Tuesday, February 21, 2006

Irza was admitted to hospital

On Thursday (16/2), Irza was admitted to KK Women's and Children's Hospital due to pro-longed febrile fit. Since the fit was quite long (more than half an hour), Irza had breathing difficulties causing low level of oxygen in his blood. Therefore, he needed to be admitted to the Children's Intensive Care Unit (CICU) for further observation.

CTScan was performed to check any possibility of brain injury, while Lumbal Puncture (LP) was performed to check possibility of brain infection (meningitis). The good news, there was no sign of of brain injury nor brain infection based on the CTScan and LP results, even though we needed to wait for 2-3 days to get the full LP results. Alhamdulillah.

Irza's condition was improved so he was transferred to the High Dependency (HD) ward on Saturday (18/2), and eventually was transferred to normal ward on Sunday (19/2). And since there was no fever detected on the past two days (Sunday and Monday), the doctor certified him to be discharged from the hospital on Monday (20/2), and he has been going back home since then.

Thanks for all who offer their full supports and prayers for Irza's recovery, including those who come to the hospital to visit (thanks Dini, Nonong, Roger, Rebecca, teacher Hidayah and teacher Mas), also via e-mail, SMS (thanks Zul, Amel), phone, chat (thanks Deden, Nadia, Rachel) and blog (thanks Teh Inong).

Read the Indonesian version of this post here, here and here.

Wednesday, February 15, 2006

Singapore River Hongbao

After attending my friend's wedding party at Ubi Avenue, I took Irza to Suntec City Mall. After spending some time around the huge shopping mall, we took the free shuttle bus to City Hall MRT station. Our destination: Esplanade Park, which is the venue of the Singapore River Hongbao 2006.

Singapore River Hongbao is an annual event, which is being held every year during the Chinese New Year period. It's an event showcasing the Chinese culture, however the event is open to all for everyone to understand and appreciate the culture.

From the bus stop just in front of the Cathedral, we walked to the event's venue, Esplanade Park, which is only two blocks away. To facilitate the event, Connaught Drive, which is the road between the Padang and Esplanade Park, is closed to traffic. Our destination is the amusement park, which is on the northern side of the park, near the Tan Kim Seng fountain. For some reason, Irza was not really to excited in trying the rides, so he only tried two of them.

Unfortunately, we didn't explore the whole area, especially the southern area of the park, which is full of showcases of Chinese culture. Irza was tired so we decided to stop exploring and headed back home. We also decided to give the fireworks display a miss.

Read the Indonesian version of this post.

Saturday, February 11, 2006

Inka is getting a new passport

Inka's passport will be expired some time mid this year (2006). Since most countries require travellers to have at least six month before the expire date of the passports, it's time for her to renew her passport. So my wife went to the Indonesian embassy yesterday (Friday, 10 February 2006) to apply for the passport renewal.

It turns out to be that the photo is no longer being taken at the embassy. Instead, it's being outsourced to a photo company located at Orchard Towers, near the Orchard Hotel, opposite Forum the Shopping Mall. So today, we went to Orchard Towers so Inka can get her pictures taken there. We left home at around 10:30am and reached Orchard Towers at around 11am. After finished, the children already felt hungry (and it's not noon yet), so we went straight to Great World City and had lunch at the KFC restaurant there, since my wife had some discount coupons for KFC.

Great World City is one of the shopping malls just outside the vicinity of Orchard shopping belt area, which is quite big and a bit "luxurious", more for middle to high class, especially those expatriates living around the area. There's also a luxurious serviced apartment and office towers on the same complex. The "luxury" can also be seen on the toilets (see right picture, apologise for the blur picture since I took the photo using my mobile phone camera), with a lot of decoration on the toilet's wall.

After taking a stroll around the mall, including bringing the kids to play at the Timezone in the third floor, we went to the Starhub Redemption Centre at Killiney Road to redeem the notebook we won on one of Starhub's online contests. After which, we went to the Specialist Shopping Centre nearby. The anchor tenant, John Little, is having a great sale (see left picture), unfortunately we couldn't find the item we're looking for there, so we cross the road and went to OG Orchard Point instead. Had a bit shopping there (not much, of course) before we went back and called it off for the day.

Read the Indonesian version of this post.

Wednesday, February 08, 2006

Ten Mile Junction

Last night, we went to Ten Mile Junction, a shopping mall which is also an LRT station, part of the Bukit Panjang LRT line. The shopping mall is located at the corner of the junction of Choa Chu Kang Road and Woodlands Road, not far from Bukit Panjang Town. I remember last time we went to this mall and it's deserted. Other than the train station, we only saw Shop N Save supermarket and a few other stalls. The rest of the mall was empty.

However, when we went there again yesterday, we were surprised to see that the mall is "a bit" live now, even though it's still not as lively as the Bukit Panjang Plaza nearby. Quite a lot of cars parked in the "bleak" carpark, compared to last time when we only saw three or four other cars in the carpark. After entering in, we found out that the main "magnet" of the mall now is the Sheng Shiong supermarket, which is occupying most of the mall's space. Not too sure why a lot of people like to shop there, we didn't enter the supermarket, but I guess it might be due to the cheaper goods there.

There's also a food court on the second floor, and some eateries and restaurants on the first floor. There are also some education centres, and surprisingly, Inka and Irza's old school, the MMI (Modern Montessori International), also has a branch there. Not too sure whether the Shop N Save supermarket is still there after the arrival of Sheng Shiong supermarket, didn't really check.

But overall, the mall is still a bit "grim" and I believe it needs a renovation if they want to make the mall "live" again. We also did not spend so much time there, after buying some snacks from Hara restaurant downstairs, we immediately left the mall and went to Causeway Point, another mall nearby.. :) well.. it's not really nearby, it's located at Woodlands (near the Woodlands checkpoint), about 15 minutes drive from Ten Mile Junction via BKE. But at least there's quite a lot of things to see and do there, since Causeway Point is the biggest malls around north Singapore vicinity.

Read the Indonesian version of this post.

Friday, February 03, 2006

Irza's having fever

Irza's having fever since the second day of Chinese New Year (30 January 2006). The fever was quite high, reaching more than 40.5C. Luckily, it was a long weekend holiday so he can rest at home. On Wednesday (1 February 2006), the fever has subsided, so my wife decided to send him to school. However, the fever came back again on the next day (2 February 2006), accompanied with cold and cough, so we decided not to send him to school yesterday (2/2) and today (3/2). So, unfortunately, he missed his field trip to Health Zone yesterday.

It's OK Irza, there'll always be next time. :)

Read the Indonesian version of this post.

Thursday, February 02, 2006

Happy New Year

We would like to wish all of you, a Happy Chinese New Year (29 January 2006) and a Happy Muslim New Year (31 January 2006). Wishing all of you a great happy and prosperous new year ahead.