My Two Girls – All About Zara and Zaria

Do you realise that in Malaysia when a hotel room costs you less than RM400, chances are the hotel will be pretty horrid?

During the school holidays, we decided to bring the girls to Cherating for a holidays. We booked 2 nights stay in Holiday Villa for RM270/night (from the net), Holiday Villa you know, should be ok right?

The rooms were decent and it’s challet style, but the pool is another story.

When we brought the girls to the pool, I noticed that the water was brownish, thinking it was maybe sand from the sea, I didn’t stop the girls when they jumped into the pool, gulping down some of the water in their excitement. When I got into the water to join them, then only I realised it was filth and not sand. My skin has this slimy coat, on top of that, I can smell poops and urine. People were swimming fully clothed, and their kids were in diapers and all. Ewwwwwww.

I suspect that’s how the girls got sick.

We checked out the 2nd day (even though we booked for 2 nights), and moved to Legend Hotels next door, for an additional RM100 per night. The pools were nicer and cleaner, but the rooms were pretty basic with a leaking toilet and smelly pillows. RM370 and still you get crap?

For the girls, they were not as fussy as us in terms of cleanliness, so they had fun. Two things though, Zara was asking us when we’re going home, and Zaria was requesting us to go back to the hotel with rafters (which is Holiday Villa).

For the duration we were there, we spent most of the time in the hotel, but we did try to explore the fishing villages around and event went to Chukai for brunch.

Girls at Holiday Villa Cherating

Girls at the beach in Legends Hotels – Both were fascinated by the cheap bubbles we bought them; They were playing ‘catch-me-if-you-can’ with the waves; Zaria spent most of the time at the shallow steps at the baby pool, refusing to go any where deeper where her feet couldn’t touch the ground.

Chance upon this extremely crowded coffee shop in Chukai called Hai Peng.

On our way back, popped by a village stall to have kuih still baked using wood fire

Another stop at a fishing market, where the girls have some keropok lekor (not the crunchy), and we had some satai ikan (some otak-otak style) snack.

Continue from here, here and here, this is the last piece, I’m keeping the best for last.

Now it was a coincidence that Daddy was in Japan too the 1st week I was there. He arrived 2 days later than me, and he was staying in Shinjuku (新宿). Here was a conversation that took place before he left for Japan :
I asked him “Should I check out and move to Shinjuku to stay with you?”
He replied, “Of course not. What would people think? We are there to work you know?”
Hello, we’re married right? Even if we’re working, we should be sleeping together at night, no?
That’s Daddy, so full of his principals, no abuse of work trips, no taking advantage of the company, etc etc. Anyway, I side track.

So we didn’t meet until the weekend. On Friday (27/2) I moved to Shinjuku after work, and met Daddy at, Hotel Century Southern Tower, the hotel he stayed in, which has beautiful view of Tokyo from the room and more luxurious than mine.

On Saturday, I was really keen to go to Hakone (箱根), a 2 hr train ride away, to look at Mt Fuji from afar. Daddy didn’t want a taxing trip, he was more keen to do some exploring of Tokyo; so Tokyo it was.

We headed to Ueno (上野), a nice place to check out local produce. There were lots to see, and things were cheaper than Shinjuku; but when I wanted to buy some seaweed and green tea, Daddy thought it was better to buy from reputable source. He said the things from the street vendor didn’t look like it was good quality.

Ueno – Ameyoko Shopping street

At a Fish Market – fresh clams and fish; live crabs and prawns for sale; recommended cooking style provided for reference. How thoughtful.

For lunch, we had the best Udon in a restaurant stumbled by chance, I was attracted by the sign which said, 手打ち (Japanese : Handmade). I normally prefer Soba over Udon, but this was good. I had mine cold topped with Vege tempura.

After Ueno, we went to Asakusa (浅草), walked around Nakamise (仲见世), a shopping street (mainly souvenirs) leading to Sensoji Temple (浅草寺).

