Ha, been making it a ritual to go to Malaysia to pump petrol with Papa once a week for the last couple of months, Papa was addicted to the thrill of getting cheap petrol and circumventing the law...one of his greatest triumph - the reserve fuel indicator lighting up
We went to the Changi mangrove with Aunt Valerie. Papa would ask the small munchkin if she wanted to be carried, she would often reply blithely , "Only if you want to."
This little girl was 6 and the baby of the house too, ah the youngest ones were always the spoilt ones. Uncle wanted to go to the hawker centre to eat nasi lemak but his wife said that his daughter would be mad....so he had to go to the air-conditioned cafe to eat ang moh food. haha
Jun did not particularly like the humidity and heat
Checking out insects
Checking out the mudskippers, spiders, crabs, monitor lizards
Us seeing the rest of the group in the cafe, happily eating the fried goreng pisang (they were so good!)
Bye Sophie
Bright, sunny day. Thanks Aunt Val (newly minted MP). Tong's new request is to go at night so he could spot snakes...
Jie was going to China with her classmates! 6-day trip
Jun was really miserable. He even wept.
Jie and her equally ditsy friends...
The kids went to pick up Jie on Fri with Ah Gong. They were bouncing with excitement for the whole day as they really missed Jie. And they knew she would buy presents for them. Ha
Xiaoshen took these two to the playground. How nice to have a playmate.
Another unglam photo of Mei - even doing a split in her sleep
Waigong went for a hernia operation. He wanted to be hale and strong for the trip to Chiang Mai.
Ha she remembered that she had a sunhat
I often gave them a disgusted look when they displayed their love for each other
Oh Mama finished Mei's book! HA. It was hard deciding what to write as Mei did not seem to have a particular liking for something...well, she recently said that she wanted to become a doctor so that she could earn lots of money to buy one of those humongous houses behind Jie's boarding school...Papa came up with the delightful idea of having a book of her wanting to be in different occupations...Mama said we could end off with her wanting to be Daddy's girl and that pleased Daddy greatly, who said he would sponsor the production fees and distribute the book to every single friend. LOL
Picture of her favourite toys having a tea party with her. Bintong and Mimi
The sassy one
Her favourite top and pants - the top had a huge opening at the back and Papa and Tong kept teasing her about it. I thought her future bfs might have some difficulty getting through the two fiercely protective men in her life
We went to watch a soccer match together! Sailors vs a UAE team for the championship in the AFC Champions League Two. Impressive feat to be in the finals. So thrilled for Coach Lee who was the managing person for this team..
It was drizzling but we were seated at the sheltered VIP area as Papa had bought the expensive $50 tickets! He was always spoiling the family by splurging on food, experiences and all the nonsense things that the kids liked to buy but he would scrimp on himself, like he wanted to save on parking fees on the last few days of work, when a whole-day parking would only cost $12 at one of the old buildings near his office! Silly Papa!
Ha, told Jun why he needed to work hard...so he could enjoy a higher quality of life, like this VIP seat experience, skipping the long queue and being ushered right to the seats
the die-hard fans
Opening ceremony
Had a lot of fun cheering for our players and taunting the opponents. We thought the referee was corrupt as he disregarded a lot of obviously foul actions and seemed to favour the opponents. We were seated in front of some enthusiasts who gave hilarious commentary, like "Even my grandmother can see better than you". We had a great time. Mei fell asleep during the match.
Papa saw his friend Uncle King there. He would even fly to London to catch the important matches. Papa was hoping that one day he would be able to do so too. HA
Almost 10000 in attendance. Could you imagine that?
The final score. We were disappointed. But heh, it was still an achievement to be in the finals!
Tong who was not initially interested found it fun and said he would like to go and watch more matches. Jun played games on his phone the whole time so he enjoyed himself too. Heh...to more core memory forming experiences as a family!
Just a random photo on a random day...I know...Papa often said this "RHIP" - Rank had its privileges. Ah, being the youngest in the family had its privileges. We were talking to Uncle Jams over lunch one day about how being the first born was totally tough. Uncle Jams felt it was OK as we learnt to take care of people and it became part of our make-up. Well, when Jie was 6, she was taking care of Jun but this little imp was still being carried around and Mama had to brush her teeth for her every day.
A totally thrilling time at West Coast Park. A public holiday and we went cycling with Eryi's family.
Very expensive to rent one of these family bikes...$50? and it was rather slow...hahahah..
Jun found it too tiring to paddle the go-kart up the slopes so he joined us instead. Luckily, we did not rent a vehicle for everybody as Eryi had wanted to jog and they also brought their bike along, so she paddled with Yanjie and Tong took the single go-kart.
The highlight of the outing - BBQ by the beach
Noticed Jie in the skirt? She intentionally brought the skirt along so that she could take some romantic shots at the beach. Gosh...Papa said she was getting vainer too..and incredibly thick-skinned..LOL
Chef for the day
Youyou gushed about how the fishballs were so much better than the ones sold in his canteen...
We did an AAR for the BBQ and reflected that we needed to bring a big standing light, big pair of scissors etc in future.
tiny pit but amazing fire
a few sotong balls rolled off and Papa threw them into the sea
Celebrated Mother's Day at church. Yay, we went to church without the kids.
