Zhong Qiu Jie is to be with your family

That's what Katy said when we tried to hustle her home after Zhong Qiu Jie dinner with Uncle Bert, Auntie Pinky, Gabriel, Raphaella, and Auntie Pinky's family.
Cheeky monkey!

Katy really does love her family though.  She was thrilled to have the chance to bottle feed Raphaella.

Pinky and Bert hosted a fabulously extravagant lunch featuring rice wine

XO sauce from the Mandarin Oriental (yum!)

and yummy Shanghai hairy crabs!

It was a real treat and not something we will be able to have for a long time.  The season here is very  short and highly anticipated!  Katy tried it and loved it!  Luckily Uncle Bert had a lot of patience picking out the tasty morsels for Katy to eat!  She really loved the coral.

 Eventually, Katy picked up the process herself.

It's a very finicky process though and you have to supplement with other food.  You get exhausted way before you actually get full!  Luckily, Auntie Pinky had cooked some delicious Lomagai (lotus wrapped sticky rice) for us to eat with the XO sauce!

Gabriel was quite fond of the hairy crab himself, and Katy was happy to oblige.

After dinner, Katy discovered Haagen Dazs ice cream mooncakes!

After dinner, we rolled downstairs to the ICC lawn to play with the glow sticks, which the kids always really love!  Katy loves playing with Auntie Pinky's younger brother Bennett, who is great with the kids.  Pinky's Mom, sister Rachel and brother-in-law Roy were also there.

Katy loved making lots of glow stick jewellery.

And Katy loved it when Dada threw the glow sticks in the air and created our own free form light show!

Finally, we left ICC, and returned home to DB.  We wanted to spend a little bit of time with our DB friends on the beach.  It's a big event in DB and this year it was particularly lovely as it was so cool.  The beach was covered completely in glow sticks when we arrived!

Katy played with Jessie, and we chatted with our friends the McCanns as the beach slowly emptied and tired parents brought tired kids home.  It was a lovely walk home for us, stopping to chat with friends and neighbours, including Dr Winnie Siu.  We will really miss our friends and family, and even our acquaintances.  It's a wonderful feeling to be part of a community like this on an evening like this when everyone comes together!

Best Friends

Our very close friends Scott and Tiffany Mendenhall hosted a lovely BBQ at their place.  Generous as always, they treated us to huge Alaskan crab.  The kids had a great time as usual, and loved staying up late!  10pm!!!

Katy and Ellie were like an old married couple reading books in Scott and Tiff's bed, and taking turns wearing Tiff's reading glasses!

Munchkins

 

Jonathan came over to Olivia's for another playdate after tutoring.  It wasn't so successful a playdate as they fought most of the morning!  But it was all smiles when we dropped Jonathan off in the car!

Pray Harder

Katy:  I wish I had a little brother or sister.
Mama:  Yes, I know darling.  I do too.  But I really think it just isn't going to happen?
Katy:  Yes, it will.  We just need to pray harder.  We need to pray six seven hours a day from now on!  God's just got to give us a little brother or sister!  Come on God!

Little lunching ladies again

After school on Zhong Qiu Jie, Winnie Debbie and I took Elsa, Nadia, Olivia, Katy and Toby out to lunch at Din Tai Fun, together with Toby's little brother Micah, and Olivia's little sister Sophie.  We had to get a private room with five five year olds running around and two three year olds following suit.

 It was Toby's actual birthday, so we also celebrated at lunch.  The kids had traditional peach longevity buns and Chinese desserts.

Zhong Qiu Jie at School

Now we are one year veterans of Suzhe, we know what to expect, so Dada and Mama took Katy to school for her class Zhong Qiu Jie (Mid Autumn Festival) party.  We are very fortunate, and Katy is very fortunate, that both Mama and Dada are able to attend her activities.

When we arrived, the kids started with a game singing in a big circle. 

When the song stops, the chosen child gets to choose one of the hanging "lanterns".  Then the child (or Lu Laoshi) reads the riddle written on the lantern and the kids have to guess the answer.  They get a sticker if they guess correctly.  It's a very traditional game to play in China and especially for Zhong Qiu Jie, which revolves around activities to do with the moon and lanterns.  (The adult version involves a drinking game and reciting poetry, completing incomplete poems etc)

Dada and I really enjoy watching the kids perform their songs and dances so enthusiastically!

Katy does too.

The last game we played was "ba luobo" (pick the turnip).  Again, a very traditional Chinese game and song for kids.  All the kids want to be the luobo.

Finally, Katy was chosen to be the luobo.

Lu Laoshi gets the song going.

