There are times in everyone’s lives when they wish their memories had failed them and nothing was registered. This has been definitely one of those months for Henry, as he spent nearly the entire time battling an off-and-on cold, cough, fever and throat infection. He’s gone to the hospital five times, each time for more medicine – a veritable cocktail of drugs – and as I write this he still coughs badly. Doctors say that if we hadn’t given him all the medicine, he would certainly have developed pneumonia by now. Giving medicine to a child is always tricky, doing it with an indefinite end is worse, but stopping and starting again is the most cruel. Poor Henry.

Despite the illnesses, Qilin did manage to get into school for a few days this month (although we had to pay for every missed day too!). He loves class, his friends, the toys, even his teachers, and he is very excited to get there (once we drag him from his bed). Henry loves to sleep, he loves everything about his bed. Waking him from a slumber is a dangerous business, arms flailing and shouting as if from an adult.

To be fair, Henry can have a really bad temper when he wants to, and is quite aggressive with other kids. There’s something about other children looking at him that bothers him, and playschool has taught him a few bad habits (kicking and stamping on feet), so we hope it’s only a phase and he’ll become the same cute kid he was before. That’s not to say that he’s like this all the time, but he is certainly a toughie when the mood takes him and has the advantage of size over others. We’ve wondered if when we ask him to ‘be kind’ he has misconstrued our meaning and assumes we mean ‘get fighting!’ We’ll wait and see, trying hard to control him seriously without being too tough lest he copies our actions.

Qilin’s language is under continual development. He loves to talk, mostly Chinese, and can ask leading questions like 'zhe shi shenme' or 'what's this?' He seems to enjoy learning and is now making up his own sentences like 'wo yao gan mao si le' (I'm dying of being ill). He also says 'mama, bang wo zuo yi xia' (mummy, help me sit down), and lot's of negatives like bu yao (don’t want), bu chi (don’t eat), and bu keyi (not okay). But most interesting is that he clearly recognises the difference between the languages and changes depending on who he talks to. We’ve mentioned this before but it is becoming very defined now – when told the name of something in one language he will look to the other parent to learn it’s alternative. Nice examples of duel language are when he asks mummy to 'qi chuan' and tells daddy to 'get up,' or if he wants a bath, he tells mummy 'wo yao xi zao' and daddy 'daddy bath?'

Qilin sometimes uses his hands for descriptions, like sizes of his fingers and to convey ‘open and closed’ with his fist. He even gives names to his digits, starting with the little finger as Henry himself. Next is mummy, then daddy, Lily, and the thumb is his best friend and bully-tool Zhang Yinghan.

And finally, Henry loves watching Simpsons and a Chinese cartoon called Xi Yang Yang. He knows the names of the characters and understands the running jokes such as how the angry female wolf always hits her husband with a frying pan. He made us laugh once when, after he saw mummy holding the wok, said ‘wife, don’t hit me’ in Chinese (just like the poor male wolf). He might be sometimes a furious boy, but most of the time he’s still a lovely chap and a total charmer.