A 60-minute meal

Excited with his previous attempt of dishing up a quick meal, Silver Bullet decided to, once again, race against time to whip up one of the recipes from Jaime’s 30-minute Meals book. He really was quite determined to get it all done in 30-minutes flat.

This time, he chose to make Chicken Piri-Piri, Egg Tarts and some sort of potato dish with feta cheese.They turned out pretty decent, but he had spent more than an hour in the kitchen…just a little more than 30 minutes too long.

You’ve really got to admire that man’s resilience and gullibility. Although, Silver Bullet really earned himself an A for effort.

Anyhooo...here is the recipe for Piri-Piri Chicken:

Ingredients:

• 4 large chicken thighs, skin on and bone in
• 1 red pepper
• 1 yellow pepper
• 6 sprigs of fresh thyme
• 1 red onion
• 4 cloves garlic
• 1-2 bird’s eye chilllies
• 2 tablespoons sweet smoked paprika
• 2 lemons
• 2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
• Large bunch of fresh basil

Method:

1. Turn the oven on to 200 degree Celsius
2. Put the chicken on a chopping board and slash the meat on each one a few times
3. Drizzle with olive oil and season
4. Put on the griddle pan that is heating up, skin side down
5. Cook until golden underneath. Turn the chicken over after 10 minutes
6. While waiting for the chicken to cook: Peel and roughly chop red onion with 4 peeled cloves of garlic separately.
7. Add the chillies, paprika, zest of 2 lemons and juice of 1 lemon to the onion and garlic. Add Worcestershire sauce, a good pinch of salt and pepper, basil and a swig of water. 
8. Blend until smooth. This would make a piri-piri sauce.
9. Pour the piri-piri sauce into a roasting tray. Lay peppers on top and put aside
10. Add the chicken to the roasting tray with sauce. Scatter the sprigs of thyme, and put the tray in the oven for 10 minutes

 Enjoy!

 I’ll post the egg-tart in a separate post.

Happy Friday!

The sight of goofy Daffy Duck brought a smile to my face when I got in to the office this morning:

I have to snigger every time I see such reminder on the last Friday of the month. While it is a nice gesture in support of work-life balance, I can't help but find it almost pathetic such practices is being advocated only once a month. I believe work-life balance is a not a monthly privilege, but rather a right for every employee to embrace in every day of their working life.
 
This has been a long, long week and yes! TGIF.

Pushing thin

My life has been such a bed of roses raising a 3 year old toddler whom by now, is much easier to handle. It gets easier to explain things to her as she understands better. She makes my heart swell. She is such an angel - she is able to articulate her needs better, and she never, ever misbehaves. She is the cutest thing there is.

That, my friends, was in my frickin’ dreams.

And, today just happened to be one of those days where Spud’s week-long defiance is wearing me out. And today is when I felt that when the going gets tough, the tough just wants to run far, far away and not have to deal with a toddler’s ridiculous behaviour. And today, is one of those times in my life when I just want to quit being a mom.

Sigh. If only copping out like that is so easy.

My yelling and screaming at Spud whenever I lose my head with her have been kept in check for quite some time now.Something in me snapped a while back; scared the living daylights out of me and since then convinced myself that I need to get a grip when Spud gets the better of me. I haven’t done that (yell) in months and I have to say that was quite a feat!

Unfortunately, that no-yelling spell was broken as of Monday evening at bedtime. (Hell! I tried.) She behaved alright before that, and just as I closed the door, the little imp decided not to only get in and out of bed while I was undressing to get to the shower, but spoke to me in some gibberish language which she expected me to respond to. I not only have to send her back to bed while I was half naked, I also had to keep asking her what she was trying to say – only to have her repeat a different version of the gibberish to me. Obviously she thought it was a game, but after 10x of trying to be gentle, understanding and empathetic, it was not going anywhere. The more I tried to be patient, the more she pushed me to the brink.I had to yell.

It wasn’t my usual ear piercing yell, but it was loud enough. She immediately stopped, asked me for some water and then she went to bed without a peep.

