Process of Life

Expenditure

2009-05-30T18:52:00.000+08:00

With the Great Singapore Sale on, we decided to start purchasing things for little bb. Actually we even started before the GSS in Brisbane. Whenever we go shopping nowadays, it usually out looking at the baby stuffs. We practically went crazy at DFO in Brisbane.

Look at all the clothings which we had purchased. They were pretty cheap so we decided to purchase some.. But without realising it, we purchased that many.

This is my personal favourite!

These are the things which her Daddy wanted to get for her. Nike socks and a dress. Haha.

Things bought by my colleagues when they were out shopping on their own. Aren't they cute? We also received news that there was a carnival ongoing at Philips and we headed down to look at the prices. Since we have been on the lookout, we knew that the items were really cheaper then when its on sale at the departmental store and purchased some items. Well, not some.. but quite a bit. Hahaha.

The weather was pretty hot then as I headed over after my gynae appointment in the morning. Only when we reached home, we realised that there were some items that were free in the steriliser which we had added on in the purchase. Now we have additional pacifier and teats for newborn. Hiaz.... The items spend at the Philips Carnival was about $400 already. This is not including the items which we had bought at the Robinson Sale and in Brisbane. We also still need to get the big items like the stroller and the baby cot. We plan to get the baby cot which will enable us to use it till bb is around 4 or 5 years old. Hopefully there will be a good bargain with the GSS here.

Trip to Brisbane 09

2009-05-15T16:33:00.000+08:00

The living room from the balcony

The Bedroom

The toilet.

On the second day, we had our Team Building activities. We were divided into groups and to perform some art on a painting which was actually divided into 16 pieces. There were a lot of chaos at the beginning as the painting had to be matched and the colours were different. We managed to finished the entire painting on time and here is the result!

The picture does not have any meaning to it. We even added our company logo to it haha.

The group picture with the finished product. The second half of the day was Hell Kitchen, where we had to cook two dishes and to present it. We all headed over to Woodsworth to purchase our items and there were a lot of fun trying to get the best bargains from the supermarket. Luckily Dear taught me to purchase everything and anything that is their housebrands and we managed a savings of $14. Hahhaa.

Karin's group presenting their dishes

Leong's group with Dionex logo!

Presenting while telling a long long story. Hahahha

Shane presenting the winning team with their crowns.

The second day the rest of the group went to take part in the Go Kart. With my present condition, I am unable to play so we opted out of it and went over to some factory outlet to shop and South Banks in the afternoon for a walk. We met up with some of them in the evening for dinner at South Banks and Mt Coota following dinner.

The third day we headed over to Harbour Town for more shopping but I did not manage to purchase as many things as I had at DFO as the shops were almost the same. We bought mostly things for the bb like overall and all as they were really cheap. Dear managed to get a pair of Levis while bb got 5 suits! We ended our day at Surfer's Paradise and headed back to Brisbane town for dinner.

Oh me look so fat!

2009-05-13T09:26:00.012+08:00

We are back from Brisbane! The trip was a little to short as we were there for only 4 days. We wanted to extend however it was too late as the air tickets were already booked and cannot be changed. There will be another time I guess.

After we touched down at Brisbane Airport, we collected our rented cars and spend a while at the airport carpark figuring how to move the car seat forward! hahaha... As we arrived at midnight, the car park was pretty dark and we could not find the button to open the boot! hahahah. After fumbling for a while we finally found the right buttons and we headed off to our service apartment at Oaks Charlotte Towers. We stayed in a two bedroom apartment with kitchen and living room which were all pretty nice!

The living room from the balcony

The bedroom

The toliet.

On the second day, we had our Team Building activities. We were divided into groups and to perform some art on a painting which was actually divided into 16 pieces. There were a lot of chaos at the beginning as the painting had to be matched and the colours were different. We managed to finished the entire painting on time and here is the result!

The picture does not have any meaning to it. We even added our company logo to it haha.

The group picture with the finished product.

The second half of the day was Hell Kitchen, where we had to cook two dishes and to present it. We all headed over to Woodsworth to purchase our items and there were a lot of fun trying to get the best bargains from the supermarket. Luckily Dear taught me to purchase everything and anything that is their housebrands and we managed a savings of $14. Hahhaa.

Karin's group presenting their dishes

Leong's group with Dionex logo!

Presenting while telling a long long story. Hahahha

Shane presenting the winning team with their crowns.

The second day the rest of the group went to take part in the Go Kart. With my present condition, I am unable to play so we opted out of it and went over to some factory outlet to shop and South Banks in the afternoon for a walk. We met up with some of them in the evening for dinner at South Banks and Mt Coota following dinner.

The third day we headed over to Harbour Town for more shopping but I did not manage to purchase as many things as I had at DFO as the shops were almost the same. We bought mostly things for the bb like overall and all as they were really cheap. Dear managed to get a pair of Levis while bb got 5 suits!

We ended our day at Surfer's Paradise and headed back to Brisbane town for dinner.

Oh me look so fat!

I am flying on a jet plane

2009-04-19T10:27:00.003+08:00

We will be going to Brisbane soon! Hurray. This the destination for the company trip that we will be having this year. The initial plan was to fly to Koh Samui however due to some delays, there were no air tickets for the return trip. They have also checked it out and found that the air tickets to Australia was even cheaper then the flight to Koh Samui. So they decided to change the venue to Brisbane. Hahah. What a blessing in disguise.

Finally its Friday!!

2009-03-20T21:41:00.002+08:00

Yes yes yes! Its Friday. I have been looking forward to this day for the longest time of my life. Work has been so eventful that I wish for this weekend to come earlier. Things are just not going on smoothly. The simpliest thing can also go wrong. hiaz.

One main reason for the lack of updates was that I wasn't feeling that well. Why?? hehehe.... Visit this blog to know more
www.tecvick.blogspot.com

Late post.

2009-02-22T23:20:00.003+08:00

Sorry for the lack of blogging... I was away for a business trip and held some gathering of old friends at my place. I still have a few more gathering to organise. I chose to have various small gatherings rather than a big one as I could chat with our friends and have more time with them. If I have a big housewarming party, I will not be able to spend time with them.

So if I have yet to invite you over to my place, I am sorry. I am in the mist of planning. kekeke.

Yesterday, I attending Jeannie and Ben's wedding. She was so beautiful in her gown, I was admiring her that I forgot to take photos with her. They had a special "march in", they jogged into the ballroom with no. tags behind them like they are in a marathron. However on the no. tags were the words "JUST MARRIED". Hahaa... Isn't it cute???

In their montage, they re-enacted how Ben started off the relationship with Jeannie.... Thru a packet of tissue paper. Hahhaa. The people who assisted Ben in the "courtship" was David and the rest of the gang. Hahaha... To imagine that was almost 10 years back.

