Bintan Agro Resort_Nov 20-21,2010

We booked a 2D1N trip to Bintan Agro Resort from 20-21 November to celebrate both our birthdays in Nov. It's been a long time since we last went on a trip by ourselves. the last one was to Phuket in Jan 2010..so this trip was really a good getaway for both of us to rebond and spend some good time with one another...

Bintan Agro Resort is located in the south-eastern coast of Bintan Island. You have to take a 1 hour and 45 mins ferry from Tanah Merah to Tanjung Pinang followed by a 45 mins transfer from the ferry terminal to reach there.

We took the 8.50am ferry from Indofalcon and thus we set off to Tanah Merah about 7.15am. Parked the car, got our ferry tickets, went for a quick breakfast (coffee, tea, bread and eggs), quick smoke, went through the boarding gate and onto the ferry..the lower deck of the ferry is already full by the time we got on so we had to sit on the upper deck which is open... becoz it's early morning, the sun isnt scorching hot.. thanks god... and the sea breeze was damn good in the face.. not too bad after all..

On the ferry

After about 1hr and 30 mins, we arrive at Tanjung Pinang. The queue to clear customs was really long and it really took us quite a while as we were almost towards the last of the queue..Met up with the local staff from the resort who will arrange for our land transfer and after about 45 mins drive, we arrived at the resort!! Checked in and went straight to our room..

Our Junior Suite

View from our room

The room was big and spacious. Rest & relax for a while before heading out to the Asiana Bistro and Bar for lunch. Hubby ordered Fried Rice and I ordered Fried Noodles. His came with fried egg, satay and rice crackers and mine came with fried chicken wing and fried egg. Nice....


View from Asiana Bistro & Bar

While waiting for food

Nice Food

After that, we took a walk around the resort.. it's a nice quiet resort with a recreation centre providing some sea sports activities and day tours to nearby islands, 2 places to eat, 1 spa and 2 small swimming pools..good for people like us who are not planning to do much anyway. They spent quite a bit of work to keep the grounds green & tidy.. you kept seeing people sweeping the floor of leaves...clearing puddles of waters, trimming weeds etc.. me and hubby grew up in kampungs so we are quite fine with the whole rustic kampong feel to the whole place..









After our walk, we went back to the room and I caught up with some sleep.. getting a little dazed from not having enough sleep.. haha.. then we went to our spa session at Oceania Spa at 4pm Indo Time.. Hubby went for thai massage which was conducted at the outdoor beach gazebo at the beachfront (Nice!) and I went for the aromatheraphy massage which is conducted in one of the rooms with seaview.. but there isn't any point seriously since you can't hear the waves neither can you feel the seabreeze neither can you see the seaview as you are facing down?? Still prefer the spa at KTM resort. I signed up for a 90 mins sessions but most of the time seem to be spent on massaging my legs as compared to my shoulders and the indo lady that was massaging me didnt have a very good command of English so I never asked her to do more of my shoulders.. never mind.. at least we both had a massage

Stayed in our room for a while since we are not that hungry from our very late and filling lunch.. only headed out for dinner at the Sun Moon Restaurant and Bar at around 8pm coming to 9pm i think.. ordered steamed rice with baby kailan, oatmeal sotong and chilli crabs with beer! I had the chilli crab craving for a long time now and I am so happy that I finally get to lay my hands on crabs! The food is seriously good...and it's good to have a proper nice meal with hubby...

Our Dinner
Hubby with his food

Then it's back to the room for more beers and sleep! Woke up super early the next day because the sun was super bright and shining into the room at 6am in the morning.. gosh.. and I thought I can sleep late... duhz.. but anyway we managed to fall in and out of sleep until 9am before we headed out for breakfast.. breakfast spread was okay.. much better than the fried rice, fried beehoon and fried noodles plus bread at KTM. They have counters cooking eggs, fried kway tiao and roti prata, lotong, fried fritters etc etc.. at least more varieties.. had a good breakfast, confirmed our late check out at 3pm and stayed in the room till then.. (since our land transfer is only coming at 4pm and our ferry is at 6pm Indo time..). Checked out and headed over to Sun Moon for our lunch.. which is Sun Moon fried rice (very special) and sambal kang kong.. (another craving of mine)

On the way to Sun Moon

Me & hubby
During low tide

While waiting for food
Our Lunch

Then it's time to make our way home... the top deck of the ferry this time is packed with people.. maybe because it's night time and not so hot as compared to the morning or afternoon ferry but at one point I was seriously thinking the ferry is overcrowded man... but anyway we made our way home safety and by the time we got home, it is already past 10pm... home sweet home