Today, she upped her ante. She refused to get out of bed. I gave her an option to a) get up and let me shower her together with Squirt, or b) get up a bit later and when I’m done with Squirt, she would have to shower herself. She told me, “later”, closed her door on me and then locked herself from inside.

An (almost) 3 year old closing the door on ME! Isn't it a bit too early for such defiance? ! (Although I think that in all fairness, she didn't realise what she was doing)

It was THE trigger for me to scream the house down. I was boiling mad, but I somehow managed to keep my cool and it took all of my might at that point in time to not get mad. Instead I ignored it and I let her be.

Three minutes passed and I was hoping that she would come out soon after as that’s what she usually does since she likes being showered at the same time. But the little imp didn’t this time. Even after I was done with Squirt, she refused to show up. I had to bang on her door hard to get her to unlock it and literally pulled her to the bathroom. Needless to say, it was a rough start to the morning – we were running late, Squirt was getting impatient, Spud decided to do peek-a-POO (telling me she needed to poo, but didn’t) while I was preparing breakfast and I was all alone.(Silver Bullet was out of town)

It was pure relief the moment I dropped her off at school.

When I came home, the Nanny told me that Spud has been rather defiant. She put herself in the time-out corner whenever she did not want to listen to her Nanny and she jokes around with her.I didn’t want to dwell on that piece of information, and thought that since Spud has been nice to me when I got home, she deserved a little TV time of her favourite cartoon when she finished her milk. That was short-lived – she was mucking about and I had to put the cartoon on pause while waiting for her to drink her milk.

She then sat on the floor, legs apart and put the cup of milk between her calves. She then tried to drink by lowering her entire head to the cup (which I watched in bemusement), and then decided to dunk her hair into the cup (me not so amused!).

I gave her a minute or two to immerse herself in it, but not without reminding her several times to please start drinking her milk whilst I grit my teeth to not get mad. When that didn’t work, I tried positive encouragement with a  "Finish your milk= TV”. By now, I had taken a deep,deep breath to try to not yell as she got more impressed with her milk-dipped hair. Being the fortune teller that comes with motherhood, I foresee that she would topple the full cup of milk over. And lo and behold! Just as I was walking over to remove the cup (with Squirt attached to my hip), she knocked the cup over, spilling all of its contents on the floor.

She then looked up at me with a somewhat apprehensive look, clearly realising that she was about to get into trouble, and probably expecting me to belt out another yell. Instead, I took another set of deep, deep breaths, told her to clean it up and then decreed that because she didn’t listen her TV time was over and it was time for bed.

She didn’t fuss about going to bed, and I had every intention to read her ONE story. But when we got to her room, she hit one of the cats again (another recent habit of hers which we are trying to nip) which got me pretty mad. Something which she KNOWS she is not supposed to do.

I still didn’t yell, but I told her there wasn’t going to be any bedtime story. I then told her rather sternly that I was upset with her, gave her a good night kiss and put her to bed. I wasn’t feeling lovey-dovey.

As I left the hallway, I felt defeated. I didn’t know what to do anymore.

In fact, I felt more detached than attached. All those Gentle Parenting and Attachment Parenting advice I read made me feel like I am being such a crap parent. I’m trying so hard not to yell, but I keep on punishing her when she didn’t listen , I take away all her privileges  when I don’t get what I need from her and it makes me feel like I wasn’t being a good listener and for the life of me, could not understanding her emotional needs or respecting her like Gentle Parenting style suggests.

I am not cut out for this Gentle Parenting crap. I am not a frickin' saint, could never, ever be and my child who looks like the absolute angel in this picture isn't necessary one. When I try the gentle tactic, my child walks all over me! So much for bloody damn gentle parenting.

Damn. I wish toddlers come with a manual.

Sigh.

Maybe, one day, I’ll find this post I have written to be really funny. Maybe I over-reacted and maybe, one day, I can reflect back and think that they are all trivial.Or maybe, I shouldn’t be taking all that I read on Gentle Parenting too seriously. Or maybe I just did the best thing ever for my child so she knows boundaries. Maybe it doesn't even matter 5 years from now.

