Stories of The Heart

My late mother-in-law told me once of how she occasionally got heart palpitations which was then followed by some bad news.

My heart has been doing some major exercises. It started a month or 2 ago. I dismissed it at first but became a bit more concerned when I felt some pain in the heart. It felt like the kind of pain you experience when you take in too much air while eating. Sitting up straight and taking deep breaths would help. But not that night. It lasted a few long minutes.

The doctor I visited ordered an ECG test and alhamdulillah, the results looked great. (Polyclinics - can get the test done on the same day) There was absolutely nothing wrong with my heart. The doctor suggested that I see a cardiologist just to be sure but I declined. Since the ECG looked good, surely there was nothing physically wrong with the heart.

The heart is now at it again. Perhaps I am developing anxiety attacks in this late, late age. But that is a better option than the palpitating heart being a harbinger of bad news.

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Somewhat related (because, in the remembrance of Allah, hearts find peace), I love verses 27-30 of Surah Al Fajr:

"Wahai jiwa yang tenang! Kembalilah kepada Tuhanmu dengan hati yang redha dan diredhaiNya. Maka masuklah ke dalam golongan hamba-hambaku. Dan masuklah ke dalam syurgaKu."

May we be among those who are mentioned here. Amin.

So Easy to Buy

Hello.

My name is Nad****.

I am a member of Ezbuy Prime.

____

Homaigoats.

It all started when we moved to our new place. I wanted to buy a bed for Ihsan but the beds that I like were the expensive ones from ibenma. I've heard of taobao but never got round to buying anything from there as I no understand how to read Chinese.

Then I heard of Ezbuy. Seasoned Taobao buyers are not fans of ezbuy.sg for many easons. I am a fan of it for one reason - English. (BUT, the English is only in the basic description of the item. Everything else is in Chinese. Google Translate is a very useful tool.)

After buying Ihsan's bed from it (cheap but I won't recommend it), I got lured into the whole seductive world of ezbuy. I've been an avid online shopper since my maternity leave days with Huda. I managed to rein it in after a few years, buying mostly necessities online instead of everything. Then came ezbuy...

Realising how cheap most stuff on taobao/ezbuy are, I paid a small fortune to become a prime member. The main benefit of being a prime member is that shipping from China to Singapore costs $2.99 per checkout. After piling my cart high with a dining table and 6 dining chairs, $2.99 is how much I need to pay to send the 7 pieces of furniture to Singapore. For home delivery, I topped up another $8. (For the record, I won't recommend that dining table either.)

In the early days of becoming a member, I went on full-crazy mode. I've learnt that big furniture was iffy but everything else was okay-go. I was adding so much stuff to my cart. Then, close my eyes, click purchase. Close my eyes some more, transfer money from my bank to the ezbuy account. Then twiddle my thumbs and wait for things to arrive.

With some 8 months left to my Prime membership, I have run out of things to buy (partly because of my minimalist measures). So, I asked family members if they had anything to buy. Oh yes, they did! But now, remorse has set in. I feel quite bad for being the enabler in other people's expenditure. They do need the stuff, I comforted myself. My parents wanted to buy those wrought iron flower pot racks for their corridor. About $15 for this is a good price to pay. https://ezbuy.sg/product/20000004247218.html Of course, we have no idea what the quality will be. The racks haven't arrived yet. They also bought this to hang over the parapet: https://ezbuy.sg/product/20000001863970.html

Then, my mother casually asked if ezbuy sells swing chairs. Of course they do! That was another motivation for moving house - to move to a place big enough for a swing chair. Unfortunately, I didn't get it in the end. (That's another story) Since I was so interested in a swing chair, I had spent long hours poring through ezbuy for one. They have plenty. My mother liked the first one I showed her. The price is less than half what you'd pay in Singapore. https://ezbuy.sg/product/20000000943469.html
My sister then decided to get the same thing. Long live my prime membership!

