Raising Rockstar

At 4.50pm yesterday we get this Kennedy School email:

“…A member of our community has been in touch with the PTA – who has contacts with friends flying cargo planes with aid for the people of Nepal……

….We will place boxes outside the office/gym area tomorrow morning – Thursday 30th April ONLY – for these donations to be placed in at the start of the day. The boxes will be collected early afternoon. …”

About 10am today when I pop by lugging two bags of baby blankets, towels, clothes, jackets and things, this is the view:

Note the stuffed garment bags on the far side of the pile as well…

I told The Rockstars their baby blankets are on a plane right now going to some people who really need them.

We’re Praying For You, Nepal…

Getting into a cab:

Miss: I want water.
Rockstar: Oh yeah. Me too.

Me: Hang on darlings there’s lotsa water coolers at church.

<pause>

Miss: I want water.
Rockstar: Me too.

Me: Won’t be long now.

Miss: I want wa-TER.
Rockstar: Me too.

Me: You’re kidding me, right?

Miss: I want wa-TER.
Rockstar: Me too.

Me: What’s with you guys, you know it’s just a cab ride away.

Miss: I want wa-TER.
Rockstar: Me too.

Me: Guys-

Miss: I WANT-

Me: STOPPIT.

Rockstar: Me t –

Me: STOPPIT. And (to Rockstar) what exactly is your problem today??? (He’s not usually like this on his own)

Me: We JUST left four cups of water on the table before we got into this taxi. I JUST ASKED you guys if you wanted to drink. In fact, I just asked you guys TO drink. In fact I asked you guys SEVERAL TIMES TO DRINK YOUR WATER. Now, we are going to church AND I DON’T EVEN FEEL VERY CHURCH-LIKE AND YOU KNOW THERE’S A GADZILLION WATER COOLERS IN CHURCH. AND. WE ARE ALMOST THERE.

<silence><Miss looks out the window non-plussed><Rockstar sulks>

<pause>

Me: (To cabbie) Being a kid is hard isn’t it, getting scolded by Mum.

Cabbie: <snorts> Being a parent is harder. Good luck to you with both of them. And the whole they-want-water thing. <speeds off>.

Now, that he mentioned it…….. HANG ON.

Q: Which of them do you think really wanted water? Cont’d below…

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We go straight for the water supply. Rockstar drinks a good several cups (though that might be out of obligation haha). The Miss……. needs some reminding that she wanted water (and obviously she doesn’t feel obliged. But she does like water :).

Oh yeah she’s got a chihuahua now – remote controlled, no less. And then Rockstar built a Lego house for it.

The Rockstars had, between them, 3 very different and much-enjoyed birthday celebrations this weekend; the Laws of trying to make parties and pickups and church service back and forth around Hong Kong with Weekend Event Traffic and a certain killjoy named Murphy meant Sunday night I finally realise the weekend is over…. without it feeling at all like a weekend. I mean, we didn’t even attend church at our regular timeslot (thank God for a new 3pm timing complete with Kids Club btw)!

In the midst of all the action, one close friend then told me her mother has been diagnosed with Stage 1 colon cancer, and another close friend’s young baby was admitted to the hospital.

And so the weekend ended with us praying hard. I will continue to pray hard. And I don’t feel like writing anything cute right now, so just a couple random shots from the weekend past…

1) Little Girl With No Feet Receives Puppy With No Paw. Lead and my absolute favourite link this week: Several breeders suggested the puppy should be put down. Instead, someone saw potential in him being a therapy dog. How many more animals’ lives could you save, how much more happiness can you bring to someone who needs it, just by finding more ways to do things? 

Also beautiful inspiration for how “disabilities” can make you special. They can put you in the unique position of being able to help someone that others may not be able to, in quite that same effective way. See, people shouldn’t be thinking about shooting you, they should be thinking about what kind of awesome life of love and luxury you should get to lead! Thought for the weekend….. 🙂

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2) Save The Bees! Heard of Colony Collapse Disorder? I…. might still haven’t <sheepish>

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3) Transient Workers Count Too’s “provocative” message aimed at encouraging employers in Singapore to give their helpers their day off.

“…40% of Singapore’s 222,500 domestic workers do not have a weekly day off, despite a law coming into effect in January 2013 making it mandatory…”

..Ok, go watch the video on their link (sorry, that’s a pic up there), then come back.

Ready?

OMG!!!!!!!! This is a campaign to inspire mums in Singapore to give their helpers a freaking day off????? As in, “Give the maid a day off before they are closer to your kids than you are???????”

