Do you want to go to the airport ...?

Well, these were the words of the taxi driver when he arrived at lobby four at our home address on Wednesday evening. Katrin's waters had broken about half an hour earlier, so we had called a taxi to take us to the hospital. "To the hospital, please" was our reply to the taxi driver, as Katrin with a very round tummy slipped into the back of the cab. Our bag must have confused him.
The confusion continued at the emergency ward, the nurse asked why we were here and Katrin replied, that her waters had broken. He asked, how far along in the pregnancy she were and if she had any labour. Less than two weeks short of her due date and no labour pain was the reply. "So why are you here?", was his comment. Katrin again said that her water had broken and then some action took place. A wheelchair was brought and a fragile looking nurse pushed Katrin to the lift and further on to the labour ward, it was quite a few uphill stretches in this journey and Katrin felt sorry for the nurse, but this wasn't her first time obviously!
To make a long story short-ish: During the night labour started but in an irregular pattern. When Katrin arrived she was 2.5 cm dilated, in the morning it was still only 3 cm. Dr. Yam (our obstetrician) wasn't very happy, he feared the Caesarean scar won't stand this test if he was to induce Katrin, but to wait was heightening the risk of an infection since the waters had broken. He agreed to give us 45min of walking around to start labour properly - and Katrin had been so proud to be able to breath through those labour. Not much difference 45min later, so the drip started with half the normal dose. Around lunch time we had reached 4 cm and the intensity was almost too much for Katrin to cope. A nurse coming in took one look at the situation and then said, in her opinion the baby is posterior and after an examination, she was sure of it. So Katrin was told to try being on hands and feet, but that wasn't much better. Next time Dr. Yam came in he saw only two options: Epidural or Caesarean. Since one needs an epidural to perform a c-section, we went with an epidural first. By the time the anaesthetist came (around 3pm) Katrin was 8 cm dilated. The anaesthetist administered the epidural quickly and Katrin knew why one of the nurses called epidural "happydural". What a bliss and what seemed only minutes later Katrin was told to push and there she was:
SOPHIE CHARLOTTE JENNA
Charlotte is Katrin's mum's second name and Jenna is a deviation of Karsten's mum's second name.
Her profile:
Born: 05.01.12 at 3:49pm, weight: 3560g, length: 51.5cm and despite been born in Singapore she is Caucasian ;-)

For those of you who are super sleuth: We didn't leave the children alone at home. Being-Wan or her helper came and stayed with them. They did a fantastic job in reassuring and feeding the children.
In the evening Katrin and Sophie were taken to the maternity ward and Karsten went home. Before been taken up to the ward, the nurse said she would give a bath we thought to the baby, but she was then bathing Katrin, what a very nice service!
In the room there was already another patient with a lot of people around, quite a racket, but at 8pm they all left and only her TV was still running. Katrin couldn't see her, because both beds were surrounded by drawn curtains and due to the epidural Katrin needed to stay lying for at least 8 hours.
The next morning Katrin wanted to be discharged, which was fine by her obstetrician, but we had to wait for Sophie's blood group test. If she would be Rh + like Karsten, Katrin would have needed an antidote, as she is Rh-. The first test - taken from the cord blood - showed the same blood group as Katrin. But to be sure they wanted a control test, which was never needed before. Rh- is very rare in Asian people (that's why the AntiD syringe Katrin had to buy here was so expensive, whereas it wasn't an issue in Australia or Germany). It took till the evening for the results to come back confirming the earlier test. It was great that Karsten and the children came with Being-Wan to see and cuddle Sophie and it was also good that they left after some time and didn't wait for Katrin and Sophie to be ready to come home. They would have gotten cabin fever waiting all day. That is one thing we discovered here, not many things are done in a rush, which has it's advantages and disadvantages I guess. Interesting for Katrin was also even though many different people came to see Katrin (from nurses and paediatrician to lactation consultant, customer service,
hearing test nurse and others) there was no physiotherapist amongst them - maybe if she had stayed the two days. The smallest package for booking into the hospital was two days, one day would still cost the same.
Karsten, Katrin and Sophie were chauffeued home by a complimentary limousine service by the hospital, very thoughtful.

