even the plants are nice to me......

lately, 2 of my most stubborn plants bloomed.

they have been my greatest adversaries to preventing me from staking my claim of having a pair of `green' hands.

i started growing a variety of plants last year and over time have gotten to be pretty ok about it. i wouldn't claim to be the male equivalent of martha stewart but most of my plants live within their normal life expectancy and i have seen many of them grown and bloom to my satisfaction.

except the 2 orchid plants and the soya bean seeds.

the 2 orchid plants were given to me by my mother and the soya bean seeds are request from my daughter paisley to `make them grow' since given by her teacher.

whenever my mum visits, she would lament at the state of the orchids; black spots on the leaves and not even visible buds. she didn't say in these exact words but `epic failure' is what she has in mind whenever she sees the state of the orchids they are in during her visits. my mother has a full bloom garden in her house and whenever i am at her place, she would never fail to tell me how she rescued some plants on the verge of death and how her orchids she grew bloomed in no time. i can only nod in approval everytime i hear her stories.

paisley gave me some soyabean seeds and told me to grow them. "should be a piece of cake", i told her. soon, we would be grinding soya beans for the milk and have homemade soyabean drinks. unknowingly, i think i raise an unrealistic expectation in her. i think all kids under 10 take their parents seriously. weeks past and nothing happened. it is as if those soya bean seeds have done gone into a prolong sleep. soon, this was forgotten and my daughter did not remember much (to my relief)

imagine my surprise when i look out on a few remaining plants of mine (the good ones were given to my dear 2nd auntie) recently, i notice the soyabean has sprouted greens and the orchid plants began budding furiously.

i was pleasantly taken aback tonight when i popped by the balcony to check the state of these plants. they are blooming beautifully, at least in my eyes since they have been most stubborn in all these times i try to nurture them.

the unfortunate thing was i will not be able to cart them with me, nor my mother or daughter will be able to see the fruits of my labour.

alas, i know that i am no dud gardener after all.

the soyabean long green stalks on the white pot.(top)
my orchids finally brought tears to my eyes.... (bottom)
[pictures taken on 14.november.08 on my nokia n95]



ps. i need to give credit to my wife who helps me water the plants while i was at work. she can take credit to some of my success but as some of you know, plants, like pets, responds well only to their rightful owner. and that would be me.

packing up and out

12/13 november 08 is another milestone for us. the freight company came and pack our stuff that is to be shipped to melbourne.

this has been our one and only home here in singapore and to pack up and then leave in about 10 days is a little sad and unsettling for me. in fact, our kids have already moved to my in-laws' place. and there is every likelyhood that we may never set foot to stay here ever again.

i was a little worried that with all the stuff we have, a 20foot container that we rented may not be big enough, despite assurances from our friendly freight agent, april. the anxiety grew by the hour as the boxes continues to accumulate and it seems like there is always something more to pack and load. the 4 gentlemen who worked with clockwork efficiency couldn't finish it in a day even though they tried.

what's interesting was a lot of dirt was unearth in our apartment when things got packed and i also found a few `lost' items. i realized i am not a stickler of cleaniness as i claim to be.

when the boxes were all stacked up at the end of day one, the box count was in excess of 100. no mean feat by the 4 packers.

day 2 began with more of the same; packing and labelling. this time round, the 20' container arrived and the transfering of the boxes began in earnest so they could make space for more packing up.

i was also a little `kiasu' with my beloved bicycles and i started adding padding to the bikes so their paintwork is protected as well as the delicate parts. the packers were a little bemused by my antics, but i am not going to risk anything.

by 3pm, the last box was loaded and when i checked, the container was filled to the brim. if i have another book to be uploaded, it wouldn't go in. when i signed out the packing list, a total of 158 boxes were recorded! what have i accumulated in the 10 odd years i live here?!?

my consolation is that the $6000 is well spent. i look forward to a safe delivery of our house items in melbourne in 5 weeks.

