The birth story

The day before he arrived, we were at Jardin de Plantes in Paris. On the way home, the usual 30mins drive became 2hours due to massive traffic. Saturday evening traffic in Paris was horrible. That was when the contractions started. On Sunday early morning, the contractions continued and became regular at 5 minutes interval at around 3.30am. I called my mid-wife, Adela and she said to go to the clinic and she would join us there. We arrived at 4.30am and Adela examined me. She prepared the labour room and at 5am, my obstetrician arrived. By 5.10am, the baby was out. Adela knew that I would like to have a natural birth and we worked towards it throughout my pregnancy. I was really pleased that the birth turned out as I wanted. No epidural or complications. So it was really true what people said about first delivery being long and subsequent ones would be faster. But neither Seb nor I expected it to be that fast.

I thank God for answering my prayers. Adela, my mid-wife was great. She knew that my first delivery was long and difficult. She did her best to ensure that I would get what I wrote in my first birth plan. I did not even bother to do a birth plan for this second one.

If you are looking for a mid-wife in the Parisian area, let me know. You won't be disappointed with Adela.

The wait is over

My second boy had arrived on sunday. He weighed 3kg100g and was 48cm. He arrived at the same term as his older brother; 39 weeks + 2 days.

Baby boy's name starts with an A, like his older brother. So I guess I have to call my Baby A, Baby 1 and this new born, Baby 2.

As usual, we engaged the services of Adela, my mid-wife and Dr Sabban, my obstetrician. I stayed at Sainte Isabelle Clinique as I enjoyed the service there for Baby 1. This time round, I took the suite since the room was entirely paid by my mutuelle. The rate was like that of a superior room in a 5 star hotel in Paris. Very expensive. The suite was spacious. I should have done that for my first stay instead of opting for the single room.

I stayed 3 nights there and though the food was alright, I longed for kebah and sushi. Seb delighted me with the best sushi he knew in Paris. (That was when he was still eating fish.) The fish were really fresh. I guess I had more craving for food than when I was pregnant.

We are all home now and as usual, mum is doing confinement for me. I can hardly wait for the confinement period to be over so that I can be FREE. Mum is not that strict but still, confinement is confinement!

Baby 1 takes well to Baby 2 and even kissed him. Baby 2 is adorable so far. Not a fussy baby. Or maybe because this baby business is not new to us, we are less stress up.

Oh yeah, when I was at the clinic, I met a nurse who did an internship at KK Hospital in Singapore. She knew about the confinement practise and we discussed a little. She was surprised to have a patient from Singapore and asked if my mum was going to sleep with me at night. I told her that my french husband would never allow that.

Waiting game updates

It has been almost 5 weeks since I am on maternity leave and I am still waiting patiently for baby number 2. In the first 3 weeks, I was told to rest tranquille and not move too much. Since 2 weeks, I had the go ahead to move as much as possible as we would like the baby to arrive way before term. In the hope for a short labour unlike for baby A's, the medical team (my obstetrician and mid-wife) would like me to give birth earlier. This was to avoid having a big baby. Baby A was 3.340kg and considered big for my petite frame.

So since 2 weeks, I had been active. When Baby A was at the child care, mum and I went to market, supermarket just to jalan jalan. During the weekend, we took walks in Paris. And with baby A around, we brought him to parks. He could have so much fun even in a small area of greenery. He is going to be 17 months soon and weighs about 10.7kg. Most of the time, he is happy. It is always a joy to watch him discovering new things.

Here, we were at a park nearby Anca's place. He had fun at the small playground and played for a long, long time.

Baby number 2 is very active in me. Whenever we asked baby A "Where's Didi (younger brother)?", he would sayang my tummy. Very sweet. Now, I'm just waiting for contractions. The whole family is so eager to see him and each day, we receive enquires asking if he has arrived. :) Soon, I hope.

Home made rice wine

Mum made some home made rice wine. It was easy to do it. Just need to prepare them in advance as it took about a month to yield about a bottle of wine. This wine is to be used for confinement recipes purposes. So far, she had made about 3 bottles. Just waiting to use it anytime soon.

Hoping that second baby comes anytime now.

What's cooking, mother?

I have been staying at home since a few weeks and have been enjoying home cooked food for almost all meals. Mum is amazing. Though I miss Singapore local food, I am often too laid-back to dish them up. But not my mum. Just make a wish and she would dish it up in no time. Of course, I have to drive her to Chinatown to get the ingredients.

So, we already had fried mee hoon with congee for breakfast.