Am I the only one who doesn’t think the two should have anything to do with each other? Like, you should give the maid their legal day off. Aside from the having a break thing being good for everyone, there’s also the not-likely-to-get-so-exhausted/ careless/whatever-they-break-something-or-themselves thing?

The thing about maids vs mums being closer to your kid……….. mostly a different story, isn’t it? There are working mums who are “kind of fine” with it. I met many, when I worked. “Kind of fine” as in one very senior banker mum told me initially she cried about it – but she had to work, and the helper being close to her child meant her child was being treated well while she was away. Oh and I know a few mums who hire a cleaner for when the regular helper is on her day off.

Being a mum – whether you work or not, and anywhere in between – is the hardest thing (I have never thrown up because of work, even in my worst moving market, even hitting the moving market for USD 10 mil a pop (equity derivatives) or USD 27 mil (interest rate derivatives), having been in the former job 11 years. I have thrown up several times during the Stay-At-Home-Mum years, and that’s not counting morning sickness. What’s cool about this is once you’ve gone through the erm, trial-by-fire – which I’m pretty sure any heavy-lifting mum would have – get this, some of my mum friends even drive in Hong Kong while they’re at it, you are really a lot less self-conscious about well, throwing up in public. The people who expect you to be overly embarrassed and what-not are probably the ones who haven’t done that time <shrugs>)

Which is great, because whatever your choices, you will be judged. And by other mums. And there will be mums in a position to help you/ give you some kind of not necessarily verbal, not necessarily visible (heck – telepathic? :P) moral support and they will choose not to because hey, Mums Are People And Some Are *ssholes Too (in the same vein as my I Get To Make Dead Father Jokes Because I Have One friend who erm, likes to joke around). What, you thought only bankers can be cutthroat? <snort> But then what goes around comes around in The Secret Dream World Of The SAHM too!

And don’t get me started about when well-meaning (I hope) non-profits stomp on your extra-sensitive mum nerve endings with their big high heels.

ps: My rant appears to be skewed towards mums rather than just parents because it’s all mums in the video I saw. No dads. Separately, in Hong Kong, I know maybe one stay-at-home dad. (Or rather, know of one stay-at-home dad. It might possibly be worse for him, because you know that wonderful, supportive network of mums all of us rely on to give our kids even better than our best? Yup. Stay At Home Dad has to go try and break into that as well. And erm, yeah Stay At Home Hong Kong Resident Mum is more likely used to their own Super Career Busting Hong Kong Resident Dad in the family.)

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4) Only the weirdest thing in nature I’ve read f-airly recently from WTF, Evolution?

Yes, really.

“…“Evolution, what are those flatworms doing?”

“Oh, they’re getting ready to penis-fence.”

“Penis… fence?”

“Yeah. They’re hermaphrodites, so either of them can inseminate the other one to reproduce, but neither one actually wants to be inseminated.”…”

Read the end of that story here…

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5) Photographers who will stop at nothing for that great shot.

Hugely inspirational. Freaking trip-ey. They are the person next to you on that gruelling endurance run who inspires by whatever means to squeeze that last 30 feet out of your soul.

It’s either them, or the bear.

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6) And then…. And then there are those moments when like an oasis in the desert, a magic carpet floats up. A HK taxi or MTR sign appears. And the taxi driver might not eve be a total *sshole!

Miss Skit this week is Magic Carpet Ride. Or,

Q: How Long Does This Go On For?

Things That Make Ya Go “Hmmmmmm…”

“Ohm……….. Ohm…………. Ohm………… Ohm…………….!”

“Did I Leave The Lights On In The Other Room?”

(The Miss was “meditating” on an Ikea bench and storage stool; every now and again we lifted her up and slid fresh paper along under her :D)

Easy As Ketchup Bottle.

A: About 12 feet. It went on for about 12 feet.

Good weekend, dears 🙂

#364

Making small talk one day…

Me: …so, I’m doing this Effective Parenting course…

Rockstar: Yeah you should. It’s not easy to handle kids. We could sulk all day.

Me: Not turn to a life of crime?

Rockstar: <Not looking up> Nah, we know then we’d get in trouble. 

Me: Well…. we could… not feed you, lock you in your room, take away your wifi until you tell us how awesome your life is and stop sulking?

Rockstar: <IGNORES>

Me: I take it you’re fine with that then?

Rockstar: Huh. Obviously that doesn’t work, we’d just run away or something. <looks at my parenting course notes> Oh, very good.

Oh yeah, the Miss has a….. Lego window now.

Her first attempt at the window, no help.

She says it’s a “Submaween.” (To be exact, she yelled “AIR-FWEE-BODY BE. QUIET! THIS. IS. A SUBMAWEEN!” Diva, much?)

