A Taste of Singapore

  We had another fun day today visiting Singapore with our friends. We had lots of food and cooking based activities too. In the morning on the main table we made some ‘moon sand’ with corn-flour and water. Arata really enjoyed mixing it all together with sticks and leaves. There was another flag for us to make today with this one having 2 main stripes, one red, one white. The red stripe also had a crescent moon and five stars. Yes, it is the flag of Singapore. We used tissue paper and glue to make the red part and they look great. On the main table we had some dough which was the same color as gyoza coverings. Taking a ball of this we rolled it flattened it into a circle. We then folded it in the middle and pinched it around the edges. They look just like real gyoza. Shame we couldn’t eat them!! There was a box on the table too with a large hole in the top for us to decorate with paint markers too. We knew it was something to do with food and so we drew food on the outside such as apples, bananas etc. In the kitchen play area we got out lots of food and found today that the food has a new home in four large red buckets so we can get it out anytime we wish. We headed for the park early again today to try and avoid the main heat of the day. It was still hot in the park but we made sure we took our hats and water bottles too. When we came back from the park we read a book together titled ‘The Apple Pie Tree’. When we asked the children if apple pie grows on trees they all laughed and said “No, apples grow on trees”. Goh San then arrived and introduced the children to today’s country and cooking, Singapore. First we looked at a map of Asia and identified where Singapore is. Next we saw the Singapore flag and counted how many stars there are on the flag. Taylor then counted for us in English up to 10 followed by Jessica, Jenny and Jeremy in Chinese. They all did really well and we all had a try at counting to 10 in Chinese. Goh san then introduced us to a few songs in Chinese. The first one was sung to the tune of ‘Where is Thumbkin’ and the second one well knew as it was ‘twinkle, twinkle little star’. We sang along as best we could in Chinese to this. Goh San then opened and read a book titled ‘Bringing in the New Year’ which showed us all the things people do to celebrate the New Year. There were lots of things in the book such as sweeping away the bad luck, Lanterns, making gyoza, getting a haircut, putting on new clothes, lighting fireworks, and wearing lions masks. There was even a dragon to celebrate the New Years arrival. At the table Ayaka had set up all the ingredients to make some yummy Singapore food called Meefun which is made from noodles, oil, ham, bacon, cabbage, carrot and soy sauce. We cut the ingredients ourselves and then cooked it all in a big pan. After we finished our lunch we tried it and it was so yummy. In the afternoon we used the card box we decorated to try and identify the kind of food hidden within without using our eyes. It was great fun and we managed to identify the coffee beans, and the uncooked rice using only our hands. All our Love, Darren, Ayaka, Sharee and Goh San