Figuring things out

Joaquin is doing lots of things these days to make his Daddy & Mommy proud:

• Today he crawled over to his potty and though he didn't sit on it, he crouched next to it and started going (albeit with his pants still on)! so hopefully it won't be too long before we can say bye bye to diapers. He hasn't quite read enough Economist to figure out a solution to the Financial Crisis, but let's hope it's soon.


• At the park he kept pointing at the birds and pigeons and saying "coo coo", which I guess to him means 'bird'. Maybe it was all that playing "Cucurrucucu, Paloma" (from the Habla Con Ella Soundtrack) to him while he was in the womb?


• Dense Daddy didn't know that it was time to give him milk and kept reading him his bedtime story, so Joaquin looked at the bottle in the bottle warmer and said "Nai!" (milk in Chinese).

Darling of the Crowd

Chamu won the popularity contest this weekend. We had spent last 5 days in Phuket with Jon and Kinty. A lot of sunshine, fun and rain (luckily mostly in the evenings)!
Chamu likes looking at people and, in turn, he was attracting smiles or waves everywhere we brought him. Mary Anne calls him Darling of the crowd!
He was also extremely active and probably scared his uncle and auntie into waiting a couple more years before having a baby of their own (after witnessing how Chamu tears up the living room--and every restaurant we went to!).
Chamu became comfortable with pool again but he is still somewhat afraid of grass and sand (still a city boy). After 5 days of blazing sun in Phuket, he has added some color to his white skin (and a few mosquito bites).
On the flight back to Hong Kong today, he managed to tire out all three of his caretakers. We now feel like we need another vacation to recover from the last 6 hours...
Pictures to come soon.

Strong Chamu

Chamu just had two more teeth that came out (total of six now!). Yesterday he had a slight fever and was vomiting a bit (he was a good boy and didn't complain at all even though he threw up the entire dinner). Today he is back to his usual playful and happy self.

He is getting more interactive these days and becoming really fun to play with. He now sings when we play songs to him, dances when he hears his favorite music and comes over to kiss me when he remembers. He goes to sleep by himself (after I sing to him and read him story) without much fuss. This morning after I fed him milk at 6am and put him back to his crib, he was just lying in the crib and talking to his stuffed animals...so cute!

Point of No Return

So we sent in our notice to terminate our lease today!
We will have our friend adopt some of our furniture while we are away and move the remaining items into a small apartment near the HK Airport where rent is a lot more reasonable. We will still be renting a place since storage cost in HK is very high especially for facilities with climate control (a must for the humid weather in HK). Jaime and I had thought about keeping the current apartment but the total rent wasted could fund our European trip already!
Last day of Winfield Building will be June 18, 2009 (which coincides with our City Hall anniversary). This place is in our view the best place in Hong Kong: Nice open view of the race course, breezy balcony, huge swimming pool, convenient location. This is also where we shared and created a lot of memories as newly weds. We will miss it dearly and we may move back to this building when we return to Hong Kong in 2010 (if we can still afford the rent then)... Auf Wiedersehen Happy Valley!

Mamu's Last Biz Trip...Until She Finds Another Job

After attending my best friend's wedding in Taipei, we came back to HK on Monday and I left again for NYC that very night. I had to go away for almost one week for my last biz trip at the current company. These days, Joaquin is growing up so fast that even being away for a couple of days makes a big difference.
At the wedding last Sunday, he was so focused on picking up every flower petal on the floor (which was sprinkled by the flower boy). This week, Dadu told me that he is into picking up little leaves at the park but Mamu is not around to see that. Instead, she can only look at the pictures that Dadu sends over while counting to the days she returns to Hong Kong...

Mamu Update

Mamu will be officially unemployed starting this Labor Day (May 1)! 
Dadu and Mamu are planning to take a long holiday and drive around Europe with Chamu for a few months, taking the advantage of the plunging currencies, economies, hotel and petrol prices. Come join us!

Sunday with Chamu

Sunday is always a big challenge for us. Our helper is off on Sunday and we always have erratic schedules running around so much that Chamu cannot keep to his schedule. Take today for example, Jaime and I were out until 3am and we had a hard time falling asleep when we got home. So when we woke up at 7:30am, we both had only a couple hours of sleep. Of course me being the sleepy head in the family, I could not stay awake at all, so Jaime had to be the one minding Joaquin when I was napping mid-morning. By the time I got up again around 11am, we only had less than 30 minutes to get Joaquin fed and dressed before we were due at a birthday party.
It took us 40 minutes to get to Inspiration Lake which is located next to Disneyland Hong Kong. It's a very nice artificial lake with vast picnic areas with grass (quite a rare sight in urban Hong Kong). Unfortunately, Joaquin had the wrong start with grass, he did a face plant when he tried to sit up on the sloped grass. The rest of the afternoon he was not happy and was clingy for some odd reason. Every time we tried to sit him down on the grass, he would start crying.By the time we returned to the HK island, we were both very hungry. Even though we didn't bring Joaquin's dinner, we were brave enough to think that he could wait until his parents finish their dinner first. Naturally we had to deal a very hungry and grumpy baby shrieking when his parents were trying to eat. We finally gave up and started giving him "adult food": wonton soup and steamed bun. Joaquin was so amazed by the taste of MSG, he kept shouting for more. He also liked the steamed bun so much that he kept stuffing his mouth with it. I guess this will be the last time that we put our hunger before Joaquin's.