The rest of this post will be for recommended, tried and tested products that I've bought from ezbuy/taobao. I will add on to this list from time to time. It will stop on 9 January next year when my prime membership expires. Not too sure what to feel about that. Ha.

1. Magf**mers

A year or 2 ago, I bought M**formers from Amazon. A 30-piece set costs about USD30. That is a lot of money in SGD. I yearn for more but I could not get myself to spend that much money despite knowing that the toy can keep children occupied for more than just 2 minutes.

Here comes ezbuy.

A, errrrmm, exact replica of this toy is sold here: https://ezbuy.sg/product/20000004468686.html You can buy piece by piece or in a set. 30 squares, 40 triangles, 2000 pentagons. You name it, they'll sell it to you.

Needless to say, price is great. About 20 cents each for squares, triangles and circles. 40 cents or so for pentagons and hexagons.

Vibrant colours. So easy to put together. Can make 2D or 3D figures. Doesn't hurt when you step on them (I'm looking at you, Lego)

2. Sensor-operated dustbin

R2-D2 here lovingly opens up his lid when I put my hands above it. TheHusband likes his bins rectangular but I'm happy with this feller and his curves.

 It can be charged using a USB charger. I've only charged it twice since I received it sometime in December. (I got a prime trial membership first before embracing the year-long membership)

I cannot remember the exact price I paid. It was about $25 maybe? From https://ezbuy.sg/product/20000000172360.html


3. Rocking chair

Instead of a swing chair, I got myself a rocking chair. Main reason - I was afraid the swing chair would be too big and overwhelming in our tiny balcony.

This chair is comfortable. But it's always hogged by the kids in the daytime. They sit and read in this, often fighting over it.

Another reason for not getting the swing chair: I would need to move it into the house from the balcony when it rains. The swing chair would be too cumbersome to move about.

Got it for about $40 from https://ezbuy.sg/product/20000004291753.html

---That's it for today, 30 March. Will add more when I have more time.

Pressure Cooker

My lovely friends, D & J, presented us with an electric pressure cooker recently. Taiyo Pressure Cooker, PC66D. I have never used a pressure cooker before. My mother had a stove-top pressure cooker when I was a little girl. What I remember most about the pressure cooker was that the cleaning was #&*! Scum that collected on the sides was impossible to clean off!

Anyway. This pressure cooker is an *electric* pressure cooker which means that I don't have to remember to turn off the fire or figure out how much time I need to cook anything. Just press a button and (voila!) food will be cooked. 

Unfortunately, the instructions were not clear enough. 

The first time I cooked beef ribs, it turned out perfect! (Thankful for that because I was cooking it for guests.) Second time, chicken soup. It turned out like chicken soup but steam poured out of the lid continuously. Third time, semur daging, ie, some beef dish. Turned out too dry and steam was seen too. 

I sent an SOS to my friend who gave me the pressure cooker who in turn told me to go to Metro Causeway Point. There is a dedicated Taiyo counter manned by a Taiyo staff who can answer all my queries. She's there on weekends but avoid 4/5pm thereabouts because that's her break time.

3 things that I didn't do correctly were:

1. The seal position of the exhaust valve must be turned to the right. It doesn't matter if it feels loose. Just turn it to the right and leave it there. If you try to turn it further down, you can't. Unless you use extra force in which case you can turn it around and around forever. 

This is the seal position of the exhaust valve. The manual states that there is a sealing small icon but that's not true. There's no such icon. You can see the release/exhaust icon but no sealing icon.

2. Make sure the lid is in the locked position.

This is the locked position. 

3. You must cook it in one continuous process. You cannot set it at 15 minutes, then open the lid, add potatoes, set it to another 15 minutes, continue cooking. (I did that with my semur daging.) Nope. The Taiyo lady said that if I wanted to do that, I must cook it the traditional way, in a pot on the stove.

