Temporary tattoos have hidden dangers..

Kiddo was at a friend's birthday party and got a lovely glittery temporary tattoo. I said yes knowing that she's had reactions in the past, but thinking to myself, 'Remember to wash it off later...' Well, what d'ya know, what with rushing to pack for today's Sambolo trip and dashing to the store at 8pm to get daddy a snorkel mask, I TOTALLY FORGOT!! Ugh! *smack self in the head* Added to that it was Daddy who did the bathing, so I didn't even see her till she was all covered up in her PJs.

This morning, kiddo woke up complaining of a tummy ache and when I felt the warm forehead, my heart just sank... I knew it! A forgotten tattoo! Out came the nail polish remover and thus commenced our 15min cleaning session. She was subsequently sent down for breakfast and instructed to drink lots and lots of water to, hopefully, flush out whatever chemical it was that was causing all this. Happily the tummy ache and fever settled within an hour of having the tattoo removed.

Googling temporary tattoos was an eye opener. Nowhere does it list the chemicals that go into them, it just says dyes should be US FDA approved. Then there are the 'water soluble slip layers' and the 'contact adhesives'. A whole lot of 'uh?'.

This has happened several times in the past. At first it was only after parties when we put down the tummy ache and fever to over excitement and junk food the previous day. The fever and tummy ache would go on for several days, probably until the tattoos eventually faded, but I didn't link the two before. Then we got a pack of these tattoos for fun and she had the SAME reactions at home. I could not believe it! But it happened EVERY SINGLE TIME we put it on! Since then, I've been pretty strict, no tattoos except for parties, and they get washed off the moment we get home. Unfortunately last night it got left on, and she had a whole night of marinating in those chemicals. Hopefully we got it off in time and her beach holiday won't be spoiled. Note to self... parties = tattoos! Inspect and WASH!

End of the bazaar season

Well, this is IT for me. My bazaar season (as a vendor) officially ended at 1pm today in ANZA house. Phew... Am pooped. It's pretty difficult repeating a sales pitch over and over again for up to 4 hours. Hats off to traveling salespeople who do this for a living.

At last total, the orphanage will get in the region of about Rp3.5mil (USD350) from my 2 bazaars and 1 coffee morning. Wish it were more, but I was already encouraging shoppers to round up sales with additional items. Short of randomly grabbing strangers off the path and forcibly removing cash from their wallets, I don't think I could have done better. As hubby likes to say,'Small ticket items give you small profits!'.

I did, however, meet LOADS of people this time. More so than any other previous bazaar. To be honest, the bazaars are my way of meeting people I wouldn't otherwise encounter. Some have turned out to be great friends, others have introduced me to new interests... I love the saying 'A stranger is but a friend you haven't met yet'.

It's off to the Sambolo Beach bungalows for us on Thursday and the move to the new apartment next Wednesday. Busy, busy, busy... Give me my G&T!!

Hit the 'next blog' button for some laughs

I don't know if non-members of blogspot can see this button, but if you do, hit it and see what comes up. Intuitive programming at it's best. The Genius function on iTunes supposedly makes up a playlist for you depending on your tastes when you play a particular song. The 'next blog' button attempts to do the same by randomly selecting blogs for you that you might be interested in.

Well, what they selected for me ranged from absolutely 'uh??', to 'oh yeah, I think I'll come back and check this out.' After a while it got addictive just seeing what they would come up with next.

I got directed to blogs on: Anime (why??), an Indian political site (I think, not sure, but it was all in Tamil(?) and had pictures of people waving flags and marching), a new moms blog (justified), some tech blog with pics of phones (not sure, in Japanese, so have to guess using pictures), some illustrator who draws castles and such (probably got there because I had sooo many posts with the word 'defense/ defender'. Goes to show...). And this is supposed to have been refined. I so do not want to know what it was like previously... Oh well, next time I'm bored, I'll definitely hit it for laughs.

PS how can I forget the one written by the teenage girl that sounded incredibly profound and poetic, yet with a postgraduate degree in medicine, I could not, for the life of me understand. Each word was ok, but strung together they didn't seem to SAY anything... HOW did I end up THERE??

