And life goes on...

To hell with double standards. Who cares - life's too short to stress over it. And in the meantime, life goes on.

This week has been good. Sunday was a nice but exhausting day out. Bought the kids a marble track set which they set up with all different shaped tracks and then let the marbles go from top to bottom. They loved it.

We seem to be in a nice routine now, which is very important to me - helps keep my mind on track. In the morning I wake my son, get him breakfast and dressed and at 8.30 drive him to Kinder program. Then I usually stop at my mother-in-law's to bring her water from my house (my water is filtered and her's is not, so she uses our water for drinking and cooking) before going home for breakfast and watching Ellen Degeneres' morning talk show - makes me laugh, good start I should think. 10am tv off and it's hw and hw - housework and homework. My daughter has a lot of homwork for a 7 year old, so I coach her through it. Her dad does a great job at helping her with the chinese stuff - he speaks it but doesn't read or write it so he uses an online translator etc to help her complete her activities. 11.30 start lunch for the daughter, get the uniform ready and see her off at 12.20 - her dad does the midday pick up and drop off - and about 1.45 I get my son back and he has lunch and watches tv for an hour while I rest up and take a nap (everyone naps here during the day because of the heat).

In the afternoon i do whatever I need to do outside of home - these days it's organising plane tickets for our trip back to Australia in May, renewing the son's passport and organising my teaching schedule and classroom to start next month.

5pm, time to prepare dinner, drive sort of ex husband to golf course, pick up the daughter at 6.20 and bring them to playground or home for some outside play - bikes, gardening, that sort of thing. Then dinner, showers, reading, homework and bed at 10pm. Sounds late I know, but all the kids here go to bed late like that.

10.30 is when my social life starts - my friends here (I have 2 and they are married to each other), work in the morning and at night and don't finish til 10pm or so, so a few nights a week we catch up over supper somewhere (you can eat any time here, there's always something open) or hang out in their home office til midnight or so. Last night we were at their office cleaning up the great mosquito invasion - hundreds of mosquitoes had decided that their office would be a good place to hang out and after they had sprayed the office, the mosquitoes had collected on the floor - ewwww. The only good mosquito is a dead one - I often wonder why mosquitoes exist at all - they appear to have no function! Maybe it's Mother Nature's way of killing off a few million people per year to keep the population in check. Malaria alone is responsible for 2 million deaths a year - that doesn't include deaths from dengue, Ross River fever etc. Who knows.

Anyway, on that cheery note, I'll sign off today. Time for a nap!

I did question the double standard

I built up the courage and, with rationality and calmness by my side, approached him about the double standards issue (see previous post). I said "I would like us to discuss some of the double standards that are happening here because it upsets me and I want to discuss it like normal people"
Him (facing away from me): OK what is it?
Me: Well, for example I want you to consider the incident the other night where you bumped the gate open with the car. I realise that you were hungry and it was dinner time, but can you consider what your reaction would have been if I had done the same thing. "

Him: well i did it because you asked me to get take away and it was already 7.30 and I was hungry and for every 1 time I do it like that there are 10 times I don't do it. (defensive?)

Me: you've missed the point. I don't care that you opened the gate with the car, I want you to think about how you would have felt if I had done that. What would your reaction have been?

Him: you know, you come in here and pick one thing wrong and wallow in it. If that's what you've been thinking about for the past two days, then you don't really understand what's going on here."

Me: No I am not wallowing in it, I just want to discuss it and no I think about a lot of other things, but they are big issues that we are not ready to discuss because of our fragile relationship. If we can't discuss the small things first, how can we discuss the big things.

Him: so what's next, my feet on the table, my spending money on drinking?

Me: No, I those things didn't cross my mind for this discussion. And I do think about big things, like the future of our family and our children's future, finances and the ways we can spend money and save it, and lots of other things that we are not ready to discuss yet?

Long pause...... neither of us looking up or speaking, well, that's all.... walk out and mumble something about going to the toilet.


Now what? I'm really trying... I just don't know where I went wrong. Now he's all upset with me and we're supposed to go out tomorrow on a family shopping day. Yuk.

My messy mind

With my mind going impossibly around in circles, it's hard to know where to start so that it makes sense to anybody that may read this.
I live in a difficult situation. My sort-of-ex husband and I share a house in Malaysia so that our two young children (5 + 7) can be together. If I ask for a divorce, he will want at least one child. I can't bear to be separated from either of them or to separate them from each other. They are wonderfully close and I want them to have each other in these difficult times. My sort-of-ex husband is a good father. He is patient and calm with them and they adore him.

