A new beginning...

There is so much to say yet so little comes out. A huge part of the reticence comes from knowing too well it could all go to naught. Only one fine Saturday morning, rainbows speared through the heart, lighting up all that is not, leaving nothing that needs to be said.

Wealth

If you woke up this morning
with more health than illness,
you are more blessed than the
million who won't survive the week.

If you have never experienced
the danger of battle,
the loneliness of imprisonment,
the agony of torture or
the pangs of starvation,
you are ahead of 20 million people
around the world.

If you have food in your refrigerator,
clothes on your back, a roof over
your head and a place to sleep,
you are richer than 75% of this world.

If you have money in the bank,
in your wallet, and spare change
in a dish someplace, you are among
the top 8% of the world's wealthy.

If you can read this message,
you are more blessed than over
two billion people in the world
that cannot read anything at all.
You are so blessed in ways
you may never even know.

...Author Unknown

Instant noodles

He woke me up to tell me he was hungry. 
He asked if he could cook noodles by himself... I nodded and went back to sleep.
He asked if it should be half a bowl of water for half a pack of noodles.... I mumbled "en"... and dozed off.
He asked if he could add an egg.... "ok"... zzzzz
He asked if he could add powder directly to his noodles because it wasn't spicy..."orh"... zzz

When I finally crawled out of bed, he was done eating. He's managed to cook and feed himself! House wasn't burnt down... although there was seasoning powder on the kitchen floor, around the stove, on the coffee table, some noodles on the sofa and ... dirty dishes lying around.

Pringles

He put 2 short cans of sour cream and onion Pringles into the cart.

I told him to put one back. He ignored me. I repeated... he went, "Har?"... repeated a second time. He went, "Har?"

Frustrated with his loss of hearing, I said, "Put both back!" He took one look at me, measured my resolve, and scooted off with the cart before his Vitagen gets threatened as well.

Came back grinning, with one can.

I looked at the can and then at him, and asked, "So the can grew up?" 

He laughs....

I pay.

Nothing much ...

... been alone for a month. Me having all the time to myself and me exhausting all my writing energy on flyers, brochures, emails and reports.

It's kind of nice though, to hear that the big one was asked by my son's teacher whether he (my son) has English tuition, because the boy's English is ok she says. I better not read in-between the lines else I'd go off on a spiel about the education system back home. The big one told her, "No. Mother teach."Also nice to know that his maths and Chinese are ok too.

The boy though, has decided that he prefers school here in Shanghai ( not a problem now but would be an issue when we move back to Singapore). Other than seaweed, chips (same store) and drinks from the vending machine, he's not attempted to buy anything else from the canteen. He's bought a Chinese chess set, a Singapore flag, some stickers for his cousins and not sure if he did buy it eventually, but definitely something he did consider buying - a mechanical multi-colored pencil, from the bookshop.

His Summer Holiday
- lots of meals with the family
- 3-day beach holiday in Mersing, Malaysia
- had a blast at a gathering with his kindergarten school friends
- went to Universal Studios ( pong-tang school one Friday) with his dad.
- survived 8 violin lessons with his 'old' violin teacher
- spent one evening at the new Pasir Ris public swimming pool
- went cycling at East Coast Beach a couple of times
- went to school for 6 weeks
- fell ill for a week
- had his jabs
- went to the dentist
- had a wonderful birthday party at downtown east explorer (organized and paid for by my dear girlfriends)
- didn't finish his summer holiday school work

He's flying back here tomorrow.
Another year begins

Our phone call

Told him I bought a monopoly card game but have not tried it yet because I have nobody to play with.
> He tells me I should open it and start reading the instructions so that we can play it when he gets here.
Told him I also bought a 2X2 rubik cube and that I tried to very hard solve it but couldn't. Explained that these cubes normally come in 3X3... he knows what it is but couldn't understand what I meant by 2X2.

Told him we'd give him a budget to buy his own birthday present at the toy shop.
> What's a budget? He asks.
Well, it's an amount of money.
> Twenty dollars?
I think it's going to be a bit more than that... if it's not enough, you can use your savings to top up. Or if it's too much, you can save it for another day.
> Orh.

