SMS me or TEXT me

Dear SG,

Before I came to NZ, I was an avid SMS-er. I sms when I was walking, I sms when I was watching the tv, I sms even when I was in the toilet. My thumb goes into cold turkey mode if I didn't sms for a day. I clock up an average of 500 sms-es per month! I sms to send jokes, pictures, or just chat throughout the day with a couple of friends. SMS was my communication power tool.

And then I land in NZ and I had to learn how to talk all over again. Talking with real people I mean. There's no one to text here except for my darling husband and I can only do that when he goes to work. Oh... did you notice that I've automatically use the word "TEXT" instead of "SMS"? Now that's one differences I am going to highlight today. Kiwis don't use the word "SMS", they knows what it is but it's seldom used. Instead, they said, "We'll text you" which is the same as "We'll sms you". Younger kiwis text a lot too, but matured kiwis prefer to call and talk instead. Since Andrew and I belong to the young and reckless, we prefer to text each other, it is also way cheaper than calling. kekeke....

with love from NZ,
J

PS. I need to rush off now else I would have added the "Spot the differences". You won't believe how much the mobile bill here cost. Ciao!

Turning 5 Yrs Old

Dear SG,

Do you still remember the day we turn 5? Oh well, turning 5 isn’t that special in Singapore but it sure is different here. The 5^th birthday is the day a child goes to a Primary School and starts their first term in Year Zero. Year Zero is like an adaptation period before they are prompted to Year 1 and they will stay in that Primary school until Year 6. My nephew, Eugene just turns 5 a few days ago. He spends his birthday in Kindergarten and the following day in Baverstock Oaks School. He could have spent his birthday as his first day of school in Baverstock but he prefers to have it at Kindy where all his friends are.

Eugene and his birthday cake. Poor boy was running a slight fever that day.

The next day: 1st day of school with his fresh new school uniform.

To help Eugene familiarize with his classroom and teacher, he went for a school visit last friday and spent 2 hours in the classroom attending a lesson. From now on, he will spend a full day in school from 9am to 3pm. :) I think I prefer to go to school when I am only 7 years old. hee...

with love from NZ,
J

Spot the differences:

NZ children goes to Primary school as soon as they turn 5 years old.

SG children goes to Primary school in January on the year when they will turn 7 years old.

A Kiwi classroom will have only one or two students who just started school. It makes it easier for the teacher to handle the new kids.

A Merlion classroom will be filled with terrify students who are all starting school for the first time. I wonder how the teachers handle it.

NZ students have a full day in school

SG students either has a morning session, afternoon session or for some schools a full day.

Age	New Zealand	Singapore
5	Year 0 (Primary)	Kindy
6	Year 1 (Primary)	Kindy
7	Year 2 (Primary)	Primary 1
8	Year 3 (Primary)	Primary 2
9	Year 4 (Primary)	Primary 3
10	Year 5 (Primary)	Primary 4
11	Year 6 (Primary)	Primary 5
12	Year 7 (Intermediate)	Primary 6
13	Year 8 (Intermediate)	Secondary 1
14	Year 9 (Secondary/high school/colleges)	Secondary 2
15	Year 10 (Secondary/high school/colleges)	Secondary 3
16	Year 11 (Secondary/high school/colleges)	Secondary 4
17	Year 12 (Secondary/high school/colleges)	Junior College Year 1
18	Year 13 (Secondary/high school/colleges)	Junior College Year 2

The kiwi kids might finish Year 13 around 17 or 18 years of age. This will depend on the school's cut off date for starting Year 1. In Eugene’s case, all children born before May have been prompted to Year 1. Since he just started, he will stay in Year 0 for a while.

ANZAC Day Vs Total Defence Day

Dear SG,

Today is ANZAC day in New Zealand. It’s a public holiday that commemorates all New Zealanders killed in war and also honours returned servicemen and women. ANZAC stands for Australian and New Zealand Army Corps. This same day back in 1915, New Zealand and Australian soldiers landed on the Gallipoli peninsula in Turkey. It was the first time New Zealander felt they have a role as a distinct nation fighting in the name of the British Empire. 2721 New Zealanders were killed, almost one in four of those who served on Gallipoli. That was in the First World War. Their bodies were not bought home. It’s very sad especially for the families.

http://www.dva.gov.au/images/commem/2_Turkey.jpg
A picture of the Anzac Commemorative Site build at Gallipoli in conjunction with the New Zealand government and with the approval of the Turkish government.