The hidden gem of Cibubur

Blogspot has just gone funny and I can't move my photos, so here it is: top is kiddo in her outfit, bottom is our haul for USD75...

From the title, you would assume that I'm referring to some fantastic natural wonder or ancient monolith. I'm sorry to disappoint, but although I'm fairly certain that there are nice landmarks around there, what I went for was winter apparel shopping for our ski trip to Niseko (Japan) next February. Yup, that's right, you didn't mishear at all. Winter apparel shopping. I know, I know, winter is not the first thing that crosses your mind when you think of Jakarta, but seeing as a lot of western clothing brands have their factories in this part of the world, would you be surprised that there are lots of outlet stores too?

The store in Cibubur is called Upscale and is located in Cibubur Times Square (CTS for this post). Opens at 10am. Before you think of spending some time wandering around CTS, let me warn you that CTS is a far cry (more like a whimper) from NY Times Square. Apart from a pretty large ACE hardware, it's practically deserted. So don't bother thinking you could kill some time in the local Starbucks while you wait for it to open. There's a McD's off the toll road and a petrol station KFC nearer CTS. More than that, you would have to go explore...

Walking into the store, you are immediately confronted by lots of lightweight clothes, and only a couple of racks of winter stuff. Thump goes the sound of your heart hitting the floor as you think of all the unnecessary calories in the KFC meal just consumed and the amount of money just spent in impulse buys from the ACE hardware that opens at 9am (Yes, yes, guilty...)! Well, not to worry, head upstairs and be amazed! Racks upon racks of ski jackets, heavy duty winter stuff, sweaters, ski ensembles... Even the cutest little onesies for the little ones. I went totally crazy. My friend KP and I must have tried on at least a dozen items each. Downside was the 'what you see is what you get' policy. If it doesn't fit, move on. Don't bother asking for sizes. Usually it's just the one available. The other thing of note is that sizes don't always correspond with what is printed. So try everything. There's a reason some items are factory rejects...

Well, after an hour of rummaging, I walked away with a jacket, ski pants and a body warmer for kiddo, and a jacket and body warmer for myself. I wasn't really supposed to be shopping for me, but couldn't resist the prices. The whole haul cost me about USD75. Considering my ski jacket and pants bought in London during the sales cost GBP129, it was a definite bargain.

I raved about it to my Dad today, and he's just given me a shopping list for himself! He's also headed to Japan next February, except it's a little earlier and he's doing a eating tour of Hokkaido rather than a ski trip. In any case, I shall take it upon myself to deck him out in unmissable in the dark ski jackets!!! Just kidding... Yes Dad, I heard you, only darks...

Bazaar No.1 done

Bugs in blogspot, can't organise the pics. Sorry. Top: Me behind my stall. Couldn't stand up straight, so figured peering from around the rack looked better than hunched over the table. All other photos: pics of my haul. Excepting the bear. The bear is kiddo's. She just felt it looked better with he new tutu on...

Today was the first bazaar of the Christmas season for me. Organised by the BWA (British Womens' association). It was held in the Grand Kemang Hotel. Lest anyone think I'm an insatiable bazaar hopper, I actually go to flog stuff for charity. This time it's the Panti Asuhan Pondok Taruna orphanage. With the thought of them needing 70kg of rice a day (costs about Rp500,000/ USD50 per day), I went there totally prepared to be the barracuda salesperson of the year. No taking 'no' for an answer! Everyone who pauses has to buy! Buy! Buy! I say!! Well, within an hour of arriving at the venue (6am for set up!! Ugh!), this barracuda became a minnow... I stupidly bent over to pick up a box forgetting that it was heavy and that I generally have a dinky back. No prizes for guessing what happened next... My back locked up big time, and I was left squirming around trying to pretend that I was looking for something inside the box when in actual fact I could neither fully straighten nor fully bend! I eventually plonked myself onto the sample bean bag I was selling since it allowed me to wriggle into a non excruciating position in order to unpack the offending box. No surprises that everything ended up on the edge of the table. It was as far as I could reach. An emergency call to my co-vendor, who luckily, was only due in later netted me a couple of lifesaving panadols. She was very apologetic about not having anything stronger, but at that point, I would've gratefully settled for anything, even a hammer to my toe as distraction from my back.

