There is a day called Winnie The Pooh day where all the children are asked to bring their teddy bears along to school and the whole school will go outside the school building and have a picnic on the school grounds... What a novel idea!
Anyway, after giving it some thought, Ace decided he will bring his BIG, PINK, cheerbear along as his picnic partner. When he came home, he told me that there were many people who brought very big bears and some who did not have bears brought soft toy dogs instead...
Anyway, inspired by his school picnic, we decided that we will have our very own Teddy Bear picnic at Creek Park during the eid holidays... In the morning when we woke, Ace was so excited that we will be going to a picnic...
When we drove out to have lunch though, we saw a strange sight.. there was a thick layer of cloud all gathered together like a huge blanket over the sky and there is this definitive line..... from far, the clouds just look like looming mountains.. looming in the horizon.... By the time we finished lunch, the sky turned dark and the wind started to blow.. it looked like it was going to rain! I was so worried we couldnt go for the picnic but in the end, the sky just turned perfect blue..:) woohoo!
Anyway, Ace said we have to wear our Dubai Family outfit.. which is a red liverpool t-shirt. Max doesnt have an exact one and so he wore his red I <3 Liverpool shirt lor...
But leh, as it was public holiday, 10,000 other people had the same idea as us lah.. or at least a similar idea.. so after many rounds and not finding any parking lot, we parked at Healthcare City nearby and walked over instead...
Max got very sharp eyes lor.. he saw this blue bridge and said maybe it is linked to the park.. but as it looked abandoned and there is no "entrace" or steps leading to the stairway that went up the bridge (and it was built on a platform as tall as my knee), we were not sure if it is a working bridge.. so Max went to reckee... HEng ah, it is a working bridge! So we saved another 5 min walk:) wahahaha....
I just think that dubai is a strange place. They always build things build halfway one. Build bridge, ready liao but no staircase up... no matter what they do or build... it seems to me they always have to leave it incomplete like tat... totally dun make sense to me at all....
Anyway, that is how much people outside queueing to go into the park. In Dubai, you pay 5aed per pax to go into a park. But I dun mind.. cos the weather is good... the best way to describe the experience is like going to east coast park BUT minus the heat and add in cool air conditioned air but with the smell of fresh sea breeze and many positive ions! Shiok ah!
Once we arrived, have to "Bai Zhen"... do the formation lah.. In the end we brought many bears along... Anyway, the park is nice. There were many people having picnic, BBQ, kicking ball here.. and some are riding bikes or four wheelers.. there was even a person flying a kite:)
For us, I just prepared a few simple things. Some salad... fizzy drinks, honey cake (the best cake in Dubai) and Max bought some taboleh and hummus (which is a local salad/sauce thingy that you deep with bread) and arabic bread to go along. Not to forget my favourite snack-- Doritos Capsicum flavour chips!:)
I noticed something interesting though... Most of the arabic family come to the picnic with chairs. And as their families are usually big, they will really come to a picnic with 10 foldable chairs lor! Some will also bring table and tonnes of pots and pans to put their food or even do their cooking here!:) wahahahaha... But leh, Indian families and other asians (like us Singaporeans) will bring mats and sit on the floor... and I always tot tat muslims like to sit on the floor and eat as a family! Or at least that is what I see when I watch documentaries about malay families. But I guess arabic culture may still be slightly different from our south east asian culture....
But the sky turned dark quite early. by 5.30... starting to get dark.. by 6pm it was like total darkness liao...
Anyway, I loved the area that we sat in. There was a small little hill beside us... there were so many children who were enjoying themselves running up and down the slope.. and also ROLLING up and down the slope.. they looked so happy and carefree and just looking at them was a joy lor.. and needless to say, Ace soon joined in the fun!:)
Max says he is tired and uses Ace's ball as a pillow..
Ace is happy tat we can finally eat HONEY CAKE after we finished the other foods:)
Max say the ball not comfy.. "Can use your carebear as pillow or not?" he asked Ace as he lay down on carebear's lap...
Ace and the bears... his dad included.. wahahaha:)
Ace, Angel and bear.. wahahaha.. the other bear taking the photo:)
Ti orh orh liao.. the father and son then go and kick ball... and me.. i just sit at the mat and admire the moon with the carebears:)
That's Ace runnig around and rolling around the slope again... Anyway, Ace kept saying that he wanted to rent a 4 wheeler and ride.. I would like to try riding and tried to encourage him to agree to rent the 4 pax one where we can all ride together.. but he insisted on riding alone. So in the end, Max got him a single pax one and got us a double pax one. Alas, all our picnic barang were still in our hands and all our stuff got nowhere to put..so I had to like carry some stuff on my left hand.. some on my right hand... some on my lap.. not exactly the most comfortable position to be in...
That's us as we were riding along... ours is a double seater but I only need to sit there.. Max had to do all the work.. wahahaha:)
That's Ace wheezing along happily at the start...
