Deepavali Decorations 2015

On 5^th until 8^th November, I had traveled to Kuala Lumpur with my family. The times I went, all the shopping mall are decorated with Deepavali decorations such as Kolam and many more to celebrate Deepavali which fall on 10^th November.

Kolam is a form of drawing that is drawn by using rice flour/chalk/chalk powder/white rock powder often using naturally/synthetically colored powders. A Kolam is a geometrical line drawing composed of curved loops, drawn around a grid pattern of dots- Wikipedia

The first Kolam I met was in Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA2). It has a beautiful peacock with its Kolam tail. 

Deepavali Decorations in Shopping Mall

All the Kolam in shopping mall are very beautiful. They must spending lots of time in design and finish the Kolam.

Fahrenheit

Fahrenheit

Suria KLCC

Berjaya Times Square

My favorite Deepavali decoration which I saw was in NU Sentral. It has a big elephant with 2 little elephants. The decoration is so creative and can be seen that they put in many efforts in this decorations.

Below is the video of NU TV about Deepavali decorations in NU Sentral and introduced more about NU Sentral.

I also managed to snap some pictures of Deepavali decorations in KLIA 2 before I took my flight back.

The last one is Deepavali decoration in Financial Park Labuan which in my office building. 

Happy Deepavali!!!

2015-10 Favorite Postcards Received

On May 2015, I had received a postcard which need send to Hong Kong but sent to Malaysia. I had sent back the postcard to the receiver based on the address on the postcard. In this month, the postcard had returned to me with the reason “Moved”. I was quite sad because the postcard cannot reach to the receiver.

From this month, I started to record my ranking on Postcrossing profile in blog post. For your information that when you are in top 100 on most postcards and longest distance sent  in your country, the ranking will show in your Postcrossing profile. On July, I was in top 100 in Malaysia :D

100^th (July)/ 98^th (Aug)/ 94^th (Sept)/ 91^st (Oct) on most postcards sent from Malaysia

101^st (July)/ 99^th (Aug)/ 93^rd (Sept & Oct) on longest distance sent from Malaysia

On August 2015, I got a postmark of Taiwan ‘Little Red’ and ‘Little Green” leaning postboxes. In this month, I received a postcard of Taiwan leaning postboxes. They were so cute. Hope in future can go Taiwan to see them. Hehe..

My postcard friend had sent me a postcard when she traveled to Japan. She wrote this postcard on the cruise so on the postcard has cruise’s postmark.

This is an advertisement postcard about Butterworth. Butterworth is the principal town of Seberang Perai in the state of Penang in Malaysia. It was established in the mid-19 century as a landing place across the channel from the capital of Penang.

This illustration postcard is about Jiufen old street which was prosperous because of a gold rush. The illustration is so beautiful.

Yowita from Lodz, Poland told me that Lodz is near the center of Poland and at here has many beautiful and old buildings. Lodz is the 3^rd largest city in Poland.

Unique Penang Art Gallery has drawing lessons and they will use children’s art printed as the postcard for sell. Sumi like this postcard because the girl was so brave that sing alone in a night of autumn to enjoy the peaceful and happiness.

Every year, Pangkor (an island in Malaysia) will organize Pangkor Island Festival.  I was lucky to get a postcard from Yaya when she went to Pangkor to join for this festival. I hope that in future can join for this festival too.

Millionaire Parents, Millionaire Sons by Amy Yip

In this book, Amy has sharing her own parental guides towards her sons which is different from the parental guides of modern parents such as one of the parts she had said that her house did not has television so her sons’ hobby will be reading. 

Millionaire Parents, Millionaire Sons

Some interesting words that I get from this book:-

The clever one learns from his own mistakes, while the wise one learns from others.

One of my friends confessed to me that he usually left the house very early for work and came home very late. The only time he saw his children was when they were sound asleep. “I only see my children growing longer. I don’t see them growing taller,” he told me.

