Xin Cuisine

Last Saturday, we didn't have our usual weekly dinner at Mother's place. WY went for a celebratory buffet dinner at his 文化艺术团 instead. And all the rest of us just had OTOT = Own Time Own Target.

We arranged, however, for a lunch gathering on Sunday. After a lot of calling (last minute booking is really tough - what to do, with my backache and terrible blocked nose + cough the week earlier, I haven't been feeling 'up to it' going about to make the reservation... sigh), we finally managed to book a table at Xin Cuisine located at the Holiday Inn Atrium. That is the old Glass Hotel.

Here's just a small deviation before we talked about our lunch. This is about The Glass Hotel.... This hotel has changed its name several times. It used to be called The Glass Hotel, then it became the Concorde Hotel and now, it is called the Holiday Inn Atrium.

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One day, during my varsity holidays (when R was still an army boy), I went alone to shop at CK Tang area. After some shopping and rather aimless walking around, I dropped by at the 4th floor foodcourt at Lucky Plaza to have lunch. This foodcourt was more for the Orchard Road workers type, and shared not a twinkle of the 'glamour' Orchard Road eateries are usually associated with.

As I sat there eating alone, a bespectacled Chinese-looking man in his 50's came by and asked to share the table. After I said ok, he sat down with his plate of cut fruits and started to eat. He kindly gestured and offered his fruits to me, which I politely declined.

Then somehow, this quite fatherly figure and I started a conversation and it turned out that he was a trader from Vietnam who was in Singapore on a business trip. So, I just casually (kaypoh, lah!) asked if he had been to those usual tourist attractions like the Zoo, BirdPark etc. To my surprise, he said he has been to almost all of these already on his previous trips.

Then, when I asked if he had been to Sentosa, he sat up instantly and asked, "那是什么地方？我倒没去过！" And so, being in the kaypoh mood I was in then, I told him about 50% of whatever I knew of Sentosa.

I guess I must have been quite an animated storyteller that afternoon; that Vietnamese man listened so attentively! After a while, I paused and suddenly realised - oops, maybe I had spoken too much? Afterall, this was a stranger, leh!

Then, to my shock, he asked if I could bring him to Sentosa!! Ha?! And I don't know what had gotten into me, I actually said, "OK!"!!!!! (Now that I think back, maybe I had been so foolish, hor! What if he had turned out to be a 'baddie'?! 我真不知天高地厚！)

But I was also smart - I told him that I would gather a few friends and then we could all go on the outing together! He actually said, "那很好啊！太好了！我真得很感谢你啊！那我们哪一天去呢？"

We eventually decided to make it a weekend trip after I called my friends. So he gave me his room number at The Glass Hotel and then we parted ways after we finished our respective foods.

Once I got home that day, I called up a good friend called 小燕　who agreed to get a partner to go too. Then I also got R to go with us after he booked out of camp for that weekend.

On the appointed day itself, 4 of us met up and picked that Vietnamese man up from The Glass Hotel. I remember that 小燕 and I had tugged at each other and whispered with relief that fortunately we had got the 2 guys with us, otherwise it might have been seen to be rather scandalous thing for us young ladies to be going up to a hotel room to meet that Vietnamese man, hor?! (Yah, we called him from the Reception when we got to The Glass Hotel but he said he was just about to be ready and invited us up to his room instead!)

Anyway, after all the introduction, we set off and spent several hours playing host and tour guide to this Vietnamese man, walking him through the various tourist attractions on Sentosa such as The Wax Museum and Fort Siloso. The Underwater World was not ready yet, though.

During our outing, 小燕, her partner, R and I took turns to chitchat with the Vietnamese man. We also brought him to the Rasa Sentosa food centre somewhere near the jetty and introduced to him our local Satay and Popiah. He paid for several of the items, I remember. We all had coconut juice, too, as we rested our feet and listened to him talk about his country a little.

I remember that sometime during the trip, all the others went to buy some ice-cream and I was left alone with this Vietnamese man. Then, interestingly, he said this to me, "你这个朋友 (meaning R, lah!)，既不抽烟，也不喝酒。完全没有不良的嗜好，真的很难得。是个好男生，你有眼光，要好好把握。你的朋友那位男生，就没得比。"

I was speechless for several minutes - er, what was I expected to say?!?!? Anyway, the 3 stooges returned shortly after that, so we continued our 'tour' till it was time to hop onto the ferry back to mainland. Then we parted ways with the Vietnamese man.

