Bugs, Hobbits and Adventures

Every year, I seem to be hit by at least one debilitating attack of acute bronchitis.

About 2.5 weeks ago, I caught a flu bug. Through a combination of factors - such as low immunity, lack of rest, overestimation of one's physical strengths, underestimation of how badly cold/rainy weather can exacerbate respiratory problems, gluttony and negligence - it developed to acute bronchitis. And that cost me 4 visits to the doctor, 5 days of medical leave this month and some strange side effects of the prescription medication such trembling fingers, blurred vision, headaches, nausea and disturbed digestion. I'm still not clear of the disease, but surely getting there.

The care and concern received from family, friends, colleagues and doctors have been overwhelming and great in aiding my recovery so far. Also, I've discovered the benefits of drinking apple cider vinegar with honey when a colleague made me try some.

Shu, for your sake, I hope there were some lessons learnt in this experience. Like NOT going on a hike to the Botanic Gardens when you were given 2 days of medical leave by a doctor TO REST.

 Nearer to the Tanglin Entrance of the Singapore Botanic Gardens

Swan Lake, Singapore Botanic Gardens

It was good weather to be outdoors!

I even found a reptile to stalk

These orchids were called Golden Showers. However, back in Sri Lanka they are called Kandyan Dancers because of their resemblance to dancers of a traditional dance originating from my hometown.

The outing turned out to be good for my soul, but bad for my lungs.

At the peak of the wretched disease, my parents began to worry obsessively about me. Mostly because all my housemates had left the country on their respective holidays.

Mother : If you are not careful, the next stage is PNEUMONIA (aka. death in the Dictionary of Mothers).
Father: Do not drink anything cold or eat anything right off the refrigerator.
Mother: STOP entertaining that cat and change your linen because there must be cat fur lying around!!
Father: Do you have any of the herbal oil I gave you? If you apply that before sleeping, you will have some relief from congestion.
Mother: REMEMBER to inhale steam before you go to sleep! And cover up.
Father: If you don't recover, may be you should fly down home so we can look after you.
Mother: DO NOT touch cold water!
Mother: STOP showering in the early mornings and getting exposed to the cold air outside! No wait, STOP showering altogether for a few days.
Mother: I WARNED you that you are having a bad spell according to your astrological influences. Are you remembering to be religious and all that???
Father: Why don't you let your mother come over there for a few days to look after you?

Shu: Whoa! No, that won't be necessary. Let me ask around to see if any of my friends would like to babysit a bronchitis-ridden patient for a few days.

Luckily, I found a willing volunteer. Ryuu, to the relief of my worried parents, very kindly agreed to leave behind all creature comforts and watch over me last weekend. You know, in case I died from pneumonia according to my mother. Ryuu ran to my aid from the room next door several times when I woke up in the middle of the night with coughing fits and brought me hot water to soothe the throat. Thank you immensely, Ryuu. I owe you about two month's supplies of lentil curry.

I would like to say the same about myself in being a good nurse. Unfortunately, human patients in my night watch will not receive the medical attention they need since I probably won't wake up to hear their calls for help. I promise I'm a better nurse during the day watch.

We made the most out of a depressing situation by doing a movie marathon of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (2012) and The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug (2013). That was fun and compulsory because I planned to catch the finale of the series this week. I've grown 2 years older since Mr Peter Jackson started the The Hobbit movie series in 2012 and ended it this month! And 4.5 years older if I counted the time since I first read The Hobbit.

Hurrah!! A day off for Christmas and The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies (2014) awaits.

Merry Christmas to all the children out there!

It's the holiday season when people are smiling more and feeling generous, regardless of their religious beliefs. I wish people were like that the whole year round. Then maybe fewer innocent children will die in the hands of psychopaths.

I spend far too much time deciding on gifts to my giftees. I only realise after I buy the gift  that I spent HOURS in deep meditative thoughts trying to picture the perfect gift for the giftee, given the information I have about them. I tend to forget where I am, or how late in the day it is, or that I haven't checked my phone (which is on silent mode) for awhile or that I didn't have dinner while I browse through carefully selected stores.

Today, my mission was to buy two small gifts for a set of 3-year old twin girls. The stores are filled with expensive, useless and potentially toxic things for children and to find something my giftees will benefit from was a task that took me nearly two hours. I've never met the duo, but their loving mother is one of my closest colleagues and through her, I've heard so much about these two little people in the past two years. As I gather, they are in the entertaining age of learning to read and imitating what adults say.

