LUNCH SUMMONS! At newish Café Gray in trendy boutique hotel Upper House, G’s and my first choice for a recent birthday lunch, except they were fully booked and so we “settled” on Nicholini’s. But now L has made a booking for us. She also rang 2 days ago to confirm our attendance because of the booking.
L’s husband and I share several mutual acquaintances from Secondary School days in Penang, and L met G (and later me) thru G’s ex boyfriend. (Heck, I just realized everyone in this story just happens to be Malaysian.) L has 2 boys – the most even-tempered 4-year old I’ve ever met, and a one year old she brings along for lunch because her second helper has left.
– Paul and Joe dress from Way Back When – one of my more well-worn maternity dresses during the good old days when Rockstar quietly went wherever I did
– Marni necklace that I immediately decide on when I hear L is bringing along her baby, in case we need something else to distract him with
– Donna Karan Messenger Bag I got half off during the last Net-a-porter.com sale
– all kinds of alang-alang I need to pass to my girlfriends
L to me is a font of Hong Kong parenting knowledge, she is my go-to gal I have helper problems, or I’m trying to understand the Hong Kong school debenture system. This time however, I’m still nursing wounds from Rockstar’s recent experience at her 4-year old’s birthday party.
Up the escalator to the lift lobby and on to the 49th floor… Space is tight and expensive in Hong Kong, G tells me the Upper House rooms don’t even start until 30-something floors up or something, because the rest are owned by another hotel…
This terrace is theirs tho..
As Rockstar and I pulled up at the Ladies’ Recreation Club where L plays tennis, does pilates and generally hangs out a lot, it occurred to me: L’s Most Well-mannered Even-tempered 4-year old might have friends who are not. But it’s too late, Rockstar is psyched to be attending an Older Boy Birthday Party and I’ve RSVPed.
I watched Rockstar watch his pile of building bricks steadily diminish as older kids pulled bricks off his pile to build their own tower. When the last brick in his hand was roughly snatched away, he burst into tears and my heart broke.
My normally stoic son who doesn’t even cry when he’s getting his jabs at the doctor’s bawls in frustration at being flicked off the older kids’ sleeves as he attempts to make friends. (Frankly that happened to me with their mums too.) At one point I try to get us some food and he’s handed to me at the buffet table, bawling again, by the mum whose kids are the eldest and roughest. She gives a theatrically bewildered shrug and “I don’t know” at my wide-eyed “What happened?” !0 minutes later I watch them bowl over another child.
That night, Rockstar declares “I don’t like Birthday Parties, Mum. People are so rude.”
I vowed not to bring him to another older child’s birthday for a long, long time. Not because he couldn’t take it, but because I’m not sure I can.
G excuses herself, moving her nearly 6-months pregnant frame easily through the packed dining area into the bathroom.
L apologizes for “not talking to (me) more” at the party, but we both know she means my son’s experience. I’m very appreciative of the effort, but not surprised (L otherwise has a preference for the Ladies’ Recreation Club when her sons are around so her efforts in booking the elusive table at Café Gray gave it away – especially when she’s G’s friend.)
But again, I really appreciate the sincere effort on her part, especially now she is balancing her 1-yr old in one arm and an expensive steak on a fork in the other hand. He is conspicuously the only child in the restaurant.
Then G is back, and the only child in the restaurant is off to look at the awe-inspiring (and very expensive, based on location) view while we catch up. And check out the view from the toilet, she adds:
L returns to the table to explain a “loophole” I’m not sure I get, about getting into one of the most exclusive and expensive schools, Chinese International School, in Hong Kong: there is a pre-school and kindergarten being run by a Chinese society, originally started up for their own kids. Enrolling your child here for pre-school apparently has 2 benefits:
1) if your child wigs out in the CIS interview, you get a second chance
2) it also increases your chances of getting in even if you’re Malaysian (because apparently Malaysians don’t have that much chance of getting in)
I previously blogged that CIS debentures cost HKD 2.5mio, and then was trying to reconcile this figure with the HKD 900,000 number Kings later found on some of their forms. Apparently the debentures are now trading in the secondary market at HKD 3.5mio thereabouts (when I mentioned the HKD 2.5mio number I was trying to reconcile, both G and L went “Oh, that was some time ago, it’s traded up now.”)
Then I’m advised to check whether the HKD 900,000 figure is a debenture (you get the money back without interest when your child leaves the school and it’s trade-able in the secondary market), or a donation.
I’ll blog more about this when I can think of something to say after that…
And this has nothing to do with this story except I walked past this car on the way to the cab stand… You have to live under a rock to not know McDull in HK…
