Finally!!!

Guess who's FINALLY arrived?

VITAL STATISTICS (for uncles and aunties to buy 4D)

Name: Heng Kaili Gaby
DOB: 31 October 2010
Time of Birth: 04:55 PM

Weight at Birth: 3380 g
Height/Length at Birth: 50 cm

More pictures to come once Mummy and Gaby are more presentable, and Daddy has more time to upload photos...

Prepared & Waiting...

Pregnancy supplements - Omega 3, Multivits, Iron+folic acid, and my thyroxine hormones

Gaby's car seat and bath tub awaiting...

Labour positions for the early stages

Hospital bag all packed

And the list of last-minute items that can't be put into the bag just yet..

37 weeks and waiting...

When are you coming Gaby?

(Sketch courtesy of my talented sister, Cuiwen. Colours added by Lion Daddy.)

What's in a Name?

Dear Gaby,

Today marks the 37th week that you have been growing in Mummy's belly. You are officially full-term now and if I start getting contractions and signs of labour, the hospital isn't going to worry.

From the sonogram last week, you were a pretty average and healthy 2.5kg. Mummy's belly has gone all ugly from you stretching my skin as you get bigger. Now, my belly looks like a canvas with an abstract painting of tongues of fire. But alas, I think you will make the battle scars of pregnancy all worth it.

Dad and I have been spending some time on your name. For someone who is not particularly sentimental or into rituals and symbols, I never thought I would be fussing over the meaning of your name. To my surprise, I found myself shooting out emails to friends who have a better grasp of the Chinese language to check whether the characters I chose for your name convey what they are intended to.

So now, what's in a name? Afterall, a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.

Let's start with "Gaby". 

Unfortunately, you were not named after some commendable personality. Dad and I are avid followers of this American drama series, Desperate Housewives. One of the leading characters is called Gabrielle, and is frequently called Gaby. So that's how it started.

But deciding on "Gaby" took a while because it needed self-convincing and a lot of "personalisation" to make the name "ours". To begin with, "Gaby" isn't quite a popular name in Singapore, nor is it popular among Daddy's relatives as we came to find out when they asked about what we had in mind for you. Furthermore, it sounds incomplete and improper, because it is seen to be a truncated form of "Gabrielle" or "Gabriella". Gaby has the potential to sound too babyish, or too bimbotic as well. 

Why we still went ahead to stick on with "Gaby":

• For the lack of any other pleasing alternatives, we were referring to you as Gaby for a good while from the time we the gynae spotted three lines on the sonogram and told us we were expecting a girl. Thus when we had time to rethink your name after the less than favorable responses came from Dad's family, we found it even harder to find a replacement, because it was hard to change the name that we had grown so accustomed to, and had so much affection associated with.
• From the Singaporean kiasu perspective: The "g" in Gaby would put you in the first half of the class register. Having read some research done in classrooms, and my own experience as a teacher, I have found that teachers call on names higher up in the class register more often. I think that that would give you a slight advantage at school, especially in a Singaporean classroom where we still have 30 to over 40 pupils.
• Why extend your name to a Gabrielle or Gabriella, which both sound distinctively Latino -- a culture far from ours -- when in the end, most people will call you Gaby? Besides, Mummy isn't very fond of girl names that end with an -ah at the end. With no offence to people already called these names, the -ah's in names like Anna, Adrianna, Luana, Julia, Sonia and Sophia make them more palatable and predictable as feminine names.
• "Gaby" is a name that is slightly confusing because it is androgynous -- it could have been short for Gabriel, a boy's name, too. Mummy, in her own quirky sociological way of thinking, likes that kind of uncertainty and fluidness. People aren't going to be quite sure about whether you're male or female, until they see a sex marker, or you in person. I like that because there are so many unconscious gender expectations we have once we know the sex of someone, and keeping that a mystery for a while gives people more time to figure you out as a person first, before understanding you as a girl, or a woman.
• Gaby is short and phonetically easily pronounced by people of any culture. We are afterall living in a very globalised world these days. Just look at Daddy and Mummy's families. Uncle Jo is studying in the US, Aunty Cui is in Australia, Mummy studied briefly in California too, while Dad did his Degree and Masters in the US, and now we're in Zurich while he does his PhD. We have cousins and friends who have made their homes in so many parts of the world as well. So since you are going to be exposed to many cultures, we want to make sure that your name doesn't get horribly mangled by speakers of other languages, and that you do not have to go around correcting people on how to pronounce or spell your name.
• Mummy believes that if you grow up to be a nice girl, "Gaby" will become a much more popular name simply because people associate the name with someone nice. Right now, for the lack of exposure to people of that name in Singapore, "Gaby" is just not immediately popular.
• The process and rationale behind choosing your name, is also partly how Mummy hopes your life can turn out: down to earth and fuss free, not having your sex come in the way of your decision making and those made for you, self-defining and confident of being different.

