gweipo 鬼婆

How to fill your days with nothing ...

2012-01-19T21:35:00.000+08:00

One of the things I'm asked most often about the retreat is how you can do "nothing" all day and whether or not it drove me - a rather driven person at the best of times - crazy. Bear in mind, when you register, you surrender all electronic equipment, all books, all paper, all pens. And of course your voice. Surrendering books (in my case a fully loaded kindle) was the hardest for me. I use books to escape, to travel to sooth myself to put myself to sleep.

There was a fairly rigid daily program which started with the gong at 4am and ended with lights out (literally no electricity) at 9.30pm. Naturally, on debriefing there were people complaining about too little sleep, too rigid a program, too little freedom etc. etc. Personally I'd known what I was signing myself up for (the website is pretty explicit) and had also read that rather brilliant chapter on "will power" in "Never Let Go" so I'm pretty well prepared psychologically because I know if you want to exercise will power in one area of your life - in this instance to seriously meditate, you have to eliminate as much choice as possible in all other areas of your life - as in what and when to eat / sleep / shower / walk / sit / listen / do yoga etc. And still, the mind and the body is a pretty wilful, stubborn and dwars (now what would the English be for that - at cross purposes?) thing.

Honestly, that first chapter of that book is one of the best things I've read for a long time. I'm using it in so many areas of my life. Including parenting. I just take choice out of the equation for stuff that has to be done. I can't tell you how much my son's handwriting has improved in the last few months. Why? Because most days during the week, we sit down with "Writing with Ease" and he copies a few sentences from the work book, I read a paragraph to him, he answers questions in full sentences and writes a sentence on the main idea of the paragraph. There is no discussion, no maybe, perhaps, if, but, later. Yesterday he came home beaming. "Mum, mum, the teacher is going to say something to you about something you bought and we've done and it's great." I probed and probed. Finally it came out, I'd bought the book "Writing with Ease" we'd done it and his handwriting had improved so much that the teacher refused to believe a piece of writing without a name on it was his. Nothing succeeds like success they say.

Back to meditation. I am not a great meditator. I am a baby. I am a neonate. The best I can say is that at moments, whole 10 minutes at a time, I managed to really really try to empty my mind and only concentrate on my breath and nothing else. It was really useful that they were teaching Anapanasati, which is a methodology of attaining concentration, and you could see more or less where you were on the continuum and what you needed to get yourself further. I recon I spent most of the time hovering around the beginning of the First Tetrad - contemplation of the body.

So in all those hours and half hours and three quarter hours that we were spending in sitting or walking meditation what happened? Well, I'd start with a determination to concentrate only on breathing, but of course the monkey mind would start up it's movies and off we'd go. I'd say I spent the most of the first 3 or 4 days doing some mental housekeeping, filing, observation, reminiscing, pondering, examining. Fresh from the sights, sounds and sensations of BKK and the demand on arrival that we abstain from any thoughts words or deeds concerning sex, unsurprisingly the first things to be mentally put out in the sun were all the relationships I'd ever had. The serious, the casual, the fun and the heart-breaking. Time and distance is an incredible healer, as I truly could go through everything pretty dispassionately with very little emotional involvement. It was more a kind of sorting and ordering and making sense of how it all fitted in my life and made my life and me who I am.

Next up was childhood and teen years, and early working days and our early expat lives. Family and families, studying time, leaving South Africa, leaving, leaving leaving and moving moving moving. A lot of shit has flowed through the sewer in the last few years, and I was surprised at how, with the aid of many dharma talks, a lot of verbal guidance from the monks and nuns it was able to enter and leave my mind and be examined with the same interest I would look at the busy ants with, or see a leaf that was falling, had fallen, was being swept up. There were but two occasions when I truly felt myself choking up momentarily. I left the memory, focused on the breath, the impermanence, the attachment and it was OK. Really OK. It didn't matter quite so much anymore. For those of you who are regular readers of my blog you will know what those moments were - everything around my son trying and failing to learn Chinese, and the incident and incidences surrounding the suicide attempts of someone close to me. The rest - all the other experiences and ups and downs were mere chaff of life.

I did occasionally beat myself up - as in "darn you're supposed to be meditating and seeing images and bright lights and feeling this flood of joy and blah blah." And I'd earnestly start with the long breath and the short breath and the following of the breath, and the guarding of the breath at the gate, only for the gate guard to be not so much battered down, but fooled by the ghosts of Christmas's pasts slipping by in the shadows and quietly pleading for a little attention and loving kindness.

At the end of the day, I think I made peace with myself, with my past, my history, my present and emerged much calmer and with more equanimity than I started out. I am encouraged by the stories of the English monk of his long 6 year journey before he got anywhere near to where one is truly meditating, and took the boasts of fellow meditators who were "shooting love bullets" in my stride. Luckily the boasting evening was our last evening and not somewhere in the middle where we'd all have found the necessity to compete in being "good" meditators.

The mind of course craves stimulation. So the highlights of my days were the Dharma talks - basically readings or teachings on meditation and how to meditate and Buddhism, the Yoga - nearly 2 hours of wonderful yoga taught by a marvellous nun, the Chanting - (which took me back to my catholic school days).

The insights into the monastic life from the monks and the nuns was fascinating. How do they stop thinking about sex and desire for example? They meditate on death and decay. And sometimes they go and watch corpses and bodies rotting. Really. Apparently you get to think about orifices in a whole new way after that. I'm sure - I'll leave that to them and just take the shortened 5 precepts (vows) which include no adultery, rather than the more complete 8 precepts which include chastity in thought, word and deed. One day a monk was called away towards the end of a meditation session and when he got back later he told us about an open burning cremation he'd attended. And then we chanted about how death would come and none of us could escape it's great armies. Public burning of the dead is probably not a bad thing. He explained seeing this as a young child for the first time and what an impression it had made on him.

A lot of time and talk and thought is put into death and impermanence in Buddhism. Not a bad thing in my opinion. We shy away from it a lot in normal life. We ignore it and deny it and avoid it.

Monks and nuns are also marvellously blunt creatures. About the 2nd day, one of the nuns declared apropos of nothing to the group "So you've abused in the past. I tell you now to stop continuing to abuse yourselves. Every time you think about it, talk about it, discuss it, you are abusing yourself again and again and again" and then she went on with the rest of her talk on something quite unrelated. At another point we were discussing the image of the Buddhist cycle of life (sorry I need to find my cord to download my other pictures and I'm just not in the mood to search through the cord box right now) and we were told "you get angry, you go straight to hell" - the Buddhist concept of hell being a state of mind or being or existence during life rather than a physical place to go after death. Which of course makes absolute sense. Much more sense than a hell in the ever-after. Much more effective as well as a general and absolute threat to people in general and kids in particular. And then of course this whole Asian thing of people not getting angry in order not to lose face hahaha (that's them laughing instead) suddenly makes absolute sense. Losing face, my eye - more like if they get angry they're in hell, and no-one wants to be in hell obviously! Go tell that to the generals. At other times we were told we were greedy and gluttonous - bah - two whole meals a day and we could help ourselves unlimited to the food during those meals. Normally to meditate well one would get 6 spoons of brown rice a day - if that. High days, holidays, birthdays and feast days were spent in fasting.

It's now 9.30pm and I'm going to bed. I quite liked the early to bed early to rise habit. Despite everyone's moans I think a lot of people got more sleep on the retreat (albeit on cement slabs with wooden pillows) than they usually get in the normal course of life. I sure did.

meditation on mosquitos

2012-01-17T11:02:00.000+08:00

I've been a little slack on the blogging side of things. After 10 days out of the ether and completely winding down and relaxing, I'm finding it a little hard to drive myself and force myself to do all sorts of things. Slowing down is not a bad things. A couple of you have asked to report back on the retreat, so I'll do so in bits and pieces.

One of the most memorable thing about the retreat was Karmic bugs. I'm serious. Having lived with a son for 8 years, 3 of which he was absolutely obsessed by bugs, I'm ok with bugs. Bugs don't bother me. Sure, I find a mosquito buzzing around my head annoying like anyone else, but I'm not given to screaming at the sight of a spider, or running away from a roach or any other silly behavior.

Ants hard at work

When we arrived at the retreat, Suan Mokkh, at the time we were still allowed to talk, we were taken around our dormitory, and the leader of the ladies brought out a few bags of bugs - centipedes, scorpions etal, so we'd know what we were facing if we had to face them. We were advised of the humane way of catching and releasing said bugs in the spirit of mutual humanity. Already you could see which were the "antsy" girls around bugs.

During the retreat, I remember being bitten by a mosquito at the beginning of a walking meditation and decided to meditate and reflect on the bite and how long it took to subside. By the end of the 45 minute period, there was nothing left. No pain, no itch, no bump. That gave things a huge amount of perspective - I still shoo'd mosquitos away, but if and when they occasionally bit me, it wasn't an issue. I had plenty of time to reflect on life's other little "bites" and how we let our mind itch and scratch at them, with the result that one little incident is allowed to swell up and fester and infect our whole being. How much more pain we inflict on ourselves than is necessary.

But back to the bugs. By the end of the retreat, me, who was not bothered by bugs, had literally the whole time not been bothered by bugs. On the last evening, participants had the opportunity to give the center feedback on the retreat, the program and suggestions for improvement. There were some mighty strong feelings about the insects! Demands for screens and the open air meditation halls to be netted. People being visited by numerous creepy crawlies where-ever they went. Rooms invaded by bugs and slugs and frogs and geckos. I was amazed. I'd not been party to any of this. Perhaps my room was in a fortunate position? Not so, the two paranoid ladies sleeping in rooms on either side of me had been "infested" by wild life. One of the men I met up with at the airport on the way to BKK said the same - he'd had no problems with bugs, but some of the men who had "bug issues" had lots of bugs!

I have an idea that there is an important lesson to be learnt in this experience that I can carry forward to other things that do bug me more than bugs. Stepping back, observing my reaction to things and letting go and watching the feelings subside without adding additional emotions to the fire could go a long way to a more peaceful existence.

No room for complacency ...

2012-01-16T08:56:00.000+08:00

As a mother I somehow always feel I'm running slightly behind. So last night, it was merely 6.30 pm and I was already getting the children ready for some reading and bed-time. Pajamas were on and I was shooing them to brush their teeth when my son wailed out in protest "But mum, we haven't had any supper yet and I'm STARVING!"

Oops! All I can say is that it must come from the fact that for 10 days during the retreat our last meal of the day was at mid-day and then nothing until 8.30 the next morning....

So, back to the kitchen, cooked dinner and fed them and we were back to the usual rushing to get them down by 8pm. Luckily they'd both played hours of football in the morning so fell asleep shortly after their heads hit the pillows and we'd chased out all the flying ants that were swarming into their rooms.

Here's an interesting TED talk on something quite unrelated - the creation of a para-orchestra.

message to the future

2012-01-13T13:46:00.001+08:00

My children opened a bank account here in SG to deposit the pocket money they receive from us when we remember to give it to them.
As a gift the bank gave them these cheapo fold it yourself money boxes. I was most intrigued to see the message being given to the youth. How inspirational. How aspirational. How fitting in with the way things have to and should and ought to be...

"Saving today for our home tomorrow" right there on the top where the money slot is. Just to remind you what it's all about and the most important thing of all - keep the property barons happy.

"Contribute to Singapore's success"
"Strive to do your best"
"Save and protect our environment"
"Constantly improve yourself."

Hot shower!

2012-01-11T22:06:00.000+08:00

I'm back in SG after a very interesting and "enlightening" retreat at Suan Mokkh - nope I'm not "enlightened" but I have a new found enthusiasm and appreciation for showers and hot water after 12 days of washing myself with scoops of cold water from communal ponds ...

More tomorrow, off to bed so I'm up in time for the 4am bell and meditation (haha)

Back to normal - sort of

2011-12-27T14:32:00.000+08:00

It's the day after the day after Christmas and a pack of gardeners have descended to tame the lawn that up to a few days ago resembled a swamp. The roof fixing guys have come and gone after fixing a leak in the guest house roof. Back to the gym, back to having to do groceries and cook since most of the left-overs are gone. And I'll have this pattern for 2 days and then I'm gone.

Yes, I'm going to do the retreat that my husband did in September. 10 days of silence and meditation. Do I need it. Yes. Would I have gone on my own accord? No. My husband had to push and then make all the plane bookings and the stop-over in BKK booking for it to be a reality. Am I nervous? Definitely. What scares me is leaving the kids for 13 days while it's school holidays. Not speaking to them for 10 of those 13 days. Not being there for them to cuddle up to in the mornings, to chat to during the day, to gauge their moods and feelings, to improvise from the routine when and where necessary. They will be fine. I know they'll be fine, and I know they and I and the whole family unit will benefit from me being away and coming back to some kind of an equilibrium point.

I haven't done this year's Christmas letter. Coming to that I haven't done last year or the year before's either. My husband did hint at it when we received them from other people, but how do you express what has happened in a light and breezy, preferably funny one page when much of what happened was anything but light and breezy. I was reading up about stress the other day. I don't consider myself really under stress, not really really deserving of the label, but reading that and thinking back to the period May to July this year, I guess I was pumping out every stress hormone know to womankind. Thank heavens for chocolate, although my body is not thanking me. It is all OK, it really is. We've not lost a job, everyone is perfectly healthy, we can meet challenges as they arise with the right amount of financial and other resources, but it's not always easy.

I've been a bit quiet with blogging. I've been busy, with guests, with Christmas - I decided to do something different this year. Since we didn't know many people here in SG and the few we know wellish were away, we opened our home to 7 USA Marines for Christmas lunch. When the request came from the AWA, my left leaning, anti-war, anti everything why are the americans interfering in the rest of the world feelings were completely put to one side as my mother and family feelings of 3000 people, children of someone stranded in a foreign country over christmas dominated.

I've also been doing some other rather intensive work. We're still hitting blanks as to what exactly it is that makes my otherwise pretty bright and on the ball child struggle so much at school. The latest was a trip to the OT to see if there was any physical mind/body matter. But as I suspected, the child who can draw so beautifully, play the viola, run around a soccer pitch with ease and grace and accuracy has no fine or gross motor skill problems. Relieved? Yes. But still puzzled. It's the inconsistency that bothers the school and the teacher. Then one minute he's firing on all cylinders and its obvious he understands and can do everything. The next it's as if he never learnt it before. So we've been trying Cogmed. It's been 4 weeks of 5 days a week for an hour to 90 minutes of intensive training on the computer. Most of the time I'm sitting next to him. Mainly for moral support. And the moral support consists mainly of trying to keep him calm and balance out his emotional outbursts and frustrations as things get difficult, he misses the answer, gets things wrong, lashes out verbally and physically. It's a strain. The literature only puts the training in a small paragraph and the rest is all fancy statistics and happy endings. There has been improvement. Significant improvement. I'm hoping it is as generalizable as they say it is. I'm hoping it is as permanent as they say it is. And if his pre-scores are anything to go by, he did have a huge problem with working memory which this has highlighted and promises to help.

It's intense. And if anything has highlighted to me that there can be no mastery over anything if you have no mastery over yourself. Which ties in nicely with going on this retreat and trying to master my monkey brain and pot-boiling emotions. I cannot begin to serve as a parent and role model to my kids if I cannot manage and master myself.

So I'll be off and out of touch for a couple of weeks, and then hopefully I'll be able to report back that I could manage 10 days without my children and husband's voice, without the written word, without creature comforts and with little sleep. I hope I'm up to the task.

A happy new year for when that rolls around.

all I really don't want for Christmas

2011-12-19T19:06:00.000+08:00

... and especially not 5x. aka, companies please use your imaginations. No wonder you're struggling with innovation.

'Tis the season to be jolly and merry and spend those marketing budgets before year end. But boy oh boy oh boy are the companies not really getting it right. OK, everyone 'fess up. How many desk calendars have you received to date? How many pocket agendas? How many in-between? How about wall calendars? I think we're at 5 or 6 by now. And they're really nice. Really expensive. And the companies haven't been content with sending them to us by normal post, nope, they've been fedex'd or DHL'd. And in this day and age of electronic agendas, i-phones, i-pads, google calendar and everything syncing with everything else including the whole family with each other, I'm afraid to say we don't use any of these paper versions. We have one "mum's" calendar hanging on the wall at the door where the 4 of our schedules get written into as a final reminder each day where the bags are packed and we don't use anything else. And the tragedy is that nor does anyone. We can't even give away these beautiful embossed heavy paper, packaged agendas. No-one wants them. Not even for scrap paper. Because we have left overs from previous years.

no, I don't want my guests to know ...

And how about the other "corporate gifts" we've received this year? I've taken to saying "no thank you" at the point of entry. No, I don't want a gift for joining your membership scheme, no I don't want a gift for opening a bank account, turning up at a dinner party, donating to your cause, I just don't want anything. I've just created 2 huge boxes of this type of stuff. And I've only just begun. And while you're about it. If you're giving one of your very exclusive members a gift (Singapore airlines this is for you), like some drinks coasters. If you actually want them to use them, please be discrete about your logo. Otherwise they just get trashed, and unused, no-one even picks them up to discover who made such a clever or nicely designed coaster. You just obviously don't understand your market.

Good way of doing some marketing - sorely needed eye candy for SG ...

Please, please, just send us a card and say we've donated our calendar budget to Kiva.org (the gift that potentially keeps giving), or to sightsavers, or bring me a book, or the local old age home or aids orphanage, or we've decided to fire 10 people less than we otherwise would have. But don't send us stuff. Even if it's really nice stuff. Because that's what everyone is doing and it shows a lack of imagination, creativity, innovation and all the other stuff that we'd like to think that the companies we patronize have something of.

First class massage chairs - now why didn't anyone inform the airlines of that idea?

Seen at my gym ...

To blog or not to blog ...

2011-12-17T18:11:00.000+08:00

on days like today - or rather it's more like weeks like this week, I always wonder if discretion is the better part of valor, or saying nothing is better than saying something horrid. It's all about perception anyway isn't it. And when I'm feeling grumpy and tired and then it rains and I have to get in a car rather than hop on a bus or minibus and then get frustrated with drivers who slow to a stand still whenever it rains EVEN though the state of raining is one which could be called more normal than a state of dryness in this country and EVEN then they still manage to have accidents every 4km or so ... and then lanes mean nothing here. Really they mean nothing. People weave their cars in and out of the lanes without any indication whatsoever and straddle the line in-between two lanes as if they're blinking motorbikes, or maybe they have in fact just graduated from motorbikes without the wherewithal to drive a car. It's beginning to dawn on me why people would get a chauffeur. And if you ever thought that HK was a building pit with continuos road words and change, omg. today we tried to get from point A to point B and at 3 different roads enroute (I'm talking a 5km route) the road had either been completely closed down, had changed direction into a one way (the wrong way of course) or was barricaded up with lots of trucks and cranes busily changing it into something else (mrt, Building, highway, by way, who knows). And we were just trying to get to the Titanic exhibition - albeit that that is the newest part of town.

Yesterday I was really appreciated SG. After my cross fit training they put up a challenge to run 10km along the river into town and back. I really liked the fact that I could run into town all the way to the Marina Bay sands along the water without encountering any cars or having to cross any roads along the Kallang Riverside park. Good endorphins and serotonin pulsing through my veins is obviously a great idea.

Today, I decided to follow Sorlo's advice and show my husband how much he's appreciated by giving him the day off. He's had a tough week of travel and has a couple of exams to study for in-between everything else. So I took my son to Viola - where I was unfortunately welcomed with open arms by the teacher who said a lot more gets accomplished in the lesson than when my husband is present and my son plays up a lot less! .... Fook. Then off to the exhibition. It was pretty good and engrossing. Getting there wasn't. Finding parking was a nightmare... obviously the planners did not have any idea of capacity when they designed only one layer of parking for all those thousands of cars. (Ditto last night when we went to see a movie - 50-50 - we gave up parking at the cinema, parked at our friends house out of the center and walked in!)
Well, at least my husband got his day off and some studying done.

We're trying to get out more and appreciate SG more. But I'm bad. I'm too critical I guess. It's probably not just here, it's everywhere. But the Arts and Sciences museum is built in the great location on the river, just outside the Marina Bay Sands complex. AND THE TWO ARE NOT JOINED IN A WATERPROOF MANNER ... I mean how stupid. I said as much, in the earshot of my two kids as when we exited the exhibition it was bucketing with rain and we had to borrow an umbrella to cross the 100m stretch between the two. "Don't say stupid mum, that's not a nice way of saying thing" pops up little mister being highly educated in the best school money can buy in this town. "use a more positive way of saying, like 'that was not well planned' or 'that wasn't thought out'"
Honest to god, they could have linked them underground with a passage, they could have extended the decorative overhangs which don't hang over only decorate, and thought about the climate here! Would have been thoughtful towards the riverside restaurant owners as well who can't really use the outside bit in the wet season.