Rockstar was fascinated. 

But… what’s this, Rockstar playing with his sister’s girlie pink Lego?

He felt it needed a Minecraft tree.

And so they Lego-ed into the night…

#47

To the tune of Lego Movie’s Everything Is Awesome. Roughly, anyway:

Miss: (tunelessly) AAAAAAIR-verything is awe-summmmmmmm, when you’re living in a dweammmmmm….! Dogs! Cats! Fwogs! They’re awe-sum! Socks! Cwocs! Bum-bums! Awe-sum!

Miss: <starts to trail off> Sticks… Bum-bums… Things… Awe-sum…! Bum-bums… Wigs… Awe-sum…!

Rockstar: <snorts> It’s always bums that are awesome. 

Miss: <regaining enthusiasm> AAAAAAIR-verything is awe-summmmmmmm! <wiggles bum from side to side> Bum-bums! So AWE-SUMMMMMMMMMMMMM!

When was the last time you told your bum it was “awe-sum”? Thought for the week…

ps: Stickers on Faces are pretty awesome too…

This mealtime the Miss decided her outfit needed……….. a bit of a leg up.

Too much? Nahhhhhh.

1) Strong Is The New Pretty. Photographer mum’s depiction of her sporty, fearless daughters, aged 6 and 9.

And she has a helmet on!

Mean girls. On the field, that is 🙂 (SO much better than in the movie, don’t ya think?)

Dis is cute, though…

The Miss would be sooo fascinated by this last, because it involves two huge loves for her – water, and a BALL. Throw in the school guinea pig or the dog, a few places she can seriously make your heart stop by clambering up – the higher the better – and she’s going to be having all her meals here. Better yet if you can swing an IV drip so her hands are free.

For real though, I especially like sports for girls because somehow I have this idea it nixes some of the Mean Girls mall crawling, preening and slam-booking… Also, you’re not checking your phone/ Facebook on the pitch or in the pool or sparring ring… In a world where we increasingly can’t seem to put our smartphones down, playing a sport where you have to watch the ball or your opponent or etc makes you forget about what’s on your phone for awhile.

Also, the message is clear: for your team to score, for everyone to win, you need to learn when to pass the ball. (Played netball for OUB in the Singapore Corporate Games predominantly as wing defense; we came in third 🙂

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2) Why A Harvard Professor Has Mixed Feelings About Going Into Finance

“…You might assume that stock markets are just a big casino, in which skilled traders extract money.

But arbitrageurs can create value, and stock markets can play an important social function. They determine which companies receive capital cheaply and which pay a heavy price for it, determining where factories are built, which retail stores are expanded and where research and development happens…” 

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3) In honour of Rockstar’s current learning unit in school about Geography….. I think. (Not sure about the “honour” part): 17 Powerful Images Showing The Devastating Effects Of Overpopulation.

Tar-rich zone in Alberta, Canada

Extracting coal in Tagebau Hambach strip mine, Germany

Our tech rubbish that usually ends up in a third world country

Geography of Olde was my most-hated subject going into SRP (the government public exam you take aged 15 or 16). To me it was all memorise-which-country-produced-what. Not sure how much application there was, I just remember being grilled and grilled on pure memory work.

(Now, pure mugging – memorising – is really not my strong point. My Sour Grapes response to 3 hour closed book exams (which to me are like the worst thing I will ever do in my life) is WHERE In Life Am I Going To Be Seated At A Desk Where I Can’t Just Google, And Need To Vomit Out Everything I Know In 3 Hours? Now, remembering WHERE to look for what I need quickly, that’s a different story…….)

So anyway I much prefer the way Rockstar is learning his Geography now, all “real-world application”… They even threw in a little reading encouragement – there is an English reader series out there based on the character, “Flat Stanley.” Before Easter break, the kids decorated their own Stanleys (I then took Rockstar’s to be laminated because I had no idea how long FS had to last before we got The Pic Rockstar would choose to apply to his assignment).

Dis Rockstar’s Flat Stanley. In da plastic.

Rockstar did dis. (Yes the “D-uh” shirt was his idea)

Part of the reason being because close to 10 years ago, JD did…

…Dis.

From A Dog’s Beautiful Life…

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4) This just in: Tweeting Grannies is a thing. Here’s one. (Call me a prude however, I think granny or otherwise, no one should dress in just leaves for a gadzillion people on the internet. Or get stoned. No getting stoned. Because if you are out of your tree you are probably not thinking of new ways to Save The World (from global warming and stuff).