Then we talked about the Toys R 'Us in Shanghai vs. the one in Singapore. Told him to shop in Singapore because the price is cheaper.
> It's because one Singapore dollar is 5 Renminbi, that's why it's more expensive.
No, when you do the conversion, it is still cheaper.
> What is a conversion? He asks.
...I explained with a couple of examples...
> Orh. Then proceeds to tell me he wants a control car... the one that is being sold in Shanghai - the one that comes with the steering wheel.

He tells me when he is coming back to Shanghai and that I should buy some dumplings from the market the day before he arrives so that we can cook them when he gets here.

I told him I cleaned up our apartment.
> He made me promise to drive his 'drifting car' on the floor to test (the cleanliness)....saying I should be able to make the remote control car crash to the wall if the floor is smooth.

I told him about the green worm I found curled up on the handle of our electric kettle.
> He asked if the worm got electrified.
Told him no, electric kettle is for boiling water. Won't electrify the worm. Told him I threw the worm away
> Asks why I never take some newspaper, put the worm on it - a newspaper big enough so that it will not crawl on my fingers - and bring it downstairs to the bushes.
Told him I didn't think about it... because I'm a girl and I don't like worms.
> He laughs, tell me he is not afraid of creepy crawlies and asks what I would do if he had a creepy crawlie.
I told him he would have to live alone.
> He tells me he doesn't like spider webs but he is ok with spiders. He doesn't like them because of the insects on the web. Tells me that spiders live in between rocks and that the web is only for catching their breakfast, lunch and dinner.
(I didn't know that!)
> Tells me again I should have brought the worm downstairs...
What if I threw it out of the window?
> Then it will smash onto the ground!!!
Oh.

Typhoon

City issues typhoon alert as menace of Muifa looms by -- THIS year's first typhoon alert was issued this morning as Muifa was moving closer to Shanghai, packing winds of up to 162 kilometers per hour and threatening havoc in the next two days, weathermen said.

>>> I should stock up some food and water?

August

Flew back to Shanghai last week. Alone.
They come back here at the end of August.

Meanwhile, I hear the cicadas for the first time. From whence they come I don't know but they are making a huge din day in and day out, from morning to night. I imagine they are simply sizzling in the summer heat on wu-tong treetops and complaining as loudly as they can but no, apparently, it's a love song.

I have been reading and finished 
Unaccustomed Earth by Jhumpa Lahiri
Wallpaper Magazine August Issue
I am fifteen and I do not want to die by Christine Arnothy
... and about to start on
A very short history of the world by Geoffrey Blainey

I've also watched a couple of movies, caught a cold and recovered sans medication, went for a session of yoga, visited Tanzifang at Taikang Lu and started clearing out 11 months of living excesses from the apartment.

Another 4 weeks.

3 words make a sentence

Asked his P1 teacher. "How is he?"
Answer: He is coping. Period.

Day 5 in the Singapore school

He's getting richer by the day!
I give him $2 daily.
He spent a total of 80cents the whole of last week.

2 years 1 months and 10 days

Just realized I've completed almost 11 months of my 3-year assignment. I can almost 'see' what's going to happen this time next year. How far can one plan? How far should one plan? I haven't yet planned us coming back to Singapore for sure.

Day 3

Day 2 ended with him saying that he is upset with everyone in his class. He said they would not listen to the teachers instructions and all that happened on day 2 was non-stop scolding by the teacher. He decided he had enough, hated it and that he did not want to continue going to school here in Singapore anymore. He continued to be upset the whole evening, protested when I told him to get into his uniform this morning and sulked along the journey to school.

Told him the story of the boy who went to school for 3 days and quit.
On the first day, the boy was taught how to write the Chinese character for the number One: 一
On the second day, he was taught how to write Two: 二
On the third day, he was taught Three: 三
And so the boy thought, that's simple isn't it and decided not to waste his time going to school anymore.
He never found out that the number Four is written like this: 四
Worse. Whenever he had to write 'One Hundred', he had to use a comb instead of a pen.

