Stay Home for Circuit Breaker 2020

So many resources had been shared online, for keeping the young ones entertained, educated(!?!) and occupied, and to fight off boredom for the seniors (and everyone else in-between!!!!)

Just compiling my own list here. Leave me a comment below if there are links that don't work, cos I don't visit all of them... You know, in between cooking almost 3 meals a day, marketing and household chores, screaming at the kid, trying to catch up on some of my work, and keeping myself sane with Korean shows... Heehee

General 

Read/Listen

• Even before the Covid-19 situation hit, I have been a fan of the collection of e-books offered by the National Library Board, Singapore eResources platform. Just sign up for your 'myLibrary' account (if you are Singaporean or a NLB member), and you are set to read on a browser, or using the NLB mobile app, or download to read offline using the Overdrive or Libby app. See what you need here. 
• Amazon Audible has made Stories free available online for kids, as long as schools are closed.

Teaching and Learning Resources

• As part of a global initiative to support parents and educators through these times, Scholastic has been providing free access to digital resources which are developmentally-appropriate for children aged 4 to 15 years. 
• Cambridge University Press has also stepped up to provide educators with resources to support the teaching and learning during the school closure period. 

Nature

• Part of the #PlantOneOnMe series by the Gardens By the Bay, Singapore. This is a multi-episode series on tours in the Cloud Forest conservatory. We will be eagerly waiting for the day when they will be open again and we can actually use our membership...

The Arts 

• #GalleryAnywhere gives you a daily dose of art from the comfort of your home. Presented by the National Gallery, Singapore.
• The National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. features two online exhibits through Google Arts & Culture. One features watercolour renderings on American fashion from the Index of American Design; whereas another is on Dutch masters of genre painting, or scenes of daily life. 
• 
  

Performing Arts

• Esplanade Offstage is provided for all to enjoy performing arts in Singapore and Asia. You can easily filter by your preferred form of performing arts, and enjoy one-stop page of links to their partners. Besides reading about artists, Offstage has also listed videos for us to enjoy the performances online via "The show goes on---line" since the national performing art's centre is closed.
• Of course, not forgetting the weekly full-length broadcasts of famed musicals via the Youtube page The Shows Must Go On!. We enjoyed The Phantom of the Opera and Cats.
• BroadwayHD is a subscription-based internet service that lets you watch musicals without getting to Broadway itself. It offers a free 7-day trial, so plan when there's a long weekend/holiday stretch coming up. 

Music 

Facebook live broadcasts are one of the ways musicians used to continue to showcase their craft.

• Compilations include the facebook pages 古典好好聽 Classicalmusic to go.

History

• This "Museum of the World" virtual museum tour of artifacts brought by the British Museum and the Google Cultural institute allows us to pick and choose the time period and cultural setting we want. 

Christianity-Methodist

• Even as The Methodist Church in Singapore celebrates 135 years in Singapore this year, we are constrained by the ongoing Covid-19 situation to stay at home as much as possible. But that doesn't stop us from continuing to come together to pray and worship online as a community. I signed up to receive whatsapp updates to receive the daily prayer prompt on whatsapp. 

Entertainment

Of course, it has been almost impossible to get Y to guai guai complete the never-ending list of chores (cos she doesn't complete them) and assignments set. All she hankers for is for her own game apps and the Xiaomi phone we bought last year. We have been considering whether to get on the Netflix bandwagon after our Starhub contract ran out and we decided not to continue (we hardly sat down to watch anything at all, since we all had our own choices of entertainment on our phone/tablet/laptop/desktop anyway). So I started looking out to see if the Netflix offerings were suitable. Some links/lists here for those who already have a subscription include: 

• List of Netflix Educational shows for Kids from variety.com.

----

This post was first published on 20 May 2020. 

DIY Red Bean Pancake / DouSha GuoBing 豆沙锅饼

Had too much time stuck at home during Singapore's "Circuit Breaker", so I tried making something that I was craving for, but didn't want to buy/order from outside. There aren't too many places that do tasty Chinese red bean pancakes, and if they do, they usually serve it as a large serving meant for 6-8 persons to share as a dessert. 

I had some organic red adzuki beans on hand, but was quite sick of making red bean soup or red bean popsicles. I decided to try using frozen prata to replace the pastry encasing the red bean paste. The paste was easily cooked with the help of my pressure cooker. It did take a while to prepare this dish as I had to thicken the red bean soup to a thick paste, cool and spread it out as an even thin layer. This is a trick I learnt from watching ban jien kueh hawkers. 

