My Gray Week

I’ve been out of the blog world radar for exactly 9 days as I had too much going on in my life…..AS IF! Okay, the truth is, I was too lazy to even write a coherent sentence in my blog. Yup. I was feeling rather crappy. The somber weather’s to blame for my lack of mood: dark, gray, cold...basically all adjectives associated with the word GLOOMY. That’s how I’d describe the weather last week. It was so gray, it almost felt like winter.

Anyway, here’s a running total of what my gray week consisted of. (In the interest of not boring you to tears, I’m only highlighting the significant ones. Overly mundane activities such as changing diapers and usual office work will not be listed)

• Alva had her first visit to the Plunket centre
• We attended a Malaysian student gathering
• My little princess was baptised over the weekend :)

Alva's first visit to the Plunket clinic

Plunket is the country's largest provider of support service for health, development and well being of babies. Even before Alva was born, I have decided to enrol to Plunket care because it is the most established and popular support service in NZ. Upon enrolling to the Plunket programme, a registered nurse named Jane was assigned to provide support and care to me and Alva. Jane had initially made home visits to the house, but after two visits, we were asked to continue the scheduled checks at the Plunket centre instead.

Last Wednesday, we paid our first visit to the centre in Riccarton. I was particularly excited as I was dying to know Alva's weight. The check up started with a routine Q & A regarding Alva's development;  her sleeping habit, feedings and achievements. So much to keep track on and she's only 3 months! Anyway, after the Q & A, it was time for the physical assessment. We had to take her clothes off and weigh her on the scale. My heart flip-flopped when I saw the numbers on the screen: 5.5 kilograms! She'd gained another 750 grams since the last check up. Seeing this, I couldn't help but smile proudly and look at hubby with this expression that said "thanks to me and my breast milk!".  Okay, so maybe I was a bit too much there. Anyway, to make this story short and less corny, let me just say that all is well where Alva is concerned. Jane assured us that her growth is within the normal range and that we are doing a splendid job so far :)

This is Jane

Moving on to the next event...You might want to get a cup of coffee to go with this post, coz this is quite long.

Free Makan

So this happened last Saturday - 3rd October 2009. (Forgive me for my obsession with dates and time. I have this absurd sense of obligation to record each event accurately). There I was in our messy living room, still groggy at 10.45 a.m. I slept very very late the night before as I was busy decorating my virtual farm in Farm Ville - Octavia, if you're reading this, you should know that I owe this new addiction to you ;). That explains my waking up late on Saturday. So, as I was saying, I woke up late and started  planning our activity for the day. The plan was to shop for a special candle for Alva's baptism on Sunday. Other than that, there wasn't any other agenda. Since there wasn't any hurry or anything major to do, I started checking my mails on my UC student account. There was only one message in the inbox, sent on Friday. It read:

Hello Alice 

I wonder whether you know that tomorrow ada meeting KSU KPM or KPT with M'sian postgrads at Afghan Restaurant (Colombo/St.Asaph Street) at 12 -2p.m. You're invited and hope to see you there.

Of course I didn't know coz no one told me! I glanced at the clock, 11.00 a.m. already!! "We have to get there in an hour?!" Mayday!Mayday!Mayday! I hit the panic button and just went to pieces. As you can imagine, the next 50 minutes was spent running around the house in a mad rush. Kelam kabut with a capital K.

We managed to get ourselves ready in record time and dashed to the city. It was fairly easy to find the place and luckily for us there were plenty of parking spaces. We got out of the car and started making our way to the restaurant. When we finally made it across the busy road, we found ourselves facing not a restaurant but a door leading to a staircase. Funny, I thought. Since hubby was pushing Alva in the stroller, I had to go and check to see if the restaurant was indeed upstairs. Alden and I took the stairs and made it to the 1st Floor. I peeked inside and saw what appeared to be a fancy restaurant filled with many hungry-looking Malaysians. I told hubby, who was still waiting downstairs, that we were at the right place.

I pushed the glass door open and made my way into the crowded restaurant. It wasn't easy as I had this 15kg toddler in my arms. Alden just refused (vehemently) to walk into the restaurant and in an effort to avoid an ugly scene, I resorted to carrying him like a baby. When I walked in, conversations came to a shuddering halt and all eyes were on me. There was a minute of silence in the air, like malaikat/ angel limpas kind of moment you know. I was so thankful I had Alden in my arms because he served as my defense mechanism against those judgmental eyes.

They were staring not because I was wearing something fancy or anything. No. It was because I came with a toddler. Everyone else came solo! How could I have known?  I quickly found a table and sat down. Phew! After a few minutes, imagine their surprise when they saw hubby pushing Alva in the stroller, making his way towards me. They must have thought "What? Another baby? Who are these people?" Once again there was a momentary silence. Hubby joined me at the table and we looked at each other, both asking (in telepathy) "What the heck have we gotten ourselves into?" Talk about awkward!

After awhile people started ignoring us and we were happy again. Lalalalala..The guest of honour (a big shot in the Ministry of Higher Education whose name I forgot) came at 1.00pm and everyone stood up to welcome the Datuk and Datin. How very Malaysian! The lovely emcee then delivered her wonderful welcoming speech and to our surprise, included a plea (addressed to the Datuk) to increase our living allowances. Everyone cheered and applauded in support of this. Ha! ha! Then, it was the Datuk's turn to give a speech, taking an agonizing 15 minutes. Finally at 1.35 p.m. lunch was served buffet style. Free Malaysian food for all!

My free meal

The food was simply marvelous! You know that Anton Ego's revelation scene in Ratatouille, where Ego had a moment of euphoria eating the peasant dish? Well, I had that moment when I took a bite of the Tandoori chicken. Terus balik kampung. All the waiting and morning kelamkabutness was worth the effort because we had a really great meal that day. End of story.

This is the last one, I promise :-)

Alva's Christening

I promise you this is going to be brief. Alva and Ryan (Es' son) were baptised last Sunday at St. Patrick's Catholic church, Kaiapoi. It was done during mass and Carmille (Es' friend) had to stand in as a proxy because Alva's real godmother couldn't make it to the baptism (she's in KK!). Everything went really well. She didn't even cry when the priest poured the Holy water over her head. She was an angel! Too bad there were only 3 photos taken during the baptism - and I looked fugly in all of them.  After mass, we had a BBQ feast at Es' place to celebrate our babies' Christening. The End. I told you it was going to be short. I'll let the photos do the talking :-)

Rev. Father Michael, a Malaysian from Kelantan. Small world huh?

Alva and mommy :)

Princess Alva :)

Till the next post, God Bless!