In less than 1 month, 3 of my "chi-muis" who were around to witness my holy matrimony back in 2004 delivered their bundles of joy! We are so happy for the new mums and our warmest wishes goes to:-

28^th Oct 2006 – Pei Ching and Vincent on the arrival of Charmaine Tiew Xuan Yen.

6^th Nov 2006 – Kelly and Sam on the arrival of Liew Koen.

24^th Nov 2006 – Soo Wei and Tse Chern on the arrival of Chia Rae Wen.

We will have a gathering of babies when we are back next year. Till then, hugs and kisses to all the bubs from Aunt Mel and Uncle Eng 

Ideally a baby is normally born on the 40^th week but it’s never controllable. Estimation is +/- 2 weeks. What I understand from findings is that from the 36^th week onwards, the foetus will be fully developed and it will just grow in size and weight from then on, gaining 250 g every week. The ideal weight is 3.2 kg on the 40^th week (at least for Asian babies). So, if it’s born earlier, it might be lighter and smaller in size. Nothing harmful to the baby but just that smaller babies are more difficult to care for. I trust this finding is comprehensive and accurate as I’ve got live testimonies to support this. Babies born on the various gestation weeks ranging from 38^th-40^th week do vary about 250-300 g each. Of course it also depends on how much weight the mothers have gained. However, I believe there is a maximum weight gain of the baby vs the mother’s. It doesn’t mean that the more the mother weighs, the baby’s weight will follow in an ascending pattern. The maximum baby’s weight that I’ve ever heard of is about 4kg although the mum has put on more than 20kg. Logical huh? It also makes sense from a biological perspective. At least more logical than the myths of the size and shape of the bumps. I never believed in those although it’s commonly mentioned. The shape of the bumps largely depends on the position of the baby, nothing to do with gender determination. My bump could be round or protrude on different occasions depending on what position Cameron decides to be in. His favourite position is to stick his butt or back or head (don’t know which one it is coz it feels very hard) towards my upper right of my bump making it appear to be lopsided and unsymmetrical.

I’ve only put on about 6-7 kg, rather light. What makes it worse is my stubborn soar throat and cough still refused to disappear and that affects my volume of food intake. I was so worried that it will affect Cameron that I had to call the midwife for reassurance. I hope I will recover soon as I need to catch up with food and weight. Never thought eating for 2 could be a stressful challenge!

1. Work in own comfortable environment.

2. Able to obtain more concentration and focus (That is if you are confined to your own space with no external disturbance). When I visited a MNC in Redmond last year, every developer has his/her own room because the employer believes that they need silence and own space to think as they hardly need to interact with each other. To me that’s no difference from working at home.

3. Save time on commuting particularly if you need to go through massive traffic (in KL especially on rainy days! Indirectly, you get more sleep too! And that would indirectly help the government to counter the traffic problem in the city)

4. Save costs on commuting (the heightened petrol prices just won’t get you anywhere as it will continue to raise) and meals and probably office attire since you do not need to dress up 5 days a week. Only startup and ongoing investment is on telephone and broadband connections and probably some necessary devices like printers but the accumulated expenditure is still cheaper than the daily expenses if you were to work in the office.

5. Self-managing and maximize flexibility as well as productivity in own way.

6. Nurture self-discipline as opposed to perception of laziness (it’s all in the mind!).

7. Develop mutual trust and respect between employer and employee. I never like anyone breathing down my neck, so respect is significant to me.

8. With reference to that, employee tends to be more willing to work at any time during critical needs. Of course that rarely happens but even if it does, employee won’t feel stressed or upset about the request.

9. Extremely advantageous to working mothers as they can also focus on the upbringing of the young children at the same time. Again it is self-managing and mitigates the need to employ a baby-sitter thus save costs! Anything that is good for the family is good for the country’s future. Children are the country’s future generation. If only Malaysia government and the private sectors could be more broadminded and liberal to realize that in the long run (longer maternity leave please! 2 months is pathetic! In UK, the government is making the effort to extend the ordinary maternity leave to 9 months from mid 2007..aarrghh I’ll miss the boat).

10. In some cultures, it would cut down unnecessary time wasted on socializing, long lunches and teh-tarik sessions coz those would chew up most of the precious working time. That would result in overtime if tasks do not get completed by end of the day.