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I hope this info I'm sharing will be useful for all noob cooks who are using the pressure cooker for the first time in their cooking lives. (Especially this one because when I googled for more info on this particular pressure cooker, nothing came up.) If the thought of cleaning the cooker puts you off buying one, fret no more. The inner nonstick pot of the pressure cooker makes cleaning a breeze. If you are as forgetful as I am, you no longer have to worry about burning the house down because you forgot to turn off the stove. (A real problem for me. A $2 kitchen timer has saved me many, many times. Turn the heat on, set the timer. When the timer beeps, you know that it is for something in the kitchen. Go to the kitchen and check for things that need to be turned off.)

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Now, there is beef rendang in the pressure cooker. If it turns out nice, hooray! If not, I will share my fails here. :D

If successful, imagine how easy hari raya cooking will be when the rendang pot no longer hogs one of the burners on the stove! 

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Beef rendang is cooked! Not as dry as the semur daging. Hooray! 

The Boy

Since the hives are keeping me awake (see previous post) and I need to keep my fingers busy so as not to scratch them, I shall update this blog on TheBoy.

TheBoy now is 2 years, 6 months old.

1.
Fully weaned off. Hooray for it but feeling somewhat nostalgic also. He has also stopped waking up at night for milk but still wakes up for other reasons - mostly to get me to sleep beside him. Which I do because I value peace and quiet in the middle of the night. Most nights, I start off sleeping in my own bed but sometime in the middle of the night, I find myself in TheBoy's bed.

2.
It's not that I want to toilet train him at this age. I'm not exactly the most diligent momma in this area. I avoid toilet training for as long as possible because I really, really, really am not a fan of most public toilets.

When showering him sometimes, he would squat down to pee. Each time, he commented, "Macam R--- Z---, kan?" Just like his cousin who is 9 months older than him. Back story: 2 weeks ago, he was showering in the toilet when his cousin needed to use the toilet urgently. (You don't deny a toddler his toilet.) So he saw his cousin pee and ever since that, he mentions his cousin whenever he pees.

The half-hearted toilet-training started. A couple of times, he peed in the toilet. (2 accidents so far though.) Yesterday, he pooped in the toilet too. Not having to clean buttocks smeared in squashed poop is really something.

However, we are not going to go full-on diaperless mode just yet. This toilet training is still in its infancy. I'm doing it for a few hours each day. When we go out, it will still be diapers.

 3.
TheBoy has been watching Sesame Street daily. Yup. The Big Bad TV. It started off as something to distract him before he goes to school each day. When his eyes are glued on the TV, I feed him an early lunch. Everything in the bowl disappears when he's watching Big Bird and friends. But the season ended and there was no more Sesame Street at 10.30am on Okto. Thank God for Youtube! On days when he goes to school, he watches it at 10.15am. On non-schooldays, viewing starts from 11.30am.

Has he learnt much from Sesame Street? I doubt so. He knows that my favourite character is Count. His is Elmo. I also found some old scenes involving Mr Johnson/Fat Blue with Grover the incompetent waiter. I love those scenes! I showed some of them to TheGirls who enjoyed it as much.

What I like most about Sesame Street is how real the characters are. I like that there is Oscar who's always grouchy. Telly, who's always anxious. I find him a touch annoying but if we want our children to be accepting of others, they have to know that these characters and feelings exist. I do not like shows in which everyone is happy and sunshine-y all the time. Like that purple dinosaur show. Yucks. I do have quite a bit of Oscar in me, actually.

Unfortunately, there are not many full episodes on youtube. Why? In fact, it's quite difficult looking for full episodes of sesame street on the internet. I will soon finish watching all the available good quality full episodes available on youtube. After that, what? Sigh.

4.
Hives on arms are less itchy now. The ones on thighs and calves still itch though. Hoping for some peppermint oil to numb the itch so that I can sleep now. Like Big Bird says, toodle-loo!

(Maybe that's a subliminal message to all little kids watching to go to the loo. Maybe that's why Ihsan's toilet training is seemingly effortless.)

Hives

Woke up at 1am in the morning, scratching like a monkey. It's the hives again. Little raised bumps, some red, some not. Some merge together to form bigger raised bumps. All itchy as &^$#!