A monk at the entrance of the Asakusa subway; Nakamise shopping street; an orange tree on Nakamise

Around Sensoji

Our main purpose for coming to Asakusa was to check out Kappabashi Dogugai Street, which is lined with stores selling table and kitchen wear, for we love to shop for such things. We probably spent more than an hour there, hopping from one shop to another, eventually buying a few plates. With the strong Yen, most things turned to be quite expensive.

That night, we had dinner at Soba Daian restaurant, again attracted by the 手打ち (Handmade) sign at the entrance. We shared a portion of sashimi, soba, salt grilled fish collar, tofu sashimi, and dessert; all were absolutely delicious.

It felt rather strange that we’re eating and shopping without the girls, and the hotel room was so quiet without their chatters. However, it was a lovely Saturday.

On Sunday, after checking out and a quick breakfast, Daddy took the train to the airport for his flight home, and I took the train to Takao-san-guchi to meet up with my colleagues. We wanted to visit Mount Takao or Takaosan (高尾山), a mountain which was awarded a maximum 3 stars by Michelin Voyager Pratique Japon. There were 4 of us, my 2 other non-Japanese colleagues (who were from a different site), and our Japanese colleague cum guide.

This greeted me as I got out of the station. A beautiful village at the foot of Takaosan.

Instead of hiking, we took the cable car up, but explored the top of the mountain on foot. The view and the air is so different from downtown Tokyo. There are different hiking trails leading to different places. We first went to Yakuoin Temple, built more than a thousand year ago, and then to the peak of the mountain. We saw small little shops and restaurants scattered around. On a clear day, it seems you can view Fujiyama from Takaosan, but we didn’t manage to see it. Here are the photos :

The mountains around, can’t tell which is Fujiyama; Hachioji can be seen from the top; the cable car that took us up Takaosan

Around Takaosan

Around Yokuoin Temple : A beautiful bell hung from the roof; cleansing area at the temple; donor’s names on bamboo; Tengu or 天狗, Japanese mytological figures

Shop and stalls in Takaosan; steam bun for sale; a boot washing area with brushes provided for hikers at the Takaosan-guchi station.

By the time we’re back at the Takaosan-guchi station, it was close to 3pm. Our Japanese host mentioned that she’d made reservations at a restaurant, and we had to wait 20mins for the bus to send us there. I was really hungry and wondered why we couldn’t just go to any restaurants near the station. The bus ride took another 10minutes, through winding roads and small alleys, and when we arrived at Ukai Toriyama, I knew why Michiko took the trouble, she wanted us to experience the ultimate Japanese dining.

The restaurant is in a big traditional Japanese garden, with little streams and ponds scattered around thatched-roofed country-style cottages.

The beautiful Japanese garden that houses the restaurant

A cottage for private dining; tradional lantern; a place for tea; Japanese water feature

Michiko booked one of these cottages for lunch. Served by a waitress wearing kimono, our full course lunch took us almost 3hours to finish.

Seasonal vege appetiser; local raddish stew; clear soup with pigeon meat ball

Fresh water fish sashimi (the sea water fish is still nicer); grilled seasonal fish; Dumpling in red bean soup

The rice comes with grated sticky yam, I didn’t really like the sticky slimy feel

Waiter helping to grill our meat. I have grilled chicken tigh, I’d never tasted chicken so delicious before; my colleagues have beef

All that food for 9,000Yen per course per person. Luckily my colleague was paying.

By the time we’re done, it was already dark outside, and the place still looked gorgeous.

That was how my beautiful weekend ended. Good company, good sight-seeing, good food.

The girls probably had gulped down some of the filthy pool water in the lousy hotel that we stayed in our recent holiday (will blog about it later), but Daddy thought it must have been one of the meals that we took on our trip; on Sunday night, the puking started.

Sunday : Zaria started at 9:30pm, in the car, and by 12am, she’s puked 3 times. Emptying her stomach. She did it once on our bed.
Monday : Zara started at 5am, and by 1pm, she puked 6 times.
Both looked well by Monday evening, so I sent them to school on Tuesday.

When I picked them up from school, Zara looked tired, and wanted to take a nap when we arrived home instead of having her lunch. I then realised she was running a fever, 38.6. For the rest of the day, she was not like her chirpy self, every question I asked her, she just replied with a feeble “Ya”.