Needless to say, the Vietnamese man was very grateful and was full of thanks to the 4 of us. And he gave us his address in Vietnam, inviting us to visit him if we ever went there. (Ha?! I never thought of visiting Vietnam because I grew up thinking of Vietnam as nothing more than a war-torn country - very unsafe! Landmines everywhere, anytime will explode and make people lose their limbs!But of course, I didn't say this to him, lah!)

Well, it's been almost 2 decades now since this 萍水相逢 with this Vietnamese man. I wonder if he still comes to Singapore to trade or if he remembers us....

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And so, ok, our lunch was at Xin Cuisine. For most of us, this is a new restaurant. So we had no clue as to what its specialties were or how the food tasted. I only heard from a colleague that this was where our President Nathan loves to come with his family for some private dim-sum teatime every now and then.

R, WY, WF and I arrived the earliest. Then BK, YP, WS and WP came. We adults looked at the various menus presented and couldn't make up our mind at first. Then, I took the chance and placed the orders:

北京烧鸭、麦片虾、时菜拼盘、苏东坡肉加馒头、干炒面线、炸脆小鱼、小菜烧肉、烧卖、虾饺

Shortly afterwards, Father, Mother and CP arrived. Then we took a group photo before the food came. Somehow, the photo cannot be uploaded, leh.....??

Then, the food came s-l-o-w-l-y, dish by dish. Taste and presentation were generally ok, although for some dishes, the serving was rather small even though we had order the large portion. The mixed vegetable platter, in particular, was quite a letdown. (Mother later gave me a earful about it, "这个叫什么菜？！　都是一些看不起眼的罐头菜！这些罐头，我放在厨房里，连看都不看！有时放旧了都没人要，还得把它们丢掉！叫这种菜来做什么？！" )

Aiyah, like I said, this is our first visit so how would we know, right?!

Mother also criticised a lot about the Peking Duck - we had gotten the restaurant to have the duck cooked separately in another dish (instead of getting it chopped up for 'direct consumption'). She grumbled at me almost non-stop for this because she thinks we ought to have ordered to have the duck chopped. The dish which the duck meat was used for had other ingredients and so we had been 'cheated' of most of the duck meat!

She didn't even know that we had to pay an additional $10 for the duck to be cooked in another dish - to be eaten with leaves of fresh lettuce as wraps. Sigh.

Anyway, here are some of the photos.



R and I concluded: next time, go only Roland. That is probably Mother's benchmark restaurant.

WY's BD Parties

Nursery

When WY was in Nursery, he attended the PAP kindergarten which operated from the void deck of B121. We didn't have a choice of nursery schools then, because Mother would not agree to do any more than to walk him to school in the morning and to bring hom home on foot upon dismissal. No school bus, she had said, because he was too young for it.

It was a super-lousy school. Worn-out furniture in spartan room with peeling paint & no proper hand-towels; rowdy children & parents/caregivers who pushed around & had no qualms about blocking everyone else's path as they stood at the doorway to wait for their charges everyday; aunty-teachers who only shouted and shouted but couldn't speak properly (imagine, I heard the 'form teacher' read aloud to the children "My mother goes to the market to buy a apple."!!!!!!).

Whilst we were there, we celebrated WY's birthday with only packets of oreo cookies. Those 3-pcs-in-one-pack type. We bought about 30+ packs and arranged them standing in a cane basket. Then we bundled them together with a big red ribbon. And we placed a giant candle right in the centre of this 'cookie' cake-arrangement. (Actually, it looked quite pretty. It's a pity we didn't think of taking a photograph of it then.)

Our idea was, given the condition & environment of the classroom, it would have been wiser to just let each child bring home his/her packet of oreo cookies so that we can avoid 'messy-ness' which we would have had to deal with if we had brought a cake to the class. And true enough, it worked wonders!

That morning, I just brought the 'cookie' cake-arrangement to WY's class close to dismissal time. The excited children gathered round and sang the birthday song after I lighted the giant candle. Then they happily received their packet of oreos before going home. So neat and tidy, and the 'form teacher' was also happy that there was no mess! She was, of course, also happy to be given some extra packets of the oreos for her own kids, lah.

