Armless Pianist Liu Wei - You're Beautiful (Winner of China's Got Talent...

I just have to share this. The story of a 22 year old guy in China who lost both his arms due to a tragic accident at the age of 10. He had to learn to rely on his legs, feet and toes for everything in life and picked up piano at the age of 19. This is his finale performance at China's Got Talent reality show where he won last year. A very moving performance that revealed a truly inspiring story. Susan Boyle, please step aside.

Count our blessings shall we?
x

Bento Update

I know I haven't done a bento update in a long time. The bento making is still ongoing but my creative juices are running dry so I haven't been making any great looking bentos that are worthy of blog updates. Please pardon me if you are a bento fan!

Here's one that I made last week. Nothing fancy but I'm putting it up in case anyone thought I have quit making bentos.

Sorry to disappoint. I told you it was nothing special!
x

A milestone in Kyoto

Last weekend my husband and I made a snap decision to spend our saturday night in Kyoto. We left our house early saturday morning to take the bullet train and after just 2 hours, we arrived in Kyoto at 11am.

I have been to Kyoto several times and both my husband and I love this ancient capital of Japan a lot. Because we are so familiar with the city, we knew it was going to be a very relaxing trip for us. We spent the 2 days walking around the city, visited our favourite eating spots and enjoyed snow. Most importantly, our 3 year old added another milestone to his life. He went to bed that saturday night without his nappy and woke up in his clean and dry underwear for the first time. We can now declare him to be fully toilet-trained!!

It all started because we forgot to pack in his night nappies. Just as we were discussing on what to do for the "no nappy with night peeing" situation, Aiden requested that we let him sleep with his underwear on instead. He even said "I promise I won't pee in my underwear". So we let him try. I think the poor boy was so stressed that he went to pee 3 times in a span of 15 minutes just before bed!

So he woke up on Sunday morning proudly declaring that his underwear was clean and kept telling us that he did not want to wear bedtime nappies anymore. Until today, he has been telling everyone he met that he does not need night nappies anymore. My little baby is indeed growing up!

Enjoy the photos (I mean photos of our time in Kyoto, not my boy in his underwear)!

All photos were taken by my new Olympus Pen camera - a xmas gift from my hubby. I'm so loving my new toy!
x

What's for dinner?

Christmas eve.

We had the company of our good friends who flew in from Perth with their 2 girls to spend the festive season with us in Japan. They arrived at noon on 24 December and we enjoyed a lovely dinner that evening to celebrate christmas.

 

  

My little sweet talker

My three year old was looking at some old photos of me dressed in my wedding gown 5 years ago.

Aiden : "You looked pretty Mummy."

Me     : "Thanks Aiden."

Aiden (looking at me adoringly): "You still look pretty Mummy."

Me     : "Aww............ You are so sweet."

Moments like this make me forget how often he drives me up the wall.
x

心動 - Tempting Heart

I have almost forgotten about this great chinese movie, one of my favourites of all times, until I watched a chinese documentary film on Sylvia Chang (the scriptwriter, producer and director of this movie) earlier tonight. She also happens to be one of my favourite chinese directors. In fact, I love almost all the movies that she produces.

The story of this movie, 心動 (known as Tempting Heart in english), is about how a pair of young lovers were forced to seperate due to parental objections. They led their seperate lives and had their own marriages but both remained in each other minds for many years. As fate would have it, they bumped into each other again and despite wanting to reunite, several events in life got in their way and they never got back together. In the final scene, the male lead sent a parcel to the female lead. It was box containing many random photographs that he had taken over the years whenever he thought of her. Sounds a little cliche but the story is all about love, pain, life and regrets. A painfully beautiful movie.

Lyrics

有多久沒見你以為你在那裡
原來你就住在我的心底
陪伴著我的呼吸
有多遠的距離以為聞不到你氣息
誰知道你背影這麼長
回頭就看到你

過去讓它過去來不及
從頭喜歡你
白雲纏繞著藍天

如果不能夠永遠走在一起
也至少給我們
懷念的勇氣
擁抱的權利
好讓你明白我心動的痕跡

過去讓它過去 來不及
從頭喜歡你
白雲纏繞著藍天
如果不能夠永遠走在一起
也至少給我們
懷念的勇氣
擁抱的權利
好讓你明白我心動的痕跡

總是想再見你
還試著打探你的消息
原來 你就住在我的身體
守護我的回憶

I will be back

The couple of weeks leading up to xmas were crazy. I was busy checking things off my evergrowing long list of to-dos, while preparing for our friends' arrival from Perth. It didn't help that Aiden was also on school holidays which meant errands and chores took me twice as long as they would be if I had school to occupy him. Even my trusty babysitter was on vacation!

Our friends leave early tomorrow morning and my husband is going back to work. It will feel lonely all of a sudden for me and Aiden since we have been having company for the past 2 weeks. The grand plans will be to tidy up the house (I have no idea where everything is at the moment), do grocery shopping (time for some detox after the festive binging) and spend some quality time with my 3 year old. I am happy that Aiden got to spend time with his girlfriend from Perth who he only gets to see once or twice a year but I kinda miss spending bonding time with him too. We have had 4 adults and 3 children in the house for the past 2 weeks and everyday has been a chaotic situation. Good chaos though. But it's time my baby and I spend some quality time together so tomorrow will just be a day at home with puzzles, board games, basketball (his new xmas pressie from us) and maybe a craft project. Just us 2.

And of course I have missed writing in this little sanctuary of mine. Will hopefully squeeze some time to update this blog when the little boy goes for his nap.

Happy new year everyone. I will be back.