Kason Age Group badminton tournament

This week was the annual Kason badminton tournament held at the Chinese Swimming Club badminton tournament. The competition for this tournament is always fierce, as it's considered one of the most prestigious children's competitions for the sport.

Andre participated in the Boys Singles 11 and under and category. He only managed to get to the second round but what we're pleased about is that his competition performance has improved and he seems more confident on the court. Hopefully it serves as a motivational boost for him.

Here are a couple of video clips of his 2nd round match. He's the one wearing orange.

Combat laser tag with dad

Last Friday evening, Kenneth and Andre went on a combat laser tag adventure. The activity was organised by a fathers' group from Andre's school. This group is part of the Dads for Life initiative, aimed at getting fathers more involved in their children's lives.

Conducted by Combat Skirmish, combat laser tag is a simulation game using infra-red technology. Each gun has a computerised system which indicates how many targets you've hit or killed. It also projects sound and lights when you are "shot". Perfect for active little boys who've always dreamed of being in a war scenario... without actual physical contact.

Here's Andre getting suited up.

There were so many highlights of this activity for him, but one of them has to be this oversized gun.

Testing out the equipment.

Not many pictures of father and son in action. Hard to fiddle with the camera when you're in the midst of battle. Apparently, the two of them were aggressively charging and shooting at their opponents throughout the game. Andre proudly declared to me, "I killed more than 10 people!" Truly an outlet for male testosterone.

According to him, the girls were "hopeless" as they merely huddled behind the trees, waiting to get shot at. Now you know why girls and national service don't mix!

I think it's a fantastic activity that packs a punch. It lets boys live out their war fantasies without any danger, unlike say, paintball. It also allows for great family bonding time or at least father-son bonding time, if your daughters aren't too keen.

Thumbs up!

Leaping lizards!

For the record, I hate house lizards.

Well, I hate all types of lizards but the other kinds don't enter my home uninvited so they don't bother me. Some of you might say, "no big deal, I don't like them either." But you see, I REALLY hate those lizards, ie they terrify me to the point of temporary paralysis. The phobia is so bad that I can't sleep if I know there's one in my bedroom. I'm paranoid that it will crawl on the ceiling and drop on me.

At home, Kenneth is known as the Lizard Killer. There's always a bottle of Baygon (to stun them) and a rolled up newspaper close at hand. He has to be quick cos those darn geckos are trickily fast. He jokes that he should put up a chart chalk-marking the number of lizards he has demolished, as a warning to all their kin.

Don't tell me that killing lizards is a sin as they eat mosquitoes and other insects. I've seen those lizards, most of the time, they're not quick enough to catch the mozzies. Instead, they've adapted to the lazy Singaporean lifestyle by coming out at night to feast on leftover crumbs of food. In other words, totally useless. Don't count on them to eradicate dengue any time soon.

I'm not sure how this phobia came about, I suspect I was traumatised when young. I lived in an HDB flat teeming with lizards and since I slept on a mattress on the floor, I came into close contact with them. I guess it didn't help that my parents merely laughed at my fear. In fact today, I still have a long recurring nightmare that I'm precariously perched on a piece of furniture while the room is swarming with the disgusting reptile.

I'm pretty sure part of the reason for my fear is that lizards simply look grotesque. They're bug-eyed with misshapen heads, and feet that cling creepily onto anything like stubborn blue tack. They even drop body parts at will, for Pete's sake!

We've tried everything from lizard traps to old wives' tales like leaving out lavender, egg shells and pandan leaves (I think the last one is more for roaches though). We've also put gauze over the bathroom window. Don't laugh but in a very extreme measure, we've even taped up our back door (we don't use it lah, obviously) since we discovered it was a major lizard highway to our kitchen.

I'm happy to say for the most part, our home is now generally lizard-free, except for the occasional rogue one. I'm a little apprehensive about moving to a larger place on the ground floor at the end of the year. I'll have to figure out how to lizard-proof it. Meanwhile, I'm keeping the Lizard Killer close to me.

I've got the music in me... maybe

A while back, I blogged about the ordeal that was Andre's Grade 5 theory exam. About that time, we also came to the decision that it was time for Andre's piano lessons to end.

