Birthday week

I was introduced to the concept of "birthday week" by a friend (thanks Sarah) who believed that birthdays should be celebrated over an entire week (or even a fortnight) if they are to be done properly. Alice turned eight on Thursday and she has had a big week. On Sunday, she and Felicity competed in a fun run. On Monday and Tuesday, she went to her first school camp at Jurong Bird Camp. I don't really know what happened there as Alice was telling the stories but she appeared to have a great time. We knew if we gave her presents on Thursday morning it would be difficult to stop the excitement and head off to school, so we celebrated Wednesday night with a donut cake and all the presents from the family and the extended family. Thank you to everyone who sent presents -Alice was thrilled with the variety. On Thursday she gave out treats at schools, we went out to dinner at a restaurant and she was also visited by several of our Condo friends with gifts and had a few calls on Skype which made her feel very special. Yesterday was her party and we celebrated with breakfast at the zoo with some of her school friends and favourite neighbours. We gave her rollerblades and an inflatable boat for her birthday which have been put to good use (Buckley is a bit of an old sea dog by now as the kids take it in turns to give him a tour of the pool - he is most obliging). Today we went to East Coast park to try out the rollerblades. So that's the week, and now I need a week to recover!

How to import a dog to Singapore

First, arrange for a friendly well-qualified dog-loving family to look after your pet while you head overseas to set up your new home.

Book a pet transport company in Australia to look after the flight booking and vet certificate requirements at the Aussie end of things. However, they can't actually book a flight without the import license but you can't get an import license without a dog license.

So ...get a dog license in Singapore. Make sure you don't download an old form from the AVA website (Vet Authority) which states the costs is $21.50 because they'll send your cheque back and then you have to resend the correct $14 cheque - adding possibly another two weeks of waiting time....

Now you can get an import license except when filling out the form they want to know what flight your pet is booked on. But you can't book a flight without the pet import license. So you just have to break out of the circle and guess which flight he might be booked on.

All is set, the day is booked and hopefully you guessed the correct flight. Your pet says his tearful farewell to his foster family and boards the plane.

Now is the big test of character - you have to pick up your dog from the Airfreight terminal - so take a support person. This is a frustration best handled by two. If your babysitter has the flu, and can't look after the kids, you may just be lucky enough to get her Dad fill in on her behalf and for free!

Head to the Airfreight Terminal - it is tucked behind Changi Airport and people have been known to spend two hours looking for it. Bring import licence and flight confirmation form. Bring passports and a second form of photo ID. Find a Chinese taxi driver who will take dogs (Malays are cat people) and preferably one who has been to the Airfreight Terminal before. In that case he'll be prepared for the hours of trying to locate desks in various buildings to fill out bits of paperwork. His own mantra will be "you just have to keep asking everyone you see what you have to do or you will never get out of the place." And he means that literally! Every time you are filling out a piece of paperwork he is out of his taxi quizzing people on procedure and directions.


At the Airfreight terminal:

1. Fill in form at Police Checkpoint. Everyone in the car needs to handover their passports and get a pass. Taxi drivers are exempt because obviously they are super trustworthy people.
2. Find Airfreight Terminal 6 (on your right), even though one set of instructions direct you to terminal 4. Go up the ramp to the Imports office. Get directed to catch a lift down to level 1M. Produce photo ID and get some paperwork. Go back up to the third floor, hand in paperwork, fill out some paperwork, get a stamp and then wait until your dog arrives.
3. It's now 10.15pm. Vet Authority closes at 10.30pm and you need the vet sign off before you can take the dog. Ring the Vet Authority and tell them to wait for you at a cost of $133 for every hour they have to wait.
4. After asking several times if dog has arrived yet, man at the desk checks his computer again and finds that it has. Get directed through some double doors into a cargo area filled with boxes and forklifts and no one to help you.
5. Friendly taxi driver comes to find you as he has been doing his own investigations and thinks this time he has found your dog (first one he found wasn't yours but this didn't deter the amateur sleuth) He gets forklift guy to drive up next to his taxi.
6. Look inside the box to see dejected sad-looking puppy. He looks too timid to be the lively dog you know. Recognition dawns, little yelps of joy and the four-legged gaping hole in your heart is finally filled after nine weeks of separation. Jubilation from everyone including taxi driver.
7. Drive over to Vet Authority for quick check. Arrive at 10.35pm. Get a stamp. They choose not to charge for the overtime. More jubiliation. Taxi driver discovers that the dog box he'd just put on the leather seat of his Mercedes has a white, paint-like substance on the bottom which is now covering his seat. He remains cheerful while trying to scrub it off.
8. Head towards the exit and through the red "items to declare" channel. No wrong office, need to go to that one over there. Fill out some more paperwork. Get another stamp.
9. Go to police checkpoint and pick up passports.
10. Head home, cuddling the furry bundle of joy. Give the taxi driver a serious tip. Dog jumps all over peacefully slumbering children and kisses their faces. Sleepy murmurs of happiness. The family is now complete.

