Home away from Home.

Our apartment is great - I have no complaints. It's perfect for us, but it's a bit stark for a little girls room. We brought with us Z's favourite toys - the playmobil, her barbies, english and french books, games, etc. Some friends gave Z some little things to remind her of them and home.

So, now that we're settled, we thought we'd show you Z's room and some of her favourite things. PS - Lucy the Zebra is now up there with her favourites Simba and Arial.

The Lycee

I'm finding it amazing that the Lycee Francais is such a big school, yet it seems to function really well, nothing seems to fall through the cracks. (yet).
I am constantly updated about important happenings at the school via email! Yep email. And it works both ways - when notifying the school a child is sick, or if you have any questions, or what to make a rendez-vous with someone - you do it via email! It's so modern, organised and not very french :)
And take a look at this! This is a link to the website of Z's class at school. Throughout the year, it will be updated with photos of their activites etc. And they've only been at school less than one month and already it's updated!

http://www.lyceefrancais.edu.sg/elementaire/classes-09-10/ce1/ce1b.htm

Next week, Z will start her chosen A.C.S (extra curricular activity). She chose just one - mini-tennis. It will be run in the modern air conditioned gymnasium at school. These activites aren't compulsory and are run on the 1/2 days of school (wed's and fri's and each afternoon after school).
So far, I'm really impressed.

It's a small world.

I met a fellow Aussie at a coffee morning, and after a short while, we discovered that we were the same age, lived less than 1 km away from each other growing up in Brisbane, went to the same primary school (and therefore in the same class) and then we both went on to private schools where his school were invited to our school dances and visa versa. And I didn't know him.....
And then I got talking with a lovely english lady only to find she calls herself Swiss, and that she lives in Nyon with her husband and children. They're in Singapore for two more years.

There's the little girl from Z's jazz class in Plan-les-Ouates who has just moved to Singapore for 3 years, who we met at the school.

For the hat trick - we all know who C's employer is.... well, would you believe his brother is now living in Singapore (C has worked with him in Gva), and their daughter not only goes to the french school, but is in Z's class. We have a get together with them in two weeks time.
It's a very small world and you never know who you're going to bump in to..................

Hari Raya weekend

Boy -did we make some mistakes this weekend. Firstly, it was a 3 day weekend, with monday being celebrated for Hari Raya (signifies the end of Ramadam - the muslim fasting month). I did a bit of reading, and decided to go visit the Malay part of town to experience the festivites. We found it alright, along with the other 5 million inhabitants of the island.. it was hot, crowded and not really our scene. So, we decided to go back to explore Little India. I so love it here - it's very interesting with British and Indian architecture side by side. It's fun just to wander and get lost among the alleys and arcades. You can find everything from food sellers, to spice sellers, fortune tellers to henna tattoo artists. So wander we did for a couple of hours before meeting up with one of C's colleague's from work (who is here sans famille) at Newton Circus. Newton Circus is a giant hawker centre that's very popular with tourists and locals. The food is absolutely fabulous and so fresh.... predominately the stalls sell seafood, although you can get ANY type of food here you like. We ate garlic king prawns (these prawns were almost the size of a small lobster!) and had chilli mud crab (messy but SO delicious). Little Z hasn't acquired the taste of chilli crab yet, but likes the garlic prawns. She loves the satays and singapore noodles but she's starting to like chilli .... she tried her father's laksa the other day, and liked it.

Sunday

We slept in, then headed down to the harbourfront to think about going over to Sentosa island. From here, you can take the monorail over to Sentosa Island (a touristic place predominately for children with aquariums, pink humpback dolphin shows, rides and attractions). Again, I swear the other 5 million inhabitants decided to do the same thing. The place was SO crowded and we're really not good with crowds, so we came home and spent the afternoon lazing around the pool.

Monday

We've learned our lesson and decided to stay home for the day.

Future note to self: On public holidays either don't go out, or leave Singapore!

Our first visitor

Last thursday we had our first visitor - Stephane from Geneva. Stephane was arriving on wednesday morning, and leaving late thursday night - do you believe it! It was great seeing him and catching up. He caught a taxi here early evening, and we walked down to our local - a small hawker centre about 5oo metres away. We just LOVE the food there - as did Stephane. For $40 we ate like kings.. Stuffed chicken wings, spring rolls, crumbed calamari, red curry and dal makhari, chicken rice, rice and drinks. It was so good. We took a doggy bag home.

Now by chance, Stephane and C frequently find themselves travelling to the same overseas destination at the same time. To date, they have eaten in Geneva, New York and Singapore. As fate will have it, tonight both Stephane and C are going to be in Shanghai, and have made arrangements to again meet for dinner. Amazing huh.