Apart from this single 'relatively good experience' at this PCF kindergarten, the one year that WY spent at this place was a total waste of time as far as proper education and learning was concerned. Fortunately, we moved out of this place the following year.

K1 & K2

WY joined the Magdalene's Kindergarten in K1. There were some transitional adjustments, of course, but by and large, he settled down relatively easily because this school had a much much better environment. And the people there were much more pleasant.

I remember that I was not so sure if this was a better place than the kindergarten organised by the Geylang Methodist Church next to the MRT station. So I took a half-day leave one afternoon and checked it out.

This kindergarten forms part of the Canossian Eduplex. Also located in the Eduplex are the Canossa Convent Primary School and the Canossian Children's Home. The kindergarten partners the Home for the Hearing Impaired and so some hearing-impaired children attend it, too.

When I arrived, lessons in the kindergarten had already ended and school had already been dismissed. So it was relatively quiet. Only the principal and 2 or 3 teachers were still around.

I spoke to the motherly-figure principal, who shared with me how the kindergarten emphasized moral education and inculcating the right values in the children. As she leisurely walked me around the school compound, I actually felt the 'homely-ness' of the place. I even heard some birds chirping away on the trees whose trunks and leaves were still wet from the rain that had just stopped..... Hmmm....

The classrooms were located in a long block, very much like our Bartley Primary School except that its toilets were in the centre of the long straight block and the general office was located close to the end of the block. (BPS had its toilets at the end and office right in the centre.)

Everyday, Mother would bring WY to the void deck to wait for the school bus at about 10+ in the morning. When the school bus reached the school gate, the teachers would meet the children and walk them to a sheltered asssembly area in the centre of the block. Then they would sing the National Anthem & recite the Pledge before going for lessons. At dismissal, the teachers would, once again, march the children out to the gate to board the waiting school bus. All very orderly and disciplined. And very safe.

But being the 'kiasi' mother as I am, I still took leave for the 1st 3 days of the new school term to 'oversee' WY's settling-in in the new environment. I boarded the school bus (luckily, it was the 20-seater type) with WY but I sat at the back, away from him. The little boy kept looking back to 'check' that I was still around. Fortunately, the bus driver and his wife assistant were very friendly and understanding.

Then, when we reached the school, the principal requested the 'new parents' to stay out of the children's sight. And so I did. I spent the next 3 hours loitering in the canteen of the Canossa Convent Primary School which was directly opposite the kindergarten. Every time I saw the teacher bring WY's class from one room to another (I think the children were treated to some video shows on the 1st 2 days), I would crane my neck and try to watch out for WY.

Sigh, it was no joke because as I did this, I had to take care not to be seen by WY even from afar! And the hard canteen bench without any back support was far from being comfortable to sit on, especially since I was expecting WF and this was my 1st trimester only!

For WY's birthday that year, we ordered an 'edible-lego' cake which looked like this. It caused a stir amongst the excited children when R and I brought it to the class. The 2kg cake was shared amongst WY's classmates and the staff. WY also gave out some simple goodie bags to his classmates. I still remember how shocked WY's K1 teacher was when she learnt that I was (still supposed to be) in confinement that day! Hahaaha.....

The following year, WY wanted to choose a birthday cake that could 'scare' his friends! So, when we went online to select acake, he asked for a Godzilla cake! (Something that looked like this, photo from confectionery not available anymore.) R and I almost fainted from shock!

Luckily, we managed to convince WY to change his choice to a more pleasant-looking dinosaur. So, the birthday cake which was eventually chosen for his K2 class and staff was this friendly-smiley T-Rex!

P1 & P2

We didn't hold any birthday party for WY when he was in P1. Reason was simple: it was a 'proper' school and we knew that it was not the practice to have any party during lesson hours. Even a straightforward cake-cutting and sharing session during recess would have been frowned upon as being too 'lavish' and a 'show-off' in the school.

So, when WY was in P1, we had only our usual celebration at home with the rest of the family.

In the course of the year, WY attended several birthday parties of his classmates. Most were at the classmates' homes. And all except one, had something like this on their invitation cards:

"Please feel free to bring your favourite Gameboy & Playstation & XBox cartridges etc.".


At first, we didn't realise what this meant. But after a while, we 'wised up'. This meant that there would be only one item on the programme of the 'party' and that would be Gameboy or Playstation or XBox playtime before the TV set!