This made our boy laugh... but he still carried his bag reluctantly and deliberately dragged his feet through the school gates.

Day 3 ended with him showing us a thumb which was neither up nor down.

It was "ok", he said.

Rare Art

The next 2 weeks

One more week of school, then exams and then we are going home!
Except our home has been rented out...

He's finishing his first year in primary school in 2 weeks! WOW!!

He's not losing so much stationery nowadays, although occasionally he will do stupid things like sharpen his pencils both ends, break them in twos or saw them up with his ruler.

He had a few problems with his class bully earlier on in the year. Had food picked off the floor dumped into his soup, scratched his cheeks, hands, kicked, tripped etc. But last I hear, he says things are alright now, the bully doesn't bother him anymore.

So when yesterday he came back with a scratch on his cheek, I asked him how he got it. Refused to tell at first. I left it as that. But later, he did open up and told me he had a scuffle with his best friend's brother on the school bus. An older kid. Kid's brother took his 'shark' (he's into origami nowadays - it was a paper shark) so he grabbed that fellow's with his hands / fingernails but stressed that he didn't scratch him because there weren't any marks on the fellow's arm. Fellow retaliated by grabbing his face. Scuffle was broken up by bus auntie.

He's learnt how to add, subtract, count money, tell the time, recognize right angles and do 1-10 multiplications. Chinese speech and writing has improved dramatically and he's started reading chapter books by himself - Diary of a Wimpy Kid.

He's taller too. It became apparent after winter. His pants - the ones he had before the cold season, have all shrunk against those skinny legs of his.

He swims. Picked up front crawl, can swim 8 laps or so in that style without too much effort, and do a total of 16-20 laps during his hour-long lesson. He's also now learning backstroke.

Music education on the other hand, is a disaster. He punches the piano like he does the computer. Randomly and forever searching for the right keys.  He also dropped out of the school choir and joined the paper-folding / origami class instead. Finally, he is still struggling to hold the violin properly and plays it like an executor with severe finger spasms.

He lost 2 baby tooth and has a couple more loose.

I see only fleeting glimpses of the baby nowadays and so when he ran back for a voluntary second hug and kiss before going to school this morning, something he never does nowadays, I was reminded. He's not yet seven but will be soon, all grown up.

Attention span of a chicken.

I have no idea what a chicken's attention span is but I don't think there's a chicken in this world which would forget to swallow the corn that it has in its mouth. I do know however, of a boy who would write a chinese character halfway, start talking and forget that he has not yet finished writing it.

Children's Day

It's Children's Day today in China.

His school held a Charity Bazaar ( flea market + food fair).

A couple of days ago, he asked me how much I would give him... I said RMB20. He asked for more. RMB35 was the number we eventually agreed on.

On Monday, he brought a note home from school. Each food coupon was RMB5 and could be pre-purchased. So I gave him RMB20 for 4 tickets.

This morning, we argued over how much money he could bring to school. I thought I'd give him RMB15 ( 35 - 20 = 15!) but he said it was not enough and wanted RMB100. "That's 50 Da Niang veggie buns!", I exclaimed. Finally, we agreed to settle for RMB50.

Putting RMB20 in his right pocket and RMB30 in his left pocket, I told him that he could spend the RMB30 and urged him to save the RMB 20. As an incentive, if he brought back the RMB20, I'd double it - money he could spend next time.

He asked me to go to his school. I did.

Oh what fun! I observe the boy examining a bow & arrow game set at his class booth. Then he put it down and went away. Came back later with a small Optimus Prime (RMB1) and Mitsubishi toy truck (RMB1), spiderman stickers and some origami paper. I left him to himself and got myself 3 food coupons and exchanged them for chocolate ice-cream, corn on the cob and prawn crackers. He found me and asked if he could buy the bow & arrow set which was priced at RMB40. ( I think he asked only because he knew we had a spend 30 save 20 deal ) I told him to go bargain the price down  but he said, "No" and ran off. Came back with a box of Japanese rice maki, a really delicious looking cupcake covered with white icing and a pack of cookies ( 3 coupons gone). He asked again if he could buy the bow & arrow set. I relented. He happily rushed off and came back balancing the loot on his head. Told him to go spend his last food coupon before the fair ended. He flew off and came back with our 2nd pack of prawn crackers. *Yum.

