The Backup Plan

The "old and wise" used to say to the "young and stupids" repeatedly to always have a backup plan in whatever you do but seldom this immature nitwits do take notice.

To make it more interesting, last month right before Ramadhan, my maid ran away. It's the usual case with Indonesian maid here in Malaysia, after a certain period of time working with an employer, the tendency to run away is quite high.

I am not a person who thinks negatively about people. I tend to trust and respect people whenever I can. This includes our maid. She takes good care of Fahyim and displays motherly affection towards him also when one fine day she requested us to send her to her sisters and later on disappear for reasons I can't state.

We was caught of guard. We needed to think of a way to sort Fahyim out. My wife took 1 week leave to take care of the little guy. At first we can't believe that finally the time has come for us to send our only boy to the kindergarten and he is not yet 2 years old. We scouted for the nearest, most affordable and safest place there is in Bangsar and managed to filter them into two choices.

The first one was Kinderland which is situated in Jalan Terasek. It's near, it has vast experience (established in 1978) and the teacher to children ratio was quite good. There are a few negatives that I saw through my visit there was the maid. She looks fierce and gloomy. The fact that there is no Malay there, so there was no basic Islamic practice which is very essential to us. Plus, the kid screamed and hooked his legs on to my waist when I wanted to put him down.

We went to the next kindergarten near the place where we normally do grocery shopping called Peterana Kindergarten. Situated in Lucky Garden beside TMC. They just started business for not more than a year. A bit off on the experience side but it is Malay-owned and teaches basic Islamic. Not many kids there, they got 14 in total including the 4 years old and above. If Fahyim joins, he will be the fifth kid in the toddlers class. We were mesmerized by the interior design of this place. They make it child friendly similar of that Gymboree. The staircases was fully guarded with baby gates and the house is semi-full carpeted. When we are in the midst of touring the house, the principal asked another teacher to take Fahyim upstairs to play. Surprisingly, that little lad willingly and whole-heartedly surrenders himself to the teacher.  I then looked at Diyanah and saw her eyes sparkle, she suddenly shoots a lot of questions to the principal enthusiastically.I know there and then that this particular kindergarten struck my wife's heart . We had a discussion with our parents and enrolled Fahyim the very next week.

Amukan di pagi hari malas pegi skolah

He is definitely not a morning person

Behold! The messmaker has arrived fellas!

First artwork. Got 2 stars only due to short span of concentration.

A Sniff of Fresh Air

Finally we manage to squeeze a wee bit of our time to spend with the kid. After a spontaneous planning, I decided to bring our little familia to Langkawi Island for a short beachy break. The kid has grown up a bit and man he likes to play with sands and of course the all time favorite..the swimming pool!

At first, we wanted to drive there. Other than minimizing the trip cost, we thought we might as well enjoy the scenery. What I didn't know was if I were to bring my car to the island, I would have to send it via forwarding company which uses cargo ferry and will also consume time. So we book flight tickets and rent a car there, more expensive but less tiring and hassle free.

The three of us took the  LRT from Kerinchi Station to KL Sentral and took the KLIA express . It was Fahyim's first train ride but unfortunately he is too young to give a damn about it.. Haha..

We reached Resorts World Hotel Langkawi quite early. The checkout time was at 2-3 pm so there was no vacant room. So we had our early lunch at the cafe while waiting for the room.

Hi! Nama saya Fahyim. Hari ini saya buat record tak mandi sambil naik kapal terbang lagi.

The last time we went to Medan, Fahyim did not take his bath. This time he did it again with style " The Unbathed Traveller". Kah kah kah!

Fahyim jumped into the pool that evening and pulling him out of it was a big ask. I don't favor him staying in the pool for too long during that particular time because he didn't wear any swimming diapers. I went to search for the diapers which I read are sold in Cold Storage nationwide. It is called Huggies Little Swimmers, but my attempt at Cold Storage KLCC failed due to restocking complications. I manage to find one at a sundry shop along Pantai Cenang though.