In any case, there was selling to be done and people to meet. I love doing the bazaars. Every time I do, I meet someone new, or an old customer. And you never know when you're going to meet a great friend. Like my co-vendor today, V. I met her at the last bazaar a few months back and we got to talking. Now she's a fab friend that I cannot imagine I've only known for a really short time. Even funnier, our girls both have the same name! And we both love crafting... Not to mention we're going on holiday together in 2 weeks and moving into the same apartment complex in 3 weeks. Before you suggest it, no, I'm NOT stalking her...

Well, if there's shopping to be had, I'm the one to call. I can ALWAYS find something to buy. Picked up some lovely little batik covered boxes for gifts, as well as some cutesy little things for the kid. Turns out it's lovely having a co-vendor because we can take turns shopping while the other person mans the stall. And V is as great a shopper as me, which is saying a lot...

All in all, it was go, go, go from the moment the doors opened. I've never been in a bazaar that has been this busy. Barely had time to shop for myself!! *wink* For the first time, I also won a raffle prize! I only know it's to some restaurant. The main thought flowing through my head when going up to get the prize was, 'Suck it in!! Walk upright! OWN the pain! Don't limp!'. Hilarious that as we were walking around the hall, V kept trying to carry my bag. Geesh...!

Back pain or no back pain. A preliminary accounting shows that the orphanage will get Rp1,750,000 (about USD175) from today. That's about 3 days worth of rice or 60 chickens. Rather pleased with that I have to say. Hopefully it's a sign of things to come for the next few events.

PS will post some photos when my back unlocks enough for me to focus my camera higher than my knees...

Eye of the hurricane

It's Saturday. For a change, we're all 3 of us at home just chilling. No looming business trips, nothing particularly pressing. Just our little family enjoying some family time. Ok, at least we're in the same room. Kiddo is reading (as usual), The Man is fiddling with his NEW bike (it sounds like an arthritic old goat. Clackity clackety...) and I'm trying to build mountains on my farmville game...

Next week the chaos starts. Bazaar on Tuesday, coffee morning at ANZA (Aus and NZ womens' association) on Fri, Bazaar again the following Tuesday, long weekend away that Thursday with some great friends to Sambolo. The week after that, we'll be moving to the apartment. Yay!!! I shall be even more a duck than I usually am (why duck? Read the blog description above...).

Yesterday the kiddo had her 2nd lot of boosters. MMR and Varicella. Very stoic through the 1st one with only an 'Ooowwww' at the end. But the 2nd one? Oh my goodness... You would've thought the doctor was skinning her. The howling and wailing...! My poor baby. Worst thing is next month she has a typhoid jab to go for. Sigh. I bought her a bunch of new books as a little reward for the jabs (I know, I know, wasn't supposed to buy anything before the move... But she was such a sad little thing when she found out she had jabs... *sob*). And it DID smooth everything over...

The rest of today shall be family time. Much anticipated since Daddy has been away so much in the last 2 months. Nice lunch at the club... BBQ dinner... Wine... Keep repeating to self, 'I will not obsess about next week, I will not obsess about next week...'

Kiddo's bedtime prayer tonight

'God Bless Daddy, Mummy and Me. Help me get better. Keep Daddy safe on his travels. God Bless Grandpa, Grandma, Ah Kong and Ah Ma. God Bless all the orphans. Let there be no tsunamis, earthquakes and volcanoes. Help me not whine, moan, cry, and tantrum. God bless all my new friends, old friends, and ab-so-lu-te-ly everyone. Help me sleep well and not wake up late for tomorrow's school trip to the zoo. Good night God. Amen.'

What can I say? A kid's environment certainly affects their thought processes. Much more so than one would imagine. I use prayer time as a guide to what the kid is thinking, and a spring board to talking about stuff. Ever since the recent spate of natural disasters have hit the local papers, she's been including tsunamis, earthquakes and volcanoes in her nightly prayers (Downside of a kid being able to read the back side of the paper while I'm reading the front).When I talk to her about it, I can tell she's concerned they will happen to us and people she knows. On one occasion, I remember having to sit down with her and the encyclopedia to work out how safe Jakarta, KL and Singapore were for the various friends and relatives she was worried about. And being here where poverty is so visible she has asked about the street children who beg at the car door. So has developed a slight obsession about orphans and their lack of parental love. Sigh... I guess if we were living in London she would pray about blizzards, gale force winds, tube delays and Indian summers.

