A day at the beach

We brought En En to East Coast Park last week. He had loads of fun touching the tiny rocks that we sieved out from the seawater. He kept picking them up and putting them down. He also enjoyed pouring water all over himself (especially since he does not play a lot with water at home, aside from bathing). The interesting thing is that he does not like sand being poured over his skin but he does not mind sitting on the sand!

Lego Whale

I built a blue whale out of Duplo (kiddo version of Lego for toddlers) bricks recently. This was inspired by the story of Jonah and the whale which En loves because it features a "big fish". My husband modified the end part of the whale so that it had a proper tale. The blue flower on top signifies the water that the whale spouts from time to time.

Anyone has lego creations to share? I would certainly love to build them for En to play with.

The FX Driver

This evening back from work, I took a cab. Times are bad and I try not to cab home but it was getting really late and I wanted to see En before his bedtime.

I got into this cab and oh boy, is this the first time I have met a really chatty driver. He seemed well-educated and spoke very good English. Turns out that uncle cabby does forex trading in his spare time and plans to migrate to Perth next year (for good)! Have you ever met such a cabby driver?

Uncle first advised me to take cab receipts of drivers who drove too fast (after the refuse to slow down upon initial request) so that I could submit them as some proof of claim in the event I suffered a heart attack from their speedy Gonzales style of race-driving. I jokingly asked if he was a lawyer. He then went on to disclose how he used to work in a bank as a forex trader. This is no joke man. Do you know that forex is a real risky investment instrument? Trading in them means that you really need to monitor your real-time trading data and make decisions on whether one currency was going to rise or fall, as against the other currency you were hedging against.

Uncle gave up his well-paying bank job to be a cab driver some time back. He was happy to drive 5 hours a day (and I believe trade on the side). He lives in a penthouse and is happy chauffering his wife and kids sometimes, whilst not driving customers.

Its interesting that the job change to be a cab driver was a conscious choice. I mean, not many people would "downgrade" their work from a white-collared job to a blue-collared one. But this uncle had it all planned out and did not see the point of working so hard for the bank. He was hunble enough to choose a more relaxing livelihood, so that he could spend more time with his family (he could not do that as a trader previously). He did not mind that people thought it beneath him to be a cab driver. He used to drive a BMW and probably still can afford on.

Well, I was really glad that uncle cabby did not drive like a WRX driver. And of course, I had a good time listening to him tell his story!

Lotus

Got this shot of a white lotus this morning at Botanic Gardens.

Think its so lovely. Reminds me that God created all things, including such a beautiful flower. Have been teaching En to sing this simple kids' song on the things God made. If I inserted the Lotus flower into the song, its lyrics would read like this.

"Who made the Lotus?
God did, God did!
Who made the Lotus?
Our great God!"

Love the song. Ask me if you need to know who the singer is so that I can go dig it out.