The Bub in the Belly

We woke up in the wee hours of the morning and after waiting about, ventured out for breakfast at about 6 am. The only place near our hotel that was open at that time was Burger King, so we went there.

Ryan was very pleased because there was a huge play structure there for him to climb up and slide down. Richard and I took turns to go inside with him. Can you see Ryan in the photo? (He's at the window in the blue block in the centre.)


After prying Ryan away from his playhouse (make that his playMANSION), we walked over to Sesame Place. It wasn't open yet so we had to hang about outside.

Nursing while waiting for the park to open. Panoramic shot taken with Photosynth.

I love this shot.

Elmo's hand prints! Each character has its own prints on the walkway leading up to the entrance.

Ryan wearing his Elmo T-shirt!

The park just opened for the summer the day before so the day we were there was only the second day of operation for 2011. From then, the park would only be open on Friday and weekends until summer is in full force in the last week of May. Then it will be open everyday until early September when it reverts to Fridays and weekends only, until eventually closing for the year in November.

Ok, will end here for now and will write more about our day in Sesame Place in another post.

Changi airport

Frankfurt waiting lounge. Nursing Ryan and catching up on reading. Panoramic photo taken by Richard on iPhone 4, stitched together using Photosynth.

Richard’s eldest sister, Margaret, and her daughter, Jerica, are staying with us for a few days. It’s wonderful to be able to spend some time with family and we always cherish the opportunity for Ryan to bond with his relatives. They arrived on Sunday evening and, after dinner, we all went to see The Lion King (the musical) at Marina Bay Sands.

Richard and I watched The Lion King in Sydney many years ago and we enjoyed it tremendously. Actually, we hadn't planned to watch it - my mum bought the tickets for us as a gift. I was a little sceptical at first, wondering whether it would be a tacky children’s show but watching it, I was very impressed. The show was sophisticated and respectful of adult sensibilities, and sufficiently charming and accessible to the imagination of children. Richard and I sat up in the circle seats and, from that distance, the silhouette of giraffes strutting across the Serengeti plains against the backdrop of a glowing sunset was simply jaw-dropping. The stunning imagery was spectacularly evocative and the pulsing African rhythms made it burst into life. It was easy to forget that the prowling leopards, leaping antelopes and swooping birds were actually people in costume and makeup. The music, crafted by Elton John and Tim Rice, certainly didn’t disappoint. The songs were enchanting and soul-stirring and masterfully delivered by both actor and orchestra. We left the theatre skipping along and humming "Hakuna Matata".

When the musical came to Singapore, again, we did not make plans to watch it so it was a happy excuse to indulge ourselves when Margaret and Jerica came to visit. We bought the tickets just a few hours before the show, and in complete contrast to last time, we ended up two rows from the stage, in the side block (house left/stage right). This turned out to be the better side, as whenever an actor stood at the side of the stage to deliver his/her lines, more often than not, this was the side he/she stood. The sets were as majestic as I remembered, although we were too close to the stage to fully appreciate the beauty of the whole. Happily, this was balanced by the privilege of getting up close and personal with the actors. In Sydney, up in the circle, we couldn’t see their facial expressions. There was plenty else to rely on, of course - the expressive body language, dialogue, music and, of course, the scene setting. Now, in addition to all that, we could see every twitch, every blink, every raised eyebrow, every smile, every smirk and every bead of sweat. In Act II, when Simba sings “Endless Night” while looking up at the night sky and expressing his bitterness about Mufasa's promise to always be there for him, I could even see that his eyes were glistening with tears.

If you’re thinking of bringing your little one, children under 3 don’t need a ticket (but that also means that they don’t get a seat and have to sit on your lap). It’s not terribly scary, you can trust Disney on that account, even the villain is quite comical. Nevertheless, there are a couple of dark scenes, like the elephant graveyard and the death of Mufasa, plus the hyenas can be disturbing. It was great to see that Ryan understood the emotional content of these dark scenes – he was a little afraid – and it was also great to see that he handled it well.

The show, including a short interval, took about 2.5 hours. Ryan was mesmerised throughout. Richard pointed out all the different animals to him and he embraced the performance completely. In Act II, he was making comments and he even clapped his hands after a particularly lively song. He was in full concentration and didn’t fuss at all throughout the entire show, although he did ask for a very short nursing break in Act II.

Some trivia for you: The story is based on the beloved 1994 Disney animated film “The Lion King”, which tells a moving story of love and redemption. The musical has won over 70 major international theatre awards, including the 1998 Tony Award for Best Musical. It is one of only five productions in theatre history to play for ten years or more, both on Broadway and in the West End. In the West End, it grossed over 34 million pounds in 2010, which is the highest annual box office of any show in West End history, breaking its own record set in 2009.