Ben and Jeannie, wishing that you guys be happy always!

2009-02-01T17:59:00.002+08:00

It has been a while since I blogged cos we have been pretty busy with house warmings and preparing for the new year.

Had reunion dinner with my in-laws at my place this year as we have yet to have a meal with them at our new place after we moved in. We just prepared steamboat and a few dishes and that was it. I do miss having reunion dinners with my parents and relatives. Things are really different now... But it is not of a choice, I could not possibily ask either one of the party to have the dinner earlier for me. It just doesn't seem right.

First day of new year was hectic! We went over to my parent's place early in the morning and headed over to grandma's place. We came home in the afternoon and headed over to my in-laws place before heading over to his grandma's place where all the relatives gathered. We went home and plopped into bed. Hahhaa.

The second day of new year was better with lunch at my parent's place while all my relatives gathered there. We headed over to his aunt's place which is just a few mins away from my parent's place.

Yesterday, we had his colleagues over and today was his aunt. Haha. We are really tired....

Will have my Uni friends gathering at my place next week after the zoo run! Oh, we have yet to obtain the goody bag. hmmm...

Happy New Year 2009

2009-01-01T20:25:00.002+08:00

A year has passed and a new one is here. Time seems to really fly in 2008 and a lot of things has changed for me.

1) Status really changed from single to married
2) Planned our wedding
3) Had our wedding
4) Own a place which called our own
5) Renovated the entire place
6) Stayed with my in-laws after the wedding
7) Moved into our own home!

Hahaha all the major changes all took place in 2008, I wondered what is in store for me in 2009.

We stayed home for dinner on the first day of the new year and Dear cooked. Yes, my husband cooked for me! No you did not read wrongly, my husband cooks! hehehe.. I am one lucky girl. He cooked pork chops, made salad and rosti. Kekkee.. There is the prove.

I did help too! I did not just sit and wait for food. I helped him to cook the rosti and marinated the pork chops. kekkeke. Doesn't the food look tasty?? I like the Thank you Dear for cooking dinner for me.

Bad experiance at the hair salon.

2008-12-27T23:36:00.010+08:00

Had this very bad experiance at this particular hair salon around my place. I wanted to colour my hair as the roots were already showing and I have a wedding to attend this weekend. Being lazy, I decided to try the neighbourhood salons to see if they are good. If they are able to do a decent job I will go there in the future. I was in for a disappointment.

I went to do my survey in the neighbourhood and decided to try out this particular salon (not going to name the salon here but if you wish to know... do ask me) as they were having promotions. Colour, cut and treatment for just $58.80. In the mist of the job, they told me that I have to pay $10 more as my hair is long and thick. Ok, this is still acceptable to me. They promoted another treatment for me which was a Spa treatment for both the sclap and hair. Since I had not done any treatment since June and had done perm and colour, I decide to go for it and to pay additional for it. I told them that I needed a trimmed too since I had not cut my hair for more than 3 months. When the bill came, I had to pay for the hair cut. Usually the salons I go to do not charge me for the hair cut whenever I do chemcial treaments. Although the cut was just $2.80, I felt that since I had spent that much already, they should not charge me for it.

This was also the first time that I had walked out of the salon with my hair partially dry. They did not dry my hair sufficiently. I understand that they had a lot of customers today however all the other salons also had quite a no. of customers but they still do their job perfectly.

My t-shirt was also destroyed! The neckline of the t-shirt which I was wearing was tainted with the hair dye. That is too much. I did not realise this till I reached home and changed out of my t-shirt. I have long hair for such a long period of time and never, never when I dyed my hair the neckline of my t-shirt was tainted.

While showing off my newly coloured hair to my husband, he told me that the white hairs are still visible! Yes I have white hairs... hahaha... I had told them that I have white hairs which I will like to cover and they had ensured me that it will be covered.

I will either go to the salon which I had my hair permed previously or the salon at Bedok Central. I had thought that I will be going back there to perm my hair but I saw that customers who had their hair permed there did not have as nice perms compared to my. Will definately not go there for perms.

Christmas

2008-12-27T22:59:00.003+08:00

Christmas Eve was spent at Dexter and Charmaine's crib this year. Everyone brought some food over to their place. There were turkey, ham, pork knuckle, shepherd's pie, pasta and mushroom soup! Thinking about the food is making my mouth water all over again.

We only started our dinner at 8 as the guys were arguing over how to heat the turkey up with the oven/microwave. Its a little funny that the guys were so enthusiastic over the preparation of the food. Usually I thought that this is left to the ladies to handle but this time I was wrong. In this case, we ladies stayed out of their arguement and just let the guys handled it. kekeke. In the meantime, we ladies watched tv and played with Violet. She is so cute! This year's theme was music and everyone had to purchase a present that has to do with music. Scott got this trumpet in the gift exchange but Violet was the one enjoying the trumpet.

Isn't she cute??

The next day we had Christmas lunch over at my aunt's place. It was the annual gathering of all our aunties, uncles and cousins.

Some of us enjoying the food.

The popiah counter. Its the usual popiah that we have whenever we have the gathering.. one is always not enough. Hahhaha

Some of the presents from aunties and uncles that has yet to be distributed.

Our honorable pianist for the christmas carol session.

The three princesses.

Singing the drummer boy.

Games time

Christmas picture design competition

The young ones explaining their work

Next is Chinese New Year!

My Home

2008-12-10T21:33:00.003+08:00

We moved in to our new home last Saturday. It was an eventful day with the movers arriving late and making a fuss over the cost of the move. Finally everything was settled and the things were moved. After a few days of unpacking and cleaning, the house finally looked decent enough for me to take some pictures. Its lucky that we had the long weekend to get the house ready and also be able to rest for a day before we had to work.

View of the living room.

View of the tv console with the dinning area.

The view of the kitchen, which we only cooked once or twice.

My Bedroom!

The other bedroom which will be empty for now... Will take photo of the study room when its ready... Now its just full of boxes... hehehe

More Photos from the Dionex Dinner

2008-12-10T17:03:00.002+08:00

More photos to upload! Just received more photos from Ailin.

The group photo.

Us girls in the cowboy hats.

The whole group with all our presents.

Dr Cai with his present... He still did not know what he is installed for him.

Two bottles of mineral water and he is so happy!

Look at the array of food on the table prepared for him and we saboing him. Kkekeke

Daniel with me with a moustache

Dionex Christmas Dinner 08

2008-12-09T21:44:00.004+08:00

We had our company's Christmas Dinner this year early as most of my colleagues are either going for holidays or on leave nearer to the end of the year. Each year, we had our dinner at various locations. Previous year it was at Party World, last year it was at Hooters and this year we had it at the Singapore Turf Club! It was a night of fun and laughter.

Our Coperate Room

View of the race tracks.

