Fish and the day he starts his Primary School

# 345

This is my first bento for year 2015! And also my son's first lunchbox after school!! A 'fishy' business (onigiri) with a Japanese flag foodpick which I bought it from it Tokyu Hands at Orchard Central.  It contains some boiled broccoli, potato, carrot, hard boiled egg, Japanese cucumber, cherry tomatoes and char siew that Granny brought over yesterday. 

A brand new year means also the start of my boy's primary school education. A few days before the school opens, we talked about his new school and how did he feel about going to Primary school.  I was expecting he would say "excited".  Instead, he told us that he felt "nervous" about it.  Probably, we have over emphasized that he need to behave in school, pay attention in class, listen to instructions, adhere to the school's rules....etc.  We also explained it was entirely different from the carefree kindergarten environment.  One aspect of which, we did highlight was bringing homework back home. Whilst I was penning down my thoughts, I began to realise it really does not sound very fun in Primary school the way we put it across to him though.  Nevertheless,  he settled well on his first day of school last Friday, 2 January 2015.  Parents were allowed to stay behind and observe the kids during the recess time only for the first day.  Hubby and myself saw him munching his healthy lunch box quickly provided by the school (only on the first day) and could even showed his classmate where to wash hands after meal.  Afterwhich, both of us attended a 3 hours parenting workshop organised by the Parent Volunteer group.  When the school dismissed at 1.30pm, we saw him walking out together with his classmates led by his form teacher, smiling and happy!

It was interesting to note that given freedom to my son, he would come out something unexpected or rather something not approved by us.  The liberty to buy any kinds of food from the school canteen instead of packed bento from Mommy.  Yeah, speaking from a boy longing for independent - this was what he was looking forward.  We agreed but on the following days:-

Monday to Tuesday - buy lunch at school
Wednesday to Friday - Packed bento to school

On the second day of school, Papa gave him a $10 note pocket money for the whole week.  And it was a Monday which he could buy food on his own.  Shockingly, he bought a piece of fried seaweed chicken nuggets for 50cents and a packet of seaweed tibits for 30 cents!  Where's the healthy lunch box we saw him eating on the first day?  Next was even unbelievable! The canteen was too crowded that he and his Primary 4 buddy could not find seats to eat.  My son knew his choice of food was unacceptable and has asked us to give him another chance. Well, on the third day (today), he actually bought the healthy lunch box from the Chicken rice stall but still standing to eat his lunch.  At least, they found a table. Basically, a healthy lunch box has meat, vegetables and fruit.

Academic wise, he began his Hanyu Pinyin and English lessons.  He was amused during the Hanyu Pinyin lesson and discovered fun learning it.  I was pleased he enjoyed his lessons.

Walking to school

Recess time

In the classroom