Christian’s 1st Swim

Christian had his very 1st swimming class last Saturday.

He went with his classmates to the mega pool at Pasir Ris a few months ago, and came back lamenting to me:

“Nicole and Andrew can swim already you know..can i go for swim class too?”

I promised him I would search for a swim coach for him, and started asking for recommendations from the facebook group made up of the mummies at his school. Through that group, I found a great coach (although he truly does not look like a swim coach as the mummy had warned me) and also a swim-mate for Christian

Now he has 2-to-1 lessons at his schoolmate’s condo which is near our place and they truly enjoyed the 1 hour lesson. The coach is also rather flexible in terms of missed classes / scheduling, which is great cos I expected the usual policy of no-rescheduling for bad weather, sick children etc.

P and I brought Calista along for Christian’s 1st lesson. She took a long time to warm up but eventually enjoyed sitting at the side of the baby pool, kicking water. My heart beamed with pride as Christian graduated to the big pool, and ‘swam’ the length of it with the help of a float strapped to his back, while holding on to a float board.

Hopefully he’ll continue to enjoy swim lessons, and gain confidence in water in time to come.

The difference between boys and girls

Or perhaps, the difference between a son and a daughter, is quite clearly illustrated by the following incident:

I was standing up near P one day when he playfully decides to beat my buttocks like a drum in front of Calista. She giggles, and rushes ahead to join in the fun by imitating her father.

This is when I rolled my eyes and commented to P that this is the difference between a boy and a girl. P immediately understood what I meant and remarked that yes, if Christian had witnessed P doing that, P would have been charged at in an instant, head-butted, and/or have blows raining upon him.

Ah..indeed, sons are always so protective towards their mums.

Macau–Day 3 and 4

The last day! I decided to abandon the guys and the little babe, and went with my mum across the Macau-Chinese border to shop at the Zhuhai Dongbei Complex. It is a labryinth of small shops selling lots of ladies clothes, kid’s clothes, bags, etc. We took the shuttle at 10am to the border and came back only at 3pm, after an hour of foot massage (that only cost us S$9 per person). It was a good harvest of clothes for Calista, with Christian only getting 2 pieces. We had some trouble deciding what to eat for lunch though. I was reluctant to eat at the dodgy stalls selling “beef” noodles, and settled for a sushi restaurant which appeared to be part of a chain which had garnered many awards. The salmon was such a fluorescent orange that I did not dare to take it.

While we were away, P and my Dad brought Christian and Calista to the nearby "City of Dreams” to watch a 3D bubble and magic show.

P said it had no plot and was a waste of money, but the children seemed fascinated nonetheless, from my viewing of the video. Christian even dodged at one point, when he thought the dragon was going to descend upon him.

I came back to an exhausted P, who said our children decided they both needed to do big business at the same time, while i was away. I chuckled as I saw his zombified face, and granted him leave to go wander about the shops and get a beer while they were napping. When they woke, we walked over to Taipa Village to have dinner at a chinese restaurant which wasn’t too bad. We had a leisurely time there and strolled back quite early, with enough time for the kids to run around the lobby..

Here’s a picture of them getting ready for bed.

And asleep..

We woke early the next day for our 10-something flight. Thank goodness the children napped most of the way..Hopefully they had happy memories of our trip to Macau, notwithstanding Christian’s initial comment when learning we were going to Macau which was part of China:

1) Are we going to miss Andrew’s birthday party?

2) China? I don’t want to go to China. That’s where the bad emperor made people build a great wall, and whipped them..and there’s war there too! (Darling, that’s a looong looong time ago.)

A long time ago? Before gonggong was born?

^_^

 

Macau–Day 2

We had a quick breakfast at the Venetian foodcourt..paid for an overpriced Fatburger which wasn’t great. We then explored the hotel more, and found the pool and playground. The kids had some fun there, but it soon got too hot for Calista so P brought her back to the room to shower whilst I stayed behind to watch Christian in the sand pit.

We then headed to the Italian restaurant, Portofino, which was recommended by one of my colleagues. The set lunch pasta/pizza ala carte buffet was a rather good deal, and the kids really went for the breadsticks. After that we had a walk around the place somewhere, doing the usual touristy thing of taking pictures of the interior..