It wasn't an easy decision. I had personally hoped that he would at least take piano lessons till the Grade 5 level (for practical) because before that, I believe it's hard to make a call if the child truly has no interest or if he merely doesn't like to put in the time for practice. I blogged about this philosophy here.

However, over the past year or so, the time pressures on Andre began to take their toll. What with school work, tuition and badminton training, he had hardly any free time left. He would practise the piano only when I nagged him to and at times, he would kick the piano in frustration or burst into tears when he couldn't get a piece right. It became increasingly obvious that something had to go - and piano lessons were at the bottom of the hierarchy.

I was pretty torn over this decision, especially since both Uncle Peter and I realise that Andre actually has an ear for music. But after the last set of tears, for the sake of his own sanity (and mine), I finally surrendered. I allowed Uncle Peter to sign him up for a Grade 4 practical exam, which he took on Tuesday, and that marked the end of this chapter.

I would say it wasn't in vain. For almost 5 years, Andre had some music drummed into him weekly by the wonderful Uncle Peter, who became more than a teacher but also a counsellor and friend. The two of them shared a fantastic relationship, it was common to hear laughter emanating from the room during piano lessons.

And of course, the music. More important than the ability to play the piano, Uncle Peter has managed to make Andre NOT hate music. In fact, when I asked Andre whether he would ever continue his lessons, he surprised me by saying he might take them up again in the future, though with the caveat that there be no exams.

That's good enough for me. Meanwhile, I made sure I recorded Andre playing his Grade 4 exam pieces. This might be the last time I'll ever hear him play anything!

1st piece



2nd piece



3rd piece

The gentle giraffe

Growing up, Lesley-Anne was always a stuffed toy kind of girl. She never was one to play with dolls - her stuffed toys were her childhood companions.

She played masak masak with them (they were definitely more cooperative than her brother) and even dressed them up using scraps of fabric. I'm pretty sure in her mind, they all had distinct characters.

Even up to primary school age, she would still bring along a stuffed toy whenever we went out, often rotating among her favourites so they would get equal excursion time. Fair is fair.

However, one of them in particular, stood the test of time and that was Gerry the giraffe.

It was given to her by my sister when she was practically a new born so it's as almost old as she is. It sparked Lesley-Anne's fascination for the animal and remains a sentimental favourite for her.

She started a giraffe collection and was known by her primary school classmates as the girl who loves giraffes, which is somewhat ironic considering her physique is far from tall and lanky!

Here's a peek at part of the giraffe stuffed toy collection today (there's tons more! We're such hoarders). Bet you never knew there were blue or fat giraffes. I like the one on the far right with the googly eyes - it makes me laugh.

And other giraffe trinkets.

We will be moving house towards the end of the year and as a treat, I ordered a couple of giraffe bookends from ebay for her bookshelves. Aren't they sweet?

But it would be tough to beat the experience she had during our Bangkok family vacation last year. We visited Safari World and she actually came right up close and personal to an entire tower of giraffes, feeding them endless buckets of leaves and bananas. That was truly a highlight.

A Knotty Problem

A scarf for a giraffe
Would be forty feet long
But how would a giraffe
Know how to put one on?

- Patrick Winstanley

Sec 3 subject combinations

This month, the sec 2 students in Lesley-Anne's school have one main thing on their minds - subject combinations for sec 3.

In my time, this was a much easier affair, largely because it was a lot more autocratic. In my school, the top 40 kids would be streamed into triple science, the next 40 sub-science, the next 40 pure arts and the next 40 commerce. Within these classes, the subjects were pretty much fixed. Eg. in the commerce stream, you would take Accounting and Geography.

We didn't really have any say in the matter. I was streamed into triple science but being very clear about my inclination towards the humanities, I requested for a change to the pure arts class. I was treated as a strange animal since I was essentially asking for a "downgrade" (I'm still miffed that even today, the arts is still consistently considered a second rate choice to the sciences). However, the principal herself was arts-inclined and so was sympathetic to my case. On hindsight, it was a good decision as I have no head for the sciences and probably would have performed disastrously.

One thing I thought was odd was that Art was a subject in my class. This always struck me as particularly cruel since there were students who obviously couldn't paint a tree trunk to save their lives, but were forced take it as an O level subject simply because they were allocated that class. For me personally, I loved it. One fewer subject to mug for!

