Big waves coming!

Yes, the big waves are coming my way, and I'm happy and at the same time so kan-cheong going through the waves.

It's coming to year end and there's so many things to do out of the sudden. I have to help manage the current freelance project which I'm doing while managing my own personal consultancy business. While doing these, I'm assisting in the planning of my sis' wedding in December. Our new house has just finished renovation and now there's the painting, the cleaning, the buying of items for the house, moving and then there's my brother's open house.

Gosh, the feeling is so overwhelming... and surprisingly, I'm kinda enjoying it. Over and above all these, there's other family matters we're attending to as well.

I feared having to go through a calm period, like a radarless boat, wanting some action but couldn't move. Now, the waves are coming and I know I wanted this... It's a tough journey having to see to so many things at one time... but at least I'm doing it happily now without any feeling of stress, except for the occasional screaming at the kids....

Eryn's bags

Eryn simply loves bags. Big bag, small bag, cloth bag, paper bag and even plastic bag! I’ll always not let her get hold of any plastic bags in sight though as it’s a dangerous thing to do. I also forbid her from touching my handbags and my wallet, though she’ll try to peep into my handbag to see what’s inside. If she can get hold of my wallet or DH’s wallet, she’ll carefully open it and see what’s inside.


After work, Eryn likes spending her time scribbling on paper, cuddle up to me when I’m watching TV, riding on her little car, playing masak-masak, dancing and singing or holding all sort of bags in both hands, on both shoulders, and putting them in her little car.

She used to love taking bags out whenever we go out, but now we try to avoid that, after losing one nice little bag.
Her favourite bag will definitely have to be the little doggy bag specially bought from U.S. for Eryn, as seen in the picture here. It was a gift from one of DH’s aunt. This tiny doggy bag is made of clothe and wool and when you press its nose, it’ll make a cute little sound. Her other favourite is one small knapsack which is not seen in the picture here.
Recently, I’ve been trying to get rid of my light brown TOD’s bag (it’s an ORIGINAL fake. Hehe) which used to be my favourite. I left it on the floor by the door, waiting to be given away. Eryn saw it and loved it so much and said “this is Eryn’s big, big bag… It’s so cute seeing her being a makcik carrying all her bags around.


She just loves stuffing things into the bag as well – not just her tiny toys, but my name cards, tissue papers, hankerchief, bits of papers she’s scribbled on, pen, etc. When I can’t find something, I first thing I head for is her bags!! As seen in the picture on the right here, there’s her balls, little watering can, hankerchief, paper, etc.
That’s Eryn and her bags.

My little sister

My little sister is getting married! She's my one and only sister and now she has grown up.

I am one of those people who used to see and think that my little sister is still my little sister. To me, she's that little girl, who is just simply naive and has more to learn. I refuse to give-in to the fact that she's a grown up adult until now.

My sister is my best friend as well. We share some funny moments together and share many things as well. She's very calm and patient and has great personality who always thinks of her family and friends.

As a baby, she was very weak and was warded to the ICU ward. There wasn't much hope for my parents at that time until a few days later when a miracle happened. Anyway, that is a story for another day.

She was always the baby of the family and in school she always did the best to catch up in everything. It was a big surprise to us when she wanted to take her Masters in Economics and passed with flying colours, being in the 2nd place in the whole of her university, losing only to a lecturer. She presented her case in front of many deans and lecturers from Malaysia, Asia and NZ and was also offered a partial scholarship from a Australian dean.

Though having a Masters in her hands, she is never one who shows off and willingly starts from the bottom in any company that she works for. Her desire is still to become a teacher in the secondary school. She is very humble and definitely is a big blessing to the husband she's going to marry.

I'm happy on the day I found out about her up-coming wedding in December that I cannot sleep. It's like how a mother would be excited for her daughter who is getting married.

Much love to my little sister...

8 random facts about my mum

Got tagged by Wen and it made me thought a lot about my mum.