After the children napped, it was off to the city center, the Leal Senado (Senado Square). We took the shuttle bridge over to the main island, then walked a short way to the square. On the way, we passed the shop I loved when I visited HK back in 2008.. Milk pudding! We had a pre-dinner snack of milk pudding.. it wasn’t as good as in HK, but it still satisfied my craving. We took a quick walk around the charming square which reminded me of Spain, and then proceeded to look for Fat Siu Lau to have dinner. I was expecting a road-side cha chan teng, but it was more posh then expected. The roast pigeon came right at the end of the meal and was so scrumptious my already full tummy willingly expanded just a little more. I could understand why all the guides to Macau promoted this place just for roast pigeon. It had none of the gamey taste, nor was the meat tough. =P

After dinner, we decided to load up on the usual Macau souvenirs – almond biscuits, orange peel cakes and sugared peanut candy. We bought so much the stroller ended up taking the goods instead of the children. Haha. One quick trip to the Sasa outlet at Senado square later, I hauled the travelling party to walk uphill past small streets, following the signs which said “Ruins of St Paul’s”.

The air was cool and the atmospheric lighting of the ruins made it look nicer than in all the photos i’ve ever seen of it.

And that, was how the 2nd day of our trip to Macau flew by.

Trip to Macau–Day 1

Peter’s last day at his old firm was on 3rd May 2013, so we booked a very short family trip to Macau. Why Macau? Well, this was what he asked me over and over as we made our way there.. “There is nothing to do there. It’s a drab and dreary place, believe me, I’ve seen all of it during my HK days, when I transited at Macau…etc etc.”

I was able to get good rates at the Venetian, so decided to take the opportunity to let my parents experience staying in the famous hotel. It was sort of like a staycation, overseas. =7 Some colleagues who don’t have young children thought it weird, but with small kids, there’s no point going to a place which is full of interesting sights cos there’s barely any time to take in the sights after you take into account time spent on their baths, naps, etc…

So. The children had fun right from the get-go. .here’s us at Changi Airport.. Calista was rather excited to see the planes that she had heard from so long ago (when we dined at Changi Beach Club), and my heart warmed as I saw her brother pointing out the planes to her and explaining what those vehicles moving about on the runway were all about.

One thing I like about Macau is the free shuttle service to almost everywhere. We took the free shuttle to the hotel, and were wowed by the gaudy decor of the Venetian. Gold gold gold everywhere! Although the decor was too ostentatious and not quite my style, I did appreciate the thought that went into the design of the smallest furnishing. There was a theme and everything fit together nicely..

I managed to get two connecting suites. My parents got the suite with the king bed and I got the one with 2 queen beds. The kids LOVED it. They ran round and round, through the connecting door, up and down the steps to the lounge area, in and out of the big bathrooms..my parents were impressed and asked if the normal price of the suites ran into the thousands.. haha

Our room had the view of the park opposite, which was better than facing the endless construction going on at the Cotai Strip. We rested a little in the room, before heading out to search for Dom Galo, a restaurant at the Taipa Village serving Macanese food.

 

The restaurant was at Rua de Cunha, a rather short street which was supposedly the heart of Taipa Village. It was filled with pastry shops selling almond biscuits, and interesting architecture revealing the colonial influence of years past. Dinner wasn’t too bad, we had a seafood rice with crab, squid salad, crab cake and 2 or 3 other dishes I can’t quite remember now. The bill was a little surprising though, it came up to MOP900+, which is probably SGD170..

Taipa Village was a 10 minute walk from the Venetian, and it was quite an enjoyable walk indeed. The air was cool and dry, and there were travellators on flat ground for those who didn’t relish the exercise. Everybody went back feeling quite happy. My parents roamed the shops which were connected to the hotel, whilst P, I and the kids went back for a bath and bed. We decided to bathe the children together in the interests of efficiency and Christian had so much fun.

A 100,000 “Why?”s

It was a pity i had mild diarrhoea this morning, cos it meant that i couldn’t join P, Christian and Calista on the Sunday family outing..P brought the children to take the bus to Liang Court, and they went on the Singapore River Cruise, something P had been meaning to do for some time.

I was updated through photos, and they certainly had lots of fun at a kiddy carnival, throwing hoops and winning prizes. They finally got onto the boat hours after they set off from home, and i decided to drive to Marina Bay to join them for lunch and drive them home.

On the way home, Christian surprised us by asking “Daddy, why is the water in the river green, but the water from the tap white?” P and I praised him for asking a thoughtful question (we had earlier many many months ago chastised him for asking questions which showed a lack of thought).. I was rather pleased, cos this showed he had observed and thought about it.

P launched into a long Socratic-style exchange with Christian, asking him if he really thought that tap water was white.. or whether it was colourless.. before asking him what he thought was in the river. The leading questions worked, and i was glad to hear it all from the back of the car, where I was cradling a sleeping Calista.

Ah, my children are growing up. I anticipate tapping on Mr Google’s knowledge frequently to answer their million questions, soon.