The choice of subject combination today is a lot more democratic. Well, sort of. In Lesley-Anne's school, most subjects are compulsory:

Language arts
Chinese
Maths 1 & 2
Chemistry
One other science (Physics or Biology)
Social Studies

What the kids have to choose is whether they will take an additional science subject (which would make it the triple science stream) or a humanities subject (History, Geography or Literature), making it the humanities stream. Those going to the humanities stream would also need to decide whether Physics or Biology is their second science subject.

Lesley-Anne is most definitely humanities-bound. The question is which humanities and science subjects she will choose. Right now, it's most likely Lit and Biology though things can change, of course.

One of the issues she (and I'm sure many students) grapple with is, whether to take the subject that's easier to score or the one you're more interested in. I have been advising her to follow the latter. What's easy to score usually depends on the individual. For eg, Lesley-Anne's seniors tend to find Physics easier than Biology. But this could also be due to the fact that they're generally strong in Maths, something Lesley-Anne isn't.

She's also unsure whether to take up Lit as she hasn't been doing that well in prose analysis. However, I feel that if you have a keen interest in something, you will tend to be more motivated in it, hence increasing your chances of doing well in it. At the very least, you'll enjoy the learning process. Whereas if you take a subject purely for the sake of scoring, if this backfires, man, you're screwed.

Many students choose subject combinations for pragmatic reasons, eg either the one they think will give them the most options later on at tertiary level or the one that will open up the best careers. This is only my opinion and you are free to disagree with me, but I feel this is a very dated approach. Unless these choices also happen to be the ones you enjoy the most, I don't agree with this reasoning.

The world is a very different place today. Professional degrees are not always the most sought after anymore. In fact, people are carving up new (and lucrative) career paths all the time. The most successful people I know do not necessarily go to the best schools or have the best starts - they're the ones who have pursued their passions in a creative way and founded careers that are aligned with their interests.

And even if you're earning good money, many folks are realising that this is not enough to give them fulfilment in life. Personally, I know a lawyer who became a civil servant, engineers who became insurance agent or sales reps and a business graduate who became a teacher.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that at 15, we probably don't know all the possibilities out there, let alone what we want to do as a career. So unless you're very sure about your life's calling, the safest bet actually is to do what you enjoy. Remember the adage, if you love what you do, you'll never work a day in your life.

Drumming up the Singapore spirit

Every year, the p5 cohort around the island get to attend National Day Parade rehearsals and this year was Andre's turn. Having attended NDP when I was very young, I know it's vastly different from watching it on tv.

However, we hate crowds so have never attempted to bring the kids. So it's great they have a chance to experience this with the school. True enough, Andre wasn't too enthusiastic about the trip at first but he returned from the Marina Barrage all smiles and thrilled by the experience.

Here are some of the photos he took using his handphone.















The goodie bag is a perennial draw - this year, the bag is not bad at all. Made of canvas, pretty handy and tastefully done.

There are four designs - HDB/MRT, the Merlion, Changi Airport and Orchard Road.








Have you displayed your Singapore flag yet? Majulah Singapura!

The Comedy Club takes on the Japanese Occupation

In Andre's Social Studies class, the kids were told to break up into groups, write and enact a scene from the Japanese Occupation. I'm not sure if the teacher mentioned that the skit had to be historically correct but I cracked up when I read the script that Andre's group came up with.

I don't have the full script but the following was a short segment from the skit. Andre was cast as General Percival.


General Yamashita (banging on the door): 'Openupu!'

General Percival (fiddling with the doorknob): 'Hold on, this door is stuck!'

General Yamashita tries to kick the door open. "Ow! Hurry up!'

General Percival (opens the door): "Yes?" (notices Yamashita) "Good heavens!"

After a monologue, General Yamashita drags General Percival to the surrender room. "Do you wish to surrender unconditionally?"

General Percival (mutters): "Yes."

General Yamashita (thrusting a piece of paper into General Percival's hands): "Here, sign this."

General Percival (reads letter): "'Dear Emperor, we are running out of weapons and food. Please give us machine guns, rockets, green tea..' What is...?"

