Comming back!

After being away from my dear blog, today i have the chance to come back. I was actually searching for some websites that I saw my blog. Oh my god, my blog about my first son still exists. I am so excited and I can't bear from not posting a word of update.

I have the second son, his name is Ngin Chan Rithysac and Isaac is his nickname. He was born healthy on Nov 8, 2014 just one day before Cambodia Independent day.

Not different from Noren, I am so excited to welcome his arrival despite of pain during natural delivery with a 3.7 kg baby. Isaac cried out so loud immediately he was taken out of my womb. We as his parents were excited to see the new life is coming. I felt so sad the day Isaac was born because my mother was not with me. When I was in labor, I saw my mother's face on the window which made me think that she is with me to protect me during the delivery.

This is the picture of Isaac after he was born for about 2 hours. He slept so well without taking breastmilk. He is a gentle handsome boy. But he does not have big cheeks like his brother. His eyes are smaller than Noren but he has handsome sharp nose. His skin is so white and soft like silk. He has few hairs on his head which is good for cleaning.

This picture was taken in Feb 2015. He is growing :-). He looks so gentle and handsome. I am so much in love with him. Whenever I am at home, i love to sit and see his face, watch him crying, smile, poo poo and pee pee. I have never been tired of looking at him. Isaac could recognize my face on Feb 8 when could see things clearly.

These are my two princes. They love each other very much. The big brother loves to kiss the little one after coming back from school, and getting up in the morning. He also likes to scream at his brother to attract attention of his brother. He said the baby brother is shouting at me, Isaac is kicking me, mommy. Isaac is scratching me, mommy........... Oh, boy........... there is a lot of works that i have to do and a lot of complain that i have to hear. However, I do enjoy being with them. Last but not least, the burden of assignment is increasing. I have to work, I have strong commitment to breast feed Isaac till 6 months, I have to travel to province, I have to take care of big Noren and ..............endless complain from me too.......:-)

From a mother of two boys

School Age: From Home Care to Pre-Kindergarten

It has been almost one year that I have not update any post on this blog due to many assignments that I have to complete on time. Today, I would like to take the opportunity to update one post about Noren's schooling. Time flies! To me, Noren is still a little baby who was born yesterday. But, today Noren is 4 years and 5 months old. He is a pretty grown-up boy who can talk a lot and asked many questions every day.
I sent Noren to school when he was 2 years and 6 months to Footprint home care at Tuol Kork. The first day of attending school for Noren was the worst day. Noren had always been under good care of mother, father, sister and relatives around him. He felt strange to meet with other children and stay at school with the person whom he was not familiar with. Noren cried for a few days after sending him to school; then he stops crying and seemed to enjoy the playing with friends and teachers.

At 4 years old, Noren entered pre-k1. He is not difficult like before but still cries some days in the morning before sending him off to school. I put him for one full day at school. Noren started to question a lot since he was 3 years old; and now at the age of 4 years old, he has even challenged me some of the questions that he asked. He is such a funny boy but still crying when going to school. Last week (July 15) I was invited for parent-teacher meeting, his teacher reported to me good scores and behavior of Noren. However, Noren still have difficult to tell the teacher about his needs. Perhaps it relates to personal attitude. I appreciate the development that Noren gained after going to school, a large part of the development of Noren, I must give the credit to Noren's teachers.
I attended Noren's dance, but I could not see him dancing. He said he was shy to show the dance to audiences. Anyhow, dancing is not Noren's favorite.

Noren's favorites are dinosaur, airplanes, and trains. He likes watching youtube about dinosaur, not only about dinosaur for children but also discovery of dinosaur age. Noren can remember a few names of dinosaur and he insisted us to take him to dinosaur park. With airplanes, he like watching plane crashed, big inauguration of airbus, discovery of innovation of the first airplanes, and other research channels on airplanes. With regards to train, it is just a normal hobby like other children. He watch train for children but he is not so much keen to search into discovery history of train the same as he does with dinosaur and airplane.Different from other children who like to play games on Ipad of Samsung tablet, Noren like to watch youtube with regards to the search of dinosaur, airplanes or dinosaurs songs.

