Sunday, November 30, 2008

Planning to buy a soya milk machine

Ethan likes the soya milk. Nowadays, almost every supermarket have been promoting the soya milk machine and the sales have been boomed up due to the milk scandal. The salesperson had let the customer to taste different type of soya milk. Today, the taste was the pumpkin with soya and previously Ethan had been tasting the grean bean with soya. Ethan just loved it as he always requested to have one when we brought him to the supermarket. Mummy did plan to buy one for quite some time but still have not made any move because need to check whether the product is good or not. Since seeing Ethan loves it so much so mummy went to search the internet for the comments of that particular brand. Well, some good some bad.

Now mummy wanted to wait for year end sales (hopefully there is one) if not then no choice but have to buy it. Ethan need to be patience for few weeks... then...

Saturday, November 29, 2008

Gift from Seasons Villas for Ethan birthday...

Today we received the balloons gift from our landlord. Our landlord delivers the gift on the last Friday of every month for those kids whose birthday is on that particular month. The entitled person are kids below 10. We only registered Ethan on beginning of the month after we read the notice from our landlord's newsletter that new residents need to register the kid's birthday at the reception.
Because we have been to Hangzhou for the whole day yesterday, so our landlord management called us today and asked whether were we at home. We received the balloons and party hat while Ethan was still having his nap. He was happy when he saw all the balloons. He had fun with the balloons by throwing the balloons up in the air.


Christmas Bazaar in Seasons Villas

Today our landlord have organized a Christmas Bazaar for the residence. The bazaar started at 10.00am and we chose to go to the center garden in the afternoon because the weather was warmer in the afternoon. We walked there after having our lunch at home.

When we arrived at the center garden, there were lots of people and we immediately headed towards the kid corner. There was a stage for whoever who wants to take photo with the Santa Clause and would need to pay RMB20 for the charity. We did not have a chance to participate as the photo session had finished when we stepped in. We went to see the carriage ride. The carriage was pulled by a pony and inside kids can ride with Santa Clause.



Above was the stage if you want to take the photo with Santa
The stores were selling different stuffs, there were food store behind this big tent.
We went back to the kids corner after we glanced through the stores in the center garden. We hoped that we can have a photo with Santa Clause but seeing that the Santa Clause was still having the carriage ride with the kids. We quickly went to the starting point and hoped that Ethan has a chance to take a ride with Santa. Well, Ethan was lucky as we were supposed to line up but the staff seen that there was still a small space available for small kid so Ethan did not need to line up. He took a ride. the bigger kids still need to wait for the next round. Since it was unexpected, mummy had not much time to take nice photos of Ethan. We were afraid that Ethan will cry during the ride so daddy followed the carriage in case Ethan crys. Ethan is a big boy now, he really enjoyed the ride. When the ride finished daddy held him down from the carriage. He said bye bye and given a french kiss to Santa. Yes, Santa gave back a kiss too...



The painting store started to tidy up those stuffs like paint, brushes and etc. But we still seen some of the kids continue to paint the Christmas tree so we asked for staff whether we can have one. Well, the staff said that we had to paint fast because after 5 minutes they would need to tidy up all the things. We quickly let Ethan put the paint on the tree with daddy's help. If not just depending on Ethan alone, it may need more time.



After Ethan finished painting his Christmas tree, mummy seem that the carriage stopped by in the corner of the garden with nobody around except the horseman. We quickly walked to take some photos with him. After we finished taking the photos, there were few people came after seeing what we have done. Luckily we took the actions fast.

Since the Santa Clare left and some stores have been closed, it was time for the clown to entertain the kids. This round only have 2 clowns. Daddy held Ethan and taken photo with the clowns before we walked home.

Overall, Ethan enjoyed the joy of the Christmas bazaar.

Friday, November 28, 2008

Ethan second time in Hangzhou West Lake

Initially we wanted to begin our journey early but because of Ethan we had to delay until 7.00am then only manage to get ready. We were stuck on the way to Hangzhou in the Puxi area. Last time we chose the north side of West Lake to visit, this round we wanted to cover from the South till North. When we arrived at the destination, we were so shocked to see so many tourists. The group of the tourist came to the attraction batch by batch. According to one of the people passing by said, the West lake in the Hangzhou always full of tourist whole year, so whether you choose the weekend and weekday there is not much difference. Of course weekend there would be more people.

The weather was so cold today, so we let Ethan wore few layers of clothes. Even we could not stand the cold wind. Our hand frozen up and felt like can be cracked.

When we started to walk to the attraction, there was so many boat people asking and promoting their service. Asking us whether we want to take boat to the middle of West Lake or not. The asking price is RMB120, not sure the price is for per person or per boat. For us, we already felt the freezing in our body, if we sit in the boat and didn't move for sure we would feel colder. Besides that the price is also considered expensive. Not to blame us, it is manual sailing of the boat. We chose those place under sun to walk and hoped that we can get warmer.

