Bye opa and oma!

Sera and Yasmin's opa and oma have returned to Holland after spending two weeks with us. Sera seems to understand that oma, opa and grandma visit a few times a year and eventually, leave. The guest room in our house is, understood by her, as theirs. When they're not here, she tries every night to sleep in the guest room. Initially, we would encourage her to sleep in her own room with Yas, but nowadays, we let her sneak into the guest room. One, Johan and I are too tired in the night to have a bed 'tussle' with her, and second, we've come to realise that she may simply take comfort in sleeping in 'their' bed when they're not here (and believe me, she sleeps through the night in 'their' bed).

So, this morning, with their opa and oma's departure came the usual quiet acceptance from Sera. Yassy, on the other hand, has been very confused the whole morning. She went onto the balcony and kept calling out for opa and oma, waiting for them to appear. I asked her casually where they were and she said, "in school". She cuts up her wooden birthday cake, wanting to give opa and oma a slice, as she has been doing on a daily basis. Ahhh, my poor Yassy, it breaks my heart that she has to deal with goodbyes.

Nevertheless, the girls had a good time these past two weeks and no thanks to my camera, THE camera, I have no photos. But thanks to their opa and oma, I have some cute photos from their time here. Enjoy!

The girls on their way to school

Yas gets to play at the playground while Sera goes into her classroom

This is a typical Yas move - throws down the scooter, pouts and grumbles all the way home

The girls went bird watching with opa

They did lots of swimming


Sera practising her jumping in

And she's beginning to swim without her noodle ... but I have to say, she has the funniest swim ever. I call it the 'otter swim', her whole body, including her head, moves in an 'S' shape-movement

Yas just chilling out as usual

Her 'monkey' antics

Reading time ... always a big thing with the girls

Earth Day at Children's Garden. The school had encouraged green or home-made recycled clothes ... hmm, I just painted a tree, a cloud, a leaf and a flower, with non-toxic face paint on Sera.

Yas on the carousel, and she stayed on for several rounds

Opa and oma's birthday dinner at Cucina

Our weekend at Ras Al Kaimah, Hilton Spa resort

Yas and oma relaxing in the saltwater pool.

Happy Birthday oma and opa

With oma and opa's arrival, came the birthday celebrations. And everyone knows how Sera loves a birthday. And two birthdays meant ... yes, two birthday cakes and that surely got Sera and Yasmin all excited.

Evening of oma's birthday, we had a little girls' night in, while the boys went out

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Dinner at Cucina on opa's birthday. Yas and that crazy smile of hers

The only time Sera stops talking is when she's eating ice cream ... I am not kidding.

All smiles for oma and opa

The birthday card Sera gave oma ... and that's oma and opa on it

Craft time!

Johan and I play differently with the girls. He likes to play football, 'toss them' around in the swimming pool, go down the slide or up on the swing with them, be a human playground for them ... it's horseplay. He's the more active player and enjoy teaching them things like riding a bicycle for instance. I, on the other hand, am the more passive player. I let them indulge and be messy with paint, dough, water, beading, cutting, pretend play ... ahem, the more creative aspects. 'wink'.

Anyway, this morning, I suggested he did something different with them, something crafty. He did look at me with some trepidation but in the end conceded with a good amount of gusto. It was 3 simple steps really - mix the plaster, pour plaster into moulds, and then paint them. I thought I could leave them while I snucked out for a while but nah, it wasn't possible. It was,

"What! I have to read an instruction sheet?!!!!!"
"I need a mixing bowl."
"Baby, can you get me 60ml of water?",
"I need a wet cloth ... "
"Do we have more paint brushes?"
"Yasmin don't touch the plaster!!!"
"Yasmin, don't eat the plaster!!!!"

Ahh, in the end, I stayed put to mix, mould and paint with them. And I'm glad I did, because it was good fun!

Guess what he's doing ... ?

Mixing the plaster, very precisely ... hee hee

Sera painted everything in her trademark 'rainbow' colours

Yas painting her seahorse

Eggs, eggs and one scary bunny

Sera has this friend from kindergarten, whose parents throw the most fun parties. I mean, they really go all out, be it birthdays, Halloween and this , the Easter egg hunt. We were invited to join in the egg hunt at their big garden, paint eggs and dive into some typical Austrian fare.

Needless to say, the girls had a very good time at the Easter party. Yasmin, was her mischievous self, snooping around and collecting the eggs before the hunt started, squishing the waiting-to-be-painted hard-boiled eggs and stuffing her face with too many chocolate eggs. The only thing that got her all quiet and plastered to me was when the Easter bunny made his appearance. ha ha. Well, I would be terrified if I were her. 'wink'

Sera hugging the bunny, almost unbelievable! She took a very long while but eventually took a brave step towards him, only because the other kids seem to be thrilled???

another hug ...