Last night we ventured to Chijmes. I've driven past it before on the way to do my volunteering at SCWO and thought we really must try it out. Now this is what I really appreciate about Singapore. It takes heritage buildings and does something with them that allows them to continue to exist in a new function. We just wanted a quick bite before a late movie, but didn't quite want Tapas or Pub Grub, which seems to be the predominant offering, so we settled for Thai. The food was mediocre, but we didn't really expect much, what was rather interesting was the ladies of the night getting ready and waiting for the bar / club next door to open. Wow. I'm getting really old, but what they were wearing left nothing to the imagination and one could see their near future in all it's glory. Think of the worst of wanchai while you try to pierce a piece of green chicken curry, with the overhead lights and fans going on and off intermittently (power issue) and the rain streaming down on a plastic sheeting outdoor "roof" (pick your table carefully).

The whole complex was looking a little sad and dreary - and I don't think it was just the rain and the dark and the smell and the fact that the lifts hadn't been cleaned of the smell of vomit (and it was before 10pm), there were broken windows, broken signage, bronze letters missing from the walls. A great pity. It needed some of the lads and lasses from HK sanitation department with their power jet hoses and can -do attitude.

And what a pity HK doesn't do something with their heritage except let it fall apart and decay completely. And then declare it a hazard. At least they try here.

without fail ...

2011-12-12T17:12:00.000+08:00

Can someone, anyone, please explain to me why, when, and only when my husband goes on a business trip
* a child will have nightmares, all night long
* very important and very high lightbulbs will suddenly blow out of arm's reach even with the super high ladder
* the outlets for both the dishwasher and the sink will block and my best plumbing knowledge will do nothing to unblock them
* the electronic gate will cease to work
* I'll hurt my back / get a migraine / be grumpy and out of sorts from lack of sleep....
* even the bathroom scales refuse to co-operate and show a wildly advanced number after retreating for weeks.

some or all of these, often simultaneously.

I'm obviously not cut out to be a single mum.

Sick mind

2011-12-09T12:57:00.001+08:00

Remember those corny signs seriously disorganized people have in their offices / cubicles "a clean desk is a sign of a sick mind" ? Well right now I'm prepared to risk it. My desk was overflowing - and for those who have noticed my blogging is getting, well, let's say a bit more spaced out (in time that is), it's not that I'm not collecting thoughts and ideas, it's more finding them on my desk and in my mind to put them down.

In order to clear one item from my desk, a book, called "Room" which I managed to devour during my HK trip, I need to share with you a very interesting quote, which I think ties in rather nicely with the "parent bootcamp post"

"In the world I notice persons are nearly always stressed and have no time. Even Grandma often says that, but she and Steppa don't have jobs, so I don't know how persons with jobs do all the jobs and all the living as well. In Room me and Ma had time for everything. I guess the time gets spread very thin like butter over all the world, the roads and houses and playgrounds and stores, so there's only a little smear of time on each place, the everyone has to hurry on to the next bit.
Also everywhere I'm looking at kids, adults mostly don't seem to like them, not even the parents do. The call the kids gorgeous and so cute, they make the kids do the thing all over again so they can take a photo, but they don't want to actually play with them, they'd rather drink coffee talking to other adults. Sometimes there's a small kid crying and the Ma of it doesn't even hear." (Room by Emma Donoghue)

I had a few interesting responses to the Bootcamp posting. Actually I do subscribe to the idea of TCS (Taking Children Seriously) and one of my gripes with leaving children with domestic helpers is that often they don't understand the nuances of discipline. When to listen and see where a child is coming from and when to set a boundary and trust that your age, perspective and wisdom counts for something.

I do see parents in the category of where you wonder why on earth they had children. Sure they love their kids, but do they really like them? I have a profound respect for people who chose to be child-free or whatever the current correct PC term is. Particularly if it is an informed and careful choice.

And now to finish my goal of a clear desk (well, it is clear, but everything just shifted to the floor, which isn't really a solution either) before my offspring get home and want my undivided attention.

A little R, R &R

2011-12-07T15:30:00.000+08:00

Yup I went off for a little nostalgic trip to HK for some rest, recreation and replenishment. I do have a very very nice husband who basically said, go now, every weekend will have some other reason why you shouldn't go, plus I had my very good child-free friends staying here to give 2 extra adult hands while I was gone. Perfect.

There is something good about going back but not too soon. Allowing your rose-colored memories to stand up to the scrutiny of reality. My first shock was on landing. Scrummage to exit the plane, run, rush, yes honestly grown men with their wheelie bags and laptops were running to be first in the sky train and ditto when the emerged to be first at immigration, and I don't want to even tell you how amusing it was for the last 100m dash out the airport express to the taxi rank. "ah," I thought, "that truly is Hong Kong for you. People scared to wait, scared to be last, scared to miss out"

The weekend was spent in a hedonistic blur of lunch to tea to dinner to brunch to lunch to drinks to dinner. With a bit of retail therapy in-between - after seeing the film Crazy, Stupid Love on the plane I could no longer in good conscience let my friend walk around in sneakers anymore. I needed new contact lenses - yes I know Singapore has contact lenses, but it will be weeks before I find a supplier I like who has the right stuff at the right price with the right amount of niceness. I got my son a new trumpet. The second hand stop gap let's see if he likes it was starting to rust at a rather rapid rate, the bits that go up and down were sticking no matter how much they were oiled and his teacher said he was showing a real aptitude for it - and he's been practicing - a lot, despite all the set backs. Again, I know they have trumpets here, but the prices seemed steeper and I didn't feel like the hunt. I'm not into hunting right now. I want familiarity and ease.

Yardbird

And that's what HK is, it's familiar and it's easy. And while I'm walking and bussing and tramming to get the stuff I need easily, I have all sorts of serendipitous finds along the way. Like did anyone notice how much fun Bridges street (link is the sane day-time version) has become after dark? Oh, shed me 20 years and allow me to sleep late and it would be my haunt. Yardbird must be the happening place at the moment.

Cute retro store on Bridges Str

I managed to squeeze in two walks up the peak, dim sum at City Hall, dinner at Shanghai Lane, lunch at Madam Sixty Ate, dinner at Hunan Garden, drinks at Dot Cod, breakfast at pacific coffee (mistake, but the company was great), dinner at the American Club, lunch at a Vietnamese hole in the wall in Wanchai, stopover at Yardbird. I missed but will be back for the molecular Sangria at Ovologue. Brunch at the China club. I took the airport express, MTR, bus, minibus, tram, taxi.

I caught up with as many friends as I could. And I took a good hard longer distance look at my life from 4 hours flight away and decided that we have it good. We are lucky. We may not complain.

I still miss HK like it aches. But that always happens when a long love affair comes to an end.

And this, ladies and gents, is what is on offer at Changi airport - I had to reassure my friend that I was not in a seedy sex shop and in fact it's a type of deep heat to "relieve aches and pains" yeah, right.

Parent bootcamp ...

2011-11-30T15:31:00.000+08:00

OK everyone, repeat after me
"me parent, you child"

and then do it a couple of times. And spend a lot of time talking to other parents. Honestly. And consider that a reality check, tuning and adjustment may be necessary.

It takes all kinds of parents to bring up a world of kids. But occasionally I just do have to wonder when the lines got so blurred. Sure in my household they get blurred along the lines of me, forgetful mum, rather careless and terrible with too much data overload and not able to concentrate on details gets put into line by one or another child reminding me to be somewhere or do something or gets along and does it themselves or I end up in the wrong place at the wrong time or not being there at all. When they do it themselves it's called empowering them and enhancing their sense of responsibility isn't it?

The other evening we were at a dinner party. Dinner parties. And lunches. Oh are they ever fodder for thought. We met some wonderful people. Some amazing people. Some scarily smart and with it people. And we met a couple who were all of the above, but were obviously having their lives dictated to by a 5 year old. Honestly. I didn't think they were serious. But they were. The child dictated if they were allowed to go out of an evening or not, and if so, to which of their friends and what time they were expected home. A say in all matters at home and could apparently make life quite miserable if things didn't go her way. I was astounded. And I'm afraid a little blunt - I offered the husband parent bootcamp. And the more I thought about it, I felt sorry not only for them, but also for the child.

That child is going to have a really tough time. In the classroom, with playmates (I already heard about one kid who doesn't want to go to said child's house as the child is "too bossy"), never mind when they get to campus, study groups or have to enter the work force. You think I was tongue in cheek about the choice thing? Well only partially - one of the joys of childhood is its freedom from having to make too many choices, and particularly choices that are above your maturity or understanding level.

There is a sad pattern, and I've seen it repeated oh so often where ever I've lived and in a number of different cultural or national communities so I'd say it's almost culturally neutral. It involved two super smart, super nice humans married to each other. Who have a child late in life. Who struggle to have the first child and often are incapable of conceiving a second. A parent / both who travels a lot and cannot deny the child anything. A certain level of material wealth. And then a lovely charming and totally manipulative child who is denied nothing. It is a terrible waste. And if I have only one finger to point, I'm afraid more often than not I'll have to point it at the dad. They're such pushovers. There is another sad part to this all. All the hopes and prayers and feelings and desires put onto one little person. It is a lot to bear. But parenting is not a transaction. Children are not a piece of clay, or a vessel we can pour ourselves into.

No is a very hard word and it takes an extraordinary amount of practice to keep on having to say it or come up with its manifold variations. It also takes a certain type of bloody-mindedness which is beyond and outside of any kind of intellectual reasoning for a parent to say: my role in life is to deny you the things that you want that I would also love to have had and that I can easily give to you, because deep down, in some fundamental way I know that it will make you a better person and me a better parent, even if it's completely inconvenient, terribly embarrassing (witness tantrums in toy stores), and just not terrible rational.

Any other parents out there denying their children Smiggles right now? Smiggles are great. They've led to wonderful conversations about consumption, necessity, pricing, marketing, desirability, change in perception (my son was contemptuous of Smiggles until his bestest friend succumbed), design, peer pressure and all those wonderful things. But we still have not, and will not buy the products. Just like we're not going to change a perfectly serviceable functional car because some people in the society we live in think that it is beneath our social status (whatever that may be).

It's hard enough being a parent without denying yourself the most basic rights of a parent, and that is to be a parent and thereby both insisting they are and allowing your children to be children.

First they kill the trees

2011-11-24T16:53:00.000+08:00

There is the most awful arborcide going on in my community. At first it was on the main road going past, and I sort of noticed it while walking the dog and wondered how it would impact on the noise from the road towards our little house. The trees were all healthy and in good nick and I don't have a nice local councilor that I can email and ask what the heck is going on, but it wasn't right in my back yard. I sort of assumed they'd probably want to widen the road so that even more cars could be stuck in traffic every day - nope, no one ever learns that more roads means more traffic, not less.

I should have known this morning when getting out the shower I saw 2 huge trucks on the road outside. I did take action. I didn't leave things to chance. I went and asked what they were doing and they were removing a roadside tree they said.

So imagine my horror when I got home today and saw 2 trucks in my back garden covered head to toe in trees! My trees. From my garden. Without permission, without notification, without redress, without a chance to protest, no time to tie myself to the tree. I ranted, I raved. I cussed I shouted. But it was too late. Gone. Not dead, not rotten, not about to fall down. Gone, cut to pieces. And of course they won't be replaced. Arbocide. I'm sorry, it's a touchy, irrational thing with me. Oh they said, these trees fall down in the rainy season - right like they've fallen down every one of the 30 or so years that their rings say they were old. Oh, but the ants were attacking their roots - well kill the f***ing ants I say, don't touch my trees.

(By the way: Is there someone out there who can tell me how to add a bunch of photos to a blog using blogger.com without them jumping all over the place I just want to be able to line them up side by side and under each other without big gaps.)

eliminate free choice

2011-11-24T10:05:00.000+08:00

I love serendipity. There was a phase during the start of school when the library was new and the librarians were just desperately trying to get all and any books onto the shelves any old way. Which meant there was a suspension of the dewey decimal system. Yes sure it was on the spines of the books, but suddenly Nelson Mandela was next to Twilight, which shared a shelf with Learning chinese characters, the Warren Buffet way and Buffy. The poor and desperate were surviving on less than a dollar a day next to the opulence of the golden age. It was wonderful.

There is a lot of talk of how the internet creates and perpetuates intellectual silos - nothing new to what universities with their faculties do, or the very existence of selective education from preschool upwards. It's a tough battle to put yourself in the oncoming path of divergent views. And yet sometimes I just stumble on something while looking for something else that is just so much fun. It's happened twice in fact in the last week, both times with books.

The first, leading to today's title, is "Never let go: A philosophy of lifting, living and learning" By Dan John - I challenge you to read the first chapter, it's a scream (free on Kindle). He talks about why guys in prison have such buff bodies and puts it down to lack of free choice. As research has shown, we only have so much willpower (aka free choice - this is a great article by the way) and if it's all been used up in the first few hours of the day by making all sorts of crappy decisions like when to get out of bed, whether to hit the snooze button one more time, using shampoo A or B, what to wear, what to have for breakfast, whether to drink the coffee and eat the muffin or not, we use up all of our "can of free will" and there's nothing left by the time we have to do a work out or resist the cake in the office or the handful of chocolate at 4pm when the kids get home from school etc.
Suddenly you realize why Amy Chua's kids did so well. Not because she's such a great mum, but because she made all the hard choices for them and totally eliminated their free will so that they could use up their "can" in a limited and highly effective way. That's why too, when kids leave home for college they go off the rails. Why when we get back from a spa retreat we go back to being slobs. And of course we all know that the science of happiness teaches us that too much choice is not a great thing.

Oh, yes, please take away all my free will and I"ll be slim and trim and gorgeous with energy left to impose a lack of free will on my kids that makes them realize there is no alternative to music practice and homework and team sports. NO CHOICE - the new motto in this household.

The other book is slightly more scholarly, and WAY less funny, but thought provoking none the less "The Geography of Thought - how Asians and Westerners think differently and why" by Richard Nisbett. I can just see scholarly wars on the horizon as Messrs. Pinker etal. sharpen their verbal swords.

why dutch is more difficult than chinese

2011-11-21T06:37:00.000+08:00

At least according to my linguist daughter.

As Sinterklaas and his merry band of Pieten are in town, yes, yes, yes, they arrived on Saturday in all their glory Dutch is in full flow in the household. One of the advantages of living abroad, isolated by your children's contemporaries is that their sense of reality and belief is suspended just a tiny bit longer than if they'd been back 'home' and have it shattered by older and more cynical kids.

We went out on Saturday night, the first night of putting out the shoes with letters and poems and pictures and came home to the most wondrously composed letter, completely in Dutch. Well, this must be a new way to get children to spontaneously learn a language! We traced the drafts to next to the computer and realized that judicious use of google translate had been made. But nevertheless they'd done very well.

Yesterday a big portion was given over to the next letter (this time with parents taking the function of google translate) and I congratulated them on their rapidly improving Dutch and asked if they found it easier than Chinese.

Not at all, says my daughter. Chinese is way easier. You don't have the same alphabet, so it's not so easy to confuse the same letters that sound differently and you don't have to learn to spell differently.

So there you have it. Dutch is more difficult than Chinese.

what else we've been up to

2011-11-18T07:49:00.000+08:00

The last few weeks in which we (in no particular order):

Have a doggy playdate between our adopted dog and her brother ...

My daughter in a quest to beat her teachers score masters some simplified characters (great game by the way and they have simplified and traditional characters - Train Chinese Chinese writer)

We go to the races and find it a rather sad and sterile affair - missing Happy Valley already ...

Daily encounters with the dangers of driving in SG. There is no way the driver of that vehicle exited alive - and I'd hate to know what happened to passengers or anyone else in the vicinity. Not a cheap car which leads to all kind of judgements about people with too much money, too much alcohol and too few brains and consideration for others ...

I don't think that sign needs any other elaboration. I just thought this sign could be used as a social commentary in general on narcissistic personalities....

And possibly the highlight of my son's time here so far - in which we try to rescue a drowning reticulated python, but unfortunately he/she was already dead....

And I visit the Marina Sands shopping mall. Make that "shoppe" mall. Why? What qualifies any retail outlet there to be called a "shoppe". (

noun

shop (used chiefly for quaint effect).

Origin:
deliberately archaized spelling)

Protein and personal trainers and doctors

2011-11-17T09:02:00.000+08:00

As you all can see, I'm on a roll with my personal mission of getting rid of the baby fat. It all boils down to 10 years, 10kg and 10 calories a day too much over that period. The magic 10. Does that mean I'll need 10 months or 10 years to get it all back to normal again?

Anyway, the topic of today is a result of a comment someone made about her teenage son wanting to bulk up and the personal trainer wanting him to do the protein shake thing and the doctor being against it. I read that and a couple of things went through my mind. In gearing up to tackling this old body of mine I've been doing a lot of reading. And my personal opinion is that they're probably both right and they're probably both wrong and that it depends on a lot of things.

As anyone who's tried to find a suitable diet knows, whatever you read seems to contradict whatever else you read. On the surface. At the bottom line they all agree that the system is one of energy in (calories) and energy out (exercise / life) and the balance of the two will either result in equilibrium, you getting fatter or thinner.

Then, most seem to agree that you need some sort of combination of macro nutrients (carbs, protein and fat) and then most seem to diverge greatly as to the proportions in which you need them and the frequency. So you see anything from 50:40:10 to 20:40:40 etc. and anything from 6 meals/snacks a day to intermittent fasting.

But there also seems to be a pattern in what everyone is saying. A general consensus seems to be forming around the need for all macro nutrients to be present in every meal / snack (i.e. don't just have carbs or protein or fat in a meal, but a bit of each), cutting sugar out of the diet (sob) and that we should balance our protein out during the day (not just a lump of steak for dinner) and that protein has an important role in maintaining muscle. And who wouldn't like a little bit of muscle with their fat?

Now for the protein. As a weekday vegetarian, I'm finding it a bit of a struggle to keep up the protein without adding tons of carbs. I've just started doing Cross Fit (don't ask, it's lunacy, but fun), and there they are strong fans of the Zone diet and recommended I read the "vegetarian myth" - I'm open to reading anything as you know - so watch this space.

Anyway, in answer to the comment about protein, I think the answer is something in-between. Yes protein is important. But it's also important how it's delivered. And what choice you make depends on what your goals are. So if you're a skinny teenager wanting to fatten up and add muscle, I'd say that the trainer is right about protein and wrong about whey protein shakes. Why? Well for a start he's probably on a commission to sell the packs, but besides that the main aim of the shakes is to provide pure protein without any carbs and fats for people who need to lose fat and maintain or grow muscles. And who are time poor and don't have a nice mummy who is prepared to cook nutritionally sound and delicious meals for them. aka the life of most fitness trainers, who, let us be honest are also not always the most intellectual and researching of creatures.

And your doctor is right because it's probably always better to get your nutrients in the form of food and not out of a can or bottle, and he's not entirely right because depending on the protein shake it's not going to kill your son, if that's not all he's eating / drinking but he needs to know that you need to drink a lot of water if you're taking in a lot of protein to protect your liver and kidneys. By the way - the Livestrong.com website is a pretty good site with a no-nonsense attitude to health and fitness. But I always have a good look at the doctor giving the advice and see if he walks the walk or is a fat sedentary smoking guy with no idea about health and fitness in real life!

If you want to increase your protein intake it's a good idea to have some feeling for what foods deliver protein and what else is part of the package. Any of a dozen websites will give this information, just find one that is easy to use and understand.

Then finally, dear anon, good on you to seek medical advice and to have such a good relationship with your son that you're working on this together and sensibly! A final thing, if his "not bulking up" seems inappropriate for his age / relative to his peers, and is accompanied by other delays, it may be a good idea to see an endocrinologist in case he has delayed puberty.

says who?

2011-11-14T16:59:00.000+08:00

Saturday saw me watching the kids play football with a couple of other mums. One of the more adventurous had her running shoes on and had done a couple of laps of the field, braving the stares of the less energetic and less exhibitionist or daring of the rest of us, not to mention extreme heat and no breeze. Afterwards she came to join us chatting. We admired her spirit and tenacity and the talk moved to exercise and running in general. A couple of us lamented the ending of the cross country season, which, although meant getting up at an ungodly hour to have the kids running at 6.45, had meant 2 days of guaranteed exercise for us.

Then one of the mothers said she'd love to take part in a 10km run in March next year. "that's great" I said, "and you have more than enough time to prepare for it." Then out came the story. Her husband had hired this fancy schmanzy trainer, and had "lent" said trainer to her for a session. She'd admitted her goal and he'd laughed at her. Not only had he laughed at her, but he told her it was unlikely she'd be able to do it, perhaps she should revise it to 5km, or maybe if she was allowed to walk it / take all the time in the world it would be possible. And then to hit the nail in the coffin, he added that if she lost some weight first it would be a bit easier.
Now just for the record. We are not talking about a large lady here. We're talking about a middle aged mum who plays tennis a couple of times a week, is perhaps 5kg over weight and is generally active.

