Wrong Side of Thirty

Freezing in Moscow

2009-12-15T05:29:00.007+08:00

This is our third winter in Russia. Yet, this is our first time experiencing really freezing weather. I mean, the past two years, winter was relatively mild, by Moscow standards, at the coldest, it was around -10, and when it did go much below that, we were vacationing back home near the Equator. So we never got to experience what minus 20deg C actually felt like.

Well, this year, I felt that winter has been pretty warm, but as it turned out, temperatures dipped significantly this week. Today, when I went out to the mall, it was minus 17C, and that was at noon. Tomorrow, the weather forecast says maximum temperature will be minus 22C. A Singaporean friend who used to work in Moscow had said walking out of a building in to minus 20C temperature felt like he was being punched in the face. Yikes!

Our predecessors did tell us that when temperatures dip below minus 10C, the weather is actually really gorgeous. It'll be sunny and bright, just extremely cold. It's when the temperature hovers between minus 10C and plus 10C that everything looks dull, dreary and depressing. They were right.

This picture of Sean outside school was taken last week when temperature was around minus 6C. The sky is dull, not a tinge of blue in sight.

Pictures below were taken outside the mall today. It was such a nice, bright day and the air felt crisp and fresh, the sky a brilliant blue.

Don't the buildings behind the mall's sprawling carpark look like HDB flats?

It was so cold even the condensation inside the car turned immediately into ice!

Winter is officially and truly here!

Solving the Bermuda Triangle Mystery

2009-12-14T03:43:00.006+08:00

The Bermuda Triangle of stationeries, that is. As recently as early this week, Brian came to me asking for a ruler and as usual, we couldn't find one. When he needed colour pencils for homework, again, we could only find a limited number of colours. It was frustrating cos I am always replenishing supplies but they seem to go missing as quickly as I could buy them.

So this weekend, I went around the house hunting for lost items from the Bermuda Triangle of stationeries. Recovered were about 50+ rulers (including about 7 protractors), 20+ erasers, 10+ sharpeners, 100+ pens (about 50+ blue, 40+ black, 10+ red and an assortment of other colours), 10 correction tapes/liquid, 100+ pencils (about 20 of these brand new in box) and hundreds of colour pencils. And this is after discarding a half wastepaper basket full of unusable pens/pencils/highlighter/empty correction tapes etc.

I organised the items and stored them in clear plastic cases such as this one for Blue Pens.

Hopefully, this system works and things stop finding their way into the Triangle.

Standstill in snowy Moscow

2009-12-08T02:55:00.006+08:00

This year, the first snow came on November 1 and since then it's been pretty much a snow-less affair. A bit of snow once a fortnight but generally pretty warm compared to previous years. When I say warm, I mean in early single digit celsius.

Today, the cold returned with a vengeance. It was just this past weekend that they started installing Christmas trees and decorations all around the development we live in. This is the Christmas tree that stands in the middle of the now snow-covered football field.

Picture below was taken at 10pm and right before this I saw a few Russian children making snow angels! Brrr...

I just found this on the internet. I was right about this winter being unusually warm, the caption on this WSJ's Picture of the Day read: SNOW IN MOSCOW: An honor guard soldier stood at the Eternal Flame outside the Kremlin in Moscow, Monday. Heavy snow hit the Russian capital for the first time this season as after record-breaking warm weather in December. (Ivan Sekretarev/Associated Press)

Apparently, today's snow caught Moscow authorities by surprise and traffic came to a standstill in the city. In fact, not just the city, we were unlucky to be stuck in school too. The workers are usually very efficient in clearing snow on the roads, but because the weather changed quite suddenly, they were caught off-guard.

All morning, I had been huddled warmly at home enjoying the Finale of Amazing Race, last night's X Factor results and then the Fall Finale of Desperate Housewives (season 6 is really good) so I didn't even realise it was snowing till Eddie told me. He called to warn me to keep warm when heading for school pick-up as the temperature was -7 and it was "snowing very heavily". I didn't take him that seriously, just said, "Got meh?"

