I took off on Friday, and met up with King’s Wife and her girls for another day of shopping (what else can you do in the afternoon with 2 kids and 1 toddler on tow?).

Before we hit the mall, we went to the famous jeweler’s place to collect some exquisite crystal bracelet I’d ordered. I love crystal (semi precious stone and diamonds!) jewelry because of the different healing properties the different crystals hold. and I love them simple and wearable all the time, something which I don’t have to remove even when I’m in the shower.

The famous jeweler was busy completing the last bit of stringing, leaving her twins to host us. Zara was one who never stand on occasion, she made herself feel right at home; she spotted the twins’ bike, and immediately climbed on it; she saw any thing resembling a toy, and started taking and playing with it. Until one of the twin could not stand any more and went to complain to mummy.

*See where her fingers were in the photo, she even wanted to control what was to show on TV*

I got 3 different bracelets, one using garnet, another using peridot, and one more combining amethyst and rose quartz. For the latter design I got one for Zara as well. I also got a pair of earrings for my niece, Alicia since she’s into jewelry now. King Wife’s got herself a pair of earrings as well.

They are all quite pretty and dainty, and reasonably priced. Zara loves her bracelet as well. When I put it on for her, I’ll tell her, “See, pretty pretty”. She would then walk to Daddy and point to the bracelet, and then to her kakak and do the same thing. After ‘showing off’ to whover is around, she would then remove it, very swiftly. Probably a bad idea to get jewelry for her.

After jewelry shopping, we went to Mid Valley. I used to go to there everyday when we were still staying in Seputeh, but rarely now since we moved. I had forgotten how bad traffic can get there. It was a working day, but the traffic was hellish, and the car park was very full! It took me almost 1hr to get a parking spot! Such an anticlimax for a shopping spree.

As usual, we just walked around and browsed at things, the only objective we have was that Samantha (King’s Wife’s youngest) wanted to buy a Christmas Present for Zara. This 8yr old niece of mine is such an angel, wanting to use her own pocket money to buy a gift for her cousin. I told her not to spend any money on Zara, but she insisted. She told me in advance she didn’t have a lot of money, so I suggested she get Zara hair clips, since Zara had none. She chose a very beautiful pair in the end.

This year, the Christmas deco in Mid Valley was very nice. The theme must be White Christmas, because every where and everything was in white. All so gorgeous!

This shopping spree didn’t cost us much, just got some baby biscuits and diaper for Zara, and then a pair of sandals with heels for myself (since there is a dress code in the office now, and my colleagues have been commenting on the flat comfy sandals I’d been wearing). Again, Zara was such a sport throughout, no complaints or fretting. Then again, she has her best pal, Samantha che-che with her.

I have another 2 more days of leave to clear before Christmas, which means 2 more retail therapies to go to!

So I got tagged by Ipoh mari (come from Ipoh) Helen. Since she said she’ll buy me Ipoh White coffee when I visit Ipoh the next time, I have to oblige.

Here are the 5 food that I absolutely loved during my childhood, and no longer eat or able to find them :

1) Bak-yu-pok (Chu Yao Cha, ???/?, Fried lard) :

Mum was such a fan of this, every time she went to the butcher, she would ask for a big piece of lard. When she reached home, she would cube the lard, then fry it in an un-greased wok. She would fry until all the oil from the lard was released, and the lard cubes turned crunchy. She kept the oil for cooking (later), and served the crunchy lard cubes as snacks! (We ate so healthily when we were young!)

When we ate Hokkien Mee, we always asked to add more lard cubes, and all of us, including my mum would have a chop stick fight over the noodle to see who could grab the most lard cubes!

I lived with my maternal grandma when I was 7 till 9years old. Every time after school when I climbed up the stairs to enter house (grandma lived on the 1st floor of a shop house), if I could smell the fragrance of lard frying, I would jump with joy. In grandma’s house, nobody fought with me for the lard cubes, I have them all!

