Primary School Registration

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This picture has no relation to P1 registration.  I just think its hilarious to see you milking the cow and I really think this picture will come back to haunt you when you grow up.

In our country, we have a rather complex way of enrolling our kids for primary school that proves to be vexing, tiresome and nervousness all at the same time.  Registration for most good schools proved to be impossible.  The majority of the available places are always taken up by the schools’ alumni members and parent volunteers.  Leaving only a measly number of places for the general public to slog it out via balloting.  Your parents were not from top schools and didn’t have enough money to throw away to be alumni members of so-called ‘premier’ schools.  Volunteering was also out of question, as it means shifting our home to be within 1 km distance of the school.  Hence, like all parents would, we weighted the pros and cons of our neighbourhood schools for En Xi.  First, the question of all girls’ or mixed school?

You want to be an Air Stewardess when you grow up because its pretty

CHIJ (Toa Payoh), as the name suggests, is a Catholic all girls’ school that focuses on character building and values creation.  It’s the closest (distance wise) and we trust that it can provide an environment where you can be safe (from Boy-Girl-Relations) and strive (education).  Moreover, you are always fascinated by churchgoers and always asked your grand-auntie Margaret for church visits.  Having said all that, CHIJ is a popular school and it doesn’t take in parent volunteers that would have increased your chances for enrolment.

So should we opt for a mixed school instead?  Kheng Cheng is slightly further away, but still within walking distance.  It has a whole lot more places for enrolment and it’s almost certain to get in.  After all, your uncle Dylan and auntie Jolene graduated from there and are doing well with their further education at the moment.  Besides, having you in Kheng Cheng will guarantee En Jun’s enrolment in the same school.  Back to the question of BGR again, will you be lured to the idea of ‘lesbian’ in CHIJ?  Which is worst?  To see you kissing a girl or coming home with a big belly?  Sorry, paternity instincts kicked in and I apologise for the not-too-kid’s-friendly description.  

There are other schools as well, Pei Chun, Marymount and First Toa Payoh.  We ruled them out as it will require you to travel a lot more and with school starting as early as 7.20am, we figured that adequate rest is of paramount importance to yours truly, Sleeping Beauty.  So, will it be CHIJ (Toa Payoh) or Kheng Cheng?  We did what’s best for you.

I think you are serious about this ambition

You are placed in Phase 2C and the enrolment results announcement date was set on 6 Aug 2014. We were fortunate this year as Ministry of Education (MOE) announced that there would be an additional 20 dedicated places allocated in Phase 2C.  Together, with the remaining places from the previous Phases, there were 53 places up for grabs.  The 3 days for registration in Phase 2C was nail biting.  Day 1 and 2 saw the take up rate to be around 40-ish.  The number of applicants slowly crept up towards 50 and I was ever so confident that there would be no balloting exercise.  In my mind, I was thinking who would risk their application on the final day?  The third and final day was only half a day with 4 hours for registration.  I was proven wrong.  There were 54 applicants for the 53 places available.  Hence, there was to be a balloting exercise to determine your place in CHIJ.  This was going to be an important milestone in En Xi’s life.  Will you grow up embraced by Catholic values or will this mark the start of a frantic search for another school?  Odds are high, you might say, but you never know who will be the unfortunate one.

Number 32 for the 30th place (4th row, 3rd from the left)

6 Aug 2014.  We send both of you to pre-school and proceeded to attend the balloting exercise in person.  I was always, as cool as a cucumber; and your mom was always, as ‘kan cheong’ as a spider.  The event started with the principal explaining the rules of the balloting.  She spoke about all the potential points of dispute and left no contingencies unturned.  Its funny how the whole event was played out like how lottery would.  Your fate is decided by a little numbered white ball spinning in a gold cage, waiting for it to be scooped out and called by the teacher.  Together with us, was Auntie Angie (Xuan Ying’s Mom), her number was the 7th number to be called.  So lucky! We waited and waited.  Such fantastic odds (98% to be called) suddenly seem not-so-great after all.  The 20th number was called and the 27th number quickly followed suit.  50% of numbers called!  When is your number going to be called?  Your heat rate starts to pound a little harder and sweat begins to gather at your forehead.  At last, at the 30th number, number 32 was called. Heng Ah!  Such Relief!  Tio 4D also don’t feel so shiok!  And we feel so sorry for the last name that was not called.  Seeing the mummy cry was so heart wrenching.

Let's hope Xuan Ying and En Xi are in the same class

2014 New Year's Resolution

Another year has passed and reviewing 2013 resolutions, I see that we had managed to achieve most of our targets except spending more time as a couple.  Taking breaks on the 4th of each month was tough to schedule and there is always guilt of leaving you guys with your grandparents and to a certain extent, guilty of loading Ah Ma all the time.  And you know how Ah Ma is, always so caring and compromising.  Anyway, this year's new year resolution remains the same for all of us, with the addition of me, getting fitter and practicing my magic often.