The drive to school was pretty smooth. I had to pick Sean up after his Cooking Club activity at 430pm as Brian's activity ended only at 5pm today. I had warned Brian to hurry as Eddie needed the car for a function at the Indonesian Embassy at 6pm. But when we were ready to leave and I called Alexey, our driver, he said BIG PROBLEM, BIG JAM. So in my chicken-and-duck talk with him over the phone, I told him to call me once all was clear. Called Eddie to tell him Alexey would probably not be able to make it to him in time, and he said he'll take a cab to his function and Alexey could pick him up after the function.

Took the boys to the cafeteria, ordered loads of french fries and a bottle of coke. And then Eddie had to call Alexey and rushed him, cos he was worried traffic to the city would be really bad, so he wanted us to start heading back. Quickly finished our fries, went into the car at 5.24pm, and the car moved maybe 10 metres, still well within the school compound, and we were stuck there for almost 1.5 hours! During that time, the car moved maybe 5 feet more. Unbelievable.

I later found out that the SQ station manager's daughter, who goes to the British school, was stuck in her school bus for 3 hours today. So in comparison, the boys had it good. Still, I had to endure Sean's fatalistic, "We're never going to get home!" "We'll be here forever" "The car is never going to move!" whining and crying in the car on and off for an hour or so, I can't imagine having to do that for 3 hours in a bus. I think if he had been in a school bus, the bus driver would have kicked him out of the bus.

So we got home, happy to be warm, and Alexey heads for the Embassy. Then at 10pm, the door opens and Eddie's back, freezing cold. He and his colleagues had taken a cab from the office to the Embassy and abandoned the cab midway cos the cab wasn't moving. They took the metro and from the station walked to the Embassy. And then Alexey got stuck in city traffic and never made it to the Embassy. Eddie ended up taking the Metro and walking in -7 deg temperatures and terribly thick snow home! When he reached home, he could hardly speak and said he couldn't feel his nose haha.

Meanwhile, Alexey is still stuck in traffic somewhere in the city. Poor guy.

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow?...

Why homeschooling is out for me

2009-12-07T10:23:00.003+08:00

One weekend about a month ago, I told Sean he had to choose to either do some Math work or write a story. He refused. I said he had to choose one. He cried. I threatened. He cried some more. I threatened some more. In the end, he said, Fine, I choose writing. This is what he came up with.

There was a boy who needed to write a story on his older brother's not-used-anymore examination pad. He cried gigantic tears, like these. (see dollops of tears in box)

Then he had an idea. He wrote a story about himself, and this is the story that he wrote. Then he showed the story to his mother. The mother said the boy had to do math, and the boy cried gigantic tears again.

***********************************

And that is why homeschooling is out for me. But for those who think they can, here's a homeschooling site that one of the mummies here recommends.

Scooby Dooby Dooby Doo ooo ooo...

2009-12-07T00:57:00.003+08:00

Sean absolutely detests the cartoon Scooby Doo. Every time it comes on, he'll shout for the tv to be turned off or if Brian continues watching, he'll run off to his room.

This evening, the show came on. He started his nonsense again, "Turn it off, it's boring!"

I teased him, "But I like it."

He said, "Well, I don't. It's boring and it's always so obvious what happens in the end."

I laughed, "Really? What always happens?"

"First, they'll get chased by monsters, and it's not funny, and then in the middle when they get chased by monsters, they'll meet some people, and then they trap the monsters, and then they take off the monsters' heads and then the people they met are the monsters. It's always, always, always the same thing, it's boring."