(Addendum: he bought incredibles stickers, not spiderman stickers, a spiderman marker that has a roller stamp on the top end, a bottle of water, gummy sweets in the shape of a pizza, look-alike/taste-alike Yakult!?!)

We ate and I laughed so hard at the kids' conversations. One boy started jeering a girl who had applied glittery eyeshadow on herself - she had bought it and was delighted that it was 'real'!!! Another one regretted her purchase and placed it on her classmate's desk, who wasn't very impressed with the 'gift' and wanted to throw it away. One kid was given too much - he said he had RMB130 in one wallet and yet more money in his 2nd wallet. He had already filled 3 bags with stuff and became visibly very exasperated and exhausted with still having money left over after his nth trip.

My boy told me he had fun. I would think so.

Happy Children's Day!

He broke it.

It was on the floor and he fell on it.
The neck broke.
He broke the violin.
He broke a Paganini violin.
He broke a violin from the 19th century.

I told him to remember that his mother did not kill him when he broke the violin.

Project

No frills. I would have painted it, added details and made a mess of the house in the process. Him? He stuck to his plan. So long as the stuff stuck together, it was project completed. I even had to persuade him to add some feathers to the top of the robot's head. To him, anything outside of planned was out of scope. Had to bite my own fingers and lips to stop 'helping'.

We met on a boat named Pegasus...

It's our 10th Wedding Anniversary today.

House of cards

Some days I get the odd feeling that this is all a joke. That we all stand on a house made of cards. Only most days, we don't know that we are. Until a wind strong and sudden enough slams itself against it and you fall, along with everything else that you've gathered around you on this house of cards.

I brought the boy for a consultative session with a new violin teacher last night. I needed another opinion. As it turns out, he had aplenty. We spent more than an hour and a half with him, out of which he spent less than 5 minutes listening to the boy play a couple of pieces from his ABRSM Grade 2 book. When we walked down the stairs, all 5 flights of them because the studio was in an old apartment block (with a lift that only operates 4 hours a day between 3:30pm and 7:30pm) in the French concession area, cards flew from beneath my feet.

Violin

Me confused.

His SG teacher was preparing him for a Grade 2 ABRSM exam. Had we had stayed in SG, he would have taken that exam in March this year.

Over here, his SH teacher was determined to correct his basics. This went on for a good 6 months. I was just about thinking it was going nowhere when she announced that he is now stable enough for them to start on the SH conservatory of music of graded syllables. But, we soon found out that those books were out of stock. Syllables were being changed and they will not be restocking them.

So between March and May, she taught him almost all the pieces in the ABRSM Grade 2 book instead and urged me to buy the Grade 3 books for him. Told me the pieces in Grade 2 were too easy and that we should progress him to Grade 3 instead. I finally bought those books on Saturday.

Chatted with his SG teacher on the phone. Told her the boy will be back in SG for 2 months and asked if he could take the Grade 2 exams in August. Was told it was too late to register. Registrations closed in March.

Felt a bit shaken... so did some research. Quickly found out registrations for ABRSM exams in SH begins June 13th. Relief.

On Sunday, armed with newly purchased Grade 3 ABRSM books - and oh! the SH book with new syllables was hot out of the oven too so I grabbed that too - we went for his lesson.

I showed her the books and told her that out of the 3 pieces of music that he needs to prepare, he has learnt 2 of them before. Those were in his Suzuki Book 1 and Book 2. My 'strategy' was for him to start learning the '3rd piece' first and then we can work backwards if we have time. Also explained to her that he needs to learn and memorize all the scales & arpeggios as those need to be played from memory. She took a look at the materials and then told me that he may not be ready for it.

........ ?!?.........