And another one, this time intruding on a family photo of our gracious hosts

That's me with a terrified Yasmin.

Chilling with Sophia after the egg hunt

April One

This morning, when the girls and I were walking to the pool for an early swim, it was easy to notice how the courtyard garden looked and smelt different. The trees now have tender new leaves and the flowers seemed to have bloomed overnight. It's Spring for sure and I'm looking forward to it, just because last month felt dreary, filled with uncertainties, a bout of sickness and some melancholy . Even the trees looked sad with its naked branches. So this month, I'm feeling more positive despite the impending finality of our stay here. But from now till we leave, we're going to look forward to a few things - Easter, birthdays, opa and oma's visit, the remaining weeks of nice weather, Sera's final semester in nursery (awww, she's growing up too fast!), spending time with friends ... and maybe, if we get ourselves organized, camping in the desert.

Yas in a ridiculously cute 'tu-tu' swim suit from Evan. Girls posing for me before heading to the pool.

Animal Sanctuary

In a far flung corner of Dubai, there is a little sanctuary that shelters rescued and abandoned animals. From what I recognised and could identify, there was a lone sloth, a spider monkey, two llamas, three cows, a donkey, a pony, ferrets, guinea pigs, mice, tortoises, an aviary of birds, two flamingoes, a porcupine ... a mishmash of animals.

The girls and I visited it on Friday morning, and we had a surprising good time. My two little urbanites were as expected, a little apprehensive at first but Sera was eager to hold the baby tortoise in her hands. It honoured her with a little pee, to which she whispered worriedly, "Mama, he pee pee-ed on my hands ... " and Yas horrified me when she flung the baby tortoise back into the little pen. Hmm, a 'good' start into the visit. The sanctuary keepers provided us with little pails of corn, lettuce and peanuts to feed the animals, which I mostly did while the girls watched. We stayed till noon, had a little snack ourselves and drove back home. And of course, all the way home, Sera was talking about the animals especially the baby tortoise that pee-ed on her hand ... "mama, it was sooooooo warm!"

The infamous baby tortoise

Mingling with a family of ducks, chickens and flamingoes


New born rabbits

Llamas

Feeding the pony lettuce

And the only untouchable animal - the porcupine

Sera-ism

Television ...
I have this pact with Sera and her TV consumption. She gets to watch TV when Yasmin takes her nap. Other than that, I really prefer that the girls play together or they can each do their own things, but just not in front of the TV. So, we're driving home one early afternoon and Yasmin was falling asleep. Sera got very excited because that meant she could get some TV time when we got home. But the problem was Sera was also very tired ... and being in the car definitely didn't help. I catch her in my rear mirror and she is fluttering her eyelashes rapidly. It was almost comical.

"Sera, if you're tired, just close your eyes ... mama will wake you up when we reach home."

Her dead-panned response totally caught me off guard ...

"No mama, I'm not tired. It's just that the car is very dusty and I have to flutter my eyelashes."

Stunned. And I couldn't help but laugh out loud.

'Rudy who?'
I found out a few weeks ago about Rudy, Sera's friend ... that is, her imaginary friend. Rudy is beside her when she was reading. Rudy is a guest at her picnics. Rudy even goes to bed with her. Rudy is everywhere.Finally, I decided to ask her about Rudy.

"Sera, who is Rudy?"
"Oh Rudy is my friend."
"I see, can you tell me more about Rudy?"
"Rudy is from Germany, he has long black hair and red eyes."
"RED EYES?" (sound a bit vampire-ish???)
"Yes, but now he's in Singapore."

Red eyes ... ??? Ahhh, the beauty of kids and their imagination.

33 today!

This is how 16 March began for me ...

2.45AM - Johan and I are awaken by Sera's cries. Johan stumbles out of bed and finds his way, in the dark, to her room. Takes her out from her bedroom, into the guest room. She doesn't stop. I amble my way into the guest room and check her temperature. She did go to bed with a cold and a cough, so she must have been feeling uncomfortable, congested. I give her some cough syrup and tuck her into bed again. I climb back into bed ... quite awake by then.

Johan, I think, wished me 'Happy Birthday' and I may have grunted something incoherent? He then complained of a headache and some neck pain. Greatttttt. And then I realise my throat was burning and it was really difficult to swallow. Ahhh ... who cares if I've turned 33, I just want to go back to sleep.

5.45AM - Yasmin is crying. Very, very unusual. Yas has been an absolute dream when it came to sleeping through the night, 11 hours straight. Her crying must only mean she had a bad dream. I carry her and sit uncomfortably on the rocking chair for several minutes. I look at my bed longingly and we climb into the bed, and snuggle under the warm duvet. Nice. So I was sick on my birthday but nothing beats snuggling up with one of my girls, early in the morning just before the sun has risen.