:)

Hexy's Wonderful Winter

2009-12-04T19:06:00.009+08:00

Sean has been writing stories in school again. This one was done over about 3 days in school. He had told me he was writing a story about a snowflake. After a couple of days, I asked him if he was ending the story, he said no, he was still writing it. This was hurriedly ended yesterday after the teacher told him to finish up his story. Perhaps his teacher wanted everyone's work done before today's Parent-teacher meeting. I understand he has an unfinished Tortoise and Ants story...a work in progress.

Anyway, here it is, a story about Hexy the Snowflake. There are no paragraphs in his story but there are breaks here to incorporate the photos. I've also added in italic little notes of my own, stuff I had asked him to clarify.

***************************************

Full Title: Hexy's Wonderful Winter (but in the second part he didn't like it.)

Wheeeee! Hexy loved falling, especially with all of his friends. The sights were amazing. He saw a mini castle which had kids on it, chains attached to tyres, a gigantic spiderweb...Hey! This place looked familiar. Aha! I knew it! I'm in AAS, the best school that anyone had ever been to. THUMP! He landed on an interesting paper held by a certain person wearing glasses and had a green and black jacket. Hmmm...said an intrigued Hexy. Bose-Einstein Condensate? What is it? The fifth state of matter? (Note: Hexy was reading the paper held by the person wearing glasses...no prizes for guessing who it is.)

How are its atoms arranged? Oooooh! The atoms clump toge-FFFFFFT! A strong wind blew Hexy away and broke one of his bones. ARRRGH! screamed Hexy. RUMBLE went hungry Hexy's stomach. Faster and faster Hexy went until...BOOM! he broke the sound barrier! He was in space now, far above the heliopause (Note: Sean explains, Heliopause is the outer-most area of the Oort Cloud...and the Oort cloud is the part of the solar system that didn't form planets, that's where all comets come from; from my googling, Oort Cloud is a large sphere surrounding our solar system, considered to be the maximum range of our sun's gravitational influence.). But Hexy was still going fast. He was heading for a black patch which seemed to be sucking stars inside it. He was going to a BLACK HOLE!

Help! cried Hexy. VVVVVVVV...Hexy was reaching the event horizon (Note: Sean explains, event horizon is the point of the Black Hole where nothing, not even light, can escape) of the black hole. VVVVVVVVV...Nearer and nearer Hexy came. VVVVVVVVV...Hexy was very scared. VVVVV...PSSEEOUW! Oh no! Hexy got sucked into the black hole! Luckily Hexy's atoms reassembled themselves to make Hexy again.

Hexy saw wonderful shapes. He saw a cube, a tetrahedron, an S shape, a spiral, two pentagon-based pyramids stuck together tightly, a vase, a few megastars and a humongous atom. (Note: At the top left corner is Hexy, the top half of Hexy, that is, and the dots below that is Hexy's atoms reassembling; at first I thought it was the school swing or something).Suddenly, Hexy saw AAS...in the black hole! Oh no! said Hexy. I have to save them! With super speed, Hexy grabbed some indigo yarn, tied it around the school and, holding the yarn, shot out of the black hole like a bullet. ZOOM! went Hexy. The Earth looked bigger...and bigger...and then it looked HUMONGOUS.

With a KER-WHUMP and a BOOM the school landed back to its original position. Phew! Hexy wiped his sweat off. That sure was pretty fast. Little did he realize that in his later life he would encounter speed way faster than that. Hexy had just recovered from his broken bone when a laser gun fell to the ground with a WUMP and bounced into Hexy's hand.

It was quite heavy at first but for the next 5 weeks or so, it got easier and easier and easier to hold until it seemed as light as a feather (Note: He meanders a lot here, obviously losing the plot d). After Hexy's delicious lunch he got whisked away by a colourful gust of wind (Note: I asked him, why is the snowflake having lunch? Were you having lunch when you wrote this? He said, well, snowflakes have lunch, it's just that we're never outside during lunch to see them having their lunch.) Luckily Hexy was somehow hovering over the beautiful wind because Hexy soon realized the gust of wind was a lot of different plasmas cleverly mixed together.

