It was a different experience, celebrating Christmas in the sun! To get our mind off not spending Christmas with friends and family we booked a trip to a beach resort in Port Dickson, about two hours from where we live. We started the day off with presents in bed and spent the rest of the day by the pool. There was a Santa Claus going around with a bit bag of sweets and Lorelei went around wishing everybody a “Merry Christmas” and kept her Santa hat on all day. The kids were worn out from swimming all day and were in bed at 6pm. Henk and I ordered room service and our Christmas dinner consisted of nachos and french fries, sitting on the floor of the balcony, watching the sunset.
Port Dickson is a small town where mainly Malaysians and people from Singapore spend their holidays. Apart from one other family (coincidentally Dutch too) we were the only white people there. Lorelei got lots of attention as usual and Quinn drew quite the crowd, many people guessing he’s at least 1 since most babies are a lot smaller over here. I felt slightly uncomfortable though along the poolside. I wear what in Canada is considered to be the staple, new mother of 2, one-piece bathing suit, not revealing at all and as forgiving as a swimsuit can be. There were mostly Muslim women, covered from head to toe in swim gear, with long sleeves and pants. Even the Chinese women who can dress quite provocatively were wearing bathing suits that reached their elbows and knees in order to avoid getting a tan. Who would have thought that I would ever feel risqué wearing my mommy bathing suit!
Unlike us, people here tend to avoid getting a tan at all costs. The beauty ideal seems to be that the fairer you are the better it is. I was looking at daycremes the other day and a lot of them have names like “Nano White”, promising you make your skin colour lighter. I really don’t want to know what they put in that stuff – it can’t be good. On the other hand, people don’t tend to shave. I’m not talking about men in this case, but women. Long dark hair on your legs, underarms and upper lip? No one seems to mind.
On a different note, Lorelei started school last week! We ended up going with a different school than I wrote about earlier. That one just didn’t feel quite right, so we continued our search and found the perfect place. Nowhere near as strict and regulated as the other one was. This playschool is in a large house with lots of different rooms and it has quite a homely feel. There are about 40 children, varying from 3 months to 6 years. There’s lots of supervison, the teacher-child ratio being about 1:3. It’s run by a woman from Singapore and two of her daughters work there as well.
It was hard dropping Lorelei off on the first day. It was the first time we left her with somebody other than family or close friends, but we felt this was a good time for her and us to start letting go. As expected, it was harder on us than on her. She didn’t cry when we left, had a great time and was kicking and screaming when we picked her up because she didn’t want to leave.
We also decided to send Quinn to the same place 3 times a week to free our hands a bit. His first day was last Wednesday and it was so strange walking out there with just the two of us! Both of us have been watching Lorelei since she was born and have been with Quinn pretty much non stop too, so it felt weird not having them there. We enjoyed a quiet breakfast out, a luxury not having 2 kids to handle, but just being able to enjoy the food and hold a conversation (about them of course). And I admit I spent an hour scrubbing the bathroom from top to bottom to take my mind off having the kids at daycare. If they would have had webcams like the daycares in Canada I am sure I would have sat glued to the computer screen.
A few days along the line now I must say it’s going really well. Lorelei seems to be enjoying herself. She’s ready at the door with her shoes and her backpack on, 15 minutes before we’re due to leave. Quinn loves being able to crawl around in a different environment and playing with different toys. And we love some alone time to relax and get some things done. Henk is busy with his thesis and I’m trying to expand our online business.
We’re gearing up for my parents’ visit – they’re arriving on Wednesday. It will be great showing them “our” Kuala Lumpur. They’ll be staying here for 6 days before they fly on to Bali for their annual trip to escape the gloomy Dutch winter. We’ll be joining them for 10 days at the end of the month.
We are currently debating how much longer we can stay here. Henk has to be in Holland to defend this thesis in April and it looks like our savings won’t stretch much beyond that. We’re looking into getting more out of our business and Henk is also looking around to see if he can get a job here. If that doesn’t work we’ll all go back to Holland in April and stay there until our permanent residence application goes through and we can return to Canada. No news on that still – keep your fingers crossed for us!