(In the interests of full disclosure, my 91 year old grandma had at one point an email account with the name “sublime.” Simply because her initials and maiden Chinese name sound like the word 😀 (she was in her mid-70s btw). I don’t know if she still has it, I should probably check, but I remember in JC being asked what all the lesbian porn spam emails  she was getting was about <major cringe> proving it’s not just our kids we need to protect from stuff on the internet :D)

I rest my case.

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5) Rockstar Skit is …. Wait for it…. Basketcase. :D:D:D

Hangin’ out just shootin’ a couple hoops one evening, the Miss decides to put herself in the hoop…

Why not?

Eschewing otherwise characteristic seriousness, Rockstar decides to join her.

(Admittedly the first time she did this, Rockstar was uh, not happy; he was trying to shoot some hoops and all! Sometimes she’s helpful in encouraging our otherwise too-serious elder offspring to laugh things off. When she’s not driving him absolutely nuts.)

Why not indeed?

And now….

Issa slam dunk!

Good weekend, dears…

(And yes, that is a Minecraft sword on the wall)

Rockstar has not yet come of age to make school Coding Club, but we found this particular external course over the recent Easter break specifically for younger kids (min age 7. No, Rockstar was not the youngest). Why yes, they had class even on the actual public holidays, to the extent I didn’t immediately realise it was a public holiday (which is fine, just I had to double check it wasn’t a typo on the class schedule).

The above pic is of a full class (well actually a bit over full class) on the public holiday. Language spoken: English. Other language spoken: Cantonese. At least, the only other language I overheard was Cantonese. We were told this class is made up of ISF, Victoria and Kellett school kids, with Rockstar making Kennedy School representation so to speak 🙂

What I found mildly amusing however was that walking to class together, I notice at least a couple Angry Birds bags of the freebie variety from Wellcome’s coupon campaign not too long ago. BUT when they get to class, the kids take these really impressive-looking laptops out of their crappy (fine, well-used) bags 😀 (laptops provided for class upon request, but I’m not sure anyone borrowed them. Frankly Rockstar’s school has more than enough good machines, they just did a major upgrade of inventory over Christmas, so I wasn’t really thinking about Rockstar having his own designated machine or not; that first day it was more Ok, Why Not Bring The Laptop He Uses Regularly At Home Just In Case… But……..!).

On Day 1, we’re all looking for the classroom together (did I mention the public holiday?), the kids enter this new classroom for the first time, and without blinking the first thing they do is look for a power source. Then they calmly plug in and open their machines like pros.

That same first day, the 7 year old seated next to Rockstar leaned over, raised his eyebrows and chirped, “You’re not at 100% (charged laptop battery) for class?!” (Way to kiasu ok, didn’t everyone already plug their machines into power sources…) According to Rockstar, there was a lot of throwing jokes around, good natured mouthing off that included ribbing the teacher about how he was “probably like, 50 years old” (he’s 31), and the youngest kid had problems sitting still to complete the later tasks without being repeatedly reminded to stop snooping at everyone else’s screens (i.e. they’re not erm, robots who sit at their screens and don’t move)…

So they’re little kids, except…. they’ve all got these shiny laptops in their Angry Birds bags.

#363/ #46

Me (to Rockstar): So which place did you want to research for your assignment?

(Before Rockstar can respond)

Miss: Nooooo. Stop. Talking. Noooooo.

Me: Fine. You have homework too. Then we start on yours first.
Me (to Miss): What do you want to bring for Show n Tell?

Miss: Umm… umm…

Rockstar: Well? If we stop talking you start talking.

Miss: <straight-faced> Mine-cwaft.

Rockstar: <flinches> Uh-oh… 

Miss: <sweetly> I want to bring Mine-cwaft, Mum-may…

Rockstar: No! You’re not bringing my stuff! What if you break it, what if you lose something?

Me: Erm… What about the little figures, you have some duplicates right? Oh no wait, your duplicates are gross – how am I going to explain to your sister’s school when she shows her classmates Minecraft zombies and zombie pigmen?

<Rockstar snorts>

<pause>

Rockstar: I know! Why don’t you let her take (Polaroid) pictures of all my stuff that she wants to talk about? Then she even gets to use that (instant camera from before Rockstar was born, that I recently found while cleaning up). I’ll take everything out for her to take pictures. Ok, Miss?

<Miss nods>

Me: Shoulda named you Solomon, your Highness.

Rockstar: What, I just don’t want her to lose my stuff. <mutters> I’ll go crazy.

Miss: Yaaaaaay!

Partners In Crime striking an agreement (no, actually sharing a snack)

ps: In the end she’s not bringing Polaroids of Rockstar’s Minecraft Lego etc though… Just said that to yank his chain..