Urgh.

I've been getting them for a few hours a day since mid December. Given up trying to rule out possible causes.

I've seen a doctor for it where I was given Cetrizine, a supposedly non-drowsy antihistamine. Nope. Not for me. I had it twice so far. On both occassions, I could barely get up the next morning. One of the mornings, TheHusband woke me up telling me it was 6.20. Nothing registered; I went back to sleep. (Cannot leh. I am housewife. Housewife must be awake to prepare household for a new day.) But the effect was good. Within an hour or so, the hives stopped . 

I have an allergy patch test coming up in May. Hopefully, that will reveal the exact cause of the hives. 

For now, I can only hope to stop myself from scratching the hives too much whenever they appear. Trimmed my fingernails short. Applied peppermint oil. But I still wake up the next morning with scratches here and there. Sigh. 

Motivation

What drives a child to excel?

Ceteris paribus, what makes a child from household A want to do well in life while a child from a very similar household B remains lackadaisical in his/her studies?

How much of it is innate and how much of it is environment?

Sigh. Like TheHusband and I agreed upon, if we know the exact formula, all of us would be winners in parenting. Wouldn't that be nice?

----
We want our children to do well in school. Why? Perhaps we think that doing well in school means a more secure future. That is not wrong, is that? In most cases, such an association is true. There are, of course, situations in which those who did not do well in school went on to achieve greatness later in life. But, these cases are not as common and not the rule.

What us parents want is for our children to do their best in school. Do their best. That means, put in 100% of effort. Or 90%. Not 10% effort and expect parents to supply the answers all the time. If, after putting in close to 100% effort, the results are not sterling, it is okay. It is really okay.

What is not okay is if the darling child stares at the comprehension passage and expects all the information to float into the head. Merely staring is not enough, my dear child. No matter how dreary the topic is, the passage has to be read and dissected. An absence of careful reading = No efffort = Angry Parents.

Some would argue - what is the point of knowing why Mr. Chen in that comprehension brandished a knife in the wee hours of the morning or finding the height of the triangle or whatever the value of x is. You'll never need that in real life, anyway.

Now, my child, I'll tell you why you need to do such things in life. Because, you can't always do things that you like. When you go to work, you have to do things that you may not enjoy. But you do them anyway. If you don't, your bosses will not be pleased with you and you may not have a job the following month.

Working hard in school forces you to work your brains. It forces you to do things you may not particularly enjoy much. When you taste the small successes in Mathematics, it makes you feel good about yourself. You will realise that even though you don't like it much, you can do it and can be pretty good at it if you put in your 100%.

At your young age, I am your benevolent dictator. I WILL tell you what to do. The assumption is, at the cusp of adolescence, you may not know what is good for you. I will show you the path. I may force you on the path, if I have to. I do this for your own good. So that you will have more options in future. So that, you will have a secure future long after I've left this world. Ultimately, it is to ensure that you can be a good Muslim who fully uses all the faculties Allah has given you.

F's Stories

The Middle Child loves writing and drawing.  Her stories have very angmoh names though. Here's an excerpt from one of her stories. 

-F, 7 years 11 months

Before January Ends...

Let's have some updates.

1. The Girls

Masya Allah. Sometimes, they surprise me. 

During last year's Prize Giving Day, Farah got quite a few prizes - First in Class, First in Maths & English. Masya Allah. What a good achievement. And I am pleased that she is still somewhat clueless about how well she has done. Huda also was given the Best in Conduct prize. When Huda realised how much prize money Farah received from the school, she planned to work harder in P5 to get whatever that Farah got. Insya Allah. I'm grateful to the school for giving them all this money because us parents have never given and probably will never give them any monetary rewards for doing well in school. 

And then, there's the Edusave Award. Huda has been getting the certificate every year for being among the top 25% in school. Unfortunately, we don't qualify for the bursary. It's ooookay. There are others who need it more than we do. 

