4 Day 3Nights Phuket Rest & Relax Families Trip, 26 – 29 Nov 2010

This was the Tan Clan inaugural families trip and I must say – it was a successful trip. We were a party of 8 adults, 2 children, 1 toddle and 2 infants. First time we managed to go on a short vacation with all of us included.

Day 1: Friday, 26 November

Singapore → Phuket (MI 754 )Dep: 1320 / Arr 1405

It was a 1hour and 45 minutes flight from Singapore to Phuket. We were seated all near to one another. It was the 1st flight experience for my youngest niece – Taeia Tan. She took it really well.

Upon arrival at the Phuket airport, we were met by the Holiday Inn resort representative and we had 2 minivans for our families transfer.

We checked into the hotel and was given a Superior king-sized bed for our family. The other families had queen sized bedroom. My 2nd brother in law booked a family suite for his family.

As usual the 1st activity was swimming. Yeah, the children were all very excited and had great fun at the resort’s kid’s pool. Even the 2 infants also came in for a quick water play.

In the evening, we had dinner at the Hard Rock café and then adjourned to the hotel lobby for the welcome drinks. Then we called it a night and had good rest.

Day 2: Saturday, 27 November

We had an enjoyable buffet breakfast and then the children went to the kid’s club and had some fun at the club.

Then we headed to the poolside again and they played for some time before we went back to the room to change.

Lunch was arranged at Jungceylon shopping centre. This shopping mall was huge and it housed many familiar brands – Robinson and Carrefour can be found in this mall. It’s very close to home shopping. We had lunch and then explored the shopping mall. After that, some of us took the Tuk Tuk back to the hotel and we decided to walk back. It was about 10minutes walk to the hotel and along the streets, there were plenty of street shopping and amazing discoveries.

In the evening, we went by to the beachfront and we negotiated a deal for a Banana Boat ride. Together with my 3rd brother in law, his wife and my Father in law, Anthea tried her 1st ride on the Banana Boat. The ride was very fun and they were overthrown at the end of the ride when they were near the beachside. She enjoyed the ride so much and kept telling us about the fun of it.

We had dinner at the Thai restaurant in the hotel. Then we headed back to the rooms for a good night rest.

Day 3: Sunday, 28 November

During our last trip to Phuket in 2008, we did Safari tour. So this time round, we decided to try something different. We booked our family of 2 adults and 2 children for the ATV (all terrain vehicles) tour. It was a 2 hours of thrilling ride in the mountainous terrain.

As it was drizzling in the morning, it made the slopes very slippery and muddy and these add on the excitement of the rides.

After the 2 hours, we were all dirty and tired. We headed back to the hotel for a quick bath. Then had our cup noodles lunch in our rest before resting for the afternoon to regain the energy.

For dinner, we headed out the beachside for some seafood dinner. It was a simple and nice meal by the beach. After dinner, we took a stroll back to the hotel. On the way, we even stopped for Haagen Das Ice cream.

Day 4: Monday, 29 November

Phuket → Singapore (MI 753) 1455/1740

We woke up to a nice and relaxing buffet breakfast. After that, we started to pack and got ready for our home going flight.

We took a minivan from the hotel to the airport it cost us THB 1200. Then it was checked in time and home sweet home.

Overall, the 4D3N had passed by very quickly. We had so much fun and great families bonding time with the extended families. So it was a really good experienced for the Ace family.

For now…we look forward to our next families travel, would this be Beijing 2011?? To be continue….

毕业典礼- Anders K2 Graduation Ceremony 2010

19 November 2010 was a BIG Day for me. Yes, finally, Anders is graduating from his kindergarten stage and would be going to Primary 1 in 2011.

This time round, my first Skool had decided to do the ceremony as individual centre based rather than a combined concert with other centers.

The concert was much smaller in scale but the importance and significance of the celebration remained HUGE in meaning.