No presents can replace the presence of the parents.

School should provide a very safe and generous environment where children can learn from their mistakes and blunders. It would be much costly for both the children and society if they commit errors after leaving school.

Whatever you want your children to do, you do it first.

The parent who never apologizes to his children is a monster. If he’s always apologizing his children are monsters!

An investment in knowledge pays the best dividends.

Inside view

Now, I share with you the practical tools by Amy in raising her sons (for the details can read from her book)

1. Five toys system

When her sons were small, they only allowed possessing a maximum of 5 toys. It means that if they wanted to but an absolutely must-have new toy, they had to give away an existing one.

2. Building family work

To build family work, her elder son was in charge of washing the dishes, while younger son took care of laundry and folding clothes.

3. The exercise of goal setting

Amy had gone through an annual goal setting exercise for the family and each individual. It is a great way to start her sons to think things through and getting the answers instead of telling them what to do.

4. Teaching the proper value of money

For her sons’ monthly pocket money, she always ask her sons to think ahead and do a budget of their spending needs, instead of trying to  match what their friends get.

To encourage saving habits and delayed gratification, Amy would top-up 3 times any sum left unspent and put it into bank account which they cannot touch until 18 years old.

5. Master the art of selling

Amy wanted her sons to experienced rejections, kindness and all sorts of responses to their simple question of, “Would you like to help me and buy some raffle ticket?” The lesson they learnt is that some will and some won’t!

6. Doing well in school is their “JOB”

Amy never gives any monetary gifts or presents to her children when they come home with good grades. She only praises them with words like “Well done!” or “Good Job!” because getting good grades is their responsibility. 

7. Experience the best and the worst

Example Amy will alternate family vacations between “luxury” and “hardship” trips. Sometimes they went to resort and 6 star hotels, arriving in style in stretch limousine. Other time, they took 8 hour trips on public transport in overloaded buses filled with people and animals before arriving in remote parts of India and China.

8. Instill compassion

Amy always ask her sons to think of what good they are doing to themselves, to others and to Mother Earth with every thought, word and deed of theirs.

9. Be a global citizen

Every summer school holiday, Amy arranges for her sons to spend some time in a foreign country, be it a sports camp, a family vacation or a cultural exchange program.

10. Remember your roots

Amy will make sure her sons visited her husband’s home town of Shanghai and she insist on them keeping up Chinese language skills.

Wedding Postcard Project 2015

In last year, I had done for a postcard project named “My Birthday Postcard Project 2014”. In this year, I did not continued “Birthday Postcard Project” but I tried for something new which is “Wedding Postcard Project” for my friends.  

“Wedding Postcard Project” is gathering as many as wedding wish postcards from senders to my friend and her husband. Then all the postcards keep in a small file.

I started for this project in Facebook Postcard Group to exchange postcard with postcard sender who is interested take part of. The postcards offered by me as below:-

For sender who is interested to help me, they need to fill in some particulars in the G-Form. There have some feedbacks which I get from senders which as below:-

你真个好朋友！

谢谢你的心思。

没有回片没关系~只是看你开活动就报了 XD

能给人祝福真是件喜悦的事。

不用回片了 =) 算个小小惊喜

After gathering wedding wish postcards, it’s time for me to find a small file to fit in all postcards. I had bought a DVD file to put postcards because the postcards which I received all are not in same size and some postcards are too big. Therefore compare with normal postcard file, DVD file will be the best choice.

Before

After

The cover of DVD file is so plain so I found some wedding related pictures to print and stick on it.I had written some words on owl postcard and mark their pre-wedding dinner on the postcard. Besides that, I had included my handmade angpow with money inside.

Beside from Facebook Group, when I purchased some postcards, I also request the illustrator to write some wedding wish on postcard so he/she need write 2 postcards, one for me and one for my friend.

Some postcard senders even made a wedding postcard for my friend. So sweet of them because they put some effort on it.

