Adventure number 4 : Pulau Kapas

From Cherating, which we saw a basic turtle facility, we headed up north to Marang to catch our next ferry to Capt. Pirate's Longhouse. From Paka to Kerteh we go thru Petronas' huge oil refining facility.

Also picked up Jagong Rebus (boiled corn on cob) from the roadside, along with coconut jelly and the usual rambutans. We forgot to ask what Air Nira is but found out its the juice of the coconut flower from day 1 (day 2 is samsu, alcohol and day 3, it becomes vinegar), so we didn't get to try it in our forgetfullness.

We meet the captain at marang, he is like a pirate (the boys were enthralled), his boat practically skips across the choppy waters and we are bouncing up and down the waves (bubs turns a light green).

We are greeted by a pirate flag... the boys are excited!! the longhouse has a resident green snake called, Joe, a dog and other wild life. The facilities are even more basic than Pulau Sibu, no aircon, shared bathrooms, no hot water, need to cook!!! Quickly we bail and manage to get to Pulau Gemia, a small island 800 meters from Pulau Kapas. The boys dissapointed that we would not be exploring the caves of Pulau Kapas... but... it was just a tad basic with a lively bar around the corner at night, that would have kept the kids awake and too many things to watch for (snakes... and jellyfish and poisonous shell thing in the ocean).

I manage to get us a spot on Pulau Gemia and we bail with a boat pickup... just before the captain pirate had time to pull out his plank and make us swim.

To be continued.....

Adventure number 3 : Impiana Cherating

Quite a nice resort, the beach was very quiet, if we could do the walk, we would hit Cherating Club Med. Considering we are going to Club Med in Bintan in August, we thought we would check out a local resort.

Bubbi is undoubtedly the ping pong champion. They have a nice Kopi Tiam restaurant and we got a very nice connecting room. More beach and shells and pool time.

We did go on a night river cruise to see the fireflies and went with a bunch of very noisy hongkongers, luckily the fireflies are not noise sensitive. The little strip of Cherating town was hard to find but the town area is alot livelier than where we were staying (not at all like Ko samui), it had a bigger flat beach and the boys really enjoyed the batik painting activity. We will do that one again as its quite hard to make an ugly batik painting.

The fireflies light up the dark dark river like christmas lights. The day river tour looked interesting too but we have not done that yet.

We had very good ikan bakar (baked fish), walked in a kampung area, saw goats and chickens and monkeys. Oh and waiting for bubbi to do her internet, a monkey actually climbed on our car roof, peering in to see what he would be interested in. The boys giggled the whole way thru. Someone shooed him off eventually.

We also found a place to do our laundry (ahhh the luxury of clean laundry) and they charge by the kilo.

Adventure number 2 : Summerset, Kuala Rompin

This is a strange place, its on quite a nice beach but a huge facility that resembles someones dream of the English countryside. I chose it for the beach and the in between distance, so that we don't travel so far per day. We got a nice big 2 room home with kitchen and living room, after our basic accomodation on sibu, this was nice... everything is nice after our first place!!!

We picked up nice chestnuts on the drive and mangosteens.

So this place has horse riding and many other activities, but as with Malaysian things the upkeep is not so great. We spent most time in the pool and a walk on the beach, ever fearful of sandflies.

The kids started to nap in the afternoon and they would then have a later dinner and more pool time. When we got here, there was a big corporate group that just had alot of people in the main buidlings but we had our own nice isolated area.

Bubbi was happy to get CNN again.

The Great Epic Malaysian East Coast Journey...

or rather that was what my friend called it when I asked him, which is better to do, east coast malaysia or bali with young kids. Considering he lives on bali now and has done east coast malaysia extensively, we set out on our east coast journey.

Sorry no pics yet, I decided not to drag my computer out for fear of some of our wilder boat rides... we have had some hit and miss places and we are half way thru our malaysia holiday but almost the end of our east coast journey.

We started out on the 8th of July... from singapore, heading up to Kota Tinggi, saw a museum there, not bad one, good leg stretcher. Had very good rambutans on the way, only M$2 (US$0.6) for a kilo of yummy, yummy rambutans. The type that does not take the peel off the seed. The kids liked this snack the whole way of our trip so far.

We took the scenic route to the jetty that would take us to Pulau Sibu. The route is through one of the FELDA run palm oil plantations. The jetty is basic. The ride across to the island quite good. The Sibu Island resort is heavily advertised in singapore and its run by an australian. So far it has been the most expensive of all our lodgings. For what it was, a hut, no aircon, no hot water (unless you ask) and sand flies, it is too rustic and although I had done the sandfly prevention (ie oil), I forgot my back and have had to suffer the whole trip so far with an itchy back.

Ike got bitten too but he seems to not mind it. They have great service, a kid's club and I managed a dive (bad visibility but any time under the ocean is great). Nate in his skin adjustment started a full scale break out of rash as well.

The resort has nice old trees and hidden view, a newer resort next door that is coming up but the sand flies is just not pleasant enough for me to ever come back. We took a snorkelling trip one morning to a small island that was wonderful. Loads of fish, nate got to snorkel and use his fins and we picked loads of shells.

