Christopher Vu

A little story about Doggie

2012-02-10T02:57:00.000+08:00

I was supposed to go to bed, but a chat with friends online reminded me of a story about Doggie, a dog that I used to have in Australia.

Doggie was a black toy poodle. He used to sleep with us in the bedroom, as we have managed to train him not to pee until we let him out the house. But I remember one time, we woke up and found pee on the carpet. And when we looked at Doggie, he was hiding in the corner shivering, as though we were about to scold or even beat him.

We didn't, of course. We comforted him, telling him it's alright.

The thought of that still breaks my heart today. A little animal, being obedient, yet helpless. Doggie must have struggled to maintain his pee at night until he couldn't take it any more. Poor guy...

True joy

2012-02-09T15:37:00.000+08:00

An ordinary day for me goes something like this.

I knock off work at around 7pm, I take the MRT and get home tired at 8pm. I unpack and take a few minutes break before I bring Angel out for a stroll. I cycle her about 2km to the park where she's free to roam around, the route involves some up hills. She likes to be carried a lot and often I have to piggyback her all the way back to where the bike is parked.

By the time we get home it's normally around 9:30pm when I have to give her a quick shower. After a quick break, I finally have my dinner at 10pm. During this time Angel often comes into the room and just generally disturbs me, sometimes I just can't have a simple meal in peace. I wash the plates, play with her for a little while more, then I take my shower.

By now hopefully Angel would be asleep. I can now clear some work emails, yes there are always emails after working hours. Finally, at around 12pm, I can have some free time to spend on my interests.

But I'm so exhausted by now. It's either I go to bed now and have some decent rest, or more often than not, I choose to just do what I enjoy doing - catching up on news, socializing online, reading humorous stuff, reading on photography, and working on my photos. Every morning I wake up tired all over again and wondering why I did what I did in the night (morning actually).

Parenthood sucks much?

Not so.

Think about it. When was the last time you were truly happy? When was the last time you felt a genuine smile in your heart and you can't help showing it on your face too? The fact is, I feel this every single day.

True joy for me is waking up in the morning seeing Angel already up sitting on her potty chair reading her books. She knows all the alphabets but she doesn't understand a single word, but you can sense her curiosity and her eagerness to try to make sense of her book.

True joy is hearing her say "bye bye.......... daddy", giving me flying kiss, and waving her hand when I leave for work.

True joy is finally coming home seeing Angel come running and literally jumping into my arms, clinging on to me as I unpack. True joy is seeing the crafts that she made in school, it's seeing genuine excitement on her face when she knows it's time to go for a stroll, and when she runs to fetch her favorite shoes.

True joy is hearing Angel on the backseat of the bike muttering everything that she sees - T for tree, C for car, T for truck, G for grass, M for moon, red means stop no no no, green go go go! True joy is seeing her curiosity as she explores and learns about the great outdoors, and hearing her mad laughter when I piggyback her while jumping.

True joy is hearing Angel say "bye bye park. bye bye bridge. bye bye McDonald's" when we head home, it's hearing her say "home home" when we get home, it's hearing her say "white soap, green shampoo", it's seeing her suddenly pushing the door open and climbing onto my lap as I eat my dinner, it's seeing her in pyjamas holding her little pillow and blanket.

True joy is seeing Angel sleeping, and probably dreaming about her little adventures.

Parenthood is exhausting. Yes.

But this is when I feel the happiest, and most alive.

Chinese new year day 2

2012-02-08T02:36:00.000+08:00

Nap

2012-02-04T18:56:00.000+08:00

Michelle

2012-02-01T00:10:00.000+08:00

Style of the day

2012-01-29T03:39:00.001+08:00

Punggol Waterway

2012-01-29T03:11:00.001+08:00

One frame

2012-01-25T00:13:00.001+08:00

Ghim Moh

2012-01-25T00:11:00.001+08:00

Chinese new year

2012-01-24T03:00:00.001+08:00

A few frames from today, I was having the flu.

Potong Pasir

2012-01-24T02:15:00.003+08:00

Smiles

2012-01-22T23:33:00.002+08:00

She spotted me

2012-01-22T03:24:00.001+08:00

Angel has just changed to a new school. A rather big change for her - new environment, new teachers, new friends, longer hours at school, and she now has to take the school bus on her own. It has not been easy for her.

On her 5th day her school was having a Chinese new year celebration and performance, I decided to drop by and take some pictures. I waited outside the glass window when I spotted her holding her teacher's hand and slowly walking down the stairs. Angel spends most of her time with us, so it's quite an incredible feeling seeing her trying to blend in with others on her own, I can't help but smiled big time.

She's still extremely shy, her teacher had to hold and comfort her the whole time. She was looking emotionless. When they let the parents go in, I quickly went in and sat as near as I could to her.

She spotted me.

I waved to her, and she gave me the faintest of smile! This totally melts my heart, knowing that she was pleasantly surprised to see me there. During the entire performance Angel would often turn her head towards me and check on me.

I love this girl so much.

