how do you sing "happy birthday" in chinese?

Makayla had a birthday party for one of her classmates - Alex, this past weekend. Joe happened to be there when they were getting ready for the cake.

Antonia (one of Mak's classmate): "we can sing happy birthday in English, Polish, Chinese, French...."
Joe: "Really? Chinese???? How?"

Then the kids in unison, as if they practiced - started to sing Happy Birthday in Chinese. . . .

or so they thought.

To Joe's great amazement and amusement, they were not at all singing in Chinese.

This is what they were singing:

"Chin chin nay nay quai nai~ Chin chin nay nay quai nai ~"

Joe just started to crack up and Alex's dad was like "are they singing in Chinese?" and Joe answered, "I don't know what language they are signing in." but Joe knew that this was the song Makayla made up in her jibberish period.

It was just amazing to see 12 kids sing this jibberish song in unison. It's too embarrassing at this point to tell the children that what they are singing is in fact not only NOT chinese but NOT a language at all!

Since I missed the whole thing, I asked Makayla when she came back from the party.

Me: "I heard that you guys sang in Chinese - how did all the kids know to sing it?"
Mak: (confidently) "Because Antonia and I taught them!"
Me: (not having the heart to tell her that it's not Chinese) "Rrrrrriiiiigggghhhhtttt. Okay...okay..."

Oh, the kicker was that Ethan chimed in with already memorized and well-practiced "chin-chin-nay-nay-quai-nai". oh brother.

skiing

We finally got a chance to go skiing couple of times over kid's week break in February. We had a visit from Joe's sister and her boyfriend so off we went to a ski resort in Zakopane.

This is Makayla's swimming teacher - she also teaches and runs ski camp during the winter - she's a super athlete! She is so good with kids and patient with them. No one can pay me enough money to teach bunch of kids to ski - nor adults!! It takes special skills to be a teacher. I respect them :)

Ethan didn't ski but was dragged around in his little sled. He insisted on wearing a helmet and goggles - though there was no danger around him at all. He didn't even want to take them off in the lodge. It's always so puzzling what kids get fixated on.

This was the second lesson Makayla had. I took her to a local slope to just get a lesson. I thought she would go about 2 hours. Monica did one lesson and was waving for me to come. I thought they were done but she said that Makayla wants to keep going so they will take a break and do another session. I was amazed at her endurance and desire to keep going. All I remember from my childhood skiing days is me wailing over the fact that I had to carry my own skis from the parking lot to the lodge. So she had another session and by end of the day, Makayla was able to come down from the little hill - top to bottom on her own! It was a great day!

Makayla and Ethan playing air hockey at the lodge.

Drakken Siu

I'm not sure if it's every boy - but my boy sure seems be drawn to "bad" guys in whatever he sees. He has only seen the cover of Star Wars DVD's and immediately, he likes Darth Vader the most.

One morning, I wake Ethan up to go to school and say"It's time to get up, Ethan Siu." and he goes "I'm not Ethan Siu! I'm Drakken Siu." Those who are not well versed in all things Disney, he is the villain from Kim Possible. And mind you, he's not even a cool villain. He's kind of absent minded and gets bossed around by his supposed employee/side-kick, She-go. In fact, She-go is a much better villain when it comes to actual execution of trying to conquer the world. The picture below portrays the typical dynamics between the two. . . .

this is Monkey Fist, another villain he is partial to. Ethan likes to quote from him. When we were eating snacks one day, out of nowhere, he pumped his fist and declared "You WILL bow down to my POWER!!!" I was like "?????" and he said it again with a serious face "YOU WILL bown down to MY POWER!!!" ooooo-kay. then he just chuckles to himself. . . . My question is: should I be concerned or research ways to channel his "hungry for power" desires for good, and not evil?

how can this sweet face be plotting evil? though he is holding a fire-breathing dragon. . . . if not a weapon. . . or a karate chop. . . .

London trip

We had another quick trip to London. I had alot on my agenda though Joe was the one going for a business trip. First off, I had to get a haircut at a Japanese salon, which turned out well :) All my friends here thought it was so funny that I had to go all the way to London to get a cut but I'm sure my fellow owners of thick, straight, voluminous Asian hair can attest to the importance of an Asian stylist!
next stop is ofcourse to get some sushi. it was sooooooo good. melt in your mouth - and joe got to try shabu shabu for the first time. it made me think about my dad who used to LOVE shabu shabu - the perfect health food - meat and veggies boiled.

we stayed at the sheraton near sloan street where all the fancy stores were. and look at this. this is a dry cleaner - all the dress shirts were marked and lined up like some fancy shirt store. it really looked like a boutique. i should have found out how much shirt cleaning was.

we went to the V & A museum which is now my favoritest museum!!! before this visit, it used to be the Uffizi gallery in Florence. it was such a fun experience at the V & A! Even Joe really liked it and he was poo pooing it initially because it's more of applied art muesum rather than fine arts. but the way everything was displayed and layed out, it was the most interesting and innovative museum i've been too. I highly recommend it if you are in London. In fact, all the museums in London have been super enjoyable.

they have this Asian exhibition, and we thought this was really funny. it's a "life-sized automaton" - the crank handle operates the mechanisms to make the man's arm flair and make groaning sounds. Is it suppose to be a toy? i personally wouldn't buy it for my kids.

the main hall of the V&A.

we had a meal at the harrod's food court which was the fanciest food court i've ever been to. we had to have fish and chips being in England :)

then my first trip to see Les Mis - Joe's fourth.

