Outings

Trying hard to wrap up the month of November with this last post before we crossed over to December and before you know it, it's going to be a brand new year. Like how fast can time flies rite.

 

Anyhow we had a pretty busy November and definitely my favourite month being my hatchday month. As mentioned previously, we managed to squeeze in our short road trip at the very last minute. On top and above, we went for HomeTeam Festival and Navy@Vivo. Basically that 4 days of leaves including weekend was really jam packed with activities, leaving me with dead exhaustion after which. You see, Navy@Vivo was the day after we returned from the road trip.

 

Going to the HomeTean Festival was rather a last minute decision as well with Zethan in mind, how excited he is at the Fire engines, Red Rhino and the gist. It was really crowded as we went on a Sunday and Expo was packed with a few events. There were long queues practically in the whole exhibition even to tour the vehicles or snap a picture with it and we had to selectively find the activities for participation.

We had to go for Navy@Vivo as we got the tickets through balloting and this time we are going on board RSS Endurance which is supposed to be one of their biggest fleet. It was drizzling before we set off and I was crossing fingers that they will not cancel due to safety reasons otherwise I would have a whole load of thinking to do, explaining to Zethan for his disappointment.

Fortunately luck is on our side and we did not have to be in the queue for long going through the security checks and then boarding the ship. The tour around the ship was a much pleasant one as compared to our last visit as the crowd control was near to perfect and in an orderly systematic manner. Thought this RSS Endurance was indeed much more impressive but I am not going into the details, the bombastic technical terms which I am totally hopeless in. The only complains I have are we met a few Indians (no racism intended) who ignore us and cut our queue which I have no qualms to telling them off.

Oh we purposely hang around the deck and saw the Sunset Ceremony unfold right in front of us. It was such a formal ceremony but the experience could have been near to perfect if not for 2 Indians boys pushing their way to where we are at the front and squeezing Zethan out of view. Despise these parents, irresponsible and rude, allowing their children to act at their whim and fancy. Seriously I am real mad at them for pushing Zethan away.

 

Nonetheless I am sure Zethan had fun while I had a good exercise beco-ing Zelyn and climbing the numerous steep steps! Trust me, I had muscle ache the next day!

Term Break

2 weeks since the term break and our last Parent Teacher Conference for the year.

 

In a nutshell the feedback given by the teachers are really encouraging and definitely very positive especially that from the Chinese teacher.

 

By and large he had shown improvement in all areas of developments mainly in his gross motor skill. He can identify his alphabets really well and the sound they produce (phonics). When it comes to numbers, it is equally on par, rote counting as well as random counting. It was a pleasant surprise to realise that his form teacher commented that he love to dance and can dance very well even in front of the whole class.

 

This discussion came about as I have feedback to both teachers that I have observed him appearing to be lacking self confidence. E.g. when there are activities which I asked if he is keen to try or volunteer, he tend to shy away and reject politely of which I will encourage but do not force him. On the contrary, the teacher said he is very active in class, very confident and always keen to volunteer and offer his help e.g. stacking away chairs, rearranging the tables etc. A very good teacher's helper. The form teacher suspect that he just feel very conscious in front of us thus limiting his enthusiasm to try new things which can be commonly seen in young children. He did not seem to display any problem as well during Show and Tell. We then got to realise how important this Show and Tell activity is. Apparently now that the system had do away with examinations in Primary 1, they have turned to using Show and Tell as one of the evaluation activity for their 'grade'.

 

An area which could be further improved would be blending of letters e.g. We, am, is etc. Having said that, most of the children in class are unable to recognise much and there is no major issue or concern here. She do not see the urgency to push him further as after all they are just 4 years old kids.

 

The comments from the Chinese teacher were very positive. She was really pleased to see the vast improvement in him. He started from very limited Chinese vocabulary in the first term with some difficulties in understanding mandarin. forget about speaking, to currently he can converse well in mandarin. We feedback to her that we show the improvement in him at home, showing interest in identifying objects in Chinese, singing Chinese songs and Chinese rhymes. She is certainly very very pleased to hear that. 

 

Moving forward to next year, the school is likely to relocate in June 2015 instead. The children have been shown their new classroom and introduced to their new class teachers and identity - Peace 2. It was a good thing that the Chinese teacher will be following them to K1 next year but sad to say not the form teacher. There will be some shuffling in the classmates as well as some of his classmates would be separated to different classes. Coincidentally his best friend in class will be separated to a different class next year.

