Saturday, December 31, 2016

Fatherhood Reflections XXXII - My Boy Is Growing Up Too Fast

Them feels...

So proud of my little boy!

Dear Yiwei,

It was 10 plus last night and lights were all out.. we were all lazing in my bed when mummy chased you & xin to go and sleep in your own room...

that was when you ran back to me reminding me that we did not leave a small light on for dad who is still out...

me: "huh... never mind lah.. papa can switch on the light by himself later when he come back..."

you: "cannot... must leave a light on"

me: " then u go and on lor..."

you: "ok which one... "

me: "er... on the one at the door there lor"

you: *frowns* "but it's very dark im scared..."

me: "then u on the big light here then go over to on then come back and off the big light"

you: *deliberated for a while but still very determined to on the small light* "ok!...."

then i heard screams and whines "Yixin!! don't off the big light!!!" (xin was trying to off all the lights before gg to bed)

and finally all lights are off except for the small light kept specially for your dear daddy...

:)

thank you Yiwei for always being so nice and thoughful...

loving you always,
mummy





2017 Haha Goals

Wednesday, December 28, 2016

Tuesday, December 27, 2016

Manchester United 3 Sunderland 1

Fantastic win. 

Hardly got out of 2nd gear and still dominated.

This game will be known for Henrik Mhkitaryan's backheeled volley scorpion kick!

Great job all round, still 6th but onwards and upwards.

GGMU!!!

Monday, December 26, 2016

Delicious Boneless Chicken Rice

Yes, this is the name of the store!

Tucked away in the basement of Katong Shopping Centre, this stall has been around since the late 90s.

To be honest I cannot remember if I've ever eaten from this stall before even though my secondary school years I almost always walked down that road from the Dunman High back gate, past the now-defunct Fowlie Primary School (I think it is currently Tanjong Katong Primary School), past Katong Shopping Centre.

Probably it was not around back then yet.

Nonetheless I was impressed but he crowd when we chanced upon it on our way to sing Karaoke at Teo Heng. The white chicken is said to be cooked in a fusion between Hainanese and Cantonese, so it is dryer and cleaner with less condiments. Tasted great!

Better yet it gave free soups such as lotus root soup and cabbage soup, much more nutritious than those run-of-the-mill high-MSG soups at foodcourts.

If you see the whole meal for the family of  four with half a chicken, in the photo below, it cost only $28. Super cheap!

What a hidden gem!






Merry Christmas 2016 Everyone!

A wet Christmas, but nonetheless a hence to look back and reflect on the year that has gone.

The year has been satisfactory and it brings about cautious optimism that the new year ahead will be better than this one.

Here's to lots of joy, good health and prosperity in 2017!

This is what 2016 looks like to me hahaha.

Tuesday, December 20, 2016

Legoland Malaysia - An Honest Review

In a nutshell, absolutely fantastic for kids, so-so for adults.

I think the kids had so much fun at the resort over the last 3 days.

We deliberately chose to stay over Sunday to Tuesday to beat the crowds (what crowds?) and what a good decision that was. Legoland Malaysia is definitely not as crowded as Universal Studios Singapore, as we went on a Sunday. There was no ride that needed more than 15min of queuing. As we had the all-inclusive two-day pass, we went again on Monday and basically the whole park belonged to us, as there were so little people there.


The Good
Legoland Malaysia is only 20mins from the Singapore 2nd Link, so it is of close proximity. Some of the visitors were daytrippers although the bus timings were rather constricted. Obviously when the planning took place, the developers were eyeing more at the Singaporean crowd than the local Malaysian one. The pricing itself is reflective of that.

The kids loved everything associated with Lego, the Danish toys. The rides were very kid-friendly and there were ample staff throughout the hotel and park to help out your every need.

There is Lego everywhere. Like seriously, you almost can't find anything that is NOT associated with Lego. There're Lego play spaces all around the hotel, the park, at every ride and even in the pool! There's even a box of Lego in every hotel room!

The rooms had a very nice touch in that the kids get to sleep in a separate space with a double decker bed, a kid's TV, and even the toilet has two sinks, one for adults and one for kids!

Staff are friendly and helpful. The Malaysians staffing the resort and hotel were very service oriented and helpful whenever required. Also very often even in the mundane and repetitive park staffing experience (staff manning a ride having to rouse visitors to cheer every 5mins!), here you still see smiling faces and warm greetings even in the late afternoon on many rides. There is something about local Malaysian and Indonesian service and hospitality that is very warm and inviting.

There is a connected Medini Mall just in front of the Legoland entrance, which offers KFC and Burger King type of other food options. In the future there are further developments which will make it more connected to the Medini township (it is currently touted as a Singapore-styled hinterland in Johor). I can even see Gleneagles from afar having a building presence.

