Little children

The innocence of their little faces,

staring wide-eyed at you.

That little beam

or gleam of mischievous fun

shining from their eyes.

They bounce and jump,

and walk about,

not afraid to speak their minds.

"Concentrate!" they remind themselves,

if they drift off in a daze.

"Four more and then I'm done!"

One yawns sleepily and requests to wash

his face,

while another in all adult seriousness

is absorbed in her own work.

Active little ones, bursting with fun.

Full of energy...

Amusement abounds, coupled with 

several exasperated chidings.

Little children are just

themselves.

Wednesday

I haven't been posting recently because too many things have happened... yes, I know, I'm lazy. :) Yesterday, I went to a wholesale shop selling flowers with S.M to choose complimenting side flowers for the main flowers she has chosen to decorate the wedding aisle. It was super cold there and I was glad that I heeded her advice to bring a jacket. It felt like walking in a gigantic fridge! Actually, it wasn't really that big, maybe just around 3 rooms wide. hahaha. Well, anyway, when I first stepped into the room, the cold hit me and soaked me through my skin because I didn't wear my jacket prior to going in, so it took some time for me to acclimatise. My teeth were almost chattering and my jacket didn't seem to be warm enough, so for the first few minutes, I wasn't helpful to S.M. I think because I was suppose to help her go around and search for suitable side flowers. I was feeling too cold to move. :D The flowers in that mini winterland are really pretty though. In the end, we decided on some yellow side flowers (I forgot what they were called). We also purchased some other things like florist wire and paper. When S.M. requested for some of the flowers she had ordered and the yellow ones we had chosen to do a sample, the boss was so kind to give her a generous few stalks of each for free! She was really happy because she had been worried the night before about how she was going to do a sample for us to see and help in the decorating. Thank God! It was my first time being in a wholesaler place that sells flowers. I like the place and apparently they sell the cheapest flowers among the row of wholesalers along Thomson road. Currently, my favourite of what I saw there would be the baby's breath. :) It's really nice to see God's creation, even in such a sterile environment. I'm looking forward to be involved in helping out with the decorations this Friday, it'll be my first time being part of the process of a wedding! Usually, when I'm invited to a wedding, I'm only there at the end, after all the decorations have been completed. I think it'll be an interesting and fun experience. :)

The hols so far has been full of events and lessons learnt. School will be reopening in 2 weeks :( It'll be a whole new set of modules and 'foreign' subjects. A math related subject will be included called "Intro to Statistics & Research". Not a big fan of numbers, I hope my lessons will be enjoyable and that I won't have war with this module.

The zoo

I've been quite lazy to post lately. Many things have happened during the holidays so far. I'm kind of suffering from fatigue from the onslaught of activities which have nevertheless been fun. One of the recent places I went to was, the zoo! My aunt had her company's corporate pass to the zoo so she invited my mum, younger bro and I to go along with her. We had free admission and didn't have to queue for tickets so it was quick entry. :) My last visit to the zoo was 2 years ago, also, with my aunt. haha, anyway, the zoo hasn't changed much. We visited almost every animal and show stated on the zoo map. I think the monkeys were the funniest and most in variety of species there, well, maybe, aside from the variety of snakes.(not that snakes are funny, they're scary) There's a new show featuring domestic animals such as dogs and cats performing, its target audience is children, I think the show just started a year ago. It's not too bad for a new show, just that I think there was more entertainment than the animals performance. The trainers of the animals even performed break dance moves. Here are some pictures I took at the zoo:

  {An elephant placing a hat on the trainer by using suction to grip the hat by its trunk}

                      

{I love the beauty of this butterfly, it's a pity that I couldn't capture it clearly}

                            

                                                    

{a bat eating from a bunch of fruits}

                                                     

           {A monkey we saw sitting randomly on a sign ( I forgot what the sign was, I think it was something to do with reptiles. haha) I wonder how it got there. It looks bored.}

{Giraffes! My favourite animals}

                                                     

{I think this is an ostrich? I had some trouble capturing its picture because it kept moving its neck up and down.}

{Two cuties we saw near the entrance of the zoo}

{Mutualism in action}

{Rhino}

{Close-up of a dragonfly I saw}

{A monkey we saw hanging there... it was facing us initially just staring into space, then after some time, it swung its arms and faced backwards and stayed like that for quite a long while... it was quite funny... :) }

{I think this is an iguana but I forgot, it looks really comfortable on its perch}

Ok, that's all. :)

19th International Coastal cleanup

I went for the coastal cleanup last saturday. It was quite an eye-opening experience for me. :) We were assigned to Chek Jawa to do the coastal cleanup. Woke up at 5.45am and took a train to Eunos station, then a bus to the jetty and then took a ride in a boat pulau ubin and then a van directly to the area where our school was assigned to do the coastal cleanup. Armed with gloves, trashbags and cutters, we cleaned up the length of beach. There was seriously a lot of rubbish and the variety of rubbish found was quite shocking. There were plastic bags, fishing nets, ropes, those big plastic drums, tyres etc. and things like an intact wooden folding chair! There was a list we had to mark against, using the statistical method where you put 4 horizontal lines and the 5th vertical line across for each item we picked and threw into the trash bag. Picking rubbish may seem easy but there were some things like having to bend low to untangle ropes entangled on the mangrove branches and picking up sacks filled with sand that required a lot of strength and effort. We only cleaned up for an hour or so because of the incoming tide but we collected quite a lot of things... filling 23 trash bags! I still find it quite unbelievable that people can throw things like a chair into the sea! Why do these people treat the sea like a rubbish bin. We cleared rubbish on only a 50m stretch of beach on Chek Jawa and already found so much rubbish... imagine the amount of rubbish dumped around the entire island! Through this coastal cleanup, I've seen the extent of human damage done to the environment of non-biodegradable waste. You should have seen the "decorations" of rubbish and ropes etc. on the mangrove branches... Yup, so I realised that it is very important to dispose of waste appropriately and how important it is to look after the environment. 

Here are the statistics of our cleanup.

Redang Island

At Berjaya Resort

Our family went to Redang Island recently. It's my first time going to West Malaysia and also taking a plane from Seletar airport instead of Changi airport. Redang island is idyllic with clear waters, corals and marine life. We did a lot of snorkeling there; it's my first time snorkeling. Haha, I was a little nervous about snorkeling at first but found out that it wasn't that bad floating and swimming in my life jacket while peering through my snorkel goggles, breathing through my mouth, into the watery depths to see colourful corals and all sorts of fishes (even clownfishes, 'nemos' swimming in and out of sea anemone!). It was fun swimming with them literally. I found out that I don't like stepping on dead coral, especially those big ones on the seabed near the coast. It's sad that those corals were once colourful and vibrant... alive, with fishes swimming and co-existing with them. Tourism does have it's downsides, especially with throngs of people swimming to see coral. We definitely need to take care of the natural environment, otherwise it'll be depleted eventually. But, I'm really in awe at God's creation... being there and having a glimpse at the marine world is fascinating!

At Berjaya resort

The sand there is really fine. It's like caster sugar. :D

We saw someone paragliding there... looked really fun but it's expensive. :)

View in the morning

I think it was high tide at the time so we had to wade through the seawater when we reached shore.:)

Our room at Redang Lagoon

Francis enjoying the tractor ride which is suppose to carry our luggage.

Sunrise view from Redang Lagoon

Love the formation of clouds.

Clear waters

Fishermen! We saw them while riding on the speedboat on the way to another place where we were supposed to stay but couldn't stay at on the first day because it was fully booked. (it's cheaper to stay there) ;)