Living like this is easy on the surface. We have our respective rooms and don't invade each other's privacy. I cook, clean the house and take care of the kids. He works from home, pays the bills and provides for all our needs.

He is a nice person, but like anybody, not perfect. He is arrogant and does not tolerate mistakes from other people well. He is private and can look perfectly happy when he is downright miserable.

I, on the other hand, am an emotional basket-case. Reality for me is/was whatever I am feeling, whether they are justified or not. If I feel angry, someone must have done something to make me that way, and so I believe it and take it on the unfortunate person that I think has done the misdeed. Sometimes, I read way too much into things and take things personally - it's always about me.

So under the normality of daily life, things are tense. We've been together for many years, so our relationship has lots of baggage.

My main turmoil in our 'situation' always starts with "what is reality?" What really happened - did I really hear an arrogant tone in your voice? Are you saying I'm stupid? Did I really snap at you, because I didn't think I did? It's mental torture. I can be certain of one thing...that if I think something like what I just wrote, the reality (or his reality) will be the opposite.

At times he sounds like a parent - "well I can do that because I can do it properly etc etc" but if I was to do the same thing, he would be sooooo angry and righteous. Can I question the double standard here? Of course not, because then I'm being borderline (personality disorder) which he thinks I have and I do show some signs of this emotional disorder. So is my reaction (anger and annoyance) to this behaviour normal or am I just being overemotional?

Will continue another time.

Starting teaching

I will begin teaching come the start of March and today had my first student assessment. A mum met with me about her little boy, who she says is not talking to people. She has had him assessed by an educational therapist who diagnosed her young one with Autism Spectrum Disorder, but she didn't believe the report because the guy wasn't an MD. I gently told her that I agreed with his diagnosis and the specialist seemed to know what he was talking about, as all the right areas were covered in the report. It's a common occurrence here for parents to really have no idea of what is wrong with their children. And when doctors or specialists tell them, they don't understand because there is no follow up, no where for them to go for more information and of course, not many schools or centres for their children to attend, especially in a smallish town like this one.

I hope I can help her child. He was a bright, chatty (chatting to himself) little guy with a huge smile. He could use his imagination and he can follow instructions. A good start for someone with autism. I'm going to start his program using the principles of Floortime, a method of teaching autistic children that means you have to go down to their level and try to connect with them while playing. It's good I will have him for a few hours a week. Floor time takes time.

The saddest thing is that parents often come to me with the expectation that I can cure their child. I don't know why this is, but it means I have to tell them that I can only try my best. I hope my best is good enough for her to see some improvement. She asked is he bad (compared to other children). I told her I'd seen children who were worse and some that were better. But it doesn't really matter, because I can see his potential. I can see his personality and his abilities, not just his difficulties. I will build on his strengths and from there, hopefully get results.

I start teaching him in March and I'm looking forward to it. Wish me luck.

I caught a squirrel

I'm feeling terribly proud of myself this morning. Over the weekend, I'd discovered that something had been eating the bananas hanging from the shelf in my kitchen. Slightly miffed and a bit scared (I'm not an animal person), I thought about what it might be. I discovered what it was when I wondered into the kitchen one morning and saw a squirrel sitting on the microwave - and with a swish of it's bushy tail, it promptly shot out the window. I thought it was gone for good, but then it came back - again and again.

I thought about keeping the doors and windows closed so I wouldn't have to deal with it, but not an option since it's so humid and stuffy here.

So I dealt with it by setting the rat trap and it worked. The little critter crapped all over the kitchen floor under the cage, poor thing, so stressed and I couldn't bear to kill it, so I put it in the car and let it go at the golf course. My kitchen is now a squirrel free zone.

Sometimes I love Malaysia - not!

And sometimes I don't. I wanted to make this a positive blog, but sometimes you've just got to let it all out. When I'm having one of those I hate living in Malaysia days, things go round in my head for ages. This seems like a good place to put them. I don't like living in Malaysia because:

• The mosquitoes - arggh, yuk, they are always around and they carry dengue.