一切掌握在你手里

小时候，因为身体的一些缺陷，被同年龄的同学给排斥，给他们取笑。那个时候很伤心。不知道人家为什么要怎么说我。我妈当时跟我说，别人要怎么说你不要紧， 不要去管他们。别人的嘴巴是他们的，他们要说什么随便他们。不要因为他们所说了而影响你以后的生活。命是你的，生命也是你的， 你要怎么过是你自己的事，跟别人没有关系。

其实有一些事发生时好像是一件很大的事，那个时候很生气很伤心，可是过后就会发现其实没什么。人要看开。不看开的话，一切都很重要，生活永远都难过。佛学说生不带来，死不带去，一切要放下放开，亲情， 爱情，金钱等等。我没有那么伟大。我放不下我的父母，我的家庭，我的爱情，还有我的孩子等等。太多太多的东西，抱住不愿意放下。所以我选择了珍惜。珍惜现在所拥有的一切。至少到我走的那一天，虽然不能带走任何东西，至少我拥有过，我有回忆，我也给了别人回忆。人生原本是那么简单。

Birthday

In the past birthdays are meant to be celebrated for myself. After I became a mum, birthdays have taken on a brand new meaning. Birthday meaning birth - day: is the day my mum gave birth to me after going through 9 months of pregnancy and hours of labour pain. From this day onwards, my mum began her never ending job of taking care of me and worrying for me. So every birthday is much more symbolic than mothers day. Thus all my birthdays will now be celebrated for my mum, who gave birth to me on the very day known as my birth - day. Just like I told Gerald on his 1st birthday, this is the very day I gave birth to you.

Sulky Gerald

He is all dressed up and waiting by the door to go out



But we continue to dilly dally and the boy got impatient



Haha silly little boy.....

My new hairstyle

New haircut

Basically got sick of my hairstyle so i am going to walk into a hairdresser today and get them to give me a new hair style and a brand new look. Hmmmm wondered how it is going to turn out.

Playgroup search...

Time really fly.. Last year I just gave birth to Gerald and now he is 18 months and going to a playgroup soon! After which he will be going to nursery then kindergarden then primary school.. wow..

Anyway I am clearing my annual leave for this week so I got a couple of things on my list to do.. brought Gerald to the polyclinic for his last injection and a development checkup.. Of coz everything is okay... hubby is on leave yesterday also as it is his birthday.. so after Gerald check up, we went around looking for a centre near us that offers playgroup classes which Gerald can join next year 2011... as we were too late yesterday, all the centres were closed so this morning, I went to have a look again while classes are going on together with Gerald and my mother in law. Preferred the one at blk 32 as compared to blk 8. But we'll see..

He will get the chance to socialise with other kids and learn how to play as a group which is good because at home, being the only son, he is always by himself.. need to learn how to share, give and take... I believe it will be good for him...

Gerald latest update

He is a big boy now! Just turned 18 months a few days ago

I'm back!

Haven't been able to blog for quite some time now..(last blog was in Feb10..OMG).. but now I 'm back...hopefully with the help of a iPhone 4.. it will encourage and enable me to blog more often in the future... I am actually quite keen to keep this blog going because I want it to be a record of Gerald growing up...not so much for people to see but more of the things that happened in my life and in our life.. so we can look back and remember some things that we might have forgotten 10 or 20 years down the road... after all I have been writing my blog since 2004! That's 6 years running!

Updates

Wow I havent updated since Jan 19. Haha..

Nothing much happening with Gerald recently..

He is down with a virus infection.. been coughing and sneezing with runny nose for the past week. and is currently on antibotics medication... but he is recovering (I think) coz he is slowly starting to increase his milk and also sleeping better in the night... just thank god he didnt have fever...

He still cannot crawl... neither can he walk.. but he is surely using a lot of his energy by hitting the table and anything he can get his hands on.. throwing things onto the floor... rolling around his bed and onto his tummy, trying to stand up by holding onto the table or anything that he can grab on.... he can mumble but I am not sure whether he have any ideas what he is actually talking about or he is just making sounds for the fun of it... I sometimes think he find it real amazing to have sounds coming out from his mouth... he sometimes go "mamamamaaa... papapapaaaa... ahhhhh maaaaa... " but not sure whether he know that 'mammmaaaa" refers to me as his mother and vice versa..

His two bottom teeth is now completely visible but his two top teeth doesn't seem to be coming out as yet... been "stuck" for quite some time now.. Let see.. he is now 9 months.. we will be bringing him to Genting Highlands for the Chinese New Year break.. will be his first time away from home for a holiday... hope he will enjoy it.. and hope he will do fine... if he does, we might consider bringing him to Australia when he is 1 yr old... which is in another 3 months... gosh that is fast..!!!

Gerald sat up.

Gerald is becoming more and more amazing these days.

Yesterday while me and hubby are changing clothes for him, he managed to pull himself up into a sitting position from a lying position! Me and hubby got so shocked that we were staring at each other and gerald for like 5 mins! Wow!

