Kirst Afloat

The Joys of Photobooth

brought to you by Claire, James & me:

  

Happy 12th Anniversary

Tom will be in the Middle East this weekend which is our anniversary.  (Technically we were married in Hong Kong sometime in October '97-I don't recall the actual date without looking at our marriage certificate.  We consider our wedding at the Cathedral in Macau to be our actual anniversary.)  These are the flowers that Tom sent to me today. 

A benefit of living in Stanley:  the height of the arrangement is no longer a consideration!

Sick in bed

I left work early today and have been spending the afternoon dozing off and on.  I am SOOOO tired.  Woke up because of James.  He was very LOUD in his room.  (I actually thought he was one of the multitude of loud people outside-the noise level in Stanley can be high, especially since our air cons are not on at the moment.)

Claire has also been sick.  She claims that she's worse today but seems fairly perky this afternoon.  Her strep test was negative but her throat and ears still hurt.  She also has a low grade fever at times.

No fever for me but my throat was sore this morning.  It doesn't hurt much now but I am feeling sluggish and generally unwell. 

Heading back to bed.

On a colleague's door...

Baby, it's COLD outside

 
  

 

Wait...that was Beijing last week.  It snowed twice during our Grade 6 trip.  However, it's quite chilly in Hong Kong at the moment as well.  According to my iPhone, it was 55 degrees F this evening.  It feels a lot colder here, though, due to the high humidity and wind.  The fact that most places are built from concrete and that there's no heating also add to the cold.

Leaving for Beijing

Bright and early Monday morning, I head to Beijing along with the 40 students that we teach.  There will be five teachers (each responsible for eight students) and one nurse in our group.  And my own two children will be in Hong Kong with my mom and our helper.

It's odd to be leaving James and Claire alone in HK.  It's the first time that I'll be separated from James (apart from sleep-overs at Grandma's house).  I'm not sure what tomorrow night will look like but I imagine it will be emotional.  Claire's been especially touchy lately.

I have a multitude of items to attend to:  packing, rereading our trip notes, making a list of details for my mom, finding Tom's leftover RMB, etc.  We have mass/Sunday school in the morning and Claire has a birthday party from 1:00-6:00 (drop-off in Repulse Bay, pick-up at the Grand Hyatt).   It will be another action packed day, I'm afraid.  I also need to buy a birthday present (Dymock's, here we come!) as well as a warm hat, scarf and gloves.  It's forecast to be cold in Beijing although it appears that there may only be snow flurries on one of the days that we're there.

Nick Vujicic at HKIS

Just got back to the classroom after an inspirational and funny presentation by Nick Vujicic.  All middle school and high school students were able to hear Nick speak.  Our dyad ended up having front row seats-we were seating on the floor (with the rest of the MS students) and wear right up at the front.  I didn't realize that he was going to speak on top of two tables.  After deciding to sit on the floor with my students, I was surprised by having such a fantastic view.

Nick is a fantastic speaker and the entire audience was riveted by his message.  What amazed me was that it was completely silent in the gymnasium at times.  No one made a sound at times and there were at least 1300 people present (by my estimation).

I scrapped my Beijing Power Point presentation at the moment because I though reflecting on Nick's presentation was more important.  All of my students are writing about the presentation at the moment or are writing to Nick (the latter being their suggestion). 

The main point of the speech was to never give up hope, keep trying and that everyone is loved.  You don't have to change to be loved.  If only one person present is changed today, Nick was successful.  I imagine, though, that quite a few people have been changed by what they heard today.

I am thankful to have been there.

Luigi James

A preview of James' Halloween costume.  Thank goodness we were able to find a Luigi costume on Pottinger Street.  Unfortunately we could not find the proper size.  It was either a too-small size M or a much too large XXL.  We went with the latter.  The finishing touch on Halloween will be the addition of a stick on "Scoundrel Moustache". (That's the name on the package!)


James has become such a ham when photographed.  (Or even when not being photographed.  He LOVES attention.)

Hockey

Hockey has been a bit of a touchy subject this season.  The plan was to play Division 2 again this year.  However, eleven goalies signed up the eight spaces in D1.  Thus three were displaced to D2.  And I was displaced to D3.  I was not happy with this news.

Keith gave me the option of playing D3.  He let me pick my team.  The two available teams were G.I. Japan (typically a strong team) or Bloody Orange (they only won 1 game in the winter league and 1 game in the summer league).  After much thought, I chose to play with Orange.

Each year it's more of a challenge to come back after taking the summer off.  It takes a few weeks to begin to feel like yourself on the ice.  And what a rough first few weeks we had as a team.  We lost the first four games.  Badly.  I am still in the basement of D3 goalie stats.

Last Wednesday, our new jerseys arrived.  They are much better looking than their predecessors.  The unfortunate part of the jerseys, though, is that they are Princeton colors.  Orange & black.  We certainly fit right in with the Halloween season.

The guys played hard and we pulled off our first win.  Winning feels SO much better than the alternative.  I really like my teammates this season.

Bloody Oranges defeated the Huskies 2-0.
Bloody Orange – Cheung Kam Ming 2g, Gerald Tong 2a.  Kirsten Rendell stopped all 15 shots
Huskies – no goals.  Art Tam with 12 saves
The KEG 3 Stars of the game – 1) Kirsten Rendell 2) Cheung Kam Ming 3) Gerald Tong
Recap – New jerseys, fresh start!  Bloody Orange were decked out in their new outfits just in time for Halloween, giving the Huskies the ‘tricks’ instead of a treat. Cheung Kam Ming opened the scoring with a quick wrap around.  Was that enough for them to hold on?  Just in case, Kam Ming made it 2-0 with 3:44 remaining in the game.  Kirsten Rendell was solid in net stopping all the shots she faced.

 

Half-Term

Our first official break of the year.  Yes!  We've been completely exhausted from school, moving, extra-curricular activities, etc.  Typically we go away during half-term but not this year.  Claire's piano exam (Grade One, ABRSM) is on Wednesday at 3:08 in Choi Hung, smack-dab in the middle of break.  Tomorrow we have a 30 minute practice session booked in the exam room where she'll be on Wednesday.  Then she'll warm up at Karrie's studio before heading to the exam.

Other big news (or not):  Tom and I finally caved on the pet issue.  We've given the green light to rats gerbils.  The only problem is that I'm not sure desert rats gerbils are easily found in HK.  Hamsters, yes.  Chinchillas, yes.  Guinea pigs, yes.  Rabbits, yes.  We're going on a gerbil hunt tomorrow.  (Tom and I were even discussing dogs-do we skip the rodent step and go straight to dog ownership.  That's the big questions.  We travel too much, truly.  We're already going to have to line up someone to take care of the rats gerbils over Christmas break.)  Claire and James are so excited about this.  Claire has been researched and researched so that she's prepared.

Lazy day today.  Neither child was motivated to go anywhere.  We eventually made it to the beach-the busy one in Stanley.  We haven't investigated the (quieter) beach that we can see from the flat.  I'm assuming you walk down Stanley Village Round and you'll eventually run into it.  Kids had fun but Claire was miffed when a girl came over and wrecked part of her sandcastle.  The mother eventually sent the kid over to half-heartedly apologize.  Claire was not impressed.

Heading to the gym in the morning.  Claire and James want to get up early to come with me. I am so NOT up for that.  I'm hoping to head out long before they wake.