The graduation was scheduled to start in the evening at 6.30pm. Around 6.15pm, Anthea and I took a slow walk to the centre. When we arrived at the centre, we realized that the Guest of Honor – Dr.S Vasoo was already making his speech. We entered the centre discreetly and quite luckily, we managed to be seated in the 1st row of the concert.

After his speech, the graduation began. The K2 graduands marched in with pride. They were all wearing the graduation gowns and mortarboard. It was a very special MOMENT for all the parents when they saw their children and cameras were busy flashing away.

Dr. S Vasoo presented each one of them with their graduation certification. After that, they took a group photo with the centre Principal and Teachers in charge.

Then the concert began – the program was well lined up and we had great fun and were well entertained throughout the 2 hours.

Finally when the show was over, we were treated to some light refreshment prepared by the centre aunties. The food was simple and delicious. The children were having a great time, eating their food and chatting with their friends.

For some of them, this would be the last month attending the childcare as some would be going on the next stage in their life.

This was my 2nd time attending a graduation ceremony and I found it to be much more meaning than those big scale show. It really allowed the parents to see the talents in their own child.

Once again, I am a PROUD mother for the day!

亲爱的勇学，

终于毕业了。这是新的开始。。路会很长不过妈妈会陪着你！希望你会勇敢的学习。

爱您的妈妈。

Double UP…

The children had been feeling a lot of excitement since the day we ordered the Double Decker bed for them.

Yes, after some consideration that we would be staying put in our home for the few years ahead, we decided to do some adjustment to the “hardware” of the home.

The children had been bugging us to get them a double decker bed. Each time when we went to the furniture showrooms, they would take the opportunity to try the different types of children double decker beds.

As our bedrooms are all installed with a ceiling fans, we were concerned about the safety issue, especially with the fan’s blade going fast and furious. A few months back, we decided to change the children room fan as it was having some technical problem. After some researched, we bought a new TDK Ceiling Oscillation fan.

Once the fan was changed, we went to Rozel furniture showroom and checked out their double decker beds. To our luck, they were having some promotion on one particular bed and we decided to go with that promotional item.

This week on Monday, they delivered the bed and it’s now the new novelty of the home. The children enjoyed the “Tree house” in the room.

忙碌的十一月..

Just came back from another fruitful working trip in Shanghai. Weather is very cooling now in China and truly enjoys the walk in the cool evenings.

November had arrived and it’s going to be a very busy month for our family.

Work wise – I have loads of upcoming meetings and I hope to gain more out from these meetings.

Children – Anthea had completed her semestral exam and now we are waiting eagerly for her final results. So far, she had done very well for all her papers and we are very happy with her performance.

Anders will be having his K2 graduation ceremony on 19 November and now they are busy with the rehearsal. After that we will be attending his Primary 1 orientation. I am really looking forward to seeing him starting his formal primary school education in 2011.

Holidays – yes, we are going for our augural families holiday with our extended families in November. It’s going to be quite an experience for all of us.

A few months back Anthea felt ill and was pale from her illness. Then we decided to let her try Brand Essence for children. After the first few bottles, I noticed a slight improvement in her health. From then onward, she becomes a Brand Essence fan and she drinks 1 bottle everyday during her SA.

With some connection, I managed to get bulk purchase of the Brand Essence at a good rate and now we had stocked up on them. We will make sure the children drink them regularly to maintain their energy and health.

Looking forward to all the upcoming events and fun time ahead.

Happy Birthday to Terence !

On Sunday, 24 October, we celebrated my 3rd brother in law birthday. As my MIL is an Ala Carte Member, she has meals vouchers which we could use at the Millennium Group. As usual, one of our favorite dinner place is Café Brio’s @ Grand Copthrone Waterfront and yes, its buffet spread is something that the families simply adore…: )

Usually for special occassion, we would dined at this cafe and like what my FIL comment :"it's an annual affair to eat here". Anthea & Anders were very excited about the Buffet dinner.