These are some of the things I can immediately think now of as I write about my mum.

1) My mum is 58 years old. She was born in the Chinese lunar year of the cow and she is a Taurus. This simply shows in her as she is a very hardworking woman and is never one who laze around doing nothing as she will also make sure she has things to do. Of course, she enjoys her short afternoon nap as a treat.

2) My mum helped me to take care of Brendan and she’s the best mum you can have. She makes a better mum than me in caring for Brendan. She’s always on her toes, and always ensure that Brendan eats his breakfast, lunch and dinner. They must be healthy, home-cooked food too.

3) My mum is not well educated, but she does lots of self-improvement and she reads lots of books to improve her knowledge and her grammars. She knows many things about herbs and plants and all health-related issues. In her past 20 odd years, she has taken a liking to cut out interesting newspaper articles on health, diseases, personal improvement, up to BGR, motivating stories, and many more. She’ll paste them on her scrap and there’s lots of them at home. In one of the scrap book, she wrote a short letter to us, her children, to teach us some of the important things in life, should she die early one day.

4) She loves going for her daily, very early morning walk to breathe in fresh air and to improve blood circulation. I’ve join her in her walks and for a person her size and age, she can walk very fast and very far. Walking is her favourite exercise. She also like learning about massage, acupressure points and accupuncture.

5) My mum mingles around easily with people. Before I had kids, I didn’t know many of my neighbours around the current place where I am staying. After I had Brendan, she helped babysit Brendan in KL for a while and during her stay here, I joined in her quest to know my neighbours. She’ll tell me that my right neighbour is good in sewing curtains and the auntie downstairs is a confinement lady and another auntie in the other block was bullied by her hubby and she’s all alone. They love chatting with my mum too.

6) My mum comes from a big family of 13 children. She’s the 7th child in the family of 8 girls and 5 boys. Being in such a big family means that the older children have to work while the ones in the middle will have to take care of the younger children as her parents comes from China and work daily in their own bread and biscuit factory from morning to night. Hardship was written on all their faces then, during the Japanese Occupation. They stayed in a big kampong house in the outskirt surrounded by rubber trees, plants, domestic animals as well as wild animals like monkey, squirrels, owls, etc.

7) Coming from a poor family also means that they survive of their own plot of vegetable and fruit plantation, as well as rearing lots of chicken and ducks and pigs to feed 15 in the family the factory workers. She used to help cook and go to the swamp to collect earth worms with her bare hands to bring it back to feed the pigs. Whenever she thinks of this now, she’ll squirm and not touch any worm. She also couldn’t imagine doing then in her younger days.

8) My mum was a very good runner in the school days. She was so good in sports that the teachers used to pick on her to represent the various sports categories in school. But having to work after/before school, cook and taking care of her younger siblings means that there is no such thing as going through sports practice for her. She’ll just turn up on sports day and run for her life.

I could going on writing more things about my mum but I guess the above 8 items are good enough.

Gifts from India

Sometime late last year, I got to know a friend through work and he comes from India. He is a very bright and smart man, having a few businesses in India and could be quite an influential person in the industry that he worked in.
He had a certain interest in wanting to guide me in my career and always gives me encouragement to do the things I like to do. He has a certain fondness in me as a very good friend, not in that relationship sense but he seems to have some connection with me. It was very scary for me to hear that at first, but gradually I came to know that he has helped many people achieved their own career in some ways or another.

He’s around 60+ of age and is quite a health-conscious person. He’s extremely knowledgeable and is very persistent in the things that he wants to do. He has a lovely wife and his son recently got married to a very beautiful woman India whom I think is a Bollywood actress. He lives in a big mansion and is very down-to-earth. He wears branded clothes and all but is never one who shows off.
He’s like a mentor to me and is like a guidance to me. He can be quite pushy in getting things done, but it is this determination that rose him up to where he is now.