I’d been a non-pork eater for almost 12years now, so, no more lard cubes for me, but this tradition is still practiced in King’s Wife‘s house, King (my brother) would fight with his daughters over the lard cubes.

2) Grandma’s Kon-low-mee (dry noodle, ???) :

Most of the time for lunch during my stay with grandma, she would cook cintan-noodles (???), stir in lard oil (but of course!), soya sauce and black soya sauce, and then sprinkle just a bit of Ajinomoto on top of it, and viola, my very delicious lunch.

Forget about getting a balance diet of vege, protein and carbo, or even MSG-free food. Back then, life was simple!

Maybe I don’t take pork and MSG now, I could never make my home cooked kon-low-mee as delicious as my grandma’s, even if I added lots of ingredients.

3) Pink Keropok (tapioca cracker) :

On weekend, when my mum visited grandma and me, she would always dropped by at this sundry shop to buy a big pack of pink keropok. One big pack would contain 30 smaller packs, each pack held two pieces of those pink keropok (shaped something like pretzels).

That to me, was the best treat. I think I could whack 5 packs in one sitting. Our whole family would sit in front of the TV and munch on this, the whole big pack gone in a day.

I wonder where you can get the same ones these days.

4) Canteen Curry Mee :

My grandma would give me 10 cents a day as pocket money. With the 10 cents, I would buy myself a small bowl of curry mee. They were just plain noodles with curry gravy, no condiments at all, but they were delicious. No curry mee ever tasted the same.

5) Kong-Bak (Stew pork Hokkien Style, ???):
My grandma made the best Kong-bak in the universe. Big chunks of semi fat pork stewed in rich soya sauce and thick soya sauce, together with hard boiled egg. It was just yummy!

For dinner, we always had rice drenched in the sauce, chewing on the devine pieces of pork, almost licking the plate clean every time. If there’s any left over the following day, it would taste even better than the first, and more fighting on who got the of morsel.

When I moved back in with my mum, she made that as well, and hers was as good, but being the apprentice, the stew pork cooked by her still lacked the umph!

Both my grandma and mum had passed on, and their recipe now lies with King’s Wife. I can’t comment if she did a mean stew pork like my grandma because I had never tasted it, only my brother, the King, can comment.

Today, I changed the recipe a bit and replaced pork with chicken instead. It tastes good, but you can’t get the creamy fatty sauce (made by the lard) with chicken.

Now, I wonder, when Zara grows up, what would be her unforgettable child hood food, just maybe it’s the delicious breast milk mummy produces. *grin*

The 4 people who were tagged before me :
1. Beer Brat
2. Sngl Guy
3. Yvy
4. Helen

I would like to tag :
1. The Diva – For someone who loves food, I just want to see what was unforgettable from your child hood.
2. Jesslyn – What was it like in Johor? I’m curious to know
3. Egghead – I don’t believe you’d done this before? Kekeke. Either J or your contribution is fine!

Do list down the 4 people tagged before you. And tag another 3 (or more) people.

Daddy doesn’t read my blog that frequently, if he did, he always have something to say, either I could improve on my English, or my English has been improved, or the photos are nice etc. etc. I always just rolled my eyes and pretended I didn’t hear anything when he made comments.

This time, he was looking at the birthday and the milestone post, and this conversation took place (based on my memory because it happened last week).

D: *folded his arms, stood at the back of me, watching the the screen* Wah, you put so many photos on your blog?
M: Yeah, nice hor?
D: Nice, but there are photos of our house, our faces
M: *roll eye* (what is his problem?) So?
D: Zara is getting older already. You should stop posting photos of her in your blog. *saw my eyes rolling* I mean, you can still blog, but just don’t put photos
M: Part of making the blog interesting is the photos, and I love photo blogging.
D: You don’t know what kind of people out there who are reading your blogs.
M: And?
D: And these people may be weird, and may stalk Zara..
M: People who read my blogs are parents themselves la. Aiyo! *slapped my hand on my forehead*
D: They may pretend to be parents.
M: …. *my eyeballs are fully white by now* We have met some of them in the bloggers’ meet ma
D: Those you know are genuine (Twinsmum, Egghead, Sue, Loc Kee, 1+2mum confirmed genuine parents), but you don’t know if there are any weird ones lurking out there.
M: You have to take the fun out of everything huh?
D: I’m just telling you, just be careful, especially now she’s older. *walked off*
M: *pointed middle finger at his back*