Kids were sick when we left so I had to call home like 3x a day. They were okay and just wanted to make sure that we were brining back some goodies for them! What a great trip it was, can't wait to go back - maybe next time with the kids :P

year end countdown 2008

10. Holland trip - Ethan's hair gets caught on fire. When we were visiting back in January, the kids were waiting for me while I shopped. When I came back, I immediately smelled something burning. When asked, Joe's sister was like "ummmm. . . . ethan's hair got caught on fire. . . ." ethan was reaching out to grab something and his hair touched the kerosene lamp that was on the table. this picture is of the aftermath.



9. Ethan sleeps through most meals - seriously, I would say he missed about almost all lunch outings on the weekends. He would fall asleep as we near the restaurant and sleeps through the meal - then he would wake up and we'd give him the left over or buy him a bagel. It's nice and quiet meals though.


8. Siu's in nature - Ethan getting dragged as we go into the woods to go berry hunting. It's crazy how one with the nature we are becoming being in Poland. I'm a big fan of manicured landscaping, none of that here, thank you very much. just wild and crazy.


7. Learning Chinese - My lessons are going well!!! I'm so much more motivated and actually study during the week! My teacher and I had a funny conversation about the need of Chinese people to have Chinese food. She herself has been in Poland for 7 years to get her PhD. She was telling me that many Chinese men have come to study here but couldn't last more than 5 months because they couldn't eat Chinese food everyday. Puahhahahah. It reminded me of the time when Joe and I went on the Chinese tour of Italy and they would bus us to Chinese restaurants instead of Italian - we ofcoursed escaped to get local fare.


6. Having visitors - this year, we had visits from Joe's parents and Joe's sister :) It was great to show them the town and enjoy their company.
5. Home Leave - crazy but enjoyable. non-stop shopping (for such essentials like ziploc and cold-eeze - not shopping like bags and shoes. . . . unfortunately) and visiting friends :) here, a picutre of ethan making turtle shell sculpture in Cape May and Makayla's birthday party at Chuck E. Cheese.



4. Barcelona Trip - LOVE LOVE LOVE Barcelona. Good friends, good food, good art, friendly people - can't get any better than that.




3. Mallorca Trip - this was a year of all things Spain. I loved every minute of it. Here, every house in this town (Valldemossa) had a plaque of St. Catherine who is Mallorca's patron saint. Joe and I went around town to hunt for different kinds of plaques and gave up after finding out that there were too many varieties. (we have about 10 pictures of me/joe posing with different ones - silly, i know - but that's what we do.)



2. Mak swims! Mak performs! - monumental year of growth for Makayla - oh yeah, she is aslo starting to read and does math but that seems to matter more to Joe than me. Different priorities for different parents.


1. Ethan enters school!! - I was tempted to post a video clip of Ethan kicking and screaming while we forced him into the school bus. But I'd rather leave you with this happy picture a minute before the bus arrived.

PICTURE OF THE YEAR

Makayla chillaxing as she surfs the net sucking on candy. We fear the years to come.

Christmas 2008

We started our 10 days of Christmas with a quick visit from Joe's parents. First stop was to the pool to witness Makayla's swimming progress. Can you believe she was scared to put her face in the water just 3 months ago???

then off to the market square for the annual Christmas market where kids for some reason end up with lollipops.

on christmas day, kids got to open their presents, little did they know that some of them were gifts from our friends back home from their birthdays in the summer. (like the lightsabre that ethan liked so much - thanks grace!!!) we're not cheap, we're just wise. . . .

also on christmas day, we were invited to one of the american family whose been in Poland for now 20 years! they have 3 lovely daughters who love our children and our kids adore. in fact, ethan has said to the oldest daughter, "i will be with you forever. . . ." we had a great time and had american pecan pie that i've been craving!!!! yummmm.

during this visit, i forgot why, but i started to tell them about the first couple of days in Poland which was the roughest for me. i told them with my dramatic flair about how i had to suffer using a traditional mop and a bucket to clean the floor of our house since poland doesn't have wet swiffer nor steam vac. then they told us their story about when they first came here - how you couldn't buy anything. a truck will come periodically with supply of toilet paper - they would announce that they had toilet paper and people would rush out to get their ration. they also said that you can still read prints off the toilet paper and basically fell apart whenever you used them. i quickly cowered and said "times were different then. . . . ." hee hee.

the day after the christmas, we headed off the the market square - it was way more crowded than last year for some reason. there was a nativity set up at a church (with real mary and joseph!!) and monk band playing. joe loved it for some reason and was rocking it out with them. it was hilarious. what do you guys think??

winternational '08

kid's school had their winter performance. the theme was around the world and each class was assigned a country to represent. ethan's class represented all the world and we were told to dress the kids in traditional clothing. only thing i had in hand was makayla's purple chinese clothes and a cowboy outfit from halloween. i tried the chinese shirt and pants on him and i thought it looked pretty good. but joe ofcourse was adamantly against ethan wearing girl's clothes and for some reason ethan said "i don't like chhhhiiinneeeseee." so we settled for the cowboy outfit which he didn't even wear - just the vest. as you can see, only the Polish kids dressed up in their nice outfits and kids from bland countries like the States or Sweden ended up wearing good ol' blue jeans.

ethan's performance didn't disappoint. to my surprise, he refused to participate. it was like deja vu of makayla's past 3 performances. now my dream of ethan becoming the next matt lauer has been shattered. he is stage shy and he can't be forced to participate. though there's a glimmer of hope when he gave into peer pressure and came back to the performance - though he didn't dance in circles.

makayla on the other hand participated fully! it took 3 winter performances but she has overcome her fear! her class represented australia so they dressed up in summer clothes. they sang "kookabarre sits in the old gum tree..." it was really cute. makayla hung out with other kids the whole time during the show. . . . she is already entering the stage where friends are cooler than her parents. . . . sniff, sniff. . . .