Kuantan

It was long weekend again and we drove up to Kuantan for a short break this time round. It was supposed to be a 3-hr drive but took much longer due to traffic jams on the highway and roadworks as well. As usual, it was a breeze to drive when the two kiddos are sleeping but once they are awake, lots of effort needed to keep them entertained, so that the driver can keep his sanity while driving.

The easiest method is of course the goodie bag, offer a continuous flow of tasty tidbits and that will definitely keep their mouth stuffed. The downside is they will drink plenty of water and we would need toilet break at the pit stop.

Next, music CD. First, 童谣, Jeremiah loves it. Play and sing the whole CD, throw in some silly actions and expressions, they will be hooked. Done. Music CD again. This time, the "Signing Time" CD. This one does not last long because Jeremiah is not familiar with all the songs. After a few songs, he starts to protest and whine. Nobody release him from the car seat and his whining soon turns into shouts and screams. Then WAILING.

Luckily, Daddy covered quite a bit of distance while the action was going on and we had already hit Kuantan town. We were not driving that fast anymore and we decided to release Jerry before we all become deaf.

The weather was fantastic on the east coast of Peninsular Malaysia at this time of the year. Bright and sunny, the perfect settings for a day at the beach. To avoid anyone from getting a heat stroke, we played safe and only went to the beach after 530 pm.

Daddy and Sofia had all their tools ready to build a sandcastle but I think Sofia was more interested in playing with sand only. Both of them had a blast, they even went into the sea shortly after. Sofia, for the first time, was hit by the waves and swallowed a few mouthful of sea water. It was a new experience for her and she enjoyed it very much.

On the second night, we had planned to visit the turtle sanctuary at Cherating to watch turtles laying their eggs on the beach. Later we learnt that there was no fixed time the turtles would come and we could spend the entire night waiting and not spot a turtle in sight. That was disappointing, we were so looking forward to seeing the turtles. We visited the sanctuary anyway and we were lucky! The guys there were in the process of releasing some newly hatched baby turtles back to the sea and we were just in time!

The baby turtles were so tiny and fragile but so cute! We laid them on our palms and patted them before putting them back on the beach. It is sad to see how much this animal need to struggle to live now because of poachers who came to take the eggs away for commercial reason. Of course, there have been turtles being abused by people and pollution too.

Nonetheless, we wished these fellas good luck when they disappeared into the deep blue sea. Hopefully, they will be back someday later to lay their eggs on this beach.

Milestones

Jeremiah reached one of the major milestones a week after his 1st birthday - walking. Days just before his birthday, he was still reaching out for chairs and tables for support while on two feet. Shortly after, he took two, three steps on his own. I think he was thrilled and the cheers for everyone gave him great support. So we pushed him further by enticing him to walk a few more steps with toys and food. And there was no stopping.

Before we knew it, he was cruising around the house effortlessly, delighted at his newly acquired skill which enabled him to reach for "new" toys. We started to put more things aside again and had to be more cautious about things we left lying around.

One of his favourite item is the cordless phone that is often left lying around. The backlight gets triggered when he starts punching the keypad and if pressed correctly, the speaker would be on and the "sound effect" will double his fun. I just hope he would not accidentally press "999" again, it had happened once and I was in time to end the call. That was NOT fun for me!

Adjustments

More than two weeks ago, I came back from Japan with a pain in the neck that would not even go after two weeks. It was all caused by a night sleeping on a pillow that was too soft and low. I could not quite turn my head to the right and the pain was quite intense during the first few days. I gritted my teeth throughout the rest of the trip and was so glad to come back to my own pillow once home.

I thought the pain would gradually subside after a few days but it continued to disturb and irritate me, making me tired and worn out everyday. Deciding that it was enough, I went to see a chiropractor. After the first visit, I was requested to have some x-rays taken to have a full and proper "look" at my spine. He gave me two neck adjustments then and already I started to feel less tension in my neck! It was scary at first cos he turn your head like the way the kungfu masters do in the movies when they want to kill the bad guys.

KKRRAAACCK! Ok, then another KKRRAAACCK! on the left. It sounded so loud! For a moment, I thought my neck snapped!! Luckily I was wrong.

My x-rays were taken and the chiropractor shared his findings with me. I actually have 5 areas in my spine where the vertebrate is out of alignment, subluxation and spinal degeneration has occurred. This could have been caused by bad posture, pregnancy, etc. I was in the early phase of subluxation and symptoms might now show up until months or years later. But I do certainly at times experience pain, swelling of tissue and muscle stiffness in my neck and back.

So. I am now under the initial intensive care of the chiropractor to be "twisted" back to shape three times a week.

All thanks to the pillow ...

1st Birthday

We celebrated Jeremiah's first birthday couple of days ago with a simple chocolate cake at home and just the five of us.


I think he was more fanscinated by the flickering candle on the cake more than anything else. It did not matter to him the birthday song we were singing to him or the three cheers we gave to him. The candle mattered most. Perhaps if I had let him burn his fingers, he would have thought twice, or thrice?


The happiest person in the party got to be Sofia again, because it is her favourite chocolate cake! She ate and ate so much cake, like it was the last chocolate cake on earth.


I also brought Jerry to the hairdresser to chop off his baby locks, this is him, before and after. Doesn't he look like a smaller version of Daddy now??

Kobe II

It was our final day in Japan and we woke up in the morning wondering how did our holiday passed so fast? Of course we were all missing Jeremiah, who is at home with Ana, 公公 and 婆婆. We were sure he was missing us too, all his playmates had disappeared for so long!

This morning we brought Sofia to the Kobe zoo, the last trip to the zoo in Singapore was ages ago so we thought it would be very interesting for her since she loved animals. We saw plenty of animals, eg. panda (who were sleeping cos it was so hot), koalas (also sleeping), giraffes, elephants, penguins, monkeys, etc..


By then, it was close to noon and the scorching heat was unbearable for us. We took a break and had one of those cute panda 包, it was pretty delicious!


After watching a couple more animals, we decided to head downtown for lunch because it was really too hot.


After our lunch and nap, we decided to hop on the free city bus tour to a place called Mosaic Kobe Harbourland at the seaside.


The place is a modern shopping and dining area, developed on the edge of the Kobe Bay. There are restaurants, bars, a movie theatre, a shopping market, an amusement arcade and a little amusement park.


The place is very lively and there are all sorts of activities going on in the open field.


We decided to stay on for dinner and enjoy the beautiful night view at the bay.

Going to miss Japan very much as we head back to Taipei tomorrow, before flying back to KL the day after.