The spread was as usually good – the cold dishes even had Japanese Abalone with the usual fresh serving of sashimi, fresh oysters, cold crabs. The hot counters have mixture of western cuisine and some of our local favorites – hokkien noodle, chilli crab and seasonal vegetables dishes.

The favorite counter is none other than the Grilled counter – they have grills beef/mutton/prawns/cuttlefish ring and otah. Most of them were grilled to perfection by the chef in charge except for a few odd ones...: )

The children enjoy the food from all the different counters and the adults were also much busied going in and out of the main café to the grills.

We had an enjoyable dinner and when it was so called cake cutting time, I realized that there was no cake for the birthday boy…hehe.

Adrian said probably it was a buffet so no one thought of getting a cake…haha..: P

Anyway, both Anthea and Anders bought a birthday card for him and Adrian also gave him a birthday ang pow.

We wished Terence a very Happy Birthday and a good year ahead…!!

Discovering Melbourne, 9 - 13 Oct 2010

The company had scheduled a Roundtable meeting in Melbourne on 11 – 12 October. Originally it was planned that my Manager would be travelling to Singapore for local meetings and then to Melbourne for the Roundtable meeting. However, due to some medical reason, she had to change her travel plan. As such, the company had requested for me to travel for the meeting.

I was delighted and definitely happy to accept the task as every travel is a great learning opportunity for me and also a good chance to meet the clients.

So I booked myself on Qantas flights from Singapore to Melbourne.

Day 1: 9 October, Sat – QF 9 Singapore – Melbourne.

Qantas fly the Airbus A380 on weekend and thus I was lucky to get my 2nd visit on the A380. Flight was smooth and service was great.

Day 2: 10 October, Sunday

Arrival in Melbourne at 6am in the morning. I took the Sky bus from the airport to the city station (Southern Cross Station) and then got a taxi from there to my hotel. I was booked into the Amora Melbourne located at 649 Bridge Road, Richmond, Vic 2131. It was located outside of CDB but very near to the factory outlets.

As it was still too early for me to check into the hotel room, so I decided to do my shopping first. Yes, I had a short list of shopping items to get from Melbourne. My family’s members are great supporter of Jurlique products. It is very costly to buy them in Singapore but in Australia, they cost ½ the price of Singapore. Each time when we visit Australia, we are surely to stock them up.

So my 1st stop was the Chinatown Duty Free shop which is located in Little Bourke Street.

I took the Tram services from the hotel to Swanton Street. It was very fast and easily accessible. I took the opportunity to explore all the shops along Swanston Street. They have everything and anything – from souvenirs, branded goods and essential needs.

At the Duty Free shop, I bought the Jurlique Essential oils and also some nougat for the families.

After a fulfilling trip, I went back to the hotel for the check in and prepared the meeting items.

In the evening, I had dinner with my Australia colleague and the 2 facilitators for the meeting. It was a good introductory dinner.

Day 3: 11 October, Monday

The meeting was scheduled to start at 9am and there was coffee and tea at 8.45am for the delegates. I had the chance to meet up with all my Australia’s clients and greeting them in person made the difference than on the phone. Some of them even mistaken that I was based in Sydney…: )

The meeting went very well throughout the day and lunch was a good time for networking too.

In the evening, we hosted a dinner at Boheme café which was about 10minutes walk from the hotel. Dinner was delicious and the atmosphere was relaxing. We talked and chatted about different topics and it ended on a happy note.

Day 4: 12 October, Tuesday

2nd day of the meeting also went smoothly, no major hiccups. The meeting was closed around 3pm and we bade goodbyes to each other and promised to keep in contact via emails/phones.

In the evening, it started raining, so I packed back dinner and ate in the hotel room.

Day 5: 13 October, Wednesday

Had a morning meeting with one of my new subscribers. It was my 1st solo meeting and I was glad that it went well and took note of area to improve for my next meeting.

After the meeting, I went back to the hotel to pack and got ready to leave for the airport. At the city station, I was hoping to visit the Queen Victoria Market in Melbourne. Sadly, it was closed on a Wednesday, so I missed the opportunity to see it.

