Aunty Vini's Greendot

Here's a link to some pics on facebook that loren has put up, I tried to put them on the blog but they seem to take forever to upload. http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=98683&id=698141471&ref=mf

This is sometimes how we spend our monday's at Aunty Vini's house. She is a mad genetic scientist who gave up her real job to make science programs for kids (thus the madness, fm peaceful environment of cell replication and mutation to the chaos of children). Here is nate, ike and kenneth (who nate calls kenny), creating environmental chaos at her home.

She got them to race balloons and then to make their own mango ice cream with mango from her tree. mmmm....

I have started growing vege's in pots now... will need to sort out how I get a garden box here but so far this is the sprouting of my corn plant.

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.

Boys on week long break

With the boys being older, the school holidays seem alot more fun but we're only halfway 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 his younger cousin 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 meihua (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).

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.

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.

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.

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...