He touched the plasma (Note: Big blob in picture is plasma) and POOF! He had a hard plast (typo: plastic) container around him! Soon it was spring. Hexy enjoyed watching his friends fall as raindrops and evaporating slowly into the air. Then it was autumn. The wind blew Hexy's container. Hexy rolled and rolled and rolled. Soon after it was winter and Hexy came out of his container. Holding his container, Hexy was blown away. "I wonder what things I will see today," said Hexy in that cold, winter morning.

The End (this is only Part 1, Sean says)

**************************************

Having seen his story, Ms Jayne says she will be teaching him about planning story plots, not meandering, paragraphing, and possibly moving towards cursive writing (which he already has handwriting worksheets on). Lots to work on for the little fella.

Parent-teacher meeting 2009

2009-12-04T16:09:00.008+08:00

In all the years that I've attended parent-teacher meetings, for both Brian and Sean, I've gone alone. Today, Eddie actually attended one with me! Unfreakingbelieavable. And I didn't even ask him to...he just decided he wanted to join me...which kind of felt a little strange at first. But it's all good. It is a momentous day indeed. :)

*********************

Anyway, the meeting was with Sean's teacher. As I had said earlier, I was really pleased when I found out who Sean got as his teacher this year. I hadn't had the chance to speak to her much since Sean joined her class so today was the first time we actually managed to talk about Sean and how he was doing.

The meeting started with her asking if I had any comments about the report she had sent home a week ago. Not really, I said, my main concern is the social aspect of his schooling. How is he doing in this area?

She said when she first saw that she was getting Sean in her class, she expected him to come in and strut around saying, "I know this, and I know that"...but that he's not at all like that. He is very sweet, friendly and always cheerful when he steps into class every day. Eddie was concerned that he might be snooty or rude to the other children, the way he sometimes acts around us at home, making nasty faces at us, glaring at us, saying we are silly etc. She says she never sees that, he doesn't show off, nor does she feel he is spiny (as in easily annoyed or upset by others). Generally an easy-going and happy kid.

I told her he says he doesn't have friends (he wasn't complaining or unhappy about this, he was just stating this as mere fact). She says he is friendly and children around him like him BUT they just do not have the same interests. What interest other children don't interest him at all and vice versa. And he's happy to be absorbed in his own thing.

He zones out completely when he reads. She loves watching when he reads cos he'll be so focused and then he'd suddenly burst out heartily in laughter. When it's time to line up, she tries to make sure there is no book around him, because if there is one, no matter what level, it could be a simple picture book, he would immediately be drawn to it and will open it up to read and that's it, zone out.

She said she's told the other teachers she's always worried when she sees his little hand come up, it's like, "Uh-oh, what's he going to ask now?" and that he keeps her on her toes. But recently, she was so pleased with herself cos for the current unit of inquiry, they were learning about matter, and she was telling the class about the 3 states of matter, when his little hand went up, and he said, "Actually, there are 4 states of matter." and she immediately pounced and said, "Aha!, actually there are 5!" She related this to us with much glee :)

I remember Brian talking about the 5th state of matter here when Sean and him were arguing about the 4th state of matter but obviously Sean remembered none of that. So when Ms Jayne started talking about the 5th state of matter, she said Sean got very excited and kept asking about Bose-Einstein Condensate. She soon noticed the glazed look on the other kids' faces so she told him she'd print out an article for him, he could read it and discuss with her later.

Ms Jayne thinks it must be very frustrating for him to know what he knows and yet not be able to share that with the kids around him. For example, the other day, he asked her if he could bring in his Mystery of the Periodic Table book. When she said yes, he came home looking for the book. Inside the book, I had written, "Dearest Sean, With Love, from the Tooth Fairy, 19th September 2009." She said he shared the book with his classmates, and again she saw the glazed look on the kids' eyes, and when it was question time, instead of asking about the book, they started asking when the tooth fairy came! LOL!