Generally I am pleased with the progress he is making in school which show that I have made the right move to transfer him to MKG. The teachers have been doing great with the children as a whole and honestly the environment and learning approach is fantastic. Would have been better if the teachers progress with the class instead of changing new teachers every year. Sadly the school compound will be given up next year and MKG will be relocating to their new building next year. Well, good and bad. Certainly the vast play area, close to nature and greens compound will be greatly missed. On the other hand it is indeed exciting for the children to be moving into a brand new compound with all new facilities!

Thank you Ms. Yoges!

Desaru Part II

Am I too long winded or what, a 2D1N road trip to Desaru only require 2 posts!

 

It was still raining when we left the Ostrich farm which is pretty much a spoilsport but being year end weather, rainfall are more or less expected. As usual I am always the planner cum navigator in every trips, using plain gut feel and the hand drawn map, we went in search of the restaurant for our early dinner. I have put in quite abit of effort researching for this trip. Largely as food can be an issue here besides the ease of dining at the hotel which serve less than average food at sky high prices. There are a handful of seafood restaurants along the coast line in the town of Sungai Rengit which is about 30km south. It was not very difficult to locate the town and soon after we managed to find the restaurant we had plans to dine in. Upon reaching we were a little skeptical as even though it is early like 6pm, the only table occupied was probably another group of Singaporeans.

The owner was pretty pushy for us to order seafood like crabs and lobsters but with the 2 kids around we decide to give it a miss though we know that they are popular for seafood. Porridge of any form was not served so I had to feed meimei milk again. Post feed, she kept asking for rice and I was pleasantly surprised that she could munch on fish and rice very well. Food was not cheap but pretty worthwhile for the price and in decent portion. We were introduced by the lady owner a bakery down the road claiming to have delicious and freshly baked bread and pastries thus we went for a walk down after dinner and bought quite a lot of local pastries.

We hit the way back at around 8pm and was caught off-guard by the pitch dark route with not even a single lamppost in sight. The route was simple a 2 way carriage lanes with forest or plantations to the sides. It was a freaky scary drive back and I was so very glad that the kids have dozed off so we could concentrate on the road. I swear that would have to be the longest 30 minutes of my life! It did not helped that the car was fitted with white bulb thus the spectrum was no way near fantastic which make the drive more challenging. To top it off, the Malaysian cars are speeding in the dark and overtaking cars like nobody's business. I had to help look for conceal exit (side roads) and sharp bends to caution the hub. I practically breath in huge relief when we saw well lit roads once again.

 

We went back to the room to place our stuff before bringing the kids down to the playroom. A rather colourful playroom though with very limited toys but would suffice for the kids. After a good 20mins, we went for a walk exploring around the resort. The pool was dark and the beach beyond was even darker, all we heard was the waves and saw nothing else. The day ended with the kids sleeping away and it was a blessing that meimei is able to sleep by herself in the playpen without much fuss.

Day II ~

The children woke up at about 8am which start the day. Fed meimei milk and set off to have our breakfast. The spread was nothing to shout about, basically just enough to fill the tummy to kick start the day. Zethan was getting very restless and excited as we promised him the beach after breakfast.

It was quite a hot and sunny day so we had to find a spot with some shade lest the kids got sunburnt. Zethan enjoyed himself loads playing with the sand with some encouragement over the fuss he made over sand in the shoe thingy.

It's a totally different story for meimei, she looked weary of the sea, wave and sand, no tinge of excitement at all. Just like Zethan when he was much younger, meimei too reject the sand at all costs. And so she clung on to us like a koala the whole 30 minutes we are there. I had to be the spoilsport and cut short their fun time at the beach as we would have to freshen up and prepare to check out.

Since we have no time for the pool, I had to pacify Zethan with a soak in the bath tub. Meanwhile meimei drifted to sleep and I took the time to start packing while daddy bath Zethan. The whole bathing, packing affair tool about 2hrs but as meimei is still asleep, we had to request for late check out.

With daddy's suggestion, we act garang and bravely drove to Jusco Tebrau City only armed with a not very detailed map, ignoring the directions set out by the GPS. I was so pleased when we managed to find our way there and spent the whole day there. It was around 9pm in the night when we travel back to Singapore and I had to rely on my limited memory based on the last trip we made. Seriously I am so damn proud of myself for remembering the way back!

So with that, we ended our very first family road trip. It was a very good experience with the 'risks' we are braving and surviving it. Though short, I am sure everyone in the family had their fair share of fun in the different aspect of the trip. Declare the road trip successful!! It is do-able and looked forward to further road trips soon!