But today, I felt like crap.I don't know what's the right thing to do anymore, and sometimes I feel like giving up. It scares me that I may screw up as a parent, inevitably screwing up my children’s life and not know till 25 years later.

And that would suck.

And it would have been all my fault.

But I didn't yell. I felt helpless and I did not yell. And at some point, I am sure I would be screaming my head off again.

Ahh...the joy of parenting.

Classic black

A classic pair of black shoes is a must-have in any women's wardrobe.

I love mine in the form of (surprise!surprise!) wedges - which is a pretty hard thing to find these days. Black wedges are versatile. It is perfect for work and can be worn with a dress, pants, skirts and cropped pants.

This one I got has a velvety touch to it on the surface. It is also one of the very few pairs I bought that does not give me any blisters on my first wear.

Cost:  >3,500 baht.

Brand: J.J.B.A

From: Isetan @ Central World Plaza

Related post(s):

Footwear

The haze and App

With the unprecedented smog level making headlines in Singapore since last Friday where PSI Index had hit record breaking levels in history, I, too, fell victim to being PSI-obsessed. My excuse was legit – I was only trying to keep up with the latest situation on behalf of my parents who were monitoring the situation at home while they stayed over with us here in Bangkok for a few days.

On Thursday, I have raided a few pharmacies in search of face masks for my parents to bring home, only to find that they were sold out. (I bet there already have been Singaporeans who beat me to it). I finally managed to get a few at a hardware store. These are hardcore!

By Friday night, I have downloaded a new free app to track Singapore’s PSI in real time. I thought it was quite a neat little app to have (although it gave me a blank white screen for 24 hours after I downloaded it). Read more about the app here.

What is missing though,  is the PM2.5 information – one very vital information that measures fine particulate matter (PM) which is 2.5 micrometers in diameters or smaller – pollutant particles so deadly as it is tiny enough to be inhaled into the bloodstream and the deepest regions of the lung.  A piece of information which I only found out on Saturday night after extensive reading on haze at hazardous level and its impact. An extremely important news for those in authority to tell its people that it is a much more important measure than just by looking at PSI. A measure, in which I felt that those in authority, had downplayed in the first few days of the haze.

It does appear that from the sources I read, there has not been enough education or information on PM 2.5. What I thought was bizarre was that, as soon as the smog subsided, Singaporeans were quick to spend their time outdoors (apparent by what they posted on FB); completely oblivious to the existence of deadly pollutants left behind by the haze.  In fact, even when the haze was at a high 401 (imagine PM 2.5 level! And effectively rendering those surgical masks completely useless!), there was not a decree to allow Singaporeans to head home for the day. I wonder if this is a case of those in authority being completely clueless of what PM 2.5 means, or had they choose to ignore that fact so as not to create unnecessary panic?

[FYI: Singapore’s neighbor, Malaysia, declared a state of emergency as their PSI hit 500+ on Sunday. Given that Singapore is situated pretty close to Malaysia, I found it hard to believe that the PSI index in Singapore had gone down quite considerably on the same day. Wind direction, perhaps? What’s even more appalling was that we have The Minister telling Singaporeans “not to worry”and that “they will take action when the PSI readings soar far beyond the hazardous level”.  I think that means when people in Singapore are literally dropping like flies, and they would action it with conferences, closed door meeting and more talks]

But I digress. I was talking about the app.

I reckon, perhaps, should there be future development to this cool PSI app, the team who developed this could incorporate PM2.5 information as well.

Meanwhile, kudos to the net citizens who cared enough to spread and share information on PM2.5 and, for those who are reading my post today, I hope you manage to find a good mask to keep you and your family filtered from the deadly pollutants.

Coolest World Map

The latest wall graphic has now made its way to our home:

Sticking pretty on one of our walls!

This was an impromptu find – we were just idly browsing the Stik 'em up wall graphic section during one of our recent “us” days when Silver Bullet discovered this little treasure. I thought that at 1,200 baht, it was a little too pricey for my liking, and admittedly, I was quite reluctant to get it at first.

