2013, we are ready for ya!

Been planning and finalizing some little changes in our routine for next year.

Korkor going to a new school, we are going to wake up even earlier during weekdays so I could still send korkor to school enroute to the younger ones'. Though it's a CHORE to be stuck in the traffic crawl early early morning to school, but truth be told, I do feel it's a blessing being able to send the kids off to school everyday.

Hence, I really, really need to resolute to retire earlier for the night. It's going to kill me having less than 6 hours' sleep. By 11pm, I shall go dream my sweet dreams, and I must make them go to bed before 9. I truly believe that a child without enough rest are not healthy, happy and wouldn't be able to study well.

Korkor going to stay longer hours in school everyday, and his chinese tuition lessons slashed. He is on his own to figure out things he doesn't understand by himself.

The younger two are going to adapt to a new tutor for their chinese lessons. I had been asking those I know for their personal tutors contacts, but to no avail. Then, I looked up from the internet and kept directed to those tuition agents websites. After contacting a few and letdown by their high soaring fees they asked for, I was so happy when finally one seemed to be just the good candidate to replace the tutor. Just when I thought I have settled it, she sent an sms to say she was rejecting my offer.

I was pretty much upset, and went back on the hunt again, and finally, an even better candidate appears. Really, when one door closes, another opens. I made an appointment to meet her before confirming her appointment as their personal tutor, in fact, I met TWO candidates on separate occasions and they are just both wonderful. ~whew~ so happy that I have found someone.

Then, again, I've mentioned this before, meimei's ballet lessons are over, so I do not need to rush on the weekday to send her off for 1 hour anymore. Can't believe that just an hour lesson slashed during the weekday could create so much less stress and relief.

With these little new changes planned for next year, we could all now sit back and enjoy the rest of the holidays, going back to hometown to keep the grandparents' company for a longer duration, relishing on ALL my favorite food in Ipoh, taking the kids' for movies, visiting some friends, then going down south to meet their aunties, uncles and cousins, and finally spend some leisure time at Desaru with the whole gang.

Looking forward to it, IF we could sail through 21 Dec.

Holiday Inn, Chiengmai

When we arrived at the hotel we were to stay put in for 2 nights at Chiengmai, we were pleasantly surprised with the room we got.

Free upgrade to a bigger room!

2 double beds.

Free babycot (which normally is the case, except for the Pattaya and Bangkok city later)

Good spread of buffet breakfast.

We were definitely pampered well, and we were really happy with our room and the hotel's service. The rate hubs got from the internet, was a fairly good rate too, so overall, this made our stay in Chiengmai very memorable.

The return journey by train, Chiengmai-Bangkok

After 2 nights in Chiengmai, we were back again at the train station by 5pm to return to Bangkok. That time, we were more prepared from the last experience (or so we thought!) and bought some (note: some!) buns, food and drink onboard to feast on.

The train was nowhere in sight by the time we arrived the train station and we loitered around.

 Their latest "hot" gesture. A kind of snapping the fingers to make a very loud snapped sound. Annoying!

 Loitered and took pictures, lots of pictures.

 Then papa started jumping around the tracks and didi happily followed. *roll eyes*

 wah-mm-theng! see where all the naughty genes come from!??

 Meimei twirled and danced around... see how crazy we all were getting after waiting for so long?

 Loitered and waited some more. Gosh! I was beginning to get worried if any trains were coming at all!

Yippee! The train finally came after like 30 mins or so and we were so looking forward to go back to Bangkok.

But horror among horrors! We found out after boarding that that train had NO RESTAURANT!

Which meant, there would be no dinner or breakfast served on board!

Which meant, we had to seriously consider starving and with the little food we had, to ration it out evenly.

Then, we found out that that particular carriage was an older version design and so henceforth, the bed on the lower bunk is so much smaller than the one we took 2 days ago.Which meant, either I had to make do with sharing the pathetic single bed with meimei or risk having her taken away if she slept by herself. I couldn't bring myself to risk that in any way and furthermore, she refused to sleep on her own as well. So.... sigh!

