My exploration in life… (diary for baby!)

I woke up at 5-plus this Sunday morning, when YEN suddenly realised that FELIX was missing beside her and has fallen off our bed.  The way we have been sleeping in the past weeks was that we place a big pillow next to FELIX, and YEN sleeps between FELIX and I.  She found FELIX and things were in a blur at that time, with our baby boy lying face down on the pillow.

He did not cry or anything when I immediately went to switch on the light and YEN picked FELIX up.  He did not have any apparent / visible injuries.  I was more relieved when he drank milk as he would normally do, but YEN still feels uneasy about his fall.  Up till now, he seems okay, but you’ll never know, really.  We’ll keep a close eye on anything abnormal to FELIX…

Due to FELIXs’ fall, YEN has decided to stay home to keep watch over him and not attend the wedding lunch of my best pal, WENQIANG.  I had joined WENQIANG in discussing details of his big day and is kind of playing a relatively "big" part in it now that I cannot pull out of the event.  I’m very happy that my pal of twenty years finally tying the knot, after a relatively silent life in the relationships’ world.  We - the group of close friends that has stuck to each other for these years - wish him all the best in his marriage and will always be here for each other when we need anything!  =)

I’ve finally jumped onto the "Facebook" bandwagon after invitations sent to me for quite a while.  I still do not know much about it, and have little use for it, yet.  We’ll see what it brings me.

I had a week’s break from the students - a school holiday for Hari Raya Puasa and four days of PSLE marking.  I was a recorder for the composition paper and we spent quite a bit of time rushing to finish the three thousand-odd papers.  It’s a good break before the examinations for the other levels take place next week.

I thought I lost contact with my friend JINWEI, whom I knew from our time in the Armed Forces.  He had "disappeared" for more than a year before calling me last night, returning my call of more than a year ago.  We spoke a little and agreed that we must meet up sometime soon to catch up on things with KENNY too.

Our children are growing without too many incidents, thankfully.  RACHEL is still unable to converse with us through words at seventeen months, while FELIX is growing healthy at two months.  He craves for a lot of attention when he is awake and needs to be carried most times.  We have our hands full with these two precious babies of ours!

There was this incident in school the past week that I felt nice over.  The primary six students have had their PSLE examinations and returned to school for lessons on Wednesday.  I would expect them to get rowdier than they were previously.

I went to this class that I had been teaching them for their Health Education lesson.  Upon reaching their classroom, I found the monitress, who told me that the class was in the library watching "I Not Stupid 2".  The previous lesson was a relief lesson for them by a teacher, who like me, had teaching a mid-career change.  She was teaching in ZHANGDE for a year.  When I reached the class, I found the class seated on the floor of the AVA room of the library, and one of their most "problematic" students in an angry state over a remark by that teacher.  He was talking to himself aloud, making sacarstic remarks.

I went over to the student to calm him down.  He was still letting his pee brain rule over his big brain when he told me that he was angry because that teacher said he was "crazy".I think I managed to speak a bit of sense in him a little then and just before the teacher left the library, she asked to speak to him in private.  At that point, I was afraid that he would go out and further his antics.  Worse, he might even hit the teacher.    I held him by the arm when he was going, reminding him to be respectful no matter what.

The teacher met me in office just before I left for home later, telling me that the boy was in a much more stable state when she spoke to him.  He even apologised for his outburst, which was a huge surprise.  She asked me what "magic" I had performed on him when I spoke to him that he calmed down so quickly and dramatically.  I was so happy that I managed to speak some sense into him at that very moment.

This affirmed the fact that I can make a difference in the children’s lives, albeit for a short while!  This will spur me on to work hard, if not any much more, on them to help and not have to make decisions they have to regret for in life later…

First things first, I’ll like to congratulate my friend, SHIHUI a.k.a. ROWENA, for the birth of her baby girl a little while back.  I’m glad to have found my long-lost secondary school classmate of four years - KEVIN LEE - here in Friendster.  This will keep us in contact with each other!  The hectic pace of life hardly gives me anytime to think of more than my family and work - allowing me to forget important events in my friends lives like birthdays and more.  I’m so sorry, friends!

My life had taken on such an unrecognisable pattern in that I wake up in the wee hours (sometimes as early as 2am, most times between that and 4am) to do my work for school on weekdays, reaching home tired at about 7pm, and too tired plus dozing off while having dinner at 8+ or 9+pm…  My wife sees little of me when I’m awake.  She knows me very well when I lay asleep in bed nowadays, though…  I have little time for EDDIE and HUIJUN, not to mention other friends.  Argh!  What is happening?  Think I’ll have to make it right, come school holidays!

I spoke to YEN about our joint concern that I haven’t had enough time for us.  I explained that I’ll need to set things in state for my first year of teaching, starting from almost zero.  But we recognise that I’ll be given more responsibilities than now as I progress, and that won’t make things easier!  Sigh!  Back to the drawing board!

We went for lunch outside on Saturday.  I thought I’d make it a nice change for her and bring her to this cafe I was introduced to the previous day by my Head of Department, CATHERINE.  We brought RACHEL along and guess what?  We met CAT, her family (husband and two children) and friends there!  CAT is married to a French husband and has two beautiful children, a boy and a girl.  She is liberal and has been so supportive at work (one of the reasons I hadn’t felt more stressed at work than I am now!).  I am so thankful to have her as my boss!  And it was great to have her meet up with YEN and RACHEL too.  YEN told me she enjoyed the place (a cafe in Dempsey Road) as it reminds her of a laid back lifestyle and the majority of foreigners there just made it feel like we were overseas for a while…  I hope I can continue to make her feel happy in our lives…