This place does have the best brownies and the food is very good, they cater meal times for adults and kids... but we were quite happy to get off the island... to our next adventure, or as nate calls it our second adventure...

i peek kainese

that is one of ike's sentences... i pekenese? like as the dog? well he actually means "I speak chinese" but can't quite pronounce S or CH yet.

Speaking of dogs, bullet got too close to a smaller dog this week and got his nose chomped in, it looked quite bad. Ouch. Then he got into another fight with a dog at the doggy park nearby and bit the dog in the back. The other owner had not leashed their dog and although bullet was leashed he still managed to grab the other dog, wonder how this ties in to the fact that he has a soft mouth and is not supposed to crush the fowl when he picks it up after a hunter has shot it down.

Will try to get a pic of bullet's healing nose.

Friday last week...

Nate had his portfolio day, which meant we only needed to be in school at 10:30. So the boys stayed home and I took them to the supermarket. There we found some water bomb balloons and made a bunch.

The kids built a farm in the corner of their class room.

I had planned earlier with Ping (Pasqui's mom) to go to the Science Center after the portfolio review so this is Nate in the big nose (acting as snot) and him on the big big tongue. As a side thought I am wondering whether I should bring Ike to a speech therapist?

Here's my new tomato patch. Today I also sent an email to the guys who sell the veggie boxes to see the weight. Am tempted to have them send one over. Otherwise maybe I will lug it back from our SA trip in November. I used the first batch of compost from my composter though the gardener recently added mango leaves which had not quite broken down yet. I had him dig a patch for the sunflower shoots that are coming up nicely as well.

Spoke to Vini today, she said they had a big crop of radish, the only crop that did well in her garden so far.

Video Clip : Ike and his tractor

I think this was Dec 2007. Note his funny crawl.

Ike's report card

ok the video is from SA... prob 9 months ago but since I seem to be having success posting video clips, I thought I'd post it here.

Comments from English Teacher:
Ike is a quiet and sensitive little boy who has a kind and caring personality. His friendly and gentle nature has made him some good friends and in particular enjoys playing with Jonas. They can often be seen in the playground chasing each other or hanging on the monkey bars.

Ike finds it difficult to interact with the older children adn prefers to play with Jonas or by himself. he will happily join Yuyu for classroom activities where she will assist him with his work. He is becoming a little more confident in the classroom, class assemblies and school events but would still prefer an observational role than participate. His listening skills are developing and he is able to follow instructions and complete tasks with assistance.

Ike has produced some lovely assisted work in his Portfolio and I think he is very proud to see how much he has achieved in this semester. I am sure as Ike matures, he will enjoy participating more within the classroom and as a result, his confidence will grow.

Comments from the Chinese Teacher:
During this semester, Mingming has made tremendous improvement and has reaped some rewards in Chinese, he is now able to enjoy the activities and time spent during Chinese class.

Ike has been greeting me in Chinese everyday this semester, under his teacher's encouragement, he is now able to speak a few simple chinese words and describe things. He has made some improvement in his expression too. He has also made improvements in listening and understanding skills. He knows "wash your hands", "line up", "drink water" etc and can use simple sentences to reply to questions I asked, eg. "my name is mingming, I am 3 years old".

Considering that this child has made significant progress, I suggest to the parent to continuosly expose the child to Chinese as much as possible.

... and hence mommy suffers with liangzi laohu song in the car every day!! and an hour of chinese songs and phrases when the kids are in the car. At night sometimes I hear the Shaolin temple song being played!!!

Nate at his first week in Chinese class - BLUR -, in fact he fell asleep in day one of chinese class.



Nate at mid term - LIP SYNCHING -



Nate at end of term - SINGING!! -

Nate's report card

Nate's report card is quite good, I"ll try and also upload the video of him in chinese class, from the first week, mid term and at the end of term...

So Nate's report card is quite good, with more than 80% the teachers score him (on 60 areas like able to understand chinese instructions, able to understand xyz concepts", "applies knowledge to real life situtaion", "engages in conversation with peers and adults", " works independently when required" etc... on the "surpassing expectation" box. about 20% in the "meets expectation" and one dot in the "progressing towards expectation", which is "interest in chinese character and able to master some characters", well that is sorted now as I have changed all his memory cards with chinese characters, he now recognizes more than 20.

Ike on the other hand, has scored entirely in the 3rd box, ie "progressing towards expectations". In hindsight I wonder if this was the right school for him as he was a bit young to join age wise and probably maturity wise.

Nate's english and chinese teacher wrote this:
Nate has been displaying good manners and good behavior towards others. He has been socially active and constantly initiates interactions with classmates. He may be a bit playful at times but behaves when asked to. He is happily settled in school and is willing to learn new things.

During the semester, Nate has shown improvement in learning Chinese. He has a long attention span and is able to quickly remember Chinese songs, vocab, poems, and nursery rhymes. He has been expressive of his feelings in singing songs, poems and rhymes. He likes to listen to Chinese stories and is able to remember the main characters in the story. He is able to quickly answer questions about the stories read in class.

The teachers also said his math ability is very good. Will do ike's report in next blog. getting ready to head out now.