Updates

It's 2010!!!! Gerald is already 8 months old and another 4 months later, he will be 1 year old!! Wow doesn't time simply flies..

He is now at his teething stage and starting to become rather fussy... but he is also starting to understand a little of what we are trying to say or tell him or show him at times.. like when he finished his food, we will say no more.. and show him our empty hands and the empty cup/bowl and he will understand and if he is still hungry, he will also try and tell you in his baby language by going.. ah ah ah or if he is really hungry... mummm mummm.. like the other day we say we going gai gai and he actually went over to the door and waited..

Nowadays he has also become rather clingy.. he wouldnt let you out of his sight now.. once you disappeared from his sight.. he will start crying.. which is rather bad.. especially when you urgently need to use the loo! He haven't start to crawl even though he already have the pose.. hahaha.. and he is starting to pull himself up from a sitting position.. to a standing position... even though most of the times he ended up sitting back onto the floor... the other day he stood all by himself.. while holding on the table of coz.. and today he actually walked quite a distance holding on to his walker... with me supporting behind him.. woohoo.. although I can already imagine myself chasing after him when he can walk all by himself.. oh no..

Latest pics of him

Importance...

Was reading a magazine the other day.. and came across this very meaningful paragraph in the article...article is in chinese.. so here's the translated version....

To love someone, sometimes it is very difficult..
Because of him, you now have to worry...
You become too busy worrying that you lost yourself
And forgot about why you are both so much in love...
Without him, yes you do have more of your own space..
But still every night you hope he will sleep by your side
Everywhere you go, you hope he will come along with you..
He has become so important, that you become more paranoid..
Only when you learn to let go, then you will love him more..

Somehow Gerald has become him... because of him in my life, I am constantly worrying... so much so I lost myself in the endless world of worrying about him... sometimes I do crave for my own space.. but still a part of me remains with him.. still worrying.... what is he doing now, is he sleeping, is he eating well.... the list continue... I hope to see him by my side.. and yes I have become paranoid.. so much so I can't enjoy my time with him without worrying if a "Ah" mean something... other than him trying his best to talk...

A frenz asked me the other day.. so when can you rest? I replied.. not till the day I died.. becoz he is my kid and he is my worry forever till the day I died... that's a mum for you... now I completely understand why my mum still insisted on taking care of me now even though I insisted that I am already a adult and know how to take care of myself.... that's a mum for you... that's mums around the world

Long time..

been a long time since i last updated this blog.. but i haven't forgotten it at all...

life has been full ever since Gerald came into our life.. hardly have time to do anything else, personal and couple wise..other than Gerald growing up, the rest in my life seem to be at a standstill.. no more nothing... no more romance, no more couple time, no more my time... when we go out Gerald is always in tow.. even if he is not, we also dunno where to go.... i spent most of my free time with Gerald.. because i wanted soo much to be part of his growing up process.. so it has almost become work and Gerald..

me and Rick is making a long trip to Phuket.. 5 days 4 nights.. it's going to be our 1st trip on a plane.. and we are planning to do lots of snorkelling... hopefully the trip will do us good.. although in fact we just made a 2 days 1 night trip to Port Dickson by ourselves.. but finally everything is booked and confirmed.. so now we just have to wait...

finally realised how much i have aged... with my yellowish looking skin, it's worse and double the impact.. suddenly feel like a old hag.. and i just got married for 2 years, my kid is just less than 1 yr.. i looked around at my peers and sometimes think... did i make the right choice in my life...?? when everyone is enjoying their youth at their prime.. i am married and with kid..

there is always a start to everything.. so i hope it is still not too late now to go for facials to revitalise my skin, to have a proper skincare regime to maintain it, to learn proper make up to enhance my looks further and to have a change of wardrode.. there are things i cant change.. but hopefully i can still change the rest..

hopefully 2010 will be better... get rid of the old and the bad, and move on to a new beginning and hopefully a new life...

More Photos of Gerald

Gerald at Sakae Sushi..



Gerald trying to drive Daddy's car..


Announcement
Gerald now has his first two front teeth!!!

He is a model

I like this pic of Gerald a lot. He looks like a model in a mag shot or something

UPDATE

Havent update for quite some time. Gerald is growing up!

Chair at Toys r us

Gerald very cute chuckle!

High Chair

Brought Gerald out to AMK Hub today together with my parents.. my parents brought a walker for Gerald so he can sit and play in it whenever he is over at our place during the weekend..

After which, we went down to Sembawang for dinner since my bro is flying off to Australia tomorrow... and for the first time Gerald sat in a high chair.. and this time he seem happy about it.. the previous time we tried to put him in a high chair he started crying the very min he was in it.. I am surprised this time he didnt make a big fuss..

Pictures of him happily enjoying his first high class dinner experience..