Thus, I went straight to the airport, did my check in for the flight. As I was still early, I had a quick lunch and did some duty free shopping before boarding the flight for home sweet home.

Melbourne – a place I last visited 10 years ago and re-visiting it give me a sense of belonging and I had really enjoyed this work trip.

I was telling Adrian that maybe Melbourne can be our next family vacation destination….till we meet again,

G’ Day Mate!!

New Shoes/ Swimsuits

It had been a very busy working week cum sport week for me.

I am having quite a few upcoming web conferences and I am busied preparing for them. Also I have an upcoming RoundTable meeting in Melbourne, thus I will be travelling again soon.

With Adrian’s blessing, I am truly enjoying my new home based job which allows me the time to be with the children, especially comes 2011, Anders will be in Primary 1 and I will be taking care of his after school needs as well.

Besides being occupied with work and housework, we are also kept busied with our Saturdays badminton session at the sport hall. I had been booking the badminton hall on all the Saturdays to give Anthea the chance to practice her badminton skill and I know it’s getting better each time. : ) also Anders is enjoying the sport too and hope that he will be able to join the school team too when he starts Primary 1.

Anders will be graduating from the childcare in another 1 month time. I am looking forward to his graduation ceremony in mid November. They had their graduation photo taken on last Thursday, 30 September 2010. Because of the photo, he was required to wear a pair of covered black shoes, so on Wednesday, I went to Marina Square and bought a pair of Reebok for him. Now he is wearing them for his badminton game.

The children celebrated Children Day on 1 October 2010 and thus there was no school on that day for Anthea. We decided on a morning swim at my 3rd BIL and both Anthea and Anders had a great time playing with their cousins – Faith, Saige and Taeia

I noticed that Anders had “bubbles” from his swimsuit and knew it’s time for him to get a new one. Since he is now progressing well in his swimming lesson, it was time to invest in a good swimwear for him. On Saturday, after dinner with the families, we went to Velocity @ Novena Square and bought him an Arena Swimsuit. He is now all ready for his new challenge. Let’s hope he will be able to do his bronze test soon.

上海之旅和放风箏

After my last Shanghai business trip in May, my company had assigned me to make another trip to Shanghai for the RoundTable meeting. It was like going “Home” feeling as this will be my 2nd trip.

The only difference was this time round I am alone in managing the 2 days meetings. So it was quite a new challenge to me especially in a foreign land.

The meeting venue was the same as previous and thus getting from the airport to the hotel was a breeze for me since I had the 1st time experienced.

The 2 days meeting went by smoothly and I enjoyed the discussions so much and I had great takeaways from the sessions.

In the evening, I had the chance to explore 豫园 which is one of Shanghai famous tourist area. Also this time round I managed to try their Metro (MRT system). It is very similar to what we have in Singapore.

One of my friend commented that I am very brave to be alone on this business travel. I shared with my friend that Shanghai is a very easily accessible place and there are many similarities as Singapore, so moving around in Shanghai is not a problem for me. Especially when Language is not a barrier but a joy to use for me.

The new experienced I had from this trip is the RED-EYE flight I took from Shanghai to Singapore. As I purchased a very economy fare during the UOB Credit Card – Singapore Airlines joint promotion, I had no choice of the returning flight except for this flight.

The flight was scheduled to depart Shanghai at 0010hr, so I had to check in around 9pm in the evening. I was pleasantly surprised to see that the flight was FULL even though it was at such odd hours. Guess many people also enjoyed the special fare, like I did.

Overall the 3 Days 2 nite trip has proven to be another fruitful trip for me and I really treasure all these opportunities that the company is giving me.

On Sunday, there was a Kite Festival at the Marina promenade and my 2nd BIL’s family had gathered all of us for a families outing to Fly Kite.