She had done some research. She had a student who had taken the ABRSM exam and failed. ( this student had taken lessons from somebody else outside and had gone for the exam without her knowledge) Same student had done very well in the SH conservatory of music exams. Then she asked it there was a 'sight-reading' section? I said yes and she told me what I knew, that the music score is given on the spot. Repeatedly told me it is not something that can be prepared. Arh, so that was what she was worried about. He still cannot read his scores. Ok, I agree he cannot read his scores but told her I can help him there. Also told her that there is an 'aural' section. Could tell she did not really understand me. >>> Tell me, what's the Chinese equivalent for the word "aural"???

Actually, I'm not too worried about the 'sight-reading'. I remember I could never get it right either in any of the piano exams I've taken. Plus I've received a merit even failing this section. Ok, never mind if she can't prepare him for the 'aural' section. I am not a trained music teacher... but I should be able to guide him here and give him plenty of practice.

So I asked, what about the SH exams now that we have the book? Which grade can he take? And then I found out from her that these exams also happen in October. It only happens once a year! Grade 2 may be too challenging for him to prepare in such a short time. Grade 1 should be ok.

By this time, the bored boy was already muttering... I want to take Grade 1, I don't want to take Grade 3. I want to take Grade 1, I don't want to take Grade 3, I want to take Grade 1, I don't want to take Grade 3. I want to take Grade 1.............

Then she looks at me.

Me confused.

She shrugs. (15 minutes of the 45 minute lesson have now gone by) Tells me she does not know the ABRSM syllables well enough, asks me to ask his teacher in SG about the music pieces and decided to teach him a scale of the Grade 3 book instead.

Lesson over.

Later, I told the big one. He suggests, "Do both?"

Me grumbles at his stupid suggestion. "He's here for the next 6 weeks, then he goes back to SG for 2 months, then he comes back to SH in September. 10 weeks (6 weeks + Sept)  is not enough time for him to prepare for the SH exams. 2 months in SG is not enough time to prepare for ABRSM. SG teacher cannot prepare him for SH exams.

He says, "Ok, then you see how lar."

!!?!???!?

But now I do see light. Me not confused anymore. There's only one choice really.

Inflation

When we first settled in at our new place in Shanghai, a rou bao (meat bun) from DaNiang round the corner costs RMB1.50. The price went up to RMB2 after Chinese New Year. Now, it costs RMB2.50. Price went up 67%.

Bus fare 8 months ago was RMB1. Now, it's RMB2. Double.

And I found out today, that the pork floss bun from BreadTalk went up by RMB1. Up 17%.

I'm not too concerned (yet) because I don't spend a huge chunk of my salary on food and am really fortunate to not have to think about the 'cost of meal' when deciding what and where I want to eat. Plus, it's still a better deal because I don't think we can find a 50cents bao in Singapore anymore right? The cheapest bao I recall is the vege bao, which was my fav snack, which costs 45cents at the science fac canteen in NUS...eh, about .... gosh... many donkey years ago. 40 cents won't get us anywhere on public transport... and at $1.40, that pork floss bun is still cheaper than the same one at home.

But it was a case it point when my mom urged me to save more because the value of the Chinese Yuan will double in 10 years. I told her about the buns and how much that money will actually be worth in 10 years time. It'll keep her off my account for a while...

Meanwhile... Pizza anybody?

Contented.

It's nice.
Am 36.
No aches
No pain,
No discomfort,
No worries,
No troubles,
No cares.
Am 36.
Finally contented.

Leasted through.

I got a brain-hand disconnect!
Yesterday, I wrote: This is through.
Today, I wrote: These 2 were leasted as .....

I meant
This is true.
These 2 were listed as....

I realise it's wrong only when I see it. It's all very strange....

Spring is here!

人民广场 Ren Min Guang Chang ( People's Park)
The rides were closed for a period during Winter. This is one of the boy's favourite place. They have rides which he can and does go on by himself - the Dragon roller coaster, the pirate ship (viking) and the bumper car. Each ride costs between RMB5-10 (S$1-2). On Sunday, for RMB50/S$10, we got him 6 tickets. He was over the moon happy.