I have breakfast with Yas, while we wait for Sera to wake up. She finally walks into the kitchen at 8.20 (the time we're supposed to be at school) and insists that she is feeling fit to go to school. We cycle to school and get there by 9AM. Secretly, I was relieved that we were late, I get shy about my birthday and I like to keep it simple, low-keyed. I know, I'm odd in that way. But there were some moms still lurking around and it was, surprisingly, really nice to receive birthday hugs and wishes from them. It felt very comfortable. I must really be getting old and sentimental. ha ha

I hung out with Yas for the rest of the day, wishing I could just crawl into bed and sleep away my headache and sore throat. Johan, I have to say, gave me the best present by coming back early today. He picked Sera up from school, which I'm very sure that had made Sera very, very thrilled. They came back and Sera runs to me, her face bursting with excitement, "Mama, we bought you cake and it's a surprise!" I had to laugh. So after a simple dinner, the girls sang for me and were each rewarded with a big serving of the awfully decadent ice cream cake. Good choice baby!

It's 7.20PM now. I just skyp-ed with Manuela and I got to see her and little Vito on the video cam. I spoke to mama, papa and Sue-Lyn earlier as well. I got messages from friends and family throughout the day. Thank you, thank you one and all ... I'm definitely feeling like the luckiest birthday girl.

PTM

Photograph day at Children's Garden

aka Parent-Teacher-Meeting. It's a big thing at Sera's school. So much so that it's pupil-free for 2 days. Yes, I have my own opinions on that, along with many other moms at school. For 2 days, they have one-on-one time with the parents. Yesterday, I went for my 11.15AM meeting to meet all 4 teachers (2 from English and 2 from German home-room).

Sera is a doing well in school. However there were three words that were mentioned throughout the meeting - 'stubborn, bossy, impatient'. Hmm. The teachers insisted that most kids display such common behaviour and honestly, they're still very young ... they're 3 year olds. They encouraged me to see these traits as positives. So I'm going to try ...

Stubborn = determined
Bossy = leadership skills
Impatient = enthusiasm

Indigo class (teacher assistant is absent)

Playing outside before it gets too hot

I can't believe NO ONE has flown here to join us at this beach!!! Ha ha ha. We had a great time at the beach this Saturday. Believe it or not, Johan even skipped football to go to the beach. It was perfect beach weather in the morning. We stayed till noon, got a quick bite and by the time we got home, the girls were almost asleep. Ahh, we live for the weekends!

Sera and Nicolas swimming near the shore (at the background is the Atlantis hotel)

Sera was busy digging deeper into what Johan would call a ditch?

The kids spent a lot of time in it

Yas still refuses to go into the water. However, she was very contented playing in this ditch all morning

Welcome back

A sandstorm welcomed us when we returned to Dubai. Nice. I thought the pilot had it wrong when he said the temperature outside was 35-degrees. Nah, he was definitely mistaken. I was looking forward to a cool 22-degrees! The sandstorm lasted 2 days and it was, what can I say, it was a mess. You could not walk outside with sunglasses. Your hair got matted with sand and you end up eating sand if you try to talk outside. So we pretty much stayed indoors the weekend we arrived back.

Then, a few days later the rain came falling down! Nothing happens in moderation here, literally. The rain storm also lasted for 2 full days. We woke up one morning to a very flooded balcony. And I've realised, it's fun to play with the girls when it rains. So yes, we did cycle to school in the rain. I dressed them in their wind breakers (not at all rain proof) and we cycled to school enjoying the cool, very wet weather. Along the way, we encountered uprooted plants, naked trees, broken branches and floods every which way we looked. Yasmin absolutely loved it in the rain, laughing and kicking in her bicycle seat all the way there and back. Honestly, nothing beats simple pleasures like that.

My little soaked Yasmin

Gong Xi Fatt Choi

We entered the Chinese New Year celebrations straight off our flight from Phnom Penh. Reunion dinner, first day of Chinese New year and then, many subsequent visits with family and friends the rest of the week. This was Sera and Yasmin's first celebration but I think they're still too young to be impressed by it. For Sera, it was fun to dress up in her pink cheong sam and then play the entire day with her cousins and uncles. And for Yasmin, she just went crazy peeling the mandarin oranges all day long.

Sera and uncle Joseph, just one year apart

Yasmin with auntie Rachel (one month younger)

I was determined to get a family photo together, at the end of the day.


Lunch with kor and family

As you can see, impossible to get all 3 kids to smile nicely. At least their shirts matched!

Tuk tuk, temples and funny cows

To be honest, I wasn’t sure how the girls were going to receive Cambodia. I was a little nervous but Sera and Yasmin were great! Ok, Sera asked to go back to Dubai about three times during our travels but Yasmin was our super trooper. She loved every second of our trip and if anything, she suffered Cambodia blues our travels ended.