I’m not sure if any of you feel threatened by posting your kids’ photos on your blog, or even posting your own. Or if you chose to remain anonymous (photo wise), what was the reason. I never thought about it like Daddy did, but Daddy is always worry about too many unnecessary things.

So if one day I stopped posting Zara’s photos, it could only mean that my censorship board has started tightening his grip on my blog.

After a few months of contemplation, we finally bought a spanking new digital SLR, the Olympus E500.

Why this model? Don’t ask me, I’m not the technical one who will go to the net and compare features and prices. Daddy decided on the model.

We have been using our Pentax Optio 555 since Nov 2003. It has seen us through a few holidays, Zara’s birth, and her 1st year. I have been complaining about the shutter lag of the camera (which is about 1.35sec, very slow for precious moments). Every time when I tried to take a happy shot of Zara, after her smile has disappeared, then only the shot is taken. I had lost a lot of beautiful moments.

Daddy wanted us to upgrade to another camera with improved speed. I wasn’t keen. What’s the point of owning 2 very similar cameras? I told him only if it’s an SLR, or else, we just stick to what we have now. After much research and price comparison, we finally settled for this.

The draw backs of these SLR cameras are that they can’t take Videos and they are too bulky to carry around daily (which I do with my Pentax). So I’ll still rely on my Pentax for day to day shots and videos.

I don’t know much about cameras or photography, I only know how to capture moments. I believe by owning this new toy, I will have to start learning. Daddy gave me 3 days to learn up (the use of the camera), so that I can use this new beauty to capture Zara’s first birthday celebration on Sunday.

Well, Zara was running a temperature yesterday, so I was very busy caring for her. Today, she seemed to have recovered (Dr can’t tell why she got a fever, since she didn’t have any infection or flu). If she remained alright (crossing my finger, for her sake as well as mine), I’ll have today and tomorrow to learn up the features of the camera in preparation for her Sunday’s party.

Saw some of your comments, who thought the messy eater photo featured in my yesterday post was Zara.

I had to ‘announce’ here, THAT IS NOT HER, although they look rather alike. Someone sent me that photo, and I thought it looked like the mess Zara created after dinner (many many times exaggerated). So I used it.

I won’t be able to tolerate such mess, if that was her, I would have faint spell after each meal.

We finally got streamyx for the house! They finally got ports here (the new housing area).

How this will change me :
1) I will work from home more, probably twice a week at least
2) I don’t have to stay up in the office to read blogs or to blog, I can do it at home now!
3) There’ll probably more ‘rows’ with daddy, on who get to use the line more….. errr, maybe we should look at getting a router or a hub.

It won’t be good news to Zara, as mummy will try to sneak to the study to log on more often….

If you read King’s Wife’s blog, and she reads yours, you would have noticed she’d been very quiet the last few days.

This is because she’s down with fever and throat infection since Monday because she’d been giving too many bjs in one of her yoga pose.

She’s getting better now, and should be making an appearance soon.

By the way, if you wonder, why is King’s Wife called King’s Wife, let me let you in on the secret.

King’s Wife is my sister-in-law. Which mean she’s married to my brother, the King. We called him King because:
– he’s the only son in our family of 4. You can imagine how precious he is to my parents, and he always got away with a lot of things as a son.
– He’s a director in some company, and therefore revered by his subordinates (not sure if they loved him).
– Being a SAHM, King’s Wife has to ‘fook-si’ (?? – ‘provide service to’) her ATM kao-kao (sufficiently) or else will not get allowance to go shopping for another handbag.
– Normally, anything King says, we have to agree or abide although I don’t give a hoot.