About En Xi.

You seem to have grown up suddenly.  You are such a tall girl now and is taking up more responsibilities as an elder sister to your brother.  Its funny how you can be so caring, nurturing and patient with En Jun.  Then, out of no where, start your whining about En Jun not sharing again.  I love the way you smile.  Always so dainty, shy and princess-y.  You continue to be very creative in your artwork and have an imagination that spans no boundary.  We hope you find where your interest lies in, and for now, we think you might like to attend SOTA in future.  K2 is such a demanding year and like most parents, I can't stand our education system.  There is so much spelling to do in K2 for both English and Chinese.  Pre-schoolers are expected to be able to form a sentence with 7 words.  How times has changed.  I used to read ABCs only in K2.  What really makes matters worst is that P1 teachers are not going to slow down and help kids who develop later.  Really can't understand why this mad rush to learn when its now time to play.  Not to worry at the moment.  We are both helping you with your spelling and getting external help for phonics.  Don't worry, we are not loading you with tons of enrichment classes.  Just an hour of phonics and your favorite arts and craft class on Sat mornings. We are still having fun most of the time as a family.  In fact, we just did a Sunday picnic and soccer at the Botanical Gardens.

About En Jun.

The naughtiness in you surfaced after the Taiwan trip and we guess it must be your cousins, Shou Rei and Shou Cong that have influenced you.  Mummy misses the adorable side of you, but you are still as cute and most of times, just plain silly and comical.  In fact, you and En Xi make a great pair!  School has been great for you.  You have acclimatised well to the environment.  The not so great part?  Your eating and constant harassment of girl classmates.  You are growing up so much like Shou Cong.  Your teacher in N1B, Elosia says that you are a strong will child.  I told her, she haven't met your sister yet.

En Jun's starting Pre-School

A brand new year marks the start of En Jun's Pre-School, full day child care at MindChamps, Toa Payoh together with En Xi.  En Jun had little trouble acclimatising to the new environment and was taken through his steps by her lovely sister, En Xi.

En Jun @ 20 months

By now, you should realise that the blog is heavy on your darling sister.  Heck, even the blog link is your sister's name.  In case you are wondering, No, you are not an accident.  We always knew we will have a 2nd child.  Its just that we are not too IT-savvy when we first created the blog.  No, we love both of you as much.  The reason why there is significantly less post since your arrival and is due to the different nap times you both have and we are just too burnt out at night to turn on our laptop.

Anyway, this post is about you and you only.  You started pre-school in Jan 13 because we wanted Grandma to have an easier time, so that she can cook and serve us a hearty dinner.  You probably didn't know, we have been eating take-aways or catered food 'ting kart' since you were 4 months old.  That was when Mummy went back to work after we had you.  Unfortunately, you didn't settle well in the school (Nurture Stars @ Safra Toa Payoh) and Mummy wasn't comfortable with the child caring standards either.  To top it off, the place was also inconvenient for Grandma to pick you up after school.  So, now we have enrolled you in a 2hr playgroup that is just next to our block.  Hopefully things will turn out good.

Finally pointers from Mummy.

All set and ready to go!

This way ahead!

Oops, I think home is better.

Let me do some last minute reading first.

En Xi's 5th Birthday

Mummy proposed we do something different for your birthday this year.  As highlighted in the earlier post, we bought you to "Hello Kitty Town" and "Little Big Club" theme parks on the weekend before your actual birthday itself.  Thereafter, on the actual birthday, we celebrated it in your pre-school, MindChamps.  It consist of 3 parts to it, (1) a birthday cutting session complete with the usual singing, wishing and photo-taking; (2) a magic show by myself with you as my assistant; and (3) a balloon twisting for all kids to wrap up the day.  You had great fun and was indeed thrilled by our dedicated attention to you.  However, you didn't like my magic show as you kind of felt that too much attention was given elsewhere to your friends instead of you.  Nonetheless, it was still a hit, your friends were still talking about it on the following day.

 Your teachers (N1C to K1B): Jermaine Wu Lao Shi. Organizing the kids to complete the experience for you.

 Your class K1B.  Your BFF, 1st girl on your left with the wide open mouth, Tricia.  Also, girl in green long sleeves top, Cammie.

In case you are wondering, En Jun is back home sleeping.

You were my assistant, in charge of choosing volunteers for my magic show and giving out treats thereafter.  Good job, En Xi!  You did great!

There you are in action choosing volunteers.

