http://www.navalgazing.com the perspective of a military family . . . the narcissism of a blog Fri, 12 Mar 2010 03:17:50 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en After all of the effort looking into kindergarten for our daughter next year, it looks as though we have come full circle back to her current school. The international schools are good but I think that we may have confused cost with quality.  In the end we really want a school that ... http://www.navalgazing.com/2010/03/12/kindergarten/ [caption id="" align="alignleft" width="252" caption="An embodiment of the parade's theme song, "Let Us Celebrate, We Are One.""][/caption] When we moved to Singapore we were warned that gum is banned, drug distribution is punishable by death, and criminals can be caned.  We also heard that homosexuality is illegal.  So who was the lone man with ... http://www.navalgazing.com/2010/03/11/gay-pride-in-singapore/ It has been a hectic week and a half.  I taught seven financial education classes to the community during Military Saves week, we visited Kuala Lumpur for four days, we are still unpacking from the move into our new house, we are going to Vietnam in a few days, and ... http://www.navalgazing.com/2010/03/08/street-level-bureaucracy/ The Chingay Parade, "Asia's Grandest Street & Floats Parade," was two weeks ago and I have been culling through 300 photos.  I think about fifteen of them are worth viewing, a major disappointment even though I do not think there is a way to truly capture the spectacle of 7,000 ... http://www.navalgazing.com/2010/03/08/chingay-parade-2010/ [caption id="" align="alignleft" width="252" caption="Hello Kitty backpack"][/caption] Citrus and I head to the airport early tomorrow morning for a very short father-daughter trek.  We are flying one hour north of Singapore to Kuala Lumpur. Elysia just wrapped up four days of work in Malaysia so we will meet up with her in ... http://www.navalgazing.com/2010/03/04/weekend-adventure/ [caption id="" align="alignleft" width="216" caption="Each dumpling has 18 folds."][/caption] A day in downtown Singapore at the start of the Chinese New Year: After our most recent visit to the doctor for a prenatal exam, we cut through a high-end shopping mall to get to the restaurant with very good soup dumplings. Turning the ... http://www.navalgazing.com/2010/03/01/bcbgmaxazria-lion-dance/ The River Hongbau festival also had anamusement park with mostly the insane kind of rides that only hurtle you in loops.  After an evening of eating Sichuan food there was just no way that I was going to hang upside down locked in a cage.  Again. Once again, the experience of ... http://www.navalgazing.com/2010/02/28/girl-in-the-bubble/ We visited the River Hongbau festival on the Singapore waterfront two weeks ago, one of many celebrations at the start of the lunar new year.  This year's theme was a mouthful:  Welcoming the Year of the Tiger through promotion of Chengdu to enhance the offering of River Hongbao in Singapore and promote ... http://www.navalgazing.com/2010/02/28/river-hongbau-2010/ Today we received a package at our Fleet Post Office (FPO) Box containing all of the mail sent to our old address in Maryland.  Somewhere along the way they let gorillas jump up and down or rested a cargo container on it. Priority mail, 17 pounds.  It flew from Columbia, Maryland to ... http://www.navalgazing.com/2010/02/26/thanks-usps-united-airlines/ [caption id="" align="alignleft" width="252" caption="Our daughter's first crush"][/caption] For the past two weeks Citrus has had a crush on a boy in her preschool.  An older boy, perhaps already five.  Every night she is excited about the idea of seeing him the next day although her attempts to talk or play with him ... http://www.navalgazing.com/2010/02/24/first-crush/