On this public holiday, businesses or trade not under the exempted categories are not allowed to operate until 1pm. (some examples are the banks, barbers, shopping malls etc. Most will just take the whole day off if they can’t open until 1pm)

Learning about New Zealand’s ANZAC Day prompts me to compare SG’s young history as a nation. We too have a special day dedicated to our war history. In 1942 15th February, British surrendered Singapore to the Japanese. That was the beginning of the Japanese Occupation of Singapore in War World Two. 15th of February not only marks the Fall of Singapore and commemorates those who died, but is also designated as Total Defence Day, a day to remind all Singaporeans of the need to be self-reliant in the defence of our country.

http://www.cofepow.org.uk/images/photo_surrender2.jpg
The Unconditional Surrender of Singapore
Lt. Gen. A E Percival sitting opposite Gen. Tomoyki Yamashita

However, Total Defence Day is NOT a public holiday in Singapore. :P It is however a significant day and a memorial service is held at the War Memorial Park to remember the victims of the war.

Singaporean works too hard, maybe we should make 15th of February a public holiday too, that way we can slow down little, take time to remember the past and appreciate the present.

With love from NZ,
J

Spot the differences:

ANZAC day is a public holiday… at least until 1pm for some.

Total Defence Day is not a public holiday.

Businesses are not allowed to operate on ANZAC day unless they belong to the exempted categories. It is an offence to open and trade during any time the law restricts trading, and the owner or occupier of the shop may be prosecuted and be liable for a fine of up to NZ$1,000.

SG businesses remain open any public holidays so long as it makes money senses and they can profit. However, most administrative offices will close so that their staffs can go shopping and contribute positively to the economy.

Some things are the same:

Both New Zealand and Singapore were part of the British Colonies.

I got email!

Dear SG,

Today is a public holiday in New Zealand. It's called the ANZAC day. I wasn't very motivated to find out about this special day until I received an email from Victor and I had to reply him. (hee...) Here is what Victor wrote:

From: Victor Chua
Subject: Have a good ANZAC day

>Hello Aunty Joan.
>I remenber today is ANZAC day.
>ANZAC day is a special holiday.
>Have a good ANZAC day.
>By Victor.

Isn't this sweet? :D

Victor is turning 7 years old this year and he loves writing. To encourage him to write lots, I've created an email account for him on Feb 24 and started a blog for him too. He didn't like to blog much, but he checks his email everyday. Sometimes when he wants to tell his parent something but they are not home, he email them instead! kekeke...

This email account gave us a chance to send him links leading to educational websites while keeping track on his writing abilities when he replies. Ann is considering a children's creative writing class for Victor. Instead of whining about the additional class he might have to attend, Victor is actually very pleased with the idea. All we have to do now is to keep a lookout for such a class.

I am really proud of him, he attends additional Chinese class and Maths class which he's pretty ok with, and swimming class which he likes. And now he wants Creative writing class! He sure is a busy busy boy.

Check out victor's blog below:
http://victor-chua.blogspot.com/

Because of his email to me, I now have to find out what exactly is ANZAC day so that I can reply his email and tell him why ANZAC day is so special. He loves information and the best thing about him is that he remembers them! This makes him a joy to teach.

Check out my next blog on ANZAC day.

with love from NZ,
J

Hail to the weather

Picture from thefreedictionary.com

Hail: define by thefreedictionary.com as Precipitation in the form of spherical or irregular pellets of ice larger than 5 millimeters (0.2 inches) in diameter.

Dear SG,

I wish I can say I’ve finally see snow but nah… not in Auckland. Here we get hail instead. Tiny cute little round ice pieces that falls from the sky. The first time I’ve seen it was around October I think. I thought it’s strange to see so many white petals falling on the floor, I assume the wind and the rain was causing the wild flowers to loose their petals. Andrew didn't believe me when I told him it's raining petals outside. He went out to investigate and found out that my white petals were actually tiny pieces of ice! We were pretty fascinated. (Mountain tortoises) hee...