As you can see, most of these thoughts come from Mummy. There hasn't been very much use of the pronoun "we" to include Daddy in this description of how we came to settle on your name. Daddy, the much more practical person that he is, doesn't care so much about what goes into your name, as much as what goes into your cot and room, and which breastpump to get for Mummy. 

(Mummy was pleasantly surprised to find that Dad had done some research and printed out some application forms on childcare for you already. There is a crazy waiting list here in Zurich for childcare, but we hope to get you some exposure to other children and caretakers before you get back to Singapore.)

Now, for your Chinese name. The characters chosen are again, not going to be who you are as much as they are the aspirations Mummy have for you.

 慨立 

kăi lì

A similar rationale was used in ensuring that the phonetics of your Chinese name are pronounceable. That meant that I was avoiding sounds like qi, qin, ci, jing, xi, xing, xiu etc., which non-Chinese speakers have difficulty figuring out how to pronounce, and even when they do know, find it hard to shape their mouth correctly to make an accurate sound. Furthermore, your Daddy speaks no Chinese.

Kai Li also has an English-sounding equivalent, Kylie, which is also a name made popular by singer Kylie Minogue. We did not have so much trouble getting approval for your Chinese name, especially from your Nek Nek, because it is definitely way more feminine sounding, and less uncommon. Daddy, too, took to "Kai Li" way faster than he did with "Gaby".

And well, if you never grow to like "Gaby" the way we have, you can always choose to use the safer "Kai Li".

So after figuring out the sound of your Chinese name, Mummy had to choose the characters.

慨 (kăi) comes from 慷慨大方 (kāng kǎi dà fāng) -- which means generous. This is one of your Daddy's strongest personality traits. It is this generosity of not just resources, but of heart, that makes him both so likable and happy. Daddy is always willing to give. He takes care of his friends and even people he doesn't know very well. He is also not quick to judge, and doesn't bear grudges.

立 (lì) is taken from 独立 (dú lì) -- independence. As what Mummy's Chinese advisors have told her, 立 has never been traditionally used for female names since independence is not a classically desired attribute of a female, especially not in Chinese culture. But independence, for Mummy, doesn't mean being all feminist and independent of men. The independence I hope for you is that of your mind and life. I hope you will be able to confidently choose your own paths in life without being excessively subjected to peer pressure or mass culture. While there still are societal norms that are worth abiding by, we let many less consequential ones limit us needlessly.

Dear Gaby, even before you are born, there are so many hopes and dreams for you. I hope, too, that I will not crush you with these aspirations I have for you. Imposing her desires on us is what my own mother has made sure she never did, and I hope I can give you that gift as well. If I ever do get stifling, promise me you'll gently let me know.

Love,

Your Mummy

Gaby Rocks My World (or well, the globe of a belly)

This very short video is dedicated to the amusement of my never-been-pregnant readers.

( I had to add in some semblance of music to hide my heavy breathing.)

I had initially intended to take a video of Gaby hiccuping. Unfortunately, the lighting was poor and the movements too subtle for my Nokia camera phone to pick up. However, Gaby decided to surprise the recording with one of her very sudden and violent movements -- which is quite characteristic of her behaviour these couple of weeks.

The ultrasound last week indicated that she is a healthy mid-range 2.06kg baby for 33 weeks. She refused to show her face during the twenty minute session with the sonogrammer (if that's what they are called), so I do not have any nice new sonogram pictures to put up. So sad. =/ The first disappointment from Gaby.

Oh, and I just realised that my Countdown to Parenthood ticker-widget box on the right of my blog is suddenly showing a rotating picture of a baby -- upside down! I guess this is when Gaby's expected to be in her kick off position. I sense that she probably is because the hiccup movements are constantly in the lower left part of my globe these days. I cross my fingers and toes hoping she will cooperate so we can have a natural birth...

