I love the pink

TBDs..

The list of to-dos in a marriage prep seem to be getting lesser finally.


After we finally settled on our new abode 3 weeks ago, paid 5% of the house + stamp duty (ouch), we finally had time to settle the nitty gritty details like


- visit the florist, decided on the sort of flowers for pre wedding shots & actual day & car deco
- tailor make ken's suit
- buy ken's shoes
- go for my trial hair and make up
- fitting for the gown and evening gown
- deciding on caterer & meeting up with caterer at the church to decide on menu/ pricing/ other nitty gritty details like what type of flowers/ colour theme/ how many standing tables...
- decide on type/ style of wedding invitations + where to get it printed





Things to be done (TBDs) next..
- to buy/ tailor make shirts for ken
- church deco
- to get bridesmaid down to the tailor
- to decide where to take pre-wedding shots
- to decide on route for honeymoon so we can start to book hotels
- to decide on format of order of service + where to get it printed, march in song, etc..

It's been tiring but yet exciting.. 4 more months to go.

Below: Us at East Coast Park taking a breather, enjoying sunset.

Bought my new house!

I bought my first house!!!!!

Ok.. it's not exactly a house house like landed but it's my new home!

We started a house search in early Feb (ever since we did some in the early part of 07), and we contacted a few agents, went to different types of houses.. and when we finally went into this one. It was just right. It is hard to explain.. but imagine you go around feeling skeptical about the economy.. markets are volatile, credit crunch, recession fears, market data showing slowing growth etc etc.. it's what I do at work and it's like "yah, we're just looking around so we know at least what we want and we'll buy when the time is right". BUT, the moment we stepped into this house, in 5min, we were quite convinced that we really liked that place a lot a lot. The next thing you know, you're walking out discussing what price to offer!!!! It's crazy man. So to be safe, the next week (like last sat), ken brought his mum and i brought my dad to see the place (my mum was working). And we asked for their opinion. They both agreed that it was a nice place and all my conditions satisfied (mid-high floor, no afternoon sun, breezy, walkable to MRT yet without hearing the sound of the train, in the east side of the island, near amenities, quiet in terms of surroundings, quiet in terms of not having overcrowded mrt stations, no blockage, relatively gd condition of the house so i dont need to do a huge amt of renovation, and within budget).

So what next. We went to view some other condos in the same estate on sunday.. and spent the rest of sunday discussing whether we really wanted to buy the first one. So the answer was yes. We decided on the price, made an offer yesterday, the owner accepted today.. and effectively the proceedings will be completed by 9June. WOW!!! I'm super happy.. I mean, I bought my first home!!! Hahahaha.. I think I will be spending a lot of time daydreaming on how I should renovate the place from now on. And oh.. there's this korean tenant staying at the place now and she's only moving out on 8Nov.. so I'll be a landlord for 5mths and collect rent. That means I wont really have my own home after the wedding. But on the bright side, I get to collect some money, and I can wait for the christmas sale and post christmas sale to buy my furniture!!!

So yes, that's a major update from me.

Jun & Jan, see you gals next month!!!

Saigon

My first trip to Vietnam, one of the fastest emerging economies in Asia close to India and China.

First stop Hanoi.

Architecture is quite nicely preserved in some places.

The weather was great (~15%)!!

Next stop Ho Chi Minh. Had to fly Vietnam Airlines of course. The experience was better than expected... then again, maybe I was tired. Anyway, throughout the streets of HCM, you'll find nothing but loads and loads of motorcyclists on the road - men and women, both blue and white collar workers. It's like the ONLY way to get around. As a result I guess the air quality isn't quite good. But overall, Vietnam was a good experience. Beef pho was good. Hospitality was good although English is a problem to many and translation takes ages.

My last "reunion" dinner

Tomorrow is chu xi, or the eve of CNY. Besides remembering how janice was frantically looking for new clothes last year at this same time, the good thing for me this year is, it's a half day!!! That's always something to look forward too. I have decided what I am going to do tomorrow at work and hopefully I can finish that off quickly before noon and I'll have 1 thing off my to-do list too!! Next thing I need to do is to draw money from ATM to prepare an ang bao for my parents. Then next I've got cell group (really weird timing but somehow it ended up being the most convenient for all of us as a "after work-before dinner" timing since everyone has 1/2 day). We're starting a new book entitled "How do you walk the walk you talk". Sounds interesting! And next would be reunion dinner. This year is the last time I'll be having reunion dinner with my parents and extended family (dad's side) on CNY eve.. which is quite sad if you think about it negatively. But well, we all grow up and things change. For starters.. next year will be canton food for me I guess. Haha.

Meantime I received a wedding gift from ken's mum!! This is how we did it. Ken & I settled on 1 that we really liked first (his mum was not around).. then in order not to sound too forceful, we chose another 3 designs that were also nice and then asked her to pick 1 amongst 4. Thankfully she chose the same one that we chose!! Phew. So yeah we settled on that pretty quickly and bought it the same day. Happy happy! Anyway, that'll be the necklace that I'll be wearing on my wedding day. Earrings from my mum and necklace from her so it's all fair. One more thing to tick off the list.

end of jan

hey hey.. it's the end of jan already! it's been a great month though a very busy one. yujun came back for a week and it did seem like she was real efficient at her marriage prep!!! and we discussed about the bridesmaid dress, i showed it to her, we all decided it wasnt too ideal.. and she managed to get all her gals incl me a new, more subtle pink bridesmaid dress! yeh (jan, you'll see it soon)!! wow, i thought it was quite difficult to find such OTR dresses in singapore but indeed jun is very efficient! i think i shall go there to have a look too for my own wedding. the shop where i thought of making my dress is charging me $400 per dress. do u think it's too much? hmm.. 2 pieces = $800. ouch.

anyhow, finished work at 9pm last night.. dead tired and headed off to csc for dinner. my mum and i were the last to go off and it did feel quite strange and quiet. but the mee goreng was good nonetheless. meantime, am planning to finish work early tonight. meeting liling and tp for dinner (just a handful of closer jc friends).. and cross my fingers.. might see kenneth too. the difficult part of his reservice is finally over and i finally spoke to him for 15min last night. we spoke for 2 min the day before :( re service is certainly no joke i reckon. tough hours (no sleep), tough job, tough people to handle (and 60 of them), and hardly any monetary incentive.

shall continue to keep this as updated as i can. enjoy the last few hrs of jan!

2008!

It's a bit late to say HAPPY NEW YEAR! But I guess better late than never. It's still January now afterall. Had a busy first 2 weeks already, with new yr celebrations, a wedding dinner at Marriott, busy at work, and had brunch + shopping with kenneth's mum today to celebrate her birthday, and going off to Hanoi & Ho Chi Minh for a short trip tomorrow. Will be a busy one... no longer the fun/ training ones I had in HK. :( Oh well, but it will be good and hopefully fruitful too. Will be back with more pictures! Meantime, also looking forward to meeting Yujun next week and going for my gown fitting sometime this month (by the way, I tried putting on the bridesmaid dress I wore to my sis's wedding 2 yrs ago and I cant fully zip!! oh no!!!) And very importantly, I'm also busy thinking of what wedding present I should ask from my sis. She gave me 2 choices 1) Tiffany necklace 2) sponsor my honeymoon. The 2nd option will greatly help improve my cashflow but the first is tempting too.. how.. I dont think she'll give me both right? Haha.