Kindy schedule 15-19 October

SCHOOL HOLIDAY!

Selamat Hari Raya!

So, this is it, the moon was sighted yesterday so now it's time for the three-day long Hari Raya, celebrating that Ramadan is over for this time.



Hari Raya means 'Grand Day', this is the biggest and most awaited holiday for the Muslims. They have been preparing for it for weeks, putting up colourful decorations everywhere and all buildings have been decorated with lamps, predominantly in green, often in combination with yellow and gold. Everybody have been sprucing up there homes with new furnishings and decorations. People have stocked up on food and drink for weeks, so they can have big parties now the next few days.
It is a little bit like our Christmas, with lots of Muslims going back home to be with their families. Children often receive presents and gifts at this time. There are big hampers for sale in the shops, and many families hold 'open houses' to invite everybody in to celebrate with them in lavish style.

School is off next week, and apparently many government and private offices are closed for this holiday too.

So Selamat Hari Raya! Enjoy the holidays!

*Vrrrrooooommmm*!

I like our new car.

Have been driving it a few times now - and it feels good! It has a diesel engine, so it sounds like a big truck, *vrooom*.

Have to look for bigger parking spaces when I'm out and about though, cause although it has parking sensors at the back, I'm not too sure about "where I have the car" just yet. But that's ok, better safe than sorry.

It's cool to sit high, and I just love that new car smell!

Mama's got new wheels!!

Yes, it is true, we do have our new car now - and it feels really good!
It is such a relief to now have each our car, and be able to go in different directions, do different things. Yay!

Picked it up earlier today, and now it is proudly parked outside our house. The kids both had a trial sit in it - and me too (haven't been driving it yet, will go to the pool shortly for the first trip!).


Feels good though, and I think it suits me, no?

First border run

Last night I went on my first border run! That was quite an experience - I can't wait to share it with all our future visitors!
My friend T had told me that the first time she did it, she had expected an air conditioned tax free-type shop... mmm, yeah... that's not quite what it is...
My expectations were slightly lower, and kind of about right:

First you have to park the car, quite a bit away from the actual border, to avoid getting towed. Walk over, show your passport twice - first for exiting Brunei, then you walk through no-mans-land, and then show it again to enter Malaysia.
On the other side, there are loads of little shacks that sell all sorts of things if you are interested, mostly food and snacks.
You make your way to the "bar". All the expats apparently go to 'Linggis Place', cause he has the best selection of booze, and the best toilets (more about them later...).

So, seated at Linggis, you then order your esky with beer, that is kind of a laundry tub-thing full of ice and as many beers they have been able to cram in there.
You also get a box of tissues with it, with which you are apparently supposed to wipe your beer off thoroughly, because of where it's stored... (I didn't want to know more than that...)

Most of the time, when you go to the border, you bring a few friends and make a night out of it. Yesterday there were eight of us, and we spent a few hours there, with some fries, satay and cold beers. It was really nice!

Then, they bring out the "menu", of alcohol - and you make your order. The menu consists of nice little pictures of all the alcohol they offer and the choice is not all that bad actually.

I was in luck yesterday, cause two of my friends were not bringing back their allowance of beer, so I got to buy 36 cans, 1 bottle of wine and 1 bottle of Campari - it all came to $90. (We paid $3 each for the beers and food we had had while we were there!!) Here is Anna and me:

Then, after we all got merry and happy and had received all our black bags full of alcohol it was time to go home.

First, a visit to the toilets. They were literally just a box of corrugated iron, with the door hardly hanging from it's hinges. You had to have a really good singing voice... Luckily my friends reminded me to bring my own paper before I got in, and then you "flushed" by pouring water down the toilet from a bucket... Not for the weak hearted...

And then, back the way we came. Here I am with some of the purchases, just at the border:

Looking forward to many more!

Frustration!

We have no idea when we will be getting our car at the moment, it is ready to be picked up at the dealership; but they can't release it to us without Nathan having a Bruneian driving licence. He can't get that until he has his IC; and he can't get an IC without a work permit - which he can't get without a work visa, and he can't get that until... It's just never ending!

Patience, need more patience... Time for another coffee...

New Kindy photos

I just checked the Kindy homepage, and they have updated their photos on there, if you want to click in and have a look! There are a few new slideshows, of the MoonCake Festival, Recycling and their classroom. Just click here.

More 'firsts'

This past weekend we had another couple of 'firsts'.
First visitors, although, they didn't stay at our place but the Scotts, since they are mutual friends of ours. It was the Parrott family - Ulrika, Alex, André, Oliver and Liam.
They live half the year in the UK and half the year in NZ, so on their way back/home now, they stopped here in Brunei for a couple of days.

