1. I signed Zoe up for a few Music and 'Play & Learn' sessions at the local Gymboree. Honestly these Gymboree type of 'babies and toddlers play classes' don't really impress me much. What do I find wrong with them? Well, for starters, a lot of these classes are really boring. Not just to me - an adult, but also to most babies. Besides, Zoe clearly has graduated on to doing other more advanced/ different activities that she particularly enjoys, than what is in store for her "age group" as such in these classes.
Considering the attention span of a toddler, the instructors have everything NOT working for them, when they try to confine a group of 18 to 28 month old toddlers to a room to enjoy a music class!! The so-called 'dancing' that goes along with it, is literally a warm-up as far as I can see. No wonder then, more than half the number of kids are busy trying to scratch open the door and elope or in Zoe's case, give me a look like "Seriously Mama, this? Don't we jig better than this at home?"
I find these Gymboree kind of baby/ toddler classes too restrictive and even regressive at times. There really isn't much to pick from other than the typical - Arts, Music, Play & Learn or Mandarin. Whatever happened to free-style dance-like-no-one's-watching kinda classes? Why doesn't someone just hit the start button and let kids groove, shimmy, shake a leg, fall, get up again and groove their booty to endless happy beats? Why is it always about props and music and pretend play and poems and blah!!!
Inspite of my take on this, the only reason I signed her up is so she has something to do when school breaks for summer, over the next two weeks. It perhaps is OK since it is only for two weeks. Any longer and we'd probably need to draw up yet another travel itinerary for this little one, to keep her busy!
2. Hubster left mid-week for Hyderabad, for a week long annual business bootcamp that he's organizing for his company. The man is wearing a lot of hats (professionally and personally) for someone with just one head and I am frankly amazed at his capacity to juggle all of them simultaneously! I thought I was a good juggler, but he sure, does take the cake! What works for him over me though, is his independence of sleep. While I still need my 7 - 8 hours of shut eye, an average 4 - 5 hours at night, is enough for him.
Working across multiple time zones is not an easy task, and among other comforts, it deprives one of sleep the most, what with late-night calls and early am meetings. Add to that the extensive business (and pleasure) travel and there really isn't much time left for anything else. Yet, he seems to juggle it all and balance it, pretty well. Granted he's always trying to steal a wink or two (I have a 'sleep series' of photographs of him and the baby shutting eye together) when he can, but overall I'd rate him as possibly one of the hardest working people I've ever known! Coming from me, that's got to be a compliment as being an Architect, I've known a lot of those midnight-oil burner types and been one too for most of my adult life so far!
Good job Hubster!
3. It's a good thing my Mother doesn't plan to visit me or the other way around in the near future. For she would be *shocked* at seeing how tanned I've gotten offlate. It all started with the swimming and the 'shades of tan' now gradually ascend with the dragon boating. Singapore sure intends to leave behind it's colour on me, quite literally, making me perhaps the darkest shade of brown that I've ever been, in my life up until now. Definitely something Mommy never appreciated!
I, on the other hand am too busy having fun in the sun to really care!
4. Dragon Boating sessions this week got more intense and interesting as team members are slowly getting to know each other. My team must think I am partially deaf, as I keep saying "Sorry?" each time someone says something to me, on account of not understanding fully what they mean. No it's not the language, as much as it is the accent and the 'brokenness' of it. While I have zero tolerance for broken English, I now have no choice but to spend my Tues/Thurs/Sundays among people who speak exactly that, since all my team mates at SAFRA Dragons are locals. So I am getting hit by local lingo, left right and centre, whether I like it or not (It does ground me though). A lot of my teammates communicate in Mandarin and Singlish among themselves, hence somewhere between their hand gestures, their Singlish and their Mandarin, I understand what's going on. Not only is this experience becoming a 'window' to their everyday lives and stories but also their sense of humour, their issues and how they let their hair down. One of these days, I know I am going to have to adapt some Singlish myself to put across my point effectively, although for the sake of the language nazi in me, I do hope that the day never comes!
