The Georgous

You know how it is, people always say ‘Kids are really wise’, I always took it at face value (meaning I thought it might be, but never really bothered to work out why) and then today, the realisation struck me.

In their honesty and directness, children cause encourage us to re-evaluate our thoughts and opinions, indirectly it seems that they are wise, but what happens really, at least I think, is that they raise an issue, give us something to think about then we come to some realisation and attribute it to them.

This is exactly what happened today, in the car going to ballet.

It’s only a 10 minute drive to ballet, but we have often had ‘profound’ conversations, Georgia and I. Conversations between the backseat and the drivers seat…. Today it was about people, more specifically friends. Read more »

In six months time, it would been eleven years that I moved away from ‘home’ – the country of my birth. I try hard not to call it ‘home’ anymore, because that’s not where I live, that’s not where my child was born, that’s not where my heart lies.

Materially, making a home away from home, has not been hard, it has after all just needed money (the house, the car, the furniture etc. ) What has been a little more of a challenge is trying to recreate or replicate certain childhood experiences and memories for Georgia, that we (being from Penang, Malaysia) have so loved and treasured. In short to try to give her the experiences of the culture that defines us, and the worldliness of the variety of religions in the country that we come from, as opposed to the country we now live in.

I know it’s easy to say, she will have her own experiences, make her own memories, but so much of what we experience defines who we become, and while living comfortably and affluently in a developed country now, I sometimes lament the fact that she will miss out on the extremely, diverse, mullti-culture, multi-religion environment, that I took so much for granted when I was growing up. Like they say, you won’t miss it until you lose it!

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Georgia came back from spending a few days with Mama (Grandma) and Grandpa, and she said to us:

G: You know, we went to the garden centre and it was really nice, we saw guinea pigs and rabbits and even some fish.
Me: Mmm…What did you do there?
G: We had some lunch, I had some jacket potato with cheese.
Me: That sounds nice.
G: Yeah and you know we saw this really funny hanging thing that Mama wanted to buy!
Me: Oh is it?
G: And do you know what it said? (With a very serious expression, and very big eyes)
Me: No, what did it say?
G: It said, ‘God if you can’t make me thin, please make all my friends fat!’ Imagine! (she says with a shrug)

At which point, we both burst out laughing! 🙂

A Confession: I am a TED junkie. I could spend all day watching TED videos, and I have been inspired, motivated and amazed by so many of them.

Diana Laufenberg’s talk in December last year however, spoke directly to me. I have seen first hand the amazing advantages of experiential learning, and the combination of that with Constructivism (in which the learner attempts to construct their own knowledge) lends itself to a much much more powerful form of learning than one can imagine.

To be able to teach (especially the way Ms Laufenberg has) I think we, as teachers/educators need to Read more »

With Chinese New Year just around the corner, we sat talking about how we could celebrate it in our own way, especially as it’s not a public holiday here. Somehow the conversation progressed from, who we would invite, what we would eat, when we would celebrate to…

Dad: It’s actually ‘our’ year. Year of the Rabbit

G: Why is it your year?

Dad: We were born in the Year of the Rabbit.

G: And me?

Dad: You were born in the Year of  the Dog…

G (at this point looking at little confused): …and after that it’s the Year of the Hedgehog!

Dad: … ????

then why don’t I feel like I’m the best mother in the World?

A recent article Why Chinese Mothers are Superior in the Wall Street Journal has caused a lot of controversy and raised a lot of emotion amongst it readers and it’s certainly worth a read. Being an immigrant (Malaysian Chinese) to a Western culture (we now live in the UK), this article has certainly struck a chord for many reasons….not least because I too am, to a certain extent, trying to instill my child with ‘Asian values’ while being surrounded by Western Culture (I wrote about this when Georgia was little more than 1 here);

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On the evening of the second day of this year (2011), we were travelling back along the M4 from Cardiff heading East when we saw the traffic alerts signs displaying “Animals in Road”. Now this is quite interesting because in all our years of travelling along the M4, we have never come across a message like this…

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Santa Claus

Georgia recently asked me this and I had to hesitate for a minute to contemplate. It was not that I did not want to disappoint her by telling her that Santa Claus did not exist, it was what I should tell her after I told her the TRUTH that Santa Claus is just a dressed up man.

Before you report me to Social Services for depriving my daughter a wondrous magical childhood, let me explain….

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Georgia mentioned that she saw a video clip about Noah’s Ark in school yesterday, so this morning I asked her…

Me: So what did you learn about Noah’s Ark yesterday?
G: Noah?
Me: Yeah…
G: Noah …..washed all of the BAD people away! (She explained this complete with actions – with a ‘wooshing’ motion)

It was actually quite funny….but the conversation carried on.

Me: Are you sure that was Noah?
G: Yes…wasn’t it?
Me: I thought it was supposed to be God?
G: Oh yeah…maybe it was.

Now….was that REALLY the reason for the big flood? Because I’m sure we could use it in some countries 🙂

An on-going obsession in our household is with babies, so Georgia pretends to feed, change, dress and basically anything you do with babies, she does with her Dorothy (a.k.a Thumper). So although it was not surprising this conversation took place, it was still nonetheless very sweet.

Georgia looks at me very intently and then says:

G: Mummy, when you were a baby, and you grew up, did you just decide to have a baby?

Me: Umm…yes

G: Well, I’m going to have a baby too!

Me: That will be nice….