Punters downstairs getting ready and gear up for the race.

The punter's book and betting slips.

The guys gearing up for the races for the night.

The guys studying hard on which horse to bet on and how to bet. They were really studying hard.

Intense discussion ongoing.

The punter's booklet which tells us which horses and the jersy the jockeys will be wearing.

Even Ailin was well prepared! She came with her bio

Vouchers which the company purchased for us to play.This is enough for 3 races only as each bet has to be a minimum of $5.

The guys getting excited when the race started.

Leong and Honma San in their Cowboy attire.

My winning bet for the night.

My winnings! Only $19! Hahaha

Not forgetting the presents we go for the gift exchange for the night.

The buffet spread.

Gift exchange started and Kelvin got his scientific calculator. Yes a scientific calculator.

Shannon's turn to open her present.

Shannon made the wrong guess on who was the person who purchased her present.

Ailin's turn to guess but she had a can of party spray in her hands, as she already knew who purchased that present.

It was Miss Kong!

Our present to our boss.. A planner with all our birthdays. hahhaa.

The top three winners for the lucky draw.... Not me... I only got the 5th prize.

The mess we made after the event. I really pity the cleaners for the night. hahhaha...

Thank you Miss Kong for all the planning for the event. It was really an enjoyable one.

Travel to Bangkok

2008-11-26T21:31:00.004+08:00

This morning when I woke up, the first thing I saw on my phone was a sms from my Mom.

Mom: Latest News, Thai Airport close due to riots.

I am suppose to fly to Bangkok this Sunday for a training conducted by our company for the new RSLC, fast LC system. In the afternoon, I recieved an email from my Dad who responded to the email which I had sent to them on the details of my flight. I was surprised to receive the email from Dad since I am in town. He did not call me but send me an email instead. hmmm

Dad: Did you heard the news yesterday that Suvarnabhumi Airport is closed indefinitely ?.The anti government protesters are now blocking the roads leading to the airport. Many flights are cancelled.

After I saw the news on the TV on the situation in Bangkok where all the travellers were stranded, it reminded me of the time when the Hong Kong airport was close due to the weather. This resulted in me being stranded in Taiwan for a night and Hong Kong for another. It was really horrible and I do not want to put myself in that situation ever again. Now the government has also declared a state of emergency. Oh my... I don't want to be stuck there...

1st Wedding Aniversary

2008-11-16T21:53:00.004+08:00

Time flies! Tomorrow, we will be married by law for a year but it doesn't feel as if though we were married for a year. Maybe since we only stayed together after the traditional ceremoney this year.

There isn't much excitment over the first anniversary. Maybe the house isn't ready yet and there seems to be lots of things to be done to get the house ready. Although the contractor has handed the house back to us, the windows are not done yet since we decided to do it last min. As it was the weekend, we will only know when they will be able to come over to our place to remove and fix it up tomorrow. Hopefully they can do it by this week. *crossing fingers and toes

However we have already started cleaning the interior of the cabinets and wardrobe. With the storage cabinets cleaned, we will be able to move some of our things over first. When we went to purchase the cleaning equipments, it took us almost an entire morning to just purchase the things we wanted. We checked the prices at various stores first and bought the things that we deemed cheap and better at the appropriate store. (When you have spend a tidy sum on the renovation, every little cent starts to count. Don't call me aunty =P)

It always seems that I forget to purchase something and had to go back to the store to purchase it again. Luckily I have the vehicle to carry the things back to the house, else I think my arms would have broken. Oh you be surprised with the weight of the sticks, mop, broom, pails, cloth, clothes peg and etc etc weighs. Will still need to buy more things like detergents and all maybe next week.

Will post the photos of the house after the furnitures arrive!

Wonder where should we go for dinner tomorrow.

Something you did not know

2008-11-11T20:25:00.006+08:00

Ever since we got married, every felt that I will be the one bullying my husband. Well, he isn't that quiet person whom you think he is. Today, while having dinner, we had one of the typical conversation that you guys don't know about.

Me: Eh, why don't you eat some chicken? (Picks a piece of chicken breast meat for him)

Him: ok I will eat that. Oh you have eaten the chicken wing? Aren't you afraid that you will grow wings like chicken and can fly?

Me: -_-

Him: Oh I am eating chicken breast. Maybe I will grow some meat at the chest??

Me: -_-

2008-11-08T09:44:00.003+08:00

Work has been so hectic that I don't even have time to check mails or step into the office till yesterday. I am so glad that the week is over and weekend is here. When we went to the house today, so many things were already completed.

The divider from the balcony and the dinning area.. We feel that the divider is a little too little? Thinking of adding a few more beams.

The balcony and the main door.

The new main door and new shoe cabinet behind the door.

The living room with the tv console.

Entrance into the kitchen. The glass door for the kitchen is also installed

The kitchen before the installation of the kitchen cabinets

The kitchen cabinets... Is it nice??

The bedroom wardrobe. Forgot to take the entire view of the wardrobe.

The shower divider also installed.

Today the contractors will be installing the air conditions and finalising the cabinets. Looking forward to the completion of the house.

Wedding Photos

2008-10-27T19:16:00.006+08:00

After such a long long wait, we got our photos from the photographer. We collected the photos with Jerry and both of us kept looking at the photos and laughing at the photos while remembering what happened that day. So here are some of the highlights of the photos.

Me helping Chloe to join the straws together while waiting for the groom to come. SHhhh.. don't tell my husband that I played a part.

My cousins, Matthew and Jasmine

All dressed up and waiting....

The start of the negogitation....

Looking hard for the clues....

Completed the puzzle partially...

Negogitating for clues....

Searching for the correct key... Is there one?

Suck it up!

The boys sitting on the bed....

Ignoring the groom

Pals from primary school... Brings back memories of when we were young.

The yam seng party on stage...

The yam seng party which is not on the stage...

The obstacles created by Dionex..

The photos were generally pretty well taken. Will need to sort them out and print the photos for everyone. So please be patient.

2008-10-26T01:34:00.003+08:00

With the renovation progressing smoothly at the moment, we started shopping for furnitures. We went furniture malls as well as furniture shops around, we finally found somethings that we find suitable for us.

The sofa set but in lighter tone. We always wanted a L shape sofa but due to lack of space, we were only able to purchase the 3 seater. We also bought a side table that can be slide into the side of the sofa and be pulled out when we need it. This helped us to save space a little.

The small bench that goes with it so that we will have more seating space when people visit.

The dinning table with 6 chairs. They kept emphazing that the table legs are stainless steel. Love the black glass table top.