He will also call me occasionally to ask about me and my family and about the friends that we both know in Malaysia. He’ll sometimes just send me an sms to wish me a beautiful day, to tell me about the festivals going on there, to send greetings on festive seasons as well as on friendship day or just to tell me of his latest experience in securing a business alliance.

In his recent trip to Malaysia 2 months back, he presented me with a very lovely cream-coloured Pashmina shawl and 2 very beautiful traditional Indian attire for my two children. The attires are still a few sizes too big at the moment. He bought a nice cream-coloured costume which looks like a Khurta / Sherwani with a shawl for Brendan and for Eryn, an elegant, traditional red Chaniya-Choli dress with an eye-catching design.

I introduced him to one local university here where he managed to secure a business partnership for a few years contract. The local university will set up a few branches in India and my dear friend will be overlooking in building the business and in strengthening the Malaysia-India bond. He had wanted me to be the Malaysia partner in working in such alliance with him – be it education, furniture industry for the huge hotel boom in India, or simply some smaller business partnership.

I never take up his offer in attending his son’s marriage in India, or allowing him to guide me into setting up my own business and be a top-notch entrepreneur. I haven’t also accept his invitation to visit India under his family’s warm hospitality.

All I can do is extend him my sincere friendship and know that he will be one foreign friend who has inspired me in some ways.

Thanks for your kind thoughts and many well wishes and most importantly, your very kind friendship, Anand Sandil.

Fire Drill

I happened to go to the office yesterday where I'm currently working freelance and had to undergo a fire drill! When the siren sounded, all the staff were ordered to follow procedures in using the staircase down to the open car park. And there we were, all staff of ntv7, standing under the hot, scorching sun!

The bomba people were there and there was a real water spraying onto the roof of ntv7. Hmm... I do wonder why the water were brown in colour. Some of us joked that the water came from the toilet. It could be that the tank has not been in used and had probably turned rusty or something.

Anyway, there was the loooong demonstration and talk on fire prevention. Some staff were asked to give a hand it putting out the fire. One thing I learnt from the drill was never to pour water onto a fire caused by oil as this would make the fire get bigger!

The "woos" and the "wahs" and the clapping were quite an amusing sight. Factory workers from the surrounding factory lots and passer-bys stopped their car by the roadside to join in the "fun".

Come to think of it, how many of us do actually know what to expect and not panic in facing a real-life situation, in being caught in a fire? I don't think I would know about not pouring water onto a fire caused by oil, nor would I know the proper way of holding a fire extinguisher.

Speaking of fire drills, I'd better get one small fire extinguisher for the house to be on standby.

Nice Matters Award

It's so sweet of Chanel to extend me the above award.

As mentioned in Chanel's blog, the award is intended for “those that are just nice people, good blog friends, and those that inspire good feelings and inspiration! Those that care about others, that are there to lend support, or those that are just a positive influence in our blogging world!” by the originator of the Nice Matters award .

I shall pass on the award to 7 of the first few bloggers (exception of Janet) whom I've known before I started in the blogsphere. Well, I wish I could pass on to all bloggers too.

Chanel (yes, definitely back to you)
Rina
Jazzmint
Janet
Tracy
Leoni
Chin Nee

Tagged

tagged by Chanel. Well, she wants to give me "something to do", so here it is (Hey, I do have other things to do you know, hehehe)

INSTRUCTIONS:Remove the blog in the top spot from the following list and bump everyone up one place. Then add your blog to the bottom slot, as below :

Kiasumum
LemonJude
Sasha
Chanel
Babysmooches

Choose 5 people to tag:

Janet
Kee Tat
Rina
Jo
mummy to Alycia & Sherilyn

What were you doing 10 years ago?

• 10 years ago, in 1997, I was probably working in a new company with an increment. I was also probably dating and enjoying life - watching movies, reading, going out with friends, etc, basically things I don't have much time to do now with kids around.

What were you doing 1 year ago?

• I was looking forward to get the company VSS and in view of things.