The Lion King started an extended run in Singapore in March 2011 and, last Thursday, Base Entertainment and Marina Bay Sands in association with Disney Theatrical Productions announced that the musical broke yet another record by becoming the best selling show in Singapore history.

Catch it if you can, it's everything a musical should be, and perhaps a little more.

So in this post let’s talk about what Dr Makoto Shichida hoped to achieve with The Shichida Method. In my last Shichida post, I mentioned The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar by Roald Dahl. Did it leave an impression on you?

I read the story when I was a child. At the time, I did not know that it was based on a real man called Kuda Bux. On all accounts, to me, the tale was completely fictional. Yet, it made perfect sense to me. There was scientific proof that human beings used less than 10% of their brain and we could already do so much with that tiny portion. What would the unused portion be for? Surely it couldn’t be merely storage space.

I was convinced that it was possible, as Henry Sugar did in the story, to focus your concentration such that you achieved a deeper level of consciousness and, in that deeper consciousness, draw out those hidden abilities. I even tried training with a candle, as explained in the story, and, when I saw how extremely difficult it was, I believed even more that there was this untapped power in all of us which was accessible to a select few.

And the part of the story that made the deepest impression on me? It was the change in Henry Sugar from an avaricious, selfish man to a kind and generous man who went to great lengths to make money for charity. He travelled around the world, from casino to casino, always on the run as the casinos were on the hunt for him. He had to travel with a make-up artist and was always in disguise. Yet he carried on, seeking neither fame nor fortune, and used his abilities to better the lives of others.

This made perfect sense to me. I very readily accepted the idea that human beings had been created by God with all these powers and of course these amazing abilities could only be accessed by people who were wise, people who were innocent, people who were good, or in other words, people who would not abuse these powers and who would feel the responsibility and the obligation to use these powers for the greater good, to help others and to make the world a better place.

Sounds utopian? Perhaps. But if you want to believe in something, it should be something that’s worth believing in. And the idea that we could all be kind and generous and compassionate to each other and live unselfishly is something that’s definitely worth believing in.

Of course, at the time I read the story, I knew nothing of Shichida or of left/right brain education. It was therefore a happy day for me when I discovered that Shichida believes the exact same thing. The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar is, in fact, an excellent explanation and introduction to the Shichida Method.

The Shichida Method trains our focus and concentration such that we slip into an altered state of consciousness, during which we can access our hidden abilities (in his book, “The Science of Intelligence and Creativity”, Shichida even mentions focusing on a candle flame, just like Henry Sugar did, as one way to do image training). This altered state of consciousness can be achieved by activating the imaging capabilities of the right brain.

Just as Kuda Bux had said, Shichida also says that we all have the same right brain abilities and Shichida says it is the responsibility of parents and teachers to “pull out” the originally large potential capability any child was born with to the fullest extent through education (he points out that the original meaning of education (in Latin) is “to pull out the innate ability”). Shichida says, “Children, given a Shichida style education, have amazing concentration and absorbing power”.

And the aim? Professor Shichida believes that the future of the world, which includes achieving peace and a sense of goodwill among human beings, depends on the children of today and he also believes that, “Education will shape the future of the world because one of the objectives of education is to create a better world.”

Shichida marries the two concepts and says that, “When teaching children that they are valuable beings in the world, we should also teach them that they must take great responsibility as well. We must teach the children that each one of them has a responsibility to nurture his or her own innate capability to the fullest degree. Also, it is important to tell them to use such hidden treasure for the entire nation or the world.”

“We should not fall into the education trap that tries to produce the intellectually strong. “For what purpose do human beings live?” Ask your child this fundamental question about life and have him or her think about it.”

“Right brain training does not focus on academic achievement alone. One of the miraculous results of right brain education is that all the children treated with this method develop a gentle and harmonious mind. They will start showing richly nourished sensitivity, humanity, imagination and creativity. This is the natural result of right brain education whose learning principles based upon love, the sense of one-ness and cooperation. On the other hand, left brain-centred education is based upon confrontation and competition.”

Therefore, “The aim of the right brain education is not to give children mere knowledge but to foster love, the sense of oneness and cooperation among children.” This is why Shichida’s right brain education method is known as “the education of the heart”.

And that is the reason why we believe in the Shichida Method. Because our wish for Ryan is for him to grow up with a kind heart, with a compassionate soul and with a generous spirit. Because we believe that he can make a difference.

It's something that's worth believing in, don't you think?

[This post also appears in our Learning at Home section.]

Ryan's nanny had some family matters to attend to yesterday, so I took the day off to take care of Ryan. Here's a rundown of our day.

Breakfast was a "muffin tin meal" (except that I used a silicone cupcake mould!).

Top row from left to right: Elmo fruit juice, biscuit sticks, cornflakes.
Bottom row from left to right: more biscuits, boiled carrots, honeydew.