So we started our journey from Siem Reap to visit the beautiful Angkorian temples, built between 9th and 14th centuries AD. They still remained as mesmerizing as I remembered 8 years ago but the one very, very jarring difference was the onslaught of mass tourism that has unfortunately descended to Siem Reap. I still remember, walking with my travel friend then, how it felt to walk through the ancient temples. I do not lie when I say there were goose-bumps on my skin … it felt almost magical. Alas, this time, it felt different. Too many tourists jostling and behaving like paparazzi at the temples wherever we went. The cruel irony about tourism in Siem Reap is that despite the millions of tourists she receives every year, it remains the poorest province in Cambodia.

When we were temple-d out, we explored Siem Reap. Siem Reap has a beautiful country side and an entire network of floating villages on the Tonle Sap. We visited the not so typical attractions like the War Museum which was essentially a junkyard of old, rusty war artillery. We even visited a crocodile farm, though I was initially against it because I suddenly had frightening images of Yasmin eagerly climbing into to the crocodiles’ den. Johan probably had the same thoughts because he imprisoned her in his arms.

After 4 days in Siem Reap, we drove 3.5 hours to Phnom Penh, the capital city. Phnom Penh is typical of most Asian cities. It is overpopulated, polluted and oh so noisy. But if you’re willing to look beyond the utter mayhem, the city has pockets of charm and uniqueness to it. As planned, we didn’t stay long in the capital but we visited a museum, the Royal Palace and had absolutely delicious Khmer dinner with our friend Krisna and his wife, Srey Houen.

The tuk tuk was an instant hit with the girls

Angkor Wat

Bayon

The girls had a great time exploring

Ta Phrom

The girls would typically sleep in the tuk tuk by day end

This was our favourite hideaway for lunch at Siem Reap, Butterflies Garden.

Sera and Yas would be playing in the garden, running after the butterflies. Sera was just beside herself when one finally landed on her finger (only after the 2nd day).

Peace Cafe, Siem Reap

The girls playing before lunch

And resting after lunch ...


At a local orphanage

Boat ride on Tonle Sap, to the floating village

We had a lovely stay at Indochine Pavillion


Dinner with Krisna and his wife, Srey Houe at the Khmer House, Phnom Penh

Our final 4 days, we snuck into the hillside of Kep. Originally, we had planned to go to the Sihanoukville, where the beaches are. But thankfully, a traveler had advised and strongly suggested that we escaped to the quiet of Kep, where there were beaches and mountains minus the notoriety of beach tourists. Wonderful, we thought. Kep was exactly what she promised and it was exactly what we needed after Phnom Penh. We checked ourselves into; I have to say, one of the most beautiful resorts I’ve ever stayed in. It was called the Veranda Natural resort and true to its name, it was as natural as could be. The resort is built on a hill top in the midst of all the natural vegetation around it. The individual bungalows snaked out of the main building like tree branches, blending with the natural environment. We didn’t stay in the bungalows because again, I wasn’t so sure I wanted to find Yasmin hanging over the balcony and flying down hundreds of feet into the jungle … so we opted for The Cave. Our cave was just what we needed. You walk into your private terrace that is enclosed by lush tropical plants and flowers, you open the door and lo-and-behold, a spacious enclave literally dug out from a mountain. The only difference is that once inside the cave, you experienced all the amenities of a 4 star resort! Ha ha. An absolute hit with the girls, no doubt.

At Kep, we very quickly and easily spent our days in a truly laconic fashion. In our tuk tuk, we visited caves, beaches and the local markets. We also took a boat ride to Rabbit Island, no rabbits there, where Sera and I were lazing in the water for almost 4 hours. Needless to say, we became brown as roasted chestnuts.

We took a short trip to Sihanoukville from Kep. We had lunch at the Independence Hotel and then spend the afternoon at the beach. Sera had so much fun in the water but Yas was very unhappy when Johan carried her in, against her will.

Much happier now ...

Tuk tuk for the day while we explored Kep

Into the bat cave ...

Lunch and then a swim at Kep Lodge


Boat ride to Rabbit Island

Rabbit Island

Yas stayed dry with Krisna on the hammock

After a hard day in the sun, Sera enjoyed her ABC (apple, beetroot, carrot) juice

Last night at Veranda Natural Resort, Kep

Our travel in Cambodia was so satisfying. Yes, it was tricky and tiring at times, but it was so worth it. What made it so meaningful was how my Khmer friend Krisna, whom I met 8 years ago in an orphanage, travelled with us, and bonded readily and easily with the girls. To all our happy memories of Cambodia … aw kohn shruan!

Asleep on our drive back to Phnom Penh

* Unbelievably, I have no photos of the cows that we saw all the time, when in Cambodia. Yasmin loved spotting them and she even composed a song about them. It went something like that. "Funny cow, funny cow ... all that long!" Soon, all of us were singing it with her.