Maybe our schedule have become fuller, maybe my energy level has dropped, maybe En's enthusiasm has dwindled, but whatever it is, En and I have not been visiting Zhenjie at Woodlands as frequently as we would like.
Therefore on Zhenjie's birthday, after En's phonics class, we shot down to Woodlands with lots of thoughts and a little gift.. Could tell Zhenjie is rather surprised. I am sure she loves En's visits anytime, with or without gift, with or without a valid reason. (^_^)
En'en came about because Xuanxuan had wanted to be a big sister.. Of late, En'en has also began to rant about how she wants to be a big sister, again..
The last round she did that, we 'adopted' a sister for her in Cookie, her Yeeyee and QQ's toy poodle. En really treated Cookie as her sister as I recalled her SK nursery classmate's mum related to me how her son told her that En'en was very strange because she has a doggie sister!!
So this time, En'en is also smarter to say that she wants to be a real sister. Most fortunately for her, she has really turned into a real big sister this time with the arrival of her QQ and Qmama's baby Ally!! *\(^_^)/* *\(^_^)/* *\(^_^)/*
Baby Ally's EDD (estimated delivery date) was 20+May, so we were rather surprised when Dor announced at the start of May that her gynae said her baby would be due the following week!!!
Dor's waterbag was slowly leaking and Ally would be induced if she still did not want to come out by herself the next week.. Within the next couple of days, Dor announced that she would deliver her baby on May 9th, Thursday! To be exact, she would check into the hospital in the wee hours of Thursday morning, like 4am, and get ready to be induced for the baby to be delivered at about 4pm. Reason for this exact timing was so that Hong could be by her side to witness the delivery of their newborn before having to set off for work; Hong was in the midst of a musical run 搭错车 at the Esplanade.
Having known this well in advance, I planned with the excited girls how they would come home after their lessons that day, bath and get ready to go to the hospital to receive their new cousin!!
We planned to be at the hospital to witness the first moments of the newborn Ally. Juz like the girls, I had never seen a newborn in the rawest state, uncleaned and fresh from the mother's womb!
Alas, as we were selecting flowers from a florist opposite the hospital, Hong's message came in that Dor had delivered and even showed the lovely newborn's pictures!! A lil' disappointed, we rushed over to the ward immediately all the same.
Don't know how Hong did it, but Dor was upgraded to a premium room and the entire room was almost like a hotel except for the bed. We waited for almost an hour before Dor was wheeled into the ward with an uncleaned Ally!! Oh, so this was how a freshly-delivered baby looked like!!!!!!! Cute little Ally was alternating between sleeping soundly and crying disturbedly in that short duration we saw her waiting out the room and being pushed into the room.. so adorable!!
We did not manage to see her after she was wheeled into the nursery for washing up and warming up.. despite waited for... seemingly forever!! The girls, especially En, was very disappointed because all had expected to carry their lil' cousin for the first time that day...
Well, thereafter I brought the girls to visit Ally and Dor daily even until the day they were discharged! All had a chance to hold the new one.. with evidence!!
For a few years now, the annual PD camp has been a time when I would rack my head over the items which I have either volunteered or have been volunteered to take care of.. such as campfire items and ginormous scoreboards. This year, I have been asked to take on yet another foreign task - photographer and producer of the PD camp photo montage by the end of the camp!!
W o w . .
When Pauline, who was in the main comm this year, asked me on this, I was rather excited though apprehensive. Although I did not reject Pauline, I dared not accept the appointment either.. As the camp date drew nearer and there was no more escaping, I had to give an answer. I lacked the courage to give a yes.. PD chiefs even said there was no need to do the photo montage on iMovie, PowerPoint with background music would suffice. Still, it was only after Victor's encouragement and assurance of his backup support that I finally took on the challenge.
I had personally witnessed the sleepless night of the camp photographers; Mary and Ying Ling worked hard and endlessly into the nights when all the cubs and other sunshine auntys were fast asleep or at least catching 40 winks before dawn again. They are both extremely capable and tech-savvy auntys; I definitely can't hold a candle to them. Mary had since graduated and Yin Ling had stepped down as LIC in succession grooming and preparation for her migration to down under, her dream.. I had viewed the photo montages they had produced on iMovie and uploaded onto YouTube for the last two camps and was very very touched by them all over again. They left a gigantic shoe to fill...
Victor has always been the photographer and the gadgets guy in the family.. he bought all the audio visual gadgets in the family - tv, cameras, camcorders, hard disks storage, smart devices for smart tvs, macbook to process the pictures and videos, and so on and on and on... Victor has also produced countless clips on iMovie with both photographs and video clips from various devices. In short, Victor is experienced; I am not. Victor should have taken on the role and go on to the camp and he would be happily taking pictures and producing happy memorable photo montages complete with video footages! Well, since he cannot do that, he warmly strongly and actively encouraged me to go on to do it. Actively because he actually offered to fly down to Jurong kaikan in the night should I really need his help and cannot proceed with my photo montage due to my inexperience on iMovie!! Oh boy, I was damn touched...