梧桐树 Wu Tong Shu ( Phoenix Tree / Chinese Parasol)
They line the streets where we live, where his school is and where I work. Their leaves look like maple tree leaves and can grow quite big. Around 20cm or more in length / 25cm in width. About a week ago, leave buds started to sprout and now tiny baby leaves are growing... and very quickly too they are filling up the not too long ago bare trees. I find it amazing to witness these changes. In about a week, they'll start to flower and release pollen into the air. My colleagues tell me our street will soon be covered with a layer of cotton-like fluff. We'd see.

Music@home

Am excited. Bought a digital piano. After months of dragging my feet and 2 failed attempts at buying a 2nd hand piano piano, we will finally have something to play with. Better still, it wouldn't cost me usd2K to crate and ship it back home when the time comes. The reason why we left our piano in Singapore.

April Fools' Day

Played a trick on my colleagues yesterday....

(Official company email banner)

Dear Colleagues,

We are proud to unveil our new logo for MIPS. This new and contemporary logo more accurately reflects the dynamic and professional team at MIPS .

This logo will be launched officially on 1st May. Our entire line of collateral materials will be revised to include this logo. To make the shift effective, please make sure that this logo is included in all presentation and marketing materials from 1st May onwards and that the new logo is properly used in terms of color, placement and other graphic standards.

To view and download the logo guidelines and associated files, please click HERE

>>> And if they did click through, they get to see this:

• My boss basically went, "What the hell! ............"
• Another colleague asked if she is to send her materials through to my team for updating.... so I told her, "No, I am quitting. Please DIY."
• A couple more asked why I am "so free" and "jia pah eng ah" .....

 .... but yep. Haven't had quite that much fun in a while.


The boy was fooled in school too. He told me his teacher gave them a spelling test. After sheets of paper were distributed to the entire class, the teacher walked up to one of them and tore the paper up.... and that they too started tearing their own papers. He then told me he didn't get to fool anybody and I told him he had to wait till next year. Come to think about it, he will have to wait two years... next year's April Fools' Day falls on a Sunday.

I want to be ..... when I grow up.

Asked him several times before.... and again last night.
The answer is the same.

"I want to be a fireman when I grow up!"

Told him it's going to be hot!
He says, "I have a suit."
Told him he'd have to carry people on his shoulders.
He says, "I am strong."

Don't know where he got his career ambition from. There is nobody in my family who's a firefighter. We've only ever brought him to a Fire Station open house, once. There might be one book he owns ( which I don't recall him obsessing over) about Firefighters.

In any case, quite interesting to note that a survey by Reader's Digest Singapore last year showed that firefighters topped the 'Most trusted jobs' list:  Ref: http://www.asiaone.com/Business/News/Office/Story/A1Story20100226-201009.html

1 Firefighter
2 Doctor
3 Judge
4 Teacher
5 Surgeon
6 Pilot
7 Paramedic
8 Nurse
9 Pharmacist
10 Dentist

And suddenly inspired, I asked him.... There are 2 men in the house. One's blind and the other's crippled. Both were caught in a fire. How do they get out? He thought about it... then told me the blind man should carry the cripple and the cripple can tell the blind man the directions.
.............................. me wonders why a particular firefighter didn't turn up.

Chinese as a first language

The boy kept  his test paper again. Reason: 我还在做！(I'm still working on it!) I made him hand it to his teacher the next day, as-is. It came back with a "C".

His Chinese grades vary according to some unknown elements. Some days he gets it, some days, he just doesn't. Some days, he comes back with 83% for spelling and other days 95% ( I think the lowest you can get is 56%-60% since the teacher normally gives them 20 phrases / 40-44 characters and takes away 1% for each wrong character).

The thing is, these spelling tests doesn't happen on a fixed day, and there are no spelling lists. The only clue I get is when he writes 'Revise chapter 3-5' on his note book. Last Friday, his notes read: Revise chapter 11-15.

The boy was not at all concerned or emotional about it. I SO WAS! That's 5 chapters / ~ 50 phrases / at least 100 characters !!!! Here's a sample.....