And the list goes on……What matters is the job gets done within expectation and what more can you say, if either way produces the same result. But many wonder what and how do you work from home. That’s because it doesn’t apply to every profession. If you need to work with counterparts face to face, no doubt you need to be on site. However, technology is so advanced these days that you can access the company’s network seamlessly off-site and you can have netmeetings, teleconferencing and videoconfering anytime anywhere. So why not seize the opportunity by fully utilizing the available feature? If Malaysia wants to be a well known MSC hub, it’s not the setup of physical organizations in Cyberjaya that counts but what should improvise and grow is also the cultural working mindset. I’m not saying that every company in the UK allows the employees to work from home as there are still some conservative ones in this developed nation. If you are already enjoying the heavenly benefits, it would be a tough challenge trying to find the next job in another organization that can meet equivalent anticipation. I believe money isn’t the sole factor nor would it supersede other requirements all the time – mel.

10 more weeks and the countdown begins. I’m still contemplating if I should go with or without pain relief during labour. Not that my pain threshold is sky high but I’m not very keen on the idea of having large needles and fine tubes inserted into my epidural space for hours. Even with epidural, it might not be effective as certain women might still feel the sensation. There are other types of pain relief like gas and air and TENS, which requires the mum to be in total control, but I’m afraid I can’t handle those in a state of anxiety. No doubt those will aid to divert the attention away from the pain but I don’t really want to handle too many things at the same time, for once! I acknowledge the fact that there is no such thing as a painless labour and delivery but I guess as a first timer, I just don’t know what to expect and what would be best for me. Being well-informed, prepared and relax are the best I can do as it is impossible to relate real-life experience with theories. Guess will just follow what my mind and heart says when the time is right and of course heed the midwives’ advice. All these are only applicable if I can go through a normal delivery and I really hope Cameron will not decide to stay breech or would there be any complications that I need to undergo a surgery. My previous experience with surgery was not very pleasant as it took a long time to heal. And not to forget, the catheter…uurrrghh I hate that! And epidural will most probably need that.

I braved myself to watch “the” video at the antenatal class on Tuesday and it wasn’t as bad as I expected. No bloody scenes like what you get in C-sections (caesarians). Whatever it is, I hope my body will release more endorphins to combat with the adrenaline that is slowly elevating. I guess it’s coping well as I managed to stay calm and recover from soar throat, cough, chillness and tiredness over the last 2-3 days without any medication. I believe it’s also due to the increased progesterone hormones in pregnancy that helps the body to stay calm (no wonder I’ve been more patient at work ever since :p). I only gurgled some nasty sea salt water and had plenty of honey + lemon drinks. Honey does really help to get you into a good night sleep. I practically slept like a baby last night. Although I’m not as energetic compared to my second trimester when I could still do lots of cooking and moving about, I just pray that I will continue to stay calm, healthy and strong for the coming weeks as the most important day approaches. With our upcoming busy schedule with house moving, shopping and Christmas gatherings, that should occupy my mind quite a bit.

15-Nov-2006 (Wednesday), Abdullah’s presidential address at the opening of the 57th UMNO GA said:

‘Second Pillar…I respect the voices of the elected representatives of the people and they have the freedom to deliberate and debate. They have the opportunity to evaluate the government’s performance; the executive branch is now openly criticised not only by members of the opposition, but also by government backbenchers, members of Umno and members of the public…I hold to the principle that a nation should provide channels that enable its people to voice their concerns. Constructive criticism is encouraged. Differences of opinion should be viewed objectively and not necessarily be seen as being anti-government. The media is a partner in our efforts to build a responsible democratic society’

16-Nov-2006 (Thursday), Datuk Mukhriz Mahathir said :
‘I think it’s an address he delivered last year. I was hoping for something new. Perhaps, he has other ideas’

17-Nov-2006 (Friday), State UMNO Youth Chiefs called for emergency meeting to discuss Mukhriz comments as they claimed he has belittled the president’s policy speech.

Youth chief Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Tun Hussein said Mukhriz’s remark was extreme and an embarrassment for the movement.

18-Nov-2006 (Saturday), Youth chief Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Tun Hussein warned Mukhriz of this statement and demanded explanation or risk his position as UMNO Exco Council member.

Do you think Badawi is too weak to control his wing men. He is preaching one thing while his kakitangan is doing completely the opposite.

I disagree, I would like to think that he is not walking the talks. Remembered that Datuk Shahrir Samad resigned as BackBenchers Club Chairman in May 2006 because he voted for Opposition Motion over the custom’s ‘Close One Eye’ issue while none of the BN MPs back him. To comment over his resignation, Abdullah reminded all BN MPs to toe the party line, which is not to vote for Opposition’s Motion regardless of the issues.

What’s the crap about democracy if a person is not allowed to air his view and vote for things that he thinks is right? And we are not even talking about issues regarding Races or Religions. What is the point if Abdullah is promoting Malaysia as a democratic country but clamp down on those who speak up ??