Mum made char siew and then a few dumplings.And ended up, we had wan ton noodles for lunch.

Yong Tau Foo, my all time favorite. Mum diced up the chicken meat and stuffed the veggies and tofu with it. Really really delicious.

All these above food and others stuff she made can be acquired easily in Singapore. But over here, these are gourmets for me!

Singapore population tops five million

Singapore population is growing really fast.
I remembered that 10 years ago, 1 in 4 people in Singapore was a foreigner.
Now, the ration stands at 1 in 3.

Read this and this.

I doubt it will ever be 1 in 2 but 1 in 3 is really a high ratio. Living in France, this does not affect me but I wonder how does it affect the Singapore-born locals there. Any insights from you?

Figs

It is the season of figs. In France, I only saw violet colored figs and today is the first time I came across fresh green figs.

We bought some and these green ones were better than the violet ones. My mum is so in love with it that she would like to pack a box back home in January. But I doubt we can find fresh ones then. Better to enjoy them right now while they last.

Back in Singapore, she would have to settle for those dried figs.

Waiting game

I had stopped work since a week and am just waiting patiently for baby 2 to arrive. At the same time, I was nursing a very bad cough. It was so bad that I could not sleep at night and my ribs hurted when I coughed. My doctor was on holiday and his replacement could not gave me any treatment out of precaution. I was given a throat spray and some honey sweets. After more than a week, I went to see another doctor and this time round, he gave me anti-biotics for my inflammation throat. It had been 3 days since I started my treatment and I felt much better.
Baby 2 should be arriving by end of Sept. I had already packed his bag. Just another month to go. Patiently waiting for his arrival and hoping baby A will accept him fine.

We have big heads.

I had my third offical ultrasound scan last friday. This scan was to check the position of the baby and his measurements in order to determine if he would be a big or small baby at term.
Comparing with baby A's statistics at his third scan, baby A's brother was growing at the same rate as him. Everything about him was in the norm. His head circumference was however in the higher percentile. Baby A's head circumference was 36cm at birth. The delivery was not easy.

The sonographer explained that this could be due to genetics. She then took out a measuring tape and measured our heads. She took out her charts and confirmed that we were both in the 97th percentile. Seb and I both had big heads. It was not that obvious to the naked eyes and since we hardly bought hats, we never checked on the measurements.

Many months ago, I bought a cap size 12months from Petit Bateau for baby A. When he was a year old, I tried the cap on him. It was too small. I thought then that Petit Bateau had made a mistake in its label. Well, now I know better.

If you are interested to know if you have big heads, here's a link with the chart.

In the scan report, the sonographer added "head circumference: contexte familial".
I never thought that big heads could have bother me so much. I would prefer to have bigger feet so that it is easy for me to buy shoes!

Appeal to women to take caution when they choosing a man as their husband.

I happened to surf to PAP's website and saw this interesting headline:
CALL TO WOMEN TO TAKE MORE CAUTION WHEN CHOOSING HUSBANDS

However, the article was discussing about ways to tackle ex-husbands who do not provide maintenance payment to their ex-spouses and children. So did Cynthia Phua meant for us women to be careful when choosing husbands in general. But she did not provide what sort of cautions we should take. After reading the article, I thought she meant for us women to be extra careful when choosing a divorced man as husband. Or maybe never to take a divorced man who did not support his ex-family as husband.

Singapore is really a nanny state. We ladies even have to be told to take MORE caution when choosing husbands. That's what any mothers would say to their daughters isn't it?

In France, I understood that if a man did not support his ex-family as decree by law, the ex-wife could lawfully impose the ex-husband's company to transfer that sum of money from his salary to her account. That was what I heard and needed to be confirmed. Maybe I could suggest that to PAP.

How did he do it?

3 days ago, the weather station in baby A's room set off its alarm at 6am. The next day, it happened again. Somehow, baby A had managed to activate the alarm while playing with it. How he did it, I have no idea. We have the weather station (similar to this one) for years and I never bother with the alarm function. Seb finally figured out how to deactivate the alarm function yesterday night and he put it by his bedside this night as a precaution. He was the one who went into baby A's room each morning to switch off the alarm.

And this morning at 12am, we heard another alarm. Seb woke up but could not find the source. This morning, my mum told me that it was the alarm from the sliding world time calculator. It was a corporate gift from my previous company and it was always on the computer table. Yesterday, baby A played with it. Somehow, he set on the alarm function and by default, the alarm went off at 12am. My mum said she had to put the calculator under her pillow cos she did not know how to turn it off. I took 5 minutes this morning to figure out how to deactivate the alarm function. This was something that I never use.