So she later engaged him by asking him if he knew all the different elements (or gases, I don't remember). He said he only remembers some. She replied, that's all right, I've forgotten many myself. Do you know the Noble Gases? He said he did, and started telling her what they were. I thought what she did was pretty impressive cos even though I had bought him the book, I had never heard of Noble Gases and wouldn't have bothered to find out. For sure, I never read even a page of that book.

Last year, I had asked Sean why he doesn't talk about all the stuff he loves so much in school, his reply was, "Cos no one would understand." Well, Ms Jayne seems to understand or at least make an effort to. Even when they were talking about Thinking Hats, she would introduce words like Metacognition to Sean, after which he'd come home and tell us about the new word he had learnt, Thinking about thinking.

She added that he derives his happiness from activities that are more insular, from reading, from absorbing information...For example, in Free Choice, kids can choose to do anything they want, and Sean immediately wants to draw, read, write or work on Math. But he's perfectly happy to be in his own little world. Which makes her wonder if we really need to make kids who are 'unbalanced' more balanced, or should we just accept them for who they are. Do we need to make them 'normal', what exactly is 'normal'?

I told her I've wondered the same myself, and I have no answer for that either. Everyone with asynchronously-developed children will always hear that their kids need to be more balanced. I only said that I wanted her to know that Sean is very happy to be in school, and that I'm happy with what she's doing, keeping him engaged and as much as she possibly can, challenged. Really, what more can a parent ask for of a teacher? I'm content.

The tortoise and the human

2009-12-02T16:59:00.001+08:00

Once upon a time there were two good friends. One was a tortoise and the other was a human.

One day, when they were walking down the pavement, the tortoise farted in the human's face and the human fainted.

Then the fart came into the tortoise's nose and the tortoise fainted.

The end.

The tortoise who ate everything

2009-12-02T16:40:00.000+08:00

From 1H2009

Once upon a time a tortoise ate the universe. She was still hungry.

She ate zero-space. She was still hungry!

She finally ate herself, and she was probably still hungry!

The hungry tortoise

2009-12-02T16:35:00.000+08:00

1H2009. The title is about a tortoise but the story is about a turtle.

Once upon a time, a turtle was dreaming about eating a Lettuce.

The turtle ate a lifetime supply of lettuces.

The turtle became very fat.

The strong old tortoise

2009-12-02T16:30:00.001+08:00

From 1H2009. This story doesn't seem to have any ending :)

Once upon a time there was a old tortoise. The old tortoise squashed a tortoise. The tortoise died.

(Tortoise is holding a cane. The yellow stuff sticking out from its bottom is not its tail, but the tortoise that was squashed)

The old tortoise got locked up in a cage made out of the strongest material on earth.

The old tortoise broke the cage.

Ocean

2009-12-02T16:24:00.002+08:00

From 1H 2009

Here is my ocean habitat. I hatched on a beach in Sentosa, an island near Singapore. What am I?

Here is my school. The tortoise with this: (drawing of a badge that the big tortoise has around its neck) is my dad. (note: At the boys' school, parents and other outsiders need to wear their special passes when in school)

On February 2007, my mom almost swallowed a plastic bag. But before she could eat it, she saw that it didn't have tentacles.

I want to be a scientist next time. I don't care if I look silly.

The end.

The tortoise who got squished

2009-11-25T03:45:00.003+08:00

From 1H2009

Once upon a time, a tortoise was chasing an ant.

Suddenly, there was a shadow.

(Note: Above the tortoise is the Big Toe of a human being :))

The tortoise got squished by a person.

The Giant Galapagos Tortoise

2009-11-25T01:24:00.002+08:00

From 1H 2009

This is a giant galapagos tortoise.

If you count the paws you'll get 5, which means this is not a regular tortoise.

And this is his great-great-great-great-great-great-great grandson. He weighs 92 tons.