I was shocked. And told her that with that amount of time, if she really really wanted to she could even run a marathon. A full marathon. And I advised her never to go back to that particular trainer should she need good advice and encouragement. And that she'd lose weight as a by-product of running, if that was her aim. And then I pointed her to the resources on the web for beginner runners and suggested she had a look through Hal Hidgdon's site, which has some good solid advice and once upon a time took me through a marathon training.

Yet again it seems we have to take care who we listen to, what they're saying and how much credibility we give them.

Return of the No Monster ....

2011-11-14T08:03:00.000+08:00

My daughter turned 10 a couple of weeks back. It's been something that's been creeping up on us gradually, but now it's here and she's once again become a fully fledged No Monster. The last time this persona was present in our lives was when she was roughly 2 years old. She alternated saying "no" as a response to all requests both reasonable, unreasonable and in her own self interest or not with half hour long mantras in the car on the way to school of "I don't want to go to school, I don't want to go to school"(OK you can imagine the rest).

It was a rather trying time, co-inciding with the recent birth of her sole sibling who was having some health problems of his own, and I guess a dose of sleep-deprived humour was the only way to cope with it at the time.

So too now. There is this extreme irrationality that has cropped up in an otherwise rational thinking child. Take Thursday for example. I was going out, Dad was on his way home in some plane from some distant shore. They were both finished with dinner, homework, music practise and it was 6.30pm. OK guys, say I, just have a quick bath or shower and pop into bed. "No" says she. Obviously I'd insulted her 10 year old self who now goes to bed at 8pm. But you're really tired, I try, just go and read quietly and relax. "No" says the avid reader who would otherwise murder, maim and disable in order to be able to get another 10 pages read. I'm running late and this is going nowhere, so they get a hug, a curfew based on the limit and I leave.
Fast forward to Friday evening when she is in tears and protesting that despite the fact that not practising her clarinet and cello will result in suspension of lessons which she doesn't want to happen under any circumstances and despite the fact that she's fully aware and understands that when she starts practising she enjoys in and despite the fact that when she practises she makes faster progress and enjoys her lessons more she absolutely refuses to practise. And if I didn't request it the odds are less than 50/50 that she'd do it of her own accord. And besides anything, she's EXTREMELY TIRED, DIDN'T I KNOW THAT? At that point I must admit I dissolved. Into laughter. "what's so funny?" she huffed. Nothing, I say, only that if you'd grabbed the chance to go to bed earlier last night you'd not find yourself in this situation tonight. That's all.

But there are principles at stake here, obviously. She's not going to lose ground, the battle is a short minute by minute day by day one and there is no long term strategy. I suspect there may even be hormones in the picture. Last night when I put her to bed I told her about her 2 year old self. The child who loves going to school couldn't believe she'd ever resisted it so fiercly. She too had to laugh at her 2 year old self and there was a glimmer that she saw a resemblence to what was happening now. The logical thinking bit of her acknowledges the insanity of her behaviour, but the growing girl's reptilian brain short circuits logic and reason and just says "no".

Interval training - why didn't anyone tell me ...

2011-11-13T15:31:00.000+08:00

Or is it why didn't I listen?

As far as fitness and training is concerned, there seems very much to be a "boy" version and a "girl" version. Yes, sure I've followed lots of programs for getting myself ready for a marathon, half marathon, mountain marathon, Maclehose 100km, Green power 50km, etc. etc. I've done bootcamp, I've done the great and wonderful and very much to be recommended fitness program at IHP. But my history with interval training is patchy to say the least.

It's my own lazy fault really. Every time in a program where is said "interval training 5km" I'd go and do a light 5km run and not be fagged about running 100 or 200 or 400m sprints. I mean that's like really hard work. When I trained for my first marathon, during my MBA program, there was a group of guys training really hard to climb the Eiger. They'd do these tough hill interval trainings every week, and I'd be totally intimidated and resisted the one time they ever invited me to join them. One of my other classmates, a decathlete once mentioned in passing that I should swap at least one of my training runs for some interval training, but I thought that wasn't for me.

OK, put me down as a resistant know it all, or at least someone who's scared of the new and un-known. More recently, I was doing the IHP program - remember when I posted those graphs about how well and fast my fitness was improving? How week after week my heart rate went down doing the same interval training runs? At the time I was probably the slimmest I've been post children, and I foolishly put it down to the fact that I was doing at least 6 to 8 units of exercise a week, and training for a half marathon with lots of long slow runs. (I definitely wasn't eating any less). Then I went and got the hip bursitis and was injured for the longest time. Turns out I could have done a lot less, not have been injured and still have seen the same weight loss. But I didn't know / understand the science. Studies have been done with rats, and fat australian ladies, and Norwegians, and it does seem you can achieve more with less.

There are a lot of people on the net selling interval training and it's companion, HIRT - high intensity resistance training, which basically means using weights and using heavier ones than you are used to for less repetitions. The few I've been sniffing around have been Turbulence training (and their new fat loss 24/7), the Venus Index , Alwyn Cosgroves etc. I've read through their free stuff (warning use a little used email address to sign up because they sure know how to bug you with tons of emails), and it seems to make sense. I'm not sure it is necessary to fork out a lot of money for the programs if you know what you're doing and how to do it, personally I bought the fat loss 24/7 and think that the exercise program is pretty good as it lets you do everything at home with a selection of dumbbells (warning you'll need heavier ones than you're probably used to), a stability ball, a fitness bench and your own body weight. I'm not so sure about their eating program as it seems to rely quite a bit on stuff out of a jar or bottle and lots of protein, which if you're a vegetarian or even part time vegetarian like me, is pretty hard to do. I'm not into too much fag about planning things and weighing things and obsessing about meals and meal times.

One of my readers who is also a friend recently wrote to me and said, "Quick, desperate, I need to lose 5kg what should I do" and I pointed her to Dr. Fuhrmans' eat to live diet. (I'm better and preaching than practicing) and she wrote to me this morning saying she'd followed it to great success losing the 5kg she set out to lose. I'd say that's probably the most healthy way to lose a lot of weight quickly.

Ok, finally, I'm going to give you the interval training I've been doing the last 2 weeks - it's one from the Woman's runner's magazine and is excellent in my view. It's aim is to get you to run a faster 1/2 marathon, but it tick's the interval training box perfectly. I'm using the beginner's version, and believe me, after 30 minutes you can mop me off the floor, along with a whole pool of sweat. And I've lost 2kg....

To be able to do this workout, you need to be able to run at 10km per hour for at least 3 minutes. It increases by 30 seconds each workout. Recommended you don't do this more than 3 times a week with at least a day recovery between. There's 2 ways of doing it, using km/h or doing perceived effort, but the risk of perceived effort is that you think you're working harder than you really are and actually could push yourself more! If you can't run at 10km/h (or can run faster than 10km/h for longer than 3 minutes), I'd say just adjust each of the speeds up or down by 0.5km/h until it hits the button for you. You know you're doing the right thing if by the middle of the last set of 10km/h you feel like you may just die if you can't stop, but you keep going anyway.... and your heart rate is approaching or at its max. (Do go and see a doctor and all the rest if you're not reasonably healthy and fit before you do this, I don't want anyone literally dying on the treadmill).

Time (in minutes): (cumulative Speed:
minutes into run): (beginners)
4 0 7 km/h
3 4 8 km/h
2 7 9 km/h
1 9 10
1 10 9
2 11 8
2 13 9
2 15 10
1 17 9
3 18 8
2 21 9
3 * 23* 10*
1 26 9
3 27 8
30 0 (give me a drink!)

* The idea is that at this point you keep on increasing the amount of time you're going at 10km / hour by 30 seconds, so everything shifts down from that point. My personal aim is not a 1/2 marathon, but to eventually run for the MacRitchie 25, which means doing 5km in 25 minutes. So once my cumulative km hits 5km (I'm now running 33 minutes and doing 4.78km) I'm going to start increasing each component of the workout by 0.5km/h until I can get to 5km in 25 minutes.

This is the intermediate version - I'm not ready for it, but maybe some of you are!

Time (in minutes): (cumulative Speed:

minutes into run): (intermediate)

4 0 9 km/h

3 4 10 km/h

2 7 11 km/h

1** 9** 12**

2 10 11

3 12 10

4 15 9

3 19 10

2 22 11

2 ** 24** 12**

2 26 11

3 28 10

4 31 9

35 0

** You lucky intermediate people get to increase the duration of this section by a minute each time you do it!

recycling

2011-11-11T08:12:00.000+08:00

My daughter at the computer yesterday, typing away furiously in Chinese.
"what you up to?" I ask
"Oh, just typing out a poem I wrote last year" says she, glancing up from a little publication her previous school put out with the 'best' work of children in Chinese. "it fits in nicely with our current unit of enquiry on seasons, so I don't have to think of a new one"

There you have it, 10 year old student and already she's discovered the fine art of recycling. I can just be grateful she's not googling the topic and plagerising it off the net!

I just don't get it ....

2011-11-09T22:17:00.000+08:00

I'll 'fess up. I'm not the healthiest eater on the planet, and nor are my kids. But we try to have balanced meals, sitting at the table together, and 3 healthy meals and limit the snacks. Actually they're pretty good - it's me who's the problem. If I had myself as a mother and not as a self, I'd not be sipping ginger tea right now in a vague attempt to turn back the clock 10 years of kids and emotional eating and not planning meals and eating on the fly and complete lack of portion control.
I'm going the full monty, writing down every single bite that enters my mouth and being confronted with the daily tally of too much fat and carbohydrates and too little protein the one day and other too much and little the other day.

But I do try. I try to aim for the 5 portions of fruit and veg for myself and my family every day. We have sometimes foods, they're not bad on the resisting of candy (by default in the case of my son who doesn't like fruit), we stay away from lollipops, limit ourselves to good chocolate. I beat myself up regularly that I've not in the 7 years after his first year of reflux been able to get my son eating fruit. I know all the theories, I know all the ideas, all the suggestions all the ways in which I have failed him and am a bad mother, but he'd as soon chop his head off as have a bite of fruit. He does try from time to time, he too realizes this is a rather strange way of being, and as health conscious as he is (he's the label reader in the family, the one with veto power over things where the first ingredient is sugar or there is any mention of palm oil), as much as he knows that fruit is important, he just cannot eat it. It's uniformly sour or bitter to him, and he gags and out it comes. I don't know whether it's just become a kind of phobia or aversion or if there is any medical basis to the whole thing.

So now I've laid our facts bare, I have to tell you that I was completely astounded the other day when I accompanied a school trip last week and had to take care of three youngsters. The thing was totally unrelated to the field trip theme - their eating habits. The kids were told to bring along some spending money, a snack and a drink and the adults were told to let them decide when and where and what they wanted to eat. Right. Fine. I'm OK with that. I know that my kids have the facts and generally are very sensible as to what and when they eat, and also still have an amazing set of "brakes" on their eating. They'll eat 3 bites of chocolate and declare themselves to be full and put it back in the fridge (yes alas, we have to, as bad as it is, otherwise the ants, mould and heat gets to it) and promptly forget about it. If I'm confronted with chocolate there is no way it will remain in one piece as long as I am compos mentos.

So, the day started with A (one of the boys) offering everyone a Smint. Next up were some polo mints. Then out came the Nerds. I'd never heard of Nerds before, nor had my son - so he took the box offered and promptly looked at the label. Dextrose (that's sugar he declares), sugar, corn syrup, artificial flavors (list as long as a mile) - hey there is NOTHING in this. And, (disgusted) it's fruit flavored . He didn't take any. First stop on the outing and there was the burger king. At 10am. I had to persuade them to first do a couple of things before hitting the King for a snack. And when 2 of the 3 kids are eating fast food, what do you do but give your child some money as well, and hope he choses wisely. He did, sort of, a small portion of chicken nuggets. At 11.30 we were at MacDonalds having "lunch", and I discovered that Sprite constituted some parents idea of sending a drink along to school. Well I guess if Nerds is the snack then Sprite may as well be the drink, there's lemon in there somewhere, or something resembling it isn't there?

Back home we had a long chat about the food component of the outing - initiated by my son who was telling the consumption details in awe and amazement to my husband and daughter. He was amazed that this kid could be so skinny and still consume so much rubbish in his diet. I was amazed that parents obviously intelligent and wealthy enough to send their kids to a school like theirs would give their kid snacks and drinks like that (plus a LOT of money in case it wasn't enough for the 4 hours we were out and about).

I'm also concerned about what they are or are not learning about nutrition at school. I know in the very first international school my daughter attended in Spain, the headmaster considered french fries to be a vegetable. The best school so far was her little spanish nursery where there was a ban on any processed foods for snacks. As long as mum had made it, you could bring it, otherwise, if it was in a packet, forget it. I guess aged 2-5 it's much easier to control that type of thing. Both my kids have just been on school camp. For my daughter it wasn't too much of an issue, but for my son it was a dietary disaster. He came home absolutely starving after 3 days of not eating as he was unable to find anything that he liked. Simple reason - he likes food plain, unadorned and identifiable. So yes to rice (no butter or salt), yes to pasta (ditto no sauce, butter or salt), any vegetable fine, but don't over cook it even by 30 seconds, just don't mix it and cover it with tomato sauce - so there goes pasta and pizza and all the staples of what kids seem to thrive on. And then unlike my daughter, he couldn't fill up on plain unadorned fruit so he just starved. What had we done in anticipation of the trip. We'd advised the school that he didn't like fruit but we'd not pressed any point. We wanted to see if peer pressure and hunger would get the better of him. It didn't. I should have known better. As a baby, everyone said to me, if he doesn't eat something just leave it and he'll be hungry enough the next meal to eat it. That's how I ended up with a child who was severely underweight (9kg at 18 months) and at risk of being a failure to thrive baby. If he didn't want it, like it, felt full or sick he didn't eat it. Ever. And I don't have a child who necessarily has any medical issues. Unlike a friend of mine with a diabetic child. Here enters a whole other kettle of fish. Careful balanced consumption of food is potentially a life and death issue, and not in the long run like for the rest of us.

The thing is, nutrition is important. It really is about health and well being in the short and long term. Whether is just a child misbehaving with a "sugar high" or addicted to fast food and fats, or a child unable to function and concentrate as they have no food in them. And the habits are formed now. I know our HK dentist regularly took the school there to task on the menu at school and particularly the use of "fruit" (i.e. all sugar no fruit only flavoring) juice in the school canteen. She saw the most horrendous of consequences in the jaws of candy loving children. She was this one woman crusader who was fighting for the eradication of her own profession by promoting healthy eating in her patients. For every one of her I know 10 parents who are incapable of saying "no" and resisting pester power. Myself included at times (I can do "no" perhaps 8 / 10 times and sometimes it is just all too much).

No parent would knowingly choose for their child to have diabetes. And type 1 diabetes, when it strikes is devastating and life altering for the child and family. But it is a disease that no one has any control over. Not so with type 2 diabetes. And it's just plain unfair for the poor children and parents of type 1 diabetes patients that they're lumped along with people who through poor food and lifestyle choices get this disease while they do their utmost to balance their nutrition as a matter of survival.

Type 2 diabetes has been called the "epidemic of our time" and in just 5-6 years is accounting for an astounding number of cases in pediatric care. The suggestions made in this article are clear:
Nutrition counseling needs to be available in school so that children understand the importance of healthy eating. The selling of candy and sugar-containing drinks in schools must be forbidden. Fast foods loaded with calories and fat must not be available in school settings. Every food item sold in school must meet a minimum nutritional requirement that will ensure that it is good for children. We must put the health and welfare of our children above the financial benefits accrued by selling junk food in school.

Reading about it all is quite chilling. And when you realize that it's not just the US of A, but that 10% of the population of HK has type 2 diabetes as well .... and in Singapore new cases of children with (type 2) diabetes has risen from 10 per year to 50 per year in just 3 years
"Anxiety runs high for what aging children with diabetes will be up against in the years ahead.

"The health insurance system is just horrible for these kids as they age. They get kicked out of their cozy pediatric health care systems, knocked off their parents' health plans, then stop care and suffer the consequences," Lipton says.

Long-term complications of untreated diabetes that previously affected adults in their 60s — blindness, kidney failure, amputations and cardiovascular disease — will appear sooner.

"We are already seeing some 20- and 25-year-old kids now on dialysis for kidney failure. It's chilling," Lipton says.

"We're still on the front wave of this epidemic," says Larry Deeb, a Tallahassee pediatric endocrinologist and past president of the American Diabetes Association. "It's a long ways from 17 to 80."

I was a little uncertain about what I should do or whether I should say anything about my experience with this field trip, but after doing a little bit of reading to write this blog, I think I do need to address the matter with the teacher and the school. Perhaps just a we have graphic pictures of throat, tongue and other cancers on packets of cigarettes we need to do the same for candy and snacks?

How would you go about addressing this matter at school? Would you even bother, or would you just make sure your home front is aware and within the dietary norms? How do you go about teaching your kids how to say no to any extreme of nutrition? I have a 10 year old girl who will soon see the pressure of her peers who go to dietary extremes in order to lose or maintain a slim figure. Today it is a big Mac with some peer pressure. In a few years cigarettes, alcohol, drugs?

what can I bring you?

2011-11-08T12:52:00.000+08:00

As good as it gets

I have a friend visiting from HK at the moment, and one coming next weekend. They both asked what they could bring me or the kids from HK that we may be missing. My reply was one of those impossible requests - green mini buses, south bay beach and a few mountains. I think the kids would have added "M" our helper to the list. Even though the new helper is a million times better than the first one, they had a real bond with our HK helper and miss her intensely.

At least dogs are welcome

who are you trying to kid?

Really, we are settling in, and it is all relative, but I do miss those things. I'd probably have added "autumn" in HK to the list as well - that wonderful season of getting out and hitting all the running and hiking trails. The friend who arrived on Monday had the bright idea of trying out the airport public transport into the city. After the first wait and stop she rapidly changed her mind and exclaimed it had taken her longer to catch the train and get to "expo" than the whole airport express ride into central would have taken her in HK. Yup - and it probably cost her a whole lot more as well. She's here to guide a group of people from a developing country to look at SG's HBD flat scheme - something that SG does do very well. Perhaps someone should take some people from SG to have a look at HK's public transport system?

I spent a good part of Friday covering SG's public transport and it doesn't come up roses let me tell you.

Let's start with a cost comparison:

Taxi fares:
In Hong Kong

Fare Table (HK$)

First 2 kilometres or any part thereof	HK$20
Every subsequent 200 metres or part thereof / Every period of 1 minute waiting time or part thereof - For meter fare below $72.5 - For meter fare of $72.5 and above	HK$1.50 HK$1.00

In SG nobody thought about keeping things simple, so make some sense of this one:

Basic fare	Normal	Limousine
Flag-Down (inclusive of 1st km or less)	$2.80-$3.00	$3.20 / $5.00
Every 385 metres thereafter or less up to 10 km	$0.20	$0.20
Every 330 metres thereafter or less after 10 km	$0.20	$0.20
Every 45 secs of waiting or less	$0.20	$0.20

Peak Hour Surcharge
Monday - Friday : 7.00am to 9.30am	35% of metered fare	35% of metered fare
Monday - Saturday: 5.00pm to 8.00pm	35% of metered fare	35% of metered fare

Applicable at the time of boarding. Not applicable on Sundays and Public Holidays.

Midnight Surcharge
Midnight - 5:59am	50% of metered fare

Central Business District (CBD) Surcharge
Monday - Saturday : 5.00pm to Midnight	$3.00	$3.00

Applicable for trips starting from CBD area. Not applicable on Sundays and Public Holidays.
The CBD surcharge is payable on top of the Peak Hour Surcharge.

Public Holiday Surcharge
From 6pm on the eve to 12 midnight of the public holidays below: New Year's Day, 1st and 2nd Day of Chinese New Year, Hari Raya Puasa, Deepavali, Christmas Day	$1.00	$1.00

Where the above holiday falls on a Sunday and the following Monday is a holiday, the Public Holiday Surcharge will be payable up to 12 midnight of Monday.

Location Surcharges

Changi Airport & Changi Air Freight Centre
Friday-Sunday from 5.00pm to 12 midnight	$5.00	$5.00
At all other times	$3.00	$3.00
Seletar Airport	$3.00	$3.00
Singapore Expo Centre	$2.00	$2.00

Booking Fees
Current Bookings:
Monday - Friday: 7.00am to 9.30am 5.00pm to 11.00pm	$3.50	$8.00
At all other times including Saturdays, Sundays and Public Holidays.	$2.50	$8.00
Advanced Bookings (at least half an hour in advance)	$5.20	$16.00

Basically every time I get into a taxi here (assuming I can phone one or find one or book one or flag one down - impossible if there is a hint of a drop of rain) I just hand them my wallet and credit cards and tell them to take what they need. One of the problems is that all the taxi's just go off to to the airport and sit around there waiting for a longer fair and the airport supplement. And no-one to limit them and chase them back into town or the 'burbs where they're more sorely needed.