As the train chugged along the way, depression was about to sink in. It was for the fact too that I started feeling unwell, with all the tomyum I consumed everyday since day 1. And it was the day my menses chose to come for its monthly visit, making my mood spiraling downwards.

Fortunately though, the train made some stops and some locals would come onboard to sell some finger bites or easy food. We bought fried drumsticks and sticky rice. With the rest we had, we somehow managed to survive through.

Hubs checked out the whole train from the front car to its back and came back reporting ours were the best car! It's the only second class, with beds and aircon. The next best is the beds with just the fans. Then the rest were all seats with fans. I can't begin to imagine what a long night it would be sleeping seated upright with just the fans. With that thought, I began to feel, oh well, we were the luckiest among the rest of the commuters.

After washing up, settling in to our beds and all, I had a moment with didi and meimei with the curtain drawn, all cuddled up in the little small confined space of a bed. They were giggling and talking, which melt my heart and ease my worries tremendously and I thought to myself, I am so blessed.

I allowed them to play until they wanted to sleep, which I-don't-know-when. Sometime later, hubs came back and told me he wanted to go to the other car for its open doorway scenery, but the conductor asked him to return back to his own car as it would be locked soon and he won't be able to return to his bed after that. Thus, my hubs comforted me that my worry was being looked after, that they do have their safety precautions, not allowing anyone to simply enter our carriage. I wasn't sure if every carriage is locked but ours was. In a way, that had mellowed down my fear so much that I could relaxed and breathed easier.

But that night was so darn long! I woke up almost every other hour and the throat was on fire! Gosh! I so missed my home that night, I wanted to go home! *bawl*

Even when the new day's sunlight unfolded, the train was still chugging and chugging endlessly. Holy cow! The train ride came to an end at 10+ again! I was so sick and tired of this long train journeys already!

Hence, the lesson of the day is... you figure it out yourself!

Going to Chiengmai from Bangkok by train.

Dragging our luggage and carrying our backpacks after alighting from the taxi, this was the sight we saw at the railway station. 

So many people! Where were they going??

 We quickly find our train first and it was the one of the two which were stationed there, so it wasn't too challenging to locate it. Since we had some time in our hands, we walked around and bought some snacks, checked out if we could upgrade our tickets to first class not.

Apparently, there were a few tickets available for first class for the next train! For your info, our tickets had been bought by a friend's uncle from Chiengmai and he had kindly mailed them over to our home address before our travel date. He told us all first class tickets were full and only second class' were available.

Hubs asked if he could change the tickets at the counter, but we were told we can't do so as it was less than 1 hour to our scheduled train. Sigh! Had no other options.

 It wasn't long before boarding time and after taking some pictures, up we went to our train/ accommodation for that night. Exciting and a bit, uhm, worried, frankly speaking.

It wasn't difficult to find our seats. It looked pretty cosy in the picture, but, oh well, it's really not THAT cosy as portrayed in it. BUT... it was still bearable. Shall I say, I would give it a score of 7.5/10, not like highly satisfied at 10/10.

 We were near to the door, which opened up to the lavatory and the washbasins.  Jumping between these carriages were heart pumping enough for me! It wasn't that easy peeing, washing hands, brushing teeth, cleansing the face in a moving train!

But at least the kids thought it was fun, and they would go off to pee or wash their hands or anything, by themselves, since the doorway was so near to us.

The train moved at the scheduled time, and there wasn't any loud horns or signals that it was starting. It just.. go!

After lingering for another hour or so, doing basically nothing much other than looking out of the window and playing on the ipad, we walked over to the restaurant to have our dinner, thinking we better be the early birds before the dinner-goers hog up the place. Surprise, surprise! There wasn't any customers seen in that. I thought we were too early, but even after we had our dinner and hang on for a long time, there wasn't many people coming in. Apparently, I believe many rather choose to order and delivered to their seats instead, or the other half bring their own dinner onboard.

 We ordered 2 sets and it was alright. Not too full, but I suppose it was good enough, to avoid any complications on a moving train for the night?

When we got back to our seats, we saw one side was turned into the bunkers. It looked pretty amazing!

