meet the newest member of the clan

this has got to be the most boring birth announcement ever, but here goes...

Alhamdullillah, we welcomed Ilyas 'Izzuddin into our lives on Saturday 26 April 2008 at 9.12am. Despite the l-o-n-g wait for the 10cm dilation, Ilyas slid out easily after 5 pushes in 5 minutes. He was 3.8kg (i know, a 39th week scan in the morning estimated him to be only 3.1kg).

Alhamdullillah all is fine with him and me, but we had a scare of HFMD/chicken pox with Big Brother Ilhan. with a temperature and ulcers in his mouth it was a real scare but alhamdullillah it was a case of sore glands - and probably stress jadi abang.

The PC at home's crashed too, so no time for updates. Iwe're also trying to get used juggling a sensitive, sometimes-jealous Big Brother, a sweet infant and, oh, a jealous attention-seeking fat cat. oh, and did i mention that my sister also went into labour the same day i did and gave birth the same day? so it's quite a busy time in my mum's household with Ilyas 'Izzuddin and Amir Hamzah around.

ok, we'll be back with a more detailed entry and pictures!

this kid says the darndest thing...

we were at NUH the other day, and was at the Kent Ridge Wing nasi ayam stall. we were seated when an Indian family walked past us. i had my back to them, but Ilhan was facing them and noticed his eyes following them before he exclaimed;

"Eh! Mumbai dah! Yindia!"

yes, complete with the accent and the 'yin'dia and a cheeky grin. OMG. at that point i just wished the ground will open up and swallow us ala batu belah batu bertangkup. i swear i did not teach him that, although ever since we got back i do notice he has this fascination with ethnicity. like he'll tell me how so-and-so in his class is "Chinese because his name is ___ Tan" or how "Aunty Bina is Indian kan ibu?" (his babysitter in Perth), or how the columbarium we just passed by is a  'masjid Chinese' or how "MRT train ni suka cakap Chinese eh ibu?" (he was paying attention to announcements and signs). and just how did he connect that advertisement with the people? i didn't even know he knew that ad *wince*

i'm not sure how healthy or unhealthy fascination/observation is, and i'm not even sure how it came about. so now we try to stress on the 'Allah made everyone the same' and 'we must always love and be friends with everyone' bit.

the ad's here, for those who somehow have not seen it.

I Pay, Therefore I Am?

This being my second pregnancy and considering we came back to Singapore when I was almost into my 6^th month, and also because we were quite broke upon arrival and had to build up our resources from scratch, I decided no need for fancy schamncy stuff - just go to the polyclinic and then to KK as a subsidized patient.

It was fine with me; when I was preggers with llhan I had a senior consultant from NUH as my gynae, but it wasn’t spectacularly special or anything and she ended up listening to the midwife anyway when I was at the end of my tethers (it was a 17-hr long labour). She thought I should go for c-section while the midwife insisted I could still push and in the end she conceeded as she said the midwife has had more ‘field experience’ and so Ilhan was assisted out with a vacuum.

And since both my pregnancies have been pretty smooth-sailing and uneventful, I thought, why waste money on a private/exclusive gynae when, as in my first instance, she listened to the midwife anyway, right? Tak cerewet lah.

And so began my adventure – of waiting over 2 hours to see an M.O, of the disgusting toilet where patients are supposed to take their urine tests (tell me how those specks of urine got on the seat?? they cangkung on the seats or what? After use cannot wipe the seat izzit??), of nurses who talked to me like I stupid and cannot speak English liddat.

Once I contemplated changing over to SGH, which had a small O&G Dept and had lesser people. I asked the nurse and doctor during one check-up, and they both looked at me as if that was the most blasphemous question ever, and asked “Why do you want to do that?” and then reminded me I’d have to go through the hassle of going back to the poly just to get a referral yada yada yada. Ok. Fine. I get it.

But what took the cake was a check-up at my 34^th week, when after waiting for an eternity, I came in to see the pre-pubescent-looking doctor’s eyes still glued on some blog she had on her pc. She got me to lie down on the bed, where I expected her to use the microphone thingy to listen to the baby’s heartbeat or something. But no, she poked here there twice and said “OK baby growing fine”. And then the standard “You have anything to ask? No? OK come back in 2 weeks’ time.”

It was over in under 2 minutes.  TWO minutes.

My dear sister was with me at the check-up yesterday. And she had only time to think if she needed another pee when I was out from my super-express check-up. It was an “Eh? I thought you just went in?” moment. Told you.

I wonder if it’s the same when you have your own private gynae. I was thinking; if the pregnancy is a smooth one, and things/check-ups can be that fast, simple and uncomplicated with a normal doctor, then do we really need an expensive gynae? Is it just because we feel like we need that extra attention and sayang-sayang/manja-manja attention from a specialist? I mean if the pregnancy is a difficult one of course lah, but if it’s not? Is it because money talks?

But alhamdullillah, at the last minute The Hasbern landed a good job with amazing maternity benefits and I uhm…signed up for a delivery package which provides creature comforts and most importantly privacy. At first I thought it seems like a waste of money to pay an amount when you can be subsidized for all that amount, but then again, it’s not my money and tak pakai rugi.