How about buses?
I took a bus from the local supermarket home on Saturday. OK, don't make that from the supermarket home, make that from 150m from the supermarket to 600m from my home - not so much fun with heavy shopping bags. It cost me SG0.73 and the actual trip in the bus was only 750m. That's HK$4.50, which would have taken me from Kennedy town to IFC in HK in the GMB - a distance of about 4.6km
There is no such thing as door to door buses here, unless you live in a huge complex on the top of an MRT.

MRT / MTR
HK the minimum fare is HK$3, in SG it is SG$ 1.50 or three times as much. Plus you wait much much longer for the train. The advantage of course - according to my son - is that the trains are much emptier - not surprising, as people just opt to go by car. Also, some of the newer stations you walk for miles and miles in very badly signposted underground until you find the line / exit you need.

OK how about the car?
After 10 days of driving in Switzerland I'm struggling to get back into the traffic. I took GmGF to dinner by car last night and she was clutching my arm saying "did you see that? they come from left and right and side and back" - referring of course to the motorbikes. And other motorists. I had to say that as far as I could tell it was SE Asia and the only difference between here and say Saigon (or HCM city if you like) is that the people who were riding motorbikes are now in cars, but have kept the motorbike weaving in and out mentality. And the people who are riding motorbikes, probably shouldn't be on the road at all. But they have to, given the cost and limitations of the public transport here.

I do admit to really liking the ERP, and I particularly like how it's been implemented in the parking garages as well, up to the point of individual parking lots so you can quickly see how many spaces there are in which garage and at what level.

But naturally it's all relative. I sat with someone from the Netherlands and India the other day, they both thought the public transport here was fabulous. A fellow HK lady and I had to disabuse them of the notion.

So given the limitations of public transport / taxi, I think we may just be in the market for a second car. So immediately the peanut gallery pipes up "a hybrid, a hybrid, we have to get something hybrid" yup - well, if it's generally expensive to get a car here, you can almost forget about being able to afford a hybrid. The talk in the town is that it's a direct result of the supply being suppressed by the oil refinery industry here. Anyway, the numbers don't seem to add up like they do in other countries.

As you can tell from today's post I'm feeling a little bit moany. Must be the wet rainy but hot weather. And the fact that everything is covered in mould and I'm not winning the battle. Not even with 2 or 3 dehumidifiers per room. The mould on my mould is growing mould.

The great winter con

2011-11-04T07:58:00.000+08:00

I find myself living in a warped parallel reality. It is amazing how the mind can be tricked and conned if you put your thinking into second place.

For the last month or two the shops in Singapore have been undergoing the "end of season" sales and bringing out the "new seasons" clothes. The new season being winter. In a country where the average temperature doesn't move much out of the zone of 28-32 degrees we're being told we're going into winter. Which I thought was pretty stupid of itself, not to mention wasteful on the part of retailers - after all who the heck is going to buy coats and woollies in this place? Then my thoughts go to the long tail of colonialism and neo-colonialism. Who is making the buying and display decisions.

And then yesterday, after 2 weeks in the real autumn of Europe I wake at the usual 5:45 to get the kids to the reservoir for their 6:45 cross country run, and I realize getting into my car that it's light. I check my watch, has it stopped? Am I incredibly late? It doesn't get to be light until 7:15 or so and it's only 6:30.

And I realize damnit we're south of the equator. It's spring going on for summer and NOT Autumn going on for winter.

Living and renting

2011-11-02T13:12:00.000+08:00

This may sound strange to normal stable people who live out their lives in one country / village / city, but up to this point we've never lived in a house we've owned and never owned a house that we've lived in. Which is why having a place of our own that we're not renting out on a permanent basis is a big deal to us.

It's the silly little things. My son spent the first few days in our apartment saying, "wow, that's so neat, that's so clever, how did they think of that" Give the credit to swiss building standards, thoughtful design, and the fact that the people we bought the place from lived in it for 10 years themselves and did the investments that people like us, on the permanent renting situation don't invest in. Particularly things like kitchens and bathrooms. They'd in fact upgraded both about 2 years ago, and obviously in doing so had thought very carefully about what their needs were and what was practical. Now I go into our kitchen(s) yes, we have 2 which is just about the silliest thing imaginable, and get frustrated at the cupboards hanging from a hinge, the peeling off bottoms where I've just had to put down the Ikea drawer mats so they don't peel into my utensils, the surface tops that just don't ever quite get clean, the surfaces and cupboards which are all just in the wrong spot or the wrong height or the wrong depth or not practical in some way or another. Our combined kitchens in our rented house in SG is about 5x as big as the one in CH, but not nearly as useful. Go figure.

Yes, that thing about size. Male / female jokes aside, size is a relative concept. A few days into the holiday, the kids both agreed that they really really liked the place, and the best thing of all was that it was small and empty. I had to think back to the time that we moved from Spain to HK and were stuck in a Parkview serviced apartment for 2 months. 2 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms and a lounge / dining / kitchen combined and they were as happy as Larry. I guess it's that proximity thing. Kids and dogs. They need company. They hate being alone. And all that stuff? How much of it do we need anyway? Our friends brought along 2 boxes of Kapla blocks, we had 2 packs of playing cards and I had a book to read for myself (Swiss Watching) and one to read to them (A boy called Mouse), and that was it. Nothing else. No TV, no phone, no internet, no computer. We had the iPad, but they didn't even look at it.

I asked them if they'd like to be in a smaller place in SG. The consensus was that they wouldn't mind a smaller house if they could keep the big garden and pool.

Then there was the independence thing. We're near the top of a little mountain, at 900m, and the shops and Funiculaire are about 100m down the hill along a little winding path of about 500m past the cows and a few other houses. The "oh shit shop" as we used to call it in SA (i.e. a bit more expensive but it stocks everything you possibly could have forgotten and need right away but can't be bothered to go to a big store in the car) opened from 6.30 am (yes, my asian friends who don't get to be able to buy anything before 11am, 6.30 am). Despite it being nearly pitch dark, and freezing cold (literally, we had to scrape the car windows a couple of the mornings), the kids found it the most delightful challenge as to who would be up first to grab the key and some change to go and get some fresh bread for our breakfast. Alone. On their own or occasionally two of them would go down the mountain, cross a road twice, make themselves understandable in Frenglish and foot and hand language, get the right change and bring the goodies back to their lazy elders. You would have thought they'd won the lottery, so pleased and proud they were.

Our Austrian friends who have moved to Switzerland and were helping me set everything up, said it was no big deal. Their kids walk to and from school on their own (aged 9 and 11), crossing major big streets on the way. It's normal there. The big difference? The driving. I LOVE driving there. Swiss drivers are really really good. On the highways they're fast, efficient, decisive. On the byways they are slow, careful and considerate. At pedestrian crossings they stop. Even if you're 50m from the crossing and look like you may have an intention of crossing at some point, after you've zipped up the jacket, got hold of the kids hands and said "careful" all that time they're idling there waiting for you to cross. Of course I felt comfortable with my kids venturing out on the roads by themselves.

Lake view

2011-10-30T16:58:00.000+08:00

Yup, we bought our place mainly for the views!

I ended up taking a picture / pictures everyday from the balcony.

We're back online and back in the heat of SG. More another day when I'm in the mood for blogging again.

no phone no pool no pets ...

2011-10-16T17:53:00.000+08:00

We're off tonight, so I'll be offline for a while probably as we have no landline, no wifi and I'm sure roaming will be prohibitive!

Enjoy the autumn vacation everyone.

Mango Sago pomelo Pudding

2011-10-16T14:17:00.000+08:00

After realizing in doing a previous post that we'd not been out together since we got here, we decided to explore the evening dining opportunities. H opened one of the books on SG's culinary delights we'd inherited from previous inhabitants of SG and picked the one the page fell open on. It happened to be Min Jiang in Rochester park, which is an ex-Black and White neighborhood turned into trendyish restaurant neighborhood with the valet parking, noisy music and not a taxi in sight which identifies such neighborhoods.

The restaurant had a great ambiance. Sitting outside on the porch with large fans keeping us cool, aided by a ginormous portable air-conditioning unit. The dress code of "smart-casual" had been degenerated to casual casual but there were a few people sans-flip flops. We'd checked that our out-of date book's reviews weren't too out of date, with a few online reviews which seemed fine. The meal started well. The chef's platter appetizer was a delight on the eye and a good mixture of textures and tastes. The oolong tea was refreshing and light and subtly flavored. And then it all became rather mediocre. We ordered a few standards, xiao long bao - ok, but a little dry on the outside, green beans with minced pork, beans were over cooked and lacked flavor since didn't have any chili or garlic that was discernible. The beef cubes in pepper sauce was nicely flavored and very tender, so they get a tick for that. The tofu with century egg - hmm, let's say that I have this little XiJiang restaurant in HK which makes the most AMAZING tofu with century egg, so much so that just thinking about it makes me want to hop on a plane and get some. This was nothing like it, not in taste or appearance or anything else. We didn't go for the duck which is apparently their signature dish, neither of us was in the mood for duck and we've had excellent duck in our time so we didn't want to be disappointed.

Then the struggle. Do we order dessert or not. I'm watching the calories, so at first I didn't. But they had mango sago pomelo pudding on offer. I can never resist that. So we succumbed. Luckily it was so horrid and not worth the calories that I didn't even eat it out of some obligation to make good the $10 that it cost.

I have this idea of perfect mango sago pomelo pudding and very few places in the world get it right. The dim sum place in City Hall HK does it perfectly. The China club is hit and miss, and most other places are more hit than miss. I can't make it myself, I need a good recipe (please someone help me).

* the mango should be in little bite size chunks and fresh - not overdue and overripe and mooched all up
* the pomelo should be fresh and tart and in big enough pieces so you can bite into the skin and rupture it and let out that burst of tartness
* the sago should be perfectly cooked, abundant enough, not too dry, not too soggy, not too big or too small
* the soup that it is all in should be slightly opaque, not gunky yellow orange and make you want to just eat and eat and eat, even if you're stuffed to the hilt with other delicious food.

What is your version of the perfect mango sago pomelo and do you have a recipe for me?

why? and NO!

2011-10-15T11:25:00.000+08:00

I'm trying to haul my fat ass into the gym every day now, and got some advise from the best on diet and exercise etc. (my gay friends), and one put me onto Body for Life and is acting like a virtual whatsapp coach for me while I try to navigate through the intricacies of a book that is at once completely simple and at the same time too complicated for a beginner.

So this morning I do my first upper body workout. While I'm doing a little warming up on the cross trainer, the bloke walks in. You can imagine him, short, balding, glasses, quite a bit of a paunch, tshirt, bermuda shorts and flip flops. He's accompanied by his son, tallish good looking lad, slim, with the faintest hint of a bit of baby fat on his belly, but slim legs, not fat at all.

So mentally I think, oh, that's nice the lad is along to keep dad company while dad does the private training. My daughter did that the other day, I was walking the dog with my son, she didn't feel like it, we didn't want to leave her at home alone, so she tagged along with a book and moral support and positive energy.

Nope. Dad signs son in, gives him that cringeworthy pat on the back, here's a good lad kind of pep talk and walks out and leaves junior in the hands of the trainer.

Junior looking terribly uncomfortable and out of place gets put on a bicycle and told to cycle while trainer juggles the 3 other people he's training at the same time. While I'm training, I watch him out of the corner of my eye as he gets moved to the x-trainer and then put through some weights and crunches etc.

All the time I'm trying not to be judgmental but I AM. Here are some of my questions.
Why would a father who is personally in need of a major fitness overhaul get his son in the gym at such a young age (he couldn't have been more than 10) with a private trainer while he just walks off and leaves the lad alone?
Why would a trainer with any integrity accept such a child as his client? I have to re-iterate, the kid was not overweight, was not out of shape.
Why would a father leave his son alone, and not use the time and opportunity to "do it together" and be together?
Why is this kid alone in a gym which expressly is for adults unless the kid is getting personal training?
Why isn't this kid doing what most other kids his age are doing on a Saturday morning - namely running around a football pitch, rugby field, basketball court, tennis court or whatever - in the company of his peers with other kids, with parents and kids all around having fun and bonding and sharing?

I really just don't get it.

Weekend collage

2011-10-14T15:08:00.002+08:00

It's scary

2011-10-13T21:27:00.000+08:00

I went to one of those "settling in in Singapore" talks this morning. I do that type of thing from time to time as you (a) never know what you don't know and may learn and (b) never know who you may bump into that may be interesting, fun, different, good for a laugh (and / or cry, sometimes simultaneously) and (c) I didn't have anything better to do on the agenda except pack for Switzerland. Which, I've been avoiding my typical packing avoiding behavior, so the winter clothes and duvets have been lying on the family room floor for the past week, going nowhere, doing nothing and just generally being in the way as a sad reminder of my packing and decision making inadequacy as my children remind me every day when they get home from school.

Afterwards I had an impromptu lunch with a couple of ladies, one of whom I've seen before and we clicked since she's ex-Beijing chinese with years in the US and HK under her belt, the most recent being HK so we can unabashedly sigh about how much we miss the green mini buses (I kid you not) and she can see if I can still string more than 4 chinese words together in a coherent sentence (it's fading fast).

What I truly find scary though is the statement of one of the women who said when she entered the meeting "oh I see so many familiar faces, we must be all the ones without work". And then later sitting with her discovering she's one of the medical doctors who left her career behind. At the table were also a couple of PhD's, ladies speaking several languages, everyone with years of accumulated study and work experience.

A few weeks ago I went to the school's parent association AGM to see what was what. I'm not getting involved I promised myself, and I didn't. The office bearers to be elected stood up and gave a brief bio. Run the PA? Are you kidding me, these women had the attributes and background to be running the world.

And why aren't they? Well, some of the mothers I meet are, running various organization and companies and departments and regions and countries. Don't ask me for exact statistics, but on a pie in the sky extrapolation I'd say they're probably around 2 : 10.

So what's the issue? You can choose which of the two two words you want, but it's basically
Part-time
and / or School holidays
the first being a problem of too few jobs, and the second being a problem of too many weeks.

I'd say 99% of the women I speak to would like to work, but they don't want to work full time. And here in Asia, full time basically means 8am to 8pm or later. They don't want to work full time as their spouses are working full time or more than full time often combined with travel. So they want to be there to pick up the slack, to be at home when the kids are at home etc.

And then, assuming this part time job is available, the next hurdle is what on earth to do with the school holidays, particularly the LONG summer holidays.

When ever school reformers and zealots and parents and educators get going on what is wrong or missing or improveable about schooling, I never ever seem to hear anyone say that we need to sort out school holidays. But having talked to working male and female friends all over the world, school holidays are a huge issue.

I'm yet to hear of a school or country who is sensible about it all, and says OK, we all need a break, and at the break-neck speed we all operate these days, weekends are not enough, so we'll keep school holidays, but we'll spread them out over the year. My kids spend 14 of the 52 weeks of the year on holiday. So every 3 months you get 3.5 weeks off. Or better still, we all know that long holidays are terrible for the developing brain, they all forget so much that teachers need to start from scratch again, they're even worse for parent's wallets, let's not even start on the carbon footprint of holidays, so let's just say every 3 months you get 2 weeks off and be done with it. Why are long holidays so sacred? We've changed every other aspect of everything else in life, why does this persist? Is it due to the nostalgia of parents? Let's face it our kids summer holidays are NOTHING like ours used to be. Is it to protect the holiday season industry of camps and activities and CV stuffing?

It does seem rather crazy that in this day and age, where work is divisible and outsourceable and fragmentable and portable and every other ble one could think of we cannot harness all these fine minds running on idle.

I am not for one minute discounting or otherwise saying that all the immense amount of volunteer work that these mothers are doing is "less" than being profitably employed in a corporation. That has a huge value. Its just that so many of the women I speak to don't feel like they really have the choice in employment that would not interfere with their choice to be a mother. I know that there are women out there who think I'm a moaner and stupid and just have the financial advantages that allow me to be home rather than in a full time or any job. But where I walk, so too did a whole room full of people this morning. I write with the conviction that I am not alone in how I feel about and approach this issue.

Is being a "pushy mother" the best we can show for all of our freedom and education and lack of oppression. There is a powerful quote in this article (thanks Elizabeth for posting on Facebook)
"If you are not innumerate, you can start a business. If you are not living in mortal fear of rape and beatings at home, you can organise your community to dig a new well. If you are not subjecting your daughter to traumatic genital injury at three and marrying her off at ten, she can go to school. And, when she does marry and has children of her own, they will benefit from two educated, employed parents, which means twice as much literate conversation in the home, twice the contacts, and twice the encouragement to succeed.

Educated, pushy mothers make all the difference."

Yes we do. But do we make enough difference beyond our 4 walls, beyond our school or local community? Can we take abstraction one level further and enter some kind of mathematical philosophical puzzle, where each of the pieces mirrors the whole in a fragmented way, may we ask if the current status quo is not perhaps also holding things back. I'm not for one minute saying that I, or any of my peers is oppressed, but as the following quote suggests, are we choosing for "cultural comfort" above economic and social progress?
"Female oppression is a moral issue; but it also must be seen as a choice that countries make for short-term "cultural" comfort, at the expense of long-term economic and social progress."

Wives of the "code"

2011-10-12T17:21:00.001+08:00

One of my favorite children's "learning to read" websites is called "Children of the Code". It's fascinating on all levels about how and why children do and don't learn to read, what to do about it, what the psychology and physiology and history is behind reading.

There are other codes of course, that are just as difficult to crack. Even when you're an adult. Like dress code. I've been invited as the spouse to an event with my husband and the dress code is "smart elegant" for the ladies. What a potential landmine. Elegant for me is Audrey Hepburn. i.e. LBD. But how little should little be when you're pushing the wrong side of the divide of the mid 40's? Does elegant mean above the knee, on the knee or below the knee. Does it mean killer heels or kitten heels. Should any color besides black be involved? Does it mean designer? Should toes be open or closed? If open, nail polish or french manicure? Legs clad in pantyhose or bare?

It's a new country for me. And it's a new company for both my husband and myself, this being the first communal event we'll be attending. So I can't really stuff up without feeling awful about it. And SG is difficult with dress. Generally it's a flip flop and crumpled sleeveless dress kind of place. I did try and have a good squizz at what the ladies who lunch in Paragon were wearing, but it wasn't really what one could call elegant. More like business casual. Maybe it's in my favor that Singaporeans generally don't cut an elegant figure. Not like the Shanghainese for example. Shanghai Tang had a fashion show at the Polo Club on Sunday which the kids spied on their way to watch the rugby. My son came back reporting that the girls were "really young, really tall, and really really really skinny, I mean mom, so skinny that they're skinnier than me, even more skinny than this" - at which he pulled up his tshirt and sucked in his non-existent belly so that only ribs and a little hollow were left. "why, mom, why are they so thin?" I explained that it was fashion and fashion thought that was beautiful. "no, it's not beautiful, or even pretty, it's just thin" he declared.

UBS made things perfectly clear to it's employees - no, he's not employed by UBS, otherwise I'd have my hands on this reputed guide - I wonder if it follows through to what to wear after hours while engaged "on company business". I wandered around the shopping malls of Orchard Road this morning after my meditation. It's pretty hard to discern where elegant starts and frump finishes and vice-versa. And suddenly my contempt for plastic surgery and liposuction seemed a little premature.

I've never been overly image conscious, but then again neither have I ever had the self confidence to pull off dressing eccentrically or funky or different enough for it not to matter whether I've gotten the dress code right or not.

Any suggestions?

A clean apple ...

2011-10-10T14:44:00.001+08:00

Today saw me out of my normal Fairprice / NTUC / Jumbo supermarket rounds and at the Pasir Panjang Wholesale market, courtesy of my dear friend who's been going to a lot of trouble making me feel at home here in SG and showing me all her secrets. (Apologies for the photos, taken with the i-phone as I wasn't thinking and planning ahead enough to take a proper camera). The market it rather fun and the produce way fresher and a lot cheaper than the supermarkets. And a good excuse to take pictures again.

Produce arrives in the big containers and gets shunted around with high speed forklift trucks driven by the cool guys -

honestly, if you're young and cool looking and a speed merchant you get to drive one, otherwise you're just a trader or an auctioneer or once you're long in the tooth and bald of head you sort the fresh from the stale.

All the scales seemed to be from Vietnam - interesting, didn't know that was their core competency ...

Back ground music ...

Produce from all around the world

Not sure of the relevance of a surfboard in a dry good store - maybe washed up in the same container ...

taken for the cuteness factor

My office is 3rd to the left behind the cabbages ...

Nope, I didn't know that a clean apple is grown in Bonghwa either ...

What do I want you to know?