Guess what was the first thing Ryan went for?



After that, there was lots of time for books and little cars.




While Ryan hung out with his little cars, I tidied up our little storeroom and our handyman came during this time to fix a leak in our bathroom sink. With the storeroom all nice and neat, and our sink leak-free, there was more playing in Ryan's playroom, some doodling on his drawing pad, some dancing (of course!) and a little bit of this plus a little bit of that. Before we knew it, it was time for lunch.



Time to get clean! We always try to make the most of bathtime - we give Ryan some "props" and let him take as long as he wants, exploring and learning naturally while getting comfortable with the water. Richard and I get our baths at the same time too (although Richard wasn't with us today). Today I let Ryan have three measuring cups in different sizes. He learned that the big one takes longer to fill up and is heavier to lift when full, and the smaller ones take faster to fill up and are lighter to lift when full.



After that, it was off to bed but Ryan was too jazzed to sleep so I dragged some boxes into our bedroom because I wanted to get started on my submission for the Cardboard Box Challenge. I didn't get very far with that though - guess why?



Since I wasn't getting anywhere, I gave up and we went out to the terrace for bubbles!




Ryan wasn't very pleased with the giant bubblemaker because he wanted to blow the bubbles out and the giant bubblemaker is too big for that (you need to swing it about instead). Anyway, he persevered and after a while, he was finally ready for his nap. I nursed him to sleep and then went back to my cardboard creation. Ryan didn't sleep long though - he is usually too excited to nap for long when he is at home (compared to when he is at his nanny's). We went downstairs for dinner, which was the same thing that we had for lunch (rice with ABC soup). Richard came home shortly after that, and we all went out again for dinner with him at Aston's.

The rest of the night was spent on more play, including playing with the result of my attempt at the Cardboard Box Challenge. I'm not satisfied with it yet so I'm going to work on it some more before I share it on the blog. In the meantime, here's a sneak peek!


So, that was our day. Hardly a moment's rest, but we had loads of fun and time passed so quickly.

This is long overdue, I know. I have been meaning to pen down the various contacts we used for Ryan's 2nd birthday party back in January, both for my own record as well as for anyone who might require such information (here you go, Anonymous!), but kept procrastinating.

As I mentioned back in January, we rented the multi-purpose hall at HortPark. We were expecting about 50 adults and 40 children. HortPark has a selection of smaller rooms, but I would definitely recommend that you go and see the room for yourself, as the location or size may not be ideal for what you have in mind. We initially booked one of the smaller rooms, but after a trip to check it out, decided that it was too small and also in an awkward location. A description of the various rooms together with their rates can be downloaded from the HortPark website.

The booking process was very easy and HortPark staff were very helpful and easygoing. They also let us go in early to set up plus they happily let us store the birthday cake in their fridge before the party.

The birthday cake was from The Patissier. It was 2 kg and the base was strawberry shortcake. It was light, fluffy and just plain delicious. It received rave reviews from everyone, so I would definitely recommend getting your cakes from there. It was delivered straight to the venue.

The food was Peranakan (and halal), catered from Chilli Api Catering Pte Ltd. As usual, Richard and I catered too much, but the food was great, we received nothing but positive comments, so no regrets. If you are thinking of having your party at HortPark, it is a condition of the venue rental that you use one of HortPark's approved caterers, so you need to get their list of approved caterers. Chilli Api was one of them. We also got our dining tables and chairs from Chilli Api.

Toys, yes! The crucial key to the party's success! We rented the larger toys and brought smaller toys from Ryan's horde to create a big playroom for the children, which left their parents free to relax at the dining tables, chat and socialise. (Of course, do consider the ages of the children in deciding whether this will work for you.) We actually rented the toys from two different companies:

From Rent That Toy!, we got Little Tikes Super Ball Pit with 300 balls, Little Tikes PoliceCycle Sounds Rocker, Fisher Price Trike, Redbox Toys Electronic Play Kitchen with 30 pc accessories, and Vtech Build & Discover workbench.

From Singapore Toy Rental, we got a small indoor Bouncy Castle, Dolphin Slide with basketball hoop, Haenim big blocks and 20 pcs foam mat.

Both companies were fantastic, they were able to customise a package for me and were willing to swap items in and out of the package when requested.

We ordered walking animal balloons (helium filled) so that each child could take one home - this was a hit with the kids (goodie bags tend to be more interesting to the parents). We also ordered 50 standard 11" balloons for decoration. All balloons were delivered to the venue by the vendor, Babyterror. No fuss, no hassle.

The photographer, Kelvin, was from LOUD! Kelvin was fantastic, hardworking and creative. After the party, he took some outdoor family photos for us at the park. Kelvin is no longer with LOUD!, he has set up his own company. I will post some of the photos in my next post.

Ok, that's it!