Being an expat kid, she's had friends in KL, from her old school Tutor Time, and now in ACS. Not to mention the other expat kids that come and go. I can see how distressing that can be. I certainly do feel it when friends move away. The friendships tend to be rather like a summer romance, you know they're going to end right from the start, you make promises to keep in touch no matter what, and parting is wrenching. But once everyone's moved, it's only the occasional email or skype. Sometimes not even that. Thank God for blackberry messenger. These friendships tend to be quickly forged and quite intense, after all, no one really understands what an expat goes through other than another expat... She's also had to get used to Daddy traveling quite a lot. Now when she's had a scolding and says, 'I want to talk to Daddy!', Mummy has to do time zone as well as airline ETA computations. It's no longer just calling and having The Man furtively whisper that he's in a meeting and will call us back.

The moaning, whining bit... Well, that's totally my fault. because of my ear problem, anything above a certain frequency hits my brain like a laser beam and turns it into what feels like a cauldron of boiling lava with nails shooting into my ear drums. Her voice then echoes and reverberates in my skull, bouncing around and causing more churning of the lava and nails... Well, lava explodes, and so does mummy. That's generally when monster mummy makes a visit. My own yelling adds to the mix and I get even more steamed. Not nice for everyone... So every night, without fail, kiddo asks to not moan or whine. Depending on what's gone on at school, some times she adds in, 'help me to cheer not jeer (school lecture) and help me not mock or be smart alecky (heh heh)'

She throws in the 'help me get better' whether she's sick or not. Being an asthmatic and allergic-y kid, there have been times when she's on pills, syrups, puffers, sprays, creams for months on end. This is like a mantra for her. Can't sleep unless she says it. No matter, I don't imagine God would hold it against her...

All this is certainly a change from 2 years ago when her prayers were, 'God Bless Daddy, Mummy and Me. God Bless Grandpa, Grandma, Ah Kong and Ah Ma. God Bless Riesling, Cookie (our dogs), Baileys and Smokey (our cats). God Bless my friends. Help the woodpecker not eat all our fish...'

One man's food is another man's poison

It has come to me, rather uncomfortably tonight, that while avoiding shellfish is well and good (I have a horrendous shellfish sensitivity. Gives me heartburn like you wouldn't believe!), I should also, perhaps, be more cautious in scarfing down foods that are somewhat out of my usual menu.

While at Aladdin's cave (Kebayoran Market) yesterday, my maid asked if Mister and Missus would like to try cumi-cumi (cuttlefish). Being Malaysian and generally rather fond of my grub, I immediately said, sure, we'll try anything once... Except innards. I draw the line at that.

Well, IbuI stir-fried up a delicious plate of cuttlefish with chillies and 'stuff' (ginger and something else, I think). It was really yummy. Unfortunately. Because that meant I didn't realize the heartburn was coming on till I stopped for a breath and thought, 'Ooohhhh... My stomach definitely does not like that.' In fact I felt like I had swallowed a pot of chilli padi (for those Western friends who are prone to being the butt of practical jokes by Asian friends, if someone dares you to eat this cute little chilli, SAY NO! It's dynamite!). Totally unexpected. Cuttlefish isn't shellfish is it?!? Poor hubby. He's off to Hong Kong for work tomorrow and instead of some quality time with wifey, he has to put up with my moaning and groaning. Gaakkk...

Moral of the story, if you have ANY sort of food insensitivities/ allergies, BE CAREFUL! Especially if it's a food that you don't often eat. As some supermarkets back home sometimes post 'Come one, come all!' I shall now take myself and the towering inferno that occasionally doubles as my stomach off to bed...

Kebayoran Market

Following on from our recipe book acquisitions at the Indo Book Fair, my maid declared that the only place she could get certain ingredients (namely a duck for Bebek Bengil) was at a market. The largest one near us being the Kebayoran market. Neither one of us had been there before, and it fell to Mr.D, to take us to the market. Who needs the Jakarta Shopping Guide when I have a walking, talking version!