It was very nice to be back home!

Saturday was a very quiet day with lots of sleep for Katrin, Sophie and Karsten (who didn't get much sleep neither on Wednesday nor Thursday night). Pool, tennis and entertainment for the children. Late in the evening Katie H. arrived from Australia. She kindly agreed to help us in the first few weeks to settle into school and newborn baby. We are truly blessed.

Sunday was also quiet. The children enjoyed holding Sophie, we nearly set up a roster! We also had to get ready for school, which wasn't as intensive as it would have been back in Australia. Firstly because only 3 not 5 children go to school and also because, the books and textbooks provided at school for Esther and Michael. Jonas' supply was wrapped the German way with easy slip on plastic covers, so mainly the labelling was needed.

Monday was the "big" day for the three "big" children. Karsten went with Jonas to his campus. They left shortly after 7am to be there before 7:45am, on the way they overtook a student wearing the same school uniform. He later drove past in a taxi, stopped and asked if Jonas wanted a lift - what a start!
Michael and Esther were accompanied by the rest of the family who took conveniently the bus. A few chores needed to be done: We had to pre pay for this month's canteen meals for Esther, which can only be paid in cash or cheque. It seems that the main payment method is cheque except at the supermarkets and bigger shops. Then we purchased two school hats - one size fits all baseball caps, hm, sun protection is taken much more serious in Australia. One of the teachers even said that there is no rush to buy the hats, the children could still play outside without them.

On the funny side we saw some monkeys climbing on the school fence - well no, it wasn't David, Yannic nor Noah! ;-) In the school's handbook we read that the children have to watch out for monkeys who like to steal the lunch boxes or backpacks and disappear with them over the fence into the jungle...

 Monkeys?

Found the monkey?

Esther's class teacher is Mr. Landrum and seems to be very friendly and kind, there are 11 girls and 9 boys in her class - what a difference to last year's class!
Michael's class teacher is Ms Carroll, who also is very welcoming and caring.
Each year level has two to three German and two to three English speaking classes.
Back home David, Yannic and Noah did their school work and in the afternoon Katrin took Sophie to see the paediatrician, David and Yannic came along, - all is fine according to Dr. Y. Y. Yip (just read that name aloud!). To have the heel prick test (Guthrie Test) done we needed to go to the laboratory on a different level. The paediatrician has his rooms also next to the hospital (Gleneagles) like Katrin's obstetrician. The receptionist verified the referral, apparently we had the wrong form. A little while later, they could perform the test and David and Yannic gave advice on how to comfort Sophie. Then the receptionist set to work regarding the bill, in the end we had to go along a few corridors, downstairs through to the main office of the laboratory where again we waited - seems to be a great lesson in patience, living in Singapore! Finally we were able to pay, again a nice little sum, I guess this test is also a rather Western tradition. We took the bus home after we had the luxury of taking a taxi to the hospital due to the starting rain. In the bus we sat next to a young man, who tried to get some contact in order for him to become Australian citizen, a bit bizarre. Good to be back home!

Happy birthday could be heard onTuesday in the Schulz home, t'is was the day of Esther's birthday. Both our girls are born just a few days apart!