2011-10-06T05:45:00.000+08:00

Along with the rest of most of you I guess, at some time in my teens I learnt some history that involved the circumnavigation of Africa and the globe. About the West Indian and East Indian companies. About the abolition of slavery, Marco Polo etal. And yet, as naive as this may sound, I never really knew what was going on in my own country, South Africa, at the time.

The first glimpse I had of reality was when our English teacher, for us a rather radical figure who even lived up to the red sock reputation by actually wearing red socks, introduced Alan Paton's "Cry the Beloved country" to us. I was 17 by then. To this day I can still remember, albeit vaguely, some of the passages. Starting with what must be one of the most beautiful beginnings of a book:
"There is a lovely road that runs from Ixopo into the hills. These hills are grass-covered and rolling and they are lovely beyond any singing of it."

I think it was one of the first books that made me cry. "Cry, the beloved country, for the unborn child that is the inheritor of our fear. Let him not love the earth too deeply. Let him not laugh too gladly when the water runs through his fingers, nor stand too silent when the setting sun makes red the veld with fire. Let him not be too moved when the birds of his land are singing, nor give too much of his heart to a mountain or valley. For fear will rob him of all if he gives too much."

More recently I've been reading, or rather been unable to read at any pace, "Nathaniel's Nutmeg," I can take about a chapter every few weeks and need to stop out of horror and disgust at what it is that really was the "spice trade" and "opening of the trade routes". Little phrases that glibly form part of a little paragraph propped between dates that should be memorised as part of an "education".

There is a chapter in "A history of the world in 10 1/2 weeks" which talks of the St. Louis. When you learnt of the second world war, did you ever hear about the St. Louis? Or any of the other ships that kept on trying to find a port but were turned back. What about the SS Navemar or any of the other ships "bound for nowhere"? When you read that, how do you feel about refugees and immigrants in camps now waiting for processing? About the Indonesian boats stuck off the coast of Australia?

A friend of mine asked me last week to point her to something she could read. Something different. I light-heartedly suggested I'd fill her up with some South African literature. And didn't take myself seriously. Perhaps I should.
To be honest it embarrasses me. What if she asks me questions? The other day I was standing next to a group of Indian mothers at school waiting for the kids, they were discussing Deepawali and how it was celebrated in the different parts of the world where the Indian diaspora had settled. She turned to me and asked how it was done in SA. I had to say that in the time I was living in SA I didn’t have any Indian friends. That it wasn’t allowed. That the first time I came into contact, real contact with Indian people was when I left.

I've just finished reading "The Hobbit" with my daughter and we've embarked on "Lord of the Rings" it is an extended allegory and written when it was, after the Great Depression, may perhaps be extremely relevant for the times we find ourselves in / veering towards.

I woke at 4am with a pounding headache. And instead of worrying about my head, or what was causing it (today will be a bit stressful), I'm pondering on the books I should give my children to read and when. What will my literary contribution to them be? What will I read to and with them and encourage them to read so that they know who they are, where they've come from and what their inheritance is. As half breeds from two nations, as wandering souls, as expat brats and global citizens. How I will allow them not only to read and learn about history as a series of facts, but to feel it in the depths of their emotional selves. Something I think literature and drama can give like nothing else can.

Bottom feeders

2011-10-05T09:24:00.000+08:00

There is this trendy branch in economics these days, spearheaded by Mr. Pralahad which focuses on delivering products and services to the "bottom of the pyramid" Of course the academic and journalistic focus is on the doing good and being good and serving people that no-one else considered to be economically viable (all 4 billion of them ... the mind reels), and the fine print is also that one can also make a nice little profit out of it, which of course all goes back into being so noble and good.

That's the nice glossy side of things. There is another side. Which some vocal people around the world are trying to shout out in what ever way they can. Like this blogger from India, the ILO, journalists covering the medical trials, the wombs for hire, organ donation, etc. etc.

Here in our own little domestic amah drama, we've seen the darker side of the foreign domestic worker exploitation. Something that should have been a simple matter - helper doesn't meet needs, need to replace with more suitable is mired in all sorts of issues. I've already blogged on the matter of HK getting better helpers because they are treated (marginally) better, paid better, have better living conditions and now (hopefully if it's not overturned), the right of abode. At every turn my mouth has been agape at how the domestic worker agencies here exploit the helpers. There has to be lots of money in it, as there are lots of agencies. WAY more than in HK (2000 according to one document I read). I guess because the SG government makes it a lot harder and more complicated to employ someone than it is in HK. In HK we interviewed the necessary 10 or 20 people, found someone we liked, sent her off to do the paperwork and were done with it. No levy to pay, so all the spend on helper went right to her bottom line. Here it is infinitely more complicated, the helpers are generally less well educated and no-one I have ever spoken to has "done it themselves" let alone let their helper process the paperwork.

So the agencies go to town. They charge the worker and the employer every time they turn their heads. The helpers basically work for their first 3 months to pay off the debt to the agency. So what does a guilt induced employer do? Re-emburse the worker, which of course doesn't stop the agency from charging the helper. But they also charge the employer a hefty fee. And then, since they're doing all the paper work, you have no control over the timing, the follow up etc. etc. And they hold the paper work, so for example my helper couldn't process her own new passport application (S$80) but had to have it done through the agency (S$450) since they wouldn't release her the documentation she needed to do it on her own. There are supposed to be regulations , I am just wondering how enforceable they are, and who actually bothers following up.

The injustice of it all. But still, an employee who doesn't function in a position, needs to move on. And today is the day. It's taken more than a month since we decided it wasn't working. The wheels turn slowly and unfairly here in this respect.

My own home ...

2011-10-03T09:38:00.000+08:00

Finally, we've heard that we have approval for the apartment in Switzerland. All it take is patience I guess. We've wanted a place there since 1997, we've been actively looking for the last 5 years, we signed the preliminary sale / purchase agreement in July, and it's taken this long for all the machinery to grind. and now, it's a reality. I wonder if that will make it more precious to us?

Evening sky over the mountains behind us...

great Fung shui, water & mountains..

So we've taken the first step of organizing beds and mattresses to be there when we arrive in October (oh, it is already October). A few logistical hurdles to overcome, like you can't just ring Ikea and organize delivery and assembly. So we had to work through a dear friend who lives in Switzerland and is the go-between on the hotlines the aren't so hot as they don't accept international calls - even if YOU'RE paying for the privilege. We arrive early on a Monday morning in Zurich and have to drive down to the apartment, so we're hoping we won't spend the first night on the floor or in a youth hostel, as our friends with their 2 kids are driving down from St. Gallen to help me with the logistics of instantly assembling, furnishing and sorting out a home! Luckily they have the language and a power drill and tool kit! H of course has to stay here poor boy - just started his new job today, and for him it will be nose to the grindstone to pay for all this.

The neighbors...

So yesterday I started looking at what I could take with me. I was trying to explain to the kids that we have 60kg in main luggage and about 15kg in hand luggage we can take with us, which is why I was vacuum packing the duvets and covers. I see it as a great opportunity to get the winter stuff out of the house here and into the house there where it will be of more use. The poor kids have had to suffer trying on last winter's winter clothes and ski stuff (from our trip to Harbin) to see what does and doesn't still fit (not much in the end). I've not subjected myself to that indignity yet - I suspect more than one pair of jeans won't be stretched to the necessary at this point.

Then we have all the duvets and covers. At least 7 at the last count. A summer and winter one for each of us plus one for the guest room / sleepovers. And we don't need any of them here as we all just sleep under a sheet with the fans on. I did hear of the height of decadence (in my mind at least) the other day, a friend and her husband admitted to putting the aircon on full blast every night as they snuggled into their warm duvets. Here in Singapore? The thought makes me shudder. I'd probably have a divorce on my hand if I was so wasteful with the cost of electricity what it is. Let alone me not being able to face my own environmental conscience.

A view to die for!

I did have a long hard look at the covers. Use the old ones which we've had since we were married / since the kids were born, or get nice new ones? I'm torn. This is our first own place that we're actually going to use - the places in Luxembourg and South Africa are just rented out and we never see them year in year out, just make sure the rents cover the mortgages. But this one is different. We may not rent it out. It's ours to furnish, to use. To decorate as we wish. My rational side says we'll be there 1-2 times a year. And we have young kids, so we can't make it all to precious. My irrational side wanted to buy the lovely designer furniture from the previous owners, and say heck, once in your life how about a designer glass moveable extendable dining table. Of course that would have been nuts. Kids do stupid things like sit on tables or bump up against them in their enthusiasm and then it would be rather unfair to get mad at them because of your own vanity.

We spent an evening at Ikea last week, with a shopping list and a guide. We sat on couches, we lay on beds / mattresses, we made bunk bed squeak. We handled crockery (yes) and cutlery (no), we felt towels and dishcloths. We pondered dining tables and chairs - the height, the length, whether we'd be able to sit through a meal on them, if the seats would be ruined by sticky fingers. Then we decided and rejected and made the short list. Most could be ordered on line, but they're different there in Switzerland where labour is expensive. Some items could not be ordered / delivered / assembled you just darn well need to get off your lazy butt and do it yourself! Usually we would - but we do need a functioning house from the first or second day we arrive ... so the jet lagged self will be swanning around getting a dining table and chairs as soon as we arrive.

It's weird to have to get everything. I was standing in the kitchen thinking, omg toaster, kettle, spatula, pots, pans etc. etc. We have duplicates here, but it would not be worth the cost to get them there - particularly considering their age! And actually the pity is that we can't take the 2nd best, older stuff there and use new and matching stuff here, as there is a small logistical distance problem... anyway, our own home.

We do treat our rented places as home, but still, we've never had the kitchens or bathrooms we've wanted. Never been able to buildt in cupboards in the right places. Always just made do, adjusted, put up with inconveniences, accepted, accepted, accepted. and it's fine. But it's so nice to have something that is ours, really ours.

Singaporeans are not slim ....

2011-09-30T10:27:00.000+08:00

There, I've gone and said it. After all the hoopla about the advertisement of LWM I do think that the obvious has to be stated. Compared to the Honkies, Singaporeans are on the chunky side of things. A local explained it to me that it was based on where their forefathers came from and that they in turn had been a stocky, hardy farming race. I like that, I can use that as my excuse some time.

I think what is rather closer to the truth is that it seems to me, based on my 6 week view of the SG world, that it's more a case of SG people really and truly loving their food, loving eating it, loving going out to eat, loving talking about food, preparing it, exchanging recipes and restaurant tips, planning going out to eat etc. etc. And here's the thing about it. I've met many many people who look pretty similar to that lady in the advert, but who don't seem to have any hang ups about either themselves or their weight. And nor do the people around them seem to have any problems with them or their weight. I guess that was one of the things that really riled me about the advert, that it was presuming an attitude on the part of society that doesn't really seem to be there.

Now in somewhat slimmer HK, I've noticed WAY more prejudice against chubbier people. More comments from anorexic shop assistants, more pressure from friends and colleagues, and much more emphasis on appearance. When we did our look-see here, I was astounded when the realtor met me in a crumpled shift dress and fit-flops. I remarked on the fact to a well-groomed lady I met doing the school tours. "Oh" she commented, the locals don't care much for what you wear or how you wear it, and shoes are utterly unimportant. But you just have to have the right handbag and the right car, and then you'll be ok." I clicked back to the home viewing, check, the BMW latest model and check the LV handbag.

I think at the end of the day, what the advertisers don't want us to know, is that, beyond first impressions,the people around you care more about you than your weight. Or your hair. When you're married, you marry for reasons other than appearance, and those are the things that sustain you when the going gets tough and the pounds creep up. Same with the kids. My son will quite merrily say, "mom, you're getting a fat tummy" and then cuddle me, and say "but I can still feel your ribs, so you're ok, and I love you" Friends are your friends, and often someone around me would have to either gain or lose a tremendous amount of weight (well over 10kg) before the comments start flowing. Not the 2-5kg that most of us obsess about.

Yes there are health issues. Yes there are self-esteem issues. The self-esteem issues largely disappear though if you quit buying women's magazines and don't watch much TV. After reading 12 steps to a compassionate life, and my latest foray into understanding Anger and Irritation (*see very good way to analyze your emotional incidents from the book below *) because the helper is still around while we process a new helper and try and get her motivated to find a new job and she's irritating the hell out of me, I came across a wonderful book yesterday "The Compassionate Mind" by Paul Gilbert which I've started reading - and have found so much of relevance. I have to share a couple of quotes with you:

"A key problem with a sense of self and self-awareness is that just about any problem can become linked to it. If I put on too much weight because I don't control my eating, if I make mistakes, if others reject me, if others criticize me, if I struggle to understand how my computer works when others seem to do this easily - just about anything can become a way of judging and experiencing myself negatively. I then have two problems: the annoyance or disappointment about the thing itself, and the experience of me as inferior, bad, defeated, unloved or inadequate in some way. The annoyance or disappointment over the thing itself may dissipate quickly, but my ruminations about myself as inferior, incompetent, lacking willpower or whatever can stay with me for hours, days, weeks or even years, constantly underming my happiness"

and here's one for all of us who keep on moving house, country, home, life - at last a real psychological / brain research reason for why we feel the way we feel (sometimes, and why I started off calling myself Gweipo) :

"So we have positive feelings when we are succeeding at these things, such as gaining status and friendships, having a sense of connectedness to friends and family, having our own families. But we can experience very negative emotions when these important aspects of our lives are blocked and we feel like outsiders, disconnected from family or friends, and / or feel as if we have been reduced to a lowly status and are inferior"

I don't think anyone consciously choses to be overweight or obese (except for Morgan Spurlock). It's something that creeps up on you, usually when other things are busy making life tougher than it needs to be, like moving house and country, like giving birth, like falling pregnant and moving house just before or just after giving birth, like losing your identity while moving, like losing a job, career, lifestyle. Reading "The compassionate mind" I'm beginning to realize the times that my weight has been in a good old normal range (i.e. normal BMI right where it ought to be round about 20 - not that of a super-model or yummy mummy, just that of a normal fit human), have been the times that I've been the happiest and most personally fulfilled. I've been in "the zone" with myself. It's the times when I've been nice to myself, taking good care of myself. Compassionately feeding myself healthy meals, setting boundaries on myself, like a good mother would, making sure I get enough sleep and regular exercise. Times when I've not been beating myself up with "woulds" and "coulds" and "shoulds".

I'd like to get back into that space.

*

From: Overcoming Anger and Irritability - William Davie

New Look

2011-09-30T09:19:00.002+08:00

I'm trying the new look for my blog - let me know what you think!

bad taste but not in breach ...

2011-09-27T12:29:00.000+08:00

So I did my civic duty and complained to the MDA about the advert, and as you can see below the advert doesn't breach any code of conduct it's merely in bad taste. And who is the arbiter of taste after all? In fact when you look at the local forums and boards it seems that most people in SG don't really see anything wrong with the advert. But then again they're all a product of the same education system that created the people making the advert, acted in the advert and of course run the MDA....

Dear XXX

I refer to your feedback on the London Weight Management TV commercial (TVC) which is being aired on MediaCorp TV channels and has also been posted on YouTube.

MDA is aware of this TVC and has assessed it in consultation with the Advertising Standards Authority of Singapore (ASAS), which comprises of representatives from various organisations and government agencies such as Health Sciences Authority and Singapore Medical Association. ASAS deliberated on this issue and decided not to take any action against the company as the TVC was not found to be in clear breach of its Singapore Code of Advertising Practice (SCAP). MDA is also of the view that while some viewers may find the TVC to be done in bad taste, we do not consider them to be in breach of the TV Advertising Code and therefore does not warrant the TVC being taken off air.

Nonetheless, we will be conveying your feedback and concerns with the TVC to MediaCorp so that the broadcaster and the advertiser are made aware of the public’s sentiments.

We thank you for your feedback.

Should you require further assistance, please do not hesitate to contact me by replying to this email.
Kindly click here if you wish to participate in our customer service survey.

Thank you.

Yours sincerely,

Goh Shaw Ching

Assistant Manager (Broadcast & Internet)

Content & Standards

Note: Please do not change the subject header when you reply to this email. The subject header is used by MDA for filing of related correspondences with you.

Six week slump

2011-09-26T16:13:00.000+08:00

Oh, but it's the "six week slump" said someone to me at school this morning. Everyone goes through it in the new term of the new school year. I'm so glad that there is a name for it. Even so, I didn't feel I could really take her on her word for it. So I googled it. It appears that the six week slump applies for a variety of things in life.

Like the six week slump after a baby is born (no-one told me that all those years ago). Marathon runners get it when they're training, it happens around mid February to new year's resolutions, weight loss, counseling centers at universities warn their students of it - by the way, that transition graph (Hopson & Adams, 1976) is the self same one I saw many many years ago as a young expat wife being warned about the stages of leaving home for a new country! How things turn the full circle. I so think that the 6 months they're talking about can be compressed into 6 weeks. When stocks slump for more than 6 weeks all sorts of anxiety attacks occur in the business media.

Luckily the slump here at Chez Gweipo is an affair largely isolated to one person, me. The kids are still delighted to go to school and life, husband is counting down his last week of freedom.

The anti-dote? Well, I've been investigating a variety of ways of increasing my involvement in various forms of volunteerism, and am waiting to hear back who needs my talents in what capacity.

when you're down and out ...

2011-09-24T17:10:00.000+08:00

I'm not quite getting my life together at the moment, and, the compensatory things I'm doing are not admirable. Well not all of them, but most of them smack of self-indulgence and escapism.

Joyce will be glad to hear that after The Straits times decided that the drivel that passes for journalism would actually have to be paid for on the iPad, and one of my friend's husband's implored her to give up their print subscription (he's also on garden leave at the moment, while he was working and traveling he insisted on a subscription, and now he's at home and actually has to read it, he came to his senses), I finally took the plunge in consultation with the husband to take out a subscription to the IHT. It was a close call between the FT and the IHT, (and we already get the Economist), but we decided that the IHT was both more relevant to people not living in London, and somewhat more entertaining. I could just scrape in with a student's subscription as my student card is still valid, and was most happy to find out that it also gives me online and iPad access to the NY Times as well.

Anyway, so my meaningless existence involves too much reading of blogs and newspapers and too much eating, and too little getting out there and too little exercise. So the old weight is creeping up so badly that I've actually taken the drastic measure of not even weighing myself every day anymore. Which is not a good thing, as the shock after a week of denial is NOT good.

I was rather pleased to find another couple of well written SG blogs, (some on the so called top 10 of various sites, including expat women are really pathetic infomercials), and started reading. And then I was called to arms. I'm assuming this is a SG advert that these bloggers are referring to, and I'm surprised that the whole country is not up in arms about it. Ladies and gentlemen, watch the advert below, read the comments of Singapore Actually and Anita Kapoor and the translation by Kirsten Han (not that much translation is required, it's pretty obvious what the advert is driving at.)

The "before" pictures are the reality of many a woman who has given birth. And it often remains their reality for a number of reasons, not all within their control for a good many years after. In a world where we should be promoting compassion, for ourselves and for others as a starting point, this is despicable.
As my fellow bloggers have pointed out, underlying problems don't disappear with weight, or with changing countries, or with divorcing a spouse or with the purchase of the "right" car, perfume, handbag or designer shoes.

Ladies, gentlemen, mothers everywhere, let's work together to get this off the air. And a donation made by the company to a woman's organization.

A ponder on books and reading

2011-09-23T12:10:00.000+08:00

I'm constantly challenged to think about books and reading. Of course primarily because I love reading, love books, want lots of books around me, have a huge attachment to my books, buy books obsessively from all sources, online, kindle, in bookstores, where-ever books are to be found.

As most of you know, I'm also rather compulsive in ensuring that I pass this love of books and reading onto my children, in all and any languages around us.

And yet, books aren't easy. I don't want to be an old fogey and say 'it isn't like it used to be and therefore it's worse" because it isn't. In so many ways it is better. Way better. Children (and adults), have more access to books, easier and cheaper than I think at any point in history and in a richer and more varied form than ever before. A friend of mine forwarded me this article, reminding me how authors like Dr. Seuss who we take for granted, used to be revolutionary in their time. She also highlighted the great work being done by the Feng Zikai organization in ensuring there is money around to create great children's books in Chinese as well.

So what is the issue? Well, you know that before I've blogged on why the heck when my children were in Chinese medium school there was no concept of "just right" books. And now we're in the English system again I'm wondering about the whole thing about "just right" books.

One of the most fantastically wonderful things of their new school is that they get a mere 1/2 hour of homework every day Monday to Thursday. The homework is dished out on a Monday, handed in on a Friday and weekends and Friday afternoons are homework free. Can I tell you what a wonderful system this is? May I briefly praise it to the skies? And in addition to this they are expected to read for 15 - 20 minutes aloud. And miraculously, there is now time for this reading.