When we arrived at the venue, the place was packed to the rim with people and it was very hard to find an empty space on the field. Since we were there, we decided to have a go at the Kite Flying session. My Fil became the trainer for the session and he taught the children and my 3rd BIL how to fly kite…: P

After a few failed attempts to fly the kite high, we decided to call it a day and adjourned for early dinner at the nearby restaurant.

It had been a fun experienced for the children, even though they didn’t really get the chance to uplift the kite, they had fun running around with the kite. We are now planning for our next 放风针 session and hope that this time will be better.

KKH ENT & Happy Teacher’s Day

On 31 August we had an appointment made for Anthea with KKH ENT (Ear, Nose, and Throat) Specialist clinic.

Anthea has been having this “Ahem” problem with her throat. We had tried western and traditional Chinese medication but till today, the problem is still there. As we are worried that it may become chronic, so we decided to ask for the specialist opinion.

Our appointment was scheduled at 3.50pm and Adrian took a day leave to accompany us for the appointment. We registered her name and waited for about 45 minutes before the specialist see us.

The diagnosis was – mucus back drip. This means that her mucus is the one causing the problem and because of the drip back to the nose, it also block the airways to the throat, then created the “ahem” problem. The specialist prescribed 2 kind of nasal spray and we have to monitor the situation for 3 months till our next visit end November.

Hopefully, this will solve the problem.

On the same day, the children celebrated Teacher’s Day in their respective schools in the morning. As usual, we managed to buy small gifts for Anthea’s form teacher and Anders’s English and Chinese teachers.

A friend of mine recently started an online business and sell small items that are very sweet. This friend of mine enjoyed Stitching and she uses her hobby to build up a small business. I am always in full admiration of her capability – she is a SAHM and she homeschooled her own children, take care of the chores of her own and plus this new business.

I ordered the gift via her online store - Jean Stitch and when we received them in the mailer, Adrian also commented that they were lovely. I hope the Teachers will like their Teacher’s day gift as these gifts are sewn out of Love and Tender care.

LJ to Bollywood Veggie & ISH

It was a very busy week for me last week. I had to attend a 2 days conference at the Marina Bay Sand Expo and Convention centre. It was a good 2 days of education sessions and general sessions. I had the chance to meet a lot of people from the travel industry and was good to see some “old friends”.

Then on Friday, it was Anthea School Learning Journey to Bollywood Veggie. This trip is in conjunction with their English lesson – A Feast.

I joined in the LJ as a PSG. In the morning I went to the school around 9am as the children had their Mother Tongue test before the trip.

As usual I was tasked to go with Anthea class as I am familiar with her classmates. Unlike the other regular PSG whom are familiar with almost every kids.

We set off around 9.30am and reached the farm around 10am. The children were breakout into a few groups and followed different Tour Guides whom brought them to the different plot of land. The guide make introduction of the different kind of plant/trees/fruits to the children. It was a great learning experienced for the children, especially to feel/sense/taste the different plants.

About 20 minutes into the introduction, the sky started to turn dark and lightning started. For safety reason, the organizer had to end the tour and the children went to the bistro area for their snacks.

While eating the snacks, Anthea and her classmates were very lucky to have the Professor telling them the stories of those portraits in the room.

At around 12noon, the rain got lighter and we managed to board the bus for our journey back to the School. At the boarding point, Anthea form teacher had the children to say Thank You to the professor for his interesting guide for the tour.

Although the tour was short due to the rain but I had managed to see quite a variety of interesting plant/fruit. I am sure the children had enjoyed the tour and found it useful too.

A few of my friends played badminton on weekend and thanks to their recommendation, I got to know about Indoor Sport Hall (ISH) booking for badminton court.

Last week I managed to book a hall for the Saturday and we brought Anthea and Anders for their sport. Adrian had the chance to train Anthea in her badminton while I played 嗒嗒球with Anders at the side of the court.

We enjoyed the 1 hour of sport fun and both of them commented that it was very fun to play in the hall. With these approval votes, I managed to book another hall for this Saturday sport fun, let’s hope we will enjoy once again.