When we were at the shop, we were actually served by a salesperson who we were a little turned off by. He kept scratching his head and his uniform was not worn properly. We decided to head out of the store and to return later hoping that another sales personnel will serve us. Initially we thought that we were lucky as that personnel was not in the store when we returned. To our dismay, she referred us back to the same sales staff when he returned. we realised that he did not know the product well and had to ask his colleagues most of the time. This really did not give us a good impression. Nonethless, since the price was reasonable and we like the furniture, we proceeded with the purchase. Hope that all will turn out well.

Each year during Deepavali, its my grandmother's birthday. The entire family will then gather for a meal at one of our aunts' place. This year, they organised it at Noble House where its a dinner cum KTV session. The KTV session was "taken" by our uncles and aunties.

Mum and Aunty Cynthia singing....

Aunty Irene singing...

Mum and Aunty Irene... Mum seems to be singing a lot this night...

I did not take photos of grandma while we sang the birthday song and when she was cutting the cake. There were too many cameras and we were told to stand behind the birthday girl while singing the song so that our parents can take the photos. Grandma is already 80 this year. Time really flies...

Wedding Video

2008-10-17T20:39:00.004+08:00

After the long wait, we finally got our wedding video! We were suppose to meet Celestine from Fotowerks at Orchard but due to work, Dear had to meet him by himself. I am quite impress with the packaging of the DVDs.

The box which held the DVDs.

The two DVDs, one highlight and one unedited video of the day.

Aren't the videos nice?? I love the way the DVDs are designed. I am trying to find a way to upload the videos... Any suggestion on how I can do it?

This is the second week into the renovations. We headed over to the house to view the progress.

The wall for the door is hacked to widen it and the edges are smoothened.

The wall to separate the cooking area and the laundry area.

The wall completed and smoothened.

The small window is where a glass will be placed to allow light penatration.

The rubbish chute and the platform for the washing machine.

The tiles for the toliets are all laid while the electrical wirings are mostly in place so is the air condition. The progress for the place seems to be good and hopefully we will be able to get the house done on schedule. Fingers and toes crossed.

Previously I had mentioned that we were having a competition between us on the house renovation. If you had visited his website, you will have noted the paranomic photos which he had posted. Before he post those photos online, he took tons of photos. Here are the evidence!

Taking photo of the master bedroom at one corner......

Another corner.....

Even the toliet....

He simply took a lot of photos and when I asked why.. he said just in case they don't fit well together.............

Curly Hair!

2008-10-11T22:26:00.002+08:00

After much contemplating... I finally permed my hair today! Before making that decision to perm... I asked a lot of people their opinion on whether I should perm. With more reserach done online, I finally master the courage to call up the salon to book my appointment for my perm.

On my way to the salon, I was still a little hesitant. I finally told myself that I will just try. Worst case scenario I just chop my hair short. Hahha...

I am glad that I went to this salon which I read online with all the recommendations. The hair stylist sat with me and explained things throughly before he commence perming my hair. He kept explaining things to me while he trimed my hair, applied lotion to the hair... crimping my hair and curling my hair. After 4 hours of seating at the salon....

Trying to clip up my hair... But I think I need more work on that part...

Overall I kind of like my new look! Lets see how the hair will look like after I wash my hair and style it myself.

Start of Renovations

2008-10-11T22:08:00.003+08:00

The renovation for the home finally started on Wednesday as we had finalised majority of the details last Saturday. As the demolition work was from Wednesday till Friday, we only went over to the house today.

We were greeted with a house full or rubbles. Gone were all the floor tiles and most of the ceiling cornices.

The entrance into the house... The sand and the cement required for the laying of the tiles

The tiles.. But I think this is not all the tiles which we have ordered. There should be more.

Entrance to the kitchen. They demolished part of the wall to make the entrance into the kitchen larger.

The tiles on the wall still have to go.

The rubbles in the masterbed room. The toliet is still hanging around!

The other bedroom

All the tiles in the masterbed room toliet is gone!

I am getting more and more excited with the works. Hope that everything will be on schedule.

Oh, Dear has also a blog on the progress on the renovation. We are going to have a contest with each other to see who has a better blog on the renovation. His website is http://teczz.blogspot.com/ Do go over and take a look and be our judge.

Perm or curl

2008-10-02T21:35:00.004+08:00

After the wedding I wanted to change my hair style a little since I have been having long straight hair for about 6 years. When my makeup artist did some wave for me for the photoshoot, I love the look that I had. Hence I started to contemplate whether I should perm my hair. Before the weddding, I went to colour my hair as the roots were showing and told the hair dresser of my intend. He suggested that I do digital perm.

Now after the wedding, I did some research on the type of perm that I wanted. I was in for a shocked! There were so many different kinds of perm! There is the ceramic perm, digital perm, Japanese Perm and I think there is the Korean Perm too. Oh my... I read more about them and happened to chance upon a forum for ladies regarding Hair, Makeup and Beauty. Its called FlowerPod. Here is the website: www.Flowerpod.com.sg.

There were various recommendations on which salon that others have gone to for their perms. I have called a salon up and made an appointment with them. Now I am thinking whether I should take half a day off to do it instead of doing it on weekends. My weekends will be filled with going with our Interior Designer, Alvin to purchase things for the house. Hmmmm......

These few nights I have been doing research on the type of curls I will like to have... Came across these websites which has a lot of hair styles.

http://www.kakimoto-arms.com/mc004_hairstylebook/index_bn_2008_sp.html

Love the curls which the girls in there have.. but will I be able to achieve those curls when I perm??

In office today, I asked a few of my colleagues on whether I should perm. One of them kind of "dared" me to perm as he himself has permed before. Hahha... Most of my friends were either against it or for it. Most of them felt that since I will like to try I should do it while I am still young. The most hilarious one was my friend's son. He attended my ROM and from that day onwards I was known to him as jie jie mei mei. He saw my photos for the wedding and told his mum that I am jie jie mei mei when I had straight hair in the day. But when he saw the photo of my with curls, he just told his mum that is aunty. *Faint* Hahha. Will I really look like Aunty after I perm??

On the topic of beinging called Aunty. Last Sunday, I was being called Aunty by a teenager who was selling Walls ice cream door to door. We were on our way home from my mum's place after dinner. While waiting for the lift, the teenager walked by and asked: "Aunty, you want to buy ice cream from me?"

I looked around and did not see anyone else. I was thinking, he was referring to me?? OMG. Then he went: "Aunty, I got only two left, you want to buy from me?"

Immediately, I told him NO!! He called me aunty and still expects me to purchase the ice-cream from him???!!! I am not even 30 years old yet!!!!!!!!!

To perm or cut

2008-09-26T21:52:00.004+08:00

More photos which our friends had taken of us during the wedding...

Love this photo.... We wanted to take one with everyone doing different things but it seems like everyone is doing 1. haha

Nice photo of us walking down the aisle.

