Thoughts – Page 23 – trippingdifferently

June 10, 2012

Healthy leftovers? Good or bad idea?…

i am huge on leftovers! Growing up i watched my mum cook for a battalion – this is always what i tell people and it is absolutely true. My mother did cook large amounts each Sunday and my aunts, uncles and cousins would all come over and eat. Of course, we didn’t have a big house, just a modest HDB (Housing Development Board for my non-Singaporean friends) 4-room flat. So when that many came over, there was no room for all to sit at the same table, at the same time to eat. Whoever came first, ate first and then made room for the next persons. And many times we would just sit wherever we wanted to eat; the kids mostly sat in front of the TV 😉

i loved it! The house was crowded and loud but i loved it. i love being around people and being around family was even better. This is one of the reasons i like having dinner guests. It is also the main reason why it was hard for me to learn to cook just for myself (when i went to university) or just for two (during the first years of my marriage).

Then near the end of the day, when people were leaving, we packed up the leftovers and everyone took their share home and most of the time we still had enough to have leftovers for ourselves as well.

As much as we all liked gathering together, kids grew up, priorities changed, cousins moved to whole other countries to live and these big gatherings also stopped happening.

BUT… my mother still cooked large amounts on Sundays (not battalion-sized though). This time it was more for convenience. My mum worked full-time – she always has and still does. Yet she maintained a lovely home and provided wonderful meals for us. And having the meals already cooked in advanced was a great help to her.

So as you can see leftovers played a big part in my childhood, teen years and even young adult days. i still like having leftovers, some foods just taste better after a night in the fridge 😉 And that’s why the article below stuck a chord with me and why i am sharing it. It has a really tasty recipe at the end of it too.

Healthy leftovers? Good or bad idea? | Newsletters | Beyond Diet.

Do you serve leftovers? If yes, what is your favourite dish to freeze/keep as leftover? If no, why not?

syc

June 5, 2012

Book Review: Angry Housewives Eating BonBons…

First of all, i LOVE the title of this book! And i loved it even more when i found out that that is the name of the book club which is the centre of action in the book; the AHEB (Angry Housewives Eating BonBons).

Second, i apologise as i will be skimming over the details of this book. i read this for my own book club meeting at the beginning of May and my memory isn’t what it used to be. But i liked the book and remember enough to want to talk about it some more.

Ok onto the book review proper…

The first few lines of the book (Prologue) immediately grabbed my attention and the writing style and story-lines held it all the way through the book.

“I knew all about having my life saved. When I was three years old, I broke free of my MawMaw’s callused grasp to chase a paper cup skittering across the street at the same time a jalopy full of new army recruits careened around the corner. A sailor coming out of Knapp’s Drugs and Sundries, with reflexes I hope served him well in his tour of duty, threw his bottle of Hires root beer to the sidewalk and raced out into the street, scooping me up in his arms. I can still hear the cacophony of squealing brakes, honking horns, and my grandmother’s scream, feel the sailor’s rough cotton uniform on my cheek and smell the soda pop on his breath…”

See what i mean. The writing is not complex but it is full of details which draw you right into the action, right into what the character sees and feels.

Faith, the ‘I’ in the above excerpt, is the main character who is also the one with the biggest, oldest secret in the story. (No spoiler here – i won’t tell you what’s the secret.) However, all the other housewives are so well-fleshed out that you live and feel for each of them as they take turns to tell their part in this story. i like Audrey for her dare-to-live attitude and Slip for her fight-to-the-end viewpoint. Their personal stories both take an unexpected twist. Merit, whom my heart goes out to, is amazing as she tries to keep it all together under an abusive husband and then when it falls apart, raises her girls on her own; not an easy thing to do in the Sixties. Kari, the ‘mother-hen’ of the group, who has her own sad story with a wonderful end, is equally interesting to read about.

i enjoy so much the camaraderie which the women share in those 40 over years they spent together; how they were there for each other at every turn. It is something i do not have – not to say that my life is lacking but such close friendships with people who live on the same street i have not experienced. i have wonderful friends but we are, unfortunately, at this point in our lives, not living in the same country even, let alone the same street. i have always wondered about living with neighbours who became close friends and i got to see that through the eyes of these characters.

