老花眼 & others

 If you don't already know-- there are MultiFocal Contact Lenses (for 老花眼）  i.e. Presbyopia 

My eye sight had deteriorated until I can't even read the subtitles on TV. I can't see the faces of people and I had not been making eye contact because I don't want to appear squinting or staring. So that's kind of inconvenient. When I do use the regular contact lenses, I get dizzy after two hours. With the regular lenses, you can't read the text on your mobile phones, let alone use it at work having to stare the the PC screen for hours. If you stubbornly try to read, you will get a headache. When I told this to the optometrist, he recommended me the MultiFocal contact lenses, hence. I only use the lenses when I have an appointment, an event, or when I know I'm spending more time with others (so I could see their faces and stop behaving like I have something to hide). 

While I was at the optometry shop getting the lenses, the sales person told me about the sale that was going on while stocks last. Both Kiki & Colin had MISPLACED their shades.......... it is not wise to ask kids to take ownership of their belongings when they have not gotten used to caring for more items external to themselves. Like Kiki had lost the Flik Flak watch after two months of using it for school. She now uses a white colour digital watch from Diaso $2. I don't let her use the Baby-G that her Yiyi gave. She only uses the Baby-G occasionally. Kiki told me that they all have to remove their watches and put them in a pile during P.E lessons. After P.E, they will then retrieve their watches. This is to avoid scratching each other. For many young people these days, they don't use watches anyway. So I've bought Colin a new pair of shades the other time. Only Kiki is short of a pair. At the sale, there were the CK ones, Ray Ban ones and some other brands, all going at $50 a pair! Oh wow! How wonderful! (most of these were just selling at $210, $230 not long ago).

These are not kids' shades, these are adult size but honestly petite cos they can't fit my wide face.

I got myself a Swiss brand (Smarty) Polarized pair for rough use. Also $50. Every pair on sale is at $50!  While stocks last. (Shop name: The Eye Site, at Parkway Parade B1-99)

For me, it is important for my shades to be polarized because I've gotten so used to having it, I won't do without it.

The one I'm using every weekend has scratches all over and the film coat at temple are flaking off like dandruff.

Mr. Holmes

 From the movie- Mr. Holmes; I learned about a musical instrument-- the Armonica (also known as Glass Harmonica). The instrument was invented by Ben Franklin in 1761. It has a haunting, airy but captivating sound. Almost like the singing bowls to me. The instrument was not without controversy. It is said that many of the people who learned to play the instrument got mad, got obsessive and got entranced. Generally-- they went insane. Furthermore, there's also the rumour of lead poison from over-exposure because the instrument is basically made from a stacked row of glass goblets, stacked at the rims, varying in diameters. The fingers would be moisten with water and pressed onto the spinning glass to create friction, hence vibrational sounds would be the effects of friction on glass. 

I don't think it's a myth, I think it could be possible to be entranced by such haunting music. It is said that the reason for the Glass Harmonica to be so intriguing is that our brains could not determine the location of the sound due to the instrument having 1 to 4 kHz. Our brains either process sounds above 4 kHz (loudness) to determine source, or 1 kHz - with sound waves through right and left ear to determine location. So the Glass Harmonica is messing with our brains, confusing it, hence intriguing. Curiosity leading to trying out, leading to wanting more, leading to messing up the brain waves, leading to obsession, leading to more messing up of the brain waves, landing on insanity, I think.

No, the movie wasn't about the Glass Harmonica, it was just a prop in the movie but I got interested and Googled and sampled some Armonica music online and on YouTube. 

As it turns out, I'm getting the hang of searching for movies to watch. Pure gold.

The Dressmaker

"Based on the novel of the same name by Rosalie Ham. In the 1950s, Myrtle "Tilly" Dunnage returns to her hometown of Dungatar, an Australian country town to take care of her ill mother, Molly. 
Molly had sent Tilly away at the age of ten because of false accusations of murder. Tilly, an expert dressmaker trained by Madeleine Vionnet in Paris, transforms the locals with her couture creations and in the process, exacts revenge on the people who wrongly accused her of murder all those years ago."

The above is the synopsis but that's not all to the movie. 
It is not a bitter-sweet romantic movie, it is just BITTER. Bitter with a capital B.  capital I, capital TTER. Capital Depressing. It is not just the "Carrie, high school prom rage revenge" theme. It is worse.
Very hard to watch. Very depressing and I am still depressed when I think of it. 
How could they ever, ever! make such a depressing movie. Or Book!
Of course it came from a book but I haven't read the book so I do not know if the book is more depressing or the movie.
Why am I telling you this? Do I want you to watch or not to watch?
I don't know!

 

Lunch with colleagues

Lei Cha Veggie Brown Rice at Boon Lay Market

 Not bad. Given that it cost $3.50, it's cheaper than many other Lei Cha stalls.
Oh, add $0.50 for brown rice.

My colleague introduced me to this Ba Long Long fruit juice. Tasted like green apples but "biting" and raw. Ok-ok so-so for me. I don't fancy biting fruits (like Pineapples and Ba Long Long....)
Refreshing though.

Concert Going

Kiki's music school asked us to do a Lucky Dip and we got a pair of tickets to the Adam Gyorgy Concert, that's for tomorrow evening. Hopefully we've got good seats.

The Normality of the Oscar Curse

The Intern is a 2015 movie.