(more pictures below)

a surreal picture. the items on our living room all boxed up, including the lcd tv.

mounting boxes filling up the hall

the red container that awaits the boxes to be loaded up

almost done. taking a breather as the boxes almost take up the entire container

additional TLC for my beloved bianchi. my pegoretti 8.30am received the same preferential treatment

sign-out sheet numbers 158 boxes in total

when the dust settled, the living room is clean once more, but considerably empty

the one the got away. my rear bose speaker stand managed to dodge the packers. it remained hidden in the store room until it is all too late. now, i need to lug this there myself

one for the road: amoy street food centre

cecilia and i today went down memory lane this morning as we rode my trusty vespa from sembawang to amoy street for breakfast. just like old times, we set off before 7am, brave our `favourite' expressway, cte and ended up in amoy street food centre for breakfast in good time.

amoy street food centre is a significant place for us because we ate breakfast there before and after we got married; and before and after we got kids. must be more than a dozen years.....

as i am a creature of habit, i only frequent 2 stalls there in all my years of eating breakfast at amoy; xiang chang coffee shop(#01-51)for my kopi-o kosong and tian tian cooked food(#01-52) for my fried beehoon. i particularly like the entrepreneurial spirit of the fiesty old lady at tian tian. not only does she cooked a mean and delicious plate of fried bee hoon, she has good memories too. i reckon she must be at least 80 or approaching 80. when i met her today, nothing change. she continues to deftly handle the wok like when i first saw her years back; the same vigour and energy. and when she saw me, the first thing she said was, " oh, you have not come to my stall for a long time already". i felt almost embarrass that she (still) remembers me. of course, i have good reasons of not going there anymore, my workplace is no longer in town and my wife stops working. however today, i can only manage a sheepish smile and acknowledge her good memory.

here's the best part. that plate of beehoon with an egg and a piece of tau-kwa (fried beancurd) still costs me s$1.40, the same when i first buy the beehoon years back. only the coffee price went up 10cents to 60 cents.

so, a full breakfast in town that costs s$2.00, but a priceless trip for me.

ouch! smacked by singtel

i called singtel yesterday to inquire about terminating my mio broadband/landline/mobile phone plan. i got a rude shock when the customer service person told me that it will costs me $600 to terminate my account. there is this service/admin fee, cancellation fee, early termination contract fee, one for the broadband and the other for mobile. i am not sure if there is a magic formula they apply, because the total fees amounts to the same if i were to keep my account until it expires in sept 09.

either way, they win and i lose.

war zone

a couple of days before the freight mover come to pack our items into the container, i have been doing some packing on my own. the more i boxed things in, more and more things appeared. it reached a point where i am not too sure how to pack anymore. our home resembles a war zone, to put it mildly.

i have to admit that i am not one who throw away things easily, a trait i think i inherited from my grandfather. i tend to hoard things, especially my belongings. the extend of the problem is quite serious. for instance, i kept the score/result sheets of the squash tournaments i competed in when in school. i also have all 3 years of my university exam question papers with me. i could go on, but one gets the picture. the problem is, the longer i kept this, the more sentimental values it has, so i have a tough decision on my hand. to throw or to take them overseas?

i hope one does not get a sense of me being a messy guy. my office desk is clutterless and neat. i have a habit of keeping my desk clean when i call it a day. the same with our home. we generally keep it clean. my only weakness are books, bicycles and music cds. thank goodness for mp3, i don't buy cds anymore. i have also cut down on books when i realize that i now have more unread books than books i have read.

the plus is this is a temporary mess. by thursday, normalcy will prevail. our mover delivered a stack of empty carton boxes and other stuff that they will use for packing. i fully entrust them with their professionalism and know how to help me thru this mess.

