a day of firsts

(jennie – i am happy to give you a green curry recipe, but do you want a slow cooker or regular recipe?)

the slow cooker made its appearance today thank you very much in the form of….drum roll please….

chicken adobo.

this philipino dish is not a traditional slow cooker meal, but after a quick call to lita i felt confident enough to give it a go.

threw it together in five minutes (the longest part was waiting for the chicken to defrost) and then set it to low for five hours and 30 minutes. it felt good not to be rushed around dinner time, it gave me some extra time on the playground, where i played hide n seek with the kids. they love that game right now although they always hide in the same spot and call me over to it.

around the allotted time, i set out the plates, put on them french loaf brushed with a bit of olive oil, some broccoli, and with some trepidation, took off the cover of the slow cooker.

it looked marvellous in there and smelt even better. i popped a portion on each plate.

my audience of four was thrilled to see the bread but wasn’t so impressed with the other two items on their plate. only sebastian ate solidly. surprisingly, jasper did as well. sela whinged quite a bit and ignored her chicken, insisting, "i will make a broccoli sandwich", and she did, popping her broccoli on top of her french bread and popping it down the hatch. carys was quite good.

after five minutes or so, i gave them all a glass of milk. jasper was ignoring his broccoli and for some reason, as i put his glass of milk infront of him, i decided that this should be the day he had his broccoli.

"jasper," i said, "tonight you are going to eat your vegetables". immediately, jasper began to whimper. "i doan like vegetables!" he exclaimed, real tears fillng his eyes.

i picked up a fork and put a floret of broccoli on it. jasper’s eyes widened and then narrowed as he saw this redwood approaching him. "hide it!" he beseeched. "please hide the broccoli!"

suddenly i said, "jasper, cover your eyes and count to 10. and when you’re done, i want you to say, ‘ready or not, here i come broccoli’!"

and he covered, counted and consumed.

living taxes

charles sent me a one word email the other day:

DONE!

he had bought me the slow cooker!

it is divine.

tomorrow it gets it’s inaugural performance.

wednesday it also will be used – i have to make a green chicken curry for 16 women. it will be another crock pot attempt.

i went shopping for the supplies today. shopping carts in hong kong are much smaller than they are in north america, and eight double chicken breasts and condensed milk comprised most of the carts entirety. i chose to shop at chi fu, not because the park n shop there also has a wet market which sells flowers and i needed lillies, but because this park n shop is cheaper than other park n shops.

this is a very odd thing about hong kong. although park n shop and wellcome are chain grocery shops, each shop individually prices its items. the most expensive shops tend to be in the most expat centred locations. the price difference between baguio villa and chi fu is substantial, although the distance between the locations is less than 10 minutes.

same product, different deomographic of shoppers, so different prices.

welcome to hong kong.

constant craving

these past few weeks as the cold weather has really descended upon hong kong, i have been shivering away, and of course i am screaming for warming comfort food.

hearty stews.

thick soups.

casseroles.

i’m craving a crockpot.

or a slow cooker, if you’re not into using trademark expressions.

it’s been a bit of an obsession. i even went to causeway bay (and those of you who know me know it is my least favourite area of hong kong) and sussed out two department stores in search of a slow cooker. no dice.

i sent charles masses of text messages, instructing him on the slow cooker i hoped he could get me while he is in aus, while i trolled the internet, finding the crockpot recipes that i would make first. spicy beef curry stew won, while charles wants chicken in wine (typical!).

i made a steak in wine stew for the kiddies the other night…the first night the kids turned up their nose at it. undeterred, i told the young ‘uns that they would be eating the casserole the next night and instructed marianne and gary to NOT let the kids snack after 2.30pm. they raced around the playground and by dinner, they were very hungry. they were surprised to learn that they actually liked stew and dumplings. imagine that!

it was a very good stew. i was worried about the dumplings, but they were very nice too.

and the manipulation was a nice touch.