“LIFT” us up

Since our last E-polling in August 2008 for the Lift Upgrading Program, renovation work started about 1 ½ years ago. Yes, we endured all the inconveniences of daily dust, noise and walking up & down stairs when the old lift was out of order for a few weeks.

Finally after all the above, our new LIFT is up & operational few weeks back. Now we had lift landing on every floor. To celebrate the occasion, Anthea and Anders have been pushing their own bicycles downstairs in the evening and ride around at the open space.

Our old lift were built in those old days and it served mid floors to the units. This mean if I stayed on the 4th floor, the lift will only bring me to 3rd floor and I have to walk flights of stairs to get to my floor.

An ex-colleague of mine had asked me: “since you already had a lift, why do you want to VOTE for a new lift? You need to pay government monies.” He said his estate has been voting against LUP.

I told him - During my younger days, I was very active in sport and got a sport injury during a badminton game. I had a minor operation in my right tendon and was on hospitalization leaves for almost 2 months. At that time, I was in cast and had to walk around with crutches.

I was still staying with my parents during those days and thankfully the new block we stayed in had lift landing on every floor.

Yes, LIFT is that important to a person who is partially incapacitated because even one flight of stair proved to be a painful challenge.

Beside this point, there are other users like parents with prams, wheel-chaired bound person and senior citizens who may have difficulties in going up and down the stairs.

So the lift is a saver to many of us…: )

Now we are enjoying the convenience of our new LIFT Services and it has definitely lifted our spirit to a new level too… : )

Happy 45th National Day!!

What a fun day we had on this 45th National Day celebration. We woke up to a rainy morning and Anders told me: “mommy, we can’t go cycling because it’s raining.” I told him not to worry; the sun will be out later. True enough after breakfast, the rain stopped and we started packing our stuff for a day at Pasir Ris Park.

Now that both Anthea and Anders both owned a bicycle and had learnt to cycle on their own. We would like to bring them to the park to let them get used to the crowd in cycling.

As Bishan Park is undergoing major renovation and most part of the parks are closed off. After some discussion, we decided that Pasir Ris Park would be more idea for the children as it is not as crowded as East Coast Park.

We headed off around 10 plus with both bicycles in our car. The drive to the park was very smooth and fast, as the road was quite empty. We off loaded both the bicycles and headed to the park and the children were all excited about cycling in the park.

They saw a big playground and started heading toward the playground. The playground was huge and had different kind of slides and play area. Both of them went to try the different slides and had so much at the playground.

Then after play about ½ hour, we told them to ride their bicycles to explore the other side of the park. As they were riding along the way and I was following Anders while Adrian jogged beside Anthea. I could see many families having their family picnics by the grass patch and some under the canopy. Most of them were dressed in our National Day color – Red & white. It was really fun and we can feel the National Day mood with all these colors surrounding us. One of the families was even doing BBQ under the hot sun…: P

We had water breaks in-between and I also brought along cheese buns for the children as snack. During their rest, we even had the chance to play 嗒嗒球 at the open field. We had so much fun doing all the different sport at the park.

Then at about 1pm, we started to get changed before lunch. Anders even took a quick shower at the changing room. We headed toward Elias Mall, which was nearest to the park, and had a simple lunch at the food court. Then followed by a good treat of ice-cream for a hot, sunny afternoon.

Finally we reached home around 3pm. The children bathed and had their usual afternoon nap. They had planned to dine-in to watch the LIVE National Day Parade on TV.

In the evening, we packed Macdonald’s for dinner and sat in front of the TV for dinner. We had so much fun watching the 2 ½ hours parade and the children sang along to the tune of the familiar National Songs.

At 8pm, we even caught a glimpse of the Mobile Column that drove passed our street. Then at 8.10pm, the children recited the Pledge and sang the final National Anthem and this brought us to the closed of the ceremony.

It has been an enjoyable National Day for our family and we were glad that we had discovered this new “GEM of the East”. We will be there again as the children said they really had a good time at the park.