1st stop, ducks. There were big ducks, little ducks, super fat ducks (called 'entok'. Don't ask me what it means. Apparently it tastes the same, just fatter). All looked the same to me. My maid IbuI, seemed to do this weird squeezy, pokey thing and would reject some with a scoff and accept others for further consideration. These were live, flapping ducks, mind. They would then be presented to the totally useless money banks (that would be me) for perusal. The vendor would gleefully ask me to personally 'feel' the duck to see how fantastic the meat was. Uh. No. I could see them wallowing in their own poop. No feely for this missy... In any case, 2 ducks set me back Rp80k (about USD8 / RM25). I also bought 3 kampung chickens (free range chickens) for Rp135k. Cue the whole, 'Pegang aje Ibu. Bagus s'kali!!' (Hold it madam. Very good!) again. As I said just 2 minutes ago, NO HOLDING!! Or touching, or pulling of feathers. I ran off when I saw the guy whip out a machete the length of a saber to do the nasty. I insisted on taking home meat instead of a live animal lest my little sunshine decides to adopt dinner. Left D and I supervising the sectioning. My only request... Keep the duck livers. I want to make pate.
Ibu I doing whatever it is she does to get a good duck...

The fowl (foul too!) defeatherer. Birds are dipped in boiling water and tossed in this device. The little rubbery protrusions spin around and smash all the feathers off. Perhaps also adding a tenderizing effect? Out of the holes ooze icky blood and pulverized feather. Note to the curious, don't stand within 5ft of the thing, you'll get covered in the stuff.

After that it was spices, fish (1/3 the price of Hero!!) a wok (yeah, mine's not the right size apparently), some weird looking round, green eggplants for sambal, some tempe, and we were done. Tried to get a photo of the ginormous rat that was slinking around the fish seller, but it ran up a pipe before I could whip out my camera. I would say it was the same size as the rat that came by our place for a visit last week except it's fur was more, well, ratty. Perhaps the food it steals in the market is not quite as good as what is finds in the compound...The fish alley. Thank God for Crocs and a recent dry spell. Merely somewhat 'pongy'... But the ground was still a little fish gutty... No nice shoes here.

We walked past people selling hamsters, guinea pigs, rabbits, birds, eels... The was a man challenging people to beat him at chess in 3 moves. He had the king and a castle, the opponents virtually the whole board. It was something along the lines of if you won, he paid you 10k, if you lost, you'd pay him 10k. I wasn't going to pay someone to humiliate me, so onwards we went.
The chess player waiting for his marks...

The coconut grating machine. Watching them do it, I would suggest anyone who wants to eat grated coconut from the market makes sure that it's cooked very, very thoroughly. Goodness knows if the machine is EVER washed...

On the way home, IbuI and I were animatedly discussing the market when we realized that Mr.D was rather conspicuously quiet. Turns out he was amused at us raving about the market because he had only taken us to the periphery of the market as he felt the main bit was too hot and too crowded! What a man!! Sounds like something MY man would've done. Well, IbuI and I were not stinting on the abuse we heaped upon his head! So much more stuff to buy! We probably missed it all! Next time, we're leaving him with the car!! His point was that everything inside can be found outside. Why go in? But, but... What if there IS something different?? 'Nggak lah, Madam. Semuanya same aje...' (Nah Madam. It's all the same) Grrr... Even sounds like something 'Mister' would say.

All in all, I'm hot, sticky and tired. The distances weren't far, but dodging hand-drawn carts can be a rather athletic experience. By the time you hear, 'Permisi!!' (Excuse me), the cart can be practically on top of you. Couple of times, torn between the options of getting run over or cozying up to a bucket of slithery, slimy eels, I opted instead to stand with one foot parallel to the path (so the cart didn't lop off my toes!) and the other suspended over the bucket of eels. Lots of strange looks, but they saw my camera, so most just ignored me.

All in all, a rather interesting experience. Next time though, I will stand 10ft away from IbuI and pretend not to know her. I'm sure (and she agrees) that despite the prices being rather low, they were still artificially inflated when the sellers realized I was the person actually paying. Somehow, they can always spot an expat at 10 paces.