The tortoise who got turned into a sausage

2009-11-25T01:08:00.005+08:00

For most of his final months in Kindergarten, Sean spent his time in school writing stories and illustrating. It was very much free for all, though in the beginning, he was limited to just 3 pages for each story. Two publishing parties were held, where stories were printed, laminated and binded into books, but besides the 2 stories Sean had 'published', there were lots more that he did in school, some more nonsensical than others, and his teacher passed them all to me at the end of the school year (June 2009).

The boys found the pile of stories recently and had a good laugh, I'm uploading these stories over the next I don't know how many posts. Some aren't all that funny, but the boys still laugh like hyenas.

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From 1H2009

Once upon a time there was a tortoise and a sausage-making machine.

The tortoise went into the machine because the tortoise wanted to see how the machine worked.

(Notice how he drew the tortoise entering the machine :))

The tortoise turned into a sausage.

Remembering Halloween 2008

2009-11-23T19:15:00.006+08:00

Last year, I posted about the Halloween Haunted House built by Brian's good friend Eric M's parents and their friends.

The pictures below show how the haunted house was built. I got the pictures off of Eric's parents' Facebook album (Brian is FB friends with them)...hope they don't mind. I know Brian secretly wishes he were in Eric's family, and I don't blame him one bit, heck, I'd love to be in that family. They are parents who truly make their kids' childhood utterly memorable. Just look at the amount of work involved, it is really a crazy undertaking! Eric says people call his family the Crazy Canadians, but if they're crazy, I honestly wish there were more of such crazy people in this world.

Bread by Brian

2009-11-17T18:33:00.004+08:00

By the time we had gotten back to Moscow, Brian had only 3 weeks left of his Breadmaking Elective. When school reopened last week after a one-week break, his new elective was Computer Graphics (Forensics was oversubscribed).

These were from his last two breadmaking sessions. This first nasty-looking one is Quick Winter Herb Bread. Brian is such a fan of his own bakes :) He gobbled this up cos no one else would have it. The ingredients include Basil, Oregano, Thyme, Honey, Buttermilk, Nuts, Raisins and Marjoram, whatever that may be.

Now this one I like. It's Bliny, it's like the national pancake. Both Brian and I gobbled this up real quick.

Now, seeing that Brian loved his own baking so much, I signed Sean up for Cooking after-school activity (which he was keen on too), hoping he might also start to learn to try new food that he prepared himself. Yesterday was the first day of Cooking. Brian and I met Sean after the activity and he handed us a container which held 3 star-shaped cookies with strawberry-cream fillings.

When I asked Sean if he'd like to eat the cookie, he said No, I don't like the filling. The cookies were really yummy, Brian and I chomped up one and a half cookie each. Even seeing how much we were savouring the cookies couldn't persuade Sean to just try some.

Failed experiment --should have signed him up for Basketball!

Russian Ruse Part 2

2009-11-17T16:26:00.003+08:00

Remember the Russian Ruse post from last year? The one where I was almost duped by this Russian maintenance guy...

Well, our filter needed changing again. In fact, I now realise just how way overdue the change was! The Russian Ruse post was from March 2008! Eddie finally arranged for someone from the condo management to change our filter. I waited at home this morning for this person to arrive.

Ding Dong...I open the door, and there he was again, the same fella who tried to cheat me last year...arggghhhh.

Nevermind, I led him to the bathroom, he changed the filter in about 5 minutes.

As he was leaving, I rummaged through my wallet and found spare change of 200 rubles, or about S$10, and gave it to him as tips. He took the money, looked at me with a grimace on his face and then proceeded to 'write' on the wall with his finger, 1, 1, and 0, followed by a Dollar Sign. In other words, he wanted US$110 for that 5-minute work!

I went "What?", and I think again he knew he'd be getting nowhere with me, so he handed me my 200 rubles (which he probably took as an insult), walked out the door and closed the door behind him.

He'd rather leave without a tip than go without his US$110?

