Studio Shots : Jul-15

Taking studio shots had always been so fun.  But apart from good photograph skills, there were also three other components which were pretty important; Hair, Costumes and Makeup.  Taking the opportunity to use my lights to take some passport photos for Qi and Xuan, I extended its benefit to take some studio shots for the gals too.  Except for En’en, everyone readily bust into putting on their makeup and also a little hair styling for the event.

A swimming appointment with Ally : Jul-15

A swimming appointment fixed with Ally on the day when we celebrated En’en birthday too.  Ally is such a big girl now to enjoy the water better. Outdoor photography is always good when there is natural light.

En’en Birthday : Jul-15

This year, we celebrated En’en birthday similarly at both her grandparents’ place.  

Fruit Cake

Mango Cake

A little special request from her was a ‘multiple’ little presents celebration, something she had learnt from her sister’s past birthday.  So we granted her simple wish with a total of 25 small birthday presents.  We also bought two of her long time favorite cake; Mango and Fruit cake.  While she was very happy about this year's birthday, she was already planning for her party next year.  All her sisters had a birthday party when they were at primary 3 where they could invite their classmates, and thus, En’en had been also looking forward to primary 3 and having her own birthday party too!  ~ 'Sweat!'

Small presents requested by En'en

Xuan performing in Istana : Jul-15

After more than a year of practise on the saxophone, Xuan had move on to her second year in the school’s symphony band. Her symphony experiences also continued aggressively, starting this year with some public performances in NAFA concert hall and SengKang Sport Hub, then a Singapore Youth Festival (SYF) competition and now, a performance at Istana in front of the Singapore President!

We took this advantage to visit the Istana to watch Xuan perform. While it was raining heavily just before the performance, it did not dampen any of our spirit or mood to enjoy. Though drenched while taking photographs, it was actually very cooling and fun to see the rain which forced people to contain themselves in the tent for the performances. It was raining the heaviest when the President arrived, making the logistics arrangement of the arrival a bit choatic for army personnels. Interestingly, the rain stopped almost immediately after the performance ended which generously gave us the chance to take some nice photos in the huge compound in Istana. Istana is the Malay name for Palace, and looking at the size of this place, it really lives up to it’s name.

En's First Swimming Lesson : Jul-2015

Since En has announced that she wanted to learn how to swim at the start of the June holidays, she has remained serious and resolute about her intention even after the holidays had ended. Much as I want to enrol her for swimming class, I was not sure if there would be a suitable timing. After I mulled over it and discussed with Victor and subsequently En herself, I sent a text message to one of the swimming instructors' contact numbers on my mobile; I have been asking some friends of their children's swimming instructors contact to store juz in case I might need it one day. I believe the first such number was when I had wanted to enrol Qi and Xuan to learn how to swim! So many years ago!!

After looking at the 3 instructors' contact on whatsapp, I sent a text message to Desmond. Looked like he is still an active swimming coach from his profile picture! After I asked him for an available beginner class, he also readily asked for my preferred timing and swimming pool. It was a Tuesday evening that I first text Desmond, by Tuesday night, I have confirmed a Sunday morning 8am @hougang pool swimming lesson for En!!

En was exhilarated, most excited!! Forgoing my only available-sometimes Sunday sleep-in morning is more tolerable after seeing En's excitement..

I had thought Desmond was Kristie's contact and maybe Nicole's swimming instructor. However from a recent chat, I realized he isn't!!? Now, I really wonder from where or whom I got Desmond's contact. Regardless, En enjoys her swimming lesson tremendously!!

Philippines Trip : Jul-15

In end June, with sheer coincidence, I was required to visit a distributor in Philippines in July.

Although Philippines is part of ASEAN and I have several friends from there, I have never gotten a chance to visit that country yet. Thinking that Philippines is a metropolitan and transportation should be readily available, I also planned to take this opportunity to visit to our SGI centre and therefore, applied a visit letter from HQ.

My first impression upon arriving in Philippines after a 3.5 hours flight was very similar to Thailand. Traffic was messy and not as convenience as I had imagined. Roads were generally too narrow to cater for the volume on the road, and thus, jam on the road was a norm. I was fortune to be staying in a rather luxurious hotel in the city heart surrounded with a massive chain of shopping malls, another similarity to Bangkok. While I had no issue walking around the place and since transportation had been arranged for me to/fro the company and distributor, it would not be a problem for work too. But realising the bad traffic in Philippines, I started to ponder on how I could visit our SGI centre which would be some distance away, I was contemplating to hire a car and driver to bring me.

Huge shopping mall

At GSK Office

Following day, I visited our office to meet up with some customer service leads. After our morning meetings, I shared with them my plan to visit our SGI centre in Philippines and also explained to them our worldwide SGI movement to promote peace, culture and education. Following that, I showed them the SGI centre address and seek their advice on how I could to travel there. Surprisingly, they kindly offered to fetch me there with the company car and then back to my hotel. As a result, from the help of these “Buddhist gods”, I finally was able to visit our beautiful SGI centre which it was a wonderful experience.

SGI-Philippines Manila International Peace Centre

The remaining days in Philippines were a typical city life per se but the visit to the SGI alone had made the visit worthwhile. Although not as big as in India, I realised the contrast between the Makati city and the places outside was apparently too big a gap to be filled. It was just amazing how our pioneer leaders had advanced Singapore so well in the right direction, building the country with the right fundamentals and infrastructure. The next question is for the next generation leaders to maintain this advancement for another 50 years. Could they?