So it's the start of my 1 month work in Bangalore. This is my first time here in India and I want to make the most out of this one month stint. Flew together with my Thai colleague in SQ flight. Journey was rather bumpy due to turbulence along the way. Once I reached the airport, cleared immigration and got back my luggage, I had a small problem with the India customs as my haversack apparently has a chalkmark X drawn across it. I carried 2 laptops with me and many cables, wires of all sorts for my gadgets... So maybe that explains the customs fiasco...
Once we got out of the airport (it was around 1030hrs IST), it's pretty cold and windy. Our journey to the hotel is quite OK as we start to get acquainted with the road users here. Lorries have a sign at the back "OK to horn" and our driver keeps on beeping at lorry drivers, motorcyclists, other motorists.. So I guess that it is OK to horn lightly. Try this back in Singapore and we will get the driver to chase after the person who horned.
So we are going to stay in The Residence Indranagar. Pretty decent place. Pics will be up soon. It's sleep and rest time... Another day beckons ahead later.
One of my colleagues just went on a holiday spanning London, Scotland, Rome and Paris. Had a small chat to find out from her what her experience of Paris is like. She informed that it's full of Senegalese touts, gypsies and her friend almost got pick-pocketed in a fast food counter (but was foiled by the sharp-eyed cashier). From the description that she gave, it made as if Paris seemed a dangerous place as a tourist. She also claimed that London (and Rome too) is very much safer than Paris.
I've been to Paris in 2004 during our honeymoon and it is indeed a beautiful place, with the Eiffel Tower, Musee du Louvre, the wonderful Paris metro stations, the various gardens, Fontainebleau, etc. Our experience with touts was only at Montmarte where we were forced to buy a friendship band for 10 Euros from this Senegalese tout (who claimed to be a Muslim) after he had tied it on my wife's hand.
I hope that this does not stop me from visiting Paris again but I also wish that the place is free of such touts, pickpockets to make it safer for tourists.
Now that I'm more or less being tasked to go to Bangalore for work (for a month), I'm trying to list of essential items which I need / might need for my stay there. I've come out with some:
1) Baby wetwipes. Convenient for me to clean my hands, seats, etc on the go 2) Dettol hand sanitizer 3) Medication for indigestion or bowel meltdown situations 4) DVDs to watch during free period (that include my long list of French movies recorded from Starhub cable) 5) Macbook (don't intend to lug my company laptop around for short trips within India) rigged with Adobe Lightroom, Reason, Logic 8 and The Sims 3 6) iPod 7) Ricoh GR Digital camera (with 24mm wide angle lens attachment) 8) Skype phone for communication with family in SG 9) My Sony portable DVD player (when I get bored at airports or in trains) 10) A book; "Underworld" by Don Delillo
There's this idiot who keeps pissing in the lift of our in-laws' block EVERYDAY and all that the Pasir Ris Town Council did was just put a warning note on the lift. Not even a CCTV camera to catch the culprit pants down...
Just recently, a resident of the block took a citizen vigilante stand by posting his own notice on the wall of the lift. Lousy stick figure version but at least he gets his message across. Hope that culprit will be caught soon.
Just been to the spankingly new Tampines 1 mall and my first impression of it (using my car to drop by the place) had been quite bad. Knowing earlier when it had just opened that the car park situation was quite bad, I thought that visiting the place during a weekday office hour (Thursday 30th April) there would be not much of a problem. But alas no!! Here's the rough timeline of what happened during the visit:
1450hrs: Reached Tampines 1 mall vicinity. There was a short queue outside. Noticed that there was a car park FULL and number of lots available sign outside. Queue movement is pretty slow as it goes down inside the carpark ramp.
1458hrs: Managed to go inside the car park. Noticed that within the car park there are NO empty lots sign available (unlike in Tampines Mall and Century Square).
1505hrs: After 2-3 turns merry-go-round round the car park, still no vacancy. Noticed a BMW parallel parking into an empty single lot.
1508hrs: After another turn round the car park still no vacancy. Beemer still trying to parallel park (BMW driver FAIL!)
1515hrs: Gave up on trying to find an empty lot. Went out of the place. Cashcard deducted 50cents. Frack!
1520hrs: Went to next door Tampines Mall. Immediately got an empty lot. Walked out next door to Tampines 1... Blegh...
I know I'm quite sucky in updating my blog. Well here goes and I hope that the update frequency will catch up soon.
I'm proud to say that I'm in the Chapter 2 phase of parenthood. Our 2nd child was born on 5th January 2009, the second day which our dear Iffah started her nursery 2 school in Kids Meadow's kindergarten. Our son, Akif Nabil was around 3.2 kgs and our Iffah now has a younger sibling to take care of. Initially she was rejecting the idea of having to a baby boy as her younger sibling but upon his birth onwards, I guess her feelings melt immediately and she's now all loving and protective of him. Photos will be uploaded soon!
Azlina had just fininshed her maternity leave on 27th April and here are some of the things which happened along the way for all of us.
1) School for our dear Iffah can be an emotional rollercoaster ride for her. Getting her to go to school (and making her wear her uniform) is a herculean task for the whole family. But now, I guess she is quite adaptable to her school environment. Friendships are forged and she kept telling us of her friends in school; their characteristics, whom she likes and don't linke (she even has Mii characters set up in our Nintendo Wii!)
2) Iffah had finally begin to take her oral medication after not doing so for a really long time. This happened just recently when she got a viral fever infection after going to the library in White Sands. After seeing her crying in pain when being given suppositories and after 2 visits to the A&E department of KKH, she now can take some of her oral medication. At least those medicine which she's beginning to take now can help to remedy her fever which dragged for slightly more than a week. I'm proud of this milestone for her.
"In September, on the very first day of kindergarten, Ms Bradley said, 'Each day of school, ...' "
These were some of the parts of a book (taken from Nancy Carlson's Henry's 100 Days of Kindergarten) which she had memorised and able to recite it by heart.
I'm glad that Iffah picked up reading at an early age, even though there were some attempts at getting her to know words via flash cards or watching Dr Titzer's VCDs when she was still a little baby.
Trips to the local branch library proved to be fruitful for her reading accomplishments. She would borrow some and we would read to her before her bedtime. Before long, she's able to relate the things which she encountered in the books to her everyday activities eg going to pre-school (ref Henry's 100 Days of Kindergarten) to baking a cake (ref Harvey The Baker).
As such, I managed to scout some 2nd hand Nancy Carlson's books on ebay and got them quite cheaply. These books are recommended for toddlers 3 years and above and also those who are going to pre-school.
A side: 31 yr old guy with an inclination towards sonic and sub sonic frequencies and syncopated beats.
B side: A father of a lovely and smart 3 daughter, Iffah Aqila
