Maartje, Eelco, Rick, Kaat & Duuk: February 2015

Working on our wellbeing

We are working on our wellbeing. Eating the right kind of cereals….-:)

and relaxing through yoga at home

And at school

(Kaat in corner behind her teacher)

Now the apartment complex in our compound is more and more complete we have more friends who live in the gorgeous duplexes. As a result, every once in a while, we get a good view of our own house and the complex.

Our villa is 2nd block from right back corner, left front corner of the block.

There are 2 additional rows of villa's to the back left and the playground etc are in the far right corner.

To the left of the clubhouse are the future tennis courts. Inside the club is a heated pool, squash courts, a big hall, some offices, a gym and a library.

Travel kids (xmas holidays)

In the timespan of 5 days we went from Mieussy to Geneva, from Geneva to Dubai, Dubai to Cochin, Cochin to Kottayam, Kottayam to Cochin to Bangalore, Bangalore to Bangkok. With 3 kids of 5 years old and under. No problem! As our kids travel more then most adults we know, and so to them, it is all normal.

Kaat & Rick waiting at Geneva Airport.

All in their own comfort zone with maximal or minimal clothing -;)

After midnight in some airport lounge

Wide awake our 3 little clones

How do you mean I should be sleeping and 'this is not a playground'

Checking out the airplanes

Looking completely as if they belong

Hop hop. Getting as usual quite some attention from the staff.

And then after 24 hrs in Bangalore, as also pointed out by the customs staff at Bangalore Airport who start to recognize use, we were off to Bangkok again. In Business Class this time. And despite the 1am departure. Nothing but smiles.

And no I am still not going to sleep!

At some point they gave little Duuk even his own seat - or should we call it throne.

I wish I could think off more things, other then airplanes, that make Rick this happy!

By the time we made it to the hotel in Bangkok, at about 7:30 am local time, we did have some sort of tired kids, but still not difficult though!

Took a few trips to carry all our 'luggage' to the room -:), and we were just so proud we only had 1 bag and a carry on the 5 of us!

Mommy weekend away - Bangkok

A few weeks ago over brunch we had hatched a plan to have a weekend away for some of us mommies. Considering we managed to find a date which worked for all of us, we decided to not hesitate and booked immediately. So for the valentines weekend, the four of us, all more or less neighbors, a South African, American Brit, Canadian and a Dutchie, expats in banking, the hotel business, telecom and oil - left our 9 kids with their dads and went for 4 days to Bangkok.

After an issue with the wrong passports at the airport at midnight we fortunately did make it onto the flight and embarked on a weekend of relaxing, food, drinks, laughter and shopping. Lots of shopping!

We started the weekend off with an alb orate breakfast, some sleep and then high tea in the Mandarin oriental. A hotel that in its heyday, was the fanciest of its kind.

Of course with no kids around and so much chatting we took no pictures at all, apart from budget's gluten free scones….which looks like just a picture of scones of course!

Later that night we met up with some of Nan's friends at some very hip skye bar. No idea how high we really were but a really nice breeze and we could see all of Bangkok.

Our Saturday was dedicated to the weekend Market. As you can see we were all ready and excited to go.

It appears the weekend market also has an actual name

There is nothing much that cannot be bought at the weekend market and everything is cheap. We all agreed that it must be possible to find most of the stuff also in India. But if there would have been a place that had even 1/10th of what we were looking at - we would have known about it. So maybe yes you can but this kind of stuff in India, but not in 1 place, and definitely not without being hassled, whilst eating the street food, and with enough daytime to spend.

The haul from the trip for the 4 of us was significant, and cheap. And we were all excited about our finds.

In the evening we dressed up and went to the restaurant of one of Ali's university friends. As usual, we laughed a lot.

We recognized that it was quite special to go away together not knowing each other that well, and also having such fabulous husbands that none of us worried about the home front. The men and kids spend also almost the whole weekend together and send us an occasional picture.

Sunday morning we went for cultural and made our way out to the Jim Thompson House. The man is the 'father' of the successful Thai silk industry of this era, and the house holds an impressive Thai historical art collection.

By Sunday morning I had had quite some sleep and was clearly happy and relaxed.

Clean, relaxed, organized - wonderful!

After another more modern evening market we went to one of the more famous traditional Thai restaurants.

News from the home front was also still good:

I was told this was not really champagne…. and someone had borrowed our sleeping bags so Kaat & Rick had a camp out in Rick's room.

Our last day was spend shopping around for those necessities we miss so much in Bangalore, as you do, from Japanese department stores, New York Coffee chains, supplies for Chinese New year

Still happy together

So yep, we came home with another sizable haul of dishwasher soap, wrapping paper, rice cakes, gluten free pasta, ziplocs, breakfast cereal etc etc.

