springvale

we don't go there often but springvale's stock is fast rising with my wife. springvale is like footscray. there is a heavily populated vietnamese community there, and like any other vietnamese community you go to, you find abundant of excellant pho eating house, bakeries and asian groceries around.

if west melbournian craves for vietnamese pho, they will head for footscray. and i reckon eastern folks like us will drive to springvale. for us, it is about a 10km drive away. so when we go, we willl like to do a few things at one go.

my impression of springvale is that it is probably a milder version of footscray. it is more family oriented and less crowded. the only reason i said so is because when we were in footscray last december; i was slightly taken aback because two tattoo-ed, thuggish-looking vietnamese kids started leaning against my car and litting up ciggies seconds after i parked it. i have not even gotten out of my car then. i weren't sure how to react but decided to walk away pretending i didn't take notice of them. i was not sure if i would be gunned down if i voiced my displeasure at their antics.

i cannot recalled the pho shop we went to but it is on the main mall, springvale central. there are many other pho shops there but being newbies in the area, we weren't sure which one to patronize. in the end, we took the easy way out. we headed to the pho shop that is most crowded.

when my better half sipped the last drop of the pho soup base, she promptly declared it is the BEST pho she had in australia. and she had her fair share of phos in australia in the years we visited the country. hence, her declaration carried a lot of weight because she doesn't give praise easily. for instance, in all our years of courtship and marriage, not once she called me `hey, good looking' although i have had compliments elsewhere. i also knew at an instance that this shop will enjoy good business because my wife will make it a point to bring all her singapore friends and relatives to this joint. i promptly walked to the cashier and asked the owner if they have those `get 10 stamps, get 1 free pho' booklet like what starbucks or coffeebean joints offer. alas, they did not. and i think they don't need to judging from the queues we see.

we can also get good croissant and buns at springvale. and for us, no trip is complete unless we stock up our fridge with veggies, poultries and fishes.

i discovered springvale also offer probably the cheapest haircut in all of australia. $12 for a trim by vietnamese hair professionals. this will be on my `to do' list in my next trip to springvale. like the pho, i will also look out for the shop with the longest queue.

before and after: a first look

conventional wisdom and comments from friends we had so far are that we will probably `balloon' up once we settle. reasons being? cold weather will trigger increased food intake and also the relatively relaxed lifestyle are the main push factors.

well, i happen to have pictures of my kids snapped 6 months ago and as recently as march 09. let's see if we can conclude after almost 6 months living here....

here are my take using my kids as a reference point (picture on the left is 6 months old):

mingwei, i guess, lost a little weight though he is still on the heavy side. his double chin line diminished in his latest photograph. hooray!


shiqi probably put on some weight despite her tennis and swimming lessons.


shimun probably is fleshier on her cheek as well though she is still thin in appearence.


final verdict? probably too early to tell but the boy did seemed like shedding some weight but the girls are on the up.

cecilia lost weight by the way and i am holding steady. that's because she works too hard being on her own most of the time. for me, since i still travel around often, i can't tell. i do hope by being able to avoid singapore food, i can actually trim down slightly.

let's check back at end of nov 09!

swimming

previously, mingwei and shiqi have swim lessons offered by chongfu primary school. they claimed to be swimmers but the reality is, everytime they took to the pool, they struggle. if i were a lifeguard, i would be half pressed to know if they were actually swimming strugglingly (is there such a word?) or begging to be saved. that's how `good' they are.
so, one of the things that is top on our list when we moved down under is to enrol the children into swim classes. personally, i think it is a great life skill to acquire.
we managed to enrol mingwei and shiqi in but unfortunately shimun couldn't get a spot in as the class in her age group was predictably full. she is on wait list.
every saturday morning, we head to nunawading aqualink centre for their classes. the centre is an impressive roof covered, heated pool with many other facilities. there is also a gym there if you want to sweat it out. however, where we are at where we have great reserves parks, i wonder if there is a need to do the threadmill. it is a lot more refreshing running outdoors.
the lesson lasted barely 40mins but because of the small number of students per group, they get good and personalized attention.
i can see that they improved leaps and bounds after a few lessons.

强风和大雨

talking/writing about the weather is boring. it's a poor conversation starter; however i thought that i'll document this since melbourne is notorious for her unpredictable weather.
this was actually a few weeks ago. we had back-to-back strong winds and `almost' torrential rain. i am not sure if this is unusual given the dry conditions we have been acustomed to in the last few months.
obviously the `heavy' rain pales in comparision to what we get in singapore but it did rained enough for me to fill 3 buckets full of water that i used later to wash the cars and water the plant. it helped refill the 500l rainwater tank outside our place that we use to watering the garden.
(to best enjoy the video, plug in your 5.1 surround speakers into your notebook/desktop and turn up the volume for maximum impact)

vege-garden in the making

we live in an area that used to be an orchard. hence, the soil are naturally fertile. any compliment we get about the `good' state of our garden is scantly justified as we actually did little about the maintainence of our greens. obviously, we inherited these from our landloard, and even she admits do doing little to maintain the garden.

my mum who's staying with us until recently; started her vege-gardening with staples like spring onions, tomatoes, potatoes, melons and chili's. in a few short weeks, we could see the results almost `instantly'. the spring onion sprouted almost overnight and a the tomatoes are also growing in abundance.

for city dwellers like us in the past, it is almost like a small miracle to be able to grow and eat the vegetables we grow. not only we save money, we also get food that are naturally grown, free of any use of chemical/pesticide.

now, if we need spring onion for the dishes my better half whips up, we just run backyards and pull up a bunch we need.

pictures below
a. spring onion we grow on a wooden bucket on our backyard. they are probably easiest to grow.
b. chili plant. no chillies yet but hopefully we will be successful. chillies are expensive here but this is more for my wife since i can't take spicy stuff.
c. tomatoes. they grow willingly and readily and we will probably have more than we need ;-)
d. melon. not sure what kind of melon is this but we bought them and use them for soup. sprinkle some seeds on the ground and here they are now.....

school

school started on 2nd feb for all of them. by all accounts, it has been a plain sailing and a fun experience for all of them.

mingwei and shiqi are in year 6 and 4 respectively. orchard grove primary is 200m away from where we live, so they have the luxury of time. gone are the days of waking up at 6am to catch the school bus to school. here, school starts 9am and ends at 3.30pm. gone also are heavy bags, abundant homework and grumpy faces. they have each been to school camps in the last 2 weeks are they enjoyed them immensely. next week, they will have a 2 week easter break.

i remained their only nemesis in the area of study/homework as i have been stocking up all the assessment books i bought from popular bookstore whenever i am back in singapore. when i am there for good from may 09, i will start cranking up the homework volume. their 6 months honeymoon ends there and then. yes, i am a sadist as far as schoolwork is concerned.

shimun attends parkmore kindergarden 3 times a week. her school hours are shorter, about 3 hours and things also move at a leisurely pace for her.

happy when it rains....

this was a few weeks back in late march, when we were homebound due to a prolonged heavy rain. as the ps2 and wii are not fixed yet, the girls resorted to some good fun of miming to songs.
the props were my stereo set, wii guitar hero replica guitar and the end of my skipping rope which doubles up as a mike.
i was minding my own business but decided to tape this for the fun of it. if they pursue music careers in the future, at least they know where it all began....

flashback #1

while cleaning up some of the data on my pc earlier, i came across some old videos of shimun singing and showing some of her antics. she should be 3+ when this was recorded; so this is her pre-avril lavigne and hannah montana days.