How to survive long road trips with kids without an iPad

Taking a break from the journey to run, jump and swim! Endau beach.

We travel in a second-hand 7-seater van roti (as my friends have kindly christened my beloved Renault Kangoo Famille in apple green with leather seat interiors). And our car is not fitted with DVD players, but just your standard stereo system and two car seats for the kids. We don't have smart phones, tablets, PSP, Wii, or any of those stuff.

For short distances, we go really low-tech!

When we travel, we usually start out with me in the front passenger seat, but an hour down the road, my presence is requested in the back by two very persuasive kids. So, I'm squeezed in between my two kids (aged 6 and 3 years) in the back seat. My husband continues the drive accompanied by a basket filled with milk powder, water, hot water flask etc. in the front passenger seat.

The boot area is cramped with our luggage bags, travel mattresses, blankets and pillows. And yes, we also travel with Buzz Lightyear, several versions of Ultraman and Baby Alive, and at least one ukulele. If there's extra space, my husband squeezes in his painting materials -- brushes, colours, canvas. Me? I only need a small space to cram my one novel in.

The floor space at our feet is littered with slippers and shoes and more baskets filled with snacks and other stuff. Sometimes, if I remember, I bring a small pail for those emergency nature calls by the young ones. Then there are five types of tissue that we must stock up for every trip -- wet wipes, toilet paper, facial tissue, pocket tissue and kitchen rolls. Don't ask me why I need them all but it's a mom thing, okay.

So ok the whole situation is not ideal -- it's not business class on Malaysia Airlines -- but we make do. Bob Dylan on the radio lifts our spirits up.

We've traveled like this on several occasions to Parit in Perak most recently for the Hari Raya holidays, to Lumut as well for a weekend holiday when we drove up from KL along the coastal road. We've traveled to Melaka, Penang, and to Kuantan and Kuala Terengganu on the old trunk roads on our way to Pulau Perhentian, and also to Mersing and southwards to Johor Bahru to visit Legoland.

Great driver, great father, great husband!

So how did we manage without iPads, without in-car movie systems, without smart phones, etc? I'm not a super mom by any means, but I just try to take it one moment at a time, and face whatever challenge -- and joy -- as it presents itself.

It helps that I have a great husband at the wheel and he is a responsible, capable and patient driver (not to mention, a really fun dad!), and two well-traveled and cooperative children with me whom I can reason with and whom I deeply respect as mini versions of adults.

Every journey starts out daunting in my mind, but we survive and more than survive, we enjoy every minute of it along the way!

Here's how we've done it:

1. Oral Story-telling

Good behavior gets rewarded!

My kids are always pestering me for stories about their grandfather, their aunts, and about me and my husband. Maryam will say, "Please tell me a story from your mouth." It sounds so cute, I have never corrected the mistake!

But honestly, oral storytelling is an art. I remember primary school days when my teacher used to tell me aesop fable stories and how fascinated we all were, clinging to her every word.

When I try to do it with my kids, it's really an exercise in spontaneous entertainment and a test of memory (none of which I'm blessed with -- I have the most horrible long-term memory bank ever that I believe I must have gotten a bad concussion somewhere along my childhood years).

Most times, I just embellish the truth to make the stories interesting and more dramatic even though Musa will warn me, "Tell me a true story."

I think it's a great way for kids to connect with their family members and also for you as a storyteller to remember the past.



Licence to eat anything when kids are on holiday!

2. Music

Although I don't listen to the radio and prefer driving in silence (call me boring, I know), sometimes, I'll indulge the kids with the occasional rock songs. We love Eric Clapton, Bob Dylan and those hard guitar riffs and drumbeats. I also find Yusuf Islam's "I Look I See" music very nice and I love it when the kids sing along.

3. Lots of snacks

When we're on holiday, the kids have a special licence to eat. They know that they can eat anything they want -- meaning: junk food -- and somehow, they're forever hungry in the car! During the journey, there's always a balance of good and not-so-good stuff stashed in the car -- crackers, fruits, nuts, buns, pasta or fried rice, keropok, etc. -- mostly crunchy stuff which they love. While stuff like Cocoa Crunch, chips and chocolates are for them to have as snacks at the holiday destination.

4. Books

Reading in a moving vehicle usually gives me a headache but picture books or books with few and large type are still ok. We'll look at the picture on the page and I'll ask the kids questions about what they think is the story behind the pictures, or what will happen next in the following pages. Maryam, coz she's younger, loves "lift the flap" type books while Musa is a bit more discerning and enjoys a good story.

Definitely not a stud car.

5. Toys

We pack a few favourite toys during our journey. Musa is happy to have an action figure which he can act out some fantasy scene in his head. One of the toy brands I love is the Leapfrog which has a whole range of fun and educational toys. We always bring the Leapfrog books and the reader pen in the car for their independent exploration and learning.