5. The daughter seems to have developed a great internal mechanism for 'Out of sight = out of mind'. Initially she took us aback by showing no signs of missing either of us (Yours' truly or Hubster) whenever we are not around her. Be it the two times that I left her with her grand-parents alone in Mumbai and took off to travel or when Hubster takes off on long business trips himself - she goes about happily living her life as though nothing happened and doesn't bother to ask for the 'missing parent' at all!
Frankly, I am delighted at this aspect of her personality, as it takes off any pressure from either of us (her parents) when we are away from her. This week was the first time EVER that she 'skyped' in her life, and it was with Hubster (in Hyderabad), that too only because Hubster wanted to see her. She didn't really care honestly, nodding indifferently - somewhere between 'Yes' and 'No' when asked if she wanted to see 'Papa'?
I like to believe that this is her way of coping with her feelings of missing her parents, when they are away. It is when small attributes such as these, of her resilient personality gradually surface, that I am reminded of the words a friend in NYC once used to describe her - "This one is a true old soul." Old soul or not, she sure is an extremely accommodating one!
6. Monday was 'Tita's' birthday (Tita is Tagalog for Aunt - The term Zoe and now the two of us as well, use to call her Nanny by). Zoe also turned 23 months old this week. This is going to be the last 'monthly birthday' celebration in our home for her. The celebrations for both birthdays have been moved to next week, since Hubster is out of town all week long.
Tita has the day off on Sundays. This Sunday was going to be a special one for her, since she had plans to celebrate her birthday with her church friends. This Sunday was also a unique situation for us, since Hubster wasn't around and I had a Dragon Boating session early morning. So essentially the question that arose was "Who would watch Zoe this Sunday morning?" Asking Tita to stay back would not be fair and I didn't want to miss my Dragon Boating session, if possible.
That's when Tita came up with a brilliant idea - She offered to take Zoe with her to the Sunday morning mass in church and drop her back home, on my return.
We were thrilled and immediately accepted her offer and thus, this is how, Zoe got to attend her first ever 'church service' this week at a local Presbyterian church, with her Nanny's Chinese, Malay, Singaporean, Tamil and Filipina friends.
When Hubster and I talked of the situation, we were fleetingly reminded of the relationship between the 'ayah' and the young Parsi girl (whom she took care of, like her own daughter/ younger sister), in Deepa Mehta's movie '1947 Earth' (based on the book 'The Ice Candy Man') For us, in a very small way, this was Zoe's opportunity to assimilate in her keeper's life, by being part of her Sunday service followed by attending her small birthday celebration with her other friends.
For the first year of her life. more or less, Zoe was known to people as our daughter and all her friends were formed through us. That situation completely flipped in her second year. Very often on Sundays when we spend the most time with her outside - we see random caregivers in play areas come over to "Hi-five" her. She plays 'Align' with some of them - a simple game that I learnt through her, played by joining the tip of one's index finger to the other persons - sort of a 'private handshake'. At times while we're strolling around, she'll go running up to some stranger giving warm hugs - and only later do we learn, she knows them from one of her play areas/ activities/ garden visits. All these are friends Zoe has made exclusively, without us, thus bringing in new people into our lives now.
Obviously this is how it is going to be here on, as she grows up. But as my Mom puts it - it is small details such as these which set the pace for the rest of our lives, that need to be noted and appreciated when they occur! While, to me, it is one of the many recent changes that have taken place in our lives with her, it is also a subtle reminder of that bitter-sweet feeling every parent experiences when the realization sinks in - that their child really is growing up!
On that rather mushy note, it's a wrap on this week's update. The weekend saw me taking off window-shopping and art-gallery hopping my way across town, as I went solo since Hubster wasn't around. It's been only 4 days since he's gone but already feels like forever. As used to this as I should have gotten by now due to the nature of his work, I don't think I'll ever get used to not having him around! Maybe I need to take a lesson or two in this department from the nonchalant daughter!