What I can see is that UMNO would like everyone to brand Abdullah like a God where everybody within the party must obey and ‘carry-balls’ of what he says. Well, after so many years of independence, we are not anywhere closer to becoming a democratic country but we are definitely not too far from the North Korea Regime. -eng

Rafidah plays down Aussie Barbs. I am quite surprised that our well known iron lady who has rubbed shoulders with so many leaders from around the world for many years could make such a weak comment to dispute Micheal Backman’s article about Malaysia being Bodoh.

I would have thought that she will have all the government figures and statistics to dispute the article claims. Instead of lame statements like ‘he is not Malaysian’, ‘he doesn’t know Malaysia’ etc etc… Unless, she knew that she can’t spin the facts and she can’t accept the truth ?!

I am amused by her comments further

‘I don’t really care about what others say – as long as it is not a Malaysian saying it,” She said.

Well, the fact is, nobody care less about Malaysian than it’s own Government. She labeled Mahathir as ‘a Forgetful old man’ when Mahathir complained about her out-of-control and unfair distribution of AP permits. Also the recent row on the Bumi’s equity study from ASLI-CPPS Think Tank where the Government has applied so much pressure to the organization to withdraw the report which also caused the Director Dr Lim Teck Ghee to resign as a protest to the withdrawal.

All the Government seems to care the most is spending big bucks sending Astronaut to the space to play some Malay traditional games, building new Istana, new South Region project and London Sports Complex while leaving it’s own people crying from increasing living expenses, job losses and spiralling crime rates. -eng

I know I’ve not been blogging for a while. Eng has been very busy at work and at the same time, we have been busy packing our stuffs in preparation to move to another residence within the locality. However, I managed to take some time-off today to attend my first antenatal class. There were around 20 expectant mums, all due sometime in Dec/Jan and I’m one of the last few who will due in Feb. It was quite fun to be in a gathering of preggies, when you get to see bumps in all shapes and sizes There were so much information to be delivered in a 2 hour session. Today, we were educated about the stages of labour. I’ve read quite a lot about it from the net but sometimes the more you know and discuss (information overload), the more panicky you would become. I know it’s a little too early to start panicking but hey, I’m only 11 weeks away from D-Day!   Now that I’m in my final trimester, I think I did encounter Braxton-Hicks for the very first time yesterday. It’s a pre-labour, painless contraction that is preparing the body for delivery. You can call it a delivery trial-run. I’m also getting upper back pain and according to my friend, that’s because the baby is pressing against some of the organs (could be stomach) and that sets pressure on the back. Towards the end of the trimester, the pain should go off but will reside at the lower back instead…never ending pain! Nevertheless, worth it

We perfected the Hainanese "Kai Fan" and served it with side dishes - ginger sauce, chili garlic sauce and chicken rice sauce. hmmm… maybe we should start the copycat version of Nam Heong outlet here. Not forgetting the fresh homemade Soybean milk or "Tau Cheong Sui" as the drink. Guess cooking is what Malaysians abroad do during their weekends. Cheap and good Asian food is scarce here, so need to survive on own homecooked meals.

 

 

I’m nearing the end of my second trimester as I’m in my 27^th week gestation and I’m pretty excited. Furthermore, my best friend, PeiChing back in KL has just delivered a baby girl and I’ve got another best friend of mine, SooWei (@ Canberra) who is on her way! Hopefully on the 3^rd of Dec yah. Even Keen has just delivered early this year, so that makes 4 of us expecting around the same time and that allows us to exchange experiences and information quite comfortably. Hopefully the 4 kids will grow up to be best of friends like their mothers

Cameron has been kicking quite regularly now. I need to ensure that he kicks at least 10 times a day. The feeling is just indescribable and I can never get enough of his kicks. It makes me giggle and blissful each time he moves. So apart from the common pregnancy sicknesses that I’ve been educated with, the process of pregnancy can be a wonderful experience. In fact, it’s really worth the journey. I hope this will give some sort of encouragement to those who are thinking twice to start a family.

I’m expecting to deliver on 1st February 2007 and that means I have to wrap up my work by end of this month as project winds down in December and I should be off on maternity leave from mid Jan onwards. Hopefully, I will feel alright and is able to cope till then as I realized I was gasping for breath during my telecon at work yesterday. Another point that I’m looking forward to is my 6 months maternity leave, so I should be off till July next year and intend to plan a visit back to KL during that period. The HR welfare in UK is pretty good to me but apparently it’s still one of the poorest in Europe. Germany and Sweden are still tops in terms of employment benefits.