Thanks for your inputs, Donald, Bk and Affection! I myself am thinking where to bring my parents and my own little family of three to. Tough to think of an ideal location where young (my 4 year old son) and old (my 70 yr old parents) can equally enjoy.

How do you identify or determine where to go and what to do?

My guess is to bring the kids to somewhere to enjoy some Fresh Air! No, it should be a lot of Fresh Air! To roll on grass, run by the beach, smell the flowers, etc… Or on the other hand, it could be determined by where we the parents desire to go

For those of us who can afford it, we would even bring them to another country and experience the diversity of life on earth. Who doesn’t like to travel anyway?!

Where is your ideal summer vacation for you and/or your kids?

Susan Boyle epitomises the very song she sang – I Dream A Dream – in the recent audition in “Britain’s Got Talent”

What can we teach our kids, or for the matter, ourselves about her amazing adventure?

NEVER STOP DREAMING.

PS: I seldom watch TV these days, but I am absolutely hooked on the this show after watching some SPLENDID auditions on the show’s website.

Check out my current top  4 :
- Shaheen Jafargholi
- Flawless
- Julian Smith

& of course,  SUSAN BOYLE.

PSS : For a talent-hunt show, I find it amazingly touching. Enjoy.

The other day while my little son and I were in school waiting for the lift, we saw his classmate with her father.  Because there were a few other parents and kids standing between us, we didn’t get to say hello.

When the lift came all of us got in.  Before we could turn to say hello to the little girl, she opened her mouth and started ranting about how rude my son was, how he didn’t say hello to her even though he saw her, how she had never met anyone so rude… blah blah blah… Mind you, she is only 3 years old and a lot smaller in built than my little son.  But she was so cute in her little tirade that the adults in the lift including myself couldn’t help laughing.

But the best part is my little son couldn’t understand a word of what she was saying because she was ranting in mandarin (my little son is not very proficient in Chinese).  So he kept quiet all the while, smiling and probably wondering what it was that his friend was talking about that was making all the adults laugh.

Finally I told my little son to say hello to the little girl.  When he did that, the little girl stopped ranting immediately, looked satisfied and smiled.

Well, that surely is a feisty little girl that you don’t wanna mess with.

Once we went out and my little son told his little friend to “old my and” (hold my hand).  “Yes,” Joshua replied cheekily, “I will old your and”.

In my little son’s “mis-pronounced” world, a fish is a “cheesh”.  Football becomes “chootball”.  Night Safari (which is the nocturnal zoo in Singapore) is “Night Afari”.  Rambutan is “lambutan”.

However recently we noted some changes in his pronunciation.  What was “old my and” is now hold my hand.  Fish has evolved to “pish”.  Football is sometimes “pootball” but other times still “chootball”.  Night Safari is unfortunately still “Night Afari”.

We have never attempted to correct our little son’s “mis-pronunciation”.  He sorts of self-corrects as he grows older.  Or maybe the teacher in school taught him.

As much as I am happy that my little son’s linguistic ability seems to be on its way to maturity and that one day he will be able to pronounce difficult words with ease, when that day comes I will surely look back and miss those days when a rambutan was a “lambutan”.

We seldom play through the credits portion at the end of the show. But we did one day, and this was what happened…..

And here’s the REAL thing :

Lately my little son has the desire to “get inside the TV”.  It first started last week while he was watching Barney.

“Can you bring me inside there please mama?” he asked.

I was taken by surprise by that question.  “Why do you want to go in there?” I asked.  “Because I want three children,” he replied.  He meant he wanted to be the third kid in the show, as there were only two kids with Barney.

This week while he was watching Winne the Pooh & Tigger, he again asked, “Can you bring me inside there please mama?”

I asked him why and he said, “because I want to talk to them”.

“Oh, we can talk to them when they come to the shopping centres,” I said.  “We can’t go inside the TV because there’s nothing inside there.”

I then showed him the back of the TV.  “See, there’s nothing in there.”  I said,  “and Pooh, Tigger and Darby are not real people, they are fake.”

“How about me?” he asked.

“You?  You are real,” I said.

“No!  I don’t want to be real.  I want to be fake!” he declared, upset that he wasn’t the same as Darby or Pooh or Tigger.

Today, just before his nap, he told me “Mama I want you to buy me Darby but not the flat one.  But like us.”

I think he meant he wants a 3-dimentional Darby, not a 2-dimentional one like in the TV.

Or did he mean he wants a real Darby, not a fake one?!!

After 65 million years, they are BACK!

I saw this on TV News one day and was immediately drawn by it. It’s a live theatrical experience where 15 “live” dinosaurs, including the terror T-rex, walk, roar and fight for supremacy in front of your very eyes!

The show is touring North America now. How I wish they will come to Asia, am sure a lot of children (and adults) here would like catching a glimpse.

You see, the previous trip to the cinema was partially a failure because my son simply did not want to go into the cinema hall. I think the darkness and loud sound kind of traumatized him. Good thing the cinema was pretty empty then and we could sit at the last row near the exit, moving in and out during the show depending on whether there were “loud” moments.

Today, we knew it would turn out better because he has been looking forward to the trip. For the past week he has seen the trailer of “Madagascar : Escape to Africa” on TV and proclaiming he wanted to watch it in the cinema, while eating popcorn!

True enough, apart for a moment of early hesitation, he was enjoying himself in the cinema so much that  from halfway in the show, he started showing boredom and wanted to climb between row of seats!

He has definitely grown in the last few months…at least in the area of fear of the dark and loud sound.

On the work front, I have been quite stretched as I worked in the financial industry. Needless to say, the current financial turmoil is the reason for the increased workload. Thank you sub-prime, thank you Lehman, thank you investment bankers, thank you FED, thank you structurers for coming up with “wonderful” products that no one fully understood the risks until now…or maybe not even now.

On another front, for the past week after l returned from work, I have poured myself hard working on this wedding montage for a good friend of mine. I had always wanted to do this for him, so understandably there was a very strong desire to make sure I did an excellent job.

You tell me if I can make a career out of this and dump my job! Oops…I forgot recession is coming….

If you find them interesting, you can view some of my other works here.

I really enjoy doing these things despite the hours I spent on them.  The above montage took me about 20hours (!!!) to do, but I really do love working my socks off. The satisfaction I get from the appreciative couples is indescribable.