The End of the Year!

Tomorrow is the last day of school and I'm more than slightly amazed that we have been in Singapore for three years now. They have just whizzed by and this past six months have been the most frenetically busy I have ever known. It's been great but, wow, it has been busy!

I've done some pretty cool stuff at school this year. I lead two overseas trips. One with Year 9 to Sabah which was brilliant. It was really rewarding seeing kids responding to being out of their comfort zones so positively. We have a lot of mainland Chinese at our school and they were not impressed with sleeping in hammocks in the jungle and having to prepare their own food. But by the last day they didn't want to leave, which was pretty cool. I also took a group of kids to Bali to look at volcanoes. This was the second time I've done this trip and this year was as good as last. Kids get so much out of seeing the real life version of the stuff we talk about in class. Although this group were sort of 'too cool for school', individually they all said they had a great time and would do it again. There were other things too, but I won't bore you with that.

Early start at Changi

Jungle Camp

View from hotel at Kintamani, Bali

View from Mt Batur, Bali

Our school has grown a lot over the three years we have been here. In August 2012 we had 317 kids from Nursery to Year 13. At the end of this year we have over 800 kids and we look like hitting 900 by the time we come back in August. The growth hasn't been without its issues but we have managed to pull it off. Even though we are dead knackered and looking forward to the holidays, I am already a little bit excited about next year. Our staff is fairly stable now and that means we can organise things with more continuity. Our department work well together and we have done some really good stuff this year. Hopefully we can consolidate that and then build on it next year.

Mel is the co-ordinator of two core subjects for IGCSE and IB. This keeps her busy, and is both challenging and rewarding. She will be working full-time next year, which will be a big change for her and Matilda. I think she is keen to be working full-time, but she will miss the time with Matilda. We have been very lucky that they have that time together over the last three years. Mel and Matilda got to do lots of stuff together that wouldn't have been possible if Mel was working full-time. Matilda will also be at school for the whole day next year. This won't be such an issue as she asked if she could stay at school longer and has been doing full days for most of this term.

One of the things I really love about our school is the commitment to professional development. Mel and I both got to travel overseas for courses this year, which was awesome. Mel went to Phuket for Global Perspectives workshop and I had three days in Nanjing for a Geography workshop. We were also able to go to the annual Google Education Summit here in Singapore. I attended a workshop with the head guy for Google Geo Tech Education looking at Google Earth and Google Maps, as well as few other things which was quite geeky and cool. I also have a course in Bangkok lined up for September, which should be interesting.

Wearing daddy's hat at Melbourne Airport
the day we left for Singapore

Making 4th birthday wishes

Mel was looking at some photos yesterday, from around the time we arrived in Singapore. Matilda was still a wee baby; not long walking and just learning to talk. Tomorrow is the last day of her first year at school (she was in Nursery for half a day for most of the year). She really loves going to school which is awesome. We were looking at her report today. She has done quite well. She loves Chinese and swimming!
It has been amazing to watch Matilda develop from a wee baby into a little girl. She has an incredible imagination and makes up stories and songs about everything almost every day. She loves to draw and has done some interesting of portraits of Mel and I. She is very much the little princess that cares a lot about her clothes and shoes. But she also loves watching volcano videos and nature documentaries with her daddy. She also loves maps and flags:)

Matilda is very well travelled for a 4 year old. This year we went to Myanmar, Australia & NZ for Christmas and Perth for Easter. Myanmar was very cool and I am dead keen to go back. Christmas time is a much nicer time to visit both Australia and NZ. The weather is much better and everyone is mostly relaxed. Perth was great as we got to meet my cousin's little boys Zander and Jace and Mel and Matilda were able to spend time with her sister Rose out at Kalgoorlie. Matilda loves seeing her big cousins, Zoe and Emma.

Sunset over the Irrawaddy River

Shwezigon Temple, Bagan

Tilda singing to the Buddha

Sunrise ballons over Bagan

Big Umbrellas

With tomorrow being the last of school, we now have 7 weeks holiday. Yeah! We went to NZ and Australia this time last year and while it was good to catch up with friends and family, the weather is shit. Mel and I vowed we would never visit at that time of year again, unless it was absolutely, positively unavoidable! To bring things back into balance we will be heading for Thailand and Bali this year. We're heading up to Bangkok late next week for a few days. We are taking our helper, Lorie, with us so she can visit her son who teaches English there. In the last week of June, we are hitting Bali with Mel's sister and parents. It is Rose's birthday and good chance for Tilda to hang out with her big cousins for a while. I am going to Java for a couple days to visit some of the ancient Hindu/Buddhist temples near Yogyakarta and take geeky photos. In the last week before school we are spending a few days at a flash resort to make sure we are fully rested and relaxed!

