Wednesday, November 25, 2009

Visit from Popo & Gong Gong

Don't even know where to begin now. We have seen and done so much, Kay has grown by leaps and bounds in terms of speech and maturity of character. And seeing her with her grandparents is simply a joy. There is nothing that can replace the kind of love that grandparents can give. It's unassuming & without boundaries. Popo and Gonggong have spoiled her rotten.

She has even picked up some "Singlish" phrases from them along the way. Everything begins with "got" as opposed to "have". It's cute. We are quite sure she will correct it soon enough but it's just amazing how quickly they pick up words and expressions from us. Spelling her name, talking about coffee and making lattes, saying her numbers is mandarin, english and spanish (thanks to Dora), are just some of the many skills she has mastered in the past 2 months. Popo has also taught her to say "tears","snort" and "saliva" in Cantonese. Very useful words for her to get around life with :). And she has learned a little astrology about the Animal Signs of the Year we were born. She knows that she is born in the Year of the Pig, Mum is a Cow, daddy & Popo are Rats and Gonggong is a "Woof-woof" Dog. Fantastic memory this girl has. Now I can safely ask her where things are and she is right 90% of the time. The other 10% she is probably goofing around and trying to be funny.

Wish we were closer to New Zealand, but I guess we'll be back to communicating via Skype. There'll be no more late night dates for daddy and mummy for a long while. Today, is Popo's last night in Toronto. Gonggong has left a month earlier. It'll be buckets of tears again at the airport tomorrow. But that's just the sweet bitterness of life. For Kay, it will be back to Aunty Dorin's house on Thursday and we will be back to working late nights (not that this has stopped).

Here are some of the joyful moments spent with Popo and GongGong in Toronto. And wishing Popo a safe trip back to NZ. As Kay tells me when she is about to get a time-out, " I'll be nice, mummy. I'll be nice." We'll all try to be nice until we see Popo and Gonggong again.