Mosquitoes everywhere

Is it just me? Or are we swamped with the lil' pesky yeeeeeyyeeeeeyeyeeeeee MOSQUITOES!! THEY ARE EVERYWHERE FAK THEM ALL.

One night, after a couple of hours into his sleep, he woke up and laid in bed, eyes open, and pondering. I think he has never heard the sounds of mosquitoes yyeeeeyyeeee-ing near his ears before! Even adults get annoyed!

And don't ever fall prey to the little mossie repellant that you plug into your electric powerpoint where it supposed to emit scent that mossies hate. IT DOESN'T WORK! The solution: Wear leather jacket and pants.

YIIIIIIIISH.
***
Recently I read a book. I RARELY read, so when I DO read something, it's good. I promise. It's called Raising Boys, by Steve Biddulph

Highly recommended for parents with jumping hollering messy monkeys. You will know why they are jumping hollering messy monkeys.

Highly recommended ESPECIALLY FOR FATHERS of jumping hollering messy monkeys. You are the software programme which your young son will download, to learn how to be a man. A happy, well-balanced man. KEYWORDS: TESTOSTERONE.

And to mothers.... basically you are not so important anymore when your boy is six onwards. Of course you are STILL important, being there for him, teaching him about life and love, BUT this is the time when fathers become their main role model, teacher and friend. This is the time fathers should spend as much time with their sons. Boys learn so much even by playing games with their dads.

Then comes the age of fourteen. Mom, Dad, step back a little. Now they need mentors. An older male mentor. Uncles, grandfathers, pastor in your church, male teachers, scout master, a boss, even friends. If you find your boy ain't listening to you, he will most likely listen to another older male who is involved in their life at that time. Someone he looks up to, or feel at ease with. Here comes an important point.

We need more male teachers in our schools. Or at least more male volunteers for school projects. Good male leaders who recognize the needs of young boys to learn about life.

I apologize as I am not able to provide a summary on raising girls. Steve wrote one called Raising Girls. Go get 'em!

SO. I read it, so what. Am I doing a good job? I don't know. I hope so. I try my best. Love love love love love. Is all I have to give.

***
Photos I meant to post eons ago.

Goofy bedtime moments.



Darren, Eileen's boy, and Daniel.

Watching Ben Ten.


Azrina Nana's wedding at Rumah Limas, Danga Bay. It's gorgeous!



Peace bebeh.

Friends Forever

Thought of the day: Traffic at Singapore Checkpoints are scarier than being mooned by PM. Indeed, Mas Selamat has succeeded in creating terror without using weapons of mass destruction!

Good Friday was spent reuniting with my childhood friend whom I've not met for 16 years.

In that 16 years, we lost contact, studied in different continents, worked in totally different fields, lived differently and then one day, here we are, finding that we have actually a lot in common.



A toast to our friendship!

Another Convenite Lil Gathering!

Wow, I feel like I'm meeting up with a lot of lost ol' Convenites these days, and I hope to keep it up! And it's a good training ground for the littel boy to learn how to hang out with aunties and che-ches.

From left: Anette ( Prema's church buddy), Carolyn Chuah ( Yes! Carolyn Chuah! It's been 12 years!!And she has 4 beautiful children, 3 boys + a girl), me and Daniel, and Prema. I met Linda, too briefly unfortunately. But she looks the same.


Another boy with a little janggut, Hong Kit.

Convenite's Lil Meet-Up

Back To Work

Finally, after what seem like an eternity, I'm back to work! And happy birthday to me! I hit the big 3-0!! To celebrate this significant event in my life, I shall compile a list of 30 things that I'm blessed with in my life. But before I get to that, I have some unfinished business to complete for the previous post, because I was so tired then.

On my last day in Ipoh, I managed to meet up some of my coursemates from UPM for lunch. And as tradition goes, this is the time of the year to Toss The Fortune Fish. I just made that up, the name that is. In chinese, it's lou yu sheng, something like 'toss raw fish'. Why fish? The character 'yu', meaning fish, is closely associated with prosperity, because the sound for that character is identical to the sound for the character for surplus or plenty. Thus, the New Year saying 'Nian Nian You Yu' that means 'May there be surplus every year'.



Here are some more pictures.




So, in the between the lunch reunion and being back home in Johor Bahru, I was in the car...for another 10 hours.

Now, I'm sitting in my office, feeling dazed, wondering if this is reality. And trying to compile a list of the 30 things I'm grateful for in my 30 years of life so far. AKAN DATANG!

Sharon Tan's Wedding & My First Day Perm

Our flawless-complexion Convent classmate Sharon Tan finally tied the knot with long-time beau Ping Long, Tingkatan Enam STPM schoomate. There were people I have not seen for 12 years! The last time I saw some of the Convent girls, we were all wearing pinafores. But the familiar faces brought back the good 'ol nostaligic days again.

I wished I had taken more pictures if Daniel hadn't hogged my camera, especially of my Sixth Form classmates.

From left: Me and Daniel, Sharon the bride, Chui Ling, Siew Lee and her son.




From left: Me&Daniel, Su San, Sharon, Chui Ling (sitting), Queenie, Anna and Ai Ping.


Couple of the hour.


Now, what you didn't know was... I permed my hair that very day. And I'm talking about big glam curls. It's just ingeniusly hidden as a pony-tail.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Sure, I'll show you. Me.Poodle.You.Laugh.