Thanks for reading!
Love,
Shweyta
Considering the attention span of a toddler, the instructors have everything NOT working for them, when they try to confine a group of 18 to 28 month old toddlers to a room to enjoy a music class!! The so-called 'dancing' that goes along with it, is literally a warm-up as far as I can see. No wonder then, more than half the number of kids are busy trying to scratch open the door and elope or in Zoe's case, give me a look like "Seriously Mama, this? Don't we jig better than this at home?"
I find these Gymboree kind of baby/ toddler classes too restrictive and even regressive at times. There really isn't much to pick from other than the typical - Arts, Music, Play & Learn or Mandarin. Whatever happened to free-style dance-like-no-one's-watching kinda classes? Why doesn't someone just hit the start button and let kids groove, shimmy, shake a leg, fall, get up again and groove their booty to endless happy beats? Why is it always about props and music and pretend play and poems and blah!!!
Inspite of my take on this, the only reason I signed her up is so she has something to do when school breaks for summer, over the next two weeks. It perhaps is OK since it is only for two weeks. Any longer and we'd probably need to draw up yet another travel itinerary for this little one, to keep her busy!
2. Hubster left mid-week for Hyderabad, for a week long annual business bootcamp that he's organizing for his company. The man is wearing a lot of hats (professionally and personally) for someone with just one head and I am frankly amazed at his capacity to juggle all of them simultaneously! I thought I was a good juggler, but he sure, does take the cake! What works for him over me though, is his independence of sleep. While I still need my 7 - 8 hours of shut eye, an average 4 - 5 hours at night, is enough for him.
Working across multiple time zones is not an easy task, and among other comforts, it deprives one of sleep the most, what with late-night calls and early am meetings. Add to that the extensive business (and pleasure) travel and there really isn't much time left for anything else. Yet, he seems to juggle it all and balance it, pretty well. Granted he's always trying to steal a wink or two (I have a 'sleep series' of photographs of him and the baby shutting eye together) when he can, but overall I'd rate him as possibly one of the hardest working people I've ever known! Coming from me, that's got to be a compliment as being an Architect, I've known a lot of those midnight-oil burner types and been one too for most of my adult life so far!
Good job Hubster!
3. It's a good thing my Mother doesn't plan to visit me or the other way around in the near future. For she would be *shocked* at seeing how tanned I've gotten offlate. It all started with the swimming and the 'shades of tan' now gradually ascend with the dragon boating. Singapore sure intends to leave behind it's colour on me, quite literally, making me perhaps the darkest shade of brown that I've ever been, in my life up until now. Definitely something Mommy never appreciated!
I, on the other hand am too busy having fun in the sun to really care!
4. Dragon Boating sessions this week got more intense and interesting as team members are slowly getting to know each other. My team must think I am partially deaf, as I keep saying "Sorry?" each time someone says something to me, on account of not understanding fully what they mean. No it's not the language, as much as it is the accent and the 'brokenness' of it. While I have zero tolerance for broken English, I now have no choice but to spend my Tues/Thurs/Sundays among people who speak exactly that, since all my team mates at SAFRA Dragons are locals. So I am getting hit by local lingo, left right and centre, whether I like it or not (It does ground me though). A lot of my teammates communicate in Mandarin and Singlish among themselves, hence somewhere between their hand gestures, their Singlish and their Mandarin, I understand what's going on. Not only is this experience becoming a 'window' to their everyday lives and stories but also their sense of humour, their issues and how they let their hair down. One of these days, I know I am going to have to adapt some Singlish myself to put across my point effectively, although for the sake of the language nazi in me, I do hope that the day never comes!