Then we asked the attendant to make the other side and he did it very fast! 1, 2, 3... kaotim in about 10 mins or so. Wow!

Actually each of us had a bed by ourselves, but I wasn't feeling very comfortable meimei sleeps alone, so I slept with her. It was large enough to accommodate both of us, but hubs felt the empty bed was sooooo wasted! Kept nagging and nagging, until I can't stand it anymore and told him to stop it once and for all. It wasn't even him sharing a bed with one of them! o.0

 Very soon, we washed up and settled to bed. I was rather worried someone carrying didi away in the middle of the night, and I woke up several times over to check on him. o.0

OK, apparently, I know I wasn't the only one who felt that way. Seemed that my sister in law also thought about the same thing when she traveled with him on a sleeper train for the first time too. So, I confirmed I was pretty normal. Or at least, both of us abnormal.

 When dawn broke finally, we were back with the seats and had our breakfast there.

I don't know why, but we reached Chiengmai at around 10am+, it was almost a 14 hours' ride! Though the distance between these 2 cities, I was told, is about 700-800km. Could be wrong, but if it's true, why did it take so long? The train seemed to be chugging away pretty fast.

Look at my exhausted face! But frankly, I was very relieved we finally reached the city without any incidents, even though I didn't sleep too well that night. I think it was a really good experience with them and a moving train could lull you to a deep slumber, if you could bear the loud noise and free from the worries and fear that I had.

We checked out the local tour package at the train station and then got on a big tut tut to our hotel.

The train station of Cheingmai. 

Meimei 8th birthday celebration.

Girls are always luckier. I broke my rule for her. :(

There wasn't any party, but I allowed her to invite 3 of her friends over right after her RG lesson at school a day before her actual birthday.

THEY HAD SO MUCH FUN!

I ordered pizza delivery and we went over to the pool, 7 kids altogether. A mom whom I got to know from one of the extravagant princess party we attended just some months ago, came over as her daughter was one of the invited special guests. She commented this kind of a small little party is so brilliant and wonderful for the kids. Stress free and the kids were having a whale of a good time. Needless to say, meimei was very happy with this arrangement.

On the actual day, Saturday, we let her choose her favorite food joints for the day, and who needs to guess, its' hakka mee for the breakfast and (no lunch) Chillis for dinner. Hubs' colleague from China was invited too, as his mom was here for a visit. But our conversations were largely limited due to language barrier between myself and them. :( But anyway, we were there for the food.

My girl turned 8 and I am still counting my blessings each day I have her in my life. She's indeed my princess in my heart and I love her so so very berry much.

Little Gymnast grading

Last year, meimei went for her RG freehand LG grade routine only.

This year, she trained for 3 routines, that is ball, rope and freehand. I feel amazed enough that she could do a lot of things I wouldn't have thought of, though she wasn't in the top of the gang. She definitely isn't the last either, but I always believe, you need to sacrifice a lot of time and money (for the fees) to put in long regular daily hours of practice if you want to excel. Since I'm not too willing in both, well, I settle for the fun and exposure parts only la.

The trainer told me next year, she's going to learn 3 more apparatus, which are the ribbon, hoop and clubs. These 3 for the first half and back to ball, rope and freehand for the second half. Sounds like lot of things to do!!

And oh, see the leotard? Leotards cost a BOMB! If it is decorated with Swarovski crystals, the price could range from RM500-RM1000 for a brand new one! But as always, there are other options, which are not so dazzling and sparkling but costs like 4x cheaper! All the things I learned for this sport this year!

I bought a dunno-how-many-hands leotard for meimei for RM160, which is really, the cheapest among what the other girls were wearing. I know some of them costs 300-1000. It's jaw-dropping!

I then went over to Kenanga wholesale center to get a big pack of crystals and went home to hot glue on more blink blinks on her leotard. Does it make any difference? I think not, but we had fun doing that exercise.

It's quite tight on her, and I think next year I have to look for another one. In fact, I'm even thinking of learning how to make it myself, and maybe make it a small little business for me! It didn't seem so hard, did it?? How hard can it be, looking at the flimsy little dress. But I have yet to go and learn, can someone give me a push??