But it was the only one there was, and I while the price had stung a little, it was actually a pretty neat little number.

Those blue stickers there denote all of the places we have been between the both of us. We barely have seen 5% of the world, and I guess this will now serve as a motivation for us to cover more in the time to come.

On a side note,I declare that this is one of the coolest world map I have ever seen!

How the stik'em looked in a package

Related post (s):
Wall Graphics

Gratin dauphinois

The dauphinois is a rich gratin of sliced potatoes and cream. It looks like a difficlut dish to accomplish and it appears that getting the flavours and texture right can be quite tricky.

Come Jaime 30 minutes meal to the rescue - he makes such a complicated looking dish looks easy and rather simple to make!

Ingredients:

• 1 red onion
• 1kg potatoes
• 1 nutmeg
• 2 cloves garlic
• 1x300 ml tub of single cream
• Parmesan cheese
• 2 bay leaves
• Small bunch of thyme
• Olive oil
• Extra virgin olive oil
• Sea salt and black pepper

Method:

• Peel and halve the red onion
• Wash the potatoes and slice in the food processor with the onion
• Tip into a large roasting tray and season
• Grate ¼ nutmeg, crush in 2 unpeeled cloves of garlic and pour in 225ml single cream
• Finely grate over a large handful of Parmesan
• Add bay leaves, pick leaves from a few thyme sprigs and add a good drizzle of olive oil
• Mix and toss everything together, then put the tray over a medium heat.
• Pour in 200ml of boiled water, cover tightly with tin foil and leave on the heat for 10-15 minutes.
• Remove tin foil. Finely grate over a layer of Parmesan
• Drizzle the remaining thyme sprigs with oil, scatter on top and put into the over.
• Cook for 15 minutes or until golden brown and bubbling

This is a really yummy dish. It is very rich too, and I reckon not something to be made everyday.

It's all a blur

Life has been a great big blur in Singapore in the last few days. Literally.

Here are some of the snapshots I nicked off from some of my friends who have uploaded what they saw from outside their windows this morning:

A view from a neighbourhood. Source: GeraldC.

View of Marina Barrage. Source: RossKhoo

View from an expressway. Source: HYS

View from Springleaf Tower. Source: Mars

The haze which has been engulfing the entire of tiny Singapore was caused by illegal forest fires in Indonesia’s Sumatra Island. While it is an annual occurrence when big companies and small farmers slash and burn these lands to make way for plantations in lieu of the land clearing season,  this has been, by far the worst air pollution ever happened.

As of this morning (04:00 GMT), The Singapore’s pollution standards index (PSI) reached 401 – the highest in Singapore’s history. This surpasses the pollution level in Beijing (China), the most polluted city in the world! How very scary is that?

Source: /twitter.com/BeijingAir

For those not familiar with PSI readings, the breakdown is as follows:

• 0-50 Good
• 51-100 Moderate
• 101-200 Unhealthy
• 201-300 Very unhealthy
• +300 Hazardous

Singapore has officially surpassed the hazardous level by now, and in the last few days, have already exceeded the peak of 226 when the last smog happened in 1997.

Even though that was quite a while ago, I still recalled those hazey days quite distinctly. I remember walking out of the office into smog of nothingness. The visibility was quite poor and the stench from the forest fire a thousand kilometers away  was overwhelming. I remember my mother being worried for us when we had to spend a lot of time out of home.  She would, without fail, sent me text messages reminding me to “please stay indoors and don’t stay outside if not necessary” when I was away at work. The offices remained open, and the government did what they do best – give speeches and tell their people to stay indoors.

I know that there is nothing that can be done to put out the fires immediately. However,  with PSI level going off the charts and Singapore being in a situation which “could last for weeks”, I cannot believe that the people in authority have not done anything much about it . In fact, their stance was (and still is!) continuing to “urge people to remain indoors and take care”. No emergency public holiday declared for the day, putting the working people  at the mercy of their employers who may or may not tell employees that they should or could go home. WTF?! Oh, really?

