(image from womenonthefence.com)
Sorry I’ve gone off the blogosphere radar for quite a while.
Since I got back from my 30-day Alice-In-Wonderland-adventure last month, I had to clear a lot of backlog in the office that included 500+ emails to read, answer, sort out and act upon.
The new schoolyear just started as well (it starts in January in Malaysia, unlike in the Philippines, where it starts in June), which entailed last-minute mad dashes to buy school supplies, uniforms, and books. For all 5 kids! Because the twins are in formal Prep class this year. Thankfully, their stint in playschool made the transition surprisingly easy. They’re enjoying the more structured classes and the more challenging activities. For now they’re both in the same class but their class teacher has informed me that they might have to be placed in separate classes because she has difficulty telling them apart ;)
And whaddya know? MyEldest starts Secondary School this year. He just turned 11 last August and it all sounds so surreal. Before I know it, he’ll be off to university! *gulp*
OnlyGirl is in Primary 6, which means she’ll be sitting for UPSR (Ujian Penilaian Sekolah Rendah = Primary School Assessment Exams) this year. And as any parent with school-going children knows, whenever exam time comes, it’s usually the parent who gets more stressed than the child does.
The good news is: I’m going to Bali tomorrow. The not-so-good news is: it’s a business trip that involves meetings that will stretch for hours.
And Bali’s just the beginning this year. I’ve got 3 more trips scheduled within the next 3 weeks — three separate short trips to Jakarta, Jogjakarta, and Banjarmasin.
Somehow I get the feeling that my blog posts may be few and far between for the first 3 months of 2010…
Tags: blogging
Just a speck of dust in the universe
The past 30 days have left me forever altered. It was a journey of critical self-discovery, intensive soul-searching, and finding THE most blissful serenity and meaning in a place which acutely reminded me of my insignificance (as the tiniest speck of dust in the universe) and my significance (for having been invited as a guest). My limits were stretched beyond imagination — physical, emotional, psychological — and I was astonished to have found a different kind of strength which I didn’t know I possessed.
It was most heart-wrenching to leave. I may be physically back in KL but I am certain, beyond any doubt, that I left my heart behind…
Tags: Travel
This blog is on hiatus from the 20th of November until the 21st of December, 2009. In the meantime, feel free to look around and explore the 379 posts in this site.
Do you like travel posts with lots of pics? Here are a few suggestions:-
Mt. Bromo: One of the World’s Most Ethereal Landscapes
Seeing Jakarta For The First Time
An Omani Wedding
Keukenhof: The Most Photographed Place in the World
Popping In On The Penguins In Capetown
I also have travel-related posts that don’t have that many pictures but are still worth reading:-
Mini-Tour of A Plane’s Lavatory
Language: The Hidden Danger of Travel
Paris On A Budget
Immigration Encounters
CitizenM Hotel, Amsterdam: Quirky, Trendy, One-Of-A-Kind
Or maybe you like photographs. Let me share with you some of my favourites:-
Sunset at Kamala Beach, Phuket
Light From Heaven
Bird In A Nest
Drive-By Shooting
Sunsets
Perhaps you’re a working mum like me, in need of parenting tips and quick-and-easy recipes. I’ve got something for you, as well:-
How to Survive Air Travel with Infants & Small Children
Tips on Boosting Your Child’s Intelligence
Instilling the Love of Books In Your Child
How I Juggle A Career & Motherhood
Working Mum’s Recipes
You wanna know more about Malaysian culture? Here’s an interesting mini-series on Malay weddings:-
Part 1: Meminang
Part 2: Hantaran
Part 3: The Venue
Part 4: Akad Nikah
If you’re looking for something a bit more specific, type in the keywords inside the search box on the upper right hand corner of this site. Yeah, that one! The one marked ‘Search’, with the magnifying glass beside it.
Ta-ta for now! :)
Tags: away
(Click on photo to see the larger version)
Photo taken at Boulders Beach, Simon’s Town, South Africa, where the penguins roam freely within close proximity to humans.
Tags: quotation
ABC (image from zattoo.com)
If there is a real-life version of comicbook superheroes, that would be us, working mothers. We are significant members of the workforce by day, wives/cooks/caregivers/housekeepers at night, chauffeurs/chefs on weekends. We may be overworked and often under-appreciated, but once we achieve that delicate balance between career and motherhood, we wouldn’t have it any other way.
I’ve written this out of fun, as a tribute to us, working mothers, so please take this with a grain of salt or two.
Inspired by the working mum’s ABC, written for TIME Magazine by Allison Pearson, author of bestselling novel “I Don’t Know How She Does It”, I’ve come up with my own version of the working mother’s ABC:-
Annual Leave – a company benefit that you can never get enough of; comes in handy for school plays, PTA meetings, and frantic calls from your child’s teacher to pick him/her up due to fever/fall/every-imaginable-emergency-known-to-mothers
Bag – pre-baby: an article of fashion; post-baby: a portable dumping ground of toys, diapers, pacifiers, wet wipes, crayons, candy wrappers and half-eaten food
Chocolate – sanity saver extraordinaire
Desserts – “stressed” spelled backwards; best example: please refer to letter ‘C’
Energy – a valuable resource that you need more of, which your children never seem to run out of
Free time – what’s that?
Guilt – it never gets any easier!
Heels – the portion of one’s footwear whose height is inversely proportional to the number of children that you have
Ice Cream – a confectionery item that’s capable of fixing the biggest tantrums and the worst boo-boos
Just Do It – an-oft repeated phrase that can be used interchangeably with “Because I said so…”
Kiss – the smallest gesture from your child that often has a memory-erasing effect on all the naughty things that your child did that day
Love – so unconditional, so unexpected, so much more than all you’ve ever known, much much better than what you’ve expected, that when lavished upon you by your children, you begin to wonder what you’ve done in life to deserve it
Mama – sweetest word in the whole wide world, but can turn quickly into the most annoying sound in the world if uttered in a whiny, demanding voice
No – a word I vowed to use very sparingly with my children but ended up using some 318,673 times (and counting…) since my first child was born
Overtime – a word that strikes fear in the heart of working mothers who rely on daycare centres
Patience – the virtue that every working mother prays for every single hour of every single day
Quickly – the one word that children don’t seem to comprehend just when you need it the most
Rest and relaxation areas – oases in long road trips with the children
Sleep – what mothers miss the most once the babies start coming, one after another
Takeout/Takeaway – also known as ‘lifesaver’, especially after a day filled with endless meetings at the office
Undo – a computer feature that you wish is applicable to everything in life, especially after your toddler spills some chocolate syrup on the carpet
Vacation – all-time #1 item in every working mother’s wish list
Work – “I ♥ my job, I ♥ my job, I ♥ my job. I need the $$$”
Xylophone – it looked good in the toy shop but as soon as you get home, and the kids start banging on it, you wish you never bought it.
Yell – involuntary act often brought about by a combination of deadlines at the office, a huge pile of laundry at home, and a thousand-and-one other minute details
Zombie-like – the state that mothers show up in at work after an all-nighter with a sick child
Tags: working mom, working mother
