I have been promising that he will take them camping in the backyard- when the time is right. So far, they have forgotten about it - and for his sake, I hope they will not remember until that camping tent out of sight.

It sure would be nice to go camping again. The last time we camped was in Kuala Ingai many years ago - where the sight of fellow campers trying to bring a gas tank on the boat is something I will never forget. By the way, there is now a tour operator for this area and I do recommend any adventurous travelers to check out this side of Brunei.

But this is something we have to forgo for at least several more years - until the kids are older.

For now, the best holiday is perhaps with a camper van or an RV (get comprehensive rv insurance here) is more suitable for us - except the nearest place where we can go for holidays with an RV is perhaps Australia and that is unfortunately, not in the budget.

Looks like we just have to camp in the backyard after all.

After Enid Blyton, I moved on to legends and folk lore. I’ve read legends from many countries but I remembered that the most interesting were always Asian. Perhaps this was the phase which triggered my interest in culture.

As I grew older, I read more history and science - specifically, the supernatural and the unexplainable. I read stuffs like the Bermuda Triangle to Loch Ness to UFOs when I was in upper primary school.

My foray into romance stories was late and short.

Unlike most of my friends, I was never a fan of Mills & Boons. Of course, there were some romance writers which I did read a lot of at the time when I worked at a public library and had access to all the books I could handle, many years ago.

But how many chicklit or romance books can you read without thinking “enough nonsense already!”?

Maybe that is why, unlike my daughters who think, dream and speak like Disney Princesses, I was never into Cinderella or Snow White or Rapunzel even then - because they are nonsensical to me. Besides, we were not inundated with so many Princess stories then as the kids are now - they really cannot escape but to be crazy about this.

Still, I should definitely limit my daughters’ exposure to anything related to fairy tales. Who knows what comes next when a 5-year-old can ask :

“How many suitors did you have before you met Papa?”

Shimworld : Several Shades Darker

Can you imagine having folks from that part of the world in this side of Borneo?

Remember, this particular side of Borneo with its two main towns (Kuala Belait and Seria) has only about 70,000 population, the capital city is nearly two hours and as someone puts it, 1Borneo Mall is bigger than any of its high streets!

Yet, even a typical housewife like me, whose activities revolve only around sending my daughter to school and the occasional grocery shopping can easily notice how cosmopolitan Belait district is.

Just a queue at the ATM machine can be interesting. Recently, my line was held up by a Thai man who mysteriously withdrew bit by bit (using the same card) and a Nepali man came to my rescue and let me took his turn while a Sri Lankan lady looked on.

Chinese faces at restaurants or supermarkets are most likely Indonesians and I felt like I’m back in Jakarta when I hear them say words like “Bisa” (Yes) or “Pantas” (Quick). Grocery stores are usually the domain of Indian men while fuel stations are most commonly served by Indonesian Javanese.

And where else can you see British soldiers in full gear and guns walking around town doing their practice. Now my daughters have learn to generalize all tall, lean and ramrod straight Caucasians as “the soldier”.

My daughter’s music teacher is a Filipino, our regular doctor is a Burmese and we have close family friends who are Mainland Chinese.

If you’re really curious, a morning trip to the only supermarket in town that opens at 8 am is the perfect place to hear Dutch, Spanish, German, Arabic and English of various accents being spoken as fellow mothers do their morning shopping after sending their kids to school.

We are so used to seeing different kind of looks that my children have learn to accept that what could be strange sights in some places in Asia such as those Middle Eastern women in niqab or African women with flowing robes and turbans are simply part of the Belait district scene.

Our towns may be small, but we are culturally more exciting than many bigger cities in the region.

Lately I have began to notice that many of my friends are into the games in Facebook. Even though I blocked all games notifications (sorry folks!), I still get insights of their gaming activities by status update comments such as “...go rest, I’ll fertilize your farm” (Farmville) or blog posts “Love it very much because can race, bet, fish, buy and collect many things” (Pet Society).

I get requests to join certain games or accept certain gifts almost every day that I am very curious to explore these games myself.

But so far, it remains a passing wonder.

How can I look after any virtual pet or cultivate any online garden when my time online is sporadic throughout the day. There’s too much news to read and digest, pictures to sort and edit, friends to catch up with and the most necessary but least appealing task, completing paid assignments.

But perhaps I can use this to placate my daughters who have been pushing me for pets (such as a horse!) and at least, there won’t be expensive spending on stuffs like horse supplies.

But then again, I don’t wish to relive the times when virtual gaming ruled our days (and nights) as university students.

“Seeing” the image of buildings sprouting or abandoned (SimCity) in your mind even though the computer is switched off. Fighting off the brainwave of new strategies to win a battle (Warcraft) when you are supposed to be asleep. Or as one of our friend who had it worse - the sight of him ducking left and right as he furiously tapped on the keyboards (Doom) for one whole day and night and finally shouted for backup player as he bent over and puked is something I will not forget.

So for the time being, there is no gaming for me.

It was funny to hear this person hyperventilating when told that there are engineers or even posts like designers (not fashion or interior of course) in the many oil and gas related companies in Belait district who get higher pay than his managerial post.

You’d have to imagine how such well known information can escape anyone who lives in Brunei.

Perhaps it was lost along the 120 km (approximate distance between Bandar Seri Begawan and Seria)? Or maybe this person lacked regular contact with other Brunei residents, locals or expats. As if he did, he is bound to have come across one of those oil and gas workers who commute daily to Belait district or even someone who knows someone who would know this information.

