What Is Normal?

We're settling into life in KL, and we have routines set up now, but I still feel like we're in a bit of a holding pattern.  School continues to be online, and we found out that as of the beginning of August, our sea freight was still sitting in DC, because the shipping people had the wrong email address for the people in KL, and no one thought to follow up with us.  I know it will all get here eventually, but it means it will take even longer to make this apartment feel like our true new home.  In the meantime, we're trying to stay positive and enjoy the little things.

One of Vivian's favorite new classes is called Kitchen Garden.  She really wants to be more independent, so learning a bit about cooking and gardening is great for her.  The first major assignment was chopping vegetables to make a salad.

The result was great, but the process was nerve wracking, because her teacher was telling her what to do over Zoom, while Noby and I were hovering off to the side constantly worried that she was going to chop off one of her fingers.

The next class was on salsa, which was a little less terrifying, but had some more challenging ingredients like onion and hot peppers.

The results were delicious though.

Noby has also been helping her with a little balcony garden for cooking ingredients.

Elena has also had some fun class activities.  My favorite was her "shelfie" where she had to show herself with some of her favorite books.

She is very proud to be an ISKL student, and likes to wear the one uniform shirt that I bought for her, even though school is online, and they're not requiring uniforms.

She was very careful with it when she had ice cream, but I still had her eat out on the balcony.

The weather was so nice the other day, that we had dinner out on the balcony.  We tried a burger place for the first time and were very happy with the results, although Elena wasn't as happy about the photograph.

It was the end of a long day of playing for her.  We went to the ambassador's pool in the morning.

We made a dragonfly friend.  We were terrified at first, because there was a big, red flying insect hovering around, but once we realized it was a dragonfly, we were intrigued. 

Elena also has a new buddy in her class, so she runs around with him outside most days.  They both want to be astronauts, and have devised a training regimen that involves trying not to get dizzy while spinning on the swings.  Luckily, they didn't spin right after he shared some of his little sister's rainbow birthday cake with us.  The family made it themselves, and we were so impressed, especially since it was delicious.

The astronauts are also working on a spaceship design, using some of the many boxes the two families get things delivered in on a regular basis.

Viv has been hanging out with some new friends at one of the other apartment complexes, and they are equally obsessed with Disney.  I'm so happy that both girls have found friends that share their interests.

We have also been experimenting with new foods.  Noby bought a pomegranate the other day and got all the seeds out for me, which was great.

Then I found some real American bacon (which is hard to do in this Muslim country!), and showed her how to make pasta carbonara.

We still haven't been out to an actual restaurant yet, but things are starting to open up, and we're hopeful that we'll be able to go out soon.  Jeff and I had our 15th wedding anniversary last week, and while we would have loved to take a trip or go to a fancy restaurant, things just aren't there yet, so instead we went to our new "fancy" place, the ambassador's pool.  I picked up some yummy things to snack on,

and we just chilled and relaxed.

It was nice to do something that was just for the two of us.

Things in KL are slowly starting to open up.  We have our proof of vaccination, so that will help us get into places and potentially eat in restaurants again.  The government has now said that schools will not open until October, but ISKL continues to petition to open earlier.  I'm trying to hold on to my optimism that eventually things will settle into something that resembles the normal we knew before.  Hopefully our stuff is actually on its way, and hopefully school will open soon, and hopefully I will make some progress on my dissertation or get a teaching job.  There's a lot of hopefully going on.  In the meantime, the girls are shining in their new environment, and I'm continually impressed with their resilience and enthusiasm, so I'm trying to model my behavior on theirs.  Elena's Spanish teacher was going over vocabulary for parts of the body, and I love the picture I got of her lifting her foot up so that it was visible on screen.

It's a great reminder that we just have to be flexible, roll with what's asked of us, and have a loose definition of the word "normal".