And while I am at this entry, here's a visual update on my globe:

37 inches and counting (Courtesy of IKEA)

More Big Deliveries before the Grand One

Guess what made me so happy on Friday when I was, for the first time in Zurich, left all alone at night because Lionel had an office party to attend?

Our Dell Desktop finally arrived after a 1.5 month wait! No more sharing of my small ThinkPad in the evenings with Lionel. No more lousy laptop speakers when we watch our cheap DVDs from Germany. Instead, I now have a huge screen to do my blogging, Facebooking, weather checking, 1000-word e-mail reply writing and prenatal Yoga-ing from.

I spent what would have been a lonely miserable evening taking my time to set up the whole PC, and forgetting about my dinner. Say hello to my new 24-inch screen. We would never have had such a big screen if not for the fact that we're doubling this screen as our TV for movie screenings. We decided that it wasn't worth getting a TV here because there is more or less only BBC we can watch that is in English, and we did not need an additional TV license fee added to our monthly bills. especially when we do not have time to watch TV anyway. Also, Lionel's workplace has two of these big screens attached to his desktop. You know, the kind where he can click and drag a window from one monitor to another, and where his mouse can suddenly cross the air space to the next monitor...

Before the Dell delivery, we had another big delivery all the way from Singapore! Lionel's Mum excitedly bought a lot of clothes and baby-related stuff for our dear Gaby. She had them flown over to us by their SIA pilot friend who was A380ing to Zurich. My own mum threw in 2 tubs of Body Shop Body Butter that I bought at almost half price in Singapore too.

Can you spot the difference? I took the first photo without realising my belly had been caught in the shot. Then I remembered the old Nokia phone that we requested from Singapore as well., and included it to take another shot. 

With this spare phone shell, I can put in my Singtel SIM card and leave it on. Now our dear friends and family in Singapore can SMS us and pay local Singapore rates. This is all in preparation for the Big Day when well wishers want to shout us to us from Singapore.

While I am on the topic of Gaby and preparations for her, see the state of her cupboard! It's a little messy now, and it has gotten more filled up with Gaby's new clothes, bedlinen and swaddling cloths from my MIL (mudder-in-law) since this photo was captured. I definitely underestimated the size of Gaby's wardrobe. Lionel and I are now looking for how to increase storage space so that my Mum can put her clothes comfortably when she comes over for three months to help me out. (Aren't Mummies so wonderful?)

We have relocated some of Gaby's stuff to our wardrobe to make room. Since diapers are something she would definitely grow into and will consume faster than she digests milk, we've been stocking up on Size 2, 3, and 4 Pampers when they are on Aktion (sale) here. We save about 30-40% with these buys.

Ah, and we haven't updated you with our, well, some would say obiang or gaudy hall curtains. Lionel and I love colours, and since we probably will not be able to afford sending Gaby to playschool here, we wanted to make home as visually stimulating as possible with bright colours and pictures.

|I see myself carrying Gaby around the house and talking to her about the pictures on the curtains as a daily routine before she starts talking and when she is at the stage where she is content to just being talked to...

Rant of a Beached Whale

This is what I feel like when I lie in bed these days at 32 weeks.

It is increasingly hard to find a comfortable position to sleep in where I do not feel the weight of Gaby and my uterus suffocating me or causing backaches.

I had a rather sleepless night last night with both Lionel and Gaby kneeing me through the night. And I believe Gaby broke her first hicupping record. Her hicupping spasms at 3am lasted almost a good 10 minutes! So by the time she was done, I was wide awake.

While Lionel cannot wait to manufacture number 2, I need a break from this whole labour of  childbearing. The thing about pregnancy, as I have come to realised, is that it really eats a whole year of your physical freedom away. Of course there is the lifetime of parenthood, but at least physically, I am so tightly bound to this little creature and the societal expectations of what I should and what I cannot do while with child.

First begins the vulnerable first trimester where the chances of miscarriage are extremely high and I am obliged to really take care of myself. No fitness classes or massage spas would take you in before your first trimester is over. And do not forget morning sickness, bloatedness, nausea, reactions to strong smells -- and hell, not automatically being able to justify the paunch-like bulk just yet.

