A Special INVITATION & My New Camera

2 weeks ago, Anthea showed me a letter from her school regarding the following week schedules and also the dates of collecting and returning of the report books. The school also mentioned that there will be a Prize giving ceremony cum concert on Friday, 20 November 2009. Only parents of prize winners, all P6 students and performances need to attend the event due to space constraint.

I saw Anthea’s SA 2 results and told myself that likely we need not go to school on the Friday, so we just need to prepare ourselves in the morning for our Sentosa check in on the same day.

However, on Monday, she showed me a form after school. Yes, it was the INVITATION for the ceremony on this Friday. I was very surprised and happy to see that she is one of the prize winners as she is 2nd in her class. : )

I was totally over the moon with the news although I had not seen her report books yet, I knew she did well enough to gain 2nd placing in class.

Today is the report book day and she has made me a very proud mother with her wonderful results.
English – 94.0%

Chinese – 99.0 %

Mathematics – 88.0%

She scores Band 1 for all the subjects and A’s for all the others subjects – Art/Social study/Health education/ Music & Physical Education.

Only her Math was below 90% and after seeing her papers, we know where her weakness was and hopefully she will learn from it.

So this Friday, I will be attending her prize winning ceremony and thereafter we will proceed to Sentosa for our grand celebration.

For this special occasion and our Sentosa weekends stay, I decided to invest in a good camera to capture more photographs…haha.

I had been considering getting a DSLR camera and was seriously considering Panasonic Lumix DMC GF1 after hearing some very good feedback from the Club Snap forum. I had visited MS Color shop in AMK 2 – 3 times to check on this camera but so far, the shop does not has stock of the camera and advised me to wait till next month.

Today, I went to Chinatown to run some errands and there were few shops selling different models of cameras and I told myself to try my luck to see if the shop has my preferred camera. Yes, it has the G1 model that I was looking for…: P

Immediately I made my queries with the sale person and he showed me the camera.
The salesman explained to me the basic function of the G1 DSLR and also the pros & cons. In order to get a good zoom, I would need to buy extra lens and he said that would cost about another $600 (almost a price of a new camera…: P )

Then after knowing my needs, he recommend me another Panasonic Lumix – model FZ35.

This camera has what I wanted and he also mentioned that for a beginner to photography, this camera will suite me better than a DSLR. He said once I get used to playing the FZ35, he said I can go back and look for him for a DSLR camera. There was one sentence he said and impressed me – he said the FZ35 will make the photo “看起来有生命力”. Wow what a way to put it and the price was few hundred cheaper than G1. So it’s a win-save situation for me.

Finally I bought the FZ35 and the package include a 8GB SD Card, camera case, a tripod and he even gave me a free card reader and lens cleaning stuff.

I truly admired his professional knowledge and he was so openly sharing his knowledge with me and talking to him really make me learnt so much about the camera. I am really grateful to have met him in my pursue of a new hobby.

Okie, now I am reading the operating manual for my new camera and hopefully on this Friday, I can capture 有生命的照片。。哈哈！

We BOUGHT it - Digital Camera

Since it was a Sunday and Adrian not playing badminton, I decided to go and buy the digital camera.

I planned to buy a Canon since they have some freebies and also for UOB Card holders, they have addition Free Battery for Ixus 75. So with all these in mind, we headed for Harbour Front to Canon Digi-lab. I was telling Adrian we might as well go there since the collection of free gift is at the Digi-lab.

We were informed by Canon that the Digi-lab does not do sale of Canon Cameras, we can go to 2 shops in Harbour Front. We ended up in BIG Mega store. When I enquired about the Canon and Panasonic cameras at the counter, the sale person “sold” me all the advantages of Panasonic compared to a Canon.

I found it to be so amusing because before coming to Harbour Front, I was still sms-ing Eve and she asked if I was confirmed buying a Canon. I replied her that I was ok with Canon unless someone sells me Panasonic...true enough; this sales person is doing it.

Finally I was convinced and bought the Panasonic Lumix DMC – FX 12, it comes with Free 2 GB SD Card, a Tripod stand and a LCD Screen protector. I bought an additional battery. With this purchase, the store even gave me a Sizzler meal voucher and a Complimentary Spa voucher. What a Treat…:)

After buying the camera, we had lunch at the Food Junction. It was not crowded, so we had a good lunch.

Then we left the place and headed home, as we exit the Vivo City car park, I saw a LONG Car Q’s. Vivo City is packed almost on all weekends. Lucky that we managed to avoided the crowd.

We brought Anders home for his afternoon nap. I was busied with the laundry.

The new camera is resting for the moment while I charged up it battery. I was advised to charge it for 8 hours.

Dinner was at Teochew City Seafood restaurant at Centre point. As usual, mother in law has some dining vouchers. So we had another big feast. After dinner, we window shopped around in Robinson, they did a major change - Children section is now on Level 6 and it takes up the whole floor and extend into the new wing of the building. Anders was so happy, seeing all the toys but we told him firmly that he can only see and not buy. Luckily he was agreeable to it. As for Anthea, she was busied shopping for clothes for Faith at Mothercare. I can tell both Anthea and Anders will dote on Faith as they grow together.

Another fruitful Sunday for us and looking forward to clicking away photos with the new camera.