1 night right in the heart of KL city

It is indeed something refreshing spending a night in a luxurious hotel, being pampered and spoilt rotten in the heart of KL once a year.

With 2 upgrade vouchers I don't know how hubs got from, our room was upgraded from a normal standard room to a larger room with the breathtaking views of the KLCC park and the convention centre.



The room even has an extra bed so the kids could sleep pretty comfortably enough. Then again, I always feel it's better to train them to sleep in sleeping bags so wherever we go checking in to a hotel, we don't need to worry about beds for them. As we learned in Thailand, some hotels even charge for babycot and even extra pillow!!

In the late afternoon, I walked over to do a bit of window shopping, hoping to get some good buys, but came back empty handedly. It felt good to be having some time alone by myself checking out the stores in that high class mall once in awhile though. If it not been raining beforehand, we would have taken the kids to its nice pool.

That evening, for dinner, we had the buffet spread in the hotel and boy, did we stuff ourselves full. I always feel MO's buffet is the best among all the hotel's buffets. *lick lips*

After dinner, we popped over to KLCC's TGV and watched Skyfall. Yeah, pretty late than everybody else, but we were so busy before this, ok! And on that movie night, I put my feet down and told hubs for the last time, I will not be watching movie with him and the whole gang anymore if he still insists meimei sits on my lap. He always argues that his lap is forever ready for her but she never wanted to sit on his. I told him I don't care. It had always been me and my whole legs went numb every other time. He never understands how unbearable it is to have a 20+ kg kiddo sitting on the lap for the whole 2 hours.

Ooh~ after the movie was over, we just need to walk a few doors away back to our room. How comfortable that was. Many people were still lingering around in the park although the water fountain lighting display had stopped for maintenance. We saw it for just a bit before the movie and it was beautiful.

The next day, we slept through and breakfast was taken at 11am!  Hubs took the kids to KFC whilst I went over to Petrosains to get the tickets for them. Hubs was so sweet enough to babysit them whilst what did I do? Went for a yummy waffle (the best in town!) at the 2nd floor food court and then back over to the hotel for an hour massage, included in the package deal. Oh my Lord, that hour was incredible! It was so so so bliss.

I went back to the room with a big smile on my face, it was really damn good.

The short city break ended with a high tea (also inclusive) and when my hubs asked me "want to continue with another package for next year not?", guess you could tell what my answer is. 

Chatuchak market

We had more than half a day to spend nearby before checking out and lugging our things to the train station.

Decided to take the train to Chatuchak market. Packed our backpacks, filled them with water bottles, caps and off we go walking to the nearby BTS station. 

It was burning hot! Whoever says it's winter at the end of the year, it's so untrue. Lucky I brought my straw hat along, together with my sunscreen blocks. No regrets!

 They spotted a playground outside the market and ran straight towards it.

Look, it's all so old and worn yet it has this rustic charm.

 As we went in the narrow shops inside the market, the kids were getting increasingly annoyed and tired and restless. I felt the same way too, after getting ridiculous quotes on some things that got my attention. Potong stim betul, really didn't have the mood to shop/ browse anymore.

 We saw a mob dance and went over to watch.

 So lively and fun, it turned out this was more entertaining than browsing through the stores.

Didi was awed by this real-life alien made from scraps. He asked for a picture with this cool thingy.

We rode a taxi back to the hotel which was a scare as the taxi engine stopped in the middle of a highway suddenly. Thank the lucky stars somehow the driver managed to start it back up again after a few tries. *whew!~ wipe sweat*

Before we checked out from the hotel, we took a shower to prepare for our train journey in a few hours' time. In order not to sweat ourselves anymore, we rode a taxi to the nearest mall, the Robinsons and had our lunch.

Later we packed our bags into the same taxi but hubs figured out not very soon, that we were heading to the airport instead. So, we detoured back and lost some good half an hour or more. *whew~ wipe sweat again*

Travelling in Bangkok really is exciting!