enduro 2008

i chance on the above when the dahon forum i frequents informed me about this and suggested that we take the challenge riding round island on a folding bike. although i have laid off cycling for a while since i am busy with my preparation to move, i signed up because it would be fun to do a round island on a folding bike and for a good cause too. we were raising funds to support the down syndrome association of singapore. besides, i have done 60km ride on my road bike, so how bad can it be round island on a folding bike? (more about this later)

i got to know this guy called chin yuen (cy) when we were forming the team. cy is an interesting character. he quitted his job a couple of years ago as a teacher pursuing his dreams and ideals that he sees fit. he traveled a fair bit around the world. he typically would bring his dahon folding bike (a dahon vitesse, which i have one too) and see the world on his folding bike. the fact that he got sponsored by the dahon distributor here helps. (you can check out his interesting blog at five to spare ) we spoke about things a little bit and i told him that i am actually leaving singapore in a couple of weeks time. coincidentally, his girlfriend plans to pursue her phd in melbourne and we loosely agreed to meet up if it happens and ride together around beautiful melbourne.

i met the other 2 dahoners later and my immediate reaction was `oh oh....!'. there were 4 of us who will start off the ride and the 3 were fighting fit and looks like they are ready to kick the asphalt. if i had ride consistently, i would not have felt that intimidated. plus my bike is stock parts, while their dahons has superior parts, skinny race tires and all. not least superior rider.

after all the formalities, dr vivian balakrishnan flagged us off. i did well for the first 25km keeping up with the joneses and we reached the 1st pit stop without much fuss. by then the morning sun is beginning to scorch and i know things started going downhill for me when i reached the stretch of jalan buroh. i felt a tinge of pain of my thighs but i pressed on because i was still with a bunch of cyclists and do not want to look like in pain at such early stage of the ride. by this time, the 3 dahon speedy gonzales already left me for dead. i am pretty much on my own soon after.

just before i reached the 3rd pit stop in kranji, the 3 of them were actually waiting for me at a bus-stop. i could tell they have been waiting for quite a while and i felt really bad for them. the idea was to ride to the kranji pit stop together to show some `dahon power'. it was probably another 7km to the stop. i started off well along the straight stretch keeping up with them, but once we turn into the new tee road stretch, my cramps of both thighs started acting up big time now. i had to `drop off' the pack and felt bad. i struggled to the stop and by the time i arrived, the 3 guys were sufficiently rested and ready to go! well, i graciously begged them to go ahead and not wait for me. it would be travesty to ask them to wait for me and then to be left behind again after 300m. in any case, i wanted more time to rest. i also dare not sit down as i am not sure if i am able to stand up (ever) again if i were to. my legs were stiff and i was clearly grimacing. i rubbed the `deep heat' cream to loosen up the muscles. a nice shimano rider to me to drink lots of liquid to keep hydrated and the cramps will go away. i wonder why he hadn't told me 40kms earlier. now, it didn't exactly comes in useful in that hour.

my last leg were plain ugly. i cannot recall exactly but i think i almost black-out once while waiting for the traffic light to turn in my favour. my legs were almost jelly and i keep telling myself to just do `one pedal at a time'.

to complete the loop is a relief. `how about a 2nd loop?'. i almost punch that guy in the face for saying that; if only i could still walk 3 steps to get near him. i couldn't. walk, i.e.

all in all, it is a good experience for me. generous colleagues and friends helped donated more than $500 for the cause.

and next time, i'd make sure i train for such long rides. no more macho delusions from myself.

this is the team dahon during the start of Enduro 08. CY is on the far right.

that's me, before the start. i will spare you the `after' picture.

that's what i called progress!

my wife showed me our youngest daughter's school work a few days ago. what we noticed were not the content of her work, but her attempt to write her own name. looking through the sheets of her work, we noticed how she made good progress in a space of a couple of weeks in her penmenship. shi mun is 4 years old.

bravo! well done, shi mun.


1. dated 22.9. The teacher outlined her name so she can trace it.

2. On the 15/9, her teacher must have encouraged her to attempt her name. It wasn't pretty :-(










3. Back to square one, i.e. tracing the alphabets. (22/9/08)











4. She tries again on the 6/10. Much improved!

5. she is a lot more consistent now. Just need to work on the spacing.