以后，小巷，孩子，前脚，尾巴，几乎，江河，一枝，已经，闪闪发光，一团，做客，。。。

We worked on it Sunday evening... wonder who the bigger procrastinator? By 9:30pm, his eyes glazed over and I called it quits.

Sluorping

Had a conference call which took me way over lunch time... 1 hour 22 minutes over to be exact. Lunch hour starts at noon and over here, there is no reason not to eat. At around 11:45am, the chatter from my colleagues begins, "Where to eat?" and by 11:59am, everyone leaves to go eat at their chosen place.

Anyway, I went to get lunch after that call at a nearby eatery. It was not crowded anymore. Lunch time is over. Was eating my food, when I became aware that somebody else was chomping away loudly. I turned to look... a lady, enjoying her food with relish.

I smiled. I did.

Must be something to do with living in China for what? Almost seven months now? I actually think this loud 'sluorping' of food is totally acceptable. Where before I would have frowned and think it is unacceptable, un-cultured and rude, like the culturally acceptable way of slurping up your noodles in Japan, 'sluorping' up a plate of rice is now ok!

I like the way people here tuck into their food. Food comes to the table, you eat it while it's hot, in any way you want. No pretense, no nonsense. Eat.

And I like it, because I think you are suppose to eat this way - get food into your mouth and enjoy it without worrying about drips, making no sound or not being able to spit out the wrong bits.

Nice!

Art appreciation

I finished a sketch of the boy playing with his firecrackers and showed it to him.
He liked it so much, he used it to make a boat.

Last week

DOOR

Broke the door to our home last week. The small one and his Grandmother were uncontactable for 3 hours. When I got home, all was dark and the door was latched from the inside. I shouted for them, banged the door, ... nothing. So I crashed through, and that caught the attention of the Grandma, who walked out of the bedroom in a daze. They were sleeping. She saw the door and exclaimed, "WHY DID YOU BREAK THE DOOR?!? HOW DID YOU BREAK IT?" I was too exhausted from all my excitement to give her a logical response. Was simply just happy she was fine, they were fine.

We slept through that night with a broken main door. Piled all the dining chairs we had behing that door and locked ourselves in the bedroom. Got the handyman to come look at it the next morning. He shook his head when he saw it, and recommended we get the property management guys to come take a look at it instead. I didn't want to deal with those guys (long story) ... so I tried DIY. Managed to 'repair' it by removing the broken hinge. Door can close now.
WHY DID I BREAK THE DOOR? HOW DID I BREAK IT?

VIOLIN

Upgraded the boy's violin. 3 were offered to him. He had to pick and insist on this one. It's now on loan to us for an obscene amount. I don't allow him to carry it himself (except when he's practising of course) and I don't even dare walk too fast when carrying it. We call it his "Lao Lao Ye Ye".

FIRECRACKERS

It's legal in China over Chinese New Year. The boy played with a bunch of them. It was fun watching him. Reminds me of those old chinese painting protraying kids playing with firecrackers. His posture is exactly the same. I'd try to sketch that this weekend and post it here.

BACK TO SCHOOL

A new set of books!
The chinese one is jaw-dropping!
Again I enjoyed looking through his art &craft textbook. Nice!
He also has a new foreign-English teacher.  Maybe this one won't allow him to pass up blank papers.

Condensed

That is the only word I can think of to describe how I feel. 
I am now denser and thicker.
Wow. 

Learnt

3 new phrases today:

Hobson's choice: when there is only one choice or none.

Buridan's ass: example of one who makes no move because he is hungry as he is thirsty and is positioned exactly between food and drink.

Morton's fork: a choice between two equally unpleasant alternatives.

... all part of a day's work!

On the day snow blanketed Shanghai

I wake up and looked out of the window.
Hey! It's snowing heavily and the ground's covered with a thick blanket of snow!
I wake the boy up and we both looked out of the window, mesmerized by the sheets of tiny frozen capsules, floating down from the skies above.

The boy went to school and came back with A, A and A+10 ... and a B (B for blank!?!)

Am happy he's doing well.