For this year's camp, I packed unthinkable amount of stuff for a one-night stayover - MacBook complete with adaptor and mouse, SLD camera with Victor's camera bag (that's his condition of lending the cam!) and charger/adaptor, camcorder with adaptor/charger and extension cord with multiple sockets, adaptor plugs, tripod stand, on top of my usual change of clothes, iphone charger, personal plate cutlery and bulky toiletries... Arrgh!! Luckily I got to drive there despite a very eventful weekend at home. Eventful weekend at home included bringing back En from her K2 Independent Camp, Xuan's attendance of secondary schools open house and Qi's usual ballet class; Qi initially had a kayaking course on the same weekend which was subsequently rescheduled!
Really, it was not easy for me to be the photographer. I was very shy walking around with my tok-kong SLD camera while everyone else was going about their normal activities!! Fortunately I had tried on the role earlier at the SA training cum demo meeting and also at the P5 camp prayer meeting.. at least I am consciously aware of this mental barrier and that it was something I had to overcome. You know, this must be the only time which I was officially not required to do my prayers with everyone but instead walked around the hall pointing my camera at people who were sincerely chanting and praying!! I made people, both auntys and cubs, nervous and uneasy.. which did not make beautiful pictures.
Of course I was not the only photographer SA; Cindy and Betty were also going around with cameras but theirs were not SLDs!! : ( Nevertheless, there was a young boy who parked himself in our Admin room since early morning with his laptop and seemingly many tok-kong cameras; he is Aunty Esther's son and an ex lion cub, i was told. A boy with very few words and always stuck to the same chair when he was not out there taking pictures. His cameras were much bigger and heavier than mine and he was one of the official photographer sent for our event by the HQ publications team. I only knew much later that he was to be our buddhist god, my buddhist god!!
As night and the end of day 1 approached, my stress and anxiety heightened as I sat myself down to perform the most stressful work in my role - the selection of pictures and putting together of the photo montage. I had done a bit of prep work - did up a photo montage on iMovie from scratch and all the way to learning to save it and share it on DVD or YouTube; also selected a suitable upbeat music for the montage; and getting Victor to clear up disk space on the MacBook to allow space to work..
Obviously I was still totally unprepared. I had not anticipated the dilemma I would face when selecting photos and had not set out any guideline for photo selection.. My MacBook despite Victor having deleted stuff, still hung on me in the wee hours of the night countless times and I wasted lots of precious time for the mouse to start working again.. Of course, i dozed off immeasurable number of times too.. PDC Stacy went in and out of the room and still saw me working on the montage. She was very kind to say that it was not a must to screen the montage at the end of the camp, and there was no real hurry to rush out the montage, and asked me to go to sleep.. I felt really lousy. We have always been able to screen the photo montage at the end of the camp.. but PDC was willing to make an exception this year juz so that I could go and sleep!! )':
The night was really too short. Despite not going to sleep, I simply could not complete my montage!! Before long, the SAs were up and the cubs were up too. But my montage was not up! I was still struggling with too many pictures and MacBook hanging as I edited my iMovie project!! Also, my work was not ended as I still had to take pictures of the activities happening on day 2 of the camp..
Then, all the buddhist gods appeared. Betty and Cindy, and even small boy Justin went out to take the pictures I was supposed to be taking while I continue to work on the photo montage. Next, another buddhist god appear in the form of Ying Ling, the experienced photo montage producer! She was so assertive with the kind of pictures to appear on the montage that many photos miraculously fell out of her criteria, and the remaining number of pictures we had to work with, became manageable!! Oh yes, another buddhist god SA had asked buddhist god Siew Ling to return to camp that morning with a packet of kopi-o which really really really saved my day!! Otherwise I would be dozing off, maybe even snoring away, as Ying Ling worked on the montage.. Another huge buddhist god came in that little boy Justin as he had obtained prior permission with HQ publications to share his photos with PD; hence I could use his many beautiful pictures for our photo montage!!
Well, here's the crystallization of all of our efforts, determination and yes, lots of daimoku in itai-doshin spirit!! Juz in time to screen at the end of the camp..
Comparing my enthusiasm for our WD formation day this year and last, it is really as far apart as heaven and earth (天壤之别)!! In fact, heaven and hell.. I thought and planned so well ahead that I could kickoff with my members at April's zadankai last year; this year's 'annoucement' at May's zadankai was not even done with a fraction of the previous year's zeal and ideas.. and only because Victor insisted that I share something on our WD formation day.
Haiz.. even if I cannot pep up myself for this year's WDFD, I have to pep up my WDs, right? Hence, I decided to put together some photos of last year's WDFD to remind us all of what and how we did last year. This turned out to be the second photo montage I ever did, also in preparation for my role in this year's P5 camp as photographer and in-charge of the camp's photo montage.
After putting all the tangible pictures together, they proceeded to generate lots of intangible memories after playing and replaying and replaying the clip... I turned out to be the one most touched by it and motivated to work hard for this year's WDFD! However, I was not the only one.. Mona and Sreya also shared similar sentiments! Mona and I determined to exert our utmost for the remaining time we had until the formation meeting; we shall make it our most memorable one yet!!! q(^_^)p
