Category Archives: Musing

2017 Week 4 Update

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Nothing exciting happened this week! There, I live a very boring and mundane life and this weekly post does showcase this!

This has been a long weekend, because of the Chinese Lunar New Year celebrations. Living in a multiracial and multicultural society like Singapore, you do get tend to be caught in the celebrations of the festivities of the other races.

Speaking of multiracial and multicultural societies, I am appalled by what is happening in the United States these days! The latest edict by their President which has banned not only immigrants from six largely Muslim countries including legal green card holders is plain ridiculous. Most of the immigrants from these countries are fleeing persecution and hope to arrive in the ‘land of the free’ but that’s not going to happen now. Instead, countries which have exported terror (I won’t name them here, but any simple google search will tell you which ones these are) are not included in this edict, including the countries whose citizens were responsible for some of the most heinous attacks in and on American soil and people. Guess his business trumps human decency!

GG & BB’s dream universities are in America, but if things do not improve, I don’t think I will be comfortable sending them to that country to study as minorities keep getting targeted. University is still almost a decade away for BB, so we still have hope!

I also have loads of family there, some who have been there for decades and are naturalised now and some who’ve been there for a few years now. All of them are highly educated professionals and earn quite well. Browns and minorities even walking the street now begets paranoia and I am quite honestly, worried for them.

Hopefully, the people realise that we’re all human beings and citizens of the world. In this day and time, when distances are not really that important, it’s not wise keeping your borders closed, that too because you are paranoid….

Needed to get this out of my chest, so thanks for reading if you’ve managed to get so far! Hopefully things will get better soon.

January is almost over,  so let’s hope February brings with it better tidings. Have a wonderful week folks!

2017 Secondary 2 Week 3

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It was a fairly boring school week for GG & BB this week.

GG’s school honoured all students who won the Edusave awards over the past few weeks. GG was one of them and they school also posted photos of the children on their school Facebook page. GG felt quite embarrassed by all the attention she was getting in school!

BB came home from school to announce he has been selected for his school’s math olympiad team again. They will be tutored for around 5 sessions with a test at the end of this which will be some time just before they close for the half-yearly holidays. I was actually surprised that he got selected as his math marks were nothing to shout at. Apparently, the top 17 math students for the level were selected. It was not enough to be just the top 17, you also had to get a recommendation from your class math teacher.

For the past few weeks, when GG has CCA, she has not been eating the lunch we send with her in the morning. Her excuse every time has been that there was no time to eat, sometimes the difference between the class ending and CCA starting only 5 minutes. I got quite angry about this and texted a school leader, the parent-school liaison person who promised to speak to the teachers. I am also going to raise this question at the tea session with her school principal next month if things do not get better by then.

Have a good Sunday!

In My Hands Today…

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The Iris Fan (Sano Ichiro #18) – Laura Joh Rowland

20613740Japan, 1709. The shogun is old and ailing. Amid the ever-treacherous intrigue in the court, Sano Ichiro has been demoted from chamberlain to a lowly patrol guard. His relationship with his wife Reiko is in tatters, and a bizarre new alliance between his two enemies Yanagisawa and Lord Ienobu has left him puzzled and wary. Sano’s onetime friend Hirata is a reluctant conspirator in a plot against the ruling regime. Yet, Sano’s dedication to the Way of the Warrior—the samurai code of honor—is undiminished.

Then a harrowing, almost inconceivable crime takes place. In his own palace, the shogun is stabbed with a fan made of painted silk with sharp-pointed iron ribs. Sano is restored to the rank of chief investigator to find the culprit. This is the most significant, and most dangerous, investigation of his career. If the shogun’s heir is displeased, he will have Sano and his family put to death without waiting for the shogun’s permission, then worry about the consequences later. And Sano has enemies of his own, as well as unexpected allies. As the previously unimaginable death of the shogun seems ever more possible, Sano finds himself at the center of warring forces that threaten not only his own family but Japan itself.

2016 Week 53 Update

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Happy New Year! May 2017 bring love, peace and prosperity to your lives!!

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I for one am glad that 2016 is over and a new year, with loads of potential is awaiting us. Hopefully this will be a much better year for all of us with wishes being fulfilled and goals achieved.

This is the last update from me for 2016 and this week was a fairly busy week. On Boxing Day we went to the ArtScience Museum to catch the NASA Space Exhibition (Review coming up soon) and also scrambled to get the children and S’ OCI cards in by the deadline which was 30 December. The Indian High Commission here did not reach out to the diaspora at all to let them know that they can convert their PIO cards to OCI cards without any fees, but they refuse to accept it saying it was on their website. Luckily a kind immigration officer told us when we were leaving India and hence the scramble. I don’t check the HCI website unless I have some work with them and no one amongst my friends and acquaintances told me this, so I was completely unaware until the officer told me. Anyway, we made it just in time and hopefully the conversion will go through without any issues.

BB & GG start school in two days time and this year their school ends much later than last year. By the time they come home from school, freshenup and get ready for lunch, it will be almost 3:30 – 4:00 pm. That’s not lunch in my opinion, that’s tea. I should now look at sending them to school with something heavy for recess and also something else light for their five minute break before the last two periods. I need to research this fast before school starts. This year is an important year for both as its the streaming year for them where they have to choose the subjects they will take for their O levels.

Have an awesome week everyone and again Happy 2017!

Would you like you?

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I saw this one one of my various social media platforms. This is a question someone posed – would you like yourself if you met you for the first time? This got me thinking – what is the face we project to the world? Is it one which makes the other person want to continue to speak to you, to want to know more about you? Or is it one which makes the opposite person run far away from us?

If I met myself, I probably would not like me at first glance. I am an introvert and so do not mix well with people immediately. Add to the book, physical or digital, that’s always in my hands and my resting bitch face makes me look arrogant and proud at first glance. I know that its off putting to some people, and so this is something I need to work on in 2017. 

What about you? What does your first impression tell other people? Would you like yourself if you met you? I’d love to hear in the comments section