HK.

Nate had his first phonics class and I have asked his teacher to start giving him chinese writing homework. I think I will try and buy rice paper work books and brush for him as well to practice chinese calligraphy. He has kind of caught up with the class as he was 6 months behind when we got here. Am now planning our summer trip to Chengdu.... its going to be hot there, I really hope I do not kill bubbi in the process.

Looks like china now has high speed trains everywhere and am tempted to take bubs, porpor and the kids thru Chengdu (where we will meet up with Christine), then to Chongqing (hotter than Chengdu) and Guiyang and a few smaller stops. This is part of the the route my granddad took during the Sino-Japanese war, when he fled Shanghai and ended up near Guilin and Kunming. There is a cartoon conference I'd like to attend as well in Guiyang but not sure if we'd survive the 4 to 5 weeks on the road... maybe a solution would be to send bubs back with the kids while por por and I soldier on!

Thats the boys squishing my bag before I leave to HK... Nate's new girlfriend, Sage (I like her because she has Transformer toys) and Jonas, her brother who is Ike's best friend.

Our first shabbat

We had our first shabbat on friday, as the guest were arriving, we find that we don't know where we have unpacked the kippahs! So that will have to wait till the next shabbat. Here is the IKEA throw we put over bullet's seat...

Nate had a playdate at his girlfriend's house, her name is Sage, her brother is in Ike's class and Jonas is Ike's best friend. Sage has the same chinese middle name as me and according to her mom, she is in love with Nate and wants to marry him, he's up for grabs again next school year as she will be transferring to another school. Nate always seems to find kids with celebrity parents... his gf's parents are apparently TV or local movie stars. I probably should start watching more TV.

Am off to HK this week for the Art Fair, I have been having many different meetings, from the new director of the Chinese Heritage Board to publishers and consultants. Lots of stuff brewing in my head but hopefully something more concrete soon.

Weekday activities...

As the boys get out of school at 12:30, I'll take them on an excursion, somedays we go to the beach on Sentosa with a view of the tankers... another day we went to a nursery up in sembawang, where nate chose the venus fly trap plant for his show and tell and I bought myself some orchids.

There is also a big big public pool near our place which we went to check out last week, we can see the MRT zipping pass, but too bad can't board, I have yet to find a convenient park and ride facility.

Vinisha has now given me a bunch of worms to start my worm farm, hoping it will work out, the specie is different from the rather docile variety fm SA and these guys seems to want to escape the bin all the time!

I had a lot of "errands" to run the past two weeks, from having to head to JB to get my new passport to sorting out the levies one has to pay on helpers here, apparently the autopay system didn't work and the government wants to retract Olivia's visa, which will mean postponement of the hiring of my second helper. grrr.