Five snacks you enjoy

• Ice-Cream
• Chocolate
• Yogurt
• Cookies
• Junk Food

Five songs that you know all the lyrics to

• Twinkle Twinkle Litte Star
• Rain Rain Go Away
• Humpty Dumpty
• Sing A song of Sixpence
• Give Me Oil In My Lamp

Five things you would do if you were a millionaire

• Buy a land and build my own personal house on it
• Invest, Invest, Invest to make more money
• Travel
• Send kids to private school
• Charity
• (I also want to give money to my parents, siblings, build a daycare centre, buy a brand new MPV, handphone, shopping, etc).

Five bad habits

• Can be quite complacent
• Getting quite lazy to clean and cook on weekdays
• Time management?
• Not as brave as I want to be
• When someone betrays me and makes me hates him/her, it is very hard for me to forgive that person.

Five favourite toys

• Handphone
• My notebook/PC
• My kids
• My books
• My piano

Five things you like doing

• catching up on sleep
• watching my favourite TV shows
• reading
• logging on to the net
• catching up with friends over tea

Five things you would never wear again

• my flowery old fashion dresses
• braless tops (no no no)
• those over skimpy g-strings (getting fat on the bum)
• bikini (my tummy!!)
• Spectacles (I wish for this. So, gotta start planning for lasix)
  

Sarawak Cultural Village

The Sarawak Cultural Village, also known as a living museum, features some of the main 7 ethnic groups of Sarawak in one location - the long house of Bidayuh, Iban, Melanau tall house, Orang Ulu, the traiditional Malay house and the Chinese Farm House. These are the original and traditional tribal houses built within a 7-hectare site, with the various ethnic groups featuring their arts and culture in harmony.

Prior entering the village, each one were given a "passport" as our entry pass. We are encouraged to get chops from all the respective 7 houses as part of our visit to the places.

What used to be a different tribes of enemies, these ethnic groups have now foster close friendship amongst each other. We were told by our very chinese looking Melanau tour guide that there are no more Melanau tall houses in Sarawak except for the one built in this village as all the other Melanau tall houses has been torn down as they are more than 100 years old and are not safe to live-in anymore.

First time visitors to Sarawak should make the visit to the Sarawak Cultural Village a big must-see, must visit. The cultural experience to the village is what Sarawakians would consider it to be the unknown side of Malaysia.

I proudly inform a few of my Sarawakian friends of our visit to Kuching prior to the trip and each and everyone of them will say "You must visit the Sarawak Cultural Village". I'm glad I was there and I'm suprise to see for myself what I've always seen in pictures and read in magazines. It was really captivating.

It was a very hot and humid weather though and it is advisable that visitors are equipped with hats and lots of water through the walk in the village.

The diverse culture, lifestyle, wood carving, the very fine and delicate handicrafts such as the beading and the pua-weaving, legends, performances, colourful traditional attire, and the many stories of the beheadings, killings and other captivating highlights were simply unique.

For the kids, Eryn was very active and exploring the inside out of the houses with daddy while Brendan was not really pleased with having to walk and walk under the hot sun. He was also quite afraid to enter the houses. Brendan enjoyed the blowpipe display by a Penan man and watching the spinning gasing display - very boyish interest.

Eryn was an all-rounded girl, enjoying the cultural performances, checking out the items on display in all the houses, looking at the how swords are being made, mixing around with the beautifully dressed Bidayuh women, entering the skull hut, and walking from house to house.

A visit to the Sarawak Cultural Village is a must for first-time visitors.

Sarawak trip (part 2)

Day two of our vacation, was basically a visit to the Sarawak Cultural Village and some of the attractions in Kuching town.

After breakfast, we headed to the Sarawak Cultural Village which was just approximately 10 minutes walk away from our resort. The village highlights the main selected ethnic groups of Sarawak and shows the richness in the many authentic heritage and tribal histories that shines through the various racial groups existing in Sarawak today.