So, we were pleasantly surprised this year when we found out that those who didn't qualify for the bursary were given an $80 book voucher. Yipppeee! But when the letters came, Farah qualified for the book voucher but Huda was asked to attend another ceremony. Hmmm. I felt a bit sorry for Huda at that time. 

We went for Huda's ceremony. Fwaaah. It turned out that Huda was given the Edusave Character Award which comes with a cheque worth $350! Masya Allah! 

Children these days are so, so blessed! The government pumps in so much money into their education.

But of course, sometimes they really, really, really cause me much pain. The Tiger Mom makes her appearance not because I have docile children who willingly take out their books and do their much needed revision on their own free will. And there are still soooooooooo many areas we have to work on with each child. I hope by the time I die, my child will be ready to live their lives.

2. The Boy

I must write more about the boy. I've lost much of my interest in blogging as compared to my Multiply days - actually, not really. I blog quite a bit in my head but I no longer have that much time to sit down in front of the computer and spend 2 hours banging on the keyboard.

The Boy is now almost 2.5 years old. Come 8 Feb, he'll be 2 years and 6 months old.

i.     We are in the process of weaning him off breastmilk.

The beginning was a nightmare. He's been having milk on demand and that means, he's been getting it whenever he wants. 1am, 2am, 2.30am. Whenever.

After gentle coaxing did not work, and he suddenly decided to reject the bottle completely (he'd been having bottled milk once or twice a day), and I was getting frequent headaches because of my prolonged lack of sleep, I thought, I'd take out the big guns.

Asam. Tamarind paste. Which I smeared liberally on the nipples.

One morning 2 weeks ago, he asked for milk. Susu badan, he called it (because we are way too polite to call it t*t*k).

I told him that he no longer could have it because there was asam on the milk. He didn't believe it. He  had barely put his mouth on it when he recoiled in terror (okay, maybe too drama). I told him that the asam would only disappear twice a day - before his nap time and before he sleeps.

Since then, it's been quite smooth sailing. He has been asking for the bottle a lot these days. But at night, he still wakes up for breastmilk although he knows that he cannot have it. So, he just screams and thrashes about. Twice a night. I still have to go into his room and lie down beside him until he falls asleep again. As I am also a kind neighbour, I have to close the windows so that the neighbours don't call the police.

ii.     And yes, this reminds me. The boy now has his own room. In our previous place, he used to be a squatter in my room, sleeping on a mattress on the floor. With his own room, each time he cries, I take a longer time to respond. I really fear that our neighbours will hate us (they may already hate us by now).

iii.     He has started attending playgroup! The original idea was to get him to attend the childcare that the sisters used to attend. But TheHusband felt that he was a bit too young. The sisters' birthdays are in February and March, so when they joined the childcare in January of the year they turned 3, they were almost 3 years old. But this boy was just 2 years 5 months in January.

When the sisters went back to school in January, he was bored and listless. I had to play with him and read soooo many books together. I asked my sis-in-law if she had any programmes for bored little ones and was I in luck! So, he's now in school on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays from 11am to 1pm. These days are also known as my freedom days. Haha!

Unfortunately, in the first 2 weeks or so, he didn't take well to school. Having been used to being under my armpit (that's a literal translation of a Malay idiom), he cried so much. I have great respect and sympathy for his teachers. These days, he's still not too pleased about going to school, but the level of resistance is much reduced.

iv.     He is talking a lot. A lot a lot a lot!

He can express himself in Malay pretty well now. I choose to keep it this way, expose him to mostly Malay for now.

There are some episodes which I have to write about here lest I forget.

Bontot - Bontot means buttocks in Malay. We teach the name of his body parts, bontot being one of them. Unfortunately, this good child loved the sound of bontot so much, he started saying it all the time. I stopped him and suddenly, he realised that bontot is a good way to express his anger.

