Bidding Adieu... and Looking Ahead

Goodbye 2009.
It has been a good year.

Looking ahead,
I choose
Believe & Balance
as my focus words
to help navigate me
through the next year.

What's your word(s) for 2010?

Three Steps to Safety

Step 1: Check for traffic. Look left. Look right.

Step 2: Ignore crazy woman with camera and run.

Step 3: Find the biggest rock in the sea and cling on for dear life.

Are You In Search of Paradise?

Well, search no more.
It is right here.

The door is currently shut.
Judging from the footwear left outside,
there is only one occupant.
Perhaps you could wait outside,
until it is your turn?

How Would You Like To Travel?

By boat?

By plane?

Or perhaps by zooming off into space
in this funky rocket?

***
For a few hours of quiet creativity,
give children some paper,
a cardboard box,
the last of the kitchen foil,
a handful of coconut fronds
and a few empty plastic bottles,
making sure that their stationery box
and paints are at hand.

Then sit back
(catch up on reading,
blogging
or better still
by joining in the fun)
and be amazed
to see what children's imaginations
can create.

A whole host of transportation vehicles,
robots of all sizes,

a mat,

and even an alarm clock
that now sits proudly on the bedside table.

Mosaic Monday: Raabondhi

Raabondhi,
sitting hunched by the shore
searching for breakfast.


***

In this home,
we love learning about all the weird and wonderful creatures
that share(d) this Earth with us.
Animal Planet, NatGeoWild, and Discovery
are among the favourite TV channels of Em and Hero.
The other day,
they wanted to watch one of a the natural history DVDs
from their favourite David Attenborough's Life series.
While in the kitchen, making lunch,
I overheard them
talking about what they were watching on the screen.

Hero: Why is it doing that?
Em: That's what it does when it wants to mate.
Hero: What's mating?
Em: I'm not sure. We'll need to ask Mamma.
Hero: Don't you know?
Em: I think it's a kind of dance. See?


Oh, oh. Time for some birds and bees talk?

***

Thanks for playing along
to my questions yesterday.
It was fun reading all your answers.

Tell Me...

1. When was the last time you rode a bicycle?

2. What is your favourite vegetable?

3. What do you do to recycle?

4. What is your most frequently used condiment?

5. How many languages do you speak?

Safe and secure?

"Life vest under your seat."
Does that make you feel safer when flying?

Seeing these bright orange vests packaged neatly
and arranged in rows in ferries does little to make me feel safe at sea.

Although wearing one when speeding off in a launch does.

Imperfectly Perfect

We are all imperfect.
Yet, time and again, why do we attempt to attain perfection?

Perfect looks, perfect health, perfect home.
A perfect person.

And then fail miserably.

Will we ever realise that
rather than conceal our scars and wrinkles,
spray every wayward hair into place
or starve ourselves in the hope of looking like a supermodel,
we would be happier if we laugh at our imperfections
and move on?

That tearing your hair and fuming when others
~ husband, children, parents, friends, colleagues ~
do not always conform to the perfect image you had of them,
does no one any good?

That a house with small children
will never look like the homes on the glossy pages of Country Living,
except perhaps during the few hours
when everything has been cleaned and everyone is in bed?

That however much you try
and however many antibacterial products you use,
you cannot escape the fact that
germs exist and you can never be really free of them?

Happiness is not achieved by attaining perfection.
Accepting our imperfections is a far easier way
of being happy.
We are all imperfect.
Our imperfections are what make us unique.
Embrace them.

***

“My imperfections and failures are as much a blessing from God as my successes and my talents and I lay them both at his feet.”
~ Mahatma Gandhi~

"Build this day on a foundation of pleasant thoughts. Never fret at any imperfections that you fear may impede your progress. Remind yourself, as often as necessary, that you are a creature of God and have the power to achieve any dream by lifting up your thoughts. You can fly when you decide that you can. Never consider yourself defeated again. Let the vision in your heart be in your life's blueprint. Smile!”
~Og Mandino~

Papaya

From flower

to young fruit

maturing

into this
~ gorgeously sweet, organgey-red flesh to wake you up in the morning ~

Slow Down

“Time sometimes flies like a bird, sometimes crawls like a snail;
but a man is happiest when he does not even notice whether it passes swiftly or slowly.”
~Ivan Turgenev~

Red. White. Blue.

***

We are playing ABCs here.
Won't you have a peek?

Shades of Red

Red
(written by Em)

Red is for strawberries, juicy and ripe
Red is for poppies, so cheerful and bright
Red is for autumn leaves, strewn everywhere
Red is for traffic lights saying stop
Red is for rooster who wakes us up
Red is for fire engines with loud sirens
Red is for my glasses, chillies and tomatoes
Red is for my heart filled with love.

Mosaic Monday: The Humble Coconut

From tiny shoot to tall swaying palms

The flower pod bursts open to reveal sprays of tiny blooms

Young gobolhi turning to miri, then sweet fleshed kurumba

with thirst-quenching water inside

The mature coconut has umpteen uses

and those that get discarded or lie forgotten somewhere

eventually germinate and produce new shoots.

***

More mosaics at Mary's.

I am so mad...

When Em and I went to watch the sun rise above the horizon,
the beach was dotted with shells

and hundreds of little crabs
that hurried to the safety of their homes
as soon as we got near them.

Come afternoon,
and the beach that we went to
to make another sandcastle,
was very different.

Instead of the pretty shells
and the blue and red crabs,
the sand was littered with this.

Yep.
Bread rolls.
Not one. Not two. Not three.

But hundreds of them
all along the shoreline.

This is the result of the kind of irresponsible act
that makes my blood boil.

***
Updated on 21st Dec, 1:45pm.

The two nearby tourist resorts
were presented this morning with photographs
of the bread rolls on the beach.
One of them
(part of which you can see on the top left hand corner of the last photo)
has admitted to having done this
and for doing this regularly.
They seem to dump their rubbish in the sea
between the two islands
and so it gets washed up here with the currents.
But,
on the bright side,
they have agreed to take their biodegradable waste
out into the open sea
in the future
so that this beach is not going to be spoiled.

Sharpen My Pencil

How come

you can never find a sharpener

when you want your pencil sharpened?

I prefer pencils to pens.

From this... to this

Alive.
At home in the grass that grows wild
behind a fence in an abandoned home.

Dried.
Tied in a bunch with a strip of pink cotton,
decorating a home for months.

When the Rain Stops...

...the world is reflected

in the droplets of rain that linger.

The skies celebrate.

***