moving stomachs and people

sela threw up today at school. her timing was impeccable. she waited until she was out of the car, looked up and said, "my tummy feels like it is going to vomit". and then as everyone scurried around looking for a rubbish bin, sela opened her mouth and vomitted everything she has eaten since last week onto the sidewalk.

she quickly changed into her change of clothes and assured everyone that she didn’t want to go home, "i want to stay here". and then, still pale she trotted into small world and had a very good morning.

some sad news for two of the men in my world –

for jasper – asha and shae – his two best friends (remember the gorgeous little girl he is dancing with in charles’ blog, where jasper is wearing the white captains’ hat and the curly haired girl is wearing the princess dress?) are moving to australia. i haven’t told him because quite frankly, i don’t want to see him cry.

for sebastian – rufus is moving. at this stage of the game all the boys in his class have friends…and now sebastian’s best friend is leaving. i am a little bit devastated for my little blonde boy.

thank goodness carys is relatively normal.

come home soon, charles, we need you.

quirky hong kong

as sebastian and i were walking up water street today with intentions to head over to pokfulam road, we stopped and i bought him a banana.

as i was paying for bananas, my eyes rested on the pokfulam post office, and it reminded me of a 2004 post office incident.

i had received a packet from a friend and took a break from the nicu to trot down to the post office (if you take the #55 bus it drops you one block from the post shop and picks you up across the street from it) and pick up the post office. i felt so proud of myself because i had actually gotten off my tookus and down to the post office.

postal offices are very efficient in hong kong, and there was maybe one person in the line infront of me. after they had collected their parcel, i stepped up to the counter.

"good afternoon, how can i help you?" the fellow greeted me.

"parcel pickup!" i smiled back.

"where’s your form?" he asked me, quite properly.

and then i realised i had forgotten it. oh bloody hell.

"i forgot it" i confessed. then i realised that language was going to be a barrier, so i lifted up my handbag and indicated that the paper was not going to be found on my person or my accessories.

the fellow asked for my name and address, which i happily supplied. he came back with the packet, and asked me, "who is it from?"

and then i realised that although i was very good friends with this person, i could only remember her screen name. it was a brain blurp. honestly. i thought, thought, thought, and then, i was SO PROUD, i blurted out…

CLEO!

and then i realised, no, no, that was the screen name i first knew her by. oh crap.

this fellow was very sweet. he saw me wracking my brains, and he made seven dashes on the paper

– – – – – – –

and then nine dashes underneath that

– – – – – – – – –

and then, like a miniature wheel of fortune, he started filling in the letters:

"S"

S – – – – – –

S – – – – – S – –

and then he started N, R and L

S _ _ L L  _ _

S _ N _ _ R S_N

and i remembered her name – SHELLEY SANDERSON!

there is no way that in canada i would have gotten at this sort of treatment. i would have been politely asked to go home and get my "pick up your packet" (written in french and english) form. this is another great thing about hong kong.

like you needed to hear another great thing about this city. the thing is, there are plenty more to come.

no wonder we fly

don’t you hate flying with all those kids? magnificent and i get asked on a regular basis.

not nearly as much as the people around us, is our usual answer, and honestly, after the weekend we have just had, it seems that contained spaces, and planes are the safest modes of transport for our family.

thursday jasper broke free from charles’ grip in the car park and raced for the door. charles roared for jasper to stop, but since when does jasper listen to anything but the sound of his own voice, his guitar and his long lashes dusting the top of his cheeks? and when a car turned (at a reasonable speed) and jasper was running toward it, if the car hadn’t veered into a thankfully empty parking spot, well it could have gotten pretty unfortunate. just the other day i was praying for physical protection for the kids!

saturday charles and i took the kids to ifc mall. we needed to do some speciality shopping and thought that it would be fun to take the kids and let them run on the higher floors of the mall that are virtually unoccupied. the girls were wearing pink tutu’s, pink tights, and over top of that, green fuzzy jumpers.

at one point, carys asked if she could do a wee. we located a toilet and i beckoned to sela, "come on, sela, let’s go," and she looked at me and defiantly said, "i dont want to do a wee" and she ran in the general direction of her dad. what a girl. when carys and i exited, i saw charles, who was leading jasper and sebastian into the lavatories, "just to wash hands" he told me.