As already stated earlier, time flies and it flies so fast. Noren changed from a boy who does not like to talk but to a boy who like to question.

Noren at the end of term 2 at Footprint, pre-k1, Mar 2014

After witnessing the change and the development of Noren, I give good credit to footprint school which I have sent Noren to since he was 2 years and 6 months and I even consider to sending my second son when he will be in school age. But, one thing to consider and worry is the tuition fee. Although quality of the school is somehow acceptable, the school fee is skyrocket! In one year, just for one son, I pay more than 2000 USD. :-O This is much higher than the school fee for Master Degree or even PhD degree at some school in Phnom Penh (Master Degree with PUC is just around 900+ USD). I order to settle this, my husband and I have to work hard and save money to pay for Noren school fee. This is just school fee for Noren alone, not included other entertaining recreation, holidays for Noren, and his toys. If i have no work, I do not know how could I afford for his school fee. It is so crazy in Cambodia. I do not have any trust on public school in Phnom Penh at all. so sending him off to private school is the only option that I have but the price is crazy.

Knowledge Management and Action Research

When looking at my old files today, i found out that there was one important file that I forgot to post on my blog to share my knowledge with readers. I decided to do it now rather than waiting until tomorrow to come and rather than waiting until i could recall my password in a new blog that I just created for Knowledge Sharing. I have such a bad memory so if I think about something now I have to do it immediately.

I hope the slides that I shared here could contribute as a source of reference. It was actually developed for work interview with the WorldFish. One of the interesting point that I could clearly recall during question and answer was the integration of private sector in the action research so that they could make meaning contribution to local farmers and so that it could lead to reduce poverty. :-) I think it is not a bad idea, it is just a way that I presented the information make myself ironic. Anyway, the concept of social enterprise is now becoming popular, I may have a chance to make use of my suggestion into my current work. Let's see if I could make something done by the end of 2014. Yeay, time to fly!

How Knowledge Management and Action Research Contribute to Poverty Alleviation in the AAS dependent People: Short presentation for test

Meh: Mother

My mother during the visit to one pagoda near Phnom Penh on May 2011

I am writing the article about Meh in order to express my gratitude towards my mother who is currently sick and bed-ridden. I keep praying to god to help her get out of difficult situation and pain. The article below describes about my mother's life and her good deeds as a Buddha follower. She has spent a lot on Buddhist ceremonies and pagoda renovation.

Meh: MotherMeh, is literally known as mother in English. Meh is a Khmer word. My mother was born in 1936 the time that Cambodia was under French colony. She was born to a poor family. She has one sister. Being a second child in the family of single mother, she beared all responsibility to support the whole family. Her older sister was not allowed to go outside of the house due to security reason. As a 10-year-old girl, she had play role as both father, brother, and boy in order to support the family.

My mother got married to my father at the age of 22 years old. She delivered the first baby in 1956 and the second baby about 10 months later. More burden added to my mother responsibility. She was a housewife who takes care of the house and cook for my father, was a mother of dual sons who breastfed and made sure child welfare, and as a daughter in law who takes good care of an older age mother.

After the Pol Pot regime my mother moved to live in Kampong Som. Her life has never been easy. In the socialist regime, she was trader who traded Thailand products along the border to sell to her customers in Phnom Penh. In 1980s, business was not recognized and she was to escape from police chasing. She could earn from hands to mouth in order to support the whole family. My father was civil servant but he could earn a little as he was a loyal and honest servant. My mother worked very hard to support the family. Yet, she has never forget her role as a mother in giving warm love to her children especially me.

I remembered that one time my mother got severe stomachache. She did not speak out until she vomotted with blood. Still, she did not take rest.