Shanghai Zoo - for grass you can walk on

We decided to go to the zoo yesterday. Not sure what to expect. The 'arctic zoo' we visited in our recent trip to Harbin was depressing so I was semi-prepared to be similarly affected.

We bought the tickets and walked towards the entrance, passing an old man who jiggled his can when we neared him. A signal for loose change. The boy asked, "Why are there so many people asking for money?" I had no answer and did not respond.

But my mood was immediately lifted upon entering the zoo. What greeted me was a nice huge lawn and better yet, no signs warning us against putting our feet on the grass! There weren't many people too! I can almost call it deserted. A very rare thing here in crowded Shanghai.

It must have been crazy for most locals to consider going to the zoo that day. The temperature range was between -2 to 2degrees Celsius. But it turned out to be a not too crazy decision. It wasn't a miserably cold day to be out and about. The sun was shinning and there wasn't much wind.

On looking at this satellite map taken off Google (area where the zoo is circled), I realized why I was so happy. The zoo is one of the few pockets of green in Shanghai! I must have been like the animal released into the wild! No more concrete jungle! Grass you can walk on!

The first exhibit we saw was a man sweeping an empty cage. The boy asked, "What is this?" I replied, "This is a man," in the same tone as I would have said, "This is a monkey." He paused and then laughed. My dear boy.

And then we saw the giant panda ( there was just one) who did nothing but ate bamboo leaves, several 'lesser/red pandas' ( which seemed to be the happiest mammals we saw at the zoo), a gorilla who did nothing but ate, regurgitate, eat the regurgitated food, regurgitate, the whole 3-4 minutes we were there and bears who stood on their hind legs, clasped their paws and grunted for food.

Arh, visitors here bring their own entertainment kits - corn for the birds, peanuts for the primates and toss-able pieces of food for the bigger animals. There are signs prohibiting this but no one around to enforce it.

The environment/enclosures for the birds are really nice - they have nice ponds and waterways. I guess they are better off than the mammals (but the price they pay for that is clipped wings).

Alright. I'd stop. Putting compassion for the animals aside, it's a nice place to visit if you have been trapped in the city for a while.

How to get there: The easiest is to hop on the Metro Line 10 and get off at the Shanghai zoo （上海动物园). The station is right below the zoo's entrance. Tickets costs RMB40 and each adult can bring a child below 1.2m for free. Opening hours depends and is normally shorter during Winter. I think it would be safe to assume the zoo is open daily from 10am-4:30pm.

Exams over.

He should be done with his last paper by now.

Chinese paper: He said he didn't know how to write 1 or 2 characters.
Maths paper: He says he will score 110 marks. ( The paper is 100% + 20% (optional section with more challenging questions) He said he didn't know how to solve this optional question: 20+x=5. What is x?
English (as a first language / taught by foreign teacher): His 1st paper/ written one = ZERO. We all know why. Subsequent MCQ paper (he filled up everything) + Aural exam should be ok.
English ( local syllables): If he's not careless, should be able do very well.

He doesn't need to go to school until the 20th, and even then, only for a couple of hours to collect his results. Then it's winter vacation! 21 Jan - 13 Feb

Better!

Paper II: He came back annoucing that he had a MCQ (Multiple Choice) paper and filled up everything, including his name.

Horrors

Am told that the boy handed in an EMPTY, UNFILLED, BLANK English exam paper this morning. Blank to the extent that he didn't even write his name on it .....








.....It can't get worse than this can it?

Weather report

Was looking at my feet.... they haven't been this WHITE in a long time - but then so are most of me, and us. we've been wrapping ourselves since October. The weather has since turned even colder, with the highest daily temperature below 10 degree Celsius.

I send the boy to school with 3 tops (2 cotton ones sandwiching the woollen sweater- because he hates to have any skin contact with the woolly) + his school jacket, long johns and lined pants, thick socks and winter boots to school.

Layering remains key to attaining a balanced body temperature. This gives me a headache. I not only have to decide what I need to wear to work, but how to keep warm and still have these 2 groups of clothing match! This reminds me of what the boy said the other day in exasperation,

"I don't want to feel cold. I don't want to feel hot. I just want to feel normal!"