Seriously Shu, how hard is it to pick something for two little girls??? 
Just pick something pink and girly. 
*Looks at a Barbie interactive sticker book to paste clothes on dolls* *spits*
*Looks at several gender segregated "Books for boys" and "Books for girls"* *shakes head* 
No! I'd rather get them something educational or at least age-appropriate and gender-neutral
How about Roald Dahl or Enid Blyton ?
Urgh. They are only 3! They can't read that well yet.
But do you have a big budget?
No, not this time of the month when I'm on peasant-mode.
Then, just pick up something!! They are kids and they'll only care about your gift for a few minutes before they forget all about it!
True. Then I should get something the parents will be involved in. Like a bedtime story book!

After much deliberation and sorting through shelves of books and piles of toys, I found two books which I liked very much on first glance (No, the large pictures of animals had nothing to do with it! *grins*). I read through the books to ensure it was age-appropriate and useful for the girls.

Somehow, reading the books made me remember how awesome my parents are. And I was immediately hit by waves of emotions and strong memories of how the both of them brought me up when I was younger. I may have gotten a bit teary too. Somehow, it didn't seem to matter that I'm almost 30 or that the recipients were just 3-year olds; the essence of the book applied to anyone who was fortunate enough to have felt the warm embrace of loving and caring parent figures.

Yes, my daddy drives us home safely when all of us have fallen asleep while travelling on very long journeys and he endured many hardships while working overseas to put us through a good education.

Yes, my daddy is good at many subjects like Mathematics, Physics and English. He's very organised and patient. He has green fingers too.

Yes, my daddy used to make sure I was well wrapped, strapped (and awake!) while riding to school in his motorbike. He is still very concerned when I fall ill.

Yes, my daddy did buy me my first bicycle and taught me how to ride it. And he's bought me many cool toys like a TV game and a microscope.

Yes, I used to fall asleep on the couch while watching TV and my daddy used to carry me to my bed.

Yes, they both look very good in pictures of him and my mom in their early twenties!

Yes, he doesn't always crack jokes, but when he does, they usually hilarious!

When I was a kid, I used to suffer from excruciating ear pains and kept them both up through the night with my bawling. He would place his large hands over my ears to keep them warm till I calmed down.

Yes, he does that ALL the time! He would be very restless if he didn't have gadgets, appliances and vehicles to fix.

I'm not sure if my Daddy tried this when I was a baby.

Yes, my Daddy is one of the kindest and gentlest souls I know.

Yes, my Daddy's never short of ideas!

And how fortunate that he is my Daddy!

Yes, my Mummy is so adventurous that I've been to many interesting places and situations in her company. She's always pushed me to be bold and open to new adventures!

Yes, I made my Mummy run in circles around the house and tell made-up stories, just so she can feed me a plate of food. Most Asian children are spoilt like that.

Yes, my Mummy's been very protective and watched us over like a hawk. She still tries to help in every way possible even though I am miles away from home.

Yes, my Mummy's taught me countless little things that still make good sense and has made me the independent and strong willed woman I am today.

Yes, my Mummy is very pretty! Even in her 60's.

Yes, my Mummy's the one in the family who loves to hug and kiss everyone the most!

Yes, my Mummy still does when I go home for the holidays. And she constantly thinks of her children who are overseas whenever she makes their favourite food.

Yes, my Mummy does love perfumes!

Yes, after my Mummy managed to catch me (a once-mischievous kid) first. If not for her perseverance, I would have been very happy to go for months without a bath.

Yes, my Mummy loves to sing and has a huge collection of tracks in her internal jukebox, spanning several languages!

Yes, my Mummy is always warm and I still feel safe knowing she is around.

Lucky for my Mummy, I am a deep sleeper! She even used to give me haircuts while I was asleep.

Yes, I used to tag along with her to most places she went, mostly clinging on her handbag. No matter how old or independent we get, our mothers will always look to us as their children.

I'm sure the twins won't feel the emotions I felt when I read these books, but I hope they enjoy them, when I hand it over during Christmas dinner at their house tomorrow!

This year, I couldn't be home to celebrate my nephew's 7th birthday with the rest of the family. Instead, I had to send his present early through one of my friends flying back to Sri Lanka. Through a lucky coincidence, the gift reached him on his birthday day after travelling many miles across the seas, just moments after he cut his cake! It wasn't too hard to pick his gift which included a Minecraft Construction Manual, a few dinosaur eggs from the zoo gift shop which I hear just hatched in a jar of water and a glow-in-the-dark plastic skeleton as tall as him (I warned his mother not to freak out when it glows at night).

The skeleton was an obvious choice because he showed promising signs of being a bone expert in his school assignment (see picture below). I thought it was pretty good advice for preventing osteoporosis, coming from a 6-year old. It also made me realise how little we appreciate our "butt bones", that help us sit and do fun things like blog!