The puking started again from 5pm. We brought her to see a doctor in the evening, and when she got back, she vomitted again. 10pm, 11pm, 2am, 3am, until nothing came out except clear yellowish water.
Zaria too vomitted after milk before bed time.

Today, both girls are off school. Zara is still running a fever, but the vomitting has stopped (for now).

Since Sunday night, I have laid mattresses in our room (layered with sarong to prevent the matress from being soiled) and I slept with both girls on the mattresses, with basin, tissue, thermometer all nearby; waking up to help them and clean them when they vomitted (Daddy helped whenever he was ‘conscious’).

This is the girls at 9:30am this morning. Doesn’t this look like a refugee camp?

After 3 nights of interrupted sleep, I’m exhausted too.

Hope the girls get well soon too, I feel so heartache seeing them so weak, especially Zara.

I still have a post on Japan with more photos, it takes a long time to sort out the photos and post them, so it’ll come later. Meanwhile, lets talk about some cultural difference.

Here are 2 things that I found :

Credit : Hotel Gran Spa

Onsen Culture
The onsen that was located in my hotel, has 5 indoor pools and 1 outdoor pool (all heated of course from natural hot spring water). There’s a sauna and a steam bath, and also a pool with cold water. There’s a public shower area with partitions. Each comes with a shower, a tap, a stool, own set of toiletries on a low top (you are meant to sit on the stool to bath). The side partitions are not higher than 2 feet (you can’t really cover yourself if someone is using the shower next to you).

The first time I stepped into the room where the onsen is, I was wrapped in towel, and all the other females who were stark naked stared at me.
Ok, so we have to be naked once we stepped in. When you are in Rome, do what the Romans do. I walked out and did the same, nobody knew me anyway.

The ladies come in different age, shapes and sizes. I’d seen 1.5yrs old to probably 80yrs old walking about.
Nobody covered themselves when they moved from one pool to another. Nobody paid any attention to people’s body parts like I did. I couldn’t help it, I’d never seen so many naked bodies live before!
Some of them come with a friend, and they’ll be chatting to each other with their lower body submerged (hey! there’s still the upper body).

Some of the friends shower together. Imagine, taking shower with your friends? I’d seen women exfoliating themselves, standing with their legs lifted on the stool, and talking with their friend in the next shower, taking their time.
I don’t think I have friends who are close enough to do this with me. Even if I did shower with a friend, we’ll probably pretend not to look at each other, and quickly have our shower done. Not the Japanese, they shower, they talk, like chatting over a cup of coffee. A few even asked each other to help them scrub the unreachable places!

Then my colleagues told me the onsen in the Hotel that I stayed is quite famous in Hachioji, sometimes they have department events there. Imagine! Your colleagues and you all together naked! Although the females and the males are in separate sections, but still..?
I can’t imagine myself doing that with my co-workers.
Or worse still, being in the onsen with your boss? Yikes.

Bathing with their kids
While we were talking about my reaction to the onsen culture over dinner with a few closer Japanese colleagues, one of them suddenly sighed. (The conversation went something like this.)
“My daughters don’t want to bath with me any more.”
But how old are they?
“20, and 16.”
Since when they stopped?
“When they were about 12.”
When you say bath, do you mean you give them a quick shower or was it more to spend time with them?
” To spend time.”
I think 12 is about right they stopped.
“But some daughters allow their father to bath them even when they are in their twenties.”
Then I turned to the only Japanese female colleague present, what about you, when did you stop?
“Around 11~12.”
Would you mind bathing with your father at this age?
“Of course! But I don’t mind bathing with my grandfather.”

I don’t think there’s any thing dirty about the father bathing their daughters, but I don’t think I want my girls to be taking even a quick shower with Daddy when they have reached puberty.

There are more to come on the Japan trip, however, here are some short ones not on Japan :

Now have you heard about goreng pisang seller putting straws into the oil to make whatever they are frying crunchier? Do you believe it? I didn’t until last week.