Origami bowls

Fiddly scale : 6 (0 is I can do it plastered, 10 is I couldn't even work out how to start)

Picked up this paper folding book from the Indo book fair and decided to try out one of the projects. Problem is it used washi paper. I don't have any and am too skint to buy some. So I decided to do it using left over scraps of cloth instead. I did the same thing the book suggested to stiffen the paper. I.e. sandwich a piece of aluminum netting in between the pieces of paper and glue the whole shebang together. Anyone who has glued fabric will know that it's messy, fiddly and doesn't ever seem to dry clear even though the bottle says 'dries clear'. Anyway, it worked. Sort of.
1st effort. The glue is visible along the top edges if you look closely.

Today, I decided to give it a go again. I couldn't believe something that appeared so easy could end up so incredibly complicated. This time, I decided to sew a square, stuff the netting inside and slip stitch the open end together. Much better. Though I have to say that someone who has better slip stitch technique would make this look infinitely better. I also managed to smash my thumb with a hammer trying to crease the corners. There is a reason origami is meant for paper...
2nd effort. Better, but wasn't very careful so the edges are a tad wobbly.

3rd effort. It's do-able!! Note to self, take time with measuring and cutting. Rulers were invented so idiots like me don't have to eyeball stuff and have it turn out crooked...

10 days to the bazaar now. I wonder if anyone would buy them for charity??

Return of the red-eyed fanged monster

630am : My alarm rings. No sounds of stirring through the monitor. No matter, kiddo doesn't really have to wake till 640am. Close my eyes for a quick catnap.

645am : Open my eyes thinking, 'Oh s@*#! Late!' Still no signs 0f kiddo stirring. Well, can't be helped, she has to get up. Crawl under the covers with her and try to gently wake her up. My mom used to yank the covers off me and slap a sopping wet towel on my face. Not a nice way to get up... Today though, I can see the virtues of the shock treatment.

650am : STILL not getting up. This is the kid who is usually up on her own at 630am singing! 'Come on kiddo... You're late...' (Mummy getting desperate here...) This is when the monster appeared... 'But moo-oommm, I'm still tired. WHY do I have to go to school now? I WANT it to be a weekend NOW!' Mum, 'It's the weekend tomorrow, you can sleep in and catch up, now quick! Go clean up!' Monster (with the added finger on chalkboard screech thrown in for good measure), 'But I don't wanna sleep in on weekends... I wanna wake up early and go downstairs MYSELF!!' Rapidly losing patience mum, 'Look, I turn off the alarm on weekends, and if you wake too early, then of course I'll ask you to go back to sleep.' Monster, 'NNOOOO!!! I WANNA WAKE UP EARLY' Punctuated with a foot stamp. Really needing a pee mum, ' WHATEVER!!! I need the loo, GO CLEAN UP!!'

7am : Monster still yelling and screaming that she wants to wake up early tomorrow. Totally lost it mum, 'IF YOU'RE NOT DONE AND READY IN 5 MINS I'M COMING IN THERE AND DRAGGING YOU DOWNSTAIRS, AND YOU CAN GO TO SCHOOL IN YOUR PAJAMAS!!! AND IF THIS IS THE WAY YOU BEHAVE AFTER PLAYDATES, THEN NO MORE PLAYDATES!!!!' *cough, cough* I'm out of practice, we haven't had a visit by the monster in a while, obviously my vocal cords need re-conditioning...

705am : Stomping heard on the stairs and down the hall. Minimally effective because it's tiled, but I guess effort counts.

710am : 12mins late. The kiddo is slowly re-appearing. Very grumpy though. So I just left her to a silent breakfast in the car while I hid behind the daily paper. She didn't even want to have her daily chat with my Dad. Left him pretty disappointed too. 'I'll talk to you after school, grandpa...'

740am : 5mins late for school. Assembly already in progress. She was whisked off by her teacher, smiling and chatting. Back to normal... Sigh.

At a quick count, 1 monster = 1 yelling mummy, 1 disappointed grandpa, 2 staff literally hiding from both monster and mummy. Can you believe it, 1 bad tempered kid spoils the morning for 4 people...!

Indo book fair 2009

Book fair=No money... I should just leave it at that.