So, during these 'parties', the kids would simply gather and sit amongst some chips and finger-food like nuggets or cocktail sausages and raced or 'fought' one another on the Xbox in front of the TV! And because there would be only a maximum of 2 'handsets' (I don't know if these are called handsets, but you know what I am referrring to), only 2 kids would play at any one time whilst the rest just sat and watched!

For those with their GB or Playstations, they would just sit at the edge of the sofa and bury their heads amongst their individual devices as their fingers went twitching busily here and there! Woah, man! I was so shocked to see this! There would be absolutely no communication or socialising whatsoever! Might as well stay at home to play these!

And even the adults (parents of the birthday boy/girl and their relatives) who were in the house would simply chit-chat amongst themselves, not bothering to even socialise or entertain the adult-guests one teeny-weeny bit! Are your shocked?! I was!!

After a few such 'parties', we stopped saying yes to invitations which had the "Please feel free to bring along your favourite Gameboy or Playstation or XBox cartridges." type of messages.

Initially, I was concerned if WY would feel 'left out' because we didn't think such 'parties' were meaningful. So, one day, I asked him. His firmer-than-I-expected reply was, "No, lah. So boring to sit there and watch only. Whatever for? Anyway, my friends don't get to talk or even joke with one another when they play. Also, they are not even interested to cut their birthday cakes!"

So, I guess it's ok for us to just decline such invites anyway.

When WY was in P2, the same trend continued. So we didn't go to any of such birthday 'parties' that year. Instead, we attended those parties which were organised by fastfood caterers like McDonald's. Yes, it may well be that these served 'junk food', but there were at least the party games to look forward to. There was some 'fun' to look forward to.

Most of such parties were held in the condo clubhouses of the classmates' homes. Some of the hosts also arranged for the children to swim at their pools before the party began.

That year, sometime in June, we decided to place a booking for a McDonald's party for WY's birthday. Since we don't have a clubhouse, the McDonald's restaurant at Kallang became the natural choice of venue. And it was convenient, too, because most of his classmates stay near the school and this outlet.

The McDonald's staff was very seasoned organisers. Almost everything was taken care of: the decoration, the food, the music, the games, the cake and even some goodie bags for the Birthday Boy and his Guests! Not bad a deal, if you ask me, for the convenience and the hassle-free (no need for us to clean up, either!) 2-hour session! We only had to get some goodie bags ready for the children.

WY had great fun with his friends at the McDonald's party. They played game after game and talked a lot while helping themselves to their preferred set meals (yes, everyone could choose their preferred food from amongst a selected list).



All went well that day until a boy who had arrived late, took out his GB from his bag! And then, the other boys who were at first playing the games organised by the McDonald's staff, became distracted and started to gather around that boy to try to peer into his gadget as he played his gadget, right in the middle of the party!

I was rather upset at this, and I cannot remember the details now, but I think either CP or myself told the boy to keep his toy away in case it fell and got spoilt. Only then did everything become 'normal' again.

P3

When WY was in P3, we decided that it would be too childish to have another party organised by a fastfood caterer (WY had sugested KFC this time!). So after some thinking, R and I decided that we would try to organise a party at the indoor playground called Kids' Adventure at SAFRA Toa Payoh.

R and I discussed a lot about the Kids Adventure that year. Having been to a similar one in Switzerland (which was called Starbie) which HA brought us to, we had felt that it was a good alternative to the fastfood parties. There, the children could have a good physical workout + scream-out etc before they clean up and have their food. All under one roof, too, so it would be weather-proof!

But alas, due to my own neglect and bad habit of procastinating, I did not place a booking early enough. By the time I wanted to make a reservation, all suitable timeslots had been taken up. Sigh.

I 'comforted' WY and told him the truth - that it was really my fault that we couldn't book the Kids' Adventure for the party that year. And WY 'comforted' me and told me that it was ok.

We did have a celebration at CH School, though, very much like WF's birthday party in CH School. I remember WY chose a 'construction worksite' birthday cake from Prima Deli for this celebration. We still keep the toy construction trucks that came on the cake.

P4

So, for WY's birthday this year, I decided to plan and act early. In fact, planning started from some time after CNY. I went about asking colleagues for ideas and browsed around a lot (magazines + internet) to check out possible options. And I found out quite a fair bit.

