The Bub in the Belly

Our dog, Max, came along too.

Something fun today.

I wanted to pen down the process that we went through when choosing a name for our son. Actually, it's a really short story - Ryan was the first name we chose - but we went through the process anyway.

So, yes Ryan was the first name we chose. It had an instant appeal for us, it sounded right. Nevertheless, we wanted to be thorough so, before committing to it, we threw up several other names, but none of them had that "connection" for us. I guess everyone wants a name that sounds nice. But there are many, many names that sound nice. Some people want a meaningful name. But there are many many names that are meaningful. Most people want both a nice-sounding name and a meaningful one but that doesn't narrow the choices by much.

For us, there was a third factor - we had to feel a connection. Some people are inspired by songs, by experiences, by people, and we did discuss some names along those lines. For instance, I toyed with the name Dylan, remembering Bob Dylan, but I decided that I wasn't inspired enough and I wasn't enough of a fan to name my son in his honour - besides, what if it turns out that he hates Bob Dylan?? So, although there had to be a connection, it couldn't be something majorly significant, because it could turn out to be absolutely meaningless to our son or worse, the source of our inspiration might turn out to be a completely turn off for him and be totally inappropriate.

Here, the fact that it started with the letter "R" was good enough. It was a small connection that didn't demand anything from our son. He didn't have to like the song that he was named after, he didn't have to read books by an author that he had no interest in, he didn't have to feel that he needed to live up to a biblical character, etc. Anti-climactic? Haha, it really was that simple for us.

And the meaning? "Ryan" means "Little King". Perfect.

There were other criteria, which was the pretty usual stuff - we didn't want to give our son the same name as a relative/friend/friend's son; we didn't want a name that would look odd on a Chinese boy; it had to be easy to pronounce (especially by the old folks); and we didn't want a name that you couldn't find on a souvenir. We didn't need a unique name or a name with a unique spelling - our son was already special in our eyes - we felt that having a unique name/spelling was more of a burden than a gift for the child. "Ryan" satisfied all that.

There was one more criteria - we didn't want an "old" name, ie. it had to fit into the present era. "Ryan" was definitely not an "old" name so no problem there. This was amply demonstrated yesterday. As I was watching Ryan Giggs play in a football match on TV, I thought it'd be fun to look up some of the well-known people with the name "Ryan" and so I did. I didn't get any people or characters from bygones ago. Instead, these hunks (and one beautiful lady) turned up!

Ryan Giggs. Hmm, I'm not a fan and he's not really my type, but he's apparently quite a ladies' man. Anyhow... he's fit, drives an Audi and is intensely loyal (to his club). Good enough.

Ryan Reynolds. Need I say more?


Ryan Gosling. No words. No words are necessary.


Ryan Seacrest. The most hardworking man around. He probably has twenty jobs going at the same time.



Ryan Atwood - the protagonist on the TV series "The O.C." played by Benjamin Mackenzie.

More decorations on our bookcase. The one in the middle says "Gong Xi Fa Cai".


A 7-ft plastic dragon adorned our windows, swooping low above our woodland creatures.


This one was pretty cute, five children on a dragon boat! I bought it because there were going to be five children attending the Chinese New Year gathering at our home (three boys and two girls, like in the boat). We hung it from the light above our dining table.

Here's a Youtube video of the children tossing the yee sang! The video is about 2:27 minutes long. Each child has a different style - Ryan is mainly moving the chopsticks left and right (vigorously) on the plate, Brayden is mainly moving his chopsticks in a circular motion, Matthias is mainly stabbing the plate, and Ern is quite demure and a little worried about the mess. They got into the spirit of things and most of them managed to do some tossing, especially Brayden! By the time they were done, most of the yee sang was no longer on the plate! I think the children had lots of fun, so hopefully we'll be able to give them the chance to do it again next year!



You can also see that Ryan is partial to his left hand although I don't think he has quite made up his mind yet which will be the dominant hand.

Red packets were distributed to the children and the party ended shortly after 10 pm. Each family left with a pair of mandarin oranges and each child left with a paper dragon and those chopsticks. This is the paper dragon (I got it from Chinatown). You hold one stick in each hand and stretch it out. Ryan loves it!

Oh, I wanted to show you what Shann's family brought for us! Garlic! As her daughter, Ern, passed them to me, she told me, "Huat ah!"

Shann & Ern

The usual group of parents organised a Chinese New Year get-together for the children on Sunday (5 February 2012) and everyone agreed to contribute in some way. On our part, we volunteered to provide the food and host it at our place. So for us, last weekend was a blur of cooking (with a little bit of art appreciation thrown in).

It seemed only right that we serve Chinese food and incorporate Chinese New Year dishes so the menu was yee sang, fried rice noodles (bee hoon), minced pork porridge, curry chicken, fried spring rolls, stir fried prawns in XO sauce, stir fried asparagus and chicken, egg foo yoong, koi fish-shaped agar-agar, and tang yuan (dumplings in ginger flavoured syrup). We decided to buy the first three and make the rest. I initially wanted to make the yee sang too, and had already bought some of the ingredients, but when I started planning the menu, I decided that I would focus on the other dishes instead and just buy a good quality yee sang (we ordered the salmon yee sang from Si Chuan Dou Hua).

