The Day!

It feels so strange to be married, although I've surprised myself by not shedding a single tear throughout the whole day until I was eventually overcome by emotions when I climbed into bed at 9pm after I washed off the can of hairspray in my beehive and my coat of make-up. There I sobbed uncontrollably in my husband's arms, although I was unsure what I was crying for.

I started the day at 5.30am with hair and make-up lady coming to get me ready. The groom and his male entourage arrived at my place at 7am and had to pass a series of games and tasks (such as reciting Mandarin passages) before my bridesmaids allowed him upstairs to my room to see me and present me with my hand bouquet. We then went to the temple together for a short blessing ceremony before heading to the hotel for the solemnisation.

I was so nervous walking down the steps with the girls and Mum, but it was lovely seeing all my friends and family who filled up the seats and wore bright happy smiles. I thought I would cry during the solemnisation ceremony, but it was over pretty quickly and I remained dry-eyed throughout.

The most fun part was tossing my bridal bouquet after we got married. R kept saying I would drop it on the ground behind me because I was so poor at throwing so I made sure I used all my strength and in the end W, who was right at the back, caught the bouquet! She hasn't got a boyfriend at the moment, but I'm hoping this will bring her luck and lead her to the right guy.

I enjoyed the cake-cutting and traditional Yum Seng, and had a lot of fun making a speech. Although I thought I would be nervous, I wasn't in front of so many people, and really took the time to enjoy myself and say what I wanted to say. I also relaxed and enjoyed the speeches my bridesmaids made, they were so nice and full of praise for me.

I didn't really have to the time to change or eat because I wanted to spend time with all my guests and made sure they didn't feel left out. Even with just 50 people, I found it hard to give proper attention to everyone so I really have no idea how people with 300 guests do it!

I was glad it turned out, like we wanted, to be a very informal event and guests left as and when they wanted. M and D even stayed back in our hotel room till 8pm, chatting with us over champagne and fruit, compliments of the hotel. The room was frankly pretty luxurious and one of the best we've ever stayed in. If you are curious about what we did on the wedding night- the answer is "nothing much"! We fell asleep at 10pm and didn't get up til 10am, almost missing breakfast! We were really too tired.

After a relaxing morning and a terrific breakfast this morning (it included a honeycomb for toast!) we longingly departed after a late checkout. Tomorrow we will leave for Hanoi, Vietnam for a 5-day holiday.

If you want to read more about our lives together, please visit my other blog.

p.s. Thank you for coming to our little luncheon, we were very happy to have had you there! :)
p.p.s Thank you my beautiful bridesmaids for being such a GREAT help! Love you girls!

The Eve

Tonight is my last night as a single girl! How scary!

In the morning R came at 0915 with the betrothal gifts. My mother cut and shared the cake and returned one box of wedding cookies, a few oranges and half of the dowry to him. At 1020, the girls and I left for the hotel for the rehearsal. I had with me bags and bags and bags of items for the hotel staff to lay out in the morning. We didn't finish till 1300 and went over to VivoCity for a quick catch-up and last-minute briefing over lunch.

At 1500, I went to Orchard Road to do my nails with H, and following that I went to pick up my bridal bouquet while H decided to go and get her hair done. The florist did a good job and put together a bouquet which suited our garden theme. The bridesmaids' bouquets also looked very pretty and so did R's corsage.

When I came home, I discovered that my ex-colleague Z had dropped off a gift for me. It was a pair of beautiful diamond earrings and a very pretty handwritten note with her well-wishes and advice. It was such an unexpected surprise and I thought it was a very sweet, thoughtful and generous gesture.

I also received a necklace from my aunt with very interesting diamonds cut in the shape of stars when seen under a magnifier. It is so pretty I've decided to wear it tomorrow.

In the evening R came over to my place for dinner and we had mooncakes, tea and pomelo. He bought me a rabbit lantern and we went for a walk around the neighbourhood and we thought we had the prettiest one compared with the others that the kids were carrying.