General Yamashita (hastily snatches letter back) "Sorry! Here, this is the one."

General Percival signs the treaty. He then crumples treaty and tosses it at Yamashita.


Apparently, the two boys really hammed it up. Andre put on a dead-pan face and spoke in what he thought was a British accent. I have to commend the teacher for not berating the group for turning the event into a Laurel and Hardy farce.

In fact, after all the groups had presented, the teacher allowed each student to vote for the following awards in a secret ballot: Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Group Performance and Best Script.

Andre's group was voted the Best Group Performance! His best friend aka General Yamashita won Best Actor. Clearly, the kids voted not on historical accuracy but entertainment value.

The teacher gave out 'Oscars' to all the winners which I thought was highly sporting of him.

Some may say this isn't the way to teach Singapore's history but I'm certain the kids will remember this lesson much more clearly (and fondly). And maybe Andre can explore an alternative career in stand-up comedy.

Hey there, Mr Cloud

Lesley-Anne has been learning about weather and climate in geography. Recently, in an effort to make lessons more interesting, the teacher asked the kids to write a short poem about clouds.

It was to be a four-line poem: The first line had to contain the name of the cloud, the second line should compliment the cloud, the third line should be a question to the cloud and the last line, advice to the cloud. There should also be an accompanying photograph of the cloud.

I truly feel for the teacher. She was attempting to break away from the normal routine of dishing out boring facts and do something more engaging. However, this class comprises mainly math and science geeks, and poetry probably ranks somewhere between "housework" and "memorising the phone book" on the kids' 'likes'. So her effects went unappreciated.

When the teacher realised that no one had done the assignment, she gave them five minutes in class to complete it on the spot.

According to Lesley-Anne, this was one of the impromptu creations by her friend:

Dear Mr Puffy
You are very huffy
Why are you so fluffy?
I think you should be happy

Lesley-Anne's contribution wasn't much better:

Dear Cumulonimbus Cloud
You make the sky look fine
Do you know your name is very hard to spell?
Please choose a shorter name next time.

If I were the teacher, I'd just make them go back to memorising the 1001 facts about clouds.

Moving to His tune

This is Lim Tong Hai, ex-captain of the Singapore national football team and current team manager of Geylang United.

You may wonder what he's doing in our living room. No, we don't know him personally and no, Andre didn't win some "Meet A Local Sports Celebrity" contest.

You see, we recently put our place up for sale and have been receiving potential buyers. Lo and behold, one afternoon, Lim Tong Hai turned up to view our home! Kenneth recognised him, being an avid soccer fan. We asked if he would mind having a photo taken with Andre, who was slightly star-struck. If LTH was put off by being in the spotlight while doing a regular activity like house-hunting, he didn't show it. He was super friendly and obliging.

Anyway, I sidetrack - that's not the focus of this post. I wanted to share the circumstances that led to us putting our home for sale because it's a terrific testimony to how God works in our lives.

A couple of months ago, a sudden death in the family threw everything out of whack. Without going into too much detail, we basically needed to find alternative living arrangements for Kenneth's mum.

We felt that moving in to a larger place with her would be too costly and disruptive for everyone, so we decided to find a two-bedroom apartment for her in our condominium estate. This way, she can be close to us and we can walk over to check on her everyday.

Thus began a one-month rigmarole. What we thought would be a straight-forward process (there are more than 1,000 units in our estate, how hard can it be to find an apartment?) became a nightmare. Every night, I would pray with the kids, "Please help us find a nice place for nai nai".

We made 4 offers, put down the 1% cheque twice, even had agents shake our hands to seal the deal, only to have the deal broken at the very last minute for various reasons - outbid twice, 1 suddenly decided not to sell, 1 went into a price war. The situation became so crazy that 2-bedroom apartments in our estate were snapped up at record prices and in record time, often within one weekend of listing.

Kenneth and I started questioning why God wasn't answering our prayers and instead, seemed to be blocking our way. We began wondering if it's because we'd been heading down the wrong path. One Saturday, Kenneth saw that a brand new 4-storey semi-detached house opposite his mum's apartment was holding an open house. We went to take a look just for fun, as we'd seen it being built over the past few months. Turns out, it's a terribly impractical house with a scary price tag, definitely not for us.