Now that the wedding is over, I am contemplating what I should do with my hair. Should I trim it shorter or curl it. Yes curl. For the wedding, I had kept my hair as long as possible and did not trim my hair for the longest period of time. So now that its all over, trimming it short will reduce the amount of shampoo that I need to use and it will also take a shorter time for the hair to dry.

Since my hair is long now, its a good chance to do something with it and not just have the boring straight long hair. So perming it seems like an alternative choice. But I have received mixed comments about me perming my hair. The most common one is that I will look mature with curls. Hmmmm...

Should I perm??

Bali Trip

2008-09-25T21:44:00.010+08:00

We are back from Bali! No, it was not our honeymoon trip. Its just a short trip we took to rest and relax after the wedding. So we will plan for a real honeymoon trip. When?? I don't know yet. Hopefully its next year after our house is completed.

The trip to Bali was fantastic! The environment was really really nice. Here are the pictures. Looking at the pictures make me wana go back and soak in the pool again.

At the entrance of the hotel. Don't be fooled by the sofa. Its as hard as a rock.

Going to the pool...

The entrance to the swimming pool!

The little huts are actually carbanas which we can rent for the day. You can just sleep inside and jump into the pool from there.

While these are just the seats avaliable at the side of the pool.

The bar in the pool where we can have our drinks while we swim. Isn't it nice?? We basically had lazied at the pool side swimming everyday after breakfast. The water is cool and inviting while the weather was warm.

Our bedroom which was littered with rose petals.

The other side of the bedroom, I was opening the window to see what was outside.

The toliet.

Guess what is this...

Hahah, its where we hang our clothes... The closet.

Bedroom slippers...

Where we have our breakfast each morning. We were just next to the pool.

Dear with his morning coffee.

The buffet tables... We were seated just beside it. hahah.

Our honeymoon package freebie (Actually its paid for in the package and the wine sucks.)

Closer look at the cake...

Dear waiting for his cup a noodle to be cooked. Haha we were too lazy to go out for dinner. Since we have that chocolate cake, we decided to eat cup a noodles.. haha. (He is engrosed with his Discovery Channel)

Part of the package includes this romatic dinner for two.

The carabana where we had our "romatic dinner".

Before the dinner. HAha we did not take any other photos already as it was a little too dark...

The sunset at Bali.

We had a great time there... but I do not think I will go back there another time. I rather experiance Maldives where the water is nice and clear... Hmm maybe Honeymoon??

2008-09-22T10:47:00.003+08:00

Sorry for the lack of updates. Been trying to adjust to living with my in laws after the marriage. I think due to the new enviroment, I wasn't able to sleep properly for the past week. Everyday I just feel tired even though I slept early. How early? I slept at 10.30pm. That is pretty early as I usually will only sleep at about 12am at nights as I surf the internet. Now, as he sleeps very early at night, I feel bad about turning on the lights in the room while he sleeps. So I also go to bed early nowadays.

During the wedding, we received numerous well wishes from friends and relatives. Here are the few nice ones that caught my attention.

This is from my Uncle. My cousin drew this on the red packet. Isn't it cute??

Very nice red packets aren't they?

This is from my colleague's girl friend who added a flower to the red packet. Isn't it nice??

This final one is from my Colleague who is from Japan. He told us that this is the type of packaging that the Japanese will use for such occassion.

This is how it looks like. Isn't it unqiue?

After we remove the pink colour band that holds the packet together, it opens up to this.

Within that pink package is this envelope that holds the cash.

Really appreciate the efforts that these people had place in decorating and writting the wishes on the envelopes. I have read and appreicate everyone's token of appreicatation regardless of its size.

I will be flying off to Bali today! Yeah Yeah. Hahha.. I will be back with more photos.

2008-09-19T10:03:00.002+08:00

The wedding is finally over. OVER. Hahhaa. Just will like to say thank you to all Wendy and Chloe for helping me out that day. Not forgetting the brothers, Qingyu and Kelvin. We had lots of fun with the gate crashing and all, but I don't know what actually took place for the gate crashing. Heard bits and pieces of it but I am still unsure of what actually took place. So lets wait for the video to be out and the picture will be clearer to me.

Some of my friends and cousins took photos for the wedding on Saturday and had posted the photos on Facebook and Mulitply. I looked so stern and fierce in the photos cos I did not smile enough. My mouth was actually stiff already with all the smiling in the morning. hahahah

With Primary School Friends.

With Dear's Secondary School Friends

Love this photo with my cousins. In this photo I look normal haha.

House Renovation

2008-09-11T00:58:00.005+08:00

We finally confirmed and signed on the contract for the renovation. We had to haggle and push a little for the little discounts that we could get from him. Finally we were able to agree on an amount that both of us were happy with.

On Monday, the Interior Designer (ID) will go over to the house to make accurate measurements and come out with the detailed drawings. Following that we will need to take an entire day to decide on the colours for the walls, cupboards, and the tiles. Oh dear... its a long and tedious process. Then its start work!

Its a lucky thing that we will been away for a few days in Bali to rest and relax after the wedding and before we immerse ourselves totally for the renovation process.

Oh dear the wedding is just two more days away!!! *Panick attack

Had a talk with Dad regarding the seating arrangements for the relatives. He felt that I was worrying too much about everything. What he said is true, I am a perfectionist. I will like for all the things to fall nicely in place. There must be a backup plan if something were to happen. However with Murphy's Law

Anything that will go wrong will go wrong!

I am pretty worried about the day. Its not that I do not trust the people who will be helping out but just can't help worrying. I remembered Sandy's comments at a friend's wedding:

At a wedding anything or everything can go wrong no matter how well you plan it. So don't plan too much and things will work out.

I agree however I just can't help but worry.

Wedding Album

2008-09-06T23:19:00.008+08:00

We collected the album and had our final fitting for our gowns and suits today. Here are some of the photos of the photos in the album layout.

So now make a guess. Which is my favourite?

Wedding Corsage

2008-08-30T20:28:00.003+08:00

Last week we headed over to Spotlight to purchase materials for the wedding corsages to be made for the Sisters who would be helping me on that day. I did not know how to do the corsages for them and was actually contemplating whether to purchase the corsages from the florist and online. Found quite a no of corsages online and they were all so pretty. But they were tad a little to much to pay for. So we decided to try making them ourselves.

Here are the photos of the completed corsages

3 corsages which I had done. There is something different with them. Can you spot the differences?

Hahah these two corsages' "diamond" has dropped. Need to put it back.

Hope that Chloe and Wendy likes the corsages and not find it too ugly. Maybe need to get something for the brothers... hmmmm

2008-08-29T22:56:00.002+08:00

Its about two weeks left to the wedding. There still seems to be tons of things to be done but the most important guest list is done! What is left now is Dad's list of distant relatives whom he will like to invite. But from the looks of things they are almost settled. Phew. A huge relief for me.