Many options were available; we could have clay-pottery sessions, baking sessions, art & craft sessions and so on. Some organisers had their own locations to offer as venue for the party while others needed me to source for my own venue.

The 'packages' offered were wide-ranging and a little mind-boggling, too. But most importantly, however, most of these were too costly.

So, I decided to look further.

One day, an idea came to my mind. There is a Gallery at my office which is open free of charge to the public. And the information and materials there are educational and quite interesting. So why not bring the guests here, right?!

Besides, my PR colleagues who are in charge of this place are trying to attract more visitors to this Gallery and to market it to as many people as possible. So wouldn't this be a great idea?! The more I thought about it, the more confident and convinced I became - that this was where we would have the party this year.

I shared my idea with my colleague N, who agreed excitedly, "Yes, great idea!" And so, that's how the idea for the Big Project was born.

There is a cafe located in my office building. It would naturally be the place where we would have our food. And so, after some negotiating and haggling (actually, not much haggling, lah), the menu was decided:

Olive Rice, Hokkien Mee, Indonesian Vegetables Curry, Deep Fried Chicken, Cereal Fish, Fish Balls, Deep Fried Yam Cake, Almond Jelly with Fruit Cocktail and Fruit Punch

Together with my PR colleague called Asmah, the programme was also arranged:

Arrival ** Video Screening ** super-brief Briefing ** Light and Sound Show ** Questionaire Quiz ** Gurmit Singh's Know Your Singapore Quiz ** Buffet Tea at Cafe

With the blessing of her supervisors (whom I also spoke to about my plan to bring visitors to the Gallery - see the importance of networking!), Asmah also arranged for some souvenirs to be 'awarded' to the guests who successfully completed the Questionaire Quiz!

WY's form teacher also helped me to collate the RSVP list.

The day before the party, my colleague N got help to have some balloons inflated. Then she and I spent about 20 minutes in the late afternoon putting these balloons at the part of the cafe which had been reserved for our exclusive use during our function. N also helped to curl some multi-colour ribbons to complement these balloons! Hahaha...

On 1 September 2007, WY went for his early morning Chinese tuition class as usual. When he was done, R together with WF, drove him here to join his friends. The programme was scheduled to start at 1:30pm.

In the meantime, CP and I arrived early to see to the arrangements at the cafe. We carried the goodie bags which WY had helped to pack earlier, to the cafe. YP had declined to join us or let WS and WP join WY because to do so, they would have had to rush all the way from their home area to downtown after their enrichment classes ended at about 1pm or so.

For what we did at the Gallery & the party, these photos would tell it all (well, almost all). Enjoy!

(Aiyah, in the excitement, I forgot to take a photograph of the musical-notes cake before having it cut!)

10 Years Now

It's true. Time flies.

In a blink of an eye, a decade has already passed since the day R and I took our 'delivery bag' and checked into NUH as scheduled by Prof Anandakumar. I remember it was a Monday and Father had sent us there in his taxi.

This is a photo of Prof when he was younger which I got from the web by chance. A very funny joker. This photo actually doesn't do justice to him - he actually looks more handsome in person. But we'll just make do with it for this posting, lah.

Actually, I wasn't really so keen to go because somehow I had gotten used to carrying the 'extra' big tummy around. And I had also gotten used to the little 'pamperings' such as not being expected to do major housework or chores at home. In the office, colleagues had also regularly offered to buy lunch back for me. And when I took the MRT train, other passengers actually gave up their seats to me!

More importantly, I didn't want the then leisurely pace of everything to change. I didn't look forward to being in a rush all the time. I had read that once the baby was out, there would be no day or night - everything would be just endless cycles of nappy-changing, feeding, washing, more nappy-changing, more feeding and more washing etc. All in a hurry, with hardly any breathing space. Someone even told me that once the baby was out, our world would revolve around only the baby and nothing else. I wasn't sure if I wanted all that.

And yet, at the same time, I couldn't wait to hold the little one in my hands. It was fun feeling his kicks and 'boxing around' in the tummy, but I also wanted to feel the softness and smoothness of his tender baby skin. I imagined how he would smile to us as we massaged him and how he would chuckle as we tickled him. Hmm...

And so, it was with 'mixed feelings' that I strolled with R from the taxi drop-off at the old NUH block to its Admissions Office on Monday morning. At almost every turn of the corridor (NUH has many of these turns which made its corridors and lobbies rather confusing), I had to resist the temptation to just turn and go back home. I think if R had not been with me, I might have just done that.