The 29th Indonesian Book Fair started yesterday the 4th and will run through to the 8th. I went with rather low expectations of everything being in Bahasa and me not finding anything to buy, but since the entry fee was only Rp5,000 (USD0.5), I figured that even if I only found 1 book, it would still be a bargain... Yeah, right, like I've ever left a bookstore without buying more than 1 book.

In any case, I was there bright and early at 945am waiting for the 10am opening. Walking in I thought, 'Wow, I didn't know there were so many book sellers in Indonesia.' The English books were mostly outside in the foyer. Well represented by some standard shops, Periplus, Aksara, Times. However, compared to some of the others, their selection was pitiful. It was like they had brought out all the trashed up, totally not in demand titles. Periplus was better than the other 2, at least I managed to pick up some craft books. The Times stall was truly dismal, I had vouchers to spend and after going through everything twice eventually walked off with 'The enormous crocodile' by Roald Dahl for kiddo.

The inner hall was filled with offerings from local publishing houses. Never heard of 99% of them. But I DID find the Femina magazine stall that was selling their recipe books cheap. Yay!! I bought books on Manado, East Jawa, and Minang cooking, Street food, banana and corn recipes. Matter of interest, I found a recipe for Bebek Bengil!!! Had a whole discussion with the maid on where to get the ingredients. She reckons we have to buy the whole duck from the market. I'm totally ok with that as long as she doesn't come home with one still quacking. No doubt kiddo will adopt it, and there goes my Bebek Bengil.

I also figured that since I was there, I would look out for some Bahasa books for the staffs' children. From speaking to them, it doesn't sound like they can afford leisure books. Wandering around, everything was 'cinta' this and 'cinta' (love) that. Ugh. I ended up at the Islamic book store being served by a goateed little guy who was amazingly helpful. He picked a few books and gave me a synopsis of them. Apparently, the titles often have nothing to do with the content, they use words like 'cinta' only to catch the attention of teens. He also suggested 2 books on avoiding celebrity chasing and girls not looking for early marriages. That gives you an idea of the issues affecting local teenagers...

All in all, it was a morning well spent. Very, very satisfied with my haul, though in retrospect I should have grabbed the other 2 art books I was looking at. Sigh. The only downside was that the Comtec fair was bigger and noisier and right next door. So traffic was pretty bad. Although nothing like for the bazaars. Conclusion being books and tech stuff are less popular than fashion, home dec and kid stuff?

Anyway, I'm off to try my hand at some of the crafts featured in the books I bought. Tin foil here I come!!!

Green day at school

Today was green day at school. All the kids had to wear a green top. There was a presentation by the WWF and the elementary kids will be having a recycled paper making session after school. I'm pretty impressed by the recycling efforts at her school. They have recycle bins everywhere. The kids don't really have an opportunity to not recycle actually. No regular bins. Only 'paper', 'plastic' and 'waste food' bins in groups of 3 wherever you go. Good idea really.

Anyhow, we've been home for a bit. I'm messing on the computer and she's reading something when all of a sudden, she comes up to me and says, 'Mummy, don't put your juice box in the bin. It has to be recycled. We have to look after the environment or the endangered rhinoceres (rhinoceri?) will have nothing to eat. There are only 60 left! Also, if we chop down trees to make paper, the squirrels will have no homes and no nuts. So recycle your paper ok? The lady was asking people to adopt rhinos in school today. Can we adopt one?' As I sit there a bit stunned by this deluge of information, my automatic reaction is, 'Sure. Let's adopt a rhino.' Then it occurs to me that kiddo might think we can bring the fellow home! So I cautiously say, 'You DO know that we can't bring it home right?' Kiddo, 'Of course mummy! They live in the national park and eat leaves and stuff. We just have to go there everyday to give it some love!' Riiiggghhhttt. 'Everyday?' I say, trying not to fall on the floor screaming with laughter. Bad for the child's self esteem, you know. 'Ye-ah' she says matter-of-factly, 'after school everyday, we'll just go to the park and play with it.'

Now, I have full respect for the WWF presenters having to deal with a bunch of yelling fidgety kids, but if I EVER see any of them I shall very strongly suggest that presentations to impressionable young kids include the statement, 'Adopting means your parents PAY for us to look after the animal. You may not visit, touch, or play with said animal.' Capisce??

