Clarissa & Naham

It is so funny to see Clarissa playing with her friends these days. From worrying that she won't play well and nice with other children, I have seen her developed friendship at school. 

Every morning when I dropped her at school, there will be this little girl name Naham waiting for her. She is a pretty little Arabian girl with big brown eyes and fair skin. Whenever Naham saw Clarissa going into the TV room (where all the kids stay before school starts), she will give her a big smile. After that all her attention will be on Clarissa and the two will talked non stop. Peeping at them from the window outside, I always wonder what they were chatting about. There was even one time where I saw her putting her arm protectively over Clarissa's shoulder trying to protect her from another girl whom, for some reason, Clarissa didn't like. 

However, for the past two days my little weirdo daughter felt annoyed whenever her little friend tried to ask her to play. And her little friend, sensing her moodiness, did not dare to insist on playing with her. I could see from the outside that she was acting very cautious with Clarissa to avoid annoying her further. So, I decided to lecture my daughter a bit, telling her that she should play nice with everybody. Luckily, being a filial daughter, she always remember what Mommy said, and this morning when she went into the TV room, she called for her little friend. I can immediately see the Naham's face lit up when Clarissa called her, and she touched her face affectionately, and once again put her little arm on Clarissa's shoulder. 

It was a touching moment to see two little girls from two different classes (yup, that's right, the only time they played together, was just during that one hour in the morning), two different countries, two different nationalities being such good friends. I am sure over the years Clarissa and Naham will have more friends, but I do hope that they will be able to maintain their little friendship. 

The funny thing is, the other day I celebrated Clarissa's birthday at school, and the following day, I found out that Naham was celebrating hers. I could not help wondering whether you should call that "緣份“.....

A trip to the urban area

Can't remember where I read this before - when your kid start asking you what is a goat, then it's probably time to take them to visit some urban areas- to a certain extent I have to agree to this statement.

These days, our children are too much of "city kids" , so much so that there are a lot of things they have not seen before. So, the other day, we decided to organise a trip for our "city kids" to have a taste of the urban area.

We went to a little town call Sekinchan, which is also a "kampong" of a friend of mine. There, Clarissa saw things like paddy field, vegetables farms, fruit trees and other things which she doesn't have a chance to see in the city. Even for us adults, we find it so interesting. I wouldn't even know that dragon fruit came from a cactus look alike tree if I have not seen it myself. We also went to this little hill call Bandar Malawati where they were a lots of monkeys roaming freely. Before this, she only get to see monkeys in the zoo! And our trip ended with a visit to see the fireflies. To get to the place, she even experienced sitting in a "sampan" in total darkness. She kept telling me that the fireflies on the trees looked like christmas lightings and how beautiful it was.

Although it may not be a comfortable trip, due to the heat etc. I am glad she enjoyed it so much. It is so important to teach our children to appreciate Mother Nature. If I don't bring her to see and enjoy these things now, when she grows up, she may not even have a chance anymore. At the rate things are going, by then probably there will not be any fireflies around.

However, I think overall she enjoyed the trip as much as I enjoyed the "Shark Spicy Porridge" (a famouse delicacy from that village :), because even after a few days we came back, she was still telling me - "Thank you Mommy for bringing me to see the fireflies".