Kuala Lumpur =MYR 29.50
Langkawi = MYR 40.00!
Frickin lavish Islanders!

He went the first day without the diapers. The fear of him "making cake" inside the pool was looming inside my apprehended mind. Luckily Fahyim was in full control of his stools because he was too occupied with the water smashing . This time around, the wading pool is shallow enough for him to stand and move . I presume this impulse of achievement in him knowing that he can maneuver himself without being held stops him from discharging unwanted particles in the pool. 

Don't worry mang! I ain't gonna shite mang!

Wait for me pool. Here I come pool. Gotta bring milk!

Our little happy family spent 2 nights in Langkawi. We went duty free shopping, seafood eating , "underwaterworld" ing, and "cable car" ing. Action packed holiday I recalled. I remember during my bachelor times, I used to travel light. 3 shirts, 1 shorts, a pair of shoe, a few boxers and i'm ready to roll. Nowadays is a a whole different ball game .., 1 super huge luggage, 1 semi huge luggage, 1 back pack filled with formula milk and flask , 1 stroller and sometimes 1 grumpy little lad. I'd just take it as a holiday workout. Haha!

Mommy's tired of Fahyim's flying saucer night.

Cody the surfer

That's not sweat. That's just fahyim being greedy while drinking.

Apple of my Eye

The Pride of Us

Ahhhh...Its been a while since I last updated this column. It's been so busy around here that I haven't been able to call my time my own. Off to work at 10a.m, back home at 10p.m. There's lesser time to be with the kid nowadays. The purpose why I created this blog is mainly to track the improvements of Muhammad Fahyim Syakir, the kid who is slowly turning into a joker without neglecting his intelligence.

He is fast approaching 2 years old now. (1.9 years to be exact). For us,every Saturday is the day for little Fahyim to go to Gymboree and visit his grandparents. When he wakes up on Saturday morning, he will run to the front door and grab his shoes while mumbling the word "shhssst" (shoes) for numerous time. He knows it is and outing day for him after spending most of the time at home during weekdays. It reminds me on how Diyanah used to go out a lot during her pregnancy days. So that basically justifies my inference on this behavior.

Last week I sat in front of the TV with my son watching the never ever changed channel ( Disney Junior 613 which was airing Let's Go Pocoyo as usual), suddenly the boy got up and started moving in circles. It was these guys who thought him that.

The Martian Brothers!

What happens in this show is, an object such as keys or scissors will appear in the middle of this group of aliens. A background voice will pronounce the name of the object and out of the sudden this aliens will move around it in circles like the Red Indians while pronouncing the name of the object continuously. Amazingly, the kid learns from it and it stays in his head.

At home, we normally speak Malay to him but he is more influenced with the English speaking TV shows and starts picking up words from these shows instead of the Malay words conversed by us. It is quite an intriguing method  I must say. I hope by learning English from the TV and Malay from us, it will somehow create a fine balance in his comprehension of the two languages.

He grows so fast and remarkably got some valuable skills under his belt. He can count 1 to 10 while going up and down the stairs. He can differentiate between up and down by literally lifting his hand up and down respectively while pronouncing the gestures cheekily. For a 2 year kid, to be able to memorize alphabets up to the letter H is by far an outstanding achievement thanks to playschool and Youtube. 

I hate to admit that the media nowadays plays a paramount advantage to the kids education. The only challenge is to control the number of hours spent by the lad infront of the TV. 

Contractor in progress?

The Ultimate Power of Pocoyo!

I have never experienced this much cartoon since Aladdin and the Lion King. Everyday my TV set at home was fixed to the 613 channel which is the Disney Channel. It was one after the other, I went through various types of cartoons from Jake and the Neverland Pirates to Timmy Time and from Higglytown Heroes (it should be called Higglytown Hideous..hahaha ) to Elmo's World. But  I have never once in my life came across a cartoon series that has this much superpower to effect and influence the mind of young Fahyim. It is ultimately "The" frickin show and it is distinctly pronounced as " LET'S GO POCOYO"!!