Oh right. I forget that you can be pretty heartless. After all, if everything shuts down, it will have a massive impact on the economy. Just can’t let that happen, can you. But of course I understand where you are coming from.  Making money is the most important thing. Sure. Allow that masks to be sold to every Singaporean at a very inflated rate. Everyone can afford it. No wait. What did you say? Sold out? Oh never mind. Just stay indoors. Make sure you use something to cover up your nose when you go to work. Even a tissue paper will do. “We will get through this together”.

OK. I HAD to rant. But, you should know that I.AM.BLOODY.ROLLING.MY.EYEBALLS. by now.

This is a terrible thing to happen. I would really hate to see my parents (who are currently visiting us this weekend) are going back to the hazardous smog in Singapore. It kills me to think how terrible it would be for people (especially those with respiratory problems, pregnant women, old folks and young children) and helpless animals that would have to suffer for something that was done by some inconsiderate people.

I hope everyone in Singapore is taking the necessary precautions, and hoping that there will be some rain to ease the smog away.

This is really one huge fire to fight.

Articles can be found here, here and here.

Father-Daughter

This one puts a lump in my throat...and I guess for any fathers out there, their daughter will always be their little babies.



Wonder if Spud would be lucky enough to get a brand new, spanky VW when she gets to that age! :p

Quote of the day

Stumbled upon this recently and I reckon that this is not something the average person would think about:

It's thought provoking and exactly the reason why discrimination should not be condoned.

Calvin & Hobbes: Life Lessons

Every now and then, I'll put up comic strips from Calvin and Hobbes on my blog just because I loved what I read on that day. And this is of no surprise - I've always loved Calvin and Hobbes! I remembered being utterly pissed when I realized that the Calvin & Hobbes gadget on the side bar of my blog had some copyright issues and was taken off the blogger's gadget a few years back. (It's still not back on!)

There's just something about Bill Waterson's sense of humour into the characters that makes it special, especially since his "inner voices" are coming from the mind of a precocious 6-year old child (and a stuffed tiger). Most are downright hilarious, and most of the quotes, epic!

I always wondered how Bill Waterson do that...putting himself in the mind of a child, while making a six year old sound too intelligent for his own good, being wise in varied ways in an adult-like sense, yet allowing the child to be a child with such vivid, colourful and amazing imagination.

Recently,  a nicely written article on "10 Life Lessons from Calvin and Hobbes has gone viral". I love the way the writer puts it all down, and I found myself reflecting on what she wrote simply because it is all true!

Every point she made is valid, and I found these few to be the most inspiring of them all as they speak to me the most:

1. Make your own rules

 As she puts it, life doesn't make sense - and sometimes, all you need to do is embrace the insanity. Making your own rules is the way to go.

2. Embrace your weirdness

 Being the introvert and a social misfit that I am, I feel very connected to this one. Like I said before, being weird and different from everyone else is not a bad thing. My life has so far been fun that way. have you seen the people I hang out with? They make me feel normal!

3. Perception is reality

I like what she said about : "When it comes to dealing with people, everything's easier when you remember that a person’s entire world is based on their perception of reality. Therefore, their perception is their reality, no matter how objective they try (or don’t try) to be" This is all so true. 

4. Most important things you learn aren't from school

  Oh! How true. I don't think the education system in Singapore has ever taught me how to deal with bitches and bullies at the workplace.

5. There's treasure everywhere! Go explore!

The journey of parenthood taught me to see things in a different light. It might be useless plastic bottles to you, but to a 2 year old child, there is no limit to his/her imagination of what it can be.

Original article can be found here.

Poo and Food

While browsing through the bookshelves at one of the major bookstore here, I sauntered over to the cookery section and stumbled upon this:

I'm sure she's an amazing cook and all, but I thought it must have been the weirdest title for a cook book ever! I thought I was done writing about a poo-book.

Related post(s):
Thais and nicknames
Thai names

Eavesdropping Spud

The comments in Spud’s daily journal written by her Homeroom teacher the other day left me scratching my head. The last sentence left me a little confused, and I thought I should speak to her teacher to understand what had really happened when I dropped her off the next day. I did not see any cuts or bruises on Spud when I tucked her in bed that evening.