An agent approached us and asked for our requirements. Just for the heck of it, we gave our wishlist - 4+1 bedrooms, condo facilities, move-in condition, close to amenities, blah blah blah AND below $x. It sounded ridiculous even in my mind. I half expected the agent to say, "Do you think we're in Disneyland?", but to our surprise, he asked, "oh, have you considered Y? It's a couple of streets away and it meets your requirements."

Our curiosity piqued, of course we had to take a look and the agent arranged for us to view a couple of units in estate Y (I'm not disclosing the name for privacy reasons). It turns out that the layout of the units suits us to a T. There's space for everyone of us, even a bedroom with ensuite for Kenneth's mum. Both Kenneth and I could have our own offices, such luxury! There was a very nice pool and the ambience inside the estate was lovely. It was even walking distance to the MRT, which is such a great bonus since we use the trains extensively. The best part was, the price was within our budget.

We were quite taken with the place but as perpetual skeptics, we were still not entirely convinced that moving to Y was the right thing to do. We continued praying, asking God to show us what to do since we're obviously quite clueless.

That very week on Friday, Kenneth was driving me to a meeting and we decided to stop for lunch first. He turned off to this area which was unusual in itself because it's not one of our regular haunts. As he parked the car along the side of the road, I looked across the road and there, staring me in the face was the large signboard of a shop with exactly the same name and spelling as estate Y! It's uncanny because it's not a name I've seen used anywhere else and it has a very odd spelling. And then I saw that a few outlets down, there was a shop with the name "Ken Home".

The feeling was surreal. I turned to Kenneth and said, "God must think we're pretty stupid, He has to spell it out for us like that." Kenneth added, "well, I did pray for a sign..." Talk about being literal. We took photos of the two signs, to prove they're not figments of our imagination.

As if that's not enough, when Lesley-Anne came home from school that evening, she excitedly recounted a dream she had the night before. She dreamt that she was with a friend and they came to this house she'd never seen before. Her friend asked, "isn't this your home?" to which she replied, "no, I've never been here." Her friend then questioned, "if it isn't your home, why is your Benjamin Bunny sticker on the window?" True enough, it was.

To give a little backgrounder, Lesley-Anne has been the most resistant to moving. She loves our current home and has often declared that she wants to live here forever. The Benjamin Bunny sticker has been on her bedroom window since the day we moved in some 11 years ago (which explains its weathered condition). To her, the dream was a clear message from God that she could make a home elsewhere and be happy there.

After that, we were 100% sold on the idea. I mean, if the Big Guy says this is the way, who are we to argue? We contacted a few agents to view more units at estate Y that very weekend. The last unit we saw was practically perfect for us. One of the few issues we had with this estate was with the maid's room and this unit actually redid the maid's room so that it met our requirements. It had also been recently renovated so that we could move in without doing any heavy work.

We made an offer, the owner accepted it and signed the paperwork within a day. No hiccups, no last minute hitches, everything was smooth sailing.

This whole episode was such a blessing for my family and there were two main things I gained from it:

1) Gratitude: actually overwhelming gratitude. You know, as Christians, our family is probably not the best role model. We sometimes forget to pray, skip church and display ungodly behaviour like yelling at each other more often than we should. Yet, God cares enough about us to painstakingly point us in the right direction, step by step. Amazing love. We sometimes joke, wouldn't it be nice if God could plant neon signs telling us what to do each time. This came pretty close to that.

2) Reassurance: in life, we frequently have doubt, whether we're doing the right thing or making the right choices. In this situation, when we're clear that this is God's will, all doubt or fear is removed. We don't have to second guess whether we should have bought this place or whether we paid the right price for it. Obeying God can never be wrong.

I've found that God doesn't relate to everyone the same way. He speaks to each one of us in the style that best suits us individually. For example, we don't like to take ourselves too seriously and we're uncomfortable with overly pious displays of devotion so we find that God often connects with us with a generous dose of humour. The challenge is adjusting our antennae so we can receive the signal more clearly. Perhaps the solution, like in many other areas in life, is just to listen more attentively.

So, that's the story of why our apartment is for sale. Incidentally, Lim Tong Hai didn't buy it. That would have been another interesting story!

"Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it." - Luke 11:28