So the day before, Saturday, was spent getting ready for the party, which for us meant going to the market to pick up some groceries and preparing the dishes that could be prepared in advance. When we got back from the market in the morning, I made the koi fish agar-agar. The moulds were made of very thin plastic and the first one was a disaster - the mould went out of shape when I ladled in the (too) hot liquid! I corrected my mistake and the following moulds turned out fine. I was very happy with the result!

These had fresh milk in the mixture, resulting in brighter colours.


These were without milk, giving a more crystalline appearance.


For lunch, we went into town. Richard did some banking while I picked up some extra plates, bowls and servingware. Then, we took some time out to go to the National Museum to visit the Dreams & Reality exhibition, which was a collection of mid-19th century to early 20th century works from the Musée d'Orsay in Paris. There were over 140 masterpieces including works by Monet, Degas, Renoir, Cézanne and Manet. Some of the highlights of the exhibition were Vincent Van Gogh's "Starry Night" and Alexandre Cabanel's "The Birth of Venus"!



Ryan was pretty intrigued with some of the paintings as you can see from the photos.


This was Cabanel's "The Birth of Venus". Absolutely breathtaking. Ryan was quite absorbed.



This was a Monet. Lovely.

When we got home, I started on the curry chicken. Richard helped me with that - he does like to pitch in and so I usually chop up and prepare all the ingredients while he does the work at the stove. I love curry chicken with potatoes and have been making this dish since I was about 14 years old. Actually, I think every Malaysian loves this dish. I made it less spicy and a little more creamy, as I wasn't sure everyone could take the heat. It used to puzzle me whenever someone asked whether the curry was hot - after all, isn't curry supposed to be hot? Malaysians never ask this question, but I find it quite common in Singapore.

Here's the curry chicken! We served it with bread and it soon became a dry rendang because everyone mopped up the gravy!


At night, I rolled the tang yuan - I must have rolled 500 of them! Ryan helped me and we worked until the wee hours of the morning, making baby tang yuan without filling and bigger tang yuan with gula melaka filling. Richard pottered around, tidying up the house, making sure all the cameras were fully charged and arranging the furniture.


The next day, we overslept and missed Ryan's swimming class! By the time we got out of bed, it was already half-past 11. I quickly chopped up and fried the filling for the spring rolls, letting it cool and drain. I made enough for 50 rolls.

The filling for the spring rolls

We went out to pick up more fresh ingredients as well as the fried noodles (which came with cabbage and fried chicken wings). Then it was off to Shichida class while Richard picked up the yee sang and the porridge (and dough fritters). After class and back home, it was a race to the finish! Teamwork was crucial - Richard went back to the stove to make the sweet soup for the tang yuan, while I cleaned the prawns, sliced chillies for the condiments, rolled the spring rolls, and marinated and chopped up the ingredients for the other dishes. Richard fried the spring rolls and cooked the rest of the dishes while I pottered around preparing everything else and setting the table.

We made it by the skin of our teeth - the families arrived just as Richard was cooking the last dish! I didn't have time to do a few things, like remove the price tags from our new plates/bowls, heat up the porridge and prepare a mini yee sang for the children (I asked Shann to do that by taking a small portion from the main yee sang, while I dashed upstairs for a quick shower). But that was all right. As long as the food was all there, our job was done!

After dinner, we all went back to Margaret's house where the children played their little games and the adults played their adult games (yes, mahjong). Later that night, we lit the "tian deng' (sky lantern). Here's a video of it (about 3 minutes long).



Ryan had tons of fun with his "gang", so much so that, when Richard and I met up with my ex-schoolmates for paella the next evening, we asked Margaret if Ryan could spend the evening with them and she graciously agreed. We knew that Ryan would be bored out of his mind if he went with us so it was a good decision - Ryan was pleased as punch to be with his cousins.

Richard and I had the luxury of some "adult" time, catching up with Kar Yee and Yin Yin over paella at Changkat Bukit Bintang. We picked Ryan up close to midnight and the report was that Ryan was very well-behaved and didn't fuss at all, he was happy and enjoyed himself.


The next day (Sunday), we met up with Margaret and family again for lunch at Mont Kiara and again, we let Ryan stay with them while we walked around the shops a bit. Managed to spend a bit of money on an oil painting by a Japanese artist, which just barely fit in our car boot.

In the evening, we drove to Mary's place. The initial plan was for the children to go swimming there but it started raining so we scrapped that. It's rather unusual for this time of the year, but it has been raining everyday.



Anyway, the children were happy to just hang out ...



... while Spiderman kept a close watch ...


... and the adults gambled (what else did you expect? heehee). Extremely small stakes were involved since it was all within the family (ie. pretty meaningless). This is Richard's immediate family - his parents and two sisters.



Guess how we ended the evening? With mahjong of course! Some friends came over and we played late into the night, milking every last drop of our holiday.

The next day it was back to work! Happy and refreshed!