It was great seeing them again, we went out for dinner all the adults on Friday night; and the kids have been playing and having fun. Their youngest, Liam, is the same age as Lucas.
Yesterday we all went to the Empire, and literally spent all day in the water, apart from a half hour lunch break! The boys were having a blast in the lagoon, and in the different pools at the club.

Here is Lucas and Liam, the buddies.

Lucas and Liam at the lagoon.

Lucas and Liam waiting for lunch.

Alex

Ulrika

Linnea having some milkshake at lunchtime.

Lucas chilling a bit.


It was also time for Lucas first birthday party in the afternoon. His friend Abbie from school celebrated her 4th birthday, at the local Jungle Gym. Fun for the kids, hell for the parents...

The kids got to play, got some lunch, got some balloons and got to meet the Jungle Gym Elephant - to Lucas great excitement!


We were all so tired after this long day, that we slept in this morning by accident, and actually didn't wake up until when we normally leave home to go to school... But we made it anyway!

Kindy schedule 8-12 October

Term 1 week 7
Shapes & Colours - Focus activites:
Letter of the week Ff – please send items beginning with Ff
Focus story: The Monsters Party – colour mixing jelly
Primary colour mixing – cellophane paddles / ice blocks / play dough
Comparative mathematical language – tall / short /taller / shorter
Measuring on the wall chart.
2 little dicky birds – making birds with feathers
Life cycle of a frog



Monday
Sound of the week Ff, please bring something beginning with Ff for sharing time.
Music.

Tuesday
Assembly – 8.00 – 9.30
ICT – Interactive whiteboard activities
PE.

Wednesday
Malay and Mandarin (1)
Coin drop for charity – please send in a bag of spare coins that the children will roll down a large chute
Music and Singing Assembly

Thursday
Malay & Mandarin (2)
Library
Pirate ship play

Friday
Swimming 10.00 – 10.30 .
FRESH FRUIT FRIDAY – PLEASE SEND A PIECE OF FRUIT TO MAKE INTO A FRUIT SALAD

A day at the office

Nathan had to work for his money today. Look here what happened to the flight deck windshield at 35000 ft above Indonesia:

"Slight technical issue" - that's what the poor passengers were told, who already were halfway to their destination Darwin.

Nathan and his F/O Andy, turned around and with no further excitement (apart from the thunderstorms they had to dodge since they had descended to their level) they got the airplane back to Brunei - and the good thing was, he got home 3 hours early!
Always look at the bright side!

Cool chick!

We haven't got around to get sunscreens for the car yet (it's on our to-do-list), but we don't need to worry about Linnea. She will ask us for her "glasaögon" (=sunglasses, kind of) when she gets troubled by the sun. Then when you ask her if she is ok, she does this:

... and says:
-"Cool"!

BYOB

Brunei is a dry country. This means that there is no alcohol for sale anywhere in the shops, and you can't order alcohol in the bars or restaurants.

As a non-muslim you are allowed to bring in 12 cans of beer and 2 bottles of wine or spirits every time you enter the country though (remember that when you come to see us!!!). As long as it's 48 hours since last time. So when the guys go flying, the can bring some home.
If you don't have any flights that allows you the extra time to go shopping on turnaround, you have to do the "border-run" to stock up.
This means driving about 40 min to the border, park there, walk over to a little shop on the other side, buy your allowance and walk back again. Of course, you also take the opportunity to have a drink while you there!

What you are allowed to do though, in most restaurants, is bring your own (booze), known as BYOB. It is kind of funny, everybody arrives with their little cooler bags, full of beer and wine. Here I am yesterday on our way out for dinner, with our very chic bottle tote:

Pretty packaging

The other night we went up to the Turners, to have some take away together. The boys went off to get the food, and we were a little bit wondering when they came back with these little packages:

What a pretty packaging for rice!
The rest of the meal looked a bit like this:

It was very yummy!!

We are all the winners!

The best (and almost only) way of getting Lucas to do things at the moment, is to race him, or make him race Linnea. It works every time!
"Who's getting into their pyjamas first?" "Who will finish their dinner first?" "Who gets to the toilet first?" etc - and off he goes with incredible speed!

Same goes for in the morning, when he "just-wants-to-finish-this-or-this-on-tv" before we go to school - all I have to do is to remind him that Abbie, Bon or Hannah (the other kids in his Kindy class who lives in Rimba) will get there first, and he is out in the car in a flash.

-"Jag vinner"" (=I'm winning) is a very common phrase in our house at the moment.

While waiting

While waiting for our new car (will get it next week, as soon as we get our Bruneian drivers licences sorted) I thought I'd tell you a little bit about the traffic here:

Traffic here is far from the mad, hectic rushed traffic we used to experience in the UK. We have the occasional pile-up and queues, during rush hours, just like everywhere else - but nowhere to the extent of what it was like in the UK.