Tomorrow the people from the Singapore Power Services will be going to our place to turn on the utilities for our home. Following that we will shift some of the items from Dear's home to the new house in preparation for the wedding as well as for Krissy's stay at the house.

In the evening we plan to play a little of our Nintendo Wii! We gotten it from Dear's colleague who had won it at their Company's Dinner and Dance.

Surprises

2008-08-29T22:40:00.003+08:00

Last week, my manager walked over to my desk in the morning asking me if I had ordered anything from our Thailand office.

Boss: Vicky, did you order anything??
Vicky: Order? I did not order anything (My mind was racing thinking what I had requested from Thailand)
Boss: There is a box for you. You really did not order anything? (Walking over to my desk)
Vicky: Nope I am sure.

The box which contained the mystery items.

Boss then opens up the boss and covering the items were a plastic bag.

We looked closely and found these handmade accessories.

They come in 5 different colours. I like the red and the pink most.

I learnt that they were from my ex manager and another colleague in Thailand. These hearts were painfully handmade by them and they even packed it into these little plastic bags with ribbons. There are all in all 300 of them!!! I was both touched and shocked. I did not expect them to do all these for me.

I really appreciate their effort in getting these things for me and 300 of them! I am really touched.

2008-08-20T21:34:00.003+08:00

Have you ever felt so tired and restless that you become reluctant to do anything apart from what you must or need to do? I think most of us have been through this before while we were attending school. This is especially so during our exam periods when we all mugged for our papers relentlessly.

Recently I found myself to be in this mood.

In preparation of the wedding, I have tons of things to do and prepare. Like getting ready the guest list, preparing the video montages, thinking about the renovation for the house, how to get money and the list goes on. Hahha But I am not doing any of those things which I have mentioned. I just simply feel so lazy to do those things!

Wedding Montage 1

2008-08-19T08:40:00.003+08:00

The prewedding montage for the wedding dinner has been completed. I am thinking of playing this video while the guest are taking their seat in the ballroom. That way they are being enterainted while waiting for the dinner to start. In addition my album will not be damaged while its on display. I am still playing with that idea. Any suggestions?

2008-08-17T22:41:00.002+08:00

Its just about less than a month to our wedding and there seems to be tons of things that are yet to be done.

Friday we managed to finalised the red wine which we will have for our wedding at DM Wines at Fook Hai Building. The lady boss, Melisa was pretty nice and opened 3 bottles of wine for us to try. The first was a pretty nice to drink wine, the second a very sweet red one and the third was hmm, very alcoholic! The moment the 3rd bottle of wine reached my tongue, I just tasted the alcohol in it. Both of us like the sweet red wine but we choose the first one as it was for the general mass of guest that we have. This shop allowed us to have the wines on a consignment basis whereby we will be able to return all the wines that were not consumed. However if the label is damaged or the cap is opened, we will not be able to return that bottle.

As we were in Chinatown area, we headed over to the shops which sold wedding items to purchase the little red lamps which we need for the wedding. We opted for the battery operated ones as they cost half the price and we do not need to worry when is the appropriate time to turn of the lamp. With the battery ones, we just let the battery died off on its own. Kkekeke... Bought the 12 colour threads which came along with scissors, measuring tape and needles for just 12 bucks. Kkekee CHEAP!

Now its headache with the guest list. Both our parents have yet to get the invites ready to send out the invites to the relatives on the first day of the 8th month. My family seems to be unhappy whenever I ask them about the guest list. Oh dear... I just need to confirm the table nos for the hotel. I really at a lost on what I should say or do now. Everything that we say seems wrong.

We are house owners

2008-08-09T20:14:00.006+08:00

We collected our keys yesterday and finalised the sale of the house. What a date to remember 08 08 08. Hahhaa... I think its easy to remember this day where we are owners of a place to call our own. I did the final inspection of the house prior to the appointment at HDB. The process at HDB was very fast after we went in and signed some documents and we were done within mins! Isn't it fast??

Today we went back for a "first" look at the house. They left quite a no of stuffs, like the washing machine and rice cooker in the house. We will have to get the town council to pick up these stuffs maybe next weekend. Finally as promised here are the photos of the house.

The block under going upgrading at the moment.

The view of the hall from the entrance.

The view of the hall from the bedroom.

The master bedroom with the master bedroom toliet.

Master bedroom toliet. They left the heater without the shower head!

The two other bedrooms

The big kitchen where all the cabinets have to go.

View of the kitchen from the other side.

The toliet in the kitchen.

The view of our house from the outside. The neighbour hangs so many clothings outside with all three of their shoe racks. I will have to ask them to remove one shoe rack. Hiaz

After getting our keys yesterday, we have met up with our interior designer to inform him of the changes which we need to make. We have decided to assign the job to Alvin from Fused Concept as we felt that he is more creative in his designs and we are able to relate better to him compared to the other interior designers whom we have met up with. Alvin was pretty quick with his ideas and could churn out ideas almost immediately! Hahah He was so happy when we informed him that we have to remove the storeroom and place the bed there instead. However he was able to create a space for us to store all our bulky and ugly stuffs that we will have. Hahhaa. Looking forward to the renovation.

After viewing the flat, I wondered if its in its current condition, can we offer it to our friend who is coming to Singapore for a holiday. The condition of the house seems pretty good but after the owner moved all their things, the condition does not seem so favourable anymore. If its me who is staying there, I will also feel a little uncomfortable.

Initially we thought that we can retain the windown grills but today we tried to close the windows and found it difficult to move the windows to close it. There were lots of cobwebs and the windown panels were all damaged. In addition, the doors for the rooms were all also spolit. We were unable to lock the doors from within. I guess we will change the locks for the doors or change the doors itself.

Oh, my stupid laptop is down, I was using it suddenly I wasn't able to connect to the internet. No matter how I try, I was not able to turn on the wireless on my laptop. Hiaz. I guess have to bring it to office to ask my colleague to check it out. If its really dead, we will have to bring it to Dell for repairs. Its only about 2 months! I still have all my wedding montage inside... aggrrhhhh

Report is out

2008-08-06T21:56:00.005+08:00

We received the report for our house from Janis today. Apparently that the house isn't very good as the front door is facing a bad spot. All the initial plans which we have has to be abolished as they do not fit us. We have to change almost everything and some of the things have to be in odd positions.

If you remember, we decided to seek a FS opinion due to the predicament that the previous house owner was in. When we did that we also did tell ourselves that we will not follow what she tells us entirely. However after what she had analysed for us, there were a lot of things which we felt that we will need to abide by for peace and harmony. Both of us were feeling lost after the session ended.

We decided to take her views and try to incorporate as much as we could into our house. So now its back to the drawing board for our interior designer, whom we will try to arrange to meet this Friday or tomorrow. This definately will be a challenge for him. But then again maybe we have restricted his "talent" the first time as we were resistant to certain changes. I believe things will be better soon!!