Then the second trimester -- the supposedly heavenly one -- where I really start growing out of my clothes and go through puberty again, scouring for bras that fit, and resigning to the fact that Triumph would spare me no feelings in labeling me an XL in the underwear department. And while most of decent society would allow you to resume watered down fitness regimes, my changing centre of gravity dictates that I be more careful not to trip or slip. It is an arduous concentration exercise walking down a flight of stairs to ensure I do not miss a step.

And then there's the third trimester of being humongous and beached. In a few more weeks, it will be a waiting game. Will she come early at 37-38 weeks as I have heard many babies do? Will she come before my mother arrives? Has Lionel made all the arrangements for emergency transport and parking? Will I be able to do a natural birth? Are there going to be medical students looking on in horror at my labour? Will the nurse with me speak and understand my English? Have we really gotten everything ready?

And in the fourth quarter of the pregnancy year after the baby pops, that is when I am confined to 2-3 hour cycles and regiments of breastfeeding and diaper changing. No long trips out, no long dinner events...

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I am surprised I have not ballooned all over. The voluminous growth has largely been visibly confined to the belly area, although my sister-in-law would beg to differ. She insisted she could tell I'm pregnant from the expansion of my previously-also-not-very-humble rear. Well, at least I have a credible counterweight to the rear now -- so, come to think of it, I should effectively have a more stable centre of gravity with pregnancy. 

And while the marginal growth has been substantial in the mammary department (considering that I started out with a negative value), the visible final outcome is, well, still pretty modest.

At 31 weeks (last week)

Although I have been fortunate not to be inflicted with the common banes of pregnancy -- swollen feet, backaches and regular leg cramps -- my below-the-navel tummy has nonetheless succumbed to stretchmarks. Soon after I entered the third trimester, they started out inconspicuously as a little bruise like mark. Lionel spotted it first and we thought it was a bruise from my clumsy bumpings around the house and opening of fridge doors into my belly. 

But after a quiet embryonic stage that lasted but just a few days, it grew with great vehemence, spreading  its dark red streaks out, upwards like insidious roots claiming territory. And I thought being a young mother would spare me the physical tribulations of pregnancy. Alas, I have not been blessed with my own mother's good genes, who despite delivering us well into her late thirties, does not have a single stretchmark as evidence of childbearing.

I was just mentioning to my sister in an e-mail how I enjoy the part about growing up and adulthood where one stops caring so much about what people think. I am still confidently donning a bikini (because maternal swimwear is ridiculously overpriced and really, bikinis are the staple for any sort of age and figure here) when I go swimming. It may be that some of my confidence and oblivion stems from the fact that I cannot see my own stretchmarks from where my eyes sit, now that my belly is a huge sphere and I cannot see whatever is south of the protruding naval equator.

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And here ends my 837-word rant of a beached whale. (There isn't enough social interaction here for me to finish my weekly word quota. And I can't let Lionel bear all of it, can I? So here you are, dear faithful friends and readers to share the load. Thank you for following my blog.)

Getting Gaby's Pram from Konstanz

Lionel and I have been akin to the rather unrefined, unappreciated, uncultured Singapore tourist voyaging merely for bargains. Because I have just entered my third trimester, we have not had the luxury of time to take in the scenery and culture of this new city and its neighbours. Instead, we have been using our evenings and weekends to scour for the best bargains to make our apartment a home, and to get ready for Gaby's grand arrival.

During the last weekend, we trained up to Konstanz, Germany, which has been likened to the Johor Bahru for us living here. Konstanz is a pretty university town just across the border and slightly over an hour's train ride. And unlike travelling to JB, there is no causeway jam, corrupt officers to be wary of and the infamous JB snatch thieves on motorbikes. So on the other side of the human-defined boundary between what is called Switzerland and Germany, lies not just significantly more decent prices, but also tax free shopping! And when you consider that the tax rate there is 19%, it basically means you perpetually have a 20% discount on all purchases there.

It cost us 15 francs each one way for the train. So double us and make the journey a return trip and we pay 60 francs for transport.

It was fortunate that we had Euros (although very badly depreciated from the time we bought them late last year) leftover from our honeymoon in Eastern Europe last December. Lionel has a student account with UBS here and we found out that he had a 2,500 francs withdrawal/expenditure limit per month. By the last few days of July, we could not take out any money.

So with our honeymoon Euros, we set out to buy Gaby's pram. Asian prams, American prams and European prams are so different. In Singapore, I would never have dreamt of getting a bulky big-wheeled Mercedes-equivalent pram with excellent suspension. However, considering that we tram and bus around here, rather than drive about, the stroller needed precisely all that. Foldability and lightweightness became the last things on our mind.