6. Toilet stops

And that's the reason for a simple 3-hour journey to stretch to six hours. In a convoy, we're usually the first to leave and the last to arrive. RnR stops along the way are frequent and last 40-60 minutes each with trips to the toilet and patiently waiting for the kids to finish their meals. When we're traveling along old trunk roads, we love stopping at the local warung or just making impromptu stops at any beautiful locations or interesting attraction. It's a chance for all of us to stretch our legs and jump about!

7. Sleep

I will tell my kids that we would reach there in two hour's time, say, and that if they took a nap in the car, by the time they woke up, we would have reached our destination. So encourage your children to nap in the car and you'll have a far peaceful ride.

8. Conversations

I remember as a kid that I always wanted to join in my parents' conversations. I didn't want to be left out of all the stuff they were talking about. And it's the same with my kids. When I'm talking to my husband, my kids will interrupt and say, "What? What did you say to Ayah?" Instead of berating them for interrupting, I try to explain to them in simple terms about the topic of conversation. Sometimes, they will give their opinion or feedback about it and I'm always surprised at the mature insights they share with me!

9. Lots of cuddles

Being in such close quarters with each other, you just can't help but give each other kisses, hugs and cuddles every now and then. My kids are, for the most part, great traveling companions. They have no issues about staying strapped in their car seats for hours on end and physical endearments are freely given out just to let them know we appreciate their patience and tolerance on these road trips.

Having said all that, I do have to add that my kids whine a fair share -- are we there yet? can i have another story? i'm bored, etc. It can be distressing but I try to minimise it by giving them a pep talk about the trip and expected behaviours even days or weeks before we go on the actual trip. Frequent reminders about the trip -- both the challenges of the journey and the excitement of reaching our final destination -- usually help the kids to know what to expect and mentally prepare for it.
With that, good luck on the next low-tech journey you embark with your kids!



Yay, we made it. Kuala Besut, Terengganu

Some new poems

Love, part one

Yesterday evening
sitting in mozzie-infested garden
green with lush leaves tended to by your loving hands,
we talked as we always do.

How was your day
Were the kids ok
What did you have for lunch?

By the way, I'm doing up my will today;
When I die, you can have my Kenari.

You laughed -- at the thought of the beat-up gift,
not at me dying. I don't want you to die. I'd be depressed.

Me, too, I said.

And then, it was awkward for a while. A long silence
as we contemplated our mortal, vulnerable lives
and living one without the other.



Love, part two

You impress me
with your socio-politico-speak
well-thought observations about
Tun, Najib, DSAI.

I would not envy to be
your debating punching bag, dear,
you have an answer to everything.

I am contented to be your bedroom partner.

Home-Made Volcano Experiment

This ugly thing right here is supposed to be spectacular volcano
about to erupt and create havoc on all mankind!

This year, I decided to buy more learning books for my kids, as opposed to story books and picture books (which I love, by the way!).

One of the things I wanted to teach my kids is about the world, the different people and cultures around us, their food, their festivals, their beliefs, etc. Other stuff I immediately wanted them to know are about Egyptians and dinosaurs, simply because these are quite popular topics and there are lots of references on them.

We now have a huge National Geographic book at home which takes a look at world maps, and analyses different continents, countries and peoples -- it's our reference book every few nights (or when Mama has the energy after work to "teach"!).

Maryam immediately took to wanting to learn about Egyptians while Musa was keen about the volcanoes. From looking at pictures of volcanoes in the book, we went online to youtube to see some pictures of eruptions and the flow of red lava. There are many great visuals there to hold a child's interest.

From there, we went on to see other videos of home-made volcanoes. It was Musa who clicked on the tutorials on volcano-making and insisted that his Mama and Ayah watched together. He's been insisting that we buy the "ingredients" to make the volcano experiment at home since.

So last night, that's exactly what we did. Very easy to do actually. Total cost was less than RM40 to make 2 volcanoes -- one for Musa and one for Maryam. And we did the project in about an hour and a half.

I wanted it to be a re-usable volcano, so decided to build the volcano on a styrofoam board -- something water-proof that could be washed over and over again.

For the cavity of the mountain, we used plastic cups. We then plastered the clay around it to make it look like a mountain. Clay used was the cheap plasticine which costs about RM1.20 a pack. We bought 11 packs to make two mountains.

Tip: to make it easy to build your mountain, work by putting clay on the rim of the cup and work your way down from there, finally "pasting" the bottom of the cup to the styrofoam board.

The styrofoam board was pre-cut to fit into a plastic basin so that later when the lava spills out of the mountain, it is all contained in the basin and you won't have so much mess to clean up.

We decorated the styrofoam board to make it look like a village at the bottom of the mountain -- there were houses, a sheep and a tree, etc. You can use real leaves, stones and wooden bark to make it more realistic.

When the "scene" was ready, we dunked in a whole tub of baking powder into the cavity of the mountain, added some orange food colouring for effect, and the kids poured in the vinegar to start the eruption process. (Apparently, you can also create the same effect with diet Coke which is less sticky than Coke and mentos original flavour).

Because the whole thing was water-proof, we could do it over and over again. We'll probably do it again tonight! So excuse us, we've got some villages to destroy with our red hot lava!