Yes! We will collect the keys to our house on Friday. Then today we received a call from the agent saying that he needs the COV money to make certain payments for the house that the previous owners have yet to pay before the deal will be finalised on Friday. haiz. Luckily I was on leave today and was able to write the cheque and deposited the cheque before 2 pm. Hope that it will clear soon and things will go smoothly that day.

Dreadful feeling

2008-08-06T00:18:00.004+08:00

Tomorrow we will pay a visit to our FS master to review the report for our house. Having a little mixed feelings now as we are afraid that the report might not be a good one. Part of me feels that we maybe should not have gone to check the FS of the house, but will keep thinking about whether has the huge purchase affect our lives. Keeping my fingers crossed now.

We also finally recieved the letter to go to HDB on 08 August to collect our keys. Finally the sale can be finalised and we can be owners of the new house!

2008-08-03T22:34:00.005+08:00

We attended Dear's Company 10th Anniversary Dinner and Dance on Friday, 1st August. The dinner was held at Sheraton's Tower. When we signed in at the entrance, we were given a sheet of paper which require us to guess the names, age and the country which the actor or actress was from. Oh my, Hahha... there were quite a few actors or actresses whom we totally do not have any idea. They all look so alien to me.

When the dinner started, everyone was so hungry and started eating. The food was pretty nice but just that the food were mostly orange in colour. Hahha.. Can you imagine shark fin soup which is orange? Why was its orange? Haha cos there were crab roe in it. Then came the dessert, it was honey dew sago, but the honey dew was also orange in colour! Everyone had a face when we saw the dessert. Hahaha it was hilarious.

When it was time for the lucky draw, everyone was so excited. The top prize was a 37 inch flat screen tv! Everyone was aiming for that. For me, I was hoping for the Nintendo Wii or PSP II since we had won the television last year. But as luck had deemed, we gotten a Oil Painting with $300 Taka voucher. It was not a bad prize considering that we have won the voucher. Everyone started to say that its a good prize for us since we have a new home. As the picture was all covered up, everyone started to guess what the picture was about. Hahah some said Mona Lisa bathing, some said a bowl of apples, some guessed a vase. Well, I am glade to say that it was none of the above! It was just an abstract oil painting. Hahaha

On Saturday, we headed over to the bridal shop to for my FIL to fit his suit. Following that we went to Courts to look at the avaliable household appliances which we have to get for the house. There were so many to choose from and we were kind of lost in which we should pick. Luckily Dear had read up on some of the appliances and we were there mostly to check out how it looks and the price.

Before dinner, we watched the Dark Knight! It was really a nice movie, the plot was good and so were the actors. There was only one slight thing that made us unhappy. That was the commentation that was going on during the movie. The boys sitting beside us were going on and on about the movie while it was showing. Dear got fed up and told them to keep their comments to themselves! Mwahhaha. I guess the boys got a shock of their life. Hahha. Do watch the Dark Knight if you have not.

Happy Birthday Mr Tan

2008-07-31T22:51:00.004+08:00

It was Mr Tan's birthday on Monday, 28 July. We did not go or do anything special but we went to the much heard and talked about Shokudo Japanese Coffee House at Bugis. I was pretty excited about it although it should be Mr Tan's birthday. I rushed over to Bugis after I had completed my work in office as we were busy preparing for a workshop on Wednesday.

As Dear finished his work on time that day, he headed over to the restaurant when I was making my way down. That was a lucky thing too as the restaurant started to fill up when we were waiting for our food.

Dear's yummy Ramen

My Katsu Don.

My Chicken Soup

The half finished dessert......

What the dessert looked like before we touched it. Hahha.

The dessert was pretty nice! I love the dessert more then the main course. However, I will only go over for their dessert only as both of us feel that the main course is a little too salty.... Ok next stop will be Waraku Pasta! Thinking about the pizza. Yummy

Pre Wedding Photos

2008-07-27T21:59:00.004+08:00

Today we went to view the layout of the photos which we have choosen earlier. We were pretty happy with the photo layout after it was being edited for the album. Initially the photos looked very plain as all the background were pretty plain. However after they edited the photos with some background layout, the photos were pretty nice. I only have the photos for the unedited ones as we aren't allowed to take the photos with all the layout done. So here are some of the better ones...

Its too bad that I can't post the photos in the layout mode. But I simply love the photos!

Fengshui Time!

2008-07-22T00:09:00.005+08:00

Yesterday, we met up with the Fengshui Master Janis for a review of our new home. We decided to seek a Fengshui Master opinion as the previous house owner sold the house due to the lack of funds to finance the house. As they are not moving due to upgrading or other reasons, we felt that it might be a good idea to check out the house to prevent "bad" things from happening to us. Whats the harm? In the end, we might not even follow entirely but just sufficient and acceptable to us. Hence I seek the help of my online friend, Ghim to recommend me a Fengshui Master as she has also recently asked one to review her own house.

We met up with her at 11.15am at the MRT Station but she was early and I panick as the carpark queue was long. Finally we headed over to our new home. Before she started on viewing the house, she explained various things about Fengshui to us. Telling us what we should look out for or how should we do if we were to go to certain places. I did not sms her our birthdates and the TOP date for the house earlier, so she wasn't able to inform us on the spot whether we had bought the appropriate house. This made me half wondered if we should have seek her opinion even before buying the house. But its not logical for us to always go to her to get her opinion before we buy right? How much money we need to spend each time we get her to view the house? We are not that rich. We just have to just avoid or "make amendments" to avoid certain things.

Janis did not go to our home directly but stayed downstairs to take some "readings". She took a lot of "readings" as she mentioned that the "energy" was not stable and its a very borderline reading. In order for her to be sure, she needs to take more than once. Oh boy, she sure did take quite a no, more than 3 at the front of the building, 3 at the back and 3 more in front before we headed upstairs. While she was looking at her plate..... a lot of passerbys were looking at us. Oh dear, I was a little embrassed. HAhhaha...

When we finally went up, she commented that the house has a certainly good space and she will recommend how should we utlise the space avaliable to us. She has also told us the following things that we should avoid:

1) The dinner table should not be plainly visible to the main door.

2) There should not be any metal wares below the stove as it will hurt the health of the female owners. Earthern wares are more appropriate.

3) There should not be any drainage pipes directly at the bottom of the stove. This symbolises that whatever we bring back will go down the drain directly.

4) Do not place any clock on any beams that we will walk directly under.

5) Do not install any celling fan as it is a knife above our heads

Wow, I did not realise so many things. Haha. All above are easily acceptable to me. Its just that i am afraid of the colour scheme that she will propose and the position of the furnitures. We shall see what happen when we go for the actual review of the house. Keeping my fingers cross.

