Look Alike Logo

We are hooked on the Australian Open. In fact at this moment, Novak Djokovic and Rafael Nadal have been playing the Finals for over 4 hours.

When MyGirlfirst saw the logo on Djokovic's clothes last week, she said, "Isn't that the logo of Terumo?"

(Terumo is where one of her uncle works. He gave us a green bag with the Terumo logo.)

Well, there is SOME similarity but I think the two companies are really in different leagues.

Junior Chess

RD joined a one day tournament last week and a two-day chess tournament this week. Last week, he won 5 out of 8 games, placing 23rd/135. For the two day tournament, he was tied with eleven other players winning 7.5 games out of 12, placing 18th/123.

Below are the scores and ratings (along with the players ages) for this week's games so you can get an idea of how he fared against the other players.

At the moment, his rating is 629. He won against someone rated 844 and another one rated 759. He beat an eight year old. (Oh, but that 8-yr old was the one with a rating of 759.)

Apparently, the playing tables are assigned board numbers. The higher the board, the better the players. He managed to reach Board 2 (after he won three games in a row). So he went from board 25 --> 24 --> 4 --> 5 --> 2 --> 5 --> 20-something for the rest of the games. At board 2, he played against the #1 player in this round, who had won 10 out of the 12 games, lost one and drew another.

No  Age Ranking Score   1     2     3     4     5     6     7     8     9    10    11    12  

1   15     870 10.5   56:W  25:W  15:W  12:W  20:W   4:W   3:W   2:L   7:W   6:D  14:W  10:W

6   15     816 8.5    63:W  43:L  77:W  34:W  35:W  20:W   2:L  25:W  30:W   1:D   5:W   7:L
13  13     844 8      96:W  39:W  20:L  33:L  77:W  21:D 112:+  35:W  15:W 106:W   2:L   9:D
20  14     629 7.5    89:W  28:W  13:W  42:W   1:L   6:L  21:L  37:L  72:W  45:D  69:W  48:W
21  14     503 7.5    88:W  30:L  66:W  38:W  24:D  13:D  20:W  19:D  42:L  34:D  40:W  18:D
28  16     481 7.5   122:W  20:L 123:W  25:L  62:D  80:W  24:W  10:L  39:W  35:L  81:W  46:W 
37  12     518 7      60:W  11:L  62:L 108:W 102:W  25:L  50:W  20:W  12:L  41:W  34:L  64:W
42  08     759 6.5    51:W  33:W  46:W  20:L  25:W  15:D  67:W   7:L  21:W  14:L  22:L  26:L
45  12     497 6.5    94:W  24:W  11:L  46:L  65:W  36:W  25:L  54:W  38:L  20:D  67:W  30:L
48  17         6.5    27:W  38:L  23:L  51:W 120:D  78:L  80:L  94:W  82:W  49:W  54:W  20:L
69  14     556 5.5   103:W  14:L  91:W   5:L  96:W  41:L  74:D  82:W  23:L  51:W  20:L  50:-
72  12     457 5.5     7:L  98:W  24:L 121:W  10:L 119:W  36:L  99:W  20:L 105:W  50:D  49:L 
89  07     362 5      20:L  94:D 120:L  86:L  99:L 111:W  66:L 122:W  84:L 110:W  88:D  97:W

      
   
Place
   
Age
   
Ranking
   
Score
  
  
   
   
   
   
  
  
   
1
   
15
   
870
   
10.5
  
  
   
2
   
16
   
879
   
10
  
  
   
3
   
13
   
832
   
9.5
  
  
   
4-7
   
15
   
819
   
8.5
  
  
   
   
15
   
807
   
8.5
  
  
   
   
15
   
816
   
8.5
  
  
   
   
16
   
857
   
8.5
  
  
   
8-17
   
13
   
714
   
8
  
  
   
   
13
   
748
   
8
  
  
   
   
13
   
713
   
8
  
  
   
   
11
   
676
   
8
  
  
   
   
15
   
745
   
8
  
  
   
   
13
   
844
   
8
  
  
   
   
13
   
766
   
8
  
  
   
   
12
   
657
   
8
  
  
   
   
13
   
808
   
8
  
  
   
   
13
   
802
   
8
  
  
   
18-28
   
13
   
632
   
7.5
  
  
   
   
13
   
699
   
7.5
  
  
   
   
14
   
629
   
7.5
  
  
   
   
14
   
503
   
7.5
  
  
   
   
15
   
666
   
7.5
  
  
   
   
10
   
521
   
7.5
  
  
   
   
14
   
646
   
7.5
  
  
   
   
15
   
614
   
7.5
  
  
   
   
12
   
548
   
7.5
  
  
   
   
12
   
524
   
7.5
  
  
   
   
16
   
481
   
7.5
  

Off to University Soon

What can I say? Nothing we say or do will turn back time. My little baby is now heading off to Uni.

