Busy month.

I'm back in LOS and the kids are happy to see me.  So's my wife whom seems to be a little worn out from taking care of the 2 little monsters for the pass month.  I will be quite busy this month.  Firstly is to remodel my study.  I had brought back my film scanner and 24" display.  Also my NAS from my home in Singapore.  Which means I could build another station in my studies just for photo editing and scanning.  The mac mini will be the chosen one for this task.  My old PC will take the old monitor and will be used my girl for her games.  (Normally if I start using the computer she would want to play) So its much better for me to have 2 stations at home side by side.  Which means at least I could be doing something besides looking at her playing dressup games :P

Then I need to settle my little shop house.  Still under construction but having its finishing touches.  I might fly back to SG too if time allows (or if I'm bored :P).  Girl's term just ended so its a month holiday for her.  So it will be hectic for us as the kids will be at home.

Some of you also wondered why I have not posted photos recently.  Actually I shot some while in Singapore but never found the time to scan it.  I plan to do it today once I setup the scanner later.  I also tried shooting with the beast and the GIAGANTO 250mm today..... verdict... I think I won't be using it often... bloody heavy and hard to focus with such a small finder mask... Most probably will use it for my landscapes though...

Will post more later.  2 monsters calling me.... :p

Just 1 more week

and I will be back in LOS.  Yeah!  We have more or less moved into the new house my sis bought.  Its pretty close to the old house we were staying before.  Not going to sell the old house as my mum plans to rent it out for some income. :)

As for me, my reservist actually started on Friday.  Its actually pretty welfare.  Friday was just a half day briefing on what we will be doing and yesterday on Saturday, we worked hard and managed to hit our quota!  (Sorry can't really say what I'm doing as under OSA :P)  So today and tomorrow (suppose to be standby days if cannot finish), I will be free and no need to go to camp to report and book in.  Tues morning will be a debrief and that's it!  hehe..  Happy!

Wife say boy boy already started to complain since last week liao.. Night time kept looking for me :(  Think this time go back that bugger is going to be angry with me for quite some time... better get some toys for him and my girl too....

Another chapter in my life.

35 years I have stayed in my old house and just last week, the movers came and moved out most of the stuff to the new one my sister bought.  At the moment I am still staying in my old house (for convinience sake) but daily, I still need to move some minor personal stuff to the new one.  And there's no more internet connection so I guess I still need to come to the new house almost everyday to surf...

The new environment is a good change to old one.  Fresh paint, new nieghbours (pretty lucky to have good ones) and new furnitures.  It was a pain in the ass to move actually.  It does not help if your father is an avid philatelist and collector.  Meaning we had box loads of stamps (yup tons of them) to move.   Moreover my whole family are avid readers so the amount of books in boxes are huge too.  My mum gave the movers a big tip as most of our stuffs are really damn heavy :P

I will be spending sometime to shift through the collection and maybe sell them off locally at a shop or through ebay.  Its interesting though.  Stamps used to be an important part of communications (writing letters or postcards)but nowadays, we are replaced by email, twitters or blogs.  Even through social website updates.  I'm glad though that there are still a lot of stamp collectors in the interweb which means I could sell some of them off.  Most of the stamps my late father collected are from PRC.  Anyone interested do drop me a message.  Or if you have a lead in buying bulk can drop me an email too.  I have a truckload of them now sitting just beside me while I'm typing this :P  

A man's story.

This is supposed to be published yesterday but I was too poof in moving and shifting all the stuff in the house.  As  my sister has bought a new flat.  My mum decided to move in with her into the new HDB flat while we clear out the stuff in our current apartment so we can rent it out for some money.  "Asset enhancment leh!!"  

Anyway, was clearing the stuff of my old man when I spotted this whole cache of diaries he wrote.  Memories just flooded where I clearly still remember, everyday, every night during news time (around 8pm).  My late father would sit in his chair and starts to write his diary.  He continued to do this until he was bedridden.....

Anyway, all of us read through a few entries.  His writing was elegant and very very neat and easy to read.  (Unlike mine which are terrible! :P ) Most of the entries are just boring stuff like what he ate, buy and other mundane daily stuff....  a bit boring but once in a while, we get to see some very interesting entries.  Like one which he felt a bit sorry and regretted on scolding my sister for waking him up and etc... little things here and there that make these diaries so much more meaningful to us.  I wonder my kids will get to read about my blog one day after I passed away and get the same feeling?  

I took a photo of the diaries on the bed before packing them into a box.  Its going to my sister's house first before we decide what to do with them.  There were also tons of old photos which I guess we still have a lot of things to sort.  

And here's the funny part, my father passed away on the 3rd Sep (thus I want to write this piece yesterday) and the day I found the diaries was on Friday.  2 days before the 9th death anniversay.

Maybe he wants us to read about his life again?  :)

I enjoy teaching.

I simply do. :)  Ever since I started conducting photography courses way back in 2007 for SLCC, I know its a job that I would enjoy and I am a bit regretting why I never went for an education diploma.  Currently, while I'm waiting for my "office" cum shophouse to be completed.  I am giving tuition lessons to some secondary kids in my neighbour and I am enjoying every moment of it.  

I like working with teens rather than kids as they are more keen to learn and the kids here in Thailand are definitely more disciplined then those found in Singapore.  Those who took up tuitions are normally those who are really hunger for knowledge.  Do you believe that its actually the kids themselves who asked for tuition instead of their parents?  

Sometimes I do worry about our next generation of Singaporean kids.  Over here, these kids drive themselves not only for knowledge but understand the importance of education is not only in Science and Maths but in Languages, Litreatures/Arts and Humanities.   Its all about the joy of acquiring knowledge in different forms.  In Singapore, we overemphasises on just getting good grades. We keep training our kids to be efficient in exams while taking away the real joy of learning.   Don't believe me, just ask the Singaporean kids why they study and what they are studying and compare the answers with the Thai kids here :)

Yes, both will say that its for a better "future".  But do they really understand what is a better future? It's because their parents says so or is it they really understand the situation if they did not do well in their grades?