Happy Teacher's Day

In celebration of teacher's day this year, I helped you make a pencil holder and bought the stationery to put in as you had requested: 2 markers (in black and blue) and one red pen. This was Mrs. Shanti's present. On top of that, the card was to be yellow paper and I bought an orange envelope to go with it.

For Ms. Fong, you made a heart shape using pyssla beads and then we stuck it to cardboard. The card was green as you had requested and a matching green envelope.

 A simple gift to your teacher, but I'm sure they'll love these presents especially made by you for them.

Evan's Poem

Here's a video of you reciting your poem to us the night before:

What a Mess

Today was the day that you had to recite a poem which you had been working on for over 2 weeks. It was a "Story telling competition" in school.. and well somehow poem was also acceptable. Mrs Shanti had picked the poem for you as the story you wanted to recite was too long.

The day before Mrs Shanti had asked me to dress you in shirt and long pants for the competition. You seemed rather nervous but daddy and I had worked hard to go through it with you and let you overcome your fear, practising and practising and getting you to recite as clearly and confidently as possible. We didn't want you to be frightened and let this be a good practise for you to speak in public with no fear.

So after going through your clothes, we decided on a simple short sleeved shirt with jeans. Well, to us it was "formal" enough. Off we went to school at the usual time. Then on the way you went "cough cough..... uweeekkkk". Oh-kayyy.. you vomited all over nice clothes. Yikes. It was a good thing you had a change of clothes in the school bag, but it was certainly not suited for the poem recital. So we changed in the car, dropped you off in school and after explaining to Mrs Shanti that we'd get you a change of clothes from home, headed home to get something nice for you to wear.

Before we reached home, Mrs Shanti called to ask if you had a bow tie. Of course you do, you wore it for Yvonne Kor-kor's wedding. Wah.. need to wear so formal. So I brought all your clothes.. the works including the shoes. Mrs Choo brought me up to your classroom and Mrs Shanti gave me a room to help you change into the clothes. When we went back to class, your classmates went "Wahh.. Evan Ban wear so nice.." so sweet.

I'm sure the nice clothes also gave you more confidence to present your poem. When we saw you during lunch, you proudly showed me your trophy. Great job, little boy!

Goodbye Sue

How lucky I am to have something that makes saying goodbye so hard. ~Carol Sobieski and Thomas Meehan, Annie

Tuesday which was a public holiday for everyone turned out not to be as expected. At around 5pm, daddy received a call which left us all in shock. Sue Kor-kor had passed away.

How could that be? She's only so young. We were all in shock and we were all worried as to how 5th Chek Kong and Chim Poh would take the loss.

Sue Kor-kor aka Ah Nee Kor-kor was among the first Ben's I met after getting to know daddy. That was so long ago.. 16 years. Wow! We continued to meet up as we all lived not too far apart in Australia while were studying. She's sometimes cook, and wow she was a great cook. And of course we'd meet up in Ipoh or wherever there was a Ban function.

Even all the Chinese New Years she would always be in the kitchen helping out to cut, cook and most importantly to prepare the ingredients for the famous Ban's "longan lychee" drink which was the customary dessert.

It's hard to accept that she would leave us at such a young age. We tried to explain to you that she is no longer with us.. physically, but always in our heart.. but you did not seem to understand it. No matter what you do know that she loved you a lot. Like all your Kor-kors she would buy little things for you and you'd have so many things whenever we meet up. 

Goodbye dear Sue. You'll be missed.

The Italian Way

I love baking. And pizza is one of the easiest thing to make. So one of the Sundays, we decided to have an "Italian Night" which was complete with wine (none for you and me.. ).

Here's the pizza you made for yourself "4 cheese pizza" baking in the oven:

Here's our 4 Cheese pizza which had olives:

On top of that, we had pesto pasta. My first attempt at it. Of course, with it looking so green, you didn't want to try it, preferring your cheesy pizza only.

Ah Ma also made some garlic bread as there was leftover baguette:

I wasn't too sure if Ah Kong could take the pesto and obviously the pizza was out of the question for him, so we also had some ciabatta which we'd bought smoked salmon to go with it.

We also had baked potatoes. What a feast!

Dinner was fun to prepare and I'm glad that everyone enjoyed something from dinner.