Lionel surprised me with his mid term results for 2013, Primary 2. Some days back, I posted on this blog about his English Revision Paper results for this mid year & that he has not done well, given his careless mistakes. However, when i looked at his report, he exceeded beyond expectations in all his academic & non academic fields. Way to go, my boy!
We had a gathering this evening; all ex colleagues from a certain company, all no longer with that company & yet we always make it a point to meet up once in awhile, despite our busy schedule. Our last gathering was in January 2013.
Why do we call ourselves Dream Vacation Specialist? Haha, its only a name we gave ourselves becos all of us are specialize in our own destination(s). We have specialist in NZ, France, Australia, Korea, Japan, Bangkok, Bali, etc..
But who knows, we may decide to open up a company.... 20 years down the road. LOL.
Lionel has not done well for the mid term English Revision Paper. Clearly, his grades has slipped & from the looks of it, it was mostly due to careless mistakes & sloppy work. He did not checked through his work properly and countless reminders have been put through a deaf ear. The words were there for him to see & yet he can spell & write wrongly.
But he did well for his PERI Holistic Assessment for Term 2.
Daddy gave him a stern warning & that he take heed of what had been told to him. Otherwise....
You see, the word clearly indicated insects & Lionel can spell insect. Marks deducted. Yes, the teacher was strict on this.
The sentence already indicated just now... and yet Lionel can answer it as holds instead of held.
I am surprised Lionel does not know how to spell the words attention & only...?
His comprehension is very poor. When i asked him if he understood the passage, he said yes & yet, this was the kind of answers he gave... haiz.
** Self reminder: to get Lionel more comprehension passages for him to practice on
And yes, he can even spell the word balloon wrongly. *shake head*
I asked his what is the past tense of shake, he told me shook. And yet he can write shaked????
It was a last minute decision to pop over to Navy House 2013 @ Changi Naval Base. We left our home at 930am but only arrived 3 hrs later..... :(
930~1045: bus ride to airport + bfast + mrt ride to Expo 11~1215: queue-ing at Expo for the free shuttle bus to Changi Naval Base.
It was a leisure walk with the wind blowing; cool. There were many queues for those wanting to go onboard those navy ships & each queue would take a min. of 60-90mins... so we forego those.
We caught the so called " Dynamic Rescue " show at 1430 but it was nothing more of a blopper. From where the stunts were performed, we were partially blocked by one of the huge navy ships. We were not at the spectators stand. Instead, we were standing along one of the berths. And all we heard were loud explosions but could not see the action. And before u knew it, the end!
We filled in our forms, hoping to be one of those balloted for a free ride onboard the sea cruise but our names were not picked.
At 1630, we joined the long queue for the shuttle bus ride back to Expo, had our dinner at the airport again & took a bus home.
1630 ~ 1715: queue for shuttle bus 1730 ~ 1850: mrt ride to airport + dinner + bus ride home 1940~ arrived home.
Mother's Day falls on the 2nd Sunday of May, every year. The kids did some cards for me.
Rachel wanted to do 3 stalks of flowers for me, which according to her, would mean : I Love You. But she claims she doesnt have the time. Since there was only 1 stalk, I asked her what that means. She replied: The One & Only Greatest Mum of All.
The inside of the card which she wrote: Mum, Happy Mother Day. I Love You. From Rachel to Mum.
As for Lionel, he did this in school. Looking at the card, you will see an ordinary card with colours & beautifully drawn pictures but...
the card opens up to more drawings...
and more...
Get the picture? Creative idea!
Captions: My Love For You Grows & Grows & Grows... Happy Mother's Day
Our flight departs Seoul at 1100hrs via KL back to SIN.
Being a Tues morning, we were afraid of the morning rush hour on the airport limo transfer so we decided to do an early check out. We were waiting in front of Sejong Hotel for the airport limo which arrived at 0645hrs.
God! No traffic congestion; we arrived at the airport at 0750hrs. Had we known, the 0745hrs transfer would be a better choice. We hanged around & waited for MH counter to open.
Arrived SIN @ 2025hrs after a 3 hrs transit at KLIA. Okay, back to reality.
We woke up this morning to a heavy downpour. What to do but lazed around, hoping that the rain would stopped soon.
Our 1st stop ~ Gyeongbokgung Palace. Directions: Gyeongbokgung Station, exit 5. You will see the National Palace Museum. We skipped that as we wanted to join the English guided tour of the palace at 1100hrs.
Admission: 3000won.
This above pic is Geunjeongjeon, the main trone hall of Gyeongbokgung. Per booklet, the name means: All affairs will be properly managed if the Majesty demostrates diligence.
The King's state of affairs, including meetings, receptions & the coronation ceremony were all conducted here.
Gyeonghoeru Pavilion - where the Kings threw formal banquets for foreign envoys.
According to the guide, the 2nd level is open to visitors from Jun to Sep only.
Gangnyeongjeon - the King's living quarters. Here is the place where he slept, read, ate & attended to state affairs privately.
Gyotaejeon - the residence of the Queen who oversaw the operation of the palatial household; 掌管后宫之事.
The guide jokingly told us the garden behind the Queen's room was how the Queen knew about the season changes. There would be diffent types of flowers grown in each season. True or not, up to you to believe.