I think her Homeroom teacher had the same plan, for when I got to the school, her teacher was ready to explain to me what had happened.  She explained that Spud was sitting all by herself in the classroom while waiting for the school bus. All of a sudden, she fell off the bench (or chair) that she was sitting on and hit head on the corner of a cupboard nearby. Being the clutz that Spud usually is, I am not surprised and I told the teacher so. And this is where it got interesting.

The story told by her teacher went like this:

Right after she fell off and hit herself, Spud had apparently gotten very upset. She cried quite hard, and as her teacher attended to her, Spud was wailing her guts out with a, “I fell down like Humpty Dumpteeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!”

Oh boy. How I guffawed! Spud who was standing next to me while her Homeroom teacher was relating the story started laughing as well. With a big, cheeky grin on her face, she then promptly repeated that she “had fallen like Humpty Dumpty yesterday”. Still laughing away, I then teased her if she could be put back together again; to which she promptly replied with a yes.

Laughing as heartily as I was, her teacher then said that they sing the Humpty Dumpty song every day, and Spud always enjoys the singing and dancing session. It then occurred to me that perhaps, just perhaps, Spud must have played the whole Humpty Dumpty song in her head (action and all) as she was sitting idly on the bench while pretending to be Humpty Dumpty.

Of course, that was only my theory, but it is exactly stories like that makes my day. If only I can see what actually goes on in that pretty, toddler head of her!

Mustard chicken

A recipe which Silver Bullet attempted not too long ago from Jamie's 30 minute meal.

Ingredients:

• A few sprigs of fresh rosemary
• 4x180g chicken breasts
• 4 teaspoons Coleman’s mustard powder
• 3 baby leeks
• 4 cloves garlic
• 75ml single cream (taken from cream dauphinoise)
• 1 heaped teaspoon wholegrain mustard 

Method:

• Turn the heat under the frying pan up to medium
• Pick and finely chop the leaves from the rosemary sprigs and sprinkle them into the pack of the chicken
• Sprinkle 1 teaspoon of mustard powder over each chicken breat, then season and drizzle some olive oil over the chicken and into the frying pan
• Massage and rub these flavours all over the meat
• Press down the chicken to help it to cook. It should take about 18 minutes
• Crush 4 unpeeled cloves of garlic in the pan of chicken
• Flip the chicken breasts skin side up, then press down again
• Stir the leeks
• Check the chicken is cooked through, then pour 75ml of cream into the frying pan
• Cover the pan with tin foil
• Turn the heat off.
• Transfer the chicken breasts to a board and slice into pieces
• Stir 1 heaped teaspoon of wholegrain mustard into sauce
• Spoon the sauce on to a platter and put the sliced chicken on top. 
• Drizzle some virgin olive oil and serve

The Gratin Dauphinoise recipe will be posted up in a few days!

Fearless Spud

It was my turn in the pool for a Sunday make-up swimming class and I remember the moment clearly. 

After asking Spud if she wanted to dive in to pick up the toy at the bottom of the pool a shot, while fully expecting her to say “No,”, Spud surprised me by giving me a nod. She then stood with her knees on the edge, confidently raised both hands to the front of her head, made a dive and as I gently gave her a little push downwards, she eased herself to the bottom of the pool, picked up a sunken toy, swam back-up and gave me her biggest smile ever. 

She was beyond proud of herself – the sparkle in her eyes and her contagious grins right after she bobbed out of the water convinced me so.

And I was beaming with joy. 

I was smiling and laughing and telling her how cool that was and that she has done it! I didn’t have to ask, for as soon as she realised how fun that was for her, she wanted to do it again on her own accord.

And again.

And again.

And again.

She must have done it no less than 5x continuously. She was fearless.

She loved diving in to fetch the toy at the bottom of the pool so much that she created a small ruckus when her session was up. She really did not want to go (and I wasn’t beaming with joy so much at that!)