So now I've discovered a rather strange thing. My son is attracted to the most wonderful books. He brings the most interesting (and often heavy) books home from the library. On food, on trees, on music. He's suddenly discovered poetry and brings home lots of poetry books. Lavishly, beautifully, deliciously, sumptuously illustrated books. Books you want to touch and look at. But they are books that are wholly unsuited for the task of read-aloud as an exercise. They are distracting. They lead your mind in all sorts of directions. They make your fingers itch for pen and paper and paint and gouache. They consume you and subsume you. They have their place and I love them. But not for this task.

We've recently finished "The Voyages of Doctor Doolittle" as "HIS" book to read to me, and "Matty Swink" (entirely unsatisfactory book as it didn't have an ending, only a pointer to buy book 2 which doesn't yet exist, if it ever will, talk about bad strategy for winning customers) as my read to him book. So we needed a follow up book. We briefly tried "Illustrated Stories for Boys" but there were way to many pictures to distract, and funnily enough, for stories with so few words, the words were too hard. On to "Treasure Island" which he couldn't get into, then his sister suggested "Huckleberry Finn" from the same Classics Starts series as Doctor Doolittle, and within 3 pages he was captivated and hooked and reading like a pro.

So "just right", it seems has variations, gradations, and is about "just right for what". Just right for being entertained, just right for enjoying the art, just right for reading fluency without distraction, just right for information, expanding vocabulary, just right for sinking into a story. Just right for listening to (thank heavens for Naxos audio books for kids!)

Ok, I'm off to pick up my daughter after her 4 day absence and then to the hospital to have her leg and stitches seen to.

Little India

2011-09-23T10:32:00.014+08:00

We took a trip to little India the other day - here are some pictures and my rather irreverent comments.

The chinese original somehow sounds so much better ...

I really like the idea of this - multi-functionality enhanced by extra hands - even one over to smoke a cigar while the man with the facial hair and big belly...

tries to hold it all up - beauty ideals obviously differ.

check out that NOSE!

well trodden floor untouched by renovation (yet)

how to sit comfortably ...

in the back of a truck.

and legally...

Singapore has sensibly kept it's shop fronts with overhang - great in the rain

anything you need, I mean anything ... wheelbarrow

oven for making something I'm not sure what

and thus he got the idea for the chainsaw massacre ... bizarre

Nice place to rent if you can't invite guests along... or is this Singlish?

Yup, let's just keep it nicely ambiguous that way no-one get's hurt

those pesky low heads ... got to watch out here.

got to love the fire escapes ...

Singapore does a darn good job of preserving old buildings - a whole ROW of terrace houses ... unimaginable in HK

but everywhere the trucks and builders are to be found...

and cranes

Inventive ways of carrying an umbrella 3

How much is that girlie in the window ?

and other delicacies ...

I guess the CDL is the SG version of the URA of HK

May we spoof this? We have just moved your house to another neighborhood, we apologize for any inconvenience caused. For enquiries and retrieval of personal possessions call...

renew, renovate and remove ...the "r" s of any modern aspirational city

Inventive ways of carrying an umbrella 2

Green

Husband thought it would be nice to live in a shophouse - until he realized who our neighbors would be

Inventive ways of carrying an umbrella 1

what I could be doing but don't

2011-09-22T14:56:00.000+08:00

There's tons of stuff I could / should be doing, but for one reason or another - mainly motivation, I'm not. Like sorting out the 3 (big big) boxes of stuff from my children's school lives for the last 8/9 years that really really doesn't need to be kept, but some of it is really sweet, so I do want to keep it... or their clothes which they're growing out of at a rate of knots. Or all the toys and puzzles that they received for birthday presents in the days before we realized that there were better things to ask for around birthday time than presents. Or I could be packing our winter stuff up getting ready for Switzerland. Or finding a diet to go on. Or reading "The waves" (our book club book which I'm finding EXTREMELY hard going - and that's after I cheated by looking at an online "swot" site as to what, why and who of the book, or doing some Chinese self study. Or...

As it was pouring with rain this morning, our jog around the reservoir was scuppered and I spent a boring time jogging on the treadmill at the gym instead (why the HELL do they insist on making us all watch reruns of NFL?????), so then hubby and I decided to visit what is supposed to be the pinnacle of shopping here in the Tanglin Mall. Not my idea, his. Someone had told him that was where it was happening, so it was on his list of things to do before he starts work. Before you think us terribly shallow (we have our moments), we did go and do a walking tour of little India yesterday. Photos to follow after I find the camera cord. That's another thing I want to do. Invent a way to sensibly keep, store and retrieve electronic cords.

So what did we discover? Well, it's not exactly the type of mall that we're into. In fact at one point he said this must be the mall where all the white people go, since I've not seen any local people on the shopping side of the cash register. And everyone was either pregnant or had a kid in a push chair. And all the shops catered for up-market motherhood. In fact the only discerning factor I could find in it was that most of the shops were "independent" rather than part of a chain. But the bookstore was bloody useless, stocking just about everything except for books, besides best sellers and a few kids books. So, thumbs down. Although the organic shop did have my favorite Yogi tea (at a price of course) albeit with all the benefits blacked out with a marker ... anallllllllll.

We did have a rather nice lunch in Yantra, where the lunch buffet was a mere S$18 each, and there were plenty of vegetarian options and the waiters clued up as to what was and wasn't vegetarian (one of the rice dishes had meat lurking underneath). And there was a more "multi-cultural" tint to the cliental.

I'm missing my little girl, who is on a 4 day 3 night camp. I'm wondering how things are going with her stitches, her brother also wanders around in the evening saying "where is she, when is she coming back?" even though he full knows the answers to both the questions. He was away 3 days 2 nights, and somehow that went much quicker and was more bearable. Also because I knew he was closer and H had gone with the crew to help with the border crossing and could give me pictures of his room and room mates and tell me about the whole situation.

I'm trying to think now what would be a good shopping mall for me. Besides having a huge bookstore of course... What would be yours? Actually I really really don't like shopping malls, I like shopping in the street.

a small stamp from the big guy

2011-09-21T09:14:00.000+08:00

One of the best ways to get out of a funk is to go off to lunch with a friend. A long lunch, that when you emerge and look at your watch you realize it's already past 4 o'clock. What wonderful things friends are.

I've been spending a lot of time in the car. A LOT. SG has many things going for it, including luscious green, the joys of a garden, and space, but you spend a lot of time in the car. And there are a lot of cars on the road. And they crash a lot. So there are many traffic jams. I was reading the other day about how the HDB flats are having an issue with a lack of parking as so many of the residents have one or more cars ... as with many things in the media here, what is more interesting is what is not said and not questioned - which is how come people with supposedly low income to qualify for such a flat, can afford a car or two which can cost as much as a flat would cost in some other countries...

Luckily I'd brought with me a small stash of unlistened to audiobooks, which I'm now getting ample opportunity to work through (both for myself and the kids). My latest foray into literature has been Julian Barnes' "A history of the world in 10 1/2 Chapters" read by Alex Jennings. Yes, all 9 CD's of it have been polished off in the last 2 - 3 weeks. It's been tremendous fun, and I'm not sure I would have bought and read this book, whereas having it narrated has been great. My favorite chapter was 10, where there is a story about heaven and the afterlife. Somewhere in the story, the protagonist feels the desire to be judged and is taken to the kindly old gentleman who has reviewed all his files, and declares that he's "OK". Naturally he's rather disappointed at this. But he felt the need, as apparently many before him, to have someone pass judgement on him.

So at lunch, my mGF, who is going out of her comfort zone and has started up an informal meditation group for some mums is telling me how the thing she struggles most with is the fact that she doesn't feel "qualified" to run this group. Let me add, she doesn't charge anything, and the group is mainly about spending 90 minutes sitting meditating and sharing the experience of meditation. Out of most of the meditating people I know she's probably the most qualified to run such a group by virtue of the fact that she's been meditating consistently for the longest.

We've had long discussions about getting "approval" for what she's doing. She's spent hours researching how she could become "qualified" - the rigorous requirements for retreats and on-site in America training for running the MBSR course for example. The logistics of trying to satisfy your need to be "qualified" with the practical facts of having two young children at home and a traveling husband. I've told her to hell with qualifications, she's got the experience and the wisdom and embodies what it is all about. And then yesterday I told her about this chapter, and told her now I know what she's trying to do "get a small stamp from the big guy".

I find this a lot with the women I'm around. We're forever seeking official approval. We spend our lives chasing after qualifications and certifications and stamps of approval, so much so that there is little time left to get on with what we ought to get on with. I do exactly the same. I spent a couple of hours last night trawling the internet to see if I could spend another 2 years qualifying as a teacher so that I could perhaps do something along the teaching or counseling line.

This is in sharp contrast to some of the men I know. They're long on the BAD (big audacious dare) and short on the planning, permission and preparing. Unless it's planning and preparing to partake in a
BAD. We think BAD's are bad. They think BAD's are what life's about. I'll never forget the first time I met a guy who was into BAD's in a big way. He was a study friend of my husband, a couple of years older than us, and was off on a roll of interviews to jump a couple of corporate steps by switching companies. First he got his own company to up his salary and job title to a pleasantly inflationary level. Then, he went off and spent a sizable amount on getting a new, branded suit. Next was the car rental company where he rented a car he could never have afforded for a couple of hours so that he could pass this as his company car. He was a smart guy, sure. Was he smarter than any of the girls around? Not particularly. But he dared. And they didn't. We've lost track of him now, but I can bet my bottom dollar that he's on the board of some companies earning fees for turning up and signing papers. Whereas the rest of us?

One of my MBA classmates put it really well. Her opinion was that none of us would amount to very much anyway, because, we were all already over 30. And if we were going to be anything wonderful we'd be too darn busy achieving it to hang around a business school for a year getting permission and a rubber stamp to say we were worth anything. 15 years later, she's bang on the money. Sure many of my classmates have climbed the corporate ladder, those of us who didn't drop off the middle rung like myself, but exceptional beings? Nope. And I didn't notice any of their names on the MacArthur Foundation list.

Funk

2011-09-20T09:27:00.000+08:00

I'm in a bit of a funk at the moment. Just completed a technorati survey on blogging and realized that my blogging, what I spend a small portion of my day doing, everyday, is just about meaningless and insignificant in the blogosphere of things. I'm less than a blip. An old fashioned blip at that, as I still don't make any money out of it, am not quoted in mainstream media, haven't much increased my readership, have only 24 followers, aren't approached by brands to promote their product (if you exclude really, really dodgy ones). I'm having one of those big "why do I bother" moments.

That doesn't just extend to blogging, I'm supposed to go and get ready to go to bootcamp - I'm going for the fact that I paid for 2 months in advance. I'm not really enjoying it, I'm comparing too much to the great bootcamp run by the IHP at Sandy bay. Boy do I miss them. I do have the fatigue of purposeless ness. The other day I wondered if I could make getting my body into shape a purpose and then just gave up on the idea as self-absorbed nonsense. I've just finished a book a friend who was passing through left behind, "when hungry, eat" - talk about a whining South African trying to cope with the loss of privilege. I hope I don't come across in the same way.

OK, off to get dressed for bootcamp. enough of this.

when "play" didn't involve a "date"

2011-09-19T14:04:00.000+08:00

I received a bizarre email from a MOB member who is also a MOG (mother of girl) but definitely not a SMG (smug mother of girl). SMG's usually only have one child. A girl.

She sent the email to a group of MOBs asking how to respond to the following situation. A SMG had rung her up to organize a playdate between her daughter and SMG's daughter. So fine, so dandy. After all, in HK one can't take playdates for granted what with the 96.7% of the population that is a) chinese and b) firmly in the tiger mum camp and 3% of the rest that are too darn busy with extra this and extra that so times never coincide and the 0.3% of the rest of us who haven't discovered each other who are able, willing and dying to have our kids play with others, playdates are just not so thickly strewn. So when your children take a shining to each other, manage to organize their little selves to the point that the mutual parents are aware of the other child's existence AND are armed with the other's phone number and your phone rings - well whoopee you've struck jackpot.

And then the SMG lays down the terms and conditions. Was she a corporate lawyer in a previous incarnation (yes we all did have previous incarnations, how otherwise would we have found our husbands ... ha ha ha, sick laugh), perhaps in mergers and acquisitions? A social worker who only saw the worst of the worst in societies. Perhaps a probation officer married to an ex white-collar felon who's reinvented himself ala FILTH. My imagination runs away with me. Perhaps she's just someone who took a heck of a long time to conceive and now she's erring on the cautious side. Perhaps she's volunteered once to often in the classroom or on field trips and SHE'S SEEN THE OTHER SIDE (the second sex that is, nope that's us, females the second sex, only now anno 2011 little boys are the second sex).

Ok, Ok, I'm taking huge liberties with possibilities. The bottom line was, the playdate could only take place either at her home, or if said little girl's brother was not present at the time of the playdate. I know said little girl, and I know her brother. I know my little girl and I know her brother. For heavens sake, I had TWO brothers growing up. Brothers are pains. They get in the way, they interrupt, they tease. They have different body parts and feel terribly sorry for little girls who are missing out. But they're mh. Yup, in the famous words of the hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy, they're mostly harmless. Particularly at this age when they find girls generally boring and prissy and not really worth the time of day.

The general consensus of those receiving the mail was that said mother was weird. The more benevolent amongst us allowed for the fact that either she or her daughter had had a traumatic incident (hopefully nothing more than her pigtails being pulled) which had led to this rather strange request. We all had to think back to the days that the whole neighborhood of kids under the age of whatever age kids started pairing off just all hung out and played and there was no need for any "dates" to be made. There was a period in our lives I remember when we didn't even have a phone at home, and we just climbed over the back fence to play with the neighbors as and when we wanted. Everyone was always at home anyway, unless they were out playing with you.

There was one less savory incident when the boy living behind us decided to play "doctor" with my sister, who was considerably younger than the rest of us, I guess she must have been about 2-3 and the boys about 6 years older. The boy was a bit weird. Maybe we just found him weird as he was a limey (from the UK) and spindly and pale, with braces on his teeth, not like the strong tanned african boys we were used to. I can't remember how it ended, but I think it was along the lines that my sister wasn't allowed in their house anymore, or the facts of life got explained to all and sundry or something. Playing doctor really wasn't more than a little bit of exploration as to how girls differed to boys (he didn't have a sister) and was reasonably innocent. Does my sister have a trauma about this - I doubt it, if I remember I'll ask her if she even remembers it happening, my recollections of it are pretty vague.

Thing is, neighborhood kids were neighborhood kids and you all played with each other. My husband can tell similar tales of the great melting pot of socio-economic backgrounds and emotional stability and cleanliness norms in households in his "hood". No-one had to point it out to you, censor it for you, you worked it out yourself. Did kids make wrong choices? Of course, that's part of being a kid. There was a pretty awesome article in this weekend's NY Times, along the lines that the secret of success could be failure. I like this bit: "the students who persisted in college were not necessarily the ones who had excelled academically at KIPP; they were the ones with exceptional character strengths, like optimism and persistence and social intelligence. " Yup, social intelligence. You don't get that from your mum smoothing the way to a flawless playdate. Heaven knows, I try. When one of mine has a playdate I try to even out the numbers so that there isn't a 3rd spoke. But if there is - well, move on and get over it. Who told you that every moment of your existence was going to be exquisite, memorable and kodakable or is that facebookable? Do you learn more from sitting prissy making lovely cupcakes - no make that - icing cupcakes that the helper has already made for you, or from out foiling younger brother, or even better still, finding a role for brother in the play that keeps him both amused and fits in with your ideas of a good time. (Nope, put away that scalpel and doctor's mask).

My friend is a better person, more tactful and considerate than I. She didn't blurt out like I would have "are you nuts", or "what's wrong with my son" or "shove your playdate where it hurts", nope, she took her hurt and shared it with us and asked us where did the norm lie. Was it a cultural thing? Was at a MOG / SMG vs MOB thing? How should she handle this without ruining her daughters chance for a rare playdate? Has the world out there gotten so bad that we don't trust little boys anymore?

In a follow up email to the saga, she penned some lovely words, which, if you're a SMG and reading this, I'd like you to take to heart:

My thoughts on this episode also ran directly into the path of Dr. Michael Thompson's work. Particularly our culture's current fear of boys, their energy, their interests (violence), etc. and its dislike of boy culture (dirt/destruction, physicality, video games, noise...). He says this is expressed in all sorts of ways, some subtle and some not. I recall overhearing teachers at my kids' school talk about how difficult they find managing the boys and cringed when I realized how "unwelcome" they must be in these teachers' classrooms. I also recoil occasionally in the company of SPGs (smug parents of girls), who assume that something is wrong with boys who don't perform and behave like their daughters at school - particularly in the early years. What kind of unspoken messages do this boys receive and internalize? I suppose what's the worst for me is that someone who doesn't really even know my son has assumed that he's trouble for her daughter, someone to be avoided. Just because he's a boy.

close encounters of the medical kind

2011-09-17T20:35:00.000+08:00

We've had our first brush with the medical system here, and it was fine. My daughter was swimming and gashed above her knee on rather rough edge of a condominium swimming pool. A slight bit of hysteria on her part, but it had to be stitched. Her main concern was the fact she's due to go on a watersport camp next week with school. Naturally some of her activities will have to be curbed. What a child. Trying to tell the doctor what to do, and when she was ready and wanting just about to do it herself...

Enough excitement for one day.

Purpose and fatigue

2011-09-16T11:07:00.000+08:00

My husband has returned from his retreat full of purpose and meaning and clarity. And of course loads of literature on the matter. Before he left, he'd struggled through Tim Park's "Teach us to sit Still" and although I usually enjoy Tim Parks, I must admit 50% of the book was about his late night peeing and prostrate problems and 20% about trying to find a cure, leaving only about 30% for the sitting still bit. Too much detail.

I'd also bought him a set of Robin Sharma's books to read on the journey there and back - I'd not read any of them, but they were on a big display in the bookstore and the set of 3 was cheaper than buying any 2 individually. That went down better, and he passed on "the monk who sold his ferrari" to me when he got back, which I also read through. I must say that was a sight better. More universal, more general, a bit challenging and taking you out of your comfort zone.
On thing that did strike me, was in the conversation on tiredness / sleeping, he said "fatigue is a creation of the mind. Fatigue dominates the lives of those who are living without direction and dreams."

Ouch, that definitely touched a raw nerve in me. I had a long chat about it with Mgf (meditation girl friend) after meditation on Wednesday. We're both looking for a direction, a purpose that goes beyond making the house look nice, food put on the table, all the ducks lined up as and when needed with the school bags correctly packed, homework done, laundry clean, house filled with happy guests and fun playmates over the weekends and children more or less shepherded into a meaningful balanced direction in their leisure pursuits. Husband happily humming along without undue distress and disruption in his pursuit of meaning, purpose and pecuniary gain. And then what about us?

My neighbor in HK, who had a child just going into university (it had all paid off and her daughter was off to Cambridge) and another child already in university (also a good school, perfect for what she was pursuing), said to me at one point "I need a mother like me for me" she was thinking about what she'd do next in her life, had several choices to make, needed to start up the whole CV career planning thing. We wished of each other that we could be around each other longer, to hold each other accountable for moving our lives forward.

I am fatigued at the moment. 2 weeks of solo parenting with a maid to parent as well and a new dog in the house has taken its toll I will be honest. I was in bed, lights out at 8.30pm last night and had to be woken by my daughter at 6am to get up to get the show on the road for the day today. Other mothers have complained about the same kind of fatigue when they first arrived here. Is it getting used to the climate? Just the overwhelming experience of settling in to a new country and culture and having to reinvent or discover everything from scratch yet again?

Or is it something deeper, a fatigue that references our inability to find something so special and meaningful that it has us leaping out of bed each morning ready to get started?

Here's a little bit of fun on meaning, motivation and purpose from mr. Pink.

Drawing a line in the snow

2011-09-14T13:43:00.000+08:00

Just before he left for his retreat, my husband and I were discussing Christmas. Why? Well, it was already August, and if you want to do anything from SG or HK for Christmas you ought to be booked up and paid in July really, so we were already late. I hate that. I also hate the idea that you "ought" to go somewhere just because the kids have a few days / weeks off school. I hate the idea of following all the other lemmings over the cliff and into the airport lounge watching delayed flights on the board.

So, I did my mum veto right and said "no", no going away for Christmas. It's our first Christmas here, so we'll celebrate it here. Besides, some friends of ours who are off traveling had hinted they'd like to join us at the end of their trip and celebrate it with us, and I agreed, and the kids would be delighted seeing them again.

We're (meaning me and the kids) are going off to Switzerland on exorbitantly priced tickets in October to take possession of the apartment and kit it out. My husband proffered that since we had the place we may want to use it and take the kids skiing. We've attended a not insignificant number of dinner parties in the last year or so where people casually or not so casually drop comments about their children's FABULOUS skiing skills, and fearlessness down slopes intended only for adults. Not to mention the uber A types who are all into helicopter skiing off pristine slopes, inaccessible to anyone but those with a bit wad of cash to fall on as they fall out, plus the necessary connections (not everyone knows groups of people with ski-chalets in the right places and has a pilot on class in the season). Neither of us came from a background that included skiing as a matter of course - me due to location and finances and he due to finances. Shouldn't we be giving this "gift" to our children? We'd both entered skiing late and ineptly. Has that impacted our lives? Really, really?