Zara and Zaria love Keropok lekor, so sometimes I stopped by this stall to buy some for them. Last week, I parked right in front of the stall, and after getting some, I was busy passing the keropok to the girls, wrapping the bottom with tissue first where the girls could hold.
I saw the seller pouring oil into the wok. You know those cheap oil in plastic bags?
After the bag was empty, I saw her dipped the plastic bag into the oil. That caught my attention, and I stopped what I was doing, sat upright and watched again, the corner of the bag where she dipped into the oil had actually melted. I thought that’s the end, and then she dipped the bag further, melting the rest of it in the hot oil, leaving only the corner which she was still holding on. And the smirk on her face, as though she was enjoying poisoning the oil.
I didn’t look further, I quickly took back the keropok where I’d given to the girls drove off, swearing never to buy again.
I’m not sure if only that stall is doing it, or all stalls do it, but really…. BUEK!!

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Now for something nicer…

We always go to the wet market on Saturday with Zara. It was drizzling last Saturday, so I told Zara she should stay at home. She kept saying she wanted to follow, but I insisted she shouldn’t.
Zara then said “I waited for you for so long already, now you want me to wait for you again?”
I didn’t know what she was saying, “I don’t know what you mean you waited for me for so long. When did you wait for me?”
Zara replied, “You went to Japan for so long right? I waited for you for so long to come back.” Ouch!

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After one of their fights, Zaria came to complain, “I don’t like Zara any more.”
“Mummy send Zara (to) ah Kim’s house” o.O”
To her, Ah Kim’s house must be like a torture chamber.

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I asked Zaria, “Tonight should we watch Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire?”
Zaria replied, “The boy got a lot of blood one?”
I didn’t get it the first time, so I asked, “Why got blood?”
She said, “Because, the boy (Harry) got-blood of fire.” o.O”

I was in Hachioji (~45mins train from Shinjuku, Tokyo), Japan for 2 weeks from 22nd February to 7th March. We have a major deployment there which has caused some chaos in the operations, so I was there to help with my area.

Around Shinjuku (which I visited after I touched down on 22nd Feb before heading to Hachioji)

Japan was supposed to be entering Spring when I arrived, but it was still very cold (0 to 10 degrees Celsius); and they had their first snow fall on Friday 27th and again on 3rd March. Although it was a light snow fall, I’m glad I got to experience it.

I stayed in Hotel Gran Spa, a hotel basically meant for Hot Spring or onsen (温泉) user (the corporate hotels were fully booked due to high school exams where rural students flocked Hachioji to sit for the exams). Not much English was spoken in the hotel. Simple thing like ‘pillow’, ‘receipt’, were not understood. It took me a 40minutes struggle with the reception to get my room and to confirm the nights I was staying when I checked in. However, I do like the hotel because :
1) the use of onsen is free;
2) the place is very clean (all shoes are stored in lockers before entering the ‘lobby’, the rollers on my suitcase were cleaned before they helped me carry into my room);
3) it’s ~7 minutes walk to the office, and surrounded by restaurants;
4) security is very good, nobody go passed the reception without registering;
5) the people at the reception knew me (I was probably the only non-Japanese staying), I was given my room key without having to tell them my room number everyday
Every night, I used the onsen before going to bed, and I slept like a baby.

Around the hotel, on the way to the office

At work, I was in a room with my Japanese counterparts, about 20 of them. They spoke Japanese among themselves, and only when I was needed, they would switch to English. My Japanese colleagues have been working more than 15hours a day, some going home only 2 nights the week before (don’t ask me where they sleep, I dare not ask myself).

Every day I arrived at 9am and left the office later than 9pm, and still I felt bad, because I was the first to leave. Since everybody was busy, I sometimes had to eat alone, struggling with Japanese menus, luckily I can read Kanji (which is Chinese) and roughly knew what I was ordering.

Japanese is my favourite cuisine, and they make really good bread as well. The glorious food kind of made up for the long hours. Let the photos do the talking :

Most of the time, I have Onigiri (Japanese : rice balls) for breakfast. Seen here : Onigiri breakfast set; MOS English tea and chicken teriyaki burger; cold udon and hot soba. Breakfast were around : 350Yen to 600Yen

Lunches were normally set meals, noodles, pasta, or sometimes just bento (Japanese : Lunch box). Priced around 500Yen to 1000Yen.

