The best of Kelantan
After a whirlwind year last year, we are back in Kelantan again to visit our dearest Kong-Kong (the best of Kelantan) despite the fact that we will be here again for the Chinese New Year in just two weeks. And whaddya’ know? The house keeps going through changes. The first thing we noticed was that he has a brand new gate! Why? Because some wanker was speeding down the road and crashed into our gate. Can you believe it??? The entire gate and pillar with the huge postbox within was crushed and Kong-Kong had to spend a few grand just to rebuild it. Fulat betul. Plus the guy who drove into it had no money to pay for any of it.
Oh well. The new gate is very nice and he’s pushed the location of it inwards the driveway so that it makes more sense upon entry and exit into the main road. Little opportunities. Alhamdulillah.
The house is also much less cluttered as Kong-Kong has obviously thrown out a lot of Amah’s stuff. I myself am still going through Nana’s stuff, slowly but surely. Keeping clothes for T1 to wear (as she can already fit into them!) and deciding which bags we want to keep or not. I LOVE wearing Nana’s stuff (earrings, scarves, etc) because it makes me feel so close to her. Love, love, love…….
T1 finished her homework over this long weekend yesterday itself but T2, hahahahaha. She does not want to do her homework. Let’s see, she has 3 pages of Maths which involves counting stuff, colouring the correct numbers and some addition and subtraction exercises by 1 unit. In total probably about 30 units of countings to do, 10 per page. Like they would give 9 beetles and ask you to write down how many beetles there are. Or write down what happens to 15 if you add 1. Easy stuff. But my girl is not interested. At all. Die.
On top of her Maths homework, she also has Science, English and Bahasa homework. Poor, poor girl. Science involves labelling body parts on a drawing of a boy and crossing out the object that doesn’t match in a sequence. English is drawing lines to match objects and some colouring based on instructions given. There is also the writing exercise of writing the alphabets D and E, 18 times per alphabet; unlike Chinese School where you fill out the entire page with boxes! Bahasa is matching objects and colouring too. It sounds like a lot but I think if you do it all at once, it will be TOO MUCH for a 5 year old at one go. Bear in mind though that she doesn’t get this much homework every weekend. It is only because it is a long weekend and she has 5 whole days to do it. So half an hour every day. Oh, I forget, there was also Mandarin homework to write 2 words twice. So we’ve had to lug her entire school bag to Kelantan almost because Missy refused to do her homework yesterday and I’m just not one to force her if she’s not up to it.
I am passing the homework responsibility to the Hubs because he is the one who spoils her!!! To think we have to do this homework monitoring thing for a good 4 years as it will take T2 that long I think to get the hang of homework! With T1, after Reception, I never checked her bag anymore. If she didn’t do her homework, it was her problem. T2 needs more of a hand though as she cannot even read yet. Nor count!!! Aiyo!! How to do Maths!!???!!
On the plane ride here, we hit an air pocket and the plane did a sudden drop that completely freaked me out but the girls were loving it cheering, “Again! Again!!” When looking out of the plane window just before we were starting to descend, T2 said, “Oh my Goodness!! Look at the flood!! There’s still a flood in Kota Bharu!!” And T1 went, “That’s what you call a river, T2.”
Ahahahaha…..
On the plane, T2 was saying how she missed Amah….“I miss Amah, Daddy. Now there will be no more Rainbow Cake and Sponge Cake and Apple Pie and Chocolate Cake.”
That certainly got my floodgates opened because I realised too how soon it will be before our first Chinese New Year without the family Matriarch who used to organise the entire feast of what was the Reunion Dinner. I was thinking that SIL and I could whip up a replica Reunion Dinner meal (we are more than capable) but Kong-Kong said he had already ordered Roti Jala for CNY. Did I hear right? Well, we will find out soon enough. Hahaha. Another interesting point to note was that Kong-Kong officially instructed T1 to sit now at Amah’s old seat at the Dining Table. I’m not sure what Chinese culture is with respects to the Dining Table and the significance of always sitting at your own place but yup, T1 was instructed to change seats and now sit on Amah’s seat.
We’re off to visit Amah now at the Temple so adios for now, peepers!
**************************************************************************Who is Mamapumpkin?
Mamapumpkin is a former Design Architect turned Multi-Million Dollar Digital Entrepreneur. She sets out to prove to all that you can have anything and everything that you want; if you have that fire of desire burning within and the drive to work hard. Even better with much love.
Mamapumpkin has not only grown corporate businesses successfully in the past and doubled her salary 5 times over 5 organisations but has grown THREE BUSINESSES to 7 FIGURES within an 8 year period. She now shows others EXACTLY HOW after retiring her own husband from employment. He is now the official dog walker, family driver, chef and THE BEST FATHER to their two girls and THE BEST HUSBAND to the woman who CHOSE HIM!
Mamapumpkin is the girl who has nothing but fights for everything including YOU. She is idealistic in her desire to put unbelievable amounts of money and extrardinary happiness into the lives of good people so we can change the world together believing in happiness for ALL. She strives to impact lives authentically wanting to reduce poverty cycles and enable quality education for all and always supports the voiceless. She believes we can all have a life of our own desires to enable real contribution into the world. But first, one needs to understand what this all means.
A beautiful life without limits.
If you wish to learn how to propel your life forward guaranteed, be brave to take action. Mamapumpkin's purpose is to build people. Her gift is to help them UNCOVER their HIDDEN GIFTS. She operates fairly and always leaves an impression. You either love her or not and she is alright either way.
She is a living testimony that women really can have a lot. Being financially and time free has enabled her to travel the world anytime, anywhere, doing anything with anyone, as she spends most of her days with her children, having fun, supporting others wherever she can. Also having fun.