No, was my retort, I'm giving my children the gift of NOT skiing in their youth. After all, how many of their peers will be able to boast that they didn't go skiing every time a snow fall on the planet coincided with a school vacation? Honestly, time and distance is no object to the rest of the people we share our existence with - not so good in Japan, well, there's Whistler, or Aspen, or Switzerland or Austria. or New Zealand. And any 8 year old can tell you the merits and drawbacks of each. Just re-route and re book and make sure there's a critical mass of people you know doing likewise.

I'm giving them the gift of having something left over when they get older, and have money of their own and their own ideas on how to spend it. Something to save for and aspire to. While we're about giving the gift of anticipation, we're also going to give them the anticipation of tennis lessons, riding lessons, golf lessons etc. Malcolm Gladwell be damned. If any of these things turn out to be their passion, the sole reason for their existence on this planet, well, let them go out and create the opportunity and put in the 10000 without a peep or a nag or a reminder from yours truly.

medicate or meditate?

2011-09-13T09:35:00.000+08:00

What I didn't share directly with many of you was that towards the end of last academic year things started getting really pressurized. My husband was working out of SG most of the the time, I was in HK with the kids trying to finish my studies and stay sane and organize the move. Then he started interviews for a new job - leaving huge 'certainty' gaps and boding a lot of change on top of the already change heavy agenda ahead of us. I wasn't sleeping, was spending a lot of time either crying or being angry and irritable. Couldn't sit still for one minute, very agitated, couldn't focus on anything and was dropping balls all the time. I'd been seeing a councilor at the university for a while, but she'd had 2 months off due to (physical) health problems and I didn't want to see someone new and start from scratch. So I finally broke down and asked for some anti-depressant medication. It was a huge step for me. I don't medicate anything, anytime. The doctor at one point pointed out she wasn't sure if I was more depressed or anxious, but that said that the drugs would help both. And then she gave me a drug to take if the drug I was taking made me panic. Of course I googled both the anti-depressant and the anti-anxiety, and just took the anti-depressant and flushed the anti-anxiety. It was serious stuff. Both of them were serious stuff, with dire warnings and tales of addiction and inability to quit. The internet is a scary place sometimes, but better forewarned.

The first 2 weeks were hell. I was nauseous the whole time, felt completely spaced out and out of my body. During that time I did the HSK exam which I failed (by the lousy 1 point), I knew I'd failed as I was so out of it it was actually a miracle I got the marks I did. But gradually things got better and got me to a space where I was, if not happy, then at least a bit more relaxed. A bit more calm. Took things a little easier. Was more forgiving on myself and my kids. I even danced at our farewell party. I've not been able to dance in years.

I was in a space that I can only otherwise be in if I'm meditating every single day for at least 30 minutes. At least. Then it works.

So, a pill that takes seconds to swallow, or finding 30 minutes every day. 30 quiet peaceful alone minutes?

During the vacation, before the move, I followed the doctors guidelines and halved the dosage and then took a tablet every 2nd day and then one day I forgot and I just stopped them. No side effects. Well, I'd only been taking them for about 2-3 months. The calm controlled me continued for a good 3 weeks after that and now I'm back to the anxious, irritable me.

I'm trying to get back into meditation, and have joined a meditation group that meets every 2nd week. My husband has just gotten back from 2 weeks away on his 10 day silent retreat where his days were filled with meditation, yoga and contemplation. It was he who asked the question yesterday on whether I saw a difference meditating, and I started to explain to him what I've just said about a quick pill or a long disciplined sit.

He suggested meditation would be good for the kids. I said they're ahead of you, and often listen to the "mindfulness of breathing" or "lovingkindness" meditations before they go to sleep. Oh, he said, then it shouldn't be so difficult.

No it shouldn't. Actually he's the last one to get aboard this boat. I'm really glad he did it, but then again it shows me up in my un-disciplined meditation and inability to put into practice all the teachings. He's full of the joy and compassion and I'm the grouchy old prune. Make that grouchy fat old prune, as a diet of two small vegetarian meals a day, no alcohol, yoga, meditation and no stress means that he's lost 6kg (not that he was fat to start with, but he's lost his middle age middle).

Yes. I would fall on the side of meditate. Another friend enthusiastically FB'd me - I'm reading the book you recommended - Buzz. The conclusion of Buzz is that meditation is a good idea. If not for the children then for the adults in their lives.

Meditation is a good idea for more reasons than that it's good for the mind and soul. It's a good idea because if you don't have 30 minutes to yourself on a daily basis anyway, you're probably going to be in a bad way sooner or later. Running around chasing your tail with all kinds of attachments and aversions, being batted between your attachments and aversions is not a good space to be in. It's an easy "default" position to be in just mindlessly going with the flow, as it's much harder to be saying "no" and it's much harder to be compassionate to yourself and carve out that time and claim it.

And the hardest part? It's something you have to do to and for yourself. It's not something you demand of someone else or impose on your children. It's all about you.

Zim Sam Zoom

2011-09-12T06:57:00.000+08:00

Zim Sam Zoom happens to be my son's personal god. I'm not entirely sure how he came on the idea, but it's been floated around the house for a couple of months now, and he's now open to questions on the matter. I have an idea she (yes, his god, interestingly enough is female) came into being as a response to the crucifix wearing, soul attempting to win, but rather mean little girls in his class last year. If they had a god, well, then so could he. And if their god and Jesus were slightly unbelievable and incredible, well then so could his be. It's all a matter of belief, faith and convincing others after all isn't it?

On Saturday in the car between football and viola lesson he had a captive and interested audience. Yes, he had a god, and yes she was female. How he communicated? Well, in English of course. Because although his god was Japanese she spoke and understood English perfectly (better than our helper in fact, he added). No, despite the fact she spoke English, none of us would be able to communicate with her as she was a personal god and required a userID and password for access. Yes she sure is a 21st century god this person. She was very nice and friendly and great to talk to. He then clarified the spelling of her name and said there was nothing more to add.

Sounds ideal to me.

the animals don't go two by two we choose ...

2011-09-09T09:41:00.001+08:00

Funny thing memes. They used to be this intellectual type nerdy thing about how thing spread through a community, the world. And with the speed of light giving hitching information a ride on it's willing back, there ain't no stopping nothing anymore. And we've become very good at being decisive and implementing new ideas in less time than it takes to blink. Out with the old. In with the new. And there's always something written somewhere by someone which can prove that we're making the right decision - just a case of sifting through long enough to line up the "correct" research.

So, last week I walked into a heated debate here in SG about one of the elite private schools which had changed their admissions policy from a year after year after year waiting list system, completely transparent, you put your kids name down and basically sat out the years until they edged to the top of the list. Conspiracy theories abounded. They're out to get the Indians, the locals, the poor, the stupid. Two days ago, the NY times opened up the discussion about elite NY schools scrapping the age old traditions of sibling and alumni admittance.

I don't know where I stand on the matter. I can see both sides, or rather many sides to the story. A school which wants to have the best possible pool of students to choose from. To balance out nationalities, backgrounds, abilities. To have enough talented athletes in its sports programs, a full complement of musicians for the orchestra. Enough academic talent to make sure the league tables are satisfactory. To drop the accusations of elitism and allow in other besides clones of the past. Parents who want the best chance for their children. All their children. Who have hectic enough lives without having to juggle different demands, different philosophies, different holidays and start and finish times.

And the children. Let's not forget the children. I learnt a hard lesson in HK that with schooling one size does not fit all. Even if you agree with the philosophy. Even if you have the same ideals, even if you believe that ever child has the right to be fully bilingual. The fact of the matter is that schools, like businesses are becoming streamlined. Specialized. There are no more conglomerates.

(Speaking of which, I ventured into Mustafa's yesterday. Think 24/7 mix of Stanley market, Mongkok, Shenzhen. Think a modern day low cost, SE Asian version of what I guess Harrods used to be. I wandered around there thinking "if they don't have it, I probably don't need it" so complete was their range.)

There are no more conglomerates. No more vertical integration. I spent a year in the late 90's having the waste, value destruction and evils of conglomerates taught out of me. After spending two years in Brazil in the the mid 90's helping a conglomerate dismantle itself and spin off and sell off and lay barren it's soul. It was like breaking up a family. A big messy family with all sorts of skeletons in the closet, with incestuous relationships, black sheep, sanctimonious cows and all.

Nice and neat and lean and mean. And exclusive. Remember Glengarry Glen Ross? And diverse. But diverse in a very specific uniform way. Like the (public - i.e. state) high school I went to. As long as you were white skinned and came from the catchment area and spoke English or Afrikaans you were admitted. You could be as thick as two planks or as poor as a pauper, but that was OK. You were white. No questions asked and any deviant behavior was caned out of you by the headmaster, who, 20 years later was dismissed for miscegenation pedophiliac tendencies (behavior?) after the school was opened up to all races.

And now? You have to have the smarts. In a big way and early in your life. There is no space for late bloomers. My husband was a late bloomer. I peaked early and then slumped. I spent a year in a high school in the Netherlands, and at the time, one of my best friends, one of my only friends at school (I was different, I was foreign, it was the 80's, I was South African but not black) was a guy who was 3 years too old for our year group. He was a late bloomer. He'd struggled through the MAVO, then been allowed to repeat the year and jump across to the HAVO when he was ready for that, and now, finally he was in the elite stream of the VWO. In those days they allowed for late bloomers. Persistent, bloody minded late bloomers who had an overload of self belief. He went on to university and got a PhD in psychology. I've lost touch with him, but not with the concept that not everyone excels in the first grade. Or the fifth, or the eighth.

There are some more dissenting voices on the homogeniuty issue. I suspect they're being met with yeah, yeah, but this way is easier. Like the Pulitzer prize winner Maureen Dowd, who made an excellent case for not "sending in the clones" In her best paragraph she writes:

"Choosing roommates who are mirror images may fit with our narcissistic and microtargeted society, but it retards creativity and social growth. This reluctance to mix it up also has been reflected in the lack of full-throated political and cultural debates on campuses (as opposed to ersatz debates on cable TV), replaced by a quiet P.C. acceptance of differing views or an obnoxious stereotyping of anyone different."

She goes on to refer to Kakutani's article on diminished debate syndrome where he notes this “suggests a closing off of the possibilities of growth and transformation.”

Of course I'm under no illusion that "access to" equates with "relationship with". At the end of the day, at school most of my friends were similarly middle class, middle to upper intelligence people like me. At university I had the pleasure of counting medical students, a lesbian drama queen, a couple of engineers, a theology student, a few hazy psychology students and some OT and speech therapists in my inner circle. We'd all got through the acceptance hoop, but boy oh boy oh boy did we have very different world views. And thank god we did. For if I learnt anything at university it was two things. Just because people are smart it doesn't mean they think the same way as you do, and secondly never to trust something was true just because it was in a book or a research paper.

But increasingly I sit at dinner parties and coffee mornings and see that people self select. Everyone at the table agrees, or appears to agree. Or the dissenters have gone off to a separate but equal dinner party or coffee morning. Do we not dare? Do we want to be "nice"? Have we lost the art of polite debate? Are we scared of excommunication? It's a tough lonely world in a foreign land sometimes. Can we risk biting the hand that feeds us (literally at a dinner party).

Are we too attached to schools as opposed to education? I think we are. I know I am. I think we're scared. And perhaps we have every right to be. Things are changing and this seems to be the only way we can try to guarantee our children some kind of future that looks like our past. By giving them a "good education" by which we mean by getting them into a "good school". Unfortunately as noble as Einstein made being a plumber sound, when last did you invite a plumber to a dinner party, elect one to office or ask their opinion on anything besides your drainage? I think that was the message of the last novel I read "The elegance of the Hedgehog". We cannot contemplate that the concierge has anything to add to our world view.

What would Maria have thought?

Scared our children will miss out ...

Is there anything they don't stock? Yes dog supplies, dogs are unclean ....

pass the ball to a girl before kicking ...

2011-09-08T18:07:00.000+08:00

As long time readers of this blog know, my daughter plays football. Both in HK and now here in SG she's one of the few girls playing and therefore is allocated to the boys team each time. She started by accident of attending her 3 year old brother's classes many years ago, got invited by the coach to join in and went from having fun and enjoying it to a phase where she was picked on and victimized by the boys and spent a couple of lessons / months with the occasional tear or outbreak of crying in the lesson. We (more particularly my husband whose child rearing task it is to take them to football each week - when he's in town) made her persevere with the idea that it was better she suffered the bullying and male issues now as a young girl where dad and a coach was watching over and assisting, than when she hit the lecture halls or boardroom later and no-one was watching out for her.
Initially as well she could only play a defensive game and was too timid to get anywhere near someone in the possession of the ball. Lately she's got the confidence to attack and get the ball off them, never mind all the bruises on the shins and ankles as they kick her in retaliation. Luckily she's quite a smart player (again according to dad) and her strategic thinking gets her brownie points with the coaches.

So, new country, new team, start from fresh and fresh frustrations. Again the boys are not passing the ball to the girls (there are 2 of them), they're being pretty much ignored. So the coach has instituted a new rule - no scoring unless the ball has been passed to a girl. Oh dear, as in games, so in life. Today, I had to think about Saturday and her telling me this and how it didn't really change how they thought about her and they still didn't know that she actually COULD play and could play well as they weren't giving her a chance. The NY times was talking about not one, but two top women in corporate america who have lost their jobs in the last 2 days. The first, Sallie Krawcheck of BOAM and the second, Carol Bartz of Yahoo. Of course in these matters what is as interesting is what is not said as is said. Something that Ms. Bartz had blazed right out in the open by saying she was fired. Gutsy girl! I also particularly like reading all the comments to the articles. Its a way of reading between the lines. Seems that reading america may be a bit ahead of corporate america in its views of what constitutes a leader and a manager.

I wonder what the lesson is in all this. Are these ladies pioneering? Is it worth it to them what they've had to go through? Financially certainly Sallie's made a packet out of her hiring and firing regime. How long do you carry on? How many times must you cry before you give up? How much of it is self driven by the love of the game, the inner conviction that you're up to it and how much of it is encouraged from outside?

My daughter has to speak on a newsworthy topic at school next week. Would she be up to discussing this? Should I prompt her in this direction? How early should one start with girls? Or is it an un-necessary discussion given the direction boys are going academically?

Sterile but not clean ...

2011-09-07T10:28:00.000+08:00

Sitting at football last weekend chatting with a few mums who'd gone the HK then SG route and comparing our impressions. We all felt the lack of a certain something. A grubbiness, a run down shambolic busyness. The slow service generally, most particularly in restaurants even the pricy ones. And how we lamented the loss of fast efficient public transport. And I in particular the loss of the speedy green mini-buses. I've tried, I really have. I even have "one map" on my bookmarks bar. But something that would take me 15 minutes by car will take me more than an hour by public transport. With many interchanges in-between.
My conclusion was that SG is sterile but not clean. Wow, that word "clean" kicked up a storm in the conversation. All around agreed that SG is a dirty dirty place. Why? Because of the litter. Now I'm not saying that HK people are exactly good at picking up their litter after themselves, but I guess the government has more or less resigned themselves to the fact that it's inhabitants are a lot of littering so and so's (let's keep this blog clean on the language at least) and therefore have employed a whole host of friendly, conscientious and very nice people who spend their days, every single day, cleaning up after the so-called more educated, sophisticated and advanced members of the population who don't deign to do so themselves. I'm apparently not the only one noticing the litter, as this post indicates - with all the whys and wherefores.

Here in SG things aren't cleaned on a daily basis, and it shows. On my street, it seems people regularly drive along and throw their newspapers out the window - how else can I explain whole newspapers blowing in the wind after the morning rush? And the papers will stay there day after day after day. And then finally after a few weeks they'll disintegrate or disappear or go to newspaper heaven. I walk the dog through the Chinese cemetery most mornings. One of the debates on the littering thing was that it was the "expatriates" and "foreigners" - here in SG I've learnt that expat doesn't necessarily mean a well paid lawyer or banker from the old colonial masters. It's just as likely to refer to the bangladeshi manual laborer hanging onto the back of a pickup truck. Nice one, pass the buck. Now I don't know of many "expats" who go around preparing 100 course meals for their hungry ancestors and then leaving the tinfoil and styrafoam plates with the food rotting around the graves with piles of half burnt money and other stuff for the afterlife and burnt down wax candles and incense. Oh, and don't forget the plastic bags. And the tin cans, and the glass bottles. Hungry people those dead. On the first day it's a stinking mess. By the 3rd or 4th it's a fly infested buzzing gagging area which you have to avoid if you don't want your breakfast to form another feast. And your dog to die from food poisoning. I guess that's "culturally acceptable" littering?

It's funny how one tries to find rational explanations for things going on around you. One can be liberal with truth and causality as long as it sort of makes sense.... One of the explanations was that perhaps HK was only so clean because it was so hard hit by SARS. Whereas SG "only" had 238 cases and 33 deaths, HK had 1755 cases and 299 deaths.

On the home front? We don't litter because it's not right. Because I try to make the kids extrapolate to the nth degree. As in "if everyone were to leave their piece of paper on the floor how long before it would be out of control" and in other cases (like not picking flowers etc.) "if everyone were to pick a flower as they walked past how soon would it be before there were no flowers for us to enjoy the sight of".

I'm still trying to get to grips with recycling. I've been told the SG has only one landfill and it will be full by 2040. Not sure how accurate that is. I've bought the sorting bins and we're separating plastic and paper and bottles / tins. I've got the wormery for the vegetable waste. The bins are full and now I need to work out what to do with them, so now I've found a site where I can take action. I was told that they sort after collection. One woman from the AWA environmental committee said she'd even seen a rather nice and flash video of them doing so. "But," she added, "why were they just showing me a video and not letting me see the actual sorting going on? Was it real or just a promo." Yes - how conspiracy theory we all are.

I'm off to sort out the waste.

how low you can go ...

2011-09-06T08:21:00.000+08:00

I think I finally found the depths of what it is to be a less than adequate mother / person this morning. I thought we'd got it pretty sorted last night, packed the bags with the school clothes as cross country starts at 6.45 at the reservoir and they shower and change afterwards. I'd reminded the helper that we had to be in the car by 6.20 with breakfast in hand. That there needed to be extra snacks for the hungry tummies afterwards.

I remembered the kids, the dog, the leash, the blanket and towel for the dog and her water. The school bags, the changing bags. We get to the reservoir. No water for the kids. No towel for my daughter's shower afterwards. How can I get my act together that one child has a towel and the other doesn't?

We compromised. We improvised. My daughter had her school water bottle (son wisely keeps it at school) and my son got the dog's water in an empty bottle that was lying in the car.

My daughter got the towel the dog had been lying on (it was clean that morning, and only slightly smelly). The dog got her walk.

I got the information on the drive to the reservoir that the children thought that the helper should go, as "this would NEVER, have happened with M (our old helper) as she would have helped to remind us all", "yes mum, she always is better at thinking than you are" and that when I'd left them with her when we went to the meet the teacher evening, she'd not given them a story as requested, my daughter had had to read the story as she couldn't read. Ahaaaa. That would explain many many many many things that have gone wrong by omission or commission. According to the little wise ones she hadn't gone to school. But she did have a college degree. I explained to them that it was fairly rare that someone who hadn't gone to school and couldn't read an 8 year old reading book would be able to go to college.

Now I need to wait for the boss to get back from his silent retreat on Monday where he's uncontactable as he'll have to do the firing and the new hiring as it's all in his name as I'm a non-entity here. My dictionary doesn't recognize uncontactable. How funny. Must be a 21st century dictionary. I hope to heavens that the worst that overcomes us in the next week is more missing water bottles and frazzled incompetent mum.

Battle whimper of the MOBs

2011-09-05T21:54:00.000+08:00

I've been extremely fortunate in SG in that I knew a few people from HK who have moved here, and they've been most gracious and welcoming in introducing me to their circles of friends. Quite unlike my experience when I moved back to HK again many years ago. But that story you know.

On Friday, I was invited to lunch with 6 other ladies. I knew I was in the right place when the hostess offered us frozen Margarita popsicles as a starter drink. As I sat back getting comfortable, listening to the chatter around me, with a nice little buzz from the margarita, I suddenly realized that I was part of a MOB gathering. Yes, all around me, the ladies were MOTHERs OF BOYs. And the stories they had to tell - the best was the one whose sons had climbed up the storage racks in the garage to get hold of some of dad's sailing ropes so that they could tie them to the 3rd floor window to make their own private bungee jumping paradise. Fortunately she is a MOB and caught them in time.