"well you have sela" i said to him.

"no, you do."

and then we realised, neither of us did.

we looked at each other and for a flash second i was so grateful we weren’t, well, basically anywhere else in the world where a missing child would call for doors to be locked down and real hysteria. yes i was upset, but i knew this wasn’t life or death.

some people walking towards us saw our obviously stricken faces and carys’ tutu. they said, "hey, are you looking for the other one of those?" and we said, "YES!" "she’s over there, a long way." charles took off and i asked them how she seemed. "she’s crying, calling for her mum."

the kids and i took after charles, and more and more people began telling me (as soon as they saw carys) that sela was ahead, crying and upset. the kids were all running and so was i.

then i saw sela, with a lady i know vaguely from church. we go to different services. sela saw her dad and raced to him. she said something, a proclamation of love, i was sure. and then they hugged. charles walked back to me, his lips white.’

"do you know what she said, tess? she said, ‘i don’t want to do a wee.’"

huh. little cow. we cancelled the restaurant lunch we had planned and headed home. ate moussaka instead, which wasn’t such a punishment.

later that day, i took the triplets with me to a department store, wing on. we took the bus. the first bus didn’t stop for us. there was space all right , but the driver looked at the kids, then at me, and shook his head and drove on. SUCH DISCRIMINATION!

we grabbed another bus and got dropped off fairly close to our destination. we had to walk two blocks, go up one escalator, and then through a shop, across a street and that was about it. however, at the escalator, jasper dropped the rock he had found and liked, and didn’t get on the escalator and then started crying when he saw that i was five steps up. so i told the girls to keep riding the escalator and i walked down the escalator and grabbed jasper. upon hearing a scream from fellow escalator rider, i looked up just to see sela fall down the escalator: she had been trying to follow me. WHY NOW? carys fell because she forgot to get off the escalator, so all three were crying. it took me making a very interesting story about the man who lives underneath the bridge to make them stop bawling.

SUNDAY – and incase you have ever made the error of subscribing to the 1980’s tagline "take it easy, take the train" – sunday carys vomitted all over herself (BUT NO ONE ELSE, but yes, on the floor), while on the mtr.

what will happen if we go on the star ferry?

life is beautiful

if you want to read a story of love, courage, and hope – even when the outcome is uncertain, please click on this link.

http://www.cfhusband.blogspot.com/

scroll down to the bottom of the page and read up, and by the top you will be in love with baby gwyneth, and holding your breath to know if tricia has really understood that her little girl is doing wonderfully, miraculously well.

a bit of background, i was introduced to this family by a friend of mine from another website — tricia has cystic fibrosis and was getting  ready to go on the list for a double lung transplant (if you want to read their account, go to dec 1 2007)  and found herself pregnant.

http://cfhusband.blogspot.com/search?updated-min=2007-01-01T00%3A00%3A00-05%3A00&updated-max=2008-01-01T00%3A00%3A00-05%3A00&max-results=50

the pregnancy was a blessing, but fraught with complications. tricia developed gestational diabetes, her lungs had less room, which required her to take portable oxygen tanks with her everywhere and around 30 december everything started to go pear shaped. tricia was admitted to hospital. on 8 january, little gwenyth was delivered. i believe tricia is still on a vent at this time.

please read. the pictures alone will grab your heart and not let it go.

i’m starting to put my summer together. it’s a bit complicated.

we are planning on leaving hong kong pretty much the minute school gets out. the reason for this is because when school ends for the year, everyone pretty much scatters, and it gets pretty lonely. all the kids programmes are very expensive and not so interesting. last year we stayed in hong kong for three or so weeks after school completed, and we will not be doing that again. it was pretty drab for them.