....
....
In April 2010, my mother collapsed because she was too weak.....
In April 2011, she was found being affected by liver cancer and gallbladder tumor. I was pale and shock to hear this.
In Dec 2011, she was sent to VN for surgery her gallblader problem but the disease is not cured. It is an untreatable disease. In Jan 2012, she was sent there again but no major treatment was made.
In Feb and now (Mar31) she becomes bed-ridden and could not eat any foods.

Time flies so fast. If possible, I wish I could go back to the past. I want to go back to the past which I promised that I would not do anything to upset her. I would do everything to satisfy her. But, everything is over. It is over. It is too late. My mom can hear but hardly talk back to me. She can only cry woring..

Pchum Ben Day 2011

I share my view on the important of family reunion during Pchum Ben day and my sincere appreciation on my parents in maintaining family relation. I also write about the different view between old generation and young generation in giving meaning of reunion. These two views have gap which is difficult to converge in the modern society where young generation gives more meaning to friendship.

Pchum Ben is a day of family reunion and most of Buddhist followers observe this event as the most important for family reunion. Pchum Ben has a total of 15 days starting from the 1 roach (dark moon?) to the 15 roach which is call biggest day or Pchum Ben.  From the 1 roach or ben 1 to 13 roach or ben 13, children or individual family go to pagoda to pray and give offerings to their death ancestors; and on the 14 roach or ben 14, most families goes back to their hometown or the place of their parents' origin for family reunion. Then on the biggest day or ben 15, all families members go to pagoda altogether and visited resort or have picnic.
Tomorrow will be the biggest day or Pchum Ben. All of my brothers and sisters come to Kg Som where my parents are living for reunion. We often have happy time together. We make foods, eat and make fun of others. Every year, all of my siblings come to Kg Som for reunion. In Phnom Penh, we have different house and it is always difficult to stay and have chat together (i have 4 sibling living in Phnom Penh) as they are all busy. But, during Pchum Ben day, when we have family reunion, we always stay up late and everyone keep talking and talking.
My parents especially my mother, in her late 70s, is the happiest person during Pchum Ben day as she wants to maintain family relation and wants to see all of her children staying around. Though she is physically weak and affected by many disease (diabetes, blood pressure, stomachache, gallbladder tumor) she tries her best to walk around slowly in order to make sure everything runs properly and in order to welcome our arrival. My father, about 70 years old, goes to his farm to collect fruits especially coconut for us to drink.
This year, I plan to take my mother to Vietnam for checking up after the visit during Khmer New year this year, but she strongly refused to go. She argues that she missed the chance to welcome her children visit during Khmer New Year which is also the family reunion day, she would not go during Pchum Ben which is even more important than the Khmer New Year. She tries to eat in order to show that she has no problem and healthy though sometimes she could not bear the pain. I do feel pity on her for her devotion and tries her best to be the children shadow. She plays good model to us in maintaining family relation and giving love to all children no matter how old they are.
Since we arrived yesterday, it keeps raining and raining. My son and two of my nieces are sick. This year, it seems a bit quiet at least three of the small children get sick and cannot be playful. I wish they all recover soon so that they can make the reunion for meaningful and has full of fun.
By the way, it is easy to bring all small children along, they always follow the parents. But, when their are in their teenager-hood, they demand for their own freedom. It is not easy to bring them along anymore as they have their own destination and have different thought. For the parents, we think it is important for all children come to visit grandparents house and play with other cousins after being away from each other for almost a year; yet for adult children, age 16 and over, they have their own thought and demand to visit other places with their teenage friends and give less meaning to family reunion. It is hard to bring the two thought convergent. If we try to hard, they thought we did not understand about freedom; if we did not try, others thought we are too loose to educate our children. Being parents, it is difficult sometimes in particular to maintain family relationship. I very much appraise the big effort my parents have  done in order to bring all their children together. But, for us, we may not be able to follow this role model as the modern stage children are very difficult to deal with. I also cannot assure if Noren, in his teenager-hood, would follow me or not. Let's see what will happen in the future.

Playing with Foods

By September 18, 2011 Noren or commonly known as Shin-chan, a Japanese popular cartoon, turns to 18 months and 3 weeks. His height was 85 cm and weight was 12 kg while he was measured last month. Noren is big, he is actually comparable to other children in his age.