Walked for some distances, there was a garden that we entered. Seeing the tourists entering it, we also followed the same route as them. There was big vacant ground where all the pigeons stationed there, the tourist can buy the pigeon food from the stall and feed them. Ethan was attracted by all the pigeons, he counted them. Not only that, he even wanted to catch those pigeons but the pigeons were scared by him and flew away up to the sky. The pigeon flew in the sky and made one round of circle and landed on the same place again. Mummy had captured those pictures of pigeons flying in the sky. However, these photos have been posted under the parents' travel blog. Mummy had to stop him as we knew that pigeon is very poisonous, especially its shit.

Walked further inside the garden, Ethan could see the peacock walking around the garden but the peacock didn't open up its feather. We had reached a place where the tourist can feed fishes in the pond. However seeing that there are so many tourists at that place and we knew that there was no chance for Ethan to experience feeding the fishes. We chose the other direction to walk further inside where there would be less tourists.


Ethan trying to pick the red leave from the tree
We reached the place where we can view the West Lake and here there are less tourists. We have chance to take a good picture of the West Lake. Guessed here was less tourist maybe because it was quite far away from the main gate of the garden. Further inside will be the private bungalow but we have decided to hang around here instead of walking further deeper inside. Nearly the noon time.




This place is mainly for the restaurant but maybe due to the cold weather, the restaurant has closed down. Guessed during the summer time, people will be willing to have meal at this place as you can enjoy the view of the surrounding.


Building beside the Ethan was the restaurant
We have turned back towards the main gain. Before we left this garden, our mission was to walk back to the place where there was lots of fishes to see. We were afraid that Ethan was hungry after walking so many hours and under the cold weather. We have offered him the "Baby Bite". Seeing there was not many fishes swimming nearby the pond, we decided to throw a bit of Ethan's baby bite inside the pond and hoped that Ethan can get a chance to see those fishes coming up for food. Ethan was excited as he can throw the food inside the pond. The fish here were not many and small so we decided to directly go to the main area.


When we arrived at the place, there were not many people there and Ethan threw a bit of baby bite inside the pond. Then, one uncle saw and offered to give Ethan the fish foods after he fed them for a while. Ethan was happily feeding the fishes. Here the fishes were big and a lot of them. After a while, there were few batches of tourist came to this place and we waited for Ethan to finish feeding and then walked away. Guessed the most fun part for Ethan was both watching the pigeon and feeding the fishes in this garden.

Busying and joyfully feeding the fishes



Before we walked out from the garden, Ethan requested us to change his diaper. We found the place with a bench and laid Ethan on it to make the change. It was quite cold so we had to take actions fast. Ethan felt light again as before that he was always pulling up his pants and diaper, it was really full - his diaper.


After we walked out from the garden, we have walked along the tar road towards the North side. Before we started, we went to the jetty side to view the price per person for taking the engine boat. It is about RMB20 -RMB25 per person. We didn't take the boat as it was quite late at that time, we knew there will be long distance to walk from South to North. We have an idea of how much to take the boat on our visit next time.
On the way from South to North, not much things to see. They just built the tar road for you to walk. From here, there was no tourist, the tourist were mostly concentrated on the South part. Ethan have requested us to carry him along these few miles of road. In order to persuade him to walk by himself, daddy found a unknown seed from a tree which had fallen down on the road. Daddy kicked the seed and when Ethan saw it, he also wanted to do so. Ethan happily walked and kicked the seed along the way and we have saved our energy to hold him.

In the mid way, there were lot of plaques which described the history of West Lake construction

Finally we reached the North side of the West Lake after walking so many miles of road. We took some photos with the 苏堤 signboard before we headed to have our lunch. At that time we had our lunch it was already nearly 3 o clock in the afternoon.

After we had our lunch we didn't continue to visit the place as we have already visited in our last trip here. We didn't completely cover 100% of every side of 苏堤 as Ethan will need to take his nap. He didn't sleep since the morning. It should be very tiring for him. Ethan immediately went into his dreamland on our way home. We had traffic jam in the Hangzhou city before we gone into the highway. Things observed before we went in the highway was that China people tried to stop the car and hoped that you will offer him a ride. According to our driver, China people will stand along beside certain destination of the highway and hoped that they can take the bus. This way, they can save the cost of transport as it depends on distance travel. We have asked our driver that if do like this in the middle of the road take the bus, it sure be a risk where no place inside the bus. Yup, this is the risk and if this bus don't have seat then they would have to wait for the next bus. Really different from what we have seen in our own country.