what i don't understand is, how is it that when you're in singapore mothers always make you eat three full meals, and you actually manage rapidly to expand your stomach for this. i had laksa and lor mee and half of my dad's prata for breakfast (this was at 8.30) and then my mater has a full san cai yi tang (three dishes and one soup) lunch on the table and i've polished that off too. and dinner will be large.

acquisitions: the new haruki murakami novel, which i don't believe is in english translation yet. my mother has the chinese translation and gave it me.

the standing family joke is that there's a ngiao ci (rat) in the house who sneaks into the kitchen in the middle of the night for food. i slept through dinner and got up at one and went downstairs to get some tea and cookies and found my mother had left a note for the ngiao ci saying that they've put the leftover dinner in the fridge. there was black bean braised chicken wings, enoki mushroom soup, and some tunghoon stirred with veggies and dofu. when i had my fill and was coming back upstairs my mater came out of her room and said, lao shu!