Baby A had already played with phones and laptops and computers and had sometimes given us trouble. With the phone, he had called Seb's colleagues and my brother. He woke up my brother at 2am Singapore time and I got an email from Tim the next day. Oops. I deleted the neighbourhood police number from the phone in any case. With the computers, he had done things that we never knew existed. Magnifying the screen of Seb's laptop and giving his dad a hard time looking for his icons and putting the default settings back.

I hope that this night, we won't be awaken by any alarm any more.

So french and so singaporean

1. Riots, riots again.
2. Strikes, strikes non-stop.
3. Flooding in Singapore a common sight.

1. Grenoble, France. An armed robber was killed by the police during action. He had fired at the police first. What happened next was beyond me. Riots! In the suburbs Grenoble, people started to attack police vehicles and set cars on fire. The girlfriend of the killed robber had filed a complaint for the murder of her partner.

Saint-Aignan, France. A man in a car crashed thru' a police roadblock and was shot dead. Again, there were riots. Cars were set on fire, a city hall was set on fire, police station and shops were attacked.

Lost lives are never easy to accept especially for families and friends of the deceased. However, there is no need for material destructions. There are other canals of venting. I am not even sure how many of those trouble makers are real friends of the deceased.

2. Paris, France. Air traffic controllers were on strike 2 days ago. This had interrupted many holiday makers who were travelling during this summer holiday period. They were on strike over a plan to unify European airspace. This would affect their job status as public servants.

Pharmaciens were on strike a few weeks ago to protest against . . . . I had no idea and did not look up. Just heard it over the radio.

More strikes are forecasted for September. Students are going on strike due to increase charges for university entries; unions are organising massive strikes against the retirement age of 62.

3. Singapore, Singapore. It was amazing watching the videos of Orchard Road being flooded. Not once but a few times in recent months. In the videos, people were just patiently watching the rain and flowing water at the entrance of shopping malls. How could this happen in Singapore, I asked. Like everyone else. Yet, the Minister Mentor said that "Singaporeans expect everything to be perfect ". Who won't when the govt has a perfect income?

If he had said that to the French, would there be another riot or strike?

Flower arrangements

When we were at Brittany the last time, we visited a flower exhibition. Here are a few flower arrangements displayed for your viewing pleasure.

Summer sales is here

The summer sales is here. What are the damages to my wallet so far. . . . . .
I bought some summer maternity clothes from H&M Maman but all of them except for a 3/4 length pants were new collection. Thus, no discount.

Also got 2 Longchamps Pliage bags at half prices. A document bag and a big travelling bag. Of course there were not much choice of colors.
That's about it for me.
For Baby A, I bought some bodies from Petit Bateau, clothes from Absorba and Vertbaudet. I got some pyjamas and day wear for baby A from Vertbaudet and was surprised when paying that an extra 20% discount was given for more than 4 items bought. It was really a bargain.

As baby A was starting to walk and everyone stressed on the importance of having a good pair of walking shoes, I bought 2 pairs of Kickers for baby A. One for autumn and one for winter. Seb paid for them and though there were 30% discount, he was shocked by the price of such small shoes.
I really like the soles of these little shoes. They are cute, aren't they?
I think I am done with this sale. I am looking forward to the winter sales where I hope to get some bargains on clothes for myself and for the second baby.

Parc de Thoiry

Last Saturday, we went to the Thoiry zoo. It is famous for its safari drive through.
When we reached the safari, we took baby A out of his car seat and granny put him on her lap. The little boy was more intrigued by the fact that he was out of the car seat and started to explore the car. He was not interested with the animals roaming around. He even wanted to come to the driver's seat and Seb put him on his lap. Bad decision as baby A started to touch all the buttons. We had to put him back in his car seat despite his protests and only then, he started to be aware of the animals around him. Still, he was too young for this.
After the drive through, we visited the other part of the zoo by foot. The big attractions were the lions. A big glass tunnel allowed us to see these big cats up close and personal. In the ticket, it included a small palace for visitation. Nothing much special and in 15 minutes time, my mum and I were done visiting while Seb fed baby A his afternoon milkfeed.
I did enjoy the safari though I would still prefer Singapore's Zoo and Night Safari. Hopefully, baby A will appreciate it when we bring him to the Singapore zoo next year.

Munich again

I just realised that the last time we visited Munich was almost 4 years ago. Wow. Time flies. We spent 4 days over the long weekend to visit Nicole and celebrated her birthday.