The 2nd time I’ve see it was last Thursday 12th of April, the temperature was around 12 degree Celsius. It’s fortunate that the hails are pretty mild here. The ice is so tiny that it melts easily in our hands. (M&M does better than that even though they are only slightly bigger) I was too cold to go out of the house and take a photo of the hail. But I found one picture from the internet that best describe what I’ve seen here.

Picture from franklin.thefuntimesguide.com

The white spots are the hails and there isn't a lot of them, that's pretty much the same with what I've seen here. They melt pretty quickly and all that's left are just puddles of water.

we miss warm and sunny SG.

with love,
J

Spot the difference:

No hailing in SG, the only thing we hail is a cab.

In NZ, we had to call a cab, we can't really hail a cab from the road. The only hailing are from the sky. :)

Strike One! Strike two! Strike THREE!!!

Dear strike-less SG,

I heard about the SG wage increase for Prime Minister, ministers and top civil servants. Sigh... I should have chosen politics when I had the chance. *grin*

Oh well, back to the news from NZ. For the next 2 days starting from tomorrow, medical laboratory workers will go on strike. Blood transfusions, blood testing and tissue sampling services for public and private hospitals are all affected. The union is seeking a couple of improvement for their laboratory workers in terms of wages, flexibility in working hours etc,

This is the 3rd strike since I came to NZ. The 1st was on Nov 2006 and it was a 7 days strike from the same union!!! That strike caused a backlog when nearly 1000 elective surgeries were put off in Auckland.

The 2nd strike was from the Service and Food Worker Unions. They took to the street to highlight their low wages and unjust treatment from the hospitals. Although they only clean the place or prepared the food but they are certainly more considerate. Their strike only lasted 90 minutes because they wanted to make their problems known but they didn't want the patients to be affected.

It says "Healthy Pay for Healthy Hospitals". Service staffs are indeed an important part of any industry, never take them for granted.

Taking their strike to the streets.
Both pictures are from the Service and Food Worker Unions website.

Anyway, for now, the affected hospitals put up notices in the newspaper, radios and TV to remind everyone that the labs are on strike, and hospital services will be limited. The public is also reminded to see their family doctors first if it is not an emergency. Life goes on for the rest of us, I hope everyone gets what they want and no one gets hurt.

with love from NZ,
J

Spot the differences:

Auckland has 3 strikes since I arrived 6 months ago. That's an average of 1 strike every 2 months!!

The last strike in SG is ..... I really don't know when!!! But there was a famous strike called the 'Great STC Strike' ("Singapore Traction Company") that lasted 146 days and that was in 1956! The whole country's transport system was affected. For the last 30 years while I've gotten conceived, born, grew up and got hitched in SG, I've not heard of any strike.

Sticky mouse trap

Dear SG,

Living in newer neighborhood estate in Singapore means that I am not used to having mice problem in the house. In fact, I was told that only lower floor flats in very old estate has such a problem.

While NZ don't have house lizard, they do have mice. Especially when the weather turns colder, they will start to appear in the house instead of staying in the garden. Yesterday night when I was on the phone with my mom, I saw a mouse running across the hall. This morning, Joseph saw 2 of them in the same place and decided to set up a mouse trap.

Ship rat. Similar to the one we seen. They are actually pretty adorable but they do smell quite badly. This picture is taken from http://www.taiko.org.nz/Taikotuku.html

They place 3 sticky mouse trap on the floor along the wall just before they go to bed. Andrew and I got thirsty so we went back to the kitchen to get a drink. When we switch on the lights, we saw one mouse stuck to the mouse trap. To cut the long story short, Andrew painstakingly got the mouse freed from the super glue trap. It limped away into the garden but that's definitely better than staving to death or dying in a slow agonizing way. 3 cheers to Andrew for being kind and patience enough to free the mouse while I plaster myself to his side wincing at the pain the poor mouse had to go through.

This is exactly how the mouse looks like when it was caught, sticky trap and all. This picture is taken from http://salvoarts.com/melrose/AprilShow.shtml

The 2nd mouse is still at large, I pray it won't get caught in the same way. Sigh, I rather have the house lizard any time even though they too make my hair stand.


with love from NZ,
J