It was also a busier day than we expected. Esther is learning to play a string instrument through school and needed a cheque as a security for the instrument. Since we don't have a cheque account and therefore no cheque book, we thought that Katrin could quickly get a cheque book at the bank, which seems to be a more common way of payment and more convenient than getting cash from the ATM. Off we all (Katie, David, Yannic, Noah, Sophie and Katrin) went to the shopping centre. We went to the bank, and were told to go to the main hall to get a cash cheque or for Katrin to come back with Karsten in order to open a cheque account. Katrin has a dependent pass due to Karsten's work, so he is needed too. Going into the hall, there was a queue like at the airport check in. On the very right sight was Priority Banking, on the very left side was business accounts and the three counters in the middle served the rest of customers. Katie took all the children for a walk around in the centre, whilst Katrin queued up. After a few minutes a lady joined the queue. Katrin asked her if it was always that crowded which she confirmed adding "Welcome to Singapore", well we had had some taste of this. After a few more minutes without any progress, Katrin left the bank to do the grocery shopping hoping that afterwards it might be less crowded at the bank. One and a half hours later Katrin returned to the bank to the same situation just different people waiting. The lady who came after Katrin was in fifth position now, nearly there to be served but clearly annoyed. Katrin waited for a few minutes then decided to ask how to be eligible for Priority Banking. So she went to the counter at the entrance and was told that you have to have $200 000 in your account as a foreigner, so back she went... Then God moved the hearts of the clerk at the entrance and he had her sit in a waiting room, handing her a form to fill out for the cash cheque. After a while a lady came and escorted Katrin into her office. In 5 minutes the formalities were sufficed and Katrin had the cheque. The clerk asked how far along Katrin's pregnancy were - Praise the Lord for Katrin's baby belly! Meanwhile Katie and the children were waiting in the taxi queue, which was quite long too due to the rain. But they had a taxi even before Katrin was finished in the bank. All that time, more than two hours, Sophie slept happily on Katie's arm. Once again everybody was glad to be home again!
Esther came home happily with a Viola, she played a bit and everybody wanted to have a go too. Quite a racket!

Wednesday came, Jonas walked to school as before, Michael and Esther took the public bus with Katie and planned to come back on their own (which went well). After schooling for David and Yannic and Noah, who takes his sticker book activity very serious, all of them with Sophie and Katie went to Tanglin Mall at the beginning of Orchard Road to have Sophie's passport photo taken. The Australian High Commission recommended that particular photo shop. Tanglin Mall is only two bus stops away from the Gleneagles Hospital. Sophie was sound asleep when we arrived at the photo shop, what a shame to wake her and what hard work! But the staff there was fantastic and we got a good shot, open eyes and no crying! But the Singaporean lesson hit us again (patience) - we had to wait for the photos, they would be ready in a week. After some discussion, we arranged pick up for Monday providing they have texted us to say it is ready and also the pick up is in a different mall a bit further down the road (Forum Mall, where we went to the huge Toys'r'Us and which has lots of kid's related shops). Oh well, off we went to have some late morning tea at Starbucks ;-)
Michael went on an excursion to an organic farm and he managed to take over one hundred photos! His year level is preparing for an in depth study on the topic of recycling and waste which will cumulate in an exhibition in a few weeks. On Thursday they are going to Marina Barrage (a dam at the mouth of the Marina Channel to create a reservoir,  http://www.pub.gov.sg/Marina/Pages/default.aspx) and to a water plant to learn about recycled water.

Thursday was now a home day - wow what a first week for Sophie! But she took it all in her stride, sleeping and feeding and filling nappies! She is the darling of all, even Jonas comes and happily carries her around - which looks great, he is so grown up and she is so tiny! The children marvel at her tiny feet and toes.
Jonas has quite a challenging time to catch up with his class, but he raises to the occasion and thrives. Most of his class mates are turning 16 years old this year, so he the youngest. Karsten loves to sit down with him in the evening to go over Maths or Physics homework.

Friday was busy again, Katie took on the homeschooling of the boys and Katrin took Sophie first to a Coffee Morning for new parents of GESS (Jonas, Michael and Esther's school) and then for her check up with her obstetrician, who said he had anticipated a very fast delivery, but it turned out to be Katrin's second longest labour, go figure! All is well though - thank God!
The first week of school went well for all children, the bigger ones made new friends and settled very quickly into their new school environment. Apparently the teachers of the other year level classes at the primary campus told their classes what new children have joined, so they know their names and can make them feel welcomed. The younger ones applied themselves also well to their new schooling experience. Good on them ;-)