A friend even dedicated a poem to King’s wife. You can see, although she’s married to the King, she’s really not the Queen like Yee Ching or the Queen that this fella will eventually get (the shake leg do nothing but have all the ‘servants’ running around her type), and hence her title.

Hope you get well soon King’s Wife!

I was really looking forward to the holidays, 4 days in a stretch, wonderful.

Daddy and I didn’t plan for anything because it’s quite scary to travel during these long holidays because the traffic will be so bad. A four hour drive can turn into a 7hour drive. No sir-ree. Better stay in the quiet city.

We’re lucky we didn’t plan for anything too. As yesterday night, Daddy received a call and he had to travel to Germany tonight itself for work. My face turned sour immediately after he hung up (he was talking on speaker phone).

Me : “So, what am I supposed to do these 4 days?”
Daddy : “You can come with me if you want.”
Me : “niah seng Just for 4 days? You think I’m so desperate? And we’re so well off?”
Daddy : “……”
Me : “Some more you have great plans, want to bring your daughter to the park for walks, do some day trips around KL. Now..” *turn to Zara* “See, next four days, it’s just mummy and you”
Daddy : “…..”
Zara : *grinned* (as she didn’t know what this was all about)

So for the next four days, I will be alone with Zara. Not sure what we’ll do, maybe we’ll :
– camp in King’s Wife’s place
– camp in my sister’s place
– go shopping again
– go to the park with my nieces
– drive each other up the walls (aw, she’s really not that bad; and neither am I)
– go swimming

And in the night, after Zara is asleep, I’ll try to complete my long write up about how I try to conceive for 6years, and finally got Zara, and also, read the 2nd installment of The Confession of the Shopaholic – Shopohalic Takes Manhathan.

That’s something to look forward to isn’t it? Ok, so I shouldn’t complain about the quiet time I’m going to get.

After my health screening yesterday, I took the rest of the day off and went window shopping at The Curve with King’s Wife and her girls.

After visiting a few baby shops on the 1st floor, I wanted to change Zara’s diaper, so I looked around for a baby changing room.

Guess what? The disabled toilet is also the baby changing room! I was a bit hesitant to use it, because of all the hoo-hahs recently on the use of disable toilet (see this and this and this). But this is a changing room AND a disabled toilet right? So I’m entitled to use it because IT’S A CHANGING ROOM and I have a baby who needs changing, right?

Anyway, I gingerly went in with Zara. But.. wait a minute. Where’s the changing table? *look left, look right* There is only a toilet bowl and a sink!! That’s all!!

Where am I supposed to place the baby? On the toilet bowl or the sink? Or the floor? Since it’s squeaky clean and dry.

We met the cleaner who happened to be dozing off nearby. I asked her if there’s another changing room with changing table.
Her reply, “Semua pun sama, macam itu” (They are all the same, like that).
I asked again how on earth are we supposed to change the baby if there’s no table?
Her reply, “Mana saya tahu?” (How would I know).
Then she added, “Ikea sana la, sana ada tempat.” (Go to Ikea, they have it there).

Walk to Ikano (the adjacent mall to The Curve)?? That’s quite a distant to walk, especially having to carry a tired baby, push a pram which was loaded with shopping bags.

I ended up giving Zara a change in her pram in the ladies.

Now I wonder what cow sense did the management have for giving you a changing room without changing table, and is it right to have the changing room the same as the disabled toilet?

We attended the Bloggers’ Meet in Kepong yesterday.

Zara took her nap a wee bit too late, and the traffic from Shah Alam to Kepong was so bad (not to mention the distant) so we ended up arriving at 8pm, 1 1/2hrs later than the start time.

By the time we arrived, most people had already eaten their dinners and had warmed up to each other. We didn’t get to move about to talk to most people, since we have to order, eat, feed Zara, entertain Zara, and take photos.

