Have been caught in serious tropical thunderstorms two days in a row now, really silly not to learn. The weather is getting hotter and that brings quite extreme afternoon rains. Yesterday with kids while waiting for taxi and today on my own on Orchard Road after yoga class - I was so soaked as if I had jumped into the pool.

Beatrice has school holidays now for nearly 3 weeks, boys are at school. Today she went to friends house and tomorrow another friend is coming over. Easter will not be a big deal as Robert will still be working every day until the 15th. Then on 16th we will head to Bali for a short break. He will probably collapse after having had to get up 5.30 every morning since months with no day off. In fact last Monday he never even came home because they had to run tests on the rig until 5.30 am! Then had a short nap onboard and a new meeting at 7.

We have already had an Easter party with Beatrice's class and parents and siblings and that was very nice - on two classmates' condo with pool and BBQ and great egg hunt, face painting, egg painting etc. Karl was very good at egg hunt and highly motivated after he saw a boy draw a Ben 10 toy from the gift emporium. Unfortunately he didn't get anything Ben 10 related and was very upset about it for a while.  It was way after dark that we got home, so missed the earth hour at 8.30 completely.

The kids have been going to the pool a lot more now that it is warmer and all have improved so much. (In fact they are in the pool now and I am sitting here with the laptop - wifi reaches just far enough!) Karl can swim the whole length now unaided and Raoul is nearly there as well. All locals are amazed because their kids all have to take swimming lessons. But then they don't come down when it is "too cold", someone has a runny nose, too windy, too sunny or anything else really ...

I had a new experience last week - Beatrice's friend's mum is setting up a Reiki practice and she did a session on me. I had never experienced it before and it was quite strange. I started seeing all sorts of colors with closed eyes and in the end drifted off into half sleep with lots of dreams going on. Funnily when she reached my throat area she said there is a very strong voice of a women's rights activist on the right side. She didn't know anything much about my background or political involvements in the past. She claims the voice is still there although it has been very quiet for the last 10 years... at least publicly. It is a bit like psychotherapy except that she doesn't tell much and all issues that someone has come up from inside and start to shift. It left me very deeply relaxed and kind of in a protective bubble for a few days. I guess in the daily life we are so preoccupied with the reality that we don't even take time off to reflect on it not to mention the bigger picture. So have a go if you get a chance!