Strangers

2012-01-21T03:47:00.002+08:00

Taking a nap

2012-01-19T04:26:00.003+08:00

Punggol Waterway

2012-01-19T04:03:00.002+08:00

Bintan retreat

2012-01-15T04:03:00.000+08:00

That blue train

2012-01-14T06:13:00.000+08:00

No, not Thomas :)

Whenever Angel sees a train, she would say "T for train, choo choo!". But every one in a while she would mutter out "Ah-soo", in reference to the blue train "Azul" in Dora the Explorer shows.

I wonder how long she will keep this innocence.

At The Park

2012-01-10T23:29:00.000+08:00

Friends

2012-01-02T23:57:00.001+08:00

First sunset of 2012

2012-01-02T05:05:00.000+08:00

New year day

2012-01-02T05:01:00.000+08:00

Around the park

2012-01-02T04:19:00.001+08:00

Some shots I took at Sengkang Riverside Park.

A little push of help

2012-01-02T04:08:00.002+08:00

We brought Angel to Paragon's playground and let her run loose, and boy, did she run loose. She was literally jumping all over the place and playing everything available. One time we saw her pushing a kid down the slide so that she can have a go, we thought she was being bad again. I wasn't too happy.. then a while later I saw something amazing.

Angel was climbing up the steps and going down the slide repeatedly. At one point, she stopped at the steps for some reason, probably to count the steps. Then she turned around and saw a small little toddler boy behind her trying to climb up, with his mum holding him. Realizing that she's blocking the way, Angel quickly climbed up to the platform and waited for him. While on the platform, Angel kept looking at the boy and pointing her finger to the slide, as though to cheer him up and lead him the way. The little boy struggled to climb up with his hands, Angel then kneel down, grabbed his arms and attempted to pull him up. He eventually made it, Angel let him walk to the slide first, then followed him behind. The boy didn't know how to slide down, so Angel gave him a little push. It's then I realized it wasn't a push of selfishness, it was a push of help.

Angel normally doesn't get along with other kids, so it's really heartwarming to this.

Happy new year

2012-01-01T03:52:00.004+08:00

P for playground

2011-12-31T01:46:00.003+08:00

Me in Kodak Portra

2011-12-30T20:16:00.003+08:00

Taken by Jing Wen.

One more

2011-12-30T03:10:00.002+08:00

Plant seeds had stuck to her shorts as she walked across the grass field, she sat down and kept scratching her thighs. I had to remove her shorts and plug out the seeds one by one, but after that she just refused to let me put them back, leaving her only with the diaper.

How we spent Christmas

2011-12-29T02:43:00.001+08:00

We braced the weather and headed to Angel's favorite hang out place - Sengkang Riverside Park and Sengkang Wetland. I started to cycle her to this park about a year ago, initially we would just hang around the pond area. But with her explorer nature, we started to venture further, and we are still slowly discovering how vast this place really is.

Angel has kind of worked out her favorite routes:

We start at the pond area where she picks leaves and throws it to the fishes and tortoises.
Then we walk to the grass steps where she tries her balancing walk.
I have to wait for the "where bicycle?" voice when I would then carry her back to the bicycle.
We then cycle to the wetland where she does her usual running and exploring around the bridge.
Her running normally leads us to Sengkang Sports Complex, where we would go to the outdoor gym. This is where she calls the sky walk machine a "swing" and she would try her hands on the monkey bars too.
After that we walk up to a huge road bridge. We only just ventured to this bridge not long ago, so she's still slowly learning about this area.
The bridge leads us back to the park, from here on it's piggyback all the way back to the wetland to get the bicycle.
Sometimes we cycle to McDonald's to have dinner or drive through to get her a corn cup.

Normally this trip takes about 1 to 2 hours.

Sometimes all you need is just one shot

2011-12-25T02:21:00.001+08:00

Took over her Olympus E-PL2, set it to RAW capture, and took one shot. That's all I needed. Love this shot a lot.

Train in the sky

2011-12-25T02:16:00.002+08:00

Raffles Place

2011-12-25T02:14:00.002+08:00

Scenes from the train station

2011-12-25T02:12:00.001+08:00

Why I pick her up every friday

2011-12-25T01:34:00.002+08:00

Had a blast at my office Christmas party at Raffles Place, I haven't been to this vibrant part of town for a while now. After the party I felt like staying on with friends and continue partying, but I had to pick up my daughter.

On the way I kept thinking why, why do I not stay on and have fun? Why do I bring her home and spend the rest of my night taking care of her? I was still wondering that when I reached grandma's place, and as I turned the corner to face the door I got my answer within one second.

A simple "Daddy"! Followed by Angel running to the kitchen to look for grandma to open the gate. Grandma was in the shower, so Angel came back and tried to open the gate herself. She tried to climb up and reach the lock, she pushed and pulled the gate, she tried to figure out the workings of the gate. Unsuccessful, she ran back to look for grandma.

After the 4th try running to the kitchen, she finally managed to get grandma. As soon as the gate was opened, she ran up my to arms with shoes on her hands, ready to go home.

That's the reason why I bring her home.

One frame

2011-12-23T02:31:00.000+08:00