I also seeked her advice on whether we should open the house door the day we get our keys in August as its the lunar 7th Month. She strongly advised us against it and told us that she will recommend us a date that we will make our "presence" known that we are the new owners of the house and she will teach us. Oh that is really good! hahaha. Awaiting for the house review. Cannot wait!

Oh I forgot to take photos of the house again!

Happy Anniversary

2008-07-20T18:57:00.005+08:00

We celebrated our 2nd Anniversary together on Saturday although the actual date was on 15 July, Tuesday. Due to work committments we decided to celebrate it on a weekend so that we will be more relax and enjoy the meal better. We headed to Amara Hotel for the dinner at the Element Restaurant. We had an enjoyable dinner at Amara. The waiter and waitress were pretty polite and attentive to our needs. Our plates were changed once we finished them.

The mini Buddha Jump Over the Wall. Yummy... Drooling now thinking of it.

Stir fried mushrooms. There is my favorite mushrooms

Dear eating the pepper crab which he feels is not nice

Sushi and sashimi. There is no sashimi on the plate as I finished them before I remembered that I want to take photos. There is also oysters and scallops... Yummy

Greedy Dear having sushi and guava dipped with chocolate

Desert!

Before we headed to Amara for dinner we went shopping at Albert Complex as we wanted to get a watch. Finally we purchased not one but two watches! Yes two watches. Knowing myself, I got the second watch for daily wear so that if I were to damage my watch while working, I will not feel the pain. On top of that we bought these two watches for the price of only one original watch!

The watches are a gift from Dear to me as belated birthday gift. Isn't it nice? Thanks Dear!

Food tasting!

2008-07-20T17:30:00.003+08:00

We had our food tasting done on 5th July. The food was good but we will like to make some changes to the food menu that we have choosen initially. During the food tasting there was another couple who was also having their food tasting session. So during entire session both tables were looking at what the other table was having. It was a little funny.

We were also given some wedding favours to choose from.

Coasters

Photoframe

Scented Candle

Saucers. We will choose these saucers as they are practical and nice. The second saucer is more unique compared to the first one as I often see at other friends' wedding.

Good Bye Aigner

2008-07-17T21:43:00.005+08:00

Had dinner with Aigner yesterday as she will be leaving for her studies on 19 July to Australia. This way she will also be able to finish up her studies at an earlier date compared having to complete it in Singapore while working. We had our dinner at Waraku Pasta. Haha We were so hungry that we just started eating and did not take any photos of the food. As the food servings were pretty small, we headed to Swensens for a round of deserts and had ice-creams. Yummy.

As Aigner did not want us to send her off at the airport for fear of any teary good byes. Hence we said our good byes yesterday. She will however be back in Novemeber for her holidays. Will definately meet her up and maybe my house will be ready and we can have a gathering at my place instead. Wow... hahaha. Its sad that she has to leave early as the school term is about to start and she needs some time to settle down over there. Hence she is unable to attend my wedding in September. hiaz...... Nevermind Aigner, I will post some of the photos online and you will be able to view them while you are there. hahahha

After I sent Aigner home, I chatted with Chloe while I sent her home. We discussed about my wedding gown and I mentioned that I felt that I looked kind of old in the gown. She advised that if I felt that way I should do something about it. Today I got Dear to call up the bridal to ask if its possible to change the gown. However they are pretty busy today and wasn't able to answer to our queries. Hopefully I will be able to get some questions answered when we call them tomorrow. I will need to ask about the tea dress and our dads' and brother's suit. Wondered if we will be able to view the layout of our album soon too. Anticipating the outcome of the layout.

15 July was the date which both Dear and I started off as a couple. We did not celebrate that day in any way but we will go for a scrumptious meal this coming Saturday. I have placed a reservations for dinner at Amara Hotel at their Element Restaurant. I hope that it will be a delightful meal and not a disappointing one. I remembered that I enjoyed the food there when I was there for my ex company retreat. Hopefully we will enjoy it as much as I had 7 years ago. Hahahha....This time I promise I will post photos of the day online. I promise and cross my heart.

Two more things done!

2008-07-06T00:51:00.004+08:00

We headed over to T-dragons to print our invitation cards today. As Dear had to work today, we headed over to town after his work and met him there. We were shocked when we found that the unit where the shop is suppose to be located at is closed for renovation. We called up the shop immediately and to our relieve they have just relocated to another unit at the same place. Phew! What a relieve! We thought that we have made a wasted trip down to the store.

There were a lot of people over at the store who were printing their invites too. When it was our turn, we made our decisions pretty fast and within 20mins we were done. We will receive the art work from the printers on Thursday and will be able to get the inserts within 10 working days. Isn't it fast? However we might not be able to meet the date to send out the invitation cards to our friends before the 7th month period. Then we will be only able to send it out in September. We headed over to North Beach Road for lunch after we completed the paperwork. We had a fantastic prawn noodle! We also bought some crispy fried goreng pisang and sweet potatoes home. It was really really nice! We must go back one day.

In the evening, we headed over to Furama for our photo tasting session. Apart from us, there were another couple who had their food tasting session too. Hence we had a chance to view the two sets of table setup, the gold and the red table set up at a time. The food was pretty nice but we made some changes to the food menu after gathering feedback from our family members.

Next week I will be going for my trip to Bangkok for my training. Hence I will be away for a while. Some of the things which we need to do to prepare for the wedding will have to stop for these few days. Will actually like to go over to another interior designer shop to take a look and get quotation from them.

A thought about life

2008-07-02T22:18:00.004+08:00

In the past few days of my work, I have the huge urge in me to tender my resignation or to seriously look for a job. Work is becoming more and more and more dreadful to me. I can't never seem to finish the job which I have on hand and more jobs are waiting for me to be completed. Then again if there are no jobs for me before I could complete the current one, then I will be out of job soon. Hiaz. Life is always so contradicting. I guess I will really need a break from work and really rest and relax for a while.

So I will really be looking forward to the training trip which I will take when I head over to Bangkok next week. So friends, I will be away again from the 8 to the 11 July 08.

While at a customer site today, a conversation which I overheard made me ponder over things a little. The customer was interested in getting some actual samples which they will need for their cancer research work. As they are not in the Pathology Department, they are unable to obtain samples easily for their work as the Pathology Depart requires most of the tumors for their own work. So today a Dr from the Pathology Department visited my customer's lab and assisted them in searching for the remaining tumors on the tissues which they have in hand. During the process, he informed my customers that in time to come the tumors will be smaller then it will be hard for the researchers to obtain any samples. When I hear this, I was elated. I felt that there is hope for everyone now. With the advancement of science maybe, maybe we can eliminate cancer and tumors

However during the process of their conversation, they were discussing the sizes of the tumors, how the human samples were treated before it reaches this stage. As their conversation progress, I