??? STRANGE STRANGE STRANGE...

*********************

I have always been very puzzled by the way Russians (or at least those I've encountered) deal with financial matters.

For example, when we were hunting for an apartment, owners will ask for a certain rent, and after we offer that rent, they'd tell the agent that they've decided to wait it out for a few months cos they expect the rent will increase by another US$1000 by then. Expat friends tell me they have had similar experiences.

So, if let's say the rent is US$9000, they'd rather go without rent for 3 months and hope to find someone who'd pay them US$10000 later (maybe). In the meantime, they lose out on US$27000 of assured rental income.

??? STRANGE STRANGE STRANGE...

Fingers' uncrossed...

2009-11-17T11:57:00.002+08:00

...my internet woes are back.

Have not called Chief Engineer yet, don't feel like this will ever be resolved so am thinking maybe I'll just live with it. Feels like I'm back to the Singtel 56k phone line sometimes.

Oh well, as I said, this is Moscow.

Fingers' crossed...

2009-11-13T05:42:00.003+08:00

...that my internet woes are finally over.

Ever since I returned to Moscow about a month ago, I've been having trouble with my internet service. Being an internet addict of the highest degree, you can imagine what torture it is not having a reliable internet line. Sometimes it would be okay, most times I wait for long, long seconds and then realise the page won't be loading ever. Surfing with such uncertainty was such a pain.

A Russian-speaking technical support staff came by the first week I was back. As luck would have it, the internet never acts up when tech help is around, does this strange phenomenon only ever happen to me?! So Russian tech guy declares to English tech guy that I speak to over the phone that all is A-okay, no problem at all with the line. But once he left, my problem returned. Super frustrating.

This evening, Victor, one of two English-speaking tech support I had been complaining to (the other being Maxim) finally made his way over and after some investigation, apparently, resolved the problem.

I still didn't feel too optimistic that the internet wouldn't act up the moment he left. I only felt more reassured and confident that this chap really knew what he was doing cos while making small talk before he left, I asked if he worked mostly in the office, or if he made 'house-calls' all day as tech support. Victor looked at me and said, "Actually, I'm the Chief Engineer." Ohhh...

Well, fingers' crossed, so far (been 5 hours) so good.

This is Moscow

2009-11-13T04:35:00.005+08:00

Whenever we marvel at the unfathomable prices of some things here in Moscow, a friend likes to quote his Russian driver's response to such observations, "This is Moscow!" followed always by a what-can-you-do shrug.

But surely this takes the cake. A Singaporean friend's 3-year old celebrated his birthday early this month and the cost of this 2kg chocolate cake (which isn't even a 3-D cake),...a whopping S$400. This is Moscow indeed!

Happy Halloween 2009!

2009-10-31T02:20:00.007+08:00

So today was Halloween celebration at school. Sean's class party started an hour before school ended and the children could change into their costumes then. Throughout the week, he said he was going for the party without any costume.

Yesterday, I asked him if he wanted me to buy him a mask or something. He refused, "I don't have to go in a costume!"

"But everyone's gonna be wearing a costume. You'll be out of place!"

"No, I won't. You don't need to have a costume."

Hmmmm...I was actually more uneasy than he was about going without a costume...wondering what his teacher and the other mothers would think of this 'cruel' mother who'd send her son to a Halloween party without a costume.

I started googling for "easy halloween costume" and saw nothing that didn't require loads of work. It was only later in the evening that I saw a picture of kids dressed as doctors (or paramedics I'm not really sure). And light bulb appeared above my head as I remembered the working stethoscope we had bought from Toys R Us in Singapore.

I said, Sean, you can go as a doctor! No! I'm going to look silly! You'll look even sillier when you're the only one without a costume! No! I don't want to go as anything!