Do I or do I not look like a Korean housewife. Now I understand, boredom breeds disaster. In the meantime, these tight curls are going to loosen up and become softer and look more natural ( by Chinese New Year, according to my friendly neighbourhood hairdresser) which by then might make me look like a Korean mistress! We'll see...

Drama Weekend Anyone?

Drama drama drama. This weekend itself, I get to meet up my old Convernt school friend whom I haven't seen in a couple of years, AND her little babe who turned one this month. At the same time, my mom-in-law's health has taken a turn for the worse.

Pictures first. Know the Murphy's Law? I'm a great follower. God knows how come my camera's setting changed. All the pictures I took were dark. Usually even in poor lighting, my pictures turn out ok, but this time, of ALL time, I couldn't fix it... UNTIL this morning when I realize the exposure is set to the lowest *banging-head-on-the-wall-until-concussion*

Anyway, here are the pictures I tried to rescue by adjusting the brightness and contrast.
Little Darren

Da-Niu and Da-Ren playing masak masak.


Beauties and Beasts

It is always fun to see how your child interacts with another baby. Fortunately, Daniel has learnt to control his forceful pat. When he was younger, his harmless intentions to 'sayang' other kids always end up as a big slap, including me, who took countless of his 'sayang' pats, especially in the morning when I'm still sleeping and unprepared for the Good-Morning-Mummy-Give-You-Big-Slap-On-The-Nose. I always wake up crying...

Kids have no ice to break, unlike adults.
Strangers for 2 seconds.
Playmates for the rest of the evening.

Great family party!
But not so great with my mom-in-law. Initially Paul cancelled his trip back to Seremban this weekend but rushed back when his mom was admitted to Seremban General Hospital. She has been controlling her lupus by taking steroid medication to somewhat make her immune system sluggish so it won't attack her own body. But this also make her prone to infections. A couple of days back, she complained of difficulties in breathing and was becoming weaker.

On Saturday, she was admitted for lung infection which later caused one side to collapse and required the ventilator to help her breath. There was a possibility of kidney failure, hypertension and diabetes. What a shock for everyone! How could she become so ill all of a sudden? You know it is very critical when the doctors tell you to inform any relatives to come visit her and be prepared.

She was at a fork. She could either get better with the antibiotics medication or her organs could fail and be hooked up on a life support system.

It felt terrible not being there with her. I was forbidden from driving up with Daniel. I have to wait till this Friday to take the trip with Paul, and hopefully she will be discharged by then. I could be taking a few days off to help watch over her.

Janice & Michael's Wedding Lunch

T'was a beautiful Sunday. And they were a beautiful couple. The food was glorious and the wine poured like fountains. How not to enjoy the afternoon when in good company and good food. I could say this was a little Convent gathering, which I have to say, is shrinking and frequency determined mostly by weddings. The next gathering will be at Eileen's barb's first birthday, which I hope to be the gathering of the year.


From left: Ker-hui, Michael, Janice and me.


From left: Me, Dr. Irene Lee, Vivian, Ker-hui and Andrea Chow Ching Yee.


From left: Ker-hui, Vivian, me, Janice and Dr. Irene Lee (potential dermatologist, and many girls' best friend)


The couple of the hour.

South Park II

This time it's a gathering and some sort of a farewell party for Aiwah who will be going back to home-sweet-home Penang TODAY! And lots of catching up, gossiping, and chatting and laughing abt the good ol' days!



We had a sumptious dinner at NYDC cafe, Holland Village where our hair,entire body, clothes, bag, shoes, not to mention fingernails, smelt like food after we left. It's like being in a mushroom madness disco club, instead of smelling like cigarette smoke and liquor and puke, we smelt like baked mushroom and cheese. It was kinda loud in there TOO, so we had to literally scream.



Other than that, it was fabulous to meet up again, like back to the uni days. It always feels good in the company of comfortably familiar faces. I think we all have not changed much. Waihar still likes to wear Disney Mickey Mouse tees, Seok Shin slimmed down to her normal size since popping out a baby (GYM is her new religion), Aiwah still the sweet Aiwah, Aikkia and LayHoon still NOT holding hands in front of us.



Our conversations mostly covered what women (AUNTIES) usually talk about. Who getting married, who having babies, who having second babies, and of course without fail, our babies. We also proposed that we have a REUNION of our biotech grad2000 in year 2010. Our tenth year anniversary!

We will be real AUNTIES and UNCLES!

Well, hmm, actually not really. Thirties is the new twenties. Some even say life begins at 40. And I am starting to believe it. The way the world is and the way we have to live now, I'd say we are like working donkeys, and up till we pay our debts to the bank/tai-yi-long, we will be slaves to our children and our assets. LIFE will begin when we start to retire...

SO, folks, hope we meet again!

South Park

Dinner@Soup Place. A-Har's boyfriend took this picture, and I actually forgot what he looks like! Good thing we had this little gathering. Aiwah, as sweet as ever, Waihar still as Waihar, Aikkia and LayHoon still not holding hands in front of us... why so pai seh, ka kee nang mah. Anyway, it was a warm, simple, light-hearted gathering. We gotta do this more often yah!

MOS!

We got to meet up finally, at MOS burger, something new for AiWah, hey. Next time, we'll go to Holland Village to try out the food scenes...hehehe. Food glorious food! But I'm still skinny as ever, got cacing, no, got ular sawa in my stomach. Gosh, I'm bored with my hairstyle, heck, it has no style to start with! Must go for treatment already...