The church gifted the mothers with an exquisite tea set!
Gathering at Linear! Papa loved to host...he had this grand plan of moving into a landed home 8 years later when Xun came back from studies. Well, we had been looking around and checking out the prices. Papa liked Suncottages, which were just opposite BPPS! Rather costly and hardly any transactions. He was also in love with Radiance, this set of cluster houses near Beauty World MRT. A little out of our reach pricing wise now...
But the well-trained soldier Papa had a grand game plan. We were going to sell the Potong Pasir HDB flat and buy an investment property to make a tidy profit which would go into the landed house! We heard stories of friends living in landed houses... how family members led their own lives and cooped themselves up in their own rooms and the parents hardly saw them. We liked that the kids were in one room, all intimate and cozy.
Well...we were also bound by logistics limitations as Mei would be in BPPS for 6 years. So 8 years later when Mei was in sec school, we needed not be confined to Bukit Panjang..we could probably buy a house in Kovan. Papa liked hosting so much, so we definitely needed a spacious place, imagine all the cousins bringing their partners and kids in future..haha. It was a flurry of activities that Sunday for us - we went to Malaysia (bought these metal cups there!), went to church, collected the pandan cake from Sinpopo Tangs (ya I got the collection date wrong and the manager graciously still gave it to me! Yay fresh cake for Ah Ma) and then the family gathering!
. Some of them even stayed back to watch soccer matches together. They were watching different matches on different TVs (Daddy proudly proclaimed that was why he needed so many screens at home)..and had a whale of a time.
Ha, I told Papa i wanted to buy this pair of earrings in Japan during our Dec trip. I wanted to buy a second hand pair from one of those branded goods shop. Then just yesterday (1st June), I was telling Papa how my therapist friend's daughter was asking for VCA items instead of gold jewellery for her dowry! Wow, so we needed to save up a lot of money to buy them for the boys' wives? Erm...then Papa said surely we needed to give our daughters jewellery for the wedding too? So four sets of VCA? One set would be some $20000 in current times...what? some $80000? GASP. should I start buying them now, considering the prices raised a couple of hundreds each year?
Ha, the iphone made this collage for me, I thought it was exceptionally cute as it showed Mei's different facades.
Papa was away on some HADC event so we met up with Eryi at the Admiralty Park.
Mummy tried this roller slide too and got my skin on my butt burnt!
We saw this terrifying sight at the park. Somehow, troops of monkeys started gathering. We saw a monkey trying to steal things from a lady's bag just now and how the feisty lady fought back. The monkey had such an indignant and disbelieving look on its face (ya really) when she swung her bag and hit its cheek. It did not cower and kept trying to grab her bag. We thought maybe it issued some distress signal to alert the troops to come to its aid. Eh...no, it seemed like they were attracted to a food source near the playgrounds. Well, a harrowing experience.
Aunt Alicia made this cake and Mama loved it.
Papa taking a photo for his Sembcorp's staff pass...he counted 10 working days left...this week, then we would be off to Chiang Mai (looking forward), and Malaysia with Ah Gong...then just three more days before he took a short 2-day break and he would be starting work on 26 June! A new chapter..We did not know if he would be travelling a lot but we would surely miss him if he did. SAD
Random photo of the kids having fun at Waipo's home. Ah...Family bliss...having doting grandparents and chummy cousins.
Tong went for his first NCC camp! Spotted him coming down the stairs.
Running to find his position
Papa texted the current Chief of Defence to complain that the NCC boys had it so good nowadays... gathering in the sheltered places, getting to go to the escape room as part of the camp experience, no scary night patrols or crazy exercise drills...HA The Chief of Defence was the NCC head some 30 years..how cute...
Well, he said he did not enjoy taking photos at all. He looked like he had only half a life left.
Tong with the best cadet, Wenzhe, who was Papa's soccer friend's son!
Well, he looked all prim and proper, while Tong looked like he just wanted to hurry home. Heh, they went to the escape room this morning and had a leisurely three hour break of roaming around Plaza Sing, eating expensive food and playing on their phones! Ya, they were supposed to be doing rock-climbing but many parents did not sign the indemnity form. Ha, we were glad that Tong was back with us. Our big capybara was home!
Photos taken in 2015. Gosh an entire decade had passed. Where did the time go?
When we were 10 years younger and cooler...Papa said he was still cool..but his jawline had kind of disappeared...LOL
Papa had been in the news recently. Our PM hosted the French president, and there Papa was, standing behind him.
He attended his appointment ceremony recently. his 6th year!
Ah Ma went for the dinner. Papa captioned that this was the photo of Ah Ma and HER STAR.
Then Ah Ma and the three-starred Chief
Haha...and Ah Ma and the two-starred top gun
Heh...Papa really enjoyed donning the uniform...unlike his son...oh well! Now, we had two soldiers in the family...surely not afraid of any evil forces (coz according to Waipo, soldiers, especially high-ranking ones exuded an aura of protection).
Finally done with all the back log. All ready for the Chiang Mai trip!
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