5. The daughter seems to have developed a great internal mechanism for 'Out of sight = out of mind'. Initially she took us aback by showing no signs of missing either of us (Yours' truly or Hubster) whenever we are not around her. Be it the two times that I left her with her grand-parents alone in Mumbai and took off to travel or when Hubster takes off on long business trips himself - she goes about happily living her life as though nothing happened and doesn't bother to ask for the 'missing parent' at all!
Frankly, I am delighted at this aspect of her personality, as it takes off any pressure from either of us (her parents) when we are away from her. This week was the first time EVER that she 'skyped' in her life, and it was with Hubster (in Hyderabad), that too only because Hubster wanted to see her. She didn't really care honestly, nodding indifferently - somewhere between 'Yes' and 'No' when asked if she wanted to see 'Papa'?
I like to believe that this is her way of coping with her feelings of missing her parents, when they are away. It is when small attributes such as these, of her resilient personality gradually surface, that I am reminded of the words a friend in NYC once used to describe her - "This one is a true old soul." Old soul or not, she sure is an extremely accommodating one!
6. Monday was 'Tita's' birthday (Tita is Tagalog for Aunt - The term Zoe and now the two of us as well, use to call her Nanny by). Zoe also turned 23 months old this week. This is going to be the last 'monthly birthday' celebration in our home for her. The celebrations for both birthdays have been moved to next week, since Hubster is out of town all week long.
Tita has the day off on Sundays. This Sunday was going to be a special one for her, since she had plans to celebrate her birthday with her church friends. This Sunday was also a unique situation for us, since Hubster wasn't around and I had a Dragon Boating session early morning. So essentially the question that arose was "Who would watch Zoe this Sunday morning?" Asking Tita to stay back would not be fair and I didn't want to miss my Dragon Boating session, if possible.
That's when Tita came up with a brilliant idea - She offered to take Zoe with her to the Sunday morning mass in church and drop her back home, on my return.
We were thrilled and immediately accepted her offer and thus, this is how, Zoe got to attend her first ever 'church service' this week at a local Presbyterian church, with her Nanny's Chinese, Malay, Singaporean, Tamil and Filipina friends.
When Hubster and I talked of the situation, we were fleetingly reminded of the relationship between the 'ayah' and the young Parsi girl (whom she took care of, like her own daughter/ younger sister), in Deepa Mehta's movie '1947 Earth' (based on the book 'The Ice Candy Man') For us, in a very small way, this was Zoe's opportunity to assimilate in her keeper's life, by being part of her Sunday service followed by attending her small birthday celebration with her other friends.
For the first year of her life. more or less, Zoe was known to people as our daughter and all her friends were formed through us. That situation completely flipped in her second year. Very often on Sundays when we spend the most time with her outside - we see random caregivers in play areas come over to "Hi-five" her. She plays 'Align' with some of them - a simple game that I learnt through her, played by joining the tip of one's index finger to the other persons - sort of a 'private handshake'. At times while we're strolling around, she'll go running up to some stranger giving warm hugs - and only later do we learn, she knows them from one of her play areas/ activities/ garden visits. All these are friends Zoe has made exclusively, without us, thus bringing in new people into our lives now.
Obviously this is how it is going to be here on, as she grows up. But as my Mom puts it - it is small details such as these which set the pace for the rest of our lives, that need to be noted and appreciated when they occur! While, to me, it is one of the many recent changes that have taken place in our lives with her, it is also a subtle reminder of that bitter-sweet feeling every parent experiences when the realization sinks in - that their child really is growing up!
On that rather mushy note, it's a wrap on this week's update. The weekend saw me taking off window-shopping and art-gallery hopping my way across town, as I went solo since Hubster wasn't around. It's been only 4 days since he's gone but already feels like forever. As used to this as I should have gotten by now due to the nature of his work, I don't think I'll ever get used to not having him around! Maybe I need to take a lesson or two in this department from the nonchalant daughter!
Thanks for reading!
Love,
Shweyta
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