The topics touched upon in the book are also varied and of great interest to me. Everything from the war (Vietnam specifically) and the peace marches to marriage (normal, abusive, divorce etc…) and sex; it also covers parenting, adoption, lost of loved ones, relationships and expectations between parent and child, religion, the gay movement/issue, and most importantly, holding onto secrets and its effects. There is no lack of tragedies with regards to all those issues but there are also lots of triumphs as well.

Of course, in those many years, these friends have had their disagreements and fights with each other and the process of healing the broken relationships was never easy. But they stayed true to each other, loving each other, even when they were ‘hating’ the other.

i love it that two of their children would carry on the book club in their own way, just as their mothers did. We leave the Angry Housewives in the midst of another battle in life:

“The Angry Housewives tame a Hell’s Angel, I wrote. Next stop: world domination. I laughed, even though I was a breath away from bursting into tears. I looked at Slip, but my valiant, true friend did not stir, and I stared at the photograph for a moment more before adding, We’re still working on that one.”

i would read this book again some time in the future. (when my to-read list is finally no more… God only knows when that will be – hehehee;) ).

Have you read this book? If so, did you like it? Hate it? Do share.

syc

May 13, 2012September 29, 2012

Who Am I?…

Camera 360 — A rainbow always reminds me of how much God loves us.

i wondered about this question a fairly bit – at least when i was a child growing up, even more as a teenager trying to define herself. i have not asked this question of myself for quite a while now but the other day, it popped into my mind again. It caused me to look at myself today and myself maybe 20 years earlier (showing my age, huh?)

So who am i? i am a mother, a wife, a daughter, a friend, a sister, a godmother, a sister-in-christ, a writer, a blogger (yes there is a difference between the two), a photographer (not professionally, but passionately), and most importantly, i am a child of God.

Does any one role define me? Can any one role tell you about the whole me? No, i believe i am all of that and, prayerfully, i hope i am also much more than my roles.

i love being a wife and a mother – a home manager in essence. i enjoy being a friend and a sister-in-christ. i wish i could be a better daughter and godmother. i hope that my passion in life would be revealed through my writing and blogging. i want to be a professional photographer (maybe some time in the future i will be).

But the one role that possibly tells you more about me than any of the others is – i am a child of God. i believe, 100 and 1 percent, that i am God’s creation and i am here to fulfill His purposes.

Is that too simplistic a way to think? Maybe. But life is complicate enough as it is, i don’t need to make it even harder.

However, being God’s child does not mean that all my other roles take a backseat. In fact, it gives them more direction. When i am with my son, i am a mother to him and i pray i will be able to mirror God to him. Love him as God loves me. When i am with my husband, i am a wife and again God speaks very clearly about this in the Bible (see here). When i am with my parents/parents-in-law, i aim to be as loving and filial a daughter/daughter-in-law as i can be because God says to honour my parents.

You see there is no question as to what i should be doing in each situation because if you look at the Bible, truly look at God’s word, it is all there.

Now TODAY, right now, i want to bring my role as a prayer warrior and advocate of special needs orphans to the forefront. Most of you would know that i have been a prayer warrior with Reece’s Rainbow for more than 2 months now. You have read about my little Heath and my lovely Heather. And i thank you for your kind attention.

reecesrainbow_heather20120301 — 10 year old Heather, is a healthy sweetie who needs a family asap.

i still pray for them both but TODAY i want to highlight Heather. She is an adorable little girl who has Down Syndrome. But because of that one little extra chromosome, she is an orphan. She will be turning 11 in a few months and have had no one care about that for all those long years. We have very little information about her and that does not bear well, because we have no real knowledge of her actual condition and the circumstances she lives in. What we do know is that she is a child who needs a loving family to care for her, to choose her to be part of their family so that she can excel in life. Could you be her family? Would you join me in prayer for her?

i feel that Heather seems to be overlooked and the reason being there is so little known about her. But as i have said before, this does not make her need less, it makes her need more. The way i see it, she is more neglected in a way than little Heath who has had a little bit more exposure (this is only because a family managed to spot him – no interaction was allowed – when they went to pick up their adopted son from the same institute).

So please don’t let her be pushed to the side any longer. Share her story, donate to her adoption grant (click here) – a large increase in her grant would get her more notice and make it easier for a family to reach her, pray that her family comes for her. Thank you.

syc