《琅琊榜》曲目 MV+歌词

曲目

1.风起时 - (电视剧《琅琊榜》主题曲)MV

 Link

风起时

作词：海宴

作曲：孟可

变幻 风云几卷

乱世起 惊澜

血仍殷 何人心念

烈火 清平愿

慧剑 借别红颜

无意续 余年

帝阙巍 豪气仍在

冰心 誓破长夜天

昔年朱弓 壁上空悬

征途望断 铁甲犹寒

明眸在心 青山难掩

江山如画 是我心言

关山横槊 谁可补天

碧血长枪 昨日少年

孤影归途 不见烽烟

一笔千秋 后人心间

风起

云散

==================================================================

2.红颜旧 - (电视剧《琅琊榜》插曲)MV

西风夜渡寒山雨

家国依稀残梦里

思君不见倍思君

别离难忍忍别离

狼烟烽火何时休

成王败寇尽东流

蜡炬已残泪难干

江山未老红颜旧

忍别离

不忍却又别离

托鸿雁南去

不知此心何寄

红颜旧

任凭斗转星移

唯不变此情悠悠

狼烟烽火何时休

成王败寇尽东流

蜡炬已残泪难干

江山未老红颜旧

忍别离

不忍却又别离

托鸿雁南去

不知此心何寄

红颜旧

任凭斗转星移

唯不变此情悠悠

忍别离

不忍却又别离

托鸿雁南去

不知此心何寄

红颜旧

任凭斗转星移

唯不变此情悠悠

唯不变此情悠悠

唯不变此情悠悠

==================================================================

3.赤血长殷 - (电视剧《琅琊榜》插曲)MV

王凯《赤血长殷》MV

 

青砖黛瓦 故景如旧

草木无情 不解凡忧

当时烽火骤 焚尽几多残留

一袭白衣祭故人 陈情此时休

霁月清风 琅琊榜首

谁记昔年 策马风流

十载倏忽过 几回魂梦旧游

又多少冤魂织就 那缓带轻裘

尔虞我诈斗 无论缘由

本唤作成王败寇

这风雨一路 他只影独走

抛却欢喜悲凉感受

尘埃落定后 提缰回首

万千过往烙心头

暗香幽幽 江山皆没入一眸

朱墙宫深 人心难嗅

黑白纵横 杀伐无由

权倾谈笑变 妙计敛藏于袖

负手算尽天下事 当饮一樽酒

病骨一身 未雨绸缪

心中算谋 几人看透

纵年寿难永 无愧一生所求

此去踏关山千重 将前尘挥袖

泣血书千轴 悲歌唱彻

战骨碎尽志不休

且待赤焰归 整军再从头

守我山河家国依旧

横长枪 换却离愁

倾余生风骨同守

此血仍殷

此身豪情仍未收

泣血书千轴 悲歌唱彻

战骨碎尽志不休

且待赤焰归 整军再从头

守我山河家国依旧

横长枪 换却离愁

倾余生风骨同守

此血仍殷

此身豪情仍未收

情义千秋

在梅岭雪间长留

==================================================================

4.破茧成蝶 - (电视剧《琅琊榜》片头曲)

Why I will start ranting

It has been a downward spiral for quite a while now, but I thought I would attempt to pen my thoughts and feelings down so that I have an outlet for myself.

The long-suffering hubs had been at the brunt of my rants for the past 4 years (that is if I count the official school-going/primary school years). Then, he was on a break in-between jobs. That was when Y was in the later half of her Kindergarten 2 year, and we had quite a fair bit of family time together. He found work to pay the bills later, and I started my obsession with monitoring Y's academics, you know, just like how everyone expects a SAHM to be doing. Y was well-trained by her pre-school teachers and was one of the darlings of her class, so we had enjoyable "teachable" moments for her first year of primary school. Plus, having both parents at home after you finish school at 1.30pm, makes it pretty hard to be "naughty". But even then, we had our fair share of days when voices were raised, crying sessions starts, time is spent persuading and reasoning with Y, and then repeat...

By the end of P2, Y had some unpleasant incidents in school, and started being a bit more withdrawn, less smiley and cheery. She did well enough at the end of P2 to get a bursary, so I thought I could let her be more independent in her own learning at home. The other reason was also because I was getting nowhere trying to coach her. She would chase me out of her room when I wanted to go through her academic materials with her, saying she will read/study on her own, and let me know when she needed help. But all she was doing was playing/reading comics in the comfort of her aircon room.

To cut a long story short (and also cos I'm not quite ready to share those dirty bits of laundry yet), we have come to the current situation where barbs are traded daily, and I find myself doing things I should't be doing, and hating myself after...I try to console myself by saying that it is the effect of nagging every day/hour/minute after mundane things Y does that get on my nerves; strewing dirty uniform/laundry over the house, uneaten recess/lunch contents not disposed off properly, taking 30-40min long showers, snacking while reading, bugging for electronics etc. But when I look back and think that these are the result of not building disciplined habits in her from young, I can only hang my head in shame.

But for the sake of my sanity, I will start ranting, so please bear with me.

Easy Mochi with Kinako

We had been making it almost a habit to take post-dinner walks in the neighbourhood where possible. And inevitably ended up looking for some sort of snack to satiate our sweet tooth (Haha!). Y was particularly partial to the Japanese mochi snack sold at Don Don Donki at 100AM, but I balked at the price for such a small pack, which is polished off within 10 mins by the three of us. So I started searching for the recipe and bought the ingredients at Daiso. 

It's so easy that I don't think I will be buying it in future.... 

Recipe from Mono + Co *

100g glutinous rice flour 

60g dark brown sugar ** 

180g water 

2 tablespoons kinako ***

*https://monoandco.com/2016/07/30/easy-mochi-with-kinako/