When we finally arrived at the Admisssions Office, the very friendly Admissions staff checked the register and told us that the single room which we had asked for was not available. In fact, all single rooms and even all 2-bedders were occupied!

"So, we go home first, lah!" I said happily to R and got ready to move off. The shocked staff stopped us, of course, and told us that they would reserve for us the very first single-room available, explaining that its usual check-out time was 12 noon (just like hotel) and so they would know only later if a room becomes vacated. In the meantime, I had to contend with the C-class bed which they allocated to me 'temporarily'. Huh?!!!!

Anyway, as if to pacify the obviously-upset me, we were ushered to the delivery suite and we stayed there for a whole day. It was no joke, I spent the whole day waiting in the suite on an empty stomach! It was such a torture. Really, really terrible torture!

Father and Mother dropped by at about 8pm. Actually, no visitors were allowed in the delivery suite but Mother knew this particular amah who worked there. So she was 'secretly' ushered to my bed, hahaha! Mother, too, was surprised that there had been no action whatsoever. So after a while, she and Father left for home first.

Finally, by 9pm, everybody gave up and decided that I should just go and sleep before 'resuming' work (aka labour) next morning. By then, I was so famished that I think the staff nurse took pity on me. She helped to arrange for a set of dinner to be brought up to me even though it was way past dinner time.

And that was my first taste of hospital food. The food tasted quite good (maybe because I had been starved for the whole day!) but I didn't like the smell and feel of the cutlery. And eating from the tray didn't make me feel very good either.

Luckily, by then, a single room had been vacated and so we settled down in the big and airy room. The room was much bigger than this one in the picture. R bunked in, too, in this spacious room which was almost the size of our living room & dining room added together. The size of its attached bathroom & toilet was about half of our kitchen! Wow!

I slept well. I think R didn't because he had very bad blocked nose.

The next day, I was awoken at about 7am by the housekeeping staff. Aiyah, when I told them I wanted to sleep some more, they explained that the doctors would be expecting me back in the delivery suite (ha, again?!) by 9am. So, I took a quick shower and then was off to the delivery suite again. Sigh. I was not allowed to take any breakfast. Double sigh.

This time, the doctor checked and decided that there was sufficient progress to break the waterbag. And so, with that little prick, all the action started and there was no return so to speak.

I remember that the morning was quite easy. In fact, I almost didn't feel any pain which was almost always so dramatically portrayed in the movies. R was still taking it very easy and even bought a copy of newspapers and a copy of Readers Digest to enjoy.

By noon, however, the contractions had intensified and it started to feel rather uncomfortable. The nurses had urged R to go have lunch first, but R declined. By the time R wanted to go, I 'refused to let him go'. I just wanted someone with me.

And so, the waves of pain came and went. I was very brave, didn't scream at all though I frowned and squirmed a lot. At one point, I felt so chilly that R started to frantically ask for a blanket. I think I must have looked very swful then.

Then I became so exhausted that I actually fell asleep. The staff nurse actually 'praised' me and said it was good that I could rest by sleeping in between labour pains! Hahaha!!

Throughout the process, I bore with the intensifying pain and rejected the staff nurses' repeated suggestions for epidurals to be administered. "No, I don't want," I insisted. Even when Prof Ananada came, he told me not to try to 'act hero' but I told him straight that if my sister could do, so could I! Yah, I was really inspired by YP - she also didn't use epidural when delivering WS, I thought, so it should be achievable, mah! Anyway, I didn't want any of those notorious associated backaches or nausea side effects of epidural. 先苦后甘，我能忍！

There came a point, however, when I gave in and agreed sheepingly to someone's suggestion to have the epidural. So they hurriedly sent for the anaesthetist who after getting me to hastily sign the consent form (how to think properly whilst writhing in such agonising pain?!), started working on my back.

Ouch! Ouch!! Ouch!!! The anaesthetist tried very hard to insert the needle into the spinal chord cavity but somehow, failed to locate a suitable spot even after 3 tries! Of course I screamed and yelled! I think he also became scared. After a while, he paused and agreed that he should not make any further attempts. This Indian man doctor apologised profusely because he couldn't understand why he had not been able to locate the spot.