This story brought to you by Buckley's family.
"Dogs are not our whole life, but they make our lives whole."

We are indebted to Melissa, David, James, Thomas, Ben, Dusta and Bobby for their wonderful care of Buckley. Thanks to Geoff for babysitting. Thanks to Jen and Ellie for the advice - fortunately we learnt from your ordeals and no children had to be left at police checkpoints. Thanks to Jetpets for the service. Thanks also to a Singaporean taxi-driver who joined in the adventure.

Journeys through time and place

Take the bus three stops, turn the corner and you find yourself in a different place. Little India to be precise. Alice commented, "You'd expect the roads to be dirt." Bikes, colourful saris, fruit and vegie stalls spilling out onto the roads - at any moment you expect everyone to break out into a Bollywood number. We had fun trying on Indian clothes before the girls made their choice and then they got henna tattoo designs to complete the outfit.

Mother's Day was a relaxed day (I hope all Mothers had a good time). I was treated to a sleep-in, then pancakes, a few special home-made cards and some nice gifts (including one coaster that has immediately become my favourite.)

In the afternoon, we explored just a part of the rather huge Botanic Gardens. The girls, in their Indians oufits, became part of the attractions and were photographed by Japanese tourists. Alice wondered out loud why someone would want their photo. Matt explained that probably the tourists would say to their friends "while we were in Singapore we met the ugliest children - do you want to see their photo?" The girls rolled their eyes and sighed, "Oh Dad, it's because we're cute, isn't it?" Ask a silly question...

Matt had a public holiday on Monday but the girls didn't get it so we had a rare moment without them. We headed to Raffles Hotel for a Singapore Sling whilst surrounded by the grandeur of British Colonial times. It was nice to relax for a while and enjoy the moment.

Things that go boom in the night

Over the past 7 nights we have been woken up 5 times by thunderstorms. They seem to pass by right outside our window sometime between 2am and 6am. Wind, rain, lightning and thunder. Lots of thunder. Very loud thunder. In general, I've really been enjoying the thunderstorms and heavy downpours that occur every couple of days, but the novelty of being woken up by them has definitely worn off. The girls, however, sleep blissfully through it all. I wonder how Buckley (our dog) will cope when he arrives in two week's time?

What's for dinner?

I wander the supermarket wondering what I'll cook for dinner. These are some of my choices. Cuttlefish Balls, Salmon Head in Soy Sauce, Imitation Breaded Crab Claws (if they weren't imitation I may be tempted but what would they use to make fake crab...)

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And if I want to spice things up a bit, this is what I found trying to locate cumin. It's fungus. I have the option of "white fungus" or "shredded black fungus" but I decided against buying either because I'm sure I'm growing my own on an old cucumber in the fridge at the moment. I also discover "silver fish" in the spice section. So next time I find one of these pests having a nibble at an important documents it may just end up in dinner!

All this shopping is making me hungry. I feel like a snack. I might try this - "tomago gani" or baby crab. No wonder the crabs look so sad on the packaging.

Now what's for desert? Candied Yams - no idea what it is but sounds sweet.

Magical Mr Mistopheles

On Saturday we took the girls to see Cats, the musical. It was at the Esplanade Theatres which are the main theatre/concert hall complex in Singapore. To get there, we got off at City Hall station and then walked the entire 500m through an undergound mall. Much better than walking in the heat. Before entering the theatre we had to walk past the thermal scanners and luckily we were all cool enough to get in. We enjoyed the music, singing and dancing a lot. As musicals go, Cats is more a collection of scenes with not much of a storyline (it's based on a book of poems), so the girls did find it a little hard to follow what was going on. They did seem to enjoy it, as did their toy cats who came along with us.

Funny looking monkeys and other tales

Orang-utans, turtles and tigers were among the highlights of our trip to the zoo last weekend. As members of the zoo, we took our time to explore enclosures, spend time in the waterpark and didn't try to do the whole zoo in a day. We look forward to many visits back here to explore further and to ensure we get value for money out of the membership! We highly recommend our visitors add this to their holiday itinerary. Many enclosures let you get up close to the animals and other animals are free to roam the zoo.

Highlights of being in Singapore this week have been:

• having visits from Sam (otherwise known as Max's Dad or Sam from AGRA) and also Andy again (awarded most regular visitor having now clocked up a third visit)
• celebrating the May Day public holiday by having brunch with our neighbours followed by a relaxing day by the pool
• organising a cleaner
• having friends over for a play
• avoiding swine flu so far...