She's a born performer, with a Chinese opera voice when reciting or singing!

First come the Gong Gongs to come to try to pick the turnip!

Then the Gong Gongs recruit the Poh Pohs to come help.

On and on it goes through little kid, little dog...until finally a whole string of kids manage to pull the turnip out of the ground!

Well, then the kids thought it was absolutely hilarious when the parents got to play too.  Of course Lu Laoshi chose Dada to be the turnip.

Auntie Winnie got to be the cat and she really played up to it.

We had so much fun!  It was a very international morning.  Katy's cheongsam are getting too small, so we had her dressed gorgeously in the ao dai we bought for her in Hanoi, and Michelle came dressed in full Indian regalia complete with large bindi on her forehead!

After the turnip game, the kids share a bunch of Mid Autumn snacks - mooncakes, pomelo, starfruit.

Uncle Alex

Katy loves having visitors.  And it was a small consolation to her that Uncle Alex came down from Beijing to occupy the guest room recently vacated by Kung Kung and Poh Poh.  Alex was a great sport and took Katy down to Pacific Coffee for a babyccino on the way to school!

Uncle Alex likes to wear his sunglasses!  So Katy followed suit with her pink flip open sunglasses.  She's such a ham!

The Amazing Dada!

And his beautiful assistant, Butterly Kate.

After seeing the magician at Toby's birthday party ask Toby to draw two fish on a piece of paper, roll up the paper, and then burn the underside of the paper, causing two real live goldfish to fall out into a glass of water, OF COURSE (!) Katy wanted to try this out at home!!!

Dada tried to oblige, but unfortunately, no fish came out. :(

A-dither

Our Mummies Group was all a-dither this week.  It all started with the lunch on Sunday with Carmen and me at Debbie's place.  Carmen casually asked which school we were choosing for the P1 Government placement round.  "Say what?"

So finally, after an hour an a half of grilling Carmen, checking the website, asking Zhan Laoshi, checking translations, grilling Clark, Natalie's Dad, who already knew all about it, it transpired that this week was the deadline for submitting your first preference for a discretionary place at any Government funded school in Hong Kong.

There followed a scramble to get the forms from the school, fill in the forms and find all the supporting documents, then Debbie and I hightailed it to Marymount Primary School, our school of choice, to submit the forms.  It was quite an exercise in Mummy Power.

I loved Marymount.  It's on Tai Hang Road and freshly painted pink and lemon.  It's an all girls Catholic school originally founded by the Maryknoll Sisters, but now run by a lay Catholic organisation.  It seemed very calm, caring and competent!  And it's free!

Unfortunately, it's an all English curriculum, so we still have Suzhe as our first choice, with Marymount as our back up. 

Ladies who lunch

Debbie, Daphne and I took Olivia, Nadia and Katy out for lunch at Golden Valley after school.  They love having their own table, just for the kids.  They're very experienced little lunching ladies.

Wu zhi xiao laoshu

Lu Laoshi is coaching Katy and Aidan for a rhyme competition - they need to recite "wu zhi xiao lao shu" (5 little mice).  They are super cute!  And it's amazing how quickly they've memorised the rhyme.  This is why we are sacrificing beautiful facilities and sportsgrounds, small class sizes, fun class trips etc for a traditional Chinese education at Suzhe aka Changi Prison!  Activities like this rhyme competition really make it all worthwhile!

Carrot Juice Moustache

Jonathan, Olivia, Katy & Sophie

Jonathan and Katy were born on the same day, and Carmen, Jonathan's Mummy, was in prenatal fitness classes with Debbie, Maxine and me.  Carmen works a lot and has frequent trips overseas, so we don't get to see her and Jonathan much.  It was wonderful they were able to visit Debbie while we were also visiting.  The kids had a ball.

Zhan Laoshi

Katy has been working hard on her Chinese.  Every weekend, she, Olivia and Natalie have tutoring sessions with Zhan Laoshi, who is originally from Shanghai.  She gets their Chinese homework done and helps them with their Chinese schoolwork.  We've really noticed a big improvement in their Chinese since they started working with Zhan Laoshi.  She's been super helpful in coaching the kids for their P1 interviews at Suzhe.

Jack

Katy loved meeting Jack again.  The last time was in Singapore when Katy was only two.  Now Katy is five and a half and Jack is six.  He's 11 months older than Katy! 

We had a lovely dim sum lunch at Yu Xi in ICC, then Uncle Joel treated us all to ice creams at Holly Brown.  Then we caught the MTR back into Central together.

Jack has relatives in the US, so we hope to see their family sometime soon enroute somewhere.