Apart from the occasional exotic sighting of lizards (see below) or maybe some monkeys, there are not much to get excited about in the traffic here.

You have to be quite wary though while driving, cause although there are of course traffic rules here, people don't seem to know them - or they just don't care!
For example, it is more a rule than exception that when they are in the outside lane of a roundabout, they intend to go all the way around...
Another thing with roundabouts is when they approach a roundabout, with the intention to go a whole lap and go back the way they came - most people just drive the wrong way along the roundabout instead!

You will be lucky to see anyone who uses their indicator. Mostly people just change lanes or turn off, as they please - so you have to be a bit of a mind reader.

But the thing I find most dangerous actually, is that some people just drive sooo slow! Ridiculously slow, like 40 km/hour, on the motorway! So there you are, barrelling down in high speed, and all of a sudden this car seems to appear out of nowhere in front of you - driving with the speed of a lawnmower, which forces you hit the breaks far too hard for the comfort of anyone in your car...

Well, soon I will have my big car, no one will mess with me then!

Off to a good start!

We left Linnea at our friend's playgroup this morning for the first time.
She kissed us both bye-bye and wasn't the slightest worried to see us go. When we came to pick her up after three hours, we were greeted by a very happy little girl, who had had a wonderful time!

We got told that she had been absolutely fantastic, not a tear, not a tantrum; had caused no worries at all.
We know of course, that our daughter is not the worrying kind, neither is she shy or aloof but instead very independent and outgoing; but still, it's nice to hear it from other people!

She had made four little paintings that we brought home to stick on the wall in their "playroom", and she was so proud to show them off to Lucas when he got home from school.

Our big girl!

Exciting meeting

I saw one of these yesterday, driving to town. He was on the other side of the road, just walking by slowly. He was biiiig...



It's a monitor lizard, apparently not very friendly creatures. Let's hope I won't be meeting one any closer than from the car.

Time flies...

Today we have been here a month. It feels more like half a year already!
We have really settled in amazingly quick all of us, and that is great.

Lucas loves school, Nathan enjoys work (and the fact that there is not much of it!), we have made new friends, socialized with old ones; created new and healthier routines for the whole family, with more exercise/sport and healthier meals etc.

Linnea will start tomorrow at a private nursery-group, held by one of our friends, who receives a small group of children twice a week, for three hours at a time, at her home. She keeps them entertained with all sorts of fun play and different activities.
Linnea will be joining on Thursday mornings, it will do her good to make some friends of her own, play somewhere without Mummy and Daddy; and will give me time to do something just for me.

I'm meeting up with a local girl tomorrow, that I have found thanks to the internet. She is a dedicated scrapper, just like me, and is going to take me to her cousin who has a home-based scrap-shop!
I really hope that she is really nice, so that we can get together for scrap-evenings etc in the future! Nice to have someone to scrap with!

There are still a few things on our to-do list. Like finalizing the car deal, getting our credit cards so we can start our memberships in different places and the big one: find a house. It will all happen eventually - maybe by this next month!

A different kind of shoppingcart

Our new amah started yesterday. She is going to be with us full time now, if it all works out and we all get along.
The children already adore her, so that shouldn't be a problem. It's just me who have to get used to not be "allowed" to lift a finger, and have someone around all the time; which in this house, is being a bit weird, cause it is so small.

We sat down yesterday and set the menu for the week. Minda will be doing all the cooking from now on, and today we went together to the supermarket. I wanted to bring her, so she could stock up on the things she uses and will need for her cooking.

That was a different experience!
We came home with so much food (and only have a little fridge...), loads of veggies - most of which I don't know the name of or even less know what I would use it for! It is going to be fun and interesting, to taste her food! She will cook both western, local and Asian food. Tonight we are having sweet-and-sour chicken, yum!

Kindy schedule 1-5 October

Term 1 week 6
Shapes & Colours – Focus activities:
Letter of the week Ee – please send items beginning with Ee
Focus story: Elmer the elephant
Making patterns with shapes
Making Egg omelettes
Primary colour mixing – marble painting
Colour collectors hunt
Following simple repetitive patterns
Collaborative colour and texture collage of Elmer the elephant
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Monday
No school - HOLIDAY

Tuesday
ICT – Interactive whiteboard activities
PE – please remember PE uniform and trainers
Sound of the week Ee please bring something beginning with Ee for sharing time.

Wednesday
Malay and Mandarin (1)
Making Egg omelettes – Please send an egg to school

Thursday
Malay & Mandarin (2)
Library
Pirate ship play

Friday
Swimming 10.00 – 10.30.
FRESH FRUIT FRIDAY – PLEASE SEND A PIECE OF FRUIT TO MAKE INTO A FRUIT SALAD