When he fought with his sister, he would suddenly shout out, "BONTOT!" We stopped him many times and scolded him a number of times. When he got angry, we could see the 'B' forming on his lips and a stare stopped the rest of the word from coming out. A couple of times, he shouted "BON-!" And stopped. He knew he was not supposed to say that word when he was angry. I scolded him, "Ihsan tak boleh cakap bontot, kan?" (Ihsan cannot say the word bontot, right?")

That wasn't the end though.

"BON-TOL!" He responded. "Ihsan nak cakap BONTOL lah!" (BON-TOL! I wanted to say BON-TOL lah!) It doesnt matter that the word 'bontol' doesn't exist at all.

Anak Yang Soleh - A mother's word is a do'a (supplication). I try to call my children good names. (Still trying. When Tiger Mom is out, that trying part can be well, trying.)

I call the boy anak yang solih (pious child) quite often. I didn't realise how often this was until one day I called him anak yang baik (good child). His response was: Ini bukan anak yang baik lah. Ini anak yang solih. (This is not a good child. This is a pious child.)

Whatever rocks your boat, boy.

Nangis "(Cry) - The sisters were always very eager to know what he did in school. One of the first questions they asked him when they returned home from school was what Ihsan did in school. He often said, "Nangis."

While walking to his school, I asked him where we were going. You know, the usual silly mother talk. You ask your kids questions whose answer you already know.

Me: Ihsan nak pergi mana ni? (Where are you going?)
I: Nangis.
Me: Tak! Ihsan nak pergi sekolah! (No! You are going to school!) Ihsan nak pergi mana? (Where are you going?)
I: Sekolah, lepas tu, nangis. (School, and then cry)

Cannot win sometimes.

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Will stop here. As always, I never start and finish writing in one sitting. This entry took 3 sittings to reeach this point so if there is no coherence it is because (a) I wrote it in three sittings; and (b) I'm hardly ever coherent anyway,

3 weeks after moving...

...we are still very, very busy with the post-moving activities (which comprises unpacking, cleaning, unpacking, sorting out, disposal of stuff, setting up of furniture etc etc etc)

But here are things which I want to talk about which may or may not turn into lengthy blog posts of their own. ('May not' is a more likely outcome.)

1. LED there be light!

24 watts LED light as the lights in L-boxes are really an overkill. We were afraid that our bookworm kids will go blind if they read in such a dimly-lit environment so we went all out with the lighting. Our contractor told us that 12 watts or so is enough but nooooo, we had to go craaaaazy with the lights. 10 24-watt + 3 18-watt lights in the living room. 4 24-watt lights in the tiny study area. So now our house is extra extra bright if we turn all the lights on at the same time.

The bedrooms use Fanco fans with  4-light light kits. 2 lights are enough actually. 3 will be okay. 4 lights? Once again, only happens in our household. (We most probably contribute to the enhanced light pollution in Woodlands. Oops.)

2. Taobao

We taobao-ed Ihsan's bed and the dining table + dining chairs. A lot of small stuff too. All thanks to ezbuy.sg. Big items like beds and dining tables are really a case of hit and miss. It was almost a hit for the bed and quite a miss for the dining table. Things are really cheap on Taobao, though. But, I'm not buying anymore big items from Taobao. TheHusband, however, still believes in Taobao. We shall see.

(I should write reviews of all the Taobao stuff I bought. But, should. Should is the operative word here.)

3. ?

Eh. What else ah? I thought I had quite a bit to say earlier. Will add on to this list when I have more time and know what was it that I've forgotten. :p

And we moved!

We did it! We moved! We really moved and started staying at our new place.

That meant we did a lot of packing. A LOT! And we have also been doing A LOT of unpacking. A LOT!

The new place is at a very, very convenient location for non-car-owners like us. 

But of course, I miss our old quiet environment. Even though we (kind of) move just across the road, it really feels like we have moved from a kampong to a city. When people talk about the bright lights of the city, they are not kidding. The sound and noise pollution here is quite apparent. 

We haven't got our blinds and curtains yet. Hopefully, once those things are up, we will be able to block off as much of the noise and light when we need to.

The end, for now. Still much to do around the flat!