And besides, I need my own toilet mah…cannot stand sharing them with imbeciles who leave urinal souvenirs for other people…

daytime tv

Ok, so the nesting instinct has kicked in. I’ve washed and sorted out baby stuff and all, and this morning even scrubbed the toilet and kitchen floors. Earlier on I declared a war against clutter, and so now have bags of stuff to decide what to do with. How I wish holding a garage sale in Singapura is as easy as having one in Perth when you can just put up a put up signs everywhere saying ‘Garage Sale @ address @ 10am this Saturday’, bentang tikar in front of your house and your stuff will be cleared in 2-3 hours time. Kalau tak clear pun can give away to Good Sammy or Salvos for a worthy cause.

 

I’m under the impression that the flea markets here cater more to the young selling cool hip stuff for the young. Am I right? Either that or the old pros who’s been in business for a long time at Sungei Road. And I’m not very ebay/yahoo-selling savvy – don't think anyone would want to buy my old clothes/junk which are neither hip nor hold any appeal to anyone, I think. I’ll just put these at the Salvation Army collection point at Bt Timah I guess.

 

Daytime TV is pretty boring. Ellen is amusing. The audience are maniacs (why do they scream and jump up and down all the time?) and I used to wonder why she has that bit where she wriggles and dances her way up and down the audience aisle. But I guess she likes dancing and dia punya pasal lah, asal dia bahagia.

 

Tyra is a.n.n.o.y.i.n.g. Apart from being so wannabe and try-hard, she’s so unabashedly self-absorbed and fantasizes herself as some fairy godmother. It’s always ‘I’ and ‘my’ followed by cue: voice breaking, hands fanning face and audience going ‘awwwwww’ when she likens some sob story to her own ‘momma’ and sad childhood.

 

And then there’s Martha. aiyoh she’s so prim proper stiff. Give me Oprah and Nigella anytime.

 

But, but! This morning I saw a documentary on Malaysia’s Ch 9 about teachers posted in rural areas. They interviewed teachers from Peninsula Malaysia posted to obscure kawasan pendalaman in Sabah, Sarawak and the aborigine community in Pahang, Perak etc. We’re talking rural rural here, as in 4-5 hours from the main road/river kind of rural. The teachers are understandably mostly men, and they talked of their experiences adapting to that kind of environment. Some cross crocodile-infested rivers to and from school, some ride their motor kapchai up and down motocross-like dirt trails. And all the time maintaining their respectability and professionalism by wearing smart pants and shirts.

 

One teacher told of how sometimes he has to swim across the river, or stay overnight in school as the boat bocor or the water level is too high and dangerous or something. And how they cope without decent photocopiers and other things we take for granted. The govt equips each school with a LCD projector but it sits in the cupboard because the generator doesn’t generate enough electricity to run it. And there are no landlines – communication is via their own mobile phones, IF the reception happens to be good that day.

 

And yet they tackle their responsibilities with such gusto. Those in orang asli settlements learn about the culture and lifestyle of their anak didik to better work with the community. I remember reading once how teachers in rural Australian aboriginal communities found it hard to get their students to sit at their desks and pay attention until they realized the young abo kids preferred to sit in a circle on the floor as per their oral tradition.

 

Anyway, I salute these teachers. I doubt they get their generous bonuses and ‘connect plans’, or if they even get a decent monthly pay in the first place, but they totally embody the spirit and meaning of teaching. Insaf aku.

i've lost my mojo

“Datuk dan nenek saya adalah orang yang paling hodoh yang pernah saya lihat.”

No no…that wasn’t the Dr Jekyll side of me of me speaking. It was a line from a sec 1 boy’s karangan deskriptif on a visit to his grandparents’ kampong, which has the dirtiest environment and poorest people ‘yang pernah saya lihat’. And no, it didn’t happily end with him learning to see beyond his surrounding. He left it with as much disdain as when he first stepped foot into it.

 *shudder*

And so I finally ended my stint of relief teaching. The final week was back at nest to my alma mater where I also taught for 4 years till 2005. this time it was English,  and the Sec 5N class which I took was the very same one I taught IPW to when they were in Sec 2. so it was a nice “Hey Mdm K, you’re back!”

It was nice to be back among former colleagues, but it was also enough to remind me why I left in the first place. It was post-PB period and with the new scheme and all… wah betul2 OKB cikgu-cikgi sekarang eh? J I’ve been asked a couple of times by some people, “tak nak join balik teaching ke? lumayan.” Errrrr….*ahaks*….if I can ever get past all the urgh stuff which drove me away in the first place.

Eh? I forgot what else it was that I was going to write about. This placenta brain thing that I’m suffering from has left me with little inspiration to do much. I’m about 3 weeks from my due date and I’m at that stage where I wish it’d come sooner rather than later.

For now I guess I’ll go kick my butt to kickstart my nesting instinct – have not prepared anything for the arrival – cot belum pasang and baju belum basuh…