Organic-Ally

Would you believe me if I said my son has never had a M... hamburger? He's had their chicken nuggets and fries but never a hamburger. He only had those nuggets because we were a 'captive market' at the Science Centre in Singapore. From a very young age we talked about 'junk food' and 'good food'. Maybe too much. For a long time he had problems with children's party food. Took him a long time to bite into his first pizza. Now that he has tasted it, he likes it. He's also not allowed fizzy drinks and salty crisps, especially if they are laden with MSG. Are we weird parents or what? Thankfully I've found other parents who are just like us. We sit around at parents' committee meetings enjoying the crisps and hula hoops, etc, because 'We don't get to eat these at home.' It all goes back to one blue M&M. Took son to a Christmas story-telling session at the local library. He was coming up two. A kind lady there gave him one blue M...

Noticed this report in The Times today and couldn't help but feel -- only initially -- a little smug Basically, what it's saying is that a child is better off -- in terms of developmental tests -- if its mum had stayed at home instead of palming it off to a nursery or other carer. Such children manifest less aggression, for example. I have mixed feelings about this. I stayed at home to look after my child. He was a a few weeks old when I trotted off to a post-doctoral fellowship interview. While on the train I realised that I could not leave my baby to take up an academic post. When the phone call came later that evening to say, sorry, you were very good, but someone else was better, i felt a tremendous sense of relief that i didn't have to choose between son and a job. That was five years ago. Now that son is in school, I am beginning to wonder if I did make the right choice. What the researchers do not indicate in this piece of research is whether the birth order of the ...

The weekly Farmers' Market at Pinner started three Sundays ago. We've only managed to get down there for the first time yesterday. (Church service ended rather late the first week. Then last week we decided to celebrate our wedding anniversary at our son's favourite eatery.) It was wonderful to see such a wide range of food being sold. Better still to see the delight on the faces of the people at the market. Then we got to the soup stall. Son wanted to have his vegetable soup, but they could only sell it to us in a -- horror of horrors -- foam cup! I've been going on and on about how I hate plastics . So I was not impressed. However, i must not blame the nice guy there selling such delicious soup. I should be the one bringing a sensible container with me to the market. Just like we used to do when i was growing up. Came home and quickly emailed my cousin. Please bring me a stainless steel tiffin carrier when you come next week. The other disappointment was the sheer num...

Was reading my Straits Times Online that corporate businesses have taken to blogging seriously. While I had started my own business only very recently, I had been writing various bits on the News and Misc(ellaneous) pages about issues close to my heart. That was in essence, my bit of blogging. I enjoy writing those. But putting those pages onto the website itself can sometimes be hard work and I would rather be busy doing something else. So i headed off to find myself a blogspot. Not sure how this would look. Even less sure if it would work. And cannot imagine how much of my soul I dare to bare. Check back, and we shall see. Meanwhile, for those of you who've said you enjoyed my writing before, please check this blog for future entries. As always, best,

This date was etched on my mind: 4th August 2005. It wasn’t the birthday, wedding anniversary, death anniversary, party, etc. of anybody I know. It was the day I received my first Christmas shopping catalogue for the year. August? Some of us haven’t even tasted summer weather! In the event that I do return to academia (when my son is happy for me to work outside the home), I plan to carve out my own sub-discipline in anthropology. I would like to establish ‘anthropology of junk’ as a must-have in any decent anthropology department. I can picture it now at my funeral: friends and colleagues would say, ‘Siew Peng will be forever remembered for her rubbish.’ Paper, plastic, food, music, toys, gadgets, consumer goods, why is there so much of what we don’t need around us? Look in some shopping catalogues and you would find: tea bag squeezer, and used tea bag holder. Fact is I actually had to order one of these for uhm, mother-in-law. She was on her way to getting a tea bag holder when I off...

Writing in the Times recently, Mary Ann Sieghart praised the use of buses to ferry children to and from school. Not only are they more environmentally-friendly, it could – potentially – mean that children might think about applying to schools more suited to their needs even when they are further away. I have a particular aversion to doing the school run by car. I have the unusual experience of being ‘taxi-ed’ to and from my primary school. Being the youngest of six children, the only school that my parents could get me into without the hassle of balloting and endless finger-biting, etc, was the school my older siblings went to, on the basis of sibling connections. However, while we used to live about a minute’s walk from the school, my family had to move several miles away before I started school. So father had to arrange for a private taxi to ferry me to and from school. The first driver proved to be unreliable and father stepped in for the rest of the year, but this was too much of ...

It’s the end of an era at the nursery my son attended as a three-year-old. Myrna, who’s been running that school for 35 years, has finally decided to retire. From September 2005, it becomes part of – with some irony – the nursery section of the school my son currently goes to. Myrna is another of my major role models of the recycling habit. She’s been able to run her school on extremely low overheads partly by being able to engage all the parents in recycling. Parents are asked to collect milk bottle tops, cereal boxes, colourful card, yoghurt pots, bits of fabric, egg cartons, etc for use in craftwork. Apart from paints, pens and glue, everything that is used at the school seems to be recycled, even address labels and name badges. Milk and drink bottle tops are used in sorting exercises and in craft activities. Someone drills holes in them and children thread these onto string to make their models. Cereal boxes are cut into various animal shapes for the younger children to learn gluei...