Porn

Hubby and I were perusing our much over crowded workroom when he suddenly declared, 'You have too much porn.' I looked at him and was debating whether to slap first and ask questions later or just pretend my ears were acting up, when he continued with, 'Look at your shelf, it's full of books on beading, candle making, origami, sewing, painting, scrapbooking... And that's just what I can see! And I don't even know when you add something, the piles just get bigger!' Ohhh. Ookkaaay. Well, I was feeling rather unfairly attacked so I came back with, ' Oh yeah?! What about all your running and triathlon magazines? And your collection of running shoes that look perfect but YOU say they have gone past their distance limit and you need a new one? And your bike? And the indoor trainer? And the mammoth bike case when you've only ever gone for ONE triathlon?'

This is my work table. I admit it's a LITTLE messy.

Part of my craft book collection.

The Man's new bike. Brought it back all the way from New York.

His running shoe collection. Except the white pair on the right. Those are his super special bike shoes. Not in the picture are the ones he took into work for his daily running session at the gym. Also, to be fair, what looks like an extra 3 pairs is actually a reflection off the mirror. Don't ask why there's a mirror under the table. That's a whole different story...

The Man's collection of Runner's World and Triathlon magazines. And all the other various running and tri training books. Also the running and tri dvd's. He's forever in search of the perfect technique...

Let's put it this way, we both think the other is spending more on their 'porn' but I think it's pretty equal. I could've bought at least 100 craft books with what his bike costs!

As I said before, I love my crafts. Sometimes I buy books on crafts that I probably won't have time to learn anytime soon, but I love looking at the lovely pictures and filing it in my 'to-get-to-at-some-point' mental box. I reckon this is the main difference between the way Hubs' brain is wired and mine. He has his little interests, but they come one at a time. First, photography. When that was over, running, with biking and swimming now tacked on.

Carrying on with our little contretemps, I said, 'Anyway, porn is the wrong word. I don't know about you, but I CERTAINLY don't derive any sexual gratification from my crafting! It keeps me sane! I spend less on gifts! Don't you like my scrapbooks!' Well, The Man has THE MOST amazing ability to just suddenly switch off. His answer was, 'Hey, whatever tickles your tackle babes...' Followed by him whipping out the latest Runners World magazine. Grrr... Annoying Y chromosome carrier, I wasn't even finished with the discussion! We love each other. Honestly. We do.

Out of the mouths of babes

I just HAD to write this down before I forget it. Never mind that I'd give a kidney for my bed right now.

Tonight, right after bath time as I was snipping kiddo's nails, she suddenly turned to me and said, 'Mummy, when I grow up, I want to be a doctor.' Ok, nothing new there, but knowing my experience and with the benefit of a bunch of horrific over night shifts behind me, I calmly (while yelling 'No! No! No!' inside) said, 'Well, it's a lot of hard work you know, and mummy decided I'd rather spend my time with you and Daddy. BUT, you can do whatever you want...!' Never forget equality and female emancipation! Nor hold your kids back because of your own prejudices... So say all the books. Kiddo replied, 'That's ok, then I'll just be a teacher, like you. But I also want to be a scientist... So I'll be a doctor 1st, then a teacher when I get tired of being a doctor, then a scientist when I get tired of being a teacher!' Um. Well. 'Kiddo, it's hard to earn money if you keep changing jobs like that you know. And it takes a long time to study for each thing, so why don't you have a good think about it. You have plenty of time to decide.' Reply, 'Hmmm, yes, I also want to earn lots of coins like daddy.' Ulp. Too much farmville perhaps? Then, 'That's ok, I'll just stay home like you. And do stuff I like. Like being a doctor, a teacher, a scientist...' Me (out-talked by now), 'Baby, you can't earn money by staying home and just working a bit here and there you know...' Kid, 'You do.' Urk!! Beleaguered mummy, 'Mummy was very blessed because daddy makes enough money so I can stay home to look after my little baby.' Kid, 'That's ok, I'll just stay at home and be your grown-up little baby...!' Me (in a bit of a panic now), 'Where are you going to get your money from?' Answer, 'Daddy.' *slams head against the wall* What have I done?!?!