I personally found the Sarawak Cultural Village to be an interesting eye-opener. I shall highlight more of that in my next post as I found that the Sarawak Cultural Village to be just simply enchanting.

The tour around took started with a visit to the local Satok market, Cat Museum, then the Pavilion, a handicraft shop, the pottery centre and finally to the Sarawak Museum. It coincides with the Sarawak Regatta event, but due to time constraint, we didn't had the chance to go to the riverfront.

The kids enjoyed the Cat Museum and the Sarawak Museum which is deemed to be the third best museum in the South-East Asia region.

The Sarawak Museum was something the whole family enjoyed. The kids were more into the animal, fish and boat displays, while daddy was all over the place and mummy here was paying attention to every other thing like to artifacts, the ethnic and cultural display, the photos and others.

The Cat Museum was basically filled with cats - more than 4,000 of them in pictures, statues, displays, etc.. Brendan and Eryn just went meowing around the museum, amazed by the big cat statues there.

Other than that, we enjoyed shopping for a few items - the famous pepper, some smaller souvenir items and my very long-awaited pure teak wood (kayu jati) mat. When I first saw the teak wood mat at a friend's house last month, I was so interested in it and asked where she got it from. When she told me she bought it in Sarawak 5 years back, I made up my mind to get one when we get to Sarawak. There were many other crafted potteries and display items that both hubby and I wanted to get. However, it was quite a handful carrying the huge mat and other stuffs. So, we got the contact of the shopowner in case we would like to order items directly from the shop to be mailed over to KL.

The second night wasn't a good night sleep for me as Eryn was suspected to have a mild food poisoning. She vomitted on the bed 5-6 times throughout the night and had mild fever. Over breakfast, we heard that a few others had the same symptoms as well. We gave her fever medicine and she was up and about again but wasn't having any appetite to eat at all.

Otherwise, everything would turn out perfectly well.

Here we have, right in Malaysia, an exotic and beautiful place which I believe a lot of my friends have not visited before. I have visited Phuket and Bali but never stepped foot in East Malaysia. A Sarawakian friend once said to me that I should take the initiative to visit Sarawak and I will be surprised at the many offerings that Sarawak has. How true is it when I finally had the chance to be there.

I would definitely encourage friends, esp. Malaysian friends, who has visited many other countries to visit Sarawak. Do divert your next holiday destination to Sarawak if you've not been there.

Hubby and I plan to visit Sabah and other parts of Sarawak like Miri in our future holidays when the kids are much more grown up.

Sarawak trip (part 1)

Hubby's company organised a company family trip to Kuching over the 3 days Merdeka break and we took the 2 kids along with us. We've always wanted to plan for a trip to Sarawak and the opportunity arised, and it's free!

We had to get up before 6am to get ready and reach hubby's office in Shah Alam by 7am. From there, we are to take the bus to the KLIA airport for our 11am+ flight to Kuching. Upon arrival at Kuching, our tour guide brought us to Satok town for a short lunch break before heading to our accomodation place.S

Our tour guide did a very good join in briefing us on Kuching and the many beautiful tribes that exist there. With the many legends and histories of Sarawak, the place gives me the impression that it's mystical, enchanting and very exotic.

Though "kuching" is the malay word for "cat", the tour guide told us that Kuching was named after after a town where one of the relative to Brooke used to stay. It was also believed to be named after the mata kucing fruit.

We stayed at the Holiday Inn Damai Beach Resort. The resort is situated in Santubong, which is around 40 minutes drive from Kuching, and is surrounded by lush tropical rainforest with a view of Gunung Santubong.

We were allocated a very nice and comfy family room chalet by the beach, overlooking the South China Sea. The kids were practically thrilled riding on the bus to the airport, getting on the airplane, riding on the bus again, jumping on the beds and running all over the place!! Boy, looks like we parents and the kids have different views at this vacation and definitely different view in addressing our term of a "quiet and peaceful holiday". hahaha