There's another red squid called Fred and he is not in the picture

This blue dude wearing a blue suit with an ear flapping cap really really is something different. I must call its creator a sheer genius because he managed to design the show in a funny way for the purpose of education to these toddlers. 

Fahyim picked up a few words from the show including the names of the characters in it.  Pato the yellow duck is his favorite. He will pronounce Pato's name whenever that duck appears on screen. He can now say umbrella in his baby accent which is so cute which he picked up from the show. 

The only drawbacks of this show to me is the impishness of Pocoyo, his power of influencing the kid is shocking. The kid tends to imitate any and every move Pocoyo does. Be it facial expression, gestures and even its laughing style. 

Last two days, there's an episode where Pocoyo carries a red ball and started hopping around. My son ran across the living hall to pick up my Manchester United football and started hopping around imitating that stubborn Pocoyo. 

Because of the love and affection that my son has for this blue dude and his friends, I decided to find him some Pocoyo stuffs and I came to the knowledge that there's not much baby outlets that sells its products. There is one in Robinsons@Gardens and another one at Manjaku in Bandar Baru Bangi. 

Surprisingly, a t-shirt cost me MYR70 bucks and a sweat pants costs around MYR50. That's hell of a price tag for a kid's attire. Cekik darah punya Pocoyo. When we saw the price tag, I looked at my wife and she stares back at me. A mutual understanding was formed without any verbal interactions. We glanced at little Fahyim to seek alibi for spending our hard earned money. 

That lad was already on the floor hugging a Pato shirt and overjoyingly smiling at the shirt. At that point, another mutual understanding between a husband and wife was formed and finally we bought our boy his first Pocoyo merchandise. 

As long as you're happy me boy.

Sir Fahyim Strikes Back!

If you recall correctly on my previous post on the early stage of this blog, I once mentioned how I spend my leisure time after working hours on a daily basis. I do play video games. I hold my Playstation 3 very dearly to my heart.

Since I got a walking minor in my house, I manage to lose view on two CD's and only recovered ONE which is the Gran Turismo after an intensive searching by my maid. After going through almost one month of clueless searches, I decided to buy the FIFA 14 and regarded that the FIFA 12 is missing in action.

This story brought me back to last week, when suddenly, out of nowhere, the FIFA 12 made its way back to the TV shelf. I was quite surprised but not that excited because I've already got the FIFA 14. Once my finger touches the start button of the Playstation to play my favourite FIFA 14, I realise that somehow, the said game was gone. It was inside the PS3 the whole time, but this time FIFA 12 came back and FIFA 14 has gone absent. *sigh*

I definitely know who is the culprit behind all this..

The Prince of Pocoyo!

I ask the maid and as usual, she had no clue. That little boy only manage to grin when I show him an example on how a CD looks like. I was quite naive expecting him to show me to the location where he hid it. An in-depth search commenced for two weeks. I took a peek in my bag considering that the lad might put it in there like what he did to my wedding ring, but nothing inside. I explored his toy motorcycle and nothing shiny was in sight.

I didn't play any video game for two weeks. My wife liked it. But she know I don't. One fine day, when I was interrogating my son about the CD which he replied in words such as " Abetiiii" ( I don't know whats that supposed to mean) or " Oh noooo!", my wife asked me to check under the sofa. I said to her, " It can't be there, it's heavy". " Have you checked? You never know" she replied.  After contracting my left bicep to lift the sofa, my wife sighted a shiny object lying far behind the couch. IT WAS THE CD!!. Hahaha thank God! We made it after only just two weeks!

To think back on how Fahyim did it. It is merely simple. He might have climbed the couch and slip the CD behind the couch. Stupid me. I don't have this Inspector Gadget or Detective Conan intellectual skills like my wife.