The Bad
Pricing is rather steep. Room rates for a Premium room which is just Standard room with a view, was at RM1,500. The rooms have Lego decor but isn't too far off from a budget Hotel 81 room except with a view. From dispensed soap, cheap towels, and adult beds and blankets that are too short/small, all the way to mass market breakfast buffet and crap food for kids. For SGD500, you could get a night at the W Hotel Sentosa for far better environment and more exclusive service and standards.

The Legoland Waterpark is not really attractive. Just a standard waterpark in Asia - one lazy pool, one kids' water playground, one wave pool, one family slide, several individual slides. It has a cool locker system though. Nothing particularly bad, nothing really special, so nothing to really crow about. Which means it is rather pricey.

Transport is an issue. Getting there by a Singapore-registered car is dangerous. Getting there by bus is not convenient. The drop off and pick up area by the giant carpark, a good 10min walk from the rest of the park premises, doesn't look very safe. Timing for buses are also restrictive. Maybe there's not enough demand to have more flexible timings.

Check-in and check-out timings are very rigid. 4pm check-in and 11am check-out. Any extension is another extra payment to be made. This means if you're stuck with the rigid bus timings, you're left with 5hrs to burn after check-out, with literally nothing to do except play with your phone.

The Ugly
Legoland Malaysia feels and looks like it is not doing so well. Obviously Singaporeans' perception of safety and security in Malaysia is still a big issue. The crime rate is high in many Malaysian cities, specifically robbery, snatch theft and petty crime (not specific to Legoland definitely!). You don't even need statistics when the general feel of the public situation here already puts you in an apprehensive mode. So much so that a Police Post is set up right outside the Legoland entrance. Security also does not seem very tight in the hotel, no detectors or luggage screens. The park itself also had low level security. 

The poor crowds we saw on Monday and Tuesday were really dire, especially when this is already holiday period. Compared to other parks we've visited with kids in Australia, Indonesia and Singapore even on weekdays, there was some serious sense of emptiness feel about the park. On Monday, we only went back to repeat the fun rides which the kids wanted, and we hardly had to queue for any of them. On the bright side, it meant that the kids get to ride their favourite rides multiple times.
This is the crowd at the entrance at 12pm on a Tuesday afternoon. You can see there is almost no queue for tickets, while a short queue for entry. Haha.

The worst part of all is that adults and parents simply run out of things to do almost immediately. This is akin to Genting Highlands but with a kids twist, where the adults never run out of things to do (casino etc) while the kids have a problem being entertained. Here, almost everything is related to kids and prying money from parents to pay for kids' stuff like toys, services, games etc. Pity that they have more potential that could be learnt from other resorts like client segregation and better catering to the paying segment. This one is almost purely attacking parents with kids, no other segments more.

All in all, the kids had a fantastic time while the parents had a so-so experience. Will we come back again? Not very likely unless there are ever any big changes.

Here are more pictures:
The latest NinjaGo ride was actually pretty cool.

The Lego driving school was another popular ride.

The Lego megastore!

The park in the evening.

The Lego diorama of the Star Wars Battle on Hoth during The Empire Strikes Back.

Singapore in Lego mini land!

Saturday, December 17, 2016

Marvel Avengers S.T.A.T.I.O.N

Brought the kids to the Singapore Science Center for this.

S.T.A.T.I.O.N stands for Scientific Training And Tactical Intelligence Operative Network. Such a cool acronym!

Anyway it basically featured all the science behind everything for the Marvel Avengers Cinematic Universe. 

Very cool although being alone with the kids meant that I couldn't spend as kick time on all the exhibits as I would have liked. Still it was a very cool and interactive exhibition.

The kids are excited!

Cap's Vibranium shield.

Interactive media all over the place.

The Hulks high haemoglobin levels give him that green skin.

The Hulk!

The Tesseract.

Vision!

Black Widow!

Those weird things that tried to destroy Asgard.

Loki's costume.

The Destroyer in the first Thor.

Thor's costume.

Iron Man.

War Machine.

Hulk Buster!

Various Iron Man costumes.

This was a really cool interactive Iron Man activity that the boy enjoyed!





Thursday, December 15, 2016

Tuesday, December 13, 2016

Manchester United 1 Tottenham 0

We were bound to break the duck sooner rather than later. And against top opposition too! Having had a run of so many draws, this result came as a relief, but also goes some way towards vindicating Mourinho's style of play, which I quite like.

Herrera is my MOTM. The guy is everywhere on the field.

The CB pairing of Phil Jones and Marcos Rojo has been simply phenomenal since they got their chance.