It is quite deceiving if you think you're gonna be watching a movie about a retiree having a second or third lease in working life as an elderly Intern. It is a movie about the fast-pace B-to-C-business, a mega online fashion retailer founded just 18 months back, growing in leaps and bounds and having its venture capitalists parachuting a new CEO in because they think the founder is too young (and too female) for a senior role. The movie is about how a woman's marriage might go awry when her career sky rockets. About how stay-at-home-dads can't keep things together, about how biased other stay-at-home-moms judge working mothers, its like -tsk tsk tsk how could you leave your baby at home and go to work kind of look. It is about how difficult it might be for women who give their all to work, risking their husbands sleeping with either the nannies or the neighbouring mommies. And risking to die old and alone, and be buried in the "singles" section of the cemetery, having no one ever missing them. 

I do wonder if Anne Hathaway has a message. I mean, The Devil Wears Prada also has a theme like that although ten years back it was work vs boyfriend and friends. Now it's work vs children and hubby. You know, all these "Oscar Love Curse" theme is shitty.

If you don't know what I'm talking about, you can read Wiki excerpts on the "Oscar Curse":-
"In their paper published in Organization Science, Michael Jensen and Heeyon Kim use the "Oscar Curse" to examine the negative consequences of upward mobility following a sudden positive status shift. With an empirical study, the authors find "Oscar nominations/wins have positive professional consequences for male and female actors but more enduring negative personal consequences for female actors, thus emphasizing an important conundrum for female actors: Oscar nominations/wins can help a career but can also ruin a marriage."

Of course the curse is not real. What is real is that sometimes, the partner / spouse can't adjust and grow together. You see........ there HAS TO BE a tradeoff if it all happened too fast. If the couple can't find a working plan fast enough, then the quick fix would be to go separate ways because they can't keep pace with each other. In a matter of time, there would be an emotional distance. It is not uncommon but the "Oscar curse" is no longer limited to the high-powered actors. Anything that takes off fast enough might knock the air out from anyone, commoner or celebrity alike. There had been more females as "victims" career success not because there was a curse, it's JUST BECAUSE more women are now pushing it. The word is "more".  Duh.

(the Intern- 2015)

(the Devil Wears Prada- 2006)

Math

These concept doesn't come naturally to me.
Can I say that I hate these types of question? (above)
Well, I don't say it in front of the kids but I hate these types of questions. Totally. 

Don't believe everything you read.
Or rather, I should say-- process what you read, don't take everything at face value.
Every time you resist acting on your anger, you may or may not become calmer. It would be ideal to be calmer but become calm is just a facade. It may also mean that you're suppressing anger, letting it simmer and develop into long term resentment which is even worse than anger. under-current is worse than current. 

Meantime, our library helped me save $41. 
No need to buy books, just borrow from our up-to-date library =)

Don't Grade Schools on Grit

So again it was night time and Kiki was bored.

She asked if she could do some newspaper cutting. (we just bought a new tube of glue for art & craft class).

I said - Sure, cut  & paste whatever you want.

So she happily took some newspaper, short while later she showed me this-
"Don't Grade Schools on Grit".

Hum..... what's that about? I thought.
So I read the rest of the article.

The article was written by -Angela Duckworth - the founder and scientific director of CharacterLab. She is also a professor of psychology at the University of Pennsylvania. 

She was saying how she might have "invented a monster" now that schools' are even graded for "Character" of its students. She said that a decade ago, some academics approached her to draw up a kind of feedback chart so that schools could measure student's character development. The idea was that we can't improve on what we can't measure, so they needed a kind of structure / chart so that teachers could grade the character developments of the students. The professor is saying that even as we help children to develop character, we mustn't grade schools on their characters of its students. Especially when some cultures are stricter to themselves and often grade themselves lower when in fact their moral standards are higher. For instance a question like "Were you well prepared before class" could mean different things to different students / schools / teachers/ culture. To some, it's just by showing up. To others, it includes having an early night's rest, completing homework, reading in advance, preparing questions to participate in class, etc. 

So anyway, Intelligence + Character = Education.

We get caught up with grades, we forgot about character.
Plus I feel that sometimes, people with good character is at the loosing end. 

What makes up good character?

Generally, there are Three Clusters of Character Strengths.

First- Grit, Self-control, and Optimism. 

Second- Social Intelligence, and Gratitude. 

Third Cluster- Curiosity, Growth Mindset (Open Mindedness), and Zest.

Lastly, this one is not under Character cluster but by itself.

The learning outcome for all schools is to develop Purposeful Citizens of Planet Earth.
(This one I say one har.... not in news article, I plucked from website and wrote my conclusion)

The website says- When students have a larger purpose, they have more academic motivation, life satisfaction, identity formation, and vocational success.

Please bookmark their website https://characterlab.org/ for more resources.

Whether students or adults alike, these little pointers go a long way.

Saturday

By the time we got there (6pm), the queue was about 50 pax long so we didn't wait.
Why are the people still queuing? I don't think half the queue would make it into the eatery before they close for the day. The manager should disperse the queue. Anyway, this is just a novelty.

Pompompurin is Sanrio's Golden Retriever.
We have a Pompompurin Pillow. I've told her not to bring it there, it's so.... private. But she says Pompompurin has to go visit his own company.
So.

 End up eating at a Matcha place that gave us the ice cream cone before serving dinner.