Thanks to one of the husbands we had a nice hotel booking with access to the executive lounge all weekend. So we wrapped things up with another toast to the weekend. It was so nice and soooooo relaxing.

And we definitely left with much more luggage then we arrived with.

We are already talking about the next trip. Maybe one with all 4 families? It was a huge success, with only a million tears of laughter. The kids had not even missed us and all told us that we had missed so many fabulous parties whilst we were away. The dads were happy we were back but none of them looked worse for wear. Superdads and a super weekend.

Wedding in Kottayam (xmas holidays)

Just after new year we had to leave our lovely haven in Mieussy again. Yes we were going back to India, but not home. Next stop on our super trip over the xmas holidays was Kottayam in South India for a wedding of friends.

Nikky is Indian but grew up in the middle east, Erkan is Dutch Turkish and we work with both and they are our neighbors. After a ceremony in the Netherlands a few months earlier they were due to tie the knot again with Nikky's family in South India in the town of Kottayam, 2 hours from Cochin (or Kochi) in the Kerala backwaters.

After a day traveling and recovering we all got dressed up in happy colors early in the morning for the event. Excited about how good we looked.

Of course this being India, our car left us waiting for a good 45 minutes.

Duuk also initially, despite just coming out of winter clothes, was having non of it with the long sleeves.

With Erkan's friends and family not as well represented on this event Eelco also got the honor of being on of the ushers. We did not know in advance so where relieved to still be so well color coordinated for the event!

The kids at least at the start loved looking around as much as they were bing looked at

But by the time we remembered to take a family picture the sun was up high and the kids enthusiasm posing for pictures done. Hopefully the wedding photographer has some better pictures of us!

Erkan's nephew, one of the very few other kids there, was sooooo happy to have other Dutch speaking kids around.

Duuk appeared unimpressed still

The church was quite pretty, but true to what Kottayam's history should have told us, also orthodox. Meaning a long Jacobite Syrian Orthodox service, most of which we could not follow.

Once the curtain opened we had some glimpses of the pretty panels at the front of the church.

In the front of the church, or the main section, the women, including bride before the marriage vows, had to have their heads covered. Fortunately Rick's outfit had a dupatta in matching colors to my dress!

Eelco had to be at the front of the church with the rest of the bridal party, so I entertained kids outside with iPads and Duuk tried on everyone's shoes. We were by far not the only ones outside. It appeared quite informal and many people left the church at time to 'take a break'. Meaning that we had loads of people taking our kids pictures of course.

Things concluded 1.5 hours later with the bride and groom emerging

and Duuk getting his papa back:

Then it was off to a place called Windsor Castle (yes really!) for the reception. Drummers outside, a blue carpet and bridesmaids being ushered in by Eelco and others.

Eelco spend the first 1.5 hours on stage. The kids of course joined him on occasion and again I was very happy about the color selection I made for my dress and the boys outfits.

The mix in of older Indian traditions was lovely and so there were lots of little treats like those dancing girls

Especially Rick seamed totally tuned in and knew exactly when to clap or be silent or bow etc.

When things started to drag out a little again the iPad proved an excellent last mint baby sitter.

Once the bride had left the stage to change into her blessed wedding saree we where free to roam the stage. And engage with more with 'the other princesses'.

Once the bride had changed in red and gold - and the Uncle who is a state senator had come and gone for an hour of picture moments of all wedding guests with him - it was time for pictures of us all with the happily married couple. Finally Kaat got to be close to princess Nikky!

Wow!!

After that all of the friends of Nikky;s younger brother descended on our boys for some pictures. This time Rick appeared honored and was happy to indulge them.

After that it was time for a sleepy car ride back to our hotel on the lake for some relaxing and to get ready for the evening party there.

There fortunately was also some time to try out the pool

Not sure how long the kids would last in the evening we made sure we were on time. Unfortunately the bus with wedding guests had not arrived yet (many people where staying locally with family) and hence there was no photographer with skills to take a good family picture available.

Having the dance floor to ourselves was not an issue at all though!

After a good hour of dancing and still no guests we opted for some food and a break from the dancing

Kaat even decided to give up completely (only to fortunately join the party again later).

But then it was finally time!

All the different groups of friends and family started to do dances for the newly married couple

Including all the aunts & uncles

The brother and his friends

It was one big Bollywood production and Rick happily started to join in.

Eelco and I thought about it but decided not to offer up an act of our own.

The boys and the (small) crowd were mesmerized

And remained an attraction themselves

Nikky's best friend did a super solo dance, and Duuk clearly fell in love.

Then Erkan's brother and nephew decided they could do his Karate demonstration act also to music and did an impromptu performance. Super brave! (ending in the Nephew of course beating his dad in the staged fight)