Henrik Mhkitaryan has been a revelation since he managed to break into the team.

Onwards and upwards!

GGMU!!!

Fatherhood Reflections XXX - Boys And Girls

The truth!


Sunday, December 11, 2016

Tampines Rovers FC

Wow!

If they make it all the way to the Shenhua game, I'm gonna go watch them!

Very unlikely they'll make it past the first round though hahahaha!


Saturday, December 10, 2016

Fatherhood Reflections XXIX - Year End Concert 2017

The boy graduates while the girl will move on to K1 next year. Will she stay in the same school?

The kids are truly growing up too fast :(

The boy played a grasshopper in this year's school play, with a few lines thrown in. He was disappointed not to get a bigger role when some of his friends had really huge roles (abit weird that the play gave so much stage time to so few children), but at least he had a character role with lines. This compares with others who had to play frogs or mice with only dancing cameos hahaha. So it really wasn't too bad.

He was also disappointed not to have been chosen for the Valedictorian speech, which went to one boy and one girl (possibly the eldest). I'm secretly glad that he even has such ambitions, which I think will take him far in life. Hopefully he reacts positively to such disappointments.

And so, another chapter in his life begins.





Monday, December 05, 2016

Real Final Mambo Night @ Zouk on Jiak Kim Street

So this was the really final final final night of Mambo at the original premises. I'm sure I must've blogged about previous 'final nights' before, but this was for realz. See all my previous posts dating back more than 10 years ago below this post!!!

The wifey really wanted to go so I wanted to make it happen for her. Thankfully there were the grandparents to help take care of the kids for a night. 

It was definitely one of the best partying nights I've had in a very long while. Kudos to the wifey for holding out till 2.30am. We will do even better next time!

The queue from 9.30pm was already ridiculously long, stretching all the way to the bridge and then some!

Somehow we managed to get in far quicker than expected (luck + skill). It had a Mediacorp private event prior to the gates opening. We actually saw the drunken faces of Kym Ng, Lynn Pok and Vivian Lai, among other celebrities too!

Once in, I took a few pictures for old times sake.
Before taking the stairs down to the dancefloor.
The toilet that doesn't look like a toilet!

Then we started strategizing on how we should organize the night! What kiasu parents we were! At first we wanted to order sour plum shots but then were told it was out, so we chose apple shooters as our choice of poison. The guy said if we waited an hour plus more it'd be 12midnight where everything would be 1-for-1. So we decided to have a beer first. 

Two half pints of Heineken cost me a friggin' $29! So I said what the hey, we can't finish two trays (40 shots) anyway, just pay $165 for a tray of 20 and screw the midnight wait lah.

Wifey managed 6 shots while I could only do 9. So we got a large cup with ice and poured the rest there to be taken down to the dancefloor. 

At the dancefloor things were already buzzing with retro hits flowing so easily. It really was a walk down memory lane. We just stood in the centre close to the podium and like some dance class, just followed the best moves guys on the podium and sang karaoke to the hits. We meet a lot of familiar faces and friends through out.
Look at that. Amazing stuff.

Then some time around 1am we decided (maybe only me) that both of us needed more alcohol so I told wifey to wait for me while I went to buy more. Ended up skipping the queue at Zouk and walking to Velvet to buy four Long Island Teas since it was so much faster.

Ended up giving one away to a friend who was still queuing even by the time I came back from Velvet, and then another jug to another friend who had been on the dancefloor. Wait, where the wifey?!

Immediately rushed into the maddening crowd to find her. Found her alone on the dancefloor with this cute chick talking to her. A gang from Standard Chartered Bank! Ended up partying with them and sharing our drinks until they too went to get more drinks and never came back.

All this while the mambo songs were just so so good, there was really no stopping.

Till I finally see the poor wifey tired and groggy. Asked if she'd like to go home and she nodded. Asked again to confirm, she nodded again. It was around 2.30am. The famous mambo rendition of 'Home' tends to only play at 4am near closing :(

So we staggered out of the club, said our goodbyes, hiked to the bus stop and flagged a cab. Home we went.

What a fantastic night.

Here are some of the references I've had at Mambo night previously!
2015
2014
2011
2005
2004

Everton 1 Manchester United 1

Fellaini should NEVER play for the club again! I say sell him in January!

When everyone plays well and he comes on at the 83rd minute to ruin the game, giving away a penalty and getting yellow card, contributing nothing during his time on the pitch, then he cannot wear the United shirt anymore.

Herrera was downright impressive and commanding though.

Sigh.

Still super angry with Fellaini!!!

This is our fifth or sixth consecutive draw in the league now. It is unbelievable that we haven't been able to kill off games considering how dominant we've been playing.

GGMU!!!