So at the end of a couple of hours at BabyWalz, we left with (still) one of the more Asian sized big-wheelers. This pram is petite enough to manoeuvre supermarket aisles, and has the bottom carrier to double up as a marketing trolley. We got a three-wheeler because it seems easier to aim to get a single front wheel up and down a tram first. We parted with about 700 euros, of which we would get back 110 euros in tax claims. This German-made baby vehicle basically cost us more than S$1000 -- and it wasn't even in the BMW or Audi series of prams.

Don't I look all Mummified with the practical sports shoes, track pants, mummy figure, sun hat and well, the stroller? That is the store, BabyWalz, in the background.

Oh, that pink shopping trolley bag is what we came to Konstanz with -- all geared up for aggressive retail exercises. I think of Lionel as such a self-assured man, all confident in his masculinity, when he pulls this around on our Saturday grocery stockpiling trips. (Except in designated areas, all shops, including supermarkets, close on Sundays -- so that means we need to make sure we're adequately prepared for the weekend's meals and Monday's breakfast. And of course, Saturday is when my macho husband goes supermarketing with me -- and he can carry all the heavy stuff.)

And finally, what better way to end a day's shopping trip with a good meal? No wursts for us -- Lionel gets sausages at almost every breakfast. So here, we have our first Asian meal in a restaurant since our arrival a month ago.

Ah.. good clean Japanese food. Although it was more like Sakae Sushi in standard, the pricing was like going to a true Japanese restaurant in Singapore. Nonetheless, it was a relatively cheaper restaurant meal than what we would have had in Zurich.

All pictures are of me because Lionel was holding the iPhone. ;p

We took the 7pm train back to Zurich after an eventful day at Konstanz, which included a superb 80cent cone of gelato ice-cream, four colourful mugs at 50cents each, 3 DVDs at only 5.55 euros each, a nice jacket in preparation of the colder weather for Lionel, toiletries, detergents and two contented bellies.

The journey back gave us a trial run of what pram travelling was going to be like. And that test drive went well. The pram's suspension took the cobblestones, the ups and downs of pavement to roads and platforms to trains, and also passed the narrow supermarket aisle S-course test.

The only awkward thing was that elderly women would smile at me. Pregnant bellies attract a lot of friendliness, even in Europe. And to add a pram to that (Wah, the first is not even out of the baby carrier and she's having the next one!). Womenfolk would lower their heads and bend their bodies to peek into our pram to spot the baby, and I could never bear to see their disappointment when they found none. So eventually, Lionel and I decided to pull the pram cover all the way down -- so we ended up looking like over protective parents with an unbelievably angelic sleeping baby, or parents with a suspicious baby criminal to hide.

Gaby's Life in Black & White

At 2 months (8 weeks)
Ugly undefined little blob of cells with lots of space in the waterbag. That white curve is the umbilical cord.

At 3 months (13 weeks)
More human looking now, but could probably still pass off as a rat.

At 4 months (16 weeks)
Definitely human-like in form now. Space in the waterbag is getting tight. This was the gynae visit where he checked for the baby's sex and said, "Well, I don't see a boy. It is more likely to be a girl, but it could still be a boy."

At 5 months (21 weeks)
Very unimpressive sonogram picture from NUH. The gynae at Mount Elizabeth had a better scanner and printer. But notice how Gaby does not fit into one single photo anymore.

At 5 months (22 weeks)
Ah! I like this picture. If you haven't figured it out, Gaby's lying on her back and her head is on the left. The top left series of curves show her side profile. I told Lionel that he may not be the father. ;p Because both Lionel and I have thicker lower lips and Gaby here seems to have a more pronounced upper lip. But she could have taken the Heng grandfather lip -- Lionel's dad's upper lip sticks out.
Can you see her heart? It's quite high up in her chest. That black cavity in her chest. In the live sonogram, you can see it pumping quickly.

At 6 months (25 weeks)

Here we have moved over to Zurich. This is our first visit to the gynae here at the University hospital opposite Lionel's office. They are really thorough here. This is the first gynae visit which left us with not just 1, but 4 photos!!!

Gaby's left footprint!

Gaby waving at us with her right hand and all 4+1 little fingers of hers.

Gaby sucking her thumb?