But the beautiful start started to take a turn for the worse when the very hao lian Ace overshot us and rode far away in front of us. At a junction in front, we asked him to turn left and he turned right instead.. and so when we turned left, he started to cry... so we told him we will wait for him and sked him to u turn his car but he did not know how to manouvere it and so he cried again and had to wait for Max to go and "rescue" him ...
And then we came to a difficult point of the "course" where there was a slanting slope... so Max told Ace that he had to ride harder and faster so that there is momentum... and then Ace rode hard and went 3/4 of the way and then I think he got tired and so his car like rolled back a little and all Max could do was say "Just use your brake, just use your brake!" As we could not stop as well cos if we did, we will roll down the slope as well... but he managed to stop in time and he was really scared and so he whined again....
After the upslope, came the downslope lor.. so we went down the slope and becaues it was a long, gentle gradient, it was not like we could suddenly brake or stop as well as there were other "cars" behind us. Ace being the scaredy cat after his bad experience with the upslope, decided that he will come down and walk with the car.
"Dun walk with the car, sit inside and use your brake..." I told him.. because i felt that it is even more dangerous to stand beside the car as I think the car will roll fast lor...... And I wondered then if we should stop and show him how to use the brake and explain to him how it works.. But Max says, "It's ok lah.. he can do it lah... let him walk lor.." And so I let him walk..
Then the unthinkable happened.. the car.. which was much too heavy for Ace rolled down on the slope.. afraid that the car will roll away into the sea (at the end of the slope is a pathway towards the sea but there are railings there) and afraid that the car will hit others, my son held on to the car for his dear life... but the car was heavier than him and was on a downslope momentum. As I turned around and looked at Ace... i felt like everthing was happening in slow motion...
The car moved forward and being too heavy, Ace started to kneel forward.. the car dragged him down a good 1-2 meters on his knees before a kind hearted soul stepped out to help him stop the car. And there I was, sitting a few metres away in our own 4 wheeler with big and small bags beside me. Too far to help, unable to help.... I felt like I was watching a slow mo movie like tat.. and I was thinking.. "Xiao liao.. there goes his knees..."
When our car finally stopped, Max quickly went over to Ace and Ace cried really hard. He cried and cried and cried and Max motioned me to get over... (as I was still seated in my car). So I carry all the barang and went over... heng ah... ti gong boh pi lor... he only mildly scratched both his knees and his ankle. Wounds were something like the size of peanuts.
After that, Ace refused to ride on his own.. so we exchanged.. I got to ride the single and Ace and Max did the double....
Ace says he wants to do the four wheeler next time again.. but he wants to do the 4 pax one and never ever wants to do the single one again. In retrospect, I think we should have given him a lesson on how the car works and what to look out for before he started... cos through my own experience of learning how to drive... If i were in Ace's position, having someone yell to you "just use the brakes" totally mean NOTHING to me one lor... cos you have to show me or tell me exactly how to use the brakes... show me how to do it.. explain to me why it is like tat.. then I understand.. if not, "Just use the brakes" is not common sense to me at all... I am just not gifted in things like tat... and I guess unfortunately, my son takes after me in this aspect.. (Just ask my driving instructor and Max.. when I asked them how to know how much to turn the steering wheel when you turn.. they laughed at me and just said, "Just use feel lah.." It took me 20 hr worth of lessons to figure out what it means by JUST USE FEEL lor..)
But I must say I totally enjoyed the ride though... As I was steering.. all I learnt during my driving lessons came back to me and I must say.. my $3K worth of driving lessons were really worth something.. without them, I would have been like Ace.. dunno how to go, where to go and not confident lor... cos there were so many other children around also on the rented four wheelers and they were all so dangerous and reckless one lor... they might suddenly run across the pathway.. or some suddenly stopped.. suddenly changed lane.. you name it, they do it...
Anyway, the night scene was really beaitufl but I guess Ace was not really in the mood to enjoy it... he just sullenly sat in the 4 wheeler throughout the rest of the way back to the counter to return them.
He finally loooked a little happier when we were walking back to our car but kept complaining about the pain on his leg. When we asked if he wanted to go again.. he said yes but insisted he doesnt want to do a single seater four wheeler anymore...
Just to make Ace happy, Max showed him the blinking safety light that he had...
Anyway, I asked Ace afterward why he cried so much even though his wounds were very small... he said he was very frightened that he will fall into the sea...so I guess he got a bad fright more than anything else.. I told Ace that he is very brave and that if he meets this situation again, he should let go of the car... and of cos, I gave him a good, long, hug..
All in all, Ace still enjoyed himself very much though.. he enjoyed himself so much that he asked if he could invite his good friends along the next time we came. I thought he meant his school friends and he started naming his good friends, Uncle Adam, Uncle Gan, Fayth Jie Jie... wahahahhahaha...
I asked him why they were his good friends and he said, "Because they always talk to me and play with me.." hahaha...
And so, the next week, we jio all our friends to go for a picnic with us:)
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