But it wasn't all bravado. It is no co-incidence I think that the infamous "battle hymn..." was written by the mother of girls. She'd not have gotten past first base with a bunch of boys. The undercurrent was not so much a battle cry or hymn as a whimper. Seeking solace in each others tales of homework undone, library books not returned, appalling handwriting, wonderful affection and caring, weakness in math and the inability to sit still. One of the women, of asian-american descent openly said that she was dead sure that had she been living in the USA her son would have been on Ritalin (later, one of the other ladies in an aside said it may be beneficial for said lady to partake in the Ritalin as well). There was a little undertow of anxiety, just how much of a normal BOY is my child and just how much ought I to be worrying about him.

After lunch when we all had to rush back to fetch our respective children and take them off to their various enhancing activities, I went for a pit-stop. On the hostesses bed was a copy of Buzz. I remarked on it as I said goodbye and asked what she'd thought of it, as she is a fellow meditator, and that was one of the interesting aspects of the book. Two other ladies were also saying goodbye and both of them had also read the book. That's scary. That kind of statistic is that? I've met some of their kids, and they seem pretty normal nice kids and not on a DSM scale type of children. I find this concerning on the one hand. It seems like these days, every time I meet a MOB and we start becoming a little closer, you hear the tales of despair and uncertainty. The concern, the love, the desperation to want it to be all right tinged with fear that it wasn't alright. Would this be any different if our children were in single sex schools? Are we too involved? Are we too close? Do we have too few children and too much time to think and read?

I left thinking that MOB gatherings were a good thing. Never mind class mothers and PTA's and parents associations, every school should have a MOB club. And every school library needs a MOB book section - goodness knows there's been enough ink spilt on the matter in recent times. A simple amazon search with the phrase "boys" came up with nearly 140,000 books, and the top 10 (here's an example) were all indicating that all was not right in the world of boydom and MOBdom.

I'm infinitely happy that my children's new school has a good number of male teachers. Teachers who were once boys. I think my son is in safe hands.

Paper factory

2011-09-01T14:25:00.000+08:00

My life has shifted downstairs. Until Saturday 4pm with the arrival of B, a lot of our life took place in the family room which is a sort of landing between the master bedroom and the other two bedrooms. It houses the computers, desks, the piano, cellos, viola, and armchair, a rocking chair and 5 bookcases. Yes I was allowed to buy one more. Just one more. With an extension.

Despite B being the most obedient well mannered member of this family, she's not allowed upstairs as she's biologically incapable of keeping her fur to herself, and we're trying to keep the sleeping areas fur free. She's awfully good about this. On the first day we told her to stay and wait at the bottom of the stairs, and stay and wait she did. When it sounded too much fun and exciting upstairs she finally let out a yelp to remind us of her presence.

So now many of our activities have shifted downstairs. For the first time in years we're using the living room, not only when we have guests. We're doing the old fashioned thing of sitting on the arm chairs and reading a book before bed, instead of internetting. The kids do their reading there instead of in bed, and the music practice has been transformed into daily recitals for the dog. It's not a bad thing. B likes our company and quietly nods off to sleep and grunts when we switch the light off and go up to bed. At 6am as we descend the stairs it's a lunacy of happiness as she greets us each.

Today I decided to bring down my in tray to sort out and to work a little on some chinese. I managed to read one text more or less (had to look up a few very basic words!). What a paper factory it is again. We've been sorting and throwing and organizing and still the table is yet to be cleared. We have guarantees and instructions from the early 90's. It's not so much that I have a problem throwing them out, the problem is finding the time and energy to sort through them to throw them out. Our last big sort out a few weekends ago resulted in 6 black bags going out the door. And when we do throw out, suddenly it's the one thing that is needed (eg. Ikea instructions for less than handy handymen putting a bed together in a hurry). For good measure my daughter was given her 3 baby boxes (make those big boxes from when she was a baby) and school files for the last 5 years and told to keep only the best. Even she weakened after a few hours of this. My son's stuff is just piled in piles. He has cupboards with potential in his room, 5 metres floor to ceiling. We may never have to sort and then could just close the door quietly when we leave and forget about it all.

Does anyone else get the "flylady" emails... they exhaust me, but occasionally in a queue I use them as last resort reading. The philosophy is pretty spot on. Set a timer for 15 minutes and tackle one spot. One day I may be a domestic goddess and justify my expensive accounting education with a spotless house and everything filed and thrown out at 5 yearly rotating intervals.

And then I'll be in a position to blog about the stitching on my Tods for Grit.

Bottom line, what's better - me organized, or me blogging and getting out to take photos and experience experiences to blog about?

Two truths and a lie

2011-08-31T20:46:00.000+08:00

God knows why, but my son has taken to insisting I play this with him every day. I hate that game / ice- breaker, whatever it is meant to be. It seems I've been on the receiving end of 47 lies and one truth at the moment. Our helper started last week. I cannot be unfair and say it's an unmitigated disaster, but it's not good.

I had my meditation session this morning. I was press ganging myself into compassion towards her and self flagellation for my impatience and shortness. Facts of the matter, her Englsh is appalling - a fact I noted on the interview notes and my husband poo poo'd. She said she could cook and follow a recipe. She can't. Ditto use a dishwasher and washing machine. and the kids haven't taken to her at all.

I wrote down all the routines and schedules in detail. I'm now even wondering about her reading level.

And the man of the house, who had been patiently training her is on his silent retreat, and me the horrid bitch tai tai is not finding this nurturing role to my liking. Kids, yes, dog, yes (well she's the least bother and most disciplined), but helper no. This wasn't what I was looking for.

And I feel so bad. I should have listened to my instincts. but then id have had no helper at all. not easy in this household. And it's so bloody unfair here. She gets docked for the agency fee. Not that it's an issue, I'd reimburse her for that. But it's more the anticipation and dashed hopes of such a person.

What is plan B? keep her and send her on expensive training courses? Keep her and try and get a replacement like my ex-Helpers aunt? Keep looking? Give it time and compassion?

The worst. She's just what I don't want. She has this hang dog kicked dog demeanor. So she doesn't ask any questions. And then she fouls up and I get cross. I ask her to do something, she doesn't do it, doesn't know how but also doesn't tell she hasn't or doesn't know how. then it all comes out at the last and most inopportune moment. oh I feel like such a bad person! I never thought I'd be moaning on about Helpers. how low can you go?

Isn't it wonderful?

2011-08-30T10:37:00.001+08:00

For a child who struggles to put thoughts on paper with pen, my son has a remarkably good turn of phrase when he's speaking. This morning we took B (the dog) for a walk at the MacRitchie reservoir. Her discipline and listening was sorely tested as we got out of the carpark and walked past a troop of monkeys, and one of them (I guess and adult male) came lunging at her in great aggression. But she listened and just kept on walking, although my son was having puppies in panic. The deal is that I keep the leash on public roads with cars, in car parks and until we get to a 'safe' area and he gives it back to me if there are any situations (horses, other large dogs, water she may want to jump into). He's been pretty good with this so far.

We walked one way, but weren't allowed in the Nature reserve, so went towards the kayaking. Where we saw a large group of red shirt clad elderly doing their dancing to music on the pier. "Isn't it wonderful" says the little one "that there is a space like this in nature for the poor and elderly to enjoy their dancing and exercise? "

I agreed it was. I'm glad he notices these things and also realizes his privilege and doesn't take it too much for granted.

The other day my husband and I went to the Whampoa wet market to have a look. We walked past many hawkers stalls and saw all sorts of appetizing things. We had to comment if you lived in the HDB flats nearby, or the elderly home, there'd be little reason to have a kitchen or do much shopping as you could probably pop down for your meals, and get a lot more besides, like a game of chess or go and companionship.

We were enticed by this stall which offered 2 veg, rice and 1 meat for S$2.50. It tasted pretty good too. They had other combinations as well and mineral water was an optional S$0.30.

Isn't it wonderful that there is the contrast. The previous week we'd been to Jaan, where the waiter's X were stuck so far up their Y they could barely bear to speak to the patrons in normal English. But the food was pretty good and the view, well, interesting. I suppose it's pretty much as good as one can get as far as views are concerned in SG. Not that a view of Suntec and the funny casino thing perched on top of two towers is what I consider to be a wonderful view! I recon that by the end of the meal and the expensive bottled water we were probably S$250 lighter. Which is horses for courses as far as executive lunches are concerned.

the worms, I forgot the worms ...

2011-08-29T13:21:00.000+08:00

In all the hoopla about the dog and the hamster and the fish I forgot the worms! We are now also the proud container holders of 5kg of worms for our compost recycling. There is a really nifty little start-up company here in SG who can help you on your way whether you live big or small or even want to do something at your school - and he even delivers on a Sunday. AND is excellent with explanations to kids!

go forth and multiply

2011-08-29T09:43:00.000+08:00

The boy had been promised a dog, as you may remember. We were looking at a beautiful Golden Retriever, but alas, he'd been neglected for most of his 4 years and had not been trained. The lady who was looking after him temporarily, wisely decided that he'd be better off with a family with more experience with dogs. It was a blow to my son of course. He wanted a dog, and he wanted it NOW. Likewise, we decided against the dogs we saw at the SPCA, a lovely little Jack Russell - but prone to possessiveness (no good for play dates), and several very barky dogs with unknown parentage and behavioral traits.

Then I saw an ad for 2 labradors. The owners were moving to a flat, here in SG dogs are very strictly controlled. Landed properties are limited to 3 dogs. If you're in a flat or condo, only 1 dog. And if it's a HDB apartment, you're only allowed one of 62 breeds, all of which are small dogs. Unfortunately, as many experts point out, small yappy, energetic, aggressive dogs can be worse in communal living than large placid dogs. But that's besides the point. Still it's a lot better than Hong Kong where it seems that there are no restrictions whatsoever.

Following up on the ad, the owners and their little boy came around with the dog, and what a beauty. The other had been adopted already, so it was just one, not two (more on that later). She's 8 years old and the most obedient 8 year old this mum has ever managed to come across. Obeys all commands first time round - a real eye opener for children in this household who shall remain nameless. Oh, I'm not supposed to say owner, I think the PC term is now carer. What a nice family. They'd brought her up with positive reinforcement only and spent most of the afternoon going through her daily routine and how they'd trained her with us.

Listening to him I had to smile. It was all you strive to do with children. It was all about keeping positive. Not saying "no" not repeating yourself. Not shouting, not getting angry. It was about consistency and repetition and praise and lots of cuddles. About very occasional treats, but your approval and happiness being the main prize. And boy has it paid off big time for them with this dog (and us). It's been especially interesting watching the kids in this. Particularly my son, who wants to be the main dog contact point.

And it's been extremely cringeworthy for me. Because how does he go about with the dog - well, tape recorder!!! I hear him talking to her and trying to coax and cajole her just the way I go about things with him. And boy oh boy, it's playback time. And then you hear how you've slipped up along the way. The repeating, the saying no, the commanding instead of encouraging, the instructions instead of praise. All those hours of Suzuki, all those parenting books and courses and it takes a dog and a boy for a good look in the mirror.

Luckily one is never too old to learn, and kids and dogs are very forgiving and understanding.

In the period while we were thinking and looking for a dog, we bought my son some fish as a sort of consolation prize. His sister had got her replacement hamster from the SPCA, and she was being rather possessive about restricting his access. He's a boy that needs cuddles - to give and to receive. He was delighted with the fish. But unfortunately my husband made a little mistake with connecting the aerator in the tank and the next morning we'd gone from 4 fish to 1 with the others little carcasses on the top of the filter. Yuck. That afternoon back to the fish shop, where very kindly the attendant gave him 3 new fish, explained to dad how to set it up properly and they just had to pay the price difference. Different fish, easier to take care of. So imagine the delight the next morning when we discovered that the fat goldfish had in fact a whole lot of eggs in her, eggs which had hatched out 4 little baby fish by the next morning! What joy in the household.

Back to the dog. Unfortunately her younger brother was given back to the family, as the new adopters couldn't handle him properly. Which I find strange if he's anything like our darling. So we've said we'll see how things go with B (our dog) for the week, and research things and then consider taking in the brother as well. I'm not sure if that's a good or bad idea. A friend who was here for lunch yesterday day and has had years of Labrador experience said not such a good idea as they constantly fight to sort out the alpha issue, every year again... anyone else have comments?

Of course my daughter is now jealous of the dog, particularly as my son is restricting access to her. So she wants a second dog that can be hers. He was told that the first month is really important for the bonding, so he needs to be the one feeding and grooming her. So he hates any of us doing any of that. Of course the dog is absolutely not stupid as to who is the boss around in the house, and if my husband is around she defers instantly to him... so I have my son telling dad, "no, stop, don't say anything to her, don't move. Don't come near" He is a lot more relaxed now, the first day he couldn't leave her side and wanted to be active with her all the time. Now he's started learning she's just as happy just sitting next to him as he does his reading, and that she loves listening to his viola practice. Early days!

Garden leave / Gardening leave

2011-08-27T12:25:00.000+08:00

As most of you know, my husband is in-between jobs and was put on 3 months Garden leave from July to September. It's been an interesting period, coupled as it's been with us relocating, settling into Singapore and the kids starting a new school - actually it couldn't have come at a better time. His big dilemma has been from the start how to make sure he doesn't "squander" this perhaps once in a life-time chance. I'm there with him, having been on circumstance imposed garden leave for the last 10 or so years.

Suddenly he's seeing how easy it is to be busy all day every day, all month and not really have very much to show for it. Sure the plants are potted (yes he has actually been gardening a bit) and the pictures are hung and the house is looking pretty much sorted out. His in-tray is pretty empty, and miracles upon miracles he's actually even learned how to use the printer and scanner (I kid not, usually I did that for him at home and his secretary at work). It was a little more difficult to try and teach him where to find the files he'd scanned or otherwise created, but we even managed that one rainy afternoon. He's not quite at the point where he'll google a solution, he'd far rather shout for me to come and sort it out for him. Amazed too at the fact that the "shift" button (to select multiple items) seems to work only when I'm in the vicinity ... but that's another story.

A few weeks back we had some friends over for dinner and one of them told how he'd had a year's garden leave. The rest of us couldn't imagine the luxury. He was regretful. He'd wasted the entire year he admitted. It had just slipped away much to his frustration and he regretted not using it. That is much of the gist of one of the few articles I found on garden leave. It seems that men, as is their habit don't really like seeking out advice from those who've been there before to see the what's and how's of it all. God, I could point them to a couple of ex-career women with kids who'd be very happy to explain the ropes. Including the emotional nooses around your neck.

I'm extremely surprised that someone hasn't come up with the idea of using something like Volunteer spot where people on garden leave can sign up to do some meaningful charity work pro-bono which wouldn't be in breach of their contracts. Most of the websites I did find, dealt with the legal ramifications of garden leave and working or not working during it. Seems like it's really hard to let go of the work thing. Even while you're being paid not to work.

Next week my husband is off to do a 10 day silent retreat. I'd dissuaded him from the consumptive alternative of traveling the world or yet another vacation. I don't think he wanted to do that type of travel anyway - at least not on his own, and let's be honest all of his mates are currently working.

Garden leave. I think that's how I'm going to see my time not working. Ties in with my pruned tree feeling.

choosing your analogy ...

2011-08-26T15:33:00.000+08:00

it could make all the difference.

The last few days, I've been doing the rounds of coffee mornings (2 kids, 2 grades 2 trips), meet the teacher, AWA (american woman's association) newcomer event. I'm a bit fatigued out on that type of thing. It's not my kind of thing to start off with - I usually just end up talking to one person the whole time, but I had my husband to bolster the process. I was about to chicken out the other day, and in the end said, if you go I'll go. If it were up to me I'd not go on my own. I just feel awkward and out of place and don't know how to start conversations and how to get them anywhere beyond how long you've been here, what your husband does etc. Sometimes though, you do scratch the surface.

Maybe it's better not to. It's raw inside there. "I don't exist" is a common lament. I can't sign for anything as a dependent, I have no function, I've given up my career, my job, my car, my home...

The hardest I guess is the people in their mid-life who are doing this for the first time. They've not been endlessly re-starting, re-creating, re-establishing themselves since a little past pre-teenage years. They've arrived here, often with teenage kids and wow. What a shock.

Another friend of mine has just relocated to part of north america. We've been getting missives from her too. It's tough. In a way I have to smile. Often this type of mail comes from people who never replied to your own missives at the start of your expat career. When you met up with them, could never understand how you could complain that life was a tad difficult. That it wasn't that simple fitting into a new culture (even if they supposedly spoke the same language). That things were different. Just different enough to make things take a lot longer. That the local people weren't lined up with flower garlands waiting to invite you into their lives. That sometimes the best you could hope for was to be treated with polite indifference.

I was thinking about it. I seriously advised one lady that she'd have to let go of all of her attachments to everything at home, in herself and in life and do some meditation as it would make it all easier for her in the long and short term. She looked at me as if I was a half crazy hippy, but hopefully it did sound a chord with her (I wouldn't advise this to just any old person - she looked like she was half receptive to the idea).

When you move you have to choose your analogy. And I think there probably are several to choose from but I think I've come across two dominant ones.

The first is that your life has become a shattered mirror.
So you spend all your physical and emotional energy in trying to pick up the pieces and glue them back in some semblance of what it all used to be like. It's very time consuming. It's frustrating, tough and at the end of the day, there are going to be cracks. Bits that didn't quite fit together because micro pieces that make it complete went missing along the way. It's a nobel cause of course. And it keeps you busy. And if you're busy, you don't go insane from inactivity and uselessness and boredom.

The second is that you are a pruned fruit tree
As good gardeners and farmers know, in order for a tree to grow, thrive and be productive pruning has to occur from time to time. Out here in the tropics that pruning may appear really severe. Each pruning season I'd walk up Mount Davis Path, and the senior citizens would have done the necessary on my favorite trees, the ones that have leaves of white and pink. And I'd think, this time, they've gone too far. Impossible that there could be any regrowth. Oh how terrible. How ugly, how bare.
But regrow it does. New and beautiful and fresh leaves. Abundant flowers, fruit, if it's a fruit tree. Not little bitter, sour, shriveled fruit but fruit that is large and luscious and the way it should be.

I'm trying this time to let go of the mirror and embrace the fruit tree.

I wish someone had said this to me years ago. I don't know that many organizations give the right type of advise to expats. It's all about finding the supermarkets with your home produce and how to reproduce a life lost. Where to find the glue for the broken mirror and to buy extra bits for the fallen and lost. Or maybe I don't hang around long enough at those newcomer events.

yoo godda bamboo pole?

2011-08-25T15:17:00.001+08:00

No I didn't. He looked at me in amazement as if my life, my very existence here in Singapore could not be justified without the necessary bamboo pole in my possession. It was the pest control man. The bees before breakfast had gone beyond a slight amusing anecdote on living in the jungle. Now that school had started, it meant that the household too had to start around 6am. A good hour before the sun started. And that meant that each and every light that got switched on (even inside) was swarmed by bees within seconds. I put on my best, bossiest, I've lived in Africa tones of voices and declared that I didn't care what pest control had said before about bees and jungles and nature, if they had such a super-fast response time, they had to be nesting REALLY close to the house, particularly to the master-bathroom. I insisted that the man of the house contacted the landlord and pest control and pulled out all the stops to protect kith and kin and particularly my fragile sanity at that ungodly hour of the morning.

I know all about how useful honey bees are, and I'm all for them. I agreed with both pest control companies and the Singapore government, that the bees would not, should not be killed. But, I added, if we carried on the way we'd been going I was having a couple of hundred dead kamikaze bees each morning, which was hardly good for the morale of the hive in any event. Not to mention my kids freaking out as bees got tangled in their hair on the way to their breakfast toast.

In the end they came, and hence the need for the bamboo pole, to attach to other poles to paint a substance over and around the house where they'd been hiving and nesting away all these months. Apparently this substance advices them that they'd be better off re-establishing themselves elsewhere, and then everyone will be happy.

This morning a few solitary loners passed by and got shooed out the window from me. The first calm morning in weeks.

Later, we went to the Whampoa market and found buckets like this one full of poles. Even brightly decorated ones. I didn't buy one. I wasn't in a pole buying kind of mood today. But we couldn't find what we really wanted - an old fashioned broom for sweeping up the many leaves around the house and in the gutters. The old shop keepers one after another told us that they used to have them, but they're all sold out and they can't find any suppliers anymore. Sad.

Fertilizer ...

2011-08-21T17:56:00.000+08:00

It's my new mantra for when I'm feeling like things are getting on top of me and exaggerating the importance of issues.

I went for a long walk in the cemetery near our house the other day. All those tombstones and graves, one after another. Little clue with most as to who the were and what they'd achieved. Whether they'd been happy or sad, frustrated or fulfilled. Some (according to a piece of paper) had taken care and decided in detail how they were to be buried with which ornaments. I guess more than one had given thought to this. And then, I came across this one. It relativized everything. You plan, you sweat, you worry. And then after a few decades what does it all matter, you're dead and there's a huge tree growing right through the middle of your grave. Fertilizer. That's all it's come to.