Starting School and Other Adventures

 We had really been hoping that school would be held in person, but the numbers are still too high in KL, so the girls are having their third online school experience.  The good news is that, so far, this is the best one yet.  The school is great anyway, and they have clearly worked hard to make the online program the best it can be.  One of the big things that they can do, that public schools in the States couldn't, is require cameras to be on.  This isn't a big change for Elena, but for Vivian it means that she can actually SEE her new classmates, and so she's making friends in a way she never did last year.  Since our HHE hasn't arrived yet, we don't have proper desks for the girls, so I'm letting Vivian use my desk, and Elena is set up at the dining room table.

The school provided an iPad for Elena and a Macbook for Vivian.  They gave us an appointment the Saturday before school started for one person to come pick them up.  I walked to the school entrance nearest our apartment, which is the back entrance.  They let me in, and then I had to walk the length of the school to the front entrance where they had a badge for me.  The school is HUGE and impressive.  This was the entrance I ended up going through.

The set up for picking things up was clearly laid out, and everyone was friendly and helpful. I am so grateful to have a place I feel safe sending the kids whenever the school is allowed to open.

There was an online orientation the Monday before school started.  The one for middle school was pretty standard assembly stuff, but Elena is the only new kid in her class, so she got some one on one time with the teacher, and then most of the rest of the class joined the call to meet the new teacher as well.  She was one of the librarians last year, so she already knew a lot of the kids, which is nice.  She was doing an activity where the kids were raising their hand for things like did they leave Malaysia for the summer.  Then, she said, raise your hand if you're going to be friends with Elena, and every single kid raised their hand.  Elena was so happy, and I almost started crying.  One of the kids sent her a private message through the chat, and after a few minutes, they decided that they were now friends.  The teacher even put them together in a small group on the first day, so that was perfect.

For middle school, Vivian was assigned a "peer helper" who sent her an email and did a video call with her before school, so she was equally excited to have a friend.  The teachers have also made a point of putting the students in small groups and focusing on getting to know you type activities, so she has a slew of people to chat with now.

Vivian also made a friend in the building before school started, so that has been really nice.  The friend has grown up overseas like Vivian, but her family is actually from Colombia, which we thought was just perfect.  They invited us over for lunch, and they put out these really cool place mats modeled after the signs you see on Colombian buses.

They made fabulous grilled salmon and all kinds of other yummy side dishes, so we feasted.  We had offered to handle dessert, so I used that as an excuse to order a Ferraro Roche ice cream cake.  It was incredible to look at, but even more incredible to eat. 

I've been trying to do a better job of taking pictures of the meals that Noby and I make.  I've been joking that we should start the Noby and Nicole cooking show.  Let's be honest though, I'm the idea person, and she does most of the cooking.  This became especially clear when the family requested shrimp.

Now, I'm going to give myself credit for getting us to the store to buy the shrimp, because it was the longest drive I've done yet, and it started with getting gas in the car for the first time.  Luckily, the gas tank is on the right, so I won't have any unfortunate left tire/curb incidents like I had in Thailand.  After I got gas, I got on Jalan Ampang, which is one of the main roads around here, and drove as fast I've driven yet until I got to the parking garage for B.I.G.'s. I managed to park, and on the way out I got the parking validated, which I was very proud of, and got us home without incident, but the big, serve yourself tray of shrimp was too much for me.  Luckily, Noby was undeterred.  She got one bag to put the shrimp in and one bag to put over her hand, and in she went.  Here they are at home in our sink.

Getting the antennae to stay in the bag was my breaking point.  Thank goodness for Noby, who took off all the creepy stuff and made them look like the shrimp I'm used to eating.  

We used them to make shrimp scampi with linguine, but it was devoured before I took a picture.  I did manage to get a picture of our chicken in mushroom cream sauce,

teriyaki salmon,

and flank steak, which was a special Vivi request.

By the end of the week though, I was ready for some delivery.  We ordered Indian food and watched the first episode of the new Marvel Series "What If . . .?".  Both the food and the show were fantastic!

