It is Father's Day, so skip a lizard's post

May and June is parent's months. Mother's Day in May, Father's Day in June.

Normally when parent's months are coming nearer, my dad will look sulky, complaining 

• mother's day is always more significant comparing to Father's Day 
• complaining children will only call mother when they reach a place safely (my dad is a taxi driver, so he always see passengers calling mother only), no matter how old that children is.

Then we will know Father's day is coming or his birthday is coming soon. We usually celebrate Father's Day earlier because we usually are busy on Father's Day. haizzz......

My dad had worked hard to see all of us graduated from university. It was never easy to earn a living to raise 5 children. Lucky for my dad to marry such a smart wife, wise financially. Frankly, money is never enough. It is only by spending wisely, money can be enough.

Ok back to my dad. 

My dad is very strict with my brothers and rarely laugh with them, but he always joked with us, his daughters. You may think taxi driver is ignorant people, but my dad knows everything on street. I actually learned a lot from my dad. He used to tell me all his ancient stories, his life without mother, how he met my mother, his working experience. He once told me that I can write a biography of his life. So much to learn from his experiences.

When we were small, we will call "PAPA" when he came back home, and he will answered us with a sweet, "oiiiiiiii". Now only have our dog welcoming him when he came home. Thanks to my bro, having spent time to celebrate Father's Day in our place. Sorry, Dad.

It is my parents who taught me how to be a person who is street smart. Although they can be too controlling, still they are parents. My dad said we children are always baby in parent's eyes.

My dad won't be perfect without my mother. Hence, it is quite hard to write about my dad without mentioning my mother.

That's my dad when we visited my friend's house (longhouse) in Sibu.

Happy Father's Day to all fathers!

Surprise in family

Sending my sister to airport... a moment to treasure. When will be the next time I see her again?

This year is special as all of my family members came back for CNY, after 2 years. My 2 sisters tried to surprise my parents by coming home secretly. However, the secret leak out slowly.

On the day my 1st younger sister came back, my mother only told me that she is coming back. She said she also know on that day. I was so surprised because I did asked her to come back as another sister is coming back too (my youngest sister only told me that she is coming back). She told me she is not coming back. When she get home, I called my dad telling him, please come home to drive us to shopping mall because I want to buy shoes. My dad almost scolded me for wanting to buy shoes again, my sister saved my ears from a lecture by jumping out from the closet. His face expression was so precious. Mouth open, angry expression mixed with shocked expression.

My youngest sister flew straight to Sabah and stay with my auntie. As a good sister to my mother, my auntie called my mother telling her about my sister arrival tomorrow. That night, my auntie called again saying that my sister's flight is cancel. I did not dare to face my mother, when she told me my sister not coming back with a sad and broken heart expression. I can't told her the truth, and I can't look at her because I am very bad in lying. I may burst out laughing. However when my mother told me to pack more clothes, I suspected she knows. She is a mother after all, with great maternal instinct.

When we reach my grandpa's house, my uncle told my dad that he saw me in city. My youngest sister and me look much alike. My dad knew is my youngest sister. My dad was in pitiful state, because no one want to clarify the situation.

When my youngest sister reach village with my auntie, the only who was fully in shocked state was my youngest brother. He was sulking why no one told him all his sisters coming back from Peninsular Malaysia. So he can ask them to buy things for him.

All this surprise surprise, is very hard to endure for me. I remember when I was in university, my older brother decided to surprise my parents. He was planning to go back secretly for the semester break. When he did not have money to buy the ticket and can't ask my dad for more money, me as a good sister have to buy around RM 350 ticket for me. When I asked my dad for more money, my dad scolded me for asking money at last minute, and money was tight that time. To survive those days with scarce money, I had to dig all pockets of my bags and used up all my coins. Every cents was so precious, because 10 of 1 cent is 10 cents, 10 of 10 cents is RM 1, RM 1 means a brunch.

The worst thing about surprise is that I have to hide my happy feeling. I can't shout to my mother, telling her they are coming home. I have to pretend that I was sad whenever my mother was sad that they are not coming back.

I am happy that my life is full of surprises.

So many surprise recently, keep my life interesting.....

Sticker

http://justbloggled.com

This cute button reminds me of stickers I used to have when I was a little girl.

When I went to Church's children meeting... ah..My memory fails me again. I do not want to feed you with some unreliable childhood stories of mine. So I will talk about other child then.

Every child likes a sticker on their exercise book. My mother used to babysit children. Whenever they get a sticker or a stamp on their exrcise book, they will proudly show it to my mother and everyone in the house that they get a sticker. It is a acknowledgement of their works. I think every children deserves a sticker as long as they finish their work, regardless of how good it is. For some children, no matter how hard they try in doing something, it may not be nice in adult's eyes.

Some kindergardens use stamps on hand as reward to children. I found it is inappropriate to stamp on hand. It can be hazardous as kids like to lick their hand and eat with hands. Most dreadful thing is it is erasable. The award will mean nothing if it is only there for few hours or end up in stomach.

Although i like stickers as award, I did not have sticker book. It was popular that kids have books filled up with stickers, stickers collection.

When my siblings and I was still kids, we always share. I share stickers. Whenever we bought row of stickers, we will count and divide it among us. You get three, I get three, you get three. Fair distribution to avoid argument. When we eat fried chicken wings, we also need to count how many fried chicken wings, so everyone will get their fair distribution. My mother only cook fried chicken wings on special occasion.

Everyone of us is now distributed to everywhere too. It is a bit weird for a traditional Asian family. Asian tend to keep their children nearby. Hard to believe that my sister once told my mother that she will marry a man from the neighbourhood we were staying, and now she ended up married to someone from the other side of Malaysia.

When will be our next gathering for all of us?

written by Nomi

on 6 Jan 2010