I wonder how he will react when he knows how much oil platform “labourers” or welders or even divers (”Is that even a job?!” I can already hear him say…) get paid or even how much higher their insurance premiums (with no Medicare supplement) are, due to the nature of their jobs.

Still the lure of high pay won’t always keep anyone from leaving this industry because at the end of the day, money is not the only factor that guarantees job satisfaction.

Coming from a 6 year old child who has been in kindergarten for 2 years, this is perhaps nothing spectacular. But knowing the challenges that he faced in learning even the simplest thing, I was as pleased as he was.

This episode, of seeing his face lighting up as he came to me to report this achievement, reminded me of an encounter I had with a former student, several weeks ago.

He was known as a “slow student”, struggled in class and was basically not expected to amount to much. Even though I did not deal with him often then, I tried not to be too impatient whenever I do and perhaps this was the reasons why even after 7 years of no contact, he still remembers me.

But what’s more surprising than this were the two things that he said to me.

First, he offered me a job.

He explained clearly of a company and the basic job description. If I was looking for a job, I would definitely be interested because he then ended this with a  “if they like your work, they will give lunch allowance”.

Next, when he saw my car, as expected he gave a complimentary comment. But what was unexpected was he then told me of a car for sale - which cost less than a tenth of the price of my car.

The price comparison is to show that while others might call it naive or even foolish for him to even bother me with such a car - I thought he was gutsy. The kind of mentality that makes a good salesperson.

I cannot imagine any of my other former students who could surprised me with 2 like-sales pitches as he did - in less than 5 mins of talking to me.

He might not be able to master basic mathematics or even produce a composition at a Primary 6 level but he is clearly not totally incapable of anything. But he has to fail school because he could not cope with mainstream education yet was not qualified for special education.

There is a possibility that the small boy may fall into the same ending if his condition is not properly addressed and the best way to teach him is identified. I am afraid that he will end up being known as another failure in society, when it was actually the system that failed to help him.

This is also the trait which gets us to do things we’d never, in our mind-our-own-business kind of ways, get to do. For example, during our trips in the 90s, either on our Los Angeles or Orlando vacations, he managed to get permission for my younger brother to sit on a real Harley Davidson.

Not from a showroom mind you, but from a group of real deal American bikers with bulking biceps, tattooed arms, long beards and all. I simply stood on the side, hardly breathing, imaging the headlines in next day’s papers.

And travelling with him is fun because we can go to any place knowing nothing and end up knowing lots of insider stories because he can chat with anyone easily.

Just imagine, he is the kind of taxi passenger who will leave a taxi ride, with the driver coming out the car to shake hands- because they have exchanged all kinds of stories that sometimes we would know the background of the driver and even his family!

I just wished that one of the taxi which we took during our recent trip together was his.

With the likes of Jan Shim, Husini Bakar, Gavin Goh and Gembo - men known widely for their photos (and interest in photography) - surely no guests were left indifferent to see them walking around, pointing their long lens capable of capturing sharp images of (for example) smudging make-up even from the far side of the big (un-air conditioned) hall.

However, parents of performing kids were delighted to see them. We were thrilled to see those lens focused on the the stage, from all sides of the hall, when our children, dressed in their brightest were doing their routine.

We also ignored smug looks from other parents whose kids behaved like proper little adults when our kids chose to enjoy the rest of the show - with their scarlet cheeks and blue eyelids (by this time, my daughter’s Estee Lauder-ed lips were licked clean of any colour), wild laughter and energy that came from being high on adrenalin - making themselves conspicuous subjects for these photographers (while we parents) hoped that they won’t just look and be amused.

Because we know that, while annoyed glances will be forgotten the next day, beautiful pictures will last a lifetime.

The question now is how to get them to show us those pictures, hopefully stored with online backup, before the albums are forgotten when they start on their next photography outings.

*Picture courtesy of Gavin Goh

Still I relish the challenge of finding new never-before tried hotels, taking into consideration all their requirements - in addition to my single most important criteria : charm.

And how can I not be charmed with a hotel that is right next door to a Buddhist temple and a Hindu temple, with flowers stalls just outside the main door and smell of incense wafting into the room once in a while.

Imagine having a birdseye view of the non-stop stream of passerby, peddlers peddling their flowers and other curios from dawn till dusk and temple devotees - all by just drawing the curtain.

So what if there is no bathtub, no fancy Kohler faucet in sight and the nearest train station is a walk of 600m - which can be very hard after a long day (especially when there are bags involved).

When charm comes in abundance, nothing else matters.

Unlike many who either stay at the same hotel every time or others who leave it up to whatever is available according to their travel agent - I would go to the trouble of finding out everything about any hotels which caught my fancy.

It is normal for me to research everything - the surroundings, exact distances to amenities, pictures and even the kind of bed configuration it has - sometimes down to the point of knowing how comfortable the pillows and mattress is.

Although I love new experiences - thus the desire to stay in a different hotel every time - I don’t like the idea of going to any place unprepared. So far, since the first time I decided on a hotel for us in 2002, a quaint bed and breakfast I was and still am charmed by, I have not chose any hotels I was too disappointed with.

And I guess that is why my husband always leave hotel decision to me - except to specify the rates.

* That is a picture of a Superior room in South East Asia Hotel in Singapore.