Cold soba with vege tempura; Fish in soy set; Prawn pasta

Ate at my favourite lunch restaurant twice : Fish in soy set; Tempura and udon set. The size of the tempura was like our noodle bowl, for the remaining of my trip, I didn’t order another tempura dish after this lunch.

Prawn and seaweed ramen; Bentos (how come they don’t look as nice as the bentos our blogger mummies make?)

For dinners, I tried to eat in a variety of restaurants, sometimes with colleagues, sometimes alone. The price is normally above 1000Yen. People seemed to eat out a lot because there are restaurants every where.

Some of the many restaurants around Hachioji

Love the dangling shells of this one

And the lanterns on this

My new favourite : Japanese pizza and My all time favourite : BBQ on skewers

White bait salad; White bait pizzas

Shabu-Shabu : Soup was clear konbu soup and soy soup. My friend had the beef and pork, while I had the bamboo chicken. The soy soup made everything taste so delicious!

Grilled fish collar; Oh-so-fresh sashimi; Green tea ice cream with fried Mochi

Green tea tofu (dessert); Nagoya prawn rice balls; Cheese with Don’t know what (but it was tasty); Baby squid which looked like cockroaches

By the second week, after seeing me taking photos of my food before eating, my colleague asked me, “At home when you have dinner, do you take photo before eating?” o.O”

In a restaurant that served dishes from Okinawa, I pointed to the ‘specials’ (in Japanese) and asked the waitress what it was. She couldn’t explain, and a customer next to me tried to help. “Sea grapes!” I didn’t know what it was, but I just ordered. Turned out it was quite delicious, although the serving was puny.

“Sea Grapes” & Okinawa tempura

Now, what was the weirdest food that I’d eaten?
.
.
.
I had a date with my colleague from India, and because he’s been eating lunch and dinner at the same Indian restaurant for 2 whole weeks, I thought I’d do him a favour by bringing him to a Japanese restaurant. When we met up, he told me it was getting late, and we had better gone to the Indian restaurant which was nearer to the office instead of walking further (where the restaurant I wanted to bring him was located). So..

I obliged. I thought it was really weird eating Indian food in Japan.

Naan bread and some spinach curry.

The food was ok, but I just don’t understand how my colleague could eat lunch and dinner at the same restaurant for 2 weeks. o.O”

Now, you may ask, did I miss my girls since I was gone for so long and was it difficult for me? I did miss them. However, work trip is the only time I have to be alone, i.e. had the whole bed to myself, ate and shit in peace (nobody barged in when I’m doing my business), took my time to shower, can concentrate on my shopping (no need to have eyes darting around to make sure the girls do not walk away from me) etc, etc. So, consider this my me-time, and as long as it’s not too frequent, I rather enjoyed work trips.

My 2 years old

Zaria was naughty so I asked her to stand at the naughty corner, she was only allowed to leave when the timer went off (I normally set a timer on how long the girls have to stand at the naughty corner.)

Before the timer went off, Zaria went back to the play room.
I went after her, “Why are you not standing at the naughty corner? The alarm hasn’t sounded yet.”
She replied, “My leg is itchy.”
I told her, “Itchy also must stand. Go!”
Since itchy didn’t work, she tried again, “My leg is painful now.”
Trying to stifle a smile, I told her, “Painful also must stand! Until the alarm goes off. Go!”
She looked at me with puppy eyes, thinking I will give in, “My leg is very painful you know.”
A punishment is a punishment, I tried to hold on to my stern face, “Very painful also must go.”
She knew she lost the battle, she walked back to the naughty corner and stood until the timer went off.

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My 4yrs old

Zara had “Colour Carnival” day at school, and she wanted to wear her ‘party’ dress to school.
I told her they would be getting wet and paint all over so she should just wear a t-shirt and pants to school.
She said she won’t get wet and paint all over and she would be careful in her party dress.
I told her it’s “Colour Carnival” and she’s supposed to get paint and wet. The teachers would even do face painting or body painting for them.