I guess that's it for the moment. Being on holidays means I should be able to post again soon. But I probably won't:)

Ciao!

Holidays

So the holidays are coming to an end. We have to be back at school on Thursday. I guess it's not so bad as the kids don't start until the 12th. We have 5 or 6 days at school to get prepared which is good. Especially as they're broken up with a weekend and a couple of public holidays. Not everyone agrees, but I don't mind spending a few days getting organised. It means I can not worry about school for most of the holidays which is what I did. I'm quite looking forward to the new school year. Last year was pretty tough with a lot of ups and downs. I think we'll be better prepared this year and as the second half of the year was generally positive, hopefully we can maintain that positivity.

Our holiday has been good. We spent time in Vietnam and Thailand. Vietnam is a really interesting place. It was funny to walk around and hear Vietnamese people saying "g'day mate" in fake Aussie accents. Equally funny were the people who would say "oh c'mon mate" when you said "no" to whatever it was that they were selling. 

After a couple of days in Saigon, we spent five days in Hoi An on the central coast. Hoi An is an old port town that has a world heritage listing. It was an important port until the 18th century when the river it sits on changed course and the port was silted up. The central part of the town has been preserved in a sense, though once the world heritage listing was granted a lot of locals sold their properties and moved out. The shophouses are now mostly bars, cafes, restaurants and souvenir shops, with the odd museum thrown in.

 

Old shophouse in the old town of Hoi An

 Looking out the window at Green Mango in Hoi An.

Boats on the the Thu Bon River. The eyes are supposed to help the boats see danger:)

Cultural Festival on the banks of Thu Bon River.

We enjoyed Hoi An. We found a good tailor and had some copies of clothes made. The lady in the shop was totally besotted with Tilda. She has two boys already and is desperate to have a girl. When we picked up our clothes she was so stoked to get a cuddle from Tilda that she gave her a wee dress, which was really nice of her. And of course Tilda loved the dress because it was mostly pink.

After leaving Hoi An, we flew back to Saigon from Da Nang. Tilda missed out on her sleep so she was a bit grumpy on the plane and didn't settle for a while when we put her to bed at the hotel in Saigon. We flew back to Singapore the next day and she missed her sleep again. So she was pretty worked up when we got on the plane. She was so tired that she fell asleep as we taxied on the runway and slept for a third of the trip. She woke up suddenly and was upset again but some snakes helped settle her and she was good for the rest of the way home. It was really interesting to see Tilda's reaction when we got back home. She so happy to see her bed and toys again. We got her bed early (not long after 6pm) and she didn't make a peep until about 8 the next morning. 

About 10 day later we were off again, this time to Thailand. We went to Khao Lak, a place we'd been before so it was really nice to go back again. We didn't do much except swim and sleep. It was awesome for the first 5 days or so. Then Tilda picked up some kind of tummy bug and was really sick. The poor wee thing couldn't hold much down, so we took her to see a doctor in Khao Lak village. After three tries we finally found a doctor that was open. She gave us some medicine to stop the vomiting, which help a bit. Unfortunately that evening Mel got sick too. I suspect it was because she was holding Tilda when she threw up a couple of times. Needless to say, the last full day we had there was pretty quiet. Such a shitty way to finish our holiday. Oh well, our trip trip to Vietnam went really smoothly. And in all the travelling that Mel and I have done over the last 12 or 13 years we haven't had too much go wrong besides the odd cancelled/delayed flight and lost luggage.

Since we got back from Thailand, we've mostly just been hanging out. We've visited some of the museums in Singapore. Perhaps more of that soon:)

That's it for a bit.

Ciao

Tone

Thailand

Today we flew to Thailand. We're staying in Khao Lak for a week. We've been here a couple of times before and it's good to be back. The hotel is really nice although it's starting to show its age. Tilda was a champion all day, despite being cooped up in her baby seat, pram and on the plane. When ever she got the chance, she charged around like a mad thing so I think she's pretty tired now. As always, the hotel staff are smitten and want to cuddle her and stuff. She's pretty accommodating most of the time. 

The staff are really friendly and super helpful. Especially when I realised I left my ATM card in the ATM we stopped at on the way. Dumbarse!! The lady who checked us in made sure I called the bank in Singapore to cancel my card and told us not to worry and enjoy our holiday. Anyhoo, the card is cancelled and I will have to get a new one when I get back to Singapore. Oh well, could be worse  I guess. 

So we're looking forward to chilling out by the pool and on the beach. We'll probably get the odd massage here and there too:) Vietnam was cool but our trip probably wasn't what I would call a relaxing holiday. Not much else to say right now, so I'll be off.

Ciao

Tone