• It hasn't rained and it stinks - I tried running water down our outside drain to make the black smelly sludge go away and it didn't work. Please let it rain soon.
• In Segamat, my town, there is NOTHING to do.
• It's too hot for playgrounds in the afternoon.
• The school system is archaic and my girl gets too tired from all the homework.
• The drivers are atrocious - they installed traffic lights near my main corner, but does everyone take notice - noooh - they are just too important to let a set of traffic lights slow them down
• The drivers are atrocious - they pull up on the left hand side of you to turn RIGHT, so you must look for them so you don't hit them!!!
• Motorbikes - too many, too dangerous.
• Nobody buckles up in the back seat - except us I might add.
• I have to buy my fresh pork off the back of a truck or go to KL (3 hours away)
• The potatoes here are shitty!
• I don't have hot running water in my kitchen and my bathroom has a pissy little electric hot water system (not that we need hot water that much)!
• Our kitchen sink, basins and showers all run out directly into the drain that surrounds the house.
• So far this year in my kitchen I have had the following wildlife - birds, cats, rats, frogs geckos and a squirrel.
  
• The Indian lady behind us is mad and takes her showers outside - where we can see her!
• In this culture, men come first - disgusting!
  
• I sweat nearly all day, making 2 - 3 showers a day a necessity.
• Heatrash!!
• Limp hair from the humidity.
• The chinese language is soooo difficult to learn - for me anyway.
• Maids / live in house helpers- it sounds good, but good ones are rare and the rest run off or steal from you, even when they've looked you straight in the eye and said "no, I'd never do that" No thanks, I'd rather not employ an indonesian maid.
• The dirt and rubbish that litter the drains, block them up and no one cleans them. Yet where we used to live in KL, I saw countless women mopping 'outside pathways' - mopping, always bloody mopping!! " Excuse me, don't let my dirty feet ruin your nice walkway while I walk my kids to school!" Insane!
• Hot air from split system airconditioners - no wonder it's bloody hot here!
• There is such a thing as too cheap - pay peanuts get monkeys!
• I need to unlock two heavy duty padlocks to get to the street.
• Sitting at my inlaws and not understanding a word because they speak in chinese and it's not even Mandarin. My point being that even if I learned chinese, I still could not speak with them.
• Housework is bad enough, worse when it's humid and sticky and after 5 minutes the sweat is dripping off you.
• the black film of dirt that seems to cover almost everything outside.
• white canvas school shoes - I wonder which genius thought this one out - my daughter school shoes go black because of the black filmy dirt so every two days I have to wash them - why not have black shoes instead - or black sandals for girls and leather lace ups for boys.

Anyway, that's my rant for today.

Malaysian school system

The education system here in Malaysia is quite different from that in Australia and not necessarily better. There are good things - my kids are learning to speak, read and write chinese, a skill I hope they retain for life. My daughter attends primary school (gr. 2) in the afternoons, from1 - 6.20, so we get to spend mornings together, just us 2, doing homework or pottering around the house. That also means she goes to bed quite late (10.30 most nights), but it's OK, because she doesn't get up til 9.

My son is attending a montessori based kinder program where he is also learning chinese and malay. Unlike most kinders, his doesn't give out homework. There is a lot of pressure on the kinder programs to adequately prepare the children for the regimented curriculum that the grade schools follow. Standards are high, competition is encouraged and the children are disciplined with the aid of a ruler. The system is quite archaic.

Classrooms are basic. A chair and table for each student and teacher. There are no lockers, reading corners, play areas. The kids carry their books in their bag and this system uses text books and activity books as a base, so there are a lot of books, even for the 6 year olds. So many in fact, the kids need one of those trolley bags to put them in because there is no way they can carry it. Class sizes are around 35 - 40 students per class and school is held in 2 sessions. Morning 7.30 - 12.50 for the older kids 1 - 6.20 for younger children. The kids have a measly 20 minutes break in the middle of the session to eat a snack and go to the toilet.

Still, my daughter enjoys school. She likes her friends and she enjoys her computer and sports classes. She gets a bit down if she has a lot of homework, but we get her through that. She likes to achieve and get things right and she does better than most of her peers, no matter that at home, we don't speak, read or write chinese. Cousins or friends help us when she has chinese homework that she doesn't know how to do.

Amazingly, there are kids who attend tuition classes as well as school. I don't know how these kids and families cope. We tried it for a while. My girl would go to school and then two nights a week she would come home for an hour and then go out again for another 2 hours of academic activities. We lasted a month. It just got too much. On those nights, she didn't have time to play (mornings are for homework) and I could see the stress she was under. She'd also miss out on things like going shopping or out for a swim at night - things that make life pleasant and enabled her to let off steam. So we put a stop to it. Needless to say, she's a bit more relaxed now. Everything's back to normal.

I often think that if she enjoys school here, imagine how she'd feel if she were attending one of our lovely Australian primary schools. So relaxed and colourful. Maybe one day.