The weather was great and at times too hot. This time round, we flew there. Once everyone was settled on the packed plane, the pilot announced that a technical problem had to be fixed before we could fly. It took 2 hours for the repairs to be done and during this time, no one could leave the plane because we were in the middle of no where. We took a bus to get to the plane. No other plane was available and some passengers were complaining as flights between Paris-Munich catered mainly to business purposes.

Baby A fell asleep once the plane started moving. He woke up only when we landed. My fear that he would have ear pressure due to altitude changes were unfound. At Munich, Nicole and her dad came and fetched us. We had a late lunch prepared by Nicole's mum before heading back to our hotel to freshen up. Baby A enjoyed exploring their home and even played with Nicole's childhood toys.

In the evening, we had dinner at Ratskeller's in the city hall's court yard. The next day, we celebrated Nicole's birthday at the Beergarden in the English Garden. During this trip, we visited the uptown, the Residenz Musuem and the Tresury Musuem. Seb had a great time browsing thru' the huge collection of Jazz and Classical CDs in Ludwig Beck and of course trying to be reasonable in his purchaes.

As the FIFA World Cup was going on, we watched in a beergarden the live broadcast of Germany against England on Sunday. Germany won and the atmosphere was great. Baby A entertained himself with the pebbles on the ground.

As this was not our first time in Munich, we were cool with this trip. No rushing, no plans. Just leisure. Still, we were dead tired at the end of each day. It was not easy to travel with a baby who just walked and me being pregnant. Baby A did not want to eat baby food jars and throughout the trip, we shared our meals with him. We ordered food in function of what Baby A could eat. One thing for sure, he loves bretzels and we love Munich.

He can walk while the other is starting to kick hard

At a few days short to 14 months old, Baby A is walking by himself. It had been weeks since he cruised from furnitures to furnitures. He could have walk by himself but due to lack of confidence, he would hold on to our finger to walk.

This week, he walked all by himself at his grandparents'. He spent a week there and I guess the big terrace and space in the house made him wanted to explore by himself. We had him back at home today and it was amazing seeing him walking all by himself. Now, we had to remember to close all doors especially the kitchen's.

And baby A's little brother was starting to give strong kicks. He weighed around 650 grams a week ago. It is always a special sensation to feel baby kicking in me. Just a few more months to see the little one in real life.

Volkswagen Touran

We changed car. I chose the color of our Nissan Note and this time, it was Seb's turn to choose the color for the new car. Finally, he got the chance to own a black car.

With technology advancement, this car offers more gadgets than our previous one. I was skeptical when told about the Park assist function. Well, we had our new car a few days ago and Seb tried it out twice. And it works!
Check out this demostration video.
It is amazing. Definitely an essential feature for me, who can't park parallel.

Saint Renan saturday market

When Tim and Carmen came visiting, we spent a few days at the summer house in Brittany. The last time Seb and I were there, it was during the week of 15 August, 2008. At that time, I was not aware that baby A was 10 days old in me.

Each time we come here, we make it a point to visit the Saturday market at Saint Renan. The market is full of local products and has a lively ambience.
Our visitors enjoyed the market. We bought strawberries, honey, bread, seafood, artichokes, crêpes etc.

For dinner, we had a spider crab and a normal crab. To cook them, just boil a big pot of water then put the crabs in for 20 minutes. The four of us (Seb and baby A not included) had an enjoyable time eating them.

Is global warming really bad?

Recently, I finished reading Michael Crichton's State of Fear. This book changed the way I think about global warming and islands disappearing and glaciers melting. It comes with facts that some glaciers are actually growing, islands would not disappear and not every cities are getting warmer.

I read this news onLow-lying Pacific islands 'growing not sinking' in BBC
Extract:
The islands of Tuvalu, Kiribati and the Federated States of Micronesia are among those which have grown, because of coral debris and sediment.

The study, published in the magazine the New Scientist, predicts that the islands will still be there in 100 years' time.

I would still make an effort to be environment friendly. But on news about global warming, I would take it with a pinch of salt.

Maybe this one article will give you a further insight.

Extrait:
All of this matters because the IPCC has been advertised as the last and definitive word on climate science. Its reports are the basis on which Al Gore, President Obama and others have claimed that climate ruin is inevitable unless the world reorganizes its economies with huge new taxes on carbon. Now we are discovering the U.N. reports are sloppy political documents intended to drive the climate lobby's regulatory agenda.

The lesson of climategate and now the IPCC's shoddy sourcing is that the claims of the global warming lobby need far more rigorous scrutiny.