And now I reveal...

Honey finally lent his expertise into our blog, finally, finally, we're almost done with niki blog 2.0! There's still abit of kinks here and there but we're getting there. We truly hope you like the new look of our blog and that you have a swell time visiting.

And now back to construction!

C'ya!

What I Am with Will.I.Am

look who's rubbing shoulders with ernie! me & Niki have listened to it countless times now. and it's just too, too cute have a listen here . who can resist sesame street characters grooving with a super star? love it.

image via sesamestreet.org

Ai Sei Man!

I've been doing some changes to my blog and it's not going so well, I need to do alot of construction and the one with the IT degree (nudge, nudge, honey, you're e/ IT whiz!!) is not helping!! Hmmmpphhh!

So be patient ya, as I iron out the kinks!

C'ya ... off to do mummy duties!

You can take the girl out of the kampung, but never the kampung out of the girl!

Lots of time I can't comprehend my obsession with a certain food, and the food is assam laksa, an old school mate and I actually has a fb conversation over it, which lasted several posts. Even now as I am writing guess what is on my mind, I'm feeling a bit peckish, and it's nearly lunch, can I convince Vicky to eat with me later?

Suffice to say that you can take the girl out of the kampung but never the kampung out of the girl!

On a totally unrelated note/post.

Last weekend, we took Niki to KL, actually I think this is only like the 2nd time we took her to the city. In her mind she thinks that KL is like another state or something, which is geographically correct in actual fact.

So we booked a night's stay in the Concorde, and showed Niki around town, we took her to KLCC, the KL Tower, went around Bukit Bintang, it was so much fun! And I must say the newly refurbished Concorde is really not bad, and the breakfast spread was excellent -- they had nyonya laksa too :) (we are Malaysian, food will always be important, we are very comfortable with this fact!)

However, we found that the roads were in need of a bit of repair, and not fun at all when walking in a pair of platform espadrilles! Do something about it DBKL, afterall it's the city centre and tourists walk it!

Our would be graduate

Two days ago in Niki's Comm book, there was a note from the school that today they'll be having a photo session for this year's graduates in their robes. Students would have to be in school bright and early, per usual for Niki's kindy.

I sent her to school as usual and lo & behold there were a lot of parents there probably feeling the same thing I am, of anticipation and excitement of seeing our offspring in the graduation robes, and so as Teacher Wang suited them up we parents were peeking through the doors and the windows and snapping photos.

There was a sense of parental pride in the air, some parents came armed with cameras that looked like paparazzi types, you know those super duper looking ones with long lenses and built in what not that could even capture a fly in moon, and then there's me armed with my trusty camera phone. Hhhmmpphh, mine takes nice photos too, people!

Anyways back on track, so as Niki's class piled into a line to head over to the school field where chairs were already lined up for the smaller kids to sit, guess who's sitting for sure. While the taller kids stand at the back row. All of children looks so excited, I am too, Niki will soon be completing her four year pre school course :)

Obsession

Niki : Daddy, I like the Lotus, wanna buy it? Please get one

Daddy: I think we need to ask mummy what she thinks.

Niki: I already know what she's going to say, she's going to say "no"

Daddy: Then we better come up with a plan how to get her to say "yes"

Niki: Ok, agreed!

Daddy: Check out the car Niki, do you like it?

Niki: Yes, of course, we can roll down the window and we can get the wind in our face & hair! and Daddy, there's only two seats, poor thing Mummy can't join us!

Daddy: Ya lor.

Mummy: *fumes*

Niki and her father are both car enthusiasts, mummy not so much.

Surprisingly enough Niki and her dad agrees on a lot of things when it comes to fast cars, and has several times tried to strong arm me into agreeing with them that a sports car would look nice in our porch, to which mummy thinks *what??!!??*

Anyways they are still cute when we took a detour to a showroom in PJ for a look-see, can you see them beaming at the car?

To Chinese or Too Chinese

Writing exercises

And so school is out, and I am porting my daughter to office with me, the working mum dilemma so to speak,.

Anyways that's got nothing to do with my post for today, as to pick up where I left off about sending Niki to a private school instead of public school, and so as most of you know she's now heading to a private school come January 2011 for her Primary 1. But one of the criteria her dad and I have is that Mandarin must be a compulsory subject, since she's progressing very well in her chinese medium kindy right now.

It's a "I told you so" and "I should have know better then" situation but it's never too late, I had the opportunity to take up Mandarin during my primary school days but I wasn't serious and instead loads of time I just scrapped through the exam. I didn't care and look where it has gotten me now, I'm a "banana" and it's not something I'm proud of. And so, I feel it's important that Niki takes her Mandarin language classes seriously and I'm proud to say the she's much better a student than I, must have taken after her father in terms of seeing things through, which I thank God for every day!

To us, Mandarin is not only an additional universal language but it teaches the young ones about discipline, consistency, accuracy and diligence, all these are good qualities to be instilled, and even is the usual gripe is "wah, so much homework" ... and this sentence is usually uttered to herself in her thoughts by your truly, never my little one.

Even now for homework she's got another 4 pages to write, and ten words to learn for her spelling, she takes it all in stride. That's why even when she's in Primary 1 we want her to continue with her Mandarin studies.

To us, it's To Chinese, and never Too Chinese.

What a Gem!

on arrival

our villa & the view from it

Vicky, Niki & my in laws

blissful evenings

Niki, soon turning 6!

We had the most wonderful time during our short break to Terengganu last weekend.

First off, Terengganu is overall beautiful, the people there are also pretty warm as was the weather, which made it a perfect beach holiday. On the downside, all of us are at least 4 shades darker than before, and well Niki is hardly recognizable.

Our flight out was super early, and we arrived on the island by 9:15am! Thank goodness our villas were ready, and we were able to check in immediately after gulping down our welcome drinks.

By 9:50am we were already in the water snorkelling, for Niki they had kiddy gear, so she could snorkel too, and apparently saw a clown fish amongst the many, many types of fishies we saw.

The resort which is privately owned had only very few chalets making it really private and not too popular as in the case of Redang.

Gem is actually known as Pulau Gemia, and we could just as easily canoe over to Pulau Kapas, which we did, and we managed to snog (minus Niki & my in laws, of course!) and snorkel there as well :)

And the corals were alive! One night Niki & Vicky even guided a sesat hermit crab back to the sea.

The lushness of the place was breathtaking, it was so unspoilt, so natural and sea smelt salty & the sand was powdery and fine.

We already miss it, and hopefully not too long from now, we can go back again.