Had to resort to asking Brian to threaten to ban tortoise talk unless Sean played dress-up. Sean reluctantly agreed. I found a face-mask, and for the doctor's white coat, I dug out an old white Anne Klein II working shirt I had bought in the late 1990s. Presenting...Dr Sean Leong :)

The make-shift costume was a hit; the other kids wore store-bought costumes (one went as Violet from The Incredibles, another was Hermione Granger, and a boy was Freddie Krueger I think). Remarks from other mums include, "That's the coolest costume!" while his teacher said she's gonna dress up the same way next year :) And entirely free too, plus there wasn't any frills or face-paints which he would have protested against.

Party decoration.

Cute Halloween cupcakes.

Dr Sean giving the all-clear to his class teacher Ms Jayne.

I am not the most creative person and as I said earlier, can't sew for nuts. Back in 2001, when Brian was 4, I made the costume below just the night before the Halloween celebration. When inspiration strikes, I get moving. He was the "King of Hearts", I made it out by cutting coloured paper and then drawing with a black marker. Heckuva lot of work but he won 2nd prize for best costume.

The thing is, even if I were crazy enough to make this costume again, there is no way Sean would put this on, NO WAY at all. The doctor's costume was about as far as I could push him. That's one leceh little boy I have.

Happy Halloween all!

Shouting: The New Spanking

2009-10-23T12:04:00.004+08:00

So I've been doing a lot of the New Spanking since I stopped the Old Spanking (or Caning in our house) for a very long time now (My New Spanking always involves threatening to do the Old Spanking :)). I knew I should start reining in this bad shouting habit after I saw Sean just glancing sideways at me angrily when I shouted at him recently. Times like these, he seems a lot older than he really is and I don't really like what I see.

And feeling somewhat guilty after reading this facebook link from Hsien, I called out to Sean while preparing his lunch box this morning.

Me: SEAN!
Sean: Yes?
Me: I love you.
Sean: I love you too.
Me: There's something else. Come here.
Sean: What is it?
Me (facing him ever so seriously and lovingly): I'm sorry I've been yelling at you so much okay?
Sean looks at me and says quietly: I know. (Note: Brian would have said it's okay mummy)
Me: Hmm...but you know why I yell right?
Sean: No.
Me: Because you don't do all the things I ask you to do.
Sean: But why do you have to do it in a loud voice?
Me (Er moment): Because if I don't yell, you won't remember to do it the next time.
Sean: If you yell at me, I might not want to remember it.

Shikes, dunno what to say anymore.

End-of-PSLE celebration

2009-10-23T04:06:00.006+08:00

Backpost for 12 October 2009

We were leaving for Moscow the very night of Brian's last paper for PSLE but managed to have a celebratory lunch at Rakuichi, recommended by Hsien and Adeline. There are actually two branches, one in Dempsey and the other on the 3rd floor of Far East Shopping Centre.

Delicious fare but my favourite was the grilled sushi (last picture). You wouldn't think that grilled sushi would be good right? But it was heavenly, the sushi is only slightly grilled so was still succulent, and the rice was slightly grilled too, extremely fragrant.

We ordered the Rakuichi Set, the Rainbow Set, and one other set, I forget. Set lunch is about $36 - $46 each, not cheap but not exorbitant either. If you quote "I eat, I shoot, I post", you get 10% off the bill.

6 Thinking Hats

2009-10-22T23:23:00.005+08:00

I've done the 7 Habits programme but not Edward De Bono's 6 Thinking Hats.

When Sean said over dinner tonight that in school, they were learning about different coloured thinking hats, I didn't think that he was talking about the 6 Thinking Hats, but he was:

"We're learning about 6 Thinking Hats.

The White Hat is for Thinking about Information.

The Black Hat is Thinking about Weaknesses.

The Yellow Hat is Thinking about Strengths.

The Red Hat is Thinking about Feelings.

The Blue Hat is Thinking about Thinking which is Metacognition (a word his teacher taught him just a couple of days ago).

and lastly, The Green Hat, Thinking about Creativity."