Coaxing Spud to give it a go like that has never been easy. In fact, it has taken us months of periodic coaxing to convince her to pick up a toy at the bottom of the pool whenever we take her to her swimming class every weekend.  

Her answer has always been a standard “No,” and even if the toys were placed on one of the shallower steps in which she would be required to do a small dunking in, she had, for quite a while, refused to negotiate herself into it; sometimes preferring to pick it up with her feet instead (!).

And then suddenly, just like that, Spud decided that she was going to swim to the bottom of the pool after months of refusing to even bother with it.

I guess this was just a classic case of she’s ready when she’s ready.

The most amazing thing for me really is the fact that she is doing things that I don’t (or can’t) even do and she does it at so much ease. When she had made up her mind, there was no moment of hesitation and whatever doubts she had months ago had probably dissipated because she felt safe and she KNOWS she is safe.  

It is an incredible feeling to witness that first hand. And, even though this happened more than a week ago, I still beam with joy just thinking about it.

Me proud.proud.proud.

That's Spud floating on the surface while trying to get to the bottom

The Who-Poop-on-my-head –book

This book probably holds the world’s record for having one of the longest titles in the world of children’s book:

Over een kleine mol die wil weten wie er op zijn kop gepoept heft

Literally translated as: About a little mole who wants to know who pooped on his head.

How crazy-weird is that?!

I have to say that when I first heard the gist of the story, I got a little bit weirded out.  I thought that the story seems a little too strange to be read to a 2.5 year old, but I couldn’t help but thought that the story seems funny at the same time. I guess there must be some unexplainable “normal” Dutch humour on the subject of poop on the head.

But I digress.

The story goes about a mole, and whilst sleeping, felt something dropped on his head. He then sets out to find out who crapped on him. He asked every animal he saw if they each has pooped on his head, but the animals in question pleads their innocence and proceeded to take a dump right there and then to convince him that they were not the culprit. And every page was illustrated with the animals taking a dump, along with the texture of the crap they created.Mr Poopy Head got frustrated and finally, with the help of some shit experts, Little Mole gets his revenge .

In short, the book is really about shit as it describes the type of shits and texture and everything and who shat on the mole’s head. A couple of cases in point:

Talk about the author of children’s book making money out of a shit story.

The most important thing is that Spud enjoys the story tremendously and, thanks to my mother-in-law, I now know about animals’ poop than I would ever have otherwise. I guess this is one of those Dutch humour I didn't come to expect when I married Silver Bullet.

My take on this is that even thought I thought that the book is kind of weird at first, I do see the humour in it. It was all in good fun.

Squirt's post birthday

A week late, but better than never!

We had a few friends over for brunch/lunch, couldn't be bothered to buy him birthday cake and bought some cupcakes instead. But, Squirt (us) got lucky; the staff from our apartment building gave him a really nice strawberry-covered cake as his birthday cake and everyone loved it! We even forgot to take any pictures from our little party at home.

Squirt enjoyed playing with the strings on one of his presents and this Buzz Light Year car is a hit not only with the birthday boy, but with Spud as well.

Here are a few pictures from the aftermath of Squirt's little birthday celebration we had at home last weekend.

These moments are so precious. The smiles, the giggles, the laughter... it is such a joy to see them so happy playing and laughing together. 

Oh! And Squirt finally has A tooth sprouting. About bloody time. 

Babies and cardboard boxes

Letting a baby sleep in cardboard boxes as their first bed is not something I have heard of in this part of the world. And granted, if I take that statement at face value, it almost sounds downright cruel.

But, a Finnish friend of mine shared an article recently, and I am absolutely enlightened by it.

For the last 75 years, all expectant mothers in Finland are provided with a box in the form of a starter kit by the state. They include really useful items like clothes, nappies, bedding and mattress. With the mattress at the bottom of the box, it instantly becomes a make-shift bed for the newborn. I am instantly drawn to what the article said, "It's designed to give all children in Finland, no matter what background they are from, an equal start in life."

I find it heart-warming that the Finnish government provides such thoughtful aid to its people. This is not about the box being the baby's first bed, but rather what that box represents in easing up the stress for new parents, especially if it is something which they can't easily afford.