Gaby's thunder thigh (left) -- taking after Mum.

My Favourite Things

Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens,

Bright copper kettles and warm wollen mittens,

Brown paper packages tied up with string,

These are a few of my favourite things...

So it is about nine on a cool Sunday morning. I am feeling calmly happy because:

1. 
   
   
   The weather's cooled down. And Zurich is a lot more beautiful when I am not a heaving sweaty Pregosaurus.
2. 
   
   
   I only woke up once last night! Ever since I got pregnant, I have not had a single uninterrupted sleep through the night. After waking up at 2am because my pregnancy heat rash was acting up, I slept all the way till 8.20AM. That is a solid 6 hours that does a lot for my mental well-being.
3. 
   
   
   The house is more or less set up and there are no unsightly dirt sections of floor.
4. 
   
   
   Lionel washed the toilet with me last night and he did a pretty good job of getting the metal bits to shine. (I did read that men who helped out in the housework get more and better you-know -- and I can see the logic behind that. Man helps out, woman is happy --> Rolling and tumbling activity)
5. 
   
   
   Lionel's still sleeping -- so I get my quiet morning spending time with myself doing all sorts of mundane things that keep me happy. e.g. emptying and keeping the dishes from the dishwasher, taking more photos for this blog, walking around my home and feeling pleased with it...

In this cheery mood that I am in, here are a few of my favourite places at home:

Upon our fifth trip to IKEA yesterday (no car lah, so the number of trips we make depend on how much we can carry up the bus and tram each round), we finally got Lionel's dream high table and high chair for the kitchen's "balcony". I am taking quite well to this table too since that means I can chop garlic, cut fruits or marinade the meat while without being on my feet for too long at a stretch.

Did I already mention how well-designed the kitchen is? (=

I love this pull-out. Even the trays have adjustable heights which I have made use of, because I am not as tall as the ang mohs here. Can you spot our dozen packets of Bak Kut Teh Spices preciously brought over from Singapore?

I love my utensil drawer!!! We bumped into this assemble-your-own-utensil-tray section at Manor (it's a very affordable Metro, but with much nicer things). Lionel insisted on getting a Silit utensil set that was half-priced, which I still thought was really indulgent initially, but I love the shine it has after being in the dishwasher (because the water is so hard here with the minerals from the Alps or one of the mountains, only dishwashers do a fantastic job of getting all watermarks off).

Below and next to this drawer is our Corelle set shipped all the way from Singapore. It was a lovely wedding gift from Lionel's Cochlear hearing aid provider. Corelle plates look elegantly like glass, yet are deceptively light, chip resistant, unbreakable and dishwasher safe.

For the first time, I find myself using teacups. I have always avoided teacups because of how brittle the handles are, but with Corelle, I love eating my cherries in two teacups. One teacup with my cherries, and the other teacup in the other hand to spit the seeds in. *Red toothy cherried grin*

I am loving the electric stove because it is so easy to clean. I use a sponge and dishwashing liquid to just give it a wipe after cooking. It is unlike the gas stoves with the black pot holders that you have to remove and the nooks and crannies. We hope to get one like this in our new kitchen when we get back to Singapore.

Situated nicely below the stove is a drawer where we keep all the cooking utensils. Yes, Cui, I brought over the white garlic chopper I got you for your birthday but you left behind in Singapore. ;p It is working very well for us here.

Little things make the kitchen experience so much more wonderful. I like having that little white IKEA bin next to the sink, and my hand towel just above the sink so we don't drip handwater all over the kitchen floor. Because we have to pay for our rubbish disposal bags here, we usually have to keep the same bag for about 3 days before it fills up. So to keep the stench at bay, we tie up every day's food waste into little plastic bags (that come when we purchase vegetables and fruits at the supermarket) and put them in the larger paid trash bag.

And Lionel's 25kg gas grill with the 7kg gas tank sitting on our balcony. That door leads to the baby/guest room. Another door (not in the picture) leads to the hall. We're going to have our first BBQ at our place this evening with a fellow bunch of poor Singaporean students. We BBQ on a Bring-Your-Own-Meat basis and discuss where we can find the cheapest meat and sausages.

It's 10.30AM now. It takes that long to get these photos up on Blogger. The sleeping monster has just stirred, scratched his rear, then the top of his head, and lumbered into the toilet. Finally, Breakfast Time!