*sob* *sob* *sob* .... so, I endured all those poking in the back for nothing except to confirm that I should not go for epidural! Later the nurses told me that this anaesthetist was the most experienced and best they had, and he had never had such an encounter!

On hindsight, I am glad that I didn't go through with the epidural. Some colleagues suspect that the backaches which they seem to get more easily even years after their deliveries were because of their epidurals.

I think some higher divine powers must have decided that I should give the epidural a miss. I am convinced of this because even the detailed x-ray scans which Prof Ananda later sent me for, showed nothing abnormal; no curved spine whatever. No medical explanation for not having been able to administer the epidural.

Anyway, all the labour continued until the little one finally came out in a big, hot gush at the end of the 9-hour 'labour'..... phew!................

I remember that even without my glasses, I could see that Little WY has R's looks. He was very cute, all wrinkled and 'slimy'. And very 'red', too. Then, without warning, he suddenly let off a steady upright stream of urine at the nurse who had placed him in the warmer next to me! Hahaha!

After that, R went off with Little WY for his bath somewhere outside. Bearing in mind my colleague's earlier instructions (that he must at all times be with Little WY in case the nurses get Little WY mixed up with some other baby), R kept Little WY constantly within sight. Or so I think.

By the time they returned, I had already received a good wipe-down by a friendly and cheerful amah who kept congratulating me, telling me that Little WY was almost 4kg although he didn't look this heavy! Hahaha...

When they let me hold Little WY, it felt so good cuddling him. Totally indescribable.........................................

Father, Mother and CP came that evening. Then the following afternoon, YP and BK visited during their lunch break. I still remember that YP ended up having to clean up Little WY because he had passed some motion when she visited!

YP was expecting WP then. And whilst she was with us, my colleagues came. Later, they told me that when they first arrived at NUH, they saw YP on the corridor and had mistaken her for me. So they all had wondered amongst themselves why 'I' was up and about and 'still 100% pregnant'?! Hahahha....

AhYee and Uncle Frankie came, too, for a brief visit. They both carried Little WY. AhYee was so at ease carrying Little WY; I think that was probably because she had been babysitting children for some time.

Our 2-day stay in NUH that followed was not exactly enjoyable. Firstly, there was the physical discomfort. Then there was this night-shift staff nurse who was less than helpful when I asked for the bed-pan. She had insisted that I went to the toilet myself in the middle of the night because 'more than 6 hours had passed' since my delivery! Woah lao, man! I almost yelled at her!

Then there was the anxiety to try to start breastfeeding Little WY. As a first-time mother, I was naturally clumsy and fumbled a lot trying to let Little WY latch on. This little fellow had seemed to be perpetually hungry and would suckle away so ferociously that I felt pain! Ah!!!!

Then there was also Mother (and Father) who kept insisting that Little WY was crying because he was hungry and so I should let him have formula milk etc etc. Aiyoh, I felt so helpless and so confused by all those well-meaning advice.

It was absolutely overwhelming... and I started to become teary a bit. That's when everybody got a little worried, and eased off the unintended pressure a little.

Both Father and Mother came to fetch R, Little WY and myself home on our discharge. I remember that the air smelt different and it felt like I had been away for a long, long time.

Being home was good but not easy. R and I thought that we had been well-prepared to receive Little WY but the truth was that when we returned with him, nothing seemed to be in place! We had planned to breastfeed Little WY full-time, and so we hadn't gotten any milk bottles ready. Neither did we prepare any formula milk powder. Nor was there any pot for sterilising the milk bottles. Nor any tongs for picking the boiled bottles out after they had been sterilised.

So as I tried to settle down with Little WY, R dashed out to get all those provisions. I remember looking out from our kitchen window (Blk 47 then) and spotting R marching on the pavement with his hands full of so many bags of provisions and with a mattress slinged over his shoulders. So poor thing.

R was my defacto confinement maid. He did the washing and all the chores. Mother cooked for us and during the day, arranged for YP's maid to bring the tingkat over to our place. In the evening, either Mother or CP would come over with dinner.

My job was mostly only to rest and deal with Little WY. But I didn't do a very good job. Not only did I end up with sore nipples because breastfeeding wasn't 'properly done', I also caused Little WY's buttocks to become red and painful because I had been too diligent cleaning his buttocks when changing his diapers! I felt especially awful and 'useless' when Mother and R had to bring the poor crying Little WY to the paediatrician when he was barely 2 weeks old because of this.