We are spending plenty of time being active outdoors to help burn off all of this food too.  The girls' scooters finally arrived, so they spend part of each day scooting around the outdoor space.

Elena has also figured out how to swing by herself, and she couldn't be more proud.

It does get hot outside though, so the girls set up curtain "forts" in their rooms.  Vivian did hers first with her friend.

Then, Jeff helped Elena set up one of her own with a special reading area.

She's also been using her room for PE class.

We've had a few outings over the past week.  The first was not so fun, going to the embassy to get shots.  Elena needed three, and she was NOT happy.  After it was over though, she was willing to show off her bandages and sticker.

I had a fun Friday with a morning coffee hosted by the ambassador's wife and a socially distanced happy hour at the embassy in the afternoon.  The ambassador's residence is lovely, and when we were leaving we got a booklet about it as a present.

I showed the booklet to the rest of the family when I got home, which made them even more excited for our Saturday outing which was a swim at the residence pool.  It's a bit removed from the main property, and it has a great covered seating area with overhead fans.  The ambassador's family also kindly left floaties out for us to use.  The girls were very pleased.

Not gonna lie, I checked out one of the floats myself.

Jeff, of course, was all about the plants and flowers.

The real highlight though was homemade ice cream offered to us by the ambassador's helper.  It was delicious!

It was our first real family outing in KL, and even though we didn't go very far, it was great to be able to do something new together.  We like our adventures.

 

Dogman, Dentist, and Dragon Fruit

We have one week of summer vacation left, so I'm trying to keep the girls busy and take care of as much as possible before we get swept up in school.  While we were in quarantine, I attended an online Usborne book party that one of my friends hosted, and last week, the books arrived.

Books for everyone! Of course, when it rains, it pours, so the next day the set of Dogman books I had ordered for Elena arrived.  She has been spending a big part of her day reading every day.

Even Vivian, who has become a reluctant reader, has been enjoying her new book.  We've also been enjoying watching the Olympics.  All we have is the small TV we put in air freight, which Jeff insists is not big enough, but it works just fine for our new favorite sport, synchronized diving.

Of course, we're rooting for the U.S., but we were super excited to see the Malaysian diving team.

We also distracted ourselves with personality tests.  I'm an INFJ, Jeff is an INTJ, but Vivian seems to have changed from an ENFP to an ENFJ, making her even more my mini-me.  Elena insisted on doing it too.  We figured she's too young, but we helped her through it, and then cracked up when she came out ENTJ, Jeff's mini-me.

I also took advantage of our new car and our free time to take the girls to the dentist for the first time in over a year.  We found one near the embassy, so I was able to finally get the picture I wanted of the front.

The waiting area at the dentist's was very space age looking, but the background music playlist was anything but.  Elena wanted to know why so many of the songs had "love" in them.

The dentist was friendly and relaxed, and she offered Elena special sunglasses so that the light they were shining to see into her mouth wouldn't bother her eyes.  Elena was thrilled.

When it was Vivian's turn, you could tell that she was hoping for shades too, just slightly more sophisticated ones.  She was not disappointed.  She looked super cool.

We are going to have a follow up appointment with the orthodontist who works in the practice in a couple weeks, because it's that time.  Jeff and I have appointments with the dentist later this week, and I'm dreading it, because I'm sure there'll be something I need done.  In the meantime, I'm trying to enjoy the last bit of summer, and today Noby brought me a treat, dragon fruit.

It looks pretty wild on the outside.

The inside has a consistency sort of the like the inside of a kiwi, complete with little black seeds.  The flesh can be either white or this bright magenta color.  Noby said the magenta one is sweeter, so that's what she got me.  When she had cut it up, it looked a bit gory, but it tasted yummy.

It was a great morning treat, and a reminder to focus on the positives of living in Malaysia and not let covid get me down.