There were many other different residence such as:
Jagyeongjeon - Queen Dowager Jo, mother of King Heon-jong.
Donggung - residence of the Crown Prince & Princess
Hamhwadang & Jipgyoengdang - residence for concubines & court ladies.
This was the Royal Guard Changing Ceremony we caught at 1300hrs. We didnt know where to start first; watching from the outside of Gwanghwamun Gate or inside the palace grounds.
A working staff told us to watch from the outside first, then proceed inside, then outside again.
Video below.
The main guard.
The rest of the guards; not sure of their ranks or positions.
Coming to this Bukchon Hanok Village was no easy access. We had to stop & asked a couple of policemen along the way for fear of losing our way.
After watching the Royal Guard Changing Ceremony, we walked towards our right ( if you stand facing Gwanghwamun Gate), along the palace walls. Turn left at junction, still following the walls. We bypass the entrance to the National Folk Muesem & continued straight. We stopped to ask a policeman if this was the correct way to Bukchon Hanok Village & he told us to cross the traffic junction when we see the police post on our right. ( using hand gestures & signs of cos)
We crossed the traffic junction & saw many policman around & was wondering what was the occasion. Were there big shots approaching? Then we realised the road on our left as we crossed the junction was leading towards Cheongwadae - Blue house, where the current president resides & works.
Ahoy! We have reached Samcheongdong. More policeman were stationed along the way. Weird! Oh.... so we saw, the Prime Minister's residence was just up ahead.
Now, how do we get up to Bukchon Hanok Village?
See the sign on the left (above pic)? BHV is towards the left but there were many cafes & shophouses along the way... Where do we see the village?
The policeman we asked (again) did not know the way either.... until a kind resident ( who seemed to read our minds~ the locals here can read tourist's minds) pointed out to us the stone stair way next to Cafe Terrace. He signed " Go Up ". We bowed & thanked him.
This was the stone stairway. See the railings at the top of the brickwall. We have to climbed all the way up. Elaine was half-hearted. We were already tired after all that walking & to think, we still have to climb???
I persuaded her; after all the way here, just continue lah. Our main motive was to see BHV right?
Yeah. We came upon BHV. That was afterall, a residence's area, hence the sign to lower our volumes. We walked down the slopes & again Elaine was half-hearted. What if after all that walking down, there was no through road & we have to walked back up again? That couldnt be. The slope should lead to the main road, bringing us to Anguk Station ( I read it in some travel forums ; hope it doesnt provide the wrong info)
Hey, I did not do my homework for nothing, ya know.
We had a very late lunch at BK, in Myeongdong & collected our tickets for the 1700hrs performance.
NANTA Cooking is a very hilarious, non verbal performance. All kitchen utensils are transformed into musical instruments in the hands of the performancers. If you ever visit Seoul, do watch the show.
Our simple dinner for the evening. We had it at 2200hrs since we had a late lunch earlier on. Last min shopping at Myeongdong again.
Back to our rooms, repacked our luggages to accomodate all the stuff we bought, took a shower & hit the pillows. We need to wake up real early tmomorrow morning.
We had our breakfast at NSGH & set off to Dongdaemun Market. Dongdaemun Station, exit 9 (exit 8 was closed; not sure why though; perhaps repair works going on).
We saw this historical gate upon our exit from the station. If you, like us stand facing this icon, DDM is actually 5 mins walk down towards your right. However, both of us did not noticed the market & walked away from this icon instead, in the opposite direction. (back facing the gate). Stupid right?
We walked & walked... question marks in our heads... where on earth is DDM market? We came across where we were supposed to go yesterday - Gwangjang Market. It was then we realized that was supposed to be at Jongno 5(o)-ga station and NOT Jongno 3(sam)-ga station as one fellow blogger indicated. Arrrggghhh..
Again we walked from one station to another... DDM Station to Jongno 5(o)-ga Station.. :P
We came across Cheongyecheon Stream.
And diagnally across, we saw Pyounghwa Clothing Market. Right from where we were standing at that point, we finally saw DDM market. We felt lke goons! Looking back, the market was just a few steps away yet we made it sounded like its sooooo far!
Whirlwind adventure lah.
The shopping craze beguns... We stopped for lunch; Bibimbap & Shrimp Fried Rice.
The only photo I have of the market place. My two hands were again burdened with shopping bags. Haha...
Pssst, Elaine bought more stuff than me.
We left DDM at about 4pm, took a train back to Myeongdong & dumped our stuff back to our hotel room & without a min to waste, walked up the slope next to NSGH for Namsan Tower.
We wanted to "catch" the day scene & witness the light up as well.
The cable car ride up was slow; the queue was long. We waited like 45mins just for our turn to board the cable car.
Love lockets everywhere. You can buy a pair of locks at 11000won, write your love message & find a spot to interlock both locks together. This signifies the everlasting love a couple has for each other; never to be separated.
Most people would just throw the key away (fling it over the railings)... there's a sign indicating NOT to throw the keys over the railings... I was wondering if some people might just keep the key instead & when they actually broke up, one might return to the spot & unlock the locks...that is if they can find theirs...
Seoul City from up above...
Our dinner for the evening at Myeongdong again.. We had another round of shopping; seemed like more & more stuff to buy.. *wink*