After dropping him off at the flat at 2130, we headed home and I spent some time preparing the items I needed for tomorrow as well as for the overnight stay at the hotel. It's now 2330 and I've done well.

I think I will try to get some sleep before I have to get up at 0500 to wait for the make-up artist.

I'm so nervous! I hope it will be good, cool weather tomorrow and everything goes well.

Day 1: ROM

I slept for 5 hours and got up at 6.30am to get ready to meet R and head to the Registry of Marriages to collected our Certificate. We wanted to get there to beat the queue so we arrived at 8.15am, 15 minutes before the office opened. There were already 4 other couples in front of us. I made sure we brought along all the right documents.

When the shutters began to roll back slowly on the dot at 8.30am, none of the couples made a move so we quickly walked up and took a queue number. In the end we were the first couple to be seen despite arriving later than some. We still don't know why they didn't step forward when the doors were open. Last minute hesitation?

The process took 10 minutes, and it involved checking our identification and taking an oath to state we made no false declarations. By 8:42am we were out of ROM and walking toward City Hall where I needed to go to the bank to get some cash.

We also grabbed a coffee and orange juice at McDonald's before heading toward IKEA in Tampines to get some red new bedsheets, as instructed by my mother. I had lunch at IKEA while R had a drink and then I had to go to have my facial. My beautician was extra gentle and careful while she was extracting the impurities from my face to make sure she didn't leave me scarred on my big day.

In the evening I helped R prepare the items for his Guo Da Li ceremony (2 red packets, 1 cake, 2 boxes of Xi Bing (wedding cookies), a few Mandarin oranges and a round red tray). He will take all these to my place tomorrow morning. R also had a haircut at the neighbourhood salon.

My Mum picked me up after this to head to Tampines Mall where she wanted me to pick some jewellery as her gift to me. I thought of going for a bracelet but in the end I chose a pair of earrings and a ring.

There were some problems with my phone so I had to go to the SingTel shop to get things sorted while Mum headed to the shops to get herself a pair of heels to match her Qipao. I also got a blouse for my helper to wear on that day.

On our way home in the car, I made a few last-minute phone calls to make sure people knew when and what time they had to turn up on Sunday. When I came home I spent hours packing the items I needed to bring to the hotel tomorrow for the one last meeting as well as preparing all the red packets.

Tomorrow night I'm hoping I will be able to get an early night since I have to get up at 5am to do my hair and make-up.

It's 00:43 and I think I should sleep now. My best man texted me, "You'd better turn in early otherwise you will have dark eye rings and you won't be pretty on your big day."

I think he's quite right.

Everyone, be prepared to meet the Panda on Sunday.

Day 2: Back home!

After a 27 hour journey from Bridgend-Stansted-KL-Singapore, I am finally home.

The AirAsia flight wasn't too bad and despite the fact we were delayed in London for two hours, we still made our connecting leg and arrived as scheduled. None of our luggages got lost, although we did have to pay £36 for 9kg of excess baggage in KL.

We were lucky we had a very friendly Australian girl who checked us in in Stansted and I was trying all ways and methods to distract her so she wouldn't notice or pursue the matter of our very overweight luggages. My plan worked. But in KL, the guy who checked us in was an Indian chap who wasn't as nice and didn't let us get away, but still, £36 is not too much to pay.

We spent the evening at home with my family, chatting over dinner. Grandma was overjoyed to see us, though we were both taken aback by how much weight she has lost. Still she is eating and sleeping well these days and hopefully the weight will pile back on soon.

After dropping R off at my mother's flat (which is unoccupied because we all live with Grandma), I returned home and started packing the guests' gifts. I didn't even stop for a shower before I did that even though the last one I took was probably 35 hours ago!

My mother was kind enough to help me with the ribbons and tags and together we finished the job pretty quickly. She is always good with art and craft and creative stuff so I was really glad she gave me a hand.

By the time I finished this it was 00:30 and I checked my emails - both work and personal - before finally taking a shower and hitting the sack.