Sunday at the Zoo

This has to be the best Zoo I've ever seen. What a fab day. We were there when the gates opened at 8.30am, and watched the animals eating their breakfast and saw the elephants taking a bath! We then headed to the central restaurant to enjoy a 'Jungle breakfast with wildlife'.. ie Orangutans, marmosets and a huge python. It was fantastic to see them so closely. Our breaky was pretty good too. The Zoo is beautifully laid out within the rainforest, on the edge of a large reservoir. We watched a few shows, then visited 'kidzworld' - the best kids waterpark to cool down, before seeing a few more animals. Z had a brilliant day. Her favourites were the orangutans, zebras, elephants, leopard.... quite a lot of the animals actually. About 3.30pm the heavens opened, as it tends to do in the tropics, so we decided to call it a day.We were hot and pooped. What a brilliant day. We'll be back to explore the rest of the zoo we missed.... and then there's the Night Safari to experience!

Now Me

Ok, the big C is happy in his work, and the little Z is settled... now me....
We've joined the AFS Association Francaise de Singapour - and I went along to the 'welcome' seminar. There must have been about 3oo people. We were addressed by the French Ambassador to Singapore, the French Consul, the head of Alliance Francaise, and the Head of the Lycee Francaise. The club is huge and there are obviously SO many french here. I've signed us (the family) up to a cultural walk through Chinatown and a visit to a local bakery to taste the famous mooncakes. Not sure the family's as excited about it as me...
The following day I went along to a coffee morning with mum's from the Lycee. There were about 40 parents there. I met some really interesting and nice people from Japan, France, Canada and Australia. It was fantasic to hear their stories on how they happened to be in Singapore and their connection to the Lycee. Really, really interesting. So - I'm getting out there!

THE activities

My first two weeks have been occupied with enrolling Z into after school activities. This is tough... firstly it's the FINDING then CHECKING and TRIALING.

We've had great success with signing Z up for 'Little Athletics'. It's run by the Aussie and NZ club and it's pretty amazing. It's on a friday evening for 2 hours. 2 weeks into the program and she's competing weekly (based on her age) 300 metres, 100 metres, hurdles, shotput, discus and long jump. While Z competes, I have been assigned to 'raking the triple jump pit' for the season. I'm really impressed with the organisation and Z loves it.

We're still in trialing mode with a music school for violin lessons, and a swim class.

Her school offers activities after school and on wed. and fri. afternoons, so Z's chosen Mini Tennis. We're waiting to hear if she gets in.

As a parent I'm finding it really difficult to balance the opportunity for Z to participate in great activities we can't easily do in France, and not overload the poor child... And Z wants to try it all!

First Day of School

How it works.

The school hours are 8.15am to 3.15pm Monday, Tuesday and Thursday and 8.15am to 12.15am Wednesday and Friday. It's compulsory for the children to eat lunch at school - at the canteen. A phenomenon particular to schools in Singapore is that children are taken to and from school (door to door!) by bus. It's fantastic. Z's picked up at 7.33am at the gate each morning, and arrives home at 4.10pm or 1.10pm, depending on the day.

Z's first day of school was Wednesday 3rd September. C was in Geneva, so Z and I caught a taxi to school. We arrived in plenty of time, and checked out the bulletin board for her details.

There are 7 classes of CE1 this year and Z is in CE1B with 23 classmates, and her teachers name is Sylvie. Her class is on the top floor of a 3 floor building. It was clean and modern and we were warmly welcomed by Sylvie. Z chose her desk (in the front row), sat down behind her desk and said goodbye to me. I wasn't ready to cut the strings, so hung around for another 5 minutes before I realised I'd better go...

Z decided that morning, she wanted to catch the school bus home, rather than me coming to pick her up from school on the first day. I was really proud of her making this decision. Her logic was that on day 1, she'd be new just like all the other kids finding their way.

At 1.12pm, on Wednesday Z came home on the bus. She was very happy. She liked her teacher, made a friend in Malaka (another new girl who was seated beside her in class) and was happy that I'd bought all the right things for class!

Arrival

Well, here in are, living in our 4th country in 9 years, since leaving our home country of Australia. We are fortunate to have known a little about Singapore before arriving as it's our mid-journey stopover point when travelling between France and Australia, although visiting and living here are a different matter.
First impressions are good. Our dealings with immigration were painless and so easy. Next issue was preparing Zoe for the start of school - again painless. The school held a Saturday open day for the newcomers. We were welcomed by the board and most of the teachers and after a presentation we were free to wander around the school. Their facilities are very impressive. Would you believe Zoe literally bumped into a classmate from her dance class in Geneva! Talk about a small world.