so what are we going to do? charmaine called the other day and said, "i really want to spend time with you and your family this summer. how can we make this happen?" she offered her home to me, but let’s be honest, if i come, it is going to be for a month, and that wouldn’t work. her husband would definitely get tired of having us in his house and i am sure that charmaine would too.

she suggested that she find me a cottage. now, given that we had such a great experience a couple of years ago when charles’ sister carolyn located us a "three family cottage" , this is highly appealing. however, the cost of flying the kids across the country (flying to canada is prohibitive enough!) makes me realise this likely isn’t going to happen.

so i am looking at alternatives. my incredibly generous friend heidi has offered me her place at whistler, but it is nowhere near a park and doesn’t have a backyard. pam has said we can stay at her place, but i don’t want to impose on her. but you can’t expect people to jump around for you, and they have their own lives too!

not having a driver’s license is a toughie come summer time. the kids want to do summer activities but unless they are within walking distance or the bus, how can i get them there?

another option we are exploring is going to thailand for a while. that might be a good plan because it is cheap to fly there and there are kids tennis and swimming lessons.

i am not angry at epilepsy, but at times like this i sure wish i could drive. or that canadian cities had better bus systems.

carys stayed home from school today. her fever is still well above 100. she’s a good, if quiet companion. definitely the easiest of the four to have around. she doesn’t make suggestions, just makes her own entertainment. she really is a pet. even though she is feeling grotty, she just manages to be pleasant and conversational, only requesting books being read to her and the occasional piece of paper so she can cut it with a pair of scissors.

at one point she did look up and say, "there are no people here, only carys and mummy." i agreed that was so.

last night she didn’t get much sleep, but i did. we kept her in her own bed, and although she cough coughed and cried in confusion when she woke up and wasnt sure why she was awake, i slept right through it all. absolutely through the entire thing. magnificent heard more than he did the night before.

day three at small world’s d2 class, sela reports that her best friend is jasper and that is who she is playing with all day long. it wasn’t a mistake to put sela in this class, was it? if carys ever gets better and can reenter the work force i will let you know how she adjusts to her class.

until then, adieu. tonight is book club, we’re discussing we need to talk about kevin.

..coughs and couches, sofa and sniffles..

when carys went to bed last night, she was coughing a bit. nothing noteworthy, if you check yesterday’s blog which was written about an hour after the varmits toodled off to bed.

so suddenly at around 9.30, coincidentally around the time charles waltzed in the front door, it was all "cough cough cough" from carys.

"when did she start with that?" inquired the loving husband.

"just now," i said firmly.

the coughing continued. cough cough cough cough. bark bark, cough cough. bark cough cough. sort of waking up the other kids

at around 11.30pm charles vanished. i was busy watching 30 rock and so i wasn’t as alert to his absence as might have been.

when alex baldwin had finished being stone faced and pithy, i got up for my man. and i found him, asleep on the sofa, with carys entwined around him. she was cough, cough, coughing and he was drowsy but not fully asleep.

i made magnificent go into the bedroom and i slept on the sofa bed with carys. she is a nice girl, but honestly, she was sniffling and coughing all night long, whinging and moaning when she woke up. she managed to clutch BEBE to her firmly, but couldn’t find the strategically placed sippie cups i placed around the bed. so she would groan softly on the bed, until i in a stupid slumber would give her a tissue or a cup or a cuddle. poor kid.

at around 6pm sebastian came in, absolutely delighted to see the sofa bed out and to see family members, awake ones at that. of course this was when carys was just getting to sleep, so in no uncertain terms i told sebastian to please leave and come back when the sun was awake.

i don’t think i slept last night. but i did sleep from 6am-8.30am. and then i got up and made a doctor’s appointment. carys has tonsillitis, poor button. she was an angel at the drs appointment, and afterwards she ate a croissant while flipping through a copy of "guess how much i love you" while i drank a strawberry/apple smoothie.

so now i have to accept that i won’t stay awake for 30 rock because i need to get to sleep.