Maybe I'm naive, but I thought this is one of the better welfare systems I have heard since sliced bread. It sounds like a genuine extension of help to provide for its people.

I guess I will be looking at cardboard boxes in a different light now.

 Original article can be found here.

An encounter with a S'porean mom

Selling off old baby stuff or baby-related items which we don’t have any more use for as the kids have outgrew them, has been a recent mission of mine. They may be used, but all were kept in good and still-very-usable conditions.

Following the scare I did myself in when I sold the baby cot last time, I became a little bit more mindful this time offering to meet potential buyers at the nearest BTS station or just making sure that Silver Bullet is home should they want to view the product first.

Most of my buyers seemed like nice and reasonable people. A couple of them sounded weird, a handful was nice and the one who bought my breast pump were the sweetest of them all. But there was one buyer whom I thought was a tad arrogant. Her authoritative tone was a little misplaced, and I thought she bordered on being rude. She inquired about the bouncer and the conversation went like this:

(Me - in my head: What do you effing mean you don't have time? You think I have the whole time in the world?)

I had to take a long, deep breath  when I read that and was wrecking my brains real hard to craft a reply as politely as I could before I replied to her message several hours later...

Then, the next day:

So we dropped off the bouncer at her place. We waited around for more than 5 minutes, and when she finally made her grand entrance, she emanated the feeling that she was “oh-so-busy” and that our presence had more than inconvenienced her.
I shrugged whatever feelings I had aside. Besides, I only wanted to sell off the bouncer and it was not my place to be judgmental. She was cold – there were no smiles, no name re- introductions, no shaking of hands. When I had her on the phone earlier to ask for directions, I thought she sounded sneakily Singaporean. I ignored her unfriendliness and proceeded to explain to her how the bouncer works.  I even made some small talks while she inspected the bouncer, but I guess she wasn’t too keen on making any. With curiosity getting the better of me, I hazard a question of her origins.  I could sense her pride when she confirmed that she is a Singaporean. (hah!)

Satisfied with her inspection, she then handed over the money to me and then said curtly, “Keep the 30 baht”. She then quickly picked up the bouncer and turned away; again exuding the feeling that we really were inconveniencing her.

The mere 30 baht of pittance “delivery fee” thrown at me felt like an insult; a-slap-in-the-face.  I may have misread her or her tone from the text messages, but her demanding and authoritative tone she pulled on me was uncalled for. And, when I met her, I thought her arrogance was a little bit misplaced.  Did she, for one second think that if she would be shopping at a mall, the goods that SHE wanted would have come walking to her with a snap of her fingers?

There and then, I decided that I don't want to have anything to do with her beyond that.

A few days on, Silver Bullet found a small cushion that had come with the bouncer; something which we had accidentally missed out. I was in two-minds to want to contact her again. I guess, I could have just ignored it, but the good in me thought that since I had intended to sell all of it, letting her know was the right thing to do.  Besides, I didn’t really want to write her off as another “one of those” Singaporeans. As soon as she replied, I regretted my decision.

I thought the way replied with “Yes I know that” sounded as if she thought I had deliberately ripped her off.  Again, I may have just misconstrued the SMS message. I dismissed all thoughts and spent an additional 70 baht to get a messenger to deliver it to her at her apartment the next day. I didn’t get as much as an acknowledgement that she received it, let alone a simple “thanks”.

I have since come to a conclusion that *most* expat Singaporeans I met in Bangkok can be quite arrogant and bordering on rude. I don’t encounter many of them, but the few that I have met makes me want to run far, far away from them. They exude the feeling that they are so above you, and you are nothing but an inconvenience to their lives. They behave like the entitled elitist.  They have got their noses high up in the air, and their attitude, supercilious.  It might just be them making a statement of who they are, but those are the very traits I find extremely repulsive.

Just out of fun, I’ll tell a little story of the very few Singaporeans compatriots I encountered in the last few years since I have been living in Bangkok .

Watch this space -  I think it might make for an interesting read!