Nate's evaluation

I had a long chat with the coordinator of the school, apparently since we arrived mid term, we weren't given the orientation package etc. But insists the desemination of information will be better next year. She also showed me the written evaluation they have for ike which will be handed out to parents soon.

I sat with Nate's english teacher and chinese teacher.... Although nate joined mid year he caught up well (wonder if he needs a more challenging peer group?). Both say his math and memory are really good. His chinese teacher showed me 3 video clips, clip one, early stage in chinese class, he looked really blur (apparently first day of class he even fell asleep), second clip, nate was doing the lip sync and third clip, he could verbalise every word while playing london bridge.

The chinese teacher also commented how she was so proud of him at his snowman recital. He performed even better than all the rehersals and was not afraid at all. His classmate pasquale who was a bit scared with the crowd watching, asked for nate to recite with him a song about autumn, the teacher asked nate if he remembered the words and he said yes, so he went up with pasquale and stole his show.

She said his logic and math is extremely good and gave me a good idea... we came home, I used all the old name cards fm south africa (recycling!) and made them into memory cards with chinese words from his school like dong fang i tiao long (a dragon from the east), his name and many new words.... he can recognise them!!! bubbi, we will be playing memory by the beach but the cards are of chinese characters, talk about handicapping!

Grrrr-oooo-vy

Well actually I think they look a bit scary like that really rich, sleazy and old playboy in HK that wore similar shades.

So someone came and stole loren's bike from our porch! Luckily 2 weeks ago I insured the household contents and we will be able to claim back from insurance, what was great also was I could do the entire report online and a policeman called me at home to verify a few facts.

We had a nice dada's days with friends over for brunch and pool. Pictures are posted on loren's facebook, must go hijack the photo's.

Am debating whether I should book all the spots we want to stay along the east coast drive trip holiday ore maybe just the first 3 spots and then see how the flow goes, its anyway low season. hmm hmm hmmmm.

Ike's school evaluation

Here is a panda painting by ike. The school evaluation system I feel here is not as thorough as Broadacres. They do not even have categories that tell me whether his gross motor skills, fine motor skills, speech, social etc. are at peer standards or not. I think he is absorbing stuff, he sings little songs now and has really started to talk alot at home although the teachers say in school he whispers and talks really quietly. Everything he does is still teacher assisted. Overall he is happy at school and maybe he is a tad young for his class so he is not really applying himself.

Nate's evaluation is next week.

Our trip to Chengdu is cancelled, mainly because of the Swine Flu. China does not have the facilities for a big outbreak and we may all get home quarantined upon arrival which would suck. So the plan change is to now drive up the east coast of Malaysia. It is turtle season, so there is a good chance we will see turtles coming to the beach to lay eggs and a hatchery. Also we will get to visit a Kelong (fishing home on stilts), local markets, one of the last few pristine ancient jungles (the worlds largest flower or maybe bud if it has not opened), elephants and nice nice beaches with snorkelling. Then we'll hit the east west highway, get to penang then to KL and back. Maybe do the west coast another time with bubs.

The Luge, Sentosa Island

I need to remember to go explore the Barrage with the boys, its the city reservoir where kids can play in shallow water with fountains as well.

The treetop view of a strange plant that had red flowers or fruit like the pinang used in Malay celebrations.
After the ice cream we head to the Luge, which is a "niu niu qe" type race buggy from new zealand, no picture of the actual vehicle here as I was driving with ike. Nate is still a tad young to do it alone, maybe on a quieter day with Kenneth but before getting there, one can either climb up the hill to get ot the launch pad or take the ski lift, which we did, was a bit scary as its open air and above the tree tops. Not like a ski hill where everything is white and snowy, one can't estimate how high one really is, here we could see and know how high we are. Ike was really trying hard to be as brave as he can.

They did enjoy the luge downhill! its quite popular that the owner said they have had no drop in customers and are building a new track!

Sentosa Island

in the morning is really nice, we got there at 8, cool morning sun, the boys played in gentle waves, I should have brought a magazine. There was a guy there with a metal detector and when we left at about 10 he must have picked up at least 30 pieces of jewelry under the sand! Mainly rings. Am glad I have reinsured my jewelry here and one less worry wearing them though I should be getting the settings rechecked.

After the beach, the boys washed off the salt water at these little fountains and as it was getting hot we got an ice cream. Ike not even coming up for air!

Zeda in Singapore

Zeda brought lots of toys... oh this first image has nothing to do with zeda but I saw it as an ad, quite a cute baby relaxing in a hot tub.

Zeda did lots of swimming with the kids and even went to nate and ike's little school performance (had to sit thru alot of speech contestants speaking in chinese before getting to the boy's performance part. Here is Nate with his song of the snowman which went something like this:

snowman, snowman
what a cute figure you have
no need for winter coat, no need for hat
then he says something which I can't quite make out...

Zeda now on a cruise to vietnam, hk, KK.... for 2 weeks. Back for more singapore sauna treatement... It had been hot the whole week with no rain and at last it rained today.

Here is a sculpture of a skinny snowman at vivocity, where we dropped zeda, had sushi then ben and jerrys. Ike calls this the kinny noman.