GI took his High School Certificate (HSC) exams last October for his chosen HS courses (subjects). All of the year 12 students in Australia who are interested in going to college have to take their HSC exams. The scores they get are used to calculate their ATAR (Australian Tertiary Admission Rank), which is what is used by institutions to rank and select school leavers for admission. The ATAR is a rank that allows comparison of students who have completed different combinations of HSC courses. A student may seem like an average student at his current high school but he could be much better when compared with other students from other schools. The ATAR sort of evens out the playing field across schools since depending on your chosen HS courses, you take the same HSC exams.

The students are supposed to indicate their top ten choices of courses and schools, then depending on your ATAR, you may or may not get offered by the institution of your choice.

GI's first choice was Bachelor of Science in Information Technology at UTS, City Campus and he got his offer yesterday. (Hurrah for GI!)

On the same day, his first cousin got HIS offer for the course of his choice (Bachelor of Arts in Contemporary Music) at Macquarie University and the daughter of a good friend got HER offer in Biomedical Science at University of Western Australia over at Perth. After I shared the news of GI getting his offer, another good friend relayed that her son passed the entrance exams for UP Diliman, Ateneo and UST.

Hip, hip, hurrah! Hip, hip, hurrah! Hip, hip, hurrah!

This calls for celebration.

Good luck to our college kids.

The Proof is in the Pudding

One of the first decisions I had to make for the New Year was what to make for breakfast.

"Sweet. You need to make something sweet first thing."

At least that's what my mother used to say at 6am on New Year's Day when I would find her in the kitchen and I'd ask what she was making. I know this is just one of the many superstitions that get passed down from generation to generation but still...

So something sweet it will be.

I checked the ref and found some condensed milk left over.

What to do? What to do?

I decided to make some French Toast using our tried and true French Toast recipe .

I brought out the condensed milk and the eggs, then looked for bread. I found two loaves -- one was White Sandwich bread, the other was White Toast.

Now there is no such thing as "toast bread" in the home country. Sliced bread is sliced bread (aka Tasty). "Toast" to me meant sliced bread that was toasted.

The kids have been bringing sandwiches to school for lunch ever since we arrived so we have always bought sandwich bread (go figure). Recently, when there were no sandwich bread loaves left in the shelves, we picked up the toast and discovered that toast bread was not exactly equal to sandwich bread. Toast in other countries is actually slightly thicker sliced bread.

So, given that I had decided on French Toast, the next question was 'sandwich bread or toast bread'?

Hhmmm ... sandwich or toast? toast or sandwich?

I might have been able to make more pieces using the sandwich bread but I figured it was New Year and the dish IS called French TOAST, so toast bread it is!

What a good decision that was. The French toast this morning for breakfast was yummy!

(Yes, I know ... calories! calories! and on the first day of the year, no less.)

Brighter New Year

Happy New Year to one and all!

The glow sticks we got for Earth Hour 2011 were brought out and used last New Year's Eve. MyGirl was quite excited to share them with her cousins and with the cousins' cousins during our usual Saturday night family gathering at the Parkway. She counted that there would be enough for each child to have two glow sticks. She promptly went around and let them choose their colours before midnight.

The kids had great fun armed with their glow sticks, sparklers and the party poppers.

The party poppers provided a moment of surprise and left a lot of confetti on the ground. The sparklers were lit for a bit longer and enabled everyone to display some fireworks before the sparks ran out leaving a piece of wire and ignited chemicals that promptly got tossed in the bin. The glow sticks, on the other hand, were still glowing long after everyone came back inside the house.

May 2012 be more like the glow stick, bright and colourful long after New Year's Eve.

(These are some of the pictures we took in the car on our way home at 2am. MyGirl and one of her other cousins were the happy recipients of the others' glow sticks after the sparklers and the party poppers had ran out.)