But anyway, I am back with my gaming routine and the kid got a brand new toy. The first post I made on this blog concluded that I will try my level best not to spoil the kid with toys. But the grandfathers didn't bother. His "Atok" bought him this..a remote control car with a Feng Tau sound system. The kid can even drive himself when his legs get longer.

 
Major road humps ahead *haiyaa*

Fahyim and Ritchie

My wife and I took leave for two days this week to join our families vacation in Kuching, Sarawak. My father is a very busy man. He is a training consultant which means that he is on the move most of the time. He misses his grandchild so much resulted him to plan for us to meet him in Kuching.

So we went there and spent 3 days visiting that beautiful place with beautiful food. We went to this Cultural Village to see various types of Sarawak's ethnic houses but the temperature was roasting. Hot weather is equivalent to Fahyim's grumpiness. Fahyim's grumpiness is equivalent to sweaty mom and dad. Hahahaha.

Nevertheless, a visit to Semenggoh Nature Reserve to meet the Orang Utans was cordial though. The scorching weather does not stop us from trekking into the jungle to meet them. 

When we touched down at Kuching Airport on Saturday, the taxi driver told us a tale of "RITCHIE" the boss of Orang Utans. We was told that he was a rebel, protestant and  an insurgent dominant male Orang Utan in that Reserve. He once bit a visitors fingers until it fell of. Wutha?!. At first, I thought it was just a locals way to dramatized the attractions that they got there until the tourist guide that brought us to the reserve told us the same story. It seems that it's parents were shot when he was young so now its taking its toll on humans. 

Freakin obese Apeman

Fahyim was exuberantly excited seeing the Orang Utan. He called it "GOGO" as in gorilla. Hahaha! Normally, he will feel crotchety dealing with these kind of weather but the excitement kept his grouchiness on check.

We went back to the hotel and had cheap seafood at TopSpot. It cost us only MYR 150 for nearly 7 dishes consisting crabs,fish,squids and prawns. My wife saw an Instagram clip of Baby Afia eating rice courteously. She decided to present Fahyim with a plate of rice thinking that he might replicate what can do. 

Instead, he did this.

                                        

FAHYIM SYAKIR 1.7 YEARS

My son has a curly hair. People tend to mistake him for a girl because of his long curly hair. Even though the mother style him up in a manly manner. Some nitwits will still call him a she. For example " How old is SHE?" "Waahh.. SHE is so active!!" . Of course HE is active, coz he's a frickin' boy !

The other reason might be his nasty lashes. Its so long sometimes it reminds me of the lashes that Snuffy had from Sesame Street.

                                     

 



So my wife and I sat down and heavy-heartedly reached in a resolution to snip away all the curls that sometimes look like a ducks backside. Hahaha..we kept it long because it looks cute on him but people are playing with gender issues here. So bye bye curly wurly..

BEFORE

AFTER

Chillin with Pocoyo.

I have been cutting his hair myself since he was born and I thought I did not bad.

Fahyim has been a tremendous learner at his playschool. Last week was my turn to lough and my wifes' turn to sweat. Chasing the kid inside the play area was a big ask for her considering the level of fitness she is at. Hahaha. Fahyim was by far the fastest learner there. He enjoyed it so much and we're glad that he picked up a few words of praise from the teachers. 

So much has changed since he was a little boy. I remember clearly the time when he struggles to lift his head and roll his body. I remember how sour he can smell in the morning similar to the scent of a "Songkok" worn by Sekolah Agama petang kids.

He does not like to be carried like a kid nowadays, he can basically interpret things correctly using gestures or mimics of the face. I recalled during Diyanah's maternity, she hates staying in. She likes to go out and see shopping malls or bazaars or eateries. We seldom stay home. This traits was victoriously passed to the child. He feels bored if he stays in. He somehow knows when weekend comes where he will take his shoes and park it infront of the main door. What a kid.