Baby registry

Some people asked whether I was going to set up a baby registry. I said no but it was mostly because I didn't think there was one in Singapore. Most Asians tend to give cash in red envelopes, not physical gifts.

However, last night I found one that is great for people in the US. You can pay by credit card (note prices are in Singapore dollars -- they will be lower in US$) and the items will be delivered to me. The only drawback is that there is a limited selection of things to choose from.

Check out our choices at www.babywishes.com.sg. Search using "Dara" or "Leo Siaw".

Dara and baby at 25 weeks

Leo snapped this picture of me on the Vivocity outdoor deck. Not a bad setting, especially since Vivocity is a shopping mall!

I look much more pregnant if viewed from a side angle, but my eyes were closed in that photo.

More baby news

Everything has started progressing much more rapidly. I look at the photos in my last blog and I feel like they were taken several months ago instead of just last month. Here's an update:

• I'm showing now. I occasionally get seats offered to me on the bus.
• Leo and I found out that we are having a baby girl.
• We have a short list of 4 English names, but we are still working on the Chinese name. Rest assured, non-Mandarin speakers -- we will choose one that you can pronounce.
• I finally felt my baby move during a pre-natal massage two weeks. I was wondering if something was wrong because I couldn't feel the baby move. I guess she likes massages. I signed up for a package so she can get one every two weeks.
• Leo and I met with the obstetrician last Thursday. She's American and used to practice in Tacoma (a city very near Seattle for the non-NWers). It was a bit odd to speak to another American who doesn't teach English. She spoke very fast and changed topics with only a little warning.

Leo and I are going to the Botanic Garden for a free concert Sunday evening. I'll ask him to take a picture of me to post on the blog.

Dara and baby at 20 weeks

This weekend I went shopping for maternity clothes. Here are some pictures of the results. If I was wearing normal clothes, I would like more pregnant.

Pregnancy outfit 2: Pudding the cat roused himself from his nap to see what the fuss was about. Find the cat.

My Mom sent me the top below from the US. The jeans are new.

Expecting...

Leo and I are expecting our first baby at the end of August. So far parents-to-be and baby are doing well. We go for the 5 month ultrasound at the end of this month. We are both looking forward to seeing how it looks, moves around, etc. Hopefully, we will also learn the sex so that I can give a proper human pronoun. I don't know why this should bug me so much, but it does.

I'm sorry that it has taken me so long to announce it. I have been thinking off and on for the past few weeks about how to announce my pregnancy on my blog. This type of announcement seems better suited to less new-fangled means of communication. It feels awkward giving news about major life events like marriage, pregnancy, birth and death in a somewhat public forum. It's OK to innudate the world at large with trivia, but life-changing ones should receive special treatment. Fortunately, my blog does not receive much readership so it's probably not as public as I might fear.

Now that the ice is broken, I'll be updating you more often on how things are going.

Wish us luck. We are very very new at this.

Working too much

I know I have not been posting much. This past semester has been incredibly busy. For the first time, I have been bringing work home every weekend. I can't wait until the semster is over -- I only have 3 more weeks to go.

I remind myself that at least I am only busy during the semester and it only lasts for 12 weeks twice a year. A lot of people in Singapore have to keep this up year around.

Assimilation

Last week I wrote a midterm test for my pre-matriculation students. The text for the comprehension test was on the five stages of culture shock: honeymoon stage, hostile stage, acceptance stage, reverse culture shock. The acceptance stage is basically acknowledging that people do things differently without thinking its wonderfully exotic (honeymoon) or wrong and in need of correction (hostile). Reverse culture shock is when things about a person's home culture seem wonderfully exotic or wrong and in need of correction. I've been in the acceptance stage for a long time but recently realized when I watched Benjamin Button that I've begun to slip toward reverse culture shock. In one scene, the daughter is reading Button's journal to her dying mother in a hospice. She's sitting in an uncomfortable chair so she gets up and sits on the unoccupied bed next to her mother. Then she puts her feet (still in boots) on the bed. My reaction: I cringed and thought, "Eww, that's so disgusting. She should know better especially in a hospice."

While I have certainly complained about plenty in the US, I have never had this instinctive reaction that a common American custom is dirty. I haven't realized that I had assimilated some of Asian culture. It's a bit unnerving.