She was upset because she could not wear her party dress, so she complained, “Do you know there’s chemical in paint? And you want the teacher to paint on me? After the chemical get into my blood then how?” o.O”

Anybody needs defend lawyers? You know who to call.

Yesterday, while I was working (yes, it was a working weekend for me), Zara was hanging around in the study. She started pointing to objects, and said, “Per-per-per Eh-Eh NNN.. PEN!” “Ker-ker Ah-Ah Per Per.. CUP.” “Der-Orrr… DOOR.”

I have been trying to teach her to put phonic sounds together to make words, but she had not grasped it, so I was surprised she’s doing it herself just overnight.

In the night, when it was reading time, I took out a book I’d been keeping away from the girls which is meant for phonic readers, a book Zara has not read before. I got Zara to read it. Shorts stories like, “A bug. A rug. A bug in a rug. As snug as a bug in a rug.“ or “Tom’s dog has lots of spots. Tom and Bog have not got spots. Splot! Now Tom and Bob have lots of spots. And Tom’s dog has not.“

She was able to put individual sounds together in a word, and read the sentences; with occasional help on words she has not learnt the sounds yet (i.e. Now). Slowly but surely, she finished reading the few short stories in the book.

You can imagine how happy both Daddy and I were! We cheered and carried her around the room. I told her, “Now that you know how to read, very soon you’ll be writing as well. Writing is just putting sounds in a word on paper.” All motivated, she said she wanted to try.

She wrote these. Can you make them out? (Some alphabets were written in mirror image. I don’t correct her when she’s writing words, so that it doesn’t stop her flow of thoughts, but only correct her when she’s writing alphabets)
CUP, DOG, MUM, DAD, SIS, SAM and then she turned the page and wrote more, BOOK, CAT.

These are pretty obvious.

And then she said, “I want to write (the word) calculator. Can you help me?”
o.O” (I didn’t help, as it was already 11pm, and she hasn’t learnt the sound ‘oo’ ‘ay’ or ‘er’ yet. I’ll keep that for next time).

I used to work in an English centre for pre-schoolers where phonics were taught, that’s were I picked up my phonics, and understand the importance of phonics for young kids to learn reading and writing. I made sure the school I sent the girls to emphasise on phonics, and I spent time to help Zara with phonics; so I’m really proud that Zara has finally understand how to piece sounds to make words (for reading), and how to break the words into sounds (for writing). We’re really happy with her development at 4yrs 3months.

Just came back from a 2 weeks work trip in Japan.

Zara greeted me with lips like these :

Apparently, she peeled some dead skins from her lips but got so carried away, some flesh got peeled off as well, they were bleeding quite badly, and now started to heal, but still look quite bad.
Me : “What happened to you?? Why did you peel the skins off your lips?”
Zara : “Because you were not here for so long, so I became silly!” o.O”

As for Zaria, she showered me with kisses, and kept stroking me (my hand, cheeks).
She kept asking, “You come back already mummy?”
And then kept saying, “I like you, you know, mummy?” “I love you, you know, mummy?”

During these 2 weeks I was away, Daddy was away 1 week in Japan too, we had to send the girls and Jelly to my bro’s place during that 1 week when both of us were not home.
Today, when we said we’ll drop by my bro’s place today to pass them chocholate & green tea, Zaria got worried.
She asked “We’re going Ah Kim’s (Chinese : Auntie) house?”
I said yes.
She asked “Why we go Ah Kim’s house? My house is ok wut?” (Probably thinking we’re sending her over to stay again.)
Then asked again, “Are you coming with me?”
Only after reassuring her that we’re just dropping things off, she’s not going to ‘sleep’ there, then, she stopped her questioning.

As for Jelly, she was quick to bring out the laundry hamper (ours is actually a basket) when she saw me opening my suitcase; she knew there’ll be a fair bit of washing to do.

寒冷的夜里,
听着阿岳的凌晨，
在八王子的街道上逛着，
雪花飘落在撑着的伞, 微湿的外套，
为什么有一股说不出的伤感? 润湿了眼眶?

I don’t write posts in Chinese, however, I was feeling this in Chinese and it didn’t sound right when I tried to translate into English.