Managed to speak or say Hi to some :
Egghead, Loc Kee, MSAU, sue, Twinsmom, Jason, Milly, Willwolf

I didn’t get to say Hi to :
1+2mom, Suzette, peekaboooh, Young Brat.

Egghead was the orgniser, but I didn’t get to speak to him at all (except asking for directions on the phone). Managed to utter a few words to beautiful J (you are one lucky fella Egghead), and got Zara to shake hands with Little Skywalker. Egghead had already published the detail of the event in his blog.

We sat at the same table as Sue, who’s pregnant (beautifully, I must enviously say), and still made it ON TIME with Ivan.

I went over to introduced myself to MSAU, but I couldn’t recall her immediately; after a while when I could link the Panda icon to her blog, then only I know who she was *blush*. Her little girl SQ is such a sociable girl, even reached out to say Hello to Zara and I.

I could spot Sweet Sweet immediately when we entered the restaurant. Sweet Sweet is just like her name, such a sweet little girl, sitting quietly together with her parents, Loc Kee and SSM.

Willwolf was busy snapping away photos in his SLR. Even Daddy was attracted to his gadget, kept asking me to find out from Willwolf the model of the SLR. The photos turned out to be very nice, the wonders of SLR. Willwolf’s little brother son is quite a lengjai (good looking), and always have this cheeky smile on.

Jason, hmm, such a sweet young man, the kind of guys you will bring home and your parents would approve off. The only thing he’s not sweet about is he called us Uncle & Aunty shamelessly. Made us feel like we’d come to a kids’ party, and we’re so old.

Smilley Milly was very sweet and quiet, she’s so good with kids. Zara, who’s normally very chosey actually let Milly carry her.

Twinsmum has such friendly personality. Making sure every body was comfortable and aknowledged every body’s presence. The twins, Anabelle and Isabelle are such beautiful girls, and nice soft bob they have (I’m always on a look out for nice hair, since Zara has very little).

Our table was next to Suzette & Peekaboo, but I didn’t even take the time to say Hi to them. How embarassing. Never mind, there’ll always be another time (I hope).

I saw another pair of twins at another table, younger than Twinsmum’s twins, later, I was told, she is 1+2mom, another opportunity to introduce myself and befriend a fellow mummy was wasted. *shame on me*

I didn’t see Young Brat at all, I think I was mainly attracted by the sights of kids, since he is still a young bachelor (with no kids obvioulsy), I didn’t spot him. (Was he the one seated next to Milly?)

The food at Milwaukee Steak Corner was really quite good, and reasonably priced. I didn’t expect my Calamari Steak to be 2 huge grilled sotong/squids though, as the ones I’d eaten in US before were actually diced up squid pancake/pattie. Good, but tough, and since we have to entertain Zara, I didn’t have the luxury to chew my food slowly. Daddy had grilled Sole, very delicious indeed, and for the price of RM17, worth it!

We’ll definitely come again if ever we’re around this area.

The highlight of the event was Twinsmum’s birthday celebration. The organiser and co-organisers got her a cake, and we all sang her birthday song (although most were too shy and mumbled the song more than singing), saw her ‘speechlessly’ thanked us, and had a slice of the cake.

This was both Daddy and my first meeting with cyberfriends. We came because we thought Zara would enjoy it, but I think it was too short a time for her to spend with the kids. I think I enjoyed this more, meeting with people whom I’d read their ‘diaries’, seen their deepest thoughts, laughed at their silliest jokes, and it was nice being able to link up faces with writings style, or a story.

I definitely will go to another one of these bloggers’ meet again. Thanks to Egghead again for organising this.

Here are some photos taken (if you find any of your photos offensive, please leave me a comment and I’ll remove it):

Sweet Sweet is such a sweet looking child. No wonder already booked by Luke Skywalker.

I can’t tell the twins apart, but they are both very cute.

Zara’s potential boy friends, Ivan and Luke Skywalker, and their parents.

Siao Qing : “Your hair very nice la, which hairdresser did you go to?”
Zara : “There, that Baldy Locks unisex salon in Kepong Baru”