He starts to eat foods himself. He cries for eating foods himself. I was happy at the first time when I learned that my little son started to eat independently and I encouraged him to eat by himself. A few minutes later, he spread rice all over the place. In fact, he was striving to put the spoon into is little mouth. He was difficult to demand his little hands to touch the spoon and putting foods into his mouth. I was not upset but I laughed. I told myself that my little son is starting to learn. He will learn about how to use the spoon quickly.

Unfortunately, he failed to put the spoon into his mouth. One reason that I observed was not because of difficulty in demanding his hands to use the spoon, but it was his playfulness. He likes playing with foods which sometimes upsetting me. I wonder how to stop my child from playing with foods. If I took the foods from him immediately, he would cry out loud. One not-good attitude of Noren is that if we immediately stop him from doing something, he would be stubborn and keep doing things we do not want him to do. When he was with me, I tried to explain to him and insist him from stop playing with foods. I used only soft words with him. Noren understand a lot of the language though he could not speak. After he understood my soft insisting, he stopped playing it. But, it was for short time. So, what can I do next? Shout at him? force him to stop playing? or just simply taking him away from where he sat?

Fortunately, I came up with one interesting article about ‘How to stop your child from playing foods’. I read it with interest and I think it is worth sharing with all my friends who experienced or will experience similar issue. Please read the article below and if you are interested, you can register to be the member of the group via  http://www.babycenter.com

The article is written by Patricia Henderson Shimm, parent educator and author
http://www.babycenter.com 

It may be difficult to stop your child from fiddling with her food overnight, but how you respond when she does can gradually bring about change in her behavior. Although it may be tempting to scold her for playing at the table, try not to. Instead, when you sit down for a meal, enjoy your food and see whether she follows suit. When she starts building forts with her mashed potatoes or castles with her broccoli, calmly say, “Oh, I see you’re finished eating,” and take her plate away. You can also remind her that food is not for playing but for eating. The point is to avoid turning mealtime into a battleground or into a manners lesson in which you constantly have to monitor what she’s doing with her food. You concentrate on your food and assume she’s doing the same with hers. If you’re worried that she’ll starve, try not to show it, and take heart: Kids will eat when they’re hungry, especially active 2-year-olds who need an endless energy supply to fuel their growing minds and bodies.

If she seems uninterested in what you’ve prepared for her, avoid asking what she’d like to eat instead. Turning your kitchen into a restaurant where your child can order what she wants for breakfast, lunch, and dinner can be disastrous. If you operate on the assumption that everyone is eating what’s on the evening’s menu, she’ll soon learn to eat what you make.

Your child may also be playing with her food because she’s not hungry. To remedy this, don’t let her snack for at least an hour before meals so she will have the appetite to eat when it’s time. She may also be getting bored, so keep mealtimes to a realistic timetable. Your toddler really can’t be expected to sit still for more than 15 minutes at a time, even if you’ve served her absolute favorite dish. Include her in conversations by asking about her day and make the best of your time together as a family, then let her run and play while the rest of the family finishes their meal.

I Love You-Barney Song

I love you, you love me
we are happy family with a great big hug and a kiss from me to you,
won't you say you love me too.

I love you, you love me
we're best friends like friends should be with a great big hug and a kiss from me to you,
won't you say you love me too.

This is Noren's favorite song. He often smiles when he hears this song. Though he may not understand the meaning now, he will know it when he grows up.

I also like to listen to this song. It is about love within family and friends. If we love someone, we will be loved! Be nice to others, others be nice to you. I explained the meaning of this song to little Noren though I know that he may not get all the points. I expect one day he will understand.

To me, a good song is not a song for us to sing along, but it is a song with meaningful. It has to be both good lyrics and music. According to this song, it is important to show our love to others if we want to be loved.

This is the first sentiment lesson that I try to educate my little boy. I hope he will be loved and will have full of love in the whole life.

Kindhearted mummy