When I read the massage on the postcard, I feel touching with it although postcards are not for me. Some senders even write wedding advices for my friend.  Thanks a lot for their help for my project.

The day after my friend's pre-wedding dinner, I had received a WhatsApp from my friend and the content as below:-

Kien Mei, thanks so much for your gift! It is really special and we loved it. 

Wordless Wednesday: Loka Made Postcard

'Wordless Wednesday: Postcard' is recording all the postcards that I had bought from time to time for exchange purpose.

Loka Made is a Malaysia brand which believing in the concept of discovery and re-assembling local elements, creating design and illustration with local accent.

Handmade Postcard Exchange Activity 2015

In September 2015, I had joined “Handmade Postcard Exchange Activity” by Amy Shop. The receiver for your handmade postcard was randomly selected and you did not know who he/she is.

Let take a look for my handmade postcards. I am not so good in drawing so I choose to paste some cute stickers and washi tape on postcards.

For handmade postcard, you can create any impossible. Therefore, I made a macaroon rain theme postcard with some animals.

This is performance theme postcard. I used the big washi tape to create a stage with a dog sing and a boy dance. 

Let take a look what I had received from this exchange activity.

This postcard gets an idea from hiking. The things need for hiking include rain coat, rain boots and backpack. Luckily he/she had prepared for those things so when raining still can see many animals during hiking.

When I saw this postcard, I thought is printed postcard but it actually drawn by black pen. How talent of the sender is. This postcard is simple and cute.

Post Pals: Brightening the Lives of Sick Children

We know that sick is very suffering. I am not a doctor so I cannot help to reduce painful of those children. Therefore I used my way to make them happy which is sending a postcard.

Post Pals is a small charity run solely by volunteers who are dedicated to making seriously ill children and their siblings smile by the sending of cards, letters, little gifts, support and friendship. We support children aged 3 to 17 in the UK.

This charity had a little bit different with the previous that I joined because it can send to ill children’s siblings. For a family who has sick children, their siblings will feel that the important thing in their life had been stolen away such as the care from parents. Thus, Post Pals never forget about the brothers and sisters who are quietly and less obviously brave and coping with emotions and situations that would break most adults. To know more details for why this charity care about siblings, you can click here to read more.

How to send a Post?

1. Just go to “Find Pals” and read through the current children pages (included send post to some siblings of memorial Pals) and pick a child.

2. Send a cheerful card, letter or even a little gift to the child via the address on their page.

Note: The address given is not the child’s home address but a forwarding one. Please don’t expect a reply.

There have some guideline to writing post by Post Pals. On postcard you can write about yourself, your holiday, some jokes and many more.  If you don’t want to write so much can write like “just swimming by to say Hi”, if it’s a fish related card, “sending lots of smile across the miles”, "wishing a rainbow for you", "sending you sunny smiles", “wanted to roar a Hello” if it’s a lion card and lots of other short lines. 

Beside postcard or card, you also can send to them a little gift such as little bear, key ring, bracelet and many more.

Attention (Did not write the words or some related words as below)

1. “Get Well Soon”. It’s not such a good phrase if illness of child is never going to go away or worse still that will never get better.

2. “I hope you win your battle”. A lot of the children don’t know they could ‘lose their battle’ and others might not want to be reminded that they may not.

3. “I know how you feel”, have you been through the same thing as the child or parent? Even then everyone reacts and feels differently about thing.

4. “Poor you” empathy is good but sympathy isn’t generally wanted.

I had joined for this great activity to send 45 pieces of postcards to illness children include their siblings and hope will brighten their day. I did not know what to write about so I find some riddles for them. There are lots of riddles can find via online, the riddle that I choose was “Who am I?” series to let them have a guess. Hope they will get fun in guessing.

Send a post from Malaysia to United Kingdom taking around 11 days which I saw from Postcrossing so you also can send birthday gift to some children who birthday is near.