Check out your reaction, despite me performing it countless times for you at home.  

You even had a chance to perform your favourite trick!  Flower from a magic wand!

Chilling out with your BFF, Cammie.

En Jun, we promise to uphold the standards for your birthday as well.  Rest assured, you won't be shortchanged.

You are 3 years and 3 months old

Its been 5 months since Daddy last blogged. Rest assured that I still care a lot about you, its just that human beings are habitual creatures. I have 'nwuah-ed' for some time now due to the relaxed pace of my work (my boss better not be reading this) and have also spend a fair amount of time on personal reading in the nights. Since you started full day child care this year, also meant going to bed and waking up earlier for Daddy and Mummy as well. Okay, I know, enough excuses, I'm just plain lazy.

About You

In preparation for your baby brother, we decided to send you to a full day child care center in 2011, so that Ah Ma can have time to take care of Di Di when he arrives in this world. You stopped your enrichment classes at YKidz in Nov 10, but your teacher, Janet was kind enough to invite you back for Xmas celebrations. For memories sake, here are some photos with your teachers and friends at the party.

Your cousins, Ri-Ann (L) & Ricole (R)

Your best pal, Audrey

Your Principal, Ms Ng Yu Kai

Your form teacher, Ms Janet

Your other teacher, Ms Jasmine

Your new school is in MindChamps Toa Payoh, no more school bus and Mummy can now (with Daddy occasionally) bring you to school daily. This is something we enjoy and cherish very much as your mood meter is in the 'happy' zone in the morning and we get your almost undivided attention in our conversations. Ye Ye fetches you from school (at times Daddy when I get an off day or 'twang' from work).

Getting really excited for your first day in MindChamps

Initial impression up til now (3 months) shows that you are happy with the new school and your form teacher, Ms Leah (your form teacher) has managed to encourage you to eat on you own confidently. Whenever Daddy and Mummy gets an opportunity to pick you up from school, we are always thrilled to hear you say, "I'm so happy today!" We never quite figure out what you are happy about as you never quite revealed when queried and is often in a hurry to showcase your classroom stuffs to us. Your potty training is still in the works, but at least you can now inform when you want to do your 'wee wee' & 'nrgh nrgh'. So that's a good start.

I'm happy to see you grow up with a great sense of humour. Albeit at times you are shy with people you don't know, we know that there's always a cheeky side of you awaiting to throw us off our chairs.

Our Continuing Struggles

Convincing you to bath seems to take an eternity and has proved to be a challenge. We are not sure how this came about. Could it be due to a/several bad experience or just plain playfulness? Seriously, we don't know and its growing to be a little concern for us as its time and energy sapping for us all in the family. It takes a good 15 min to persuade or trick you into walking into the bathroom, another 15 min to play in the bathroom and lastly 15 min again for the right choice of clothes, which naturally has to be pink in nature. We are mostly late for appointments and what follows is a frantic march to the car and frenzied drive to our place of destination. I've officially demoted Mummy to '2nd grade princess' in the family as there can be only 1 princess in the family and that's you, our spirited child. So, again, good luck to the guy who marries you, not only does he got to contend with your feisty temperament, but also your never ending time wasting antics with 'mor' here 'mor' there.

Our Travels

Before your baby brother is born and looking forward with the next vacation seems so far away, we did a short road trip to Desaru up north in 'Boleh-land'. We had a little fun with the water park and managed to visit the fire flies river trip and ostrich farm. As always, you had the most fun and was indulged with your favourite biscuits. You are still talking about the trip til today.

Getting ready for the water park

The farm worker communicating the ostriches

The ostriches eggs were huge and almost impossible to crack

Weird looking cross bred chicken that had a bad hair day

This one had a hard day at work and was soundly asleep, its not dead if you are wondering

Was this imported from Pandora in the movie Avatar?

Some Fatherly Advice

Recently, Daddy went for a church wedding and the pastor gave the newly weds 3 words, Commitment, Contentment and Consecration. While, I can relate the need for the former 2 qualities in a relationship, no offence to you if you are ever going to be a Christian, I think the last C should be Conscience instead. Why? Consecration is to be holy through a relationship with God, with a good relationship with God brings you a good relationship with your spouse. If you are not a Church go-er, this might sound 'bulls**t' to you, but think carefully, search deeper and you realise by having the same conscience (values, principles or ethics) with your spouse towards life will quite frankly provide a meaningful relationship. So, to crudely put it, to me, God in this case is but a tool for 2 person to share common values (I chose the word conscience cos it started with the letter C, but you know what I meant) in their lifes together. Whether, you are reading this when you are 15 or 25 years of age, I hope I make sense to you. With my infamous short term memory, I hope I can share with you more in future.

Love, Daddy