Racial Harmony Day in school

Short Getaway - Malacca

Last week, grandparents were in town for iik intan's graduation and they spent a week accompanying us while papa was away for business trip.
After papa came back to Singapore on Friday,  we had a short getaway to Malacca the next day. Papa drove there and it took around 3.5 hours including the immigration clearance.

We arrived there around 2 pm and had late lunch at Mega Mall Malacca.

Then we explored the Malacca heritage centre which including their famous landmarks, St Paul's ruins, Christ church and red bricks buildings.

St paul ruins

Christ Church Area

tricycle to explore the city centre

St Francis Xavier Church

It was hot sunny day so the kids were a bit cranky and tired so we didn't explore much and went back to hotel for rest and shower.

In the evening we had dinner at Cottage Spices Nyonya restaurant which  6 minutes walk from our hotel. We stayed at Hotel Equatorial. Eventhough it's quite old, the location was good. It's 10 minutes walk to city center.

We ordered few peranakan dishes and they were so good. Our tummy was fully satisfied.
When we were on the way back to hotel, we passed by fruits stall and decided to have durian feast.
It was so cheap and the owner was very kind, he kept giving us free durian as their stall was closing soon.

We're heading back to hotel with bloated tummy full of durian hahaha....
In the end, we had good night sleep at the hotel.

The next day was a rainy and cloudy day, it's quite opposite from the day before.
After breakfast and checking out, we went to Baba Nyonya Heritage Museum and passed by Jonker Street. We visited the museum and it reminded me to my grandaunt's house in Semarang.

Then we stopped by to Baba Charlie Cake to buy some peranakan delicacy. It's freshly made and the queue was long.
We took away the kueh for our food stock during our journey back to Singapore.

We left Malacca around 1pm and it took around 3.5 hours and reached Singapore around 4pm.

It was a short, sweet and nice escape to neighbouring country.

Something we learnt from this trip, Malacca was a peranakan county. The livehood there was pretty relax. Most of food stalls only open half day either morning until afternoon or evening until late.
The people were nice and friendly.

Happy 10th Anniversary Papa Mama

On 5th July 2018 is special day for papa and mama because it's their 10th Wedding Anniversary and we celebrated it with family dinner at our favourite restaurant Brio - Jurong Point.

Papa ordered Duck Confit burger
Mama ordered Squid Ink pasta
Richie ordered Carbonara pasta
Trom and Ted shared pizza

We were very full but satisfied, it's very enjoyable evening.

On Saturday, papa and mama celebrated their anniversary with Family Builders Community. They ordered yellow rice. We loved it and it's very delicious.

Happy Anniversary Papa Mama, may both of you always stay in love forever !

Paul the Apostle - Movie

This is another good movie for this year. It's all about Paul, the Apostle's wisdoms

The synopsis :
Paul, Apostle of Christ is the story of two men. Luke, as a friend and physician, risks his life every time he ventures into the city of Rome to visit Paul, who is held captive in Nero's darkest, bleakest prison cell. Before Paul's death sentence can be enacted, Luke resolves to write another book, one that details the beginnings of "The Way" and the birth of what will come to be known as the church. But Nero is determined to rid Rome of Christians, and does not flinch from executing them in the grisliest ways possible. Bound in chains, Paul's struggle is internal. He has survived so much--floggings, shipwreck, starvation, stoning, hunger and thirst, cold and exposure--yet as he waits for his appointment with death, he is haunted by the shadows of his past misdeeds. Alone in the dark, he wonders if he has been forgotten... and if he has the strength to finish well. Two men struggle against a determined emperor and the frailties of the human spirit in order to bequeath the Gospel of Jesus Christ to the world.

What we could take from this story :
1. Love is the only way
2. God's way is not world's way
3. There's nothing impossible to God, He can change the heart of man
4. God can use any situation to save a man's soul 

Hopefully, when Ted is grown up, his movie is still available and he can watch it himself and inspired by this movie.

God is Genius Artist - Reflection story

I’ve never been interested in Art Gallery before until an encounter that happened yesterday at National Gallery 3rd level. I was intrigued by one of the posters placed in front of art gallery, I was curious what was inside and decided to give it a go.
There were many artworks and most of them were paintings and each painting was with the description about what the artist’s tools, the description and feeling. Until I saw this painting.

When I went to come closer to see the details, I was so amazed that with only strokes of different colors that sometimes the mixture was not making sense but when I walked further from the painting I saw the whole
Picture and it’s so beautiful. Then suddenly I imagined myself if I sit beside the artist during the process from the beginning until the end and thus the conversation comes like this

👩🏻 what are you making?
👩‍🎨 something beautiful in the end
👩🏻 but these strokes don’t make sense, the composition between colors are so wrong, I don’t think it will result in good picture
👩‍🎨 I haven’t done yet, it’s still a small part, be patient
👩🏻 with my impatient human’s character that everything needs to finish instantly and arrogance that I know better than the artist, I start criticising that it won’t make good painting because it’s so wrong with the colors, composition.
👩‍🎨 with smiley face, be patient and have faith in me
👩🏻 ok, I decide to wait and challenge him to make sure that I’m right

Until the end

👩‍🎨 ok, now it’s finished. You come with me looking at few meters from this artwork
👩🏻 then in awe, I’m speechless beyond comprehension. The result is beyond my expectations, it’s so so beautiful 

Then I relate it with life, Our God is like this genius artist and our lifes are like this art gallery with the same artist. Every piece is different, some may look similar but if we see closer, actually there are some different strokes that create uniqueness.
When our life seems messy, doesn’t make sense, it’s so wrong that we want to give up, God is in the process of making a beautiful piece. He knows what he’s doing much more better than we are.
Until in the end, when he finished, we could only amazed with what He has done in life. Some may have only black colors, some may have different colorful strokes but in the end of the process, every art piece is very beautiful 

One affirmation is HAVING FAITH IN GOD and BE PATIENT 

By the way, this artpiece that intrigues me was self portrait of Affandi, one of international acclaimed painter from Indonesia
He only used hands to create this beautiful canvas

Sports Day - 30 June 2018

This was his first time participating in Sports Day.
Sports Day was annual event hold by his school to celebrate youth day, the kids will perform their ability for their gross motoric skills depends on their grade.

As for Ted, since he's still N1, and considered youngest among the class, he performed hopping, running, scooping

And here he is, he managed to follow the instructions and complete the course well and was very proud when he got first medal.