The nephew's handiwork. We are all proud of his imagination.

Sweet delirium

This is a true story. In the event that the moral of this story becomes unclear, it is this: if you don't use a certain skill, you lose it.

My father who was an Engineer by profession is very good in his mathematics. I doubt there was anyone to match him in the family, except maybe his father. There's a small chance I am being biased, but there was never a mathematics problem he couldn't solve for me. Whenever I hit a brick wall in my school mathematics, my father was the last resort I turned to. Yes, the last.

That's because in asking him how to arrive at a simple answer like for my secondary school homework, I almost always ended up getting a 1-2 hour long lecture on how to derive the formula for the area of a circle or how to calculate large sums in my head without writing it down (calculators back then were a big No). With my very short attention span, it didn't take long before I lost interest and fidgeted in my seat. I sometimes thought of clever ways to expedite the lecture like cheating at mental math calculations by counting with my fingers under the table. I'm sure he saw right through me, but he never gave up and had the patience of a saint to repeat things. I didn't fully appreciate it much back then, but the mental training helped me greatly to cope and have a sustained interest in the subject till I passed high school. After that, I didn't have to use mathematics that much. And then came mobile phones with calculators. And Microsoft Excel with formulas to think for you.

For him, it was always about understanding the logic behind a calculation and breaking it down to the basics before attempting to solve it. Any seemingly ugly and complicated problem becomes clearer and simpler when you break it down to its roots. That logic even applies to life in general! And if any teacher succeeds in making students see mathematics in this light, it probably won't be the enemy it is today and more students might enjoy the challenge of finding solutions to mathematics problems.

Every subject has its own merits and demerits. For me, mathematics in school used to be a refreshing change to all the abstract, illogical, grey and subjective answers that other subjects accepted. No matter how you arrived at an answer, you either got the right answer or you didn't. Anyone made to understand the logic behind arriving at the answer, should theoretically arrive at the same solution. So it's no surprise that literature, poetry and art weren't my best friends in school and I struggled a lot with interpreting the true meanings and intentions behind certain words, phrases and actions. I still struggle with those sometimes.

A lot of people complain about what a waste of time primary and secondary schooling was and how we aren't using most of what we learnt, or remember anything for that matter. Some say that if we spent more time doing something related to a profession as early as possible, they would be a lot more successful in life. Well, probably. But how can anyone know what it is that we were going to end up doing? How can we know what our strengths and interests are without being put through different tests?

Besides being a convenient way to keep energetic children confined in one place for several hours, school is a place that gives exposure to various subjects and opens minds. It's not all a fun experience and every time I see small weary kids being dropped off school buses lugging heavy bags, I think to myself "Oh thank goodness I'm not in their shoes!". Even subject matter learnt in university for thousands of dollars becomes forgettable and redundant after a few years.

My take is that under pressure and repetitive actions, places like these are where our neurons become programmed to think in certain patterns and our brain makes complex connections which we don't always understand in full. And these complex associations come to our aid later as we make sense of the world around us and act out. School also helps to develop discipline, build character and social skills as we are forced to interact with other humans. So really, the subject knowledge that one graduates with is as temporary as the paper that one's degree conferment is printed on. The only way to retain some of that knowledge or any skill for that matter is by putting it to practical use. In the end, we are only as good as what we practice the most.

I'm not sure how much of all that made sense because a short while ago at the doctor's, I was told my immune system is compromised with a flu bug and that I'm infectious.

I've been tasked with the burden of keeping house-related accounts. And to finally arrive at the point of this blog, last week a nearly 30-year old me, messaged my father to ask how to calculate a simple secondary school mathematics problem. I asked Ryuu first, but although the answer was correct, I received a suspicious "$12 isn't much. Just pay it yourself and ask them to buy you dinner later" answer, after which I had concerns about Ryuu's current mathematical abilities.

The moment I sent that message, I got a call from my father right away. Really, it didn't warrant a call? Turns out my mother intercepted the message, read the first line and jumped into the speedy conclusion that I was having a mental breakdown and pushed my father to call me. I kid not. After misunderstandings were cleared by both parties, we had a good laugh.

My logic was flawed. The simple answer was 9x + 30x = 52

It was a little embarrassing, but family tends to forgive.

In other developments, captive rhinos are a lot gentler than I assumed. Two massive rhinos ran us to get a token feed of bananas (and stayed behind a big log) last weekend. They had huge slobbering lips. Giraffes are a lot faster than I imagined. One moment I had a carrot stick in my hand and in a split second, a long prehensile tongue appeared and the carrot stick vanished.

Our competitors from training last week extended a friendly gesture by inviting the losing team (that's us) to join them in sharing the prize of feeding these giant herbivores