It was a tough time for confinement for us because we had to keep our windows shut all day long due to the worsening haze then. At one point, the PSI exceeded the 'normal' range. We had to rely on our poor LG airconditioner to keep the pungent smoky-ness out.

I remember that initially, R and I diligently kept a log of what time Little WY had been fed, how much he had drunk, what time he had pooed and passed urine etc etc. After a few days, we gave up and just went by instinct. Too much theory or recording doesn't help.

R took a good 3-week break from office work to stay home with me. This is not very common, especially in 'those days' because there wasn't even the 3-day paternal leave new fathers nowdays enjoy. The massage-lady kept telling me that she was very impressed with R's 'sacrifice'.

On the 1st day that R returned to office (and I was left with Little WY alone during the day), I was a little apprehensive. I kept hoping that the day would go by as quickly as possible, and that R and Mother or CP would be back quickly. Fortunately, apart from being a big-eater and getting hungry very easily, Little WY was a relatively 'easy' baby.

WY's One-Month Celebration was a big affair. A total of 1000 AngNgees (aka 'pointed AngKuKueh') were ordered and delivered and distributed (mainly to colleagues who had loaded us with tonnes of good wishes and generous angpows). Mother also helped to prepare 600 red eggs and 6 big trays of glutinous rice. She also ordered several roast chickens for AhYee and some 'relatives' who didn't visit or even ask after us.

The 满月gifts which we had to bring to my office for distribution was such a mountainous load that my colleagues had to go to meet us at the carpark with the office goods trolley! It was incredible..... My colleague N thinks that even today, I still hold the 'record' for the amount of 满月 gifts distributed for colleagues in our office. Hahahha...

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Last Saturday, we didn't have to get my colleagues to get the trolley to the carpark. Instead, CP and I brought the goodies to the cafeteria at my office.

There weren't any red eggs or AngNgees, but food was aplenty nevertheless.

Check out the next post for an account of what fun we had and what we celebrated.

Term Break

No, no, no. I am not talking about the school's term break although yes, school's out for this week.

What I am saying is, Mother is On Holiday! This is her term break!!

She has flown to China (Macau & Shenzhen++) early morning on Saturday, and won't be back till midnight on Friday. Considering her previous holidays, this is a relatively short break.

So, this week I will try to use up the supply of chicken + minced pork + fish which Mother has helped to stock my freezer with. But I figure that this is going to be tough since we hardly arrive at home before 7pm these days. Sigh. Maybe I will buy dinner back on some days.

Anyway, WY will be going on a Student Leaders' Camp from Tuesday to Wednesday. This will be his first stay-over camp.

The programme comprises a visit to a secondary school and having some activities hosted by student councillors there, an overnight stay in KHS and then some further 'leadership training' sessions before dismissal at noon on Wednesday.

Like all good old-fashioned parents, we helped him to do the packing of the camping bag last night.

It was a rather exasperating experience because WY kept selecting the 'best' of his stuff to bring to the camp: the whitest and newest t-shirts, the thickest bath towel (because he thinks that the towel will need to last him 2 days), the brightest of the torches we have at home (with a halogen bulb) etc. Sigh.

I had to keep explaining how things might get lost or damaged or dirtied etc during the camp, so it isn't wise to bring the best of everything. WY gave me that kind of 'are-you-sure-things-get-lost-easily?' incredulous look. Well, R said WY will probably need to experience it himself to be totally convinced.

I hope everything turns out ok for the camp, and WY gets to learn to take care of himself. It's hard to let go (ya lah, many people say I must learn to let go...) but somehow, nothing is more true than the saying: 在父母的眼里，孩子永远是还没长大的。 Sigh.

R will also be entertaining some Japanese counterparts on Tuesday & Wednesday nights. So dinner will be only for WF and myself. Maybe I can just give him some biscuits and ice-cream, I am sure he will love that!! (Ok, this is a joke only. Not very funny, lah.)

CP will be on course on some days of the week, so she will be home in the evenings. Perhaps it will be easier for me to cook something on those evenings when more persons are home for dinner. Or, maybe for a change, we can all go out for dinner on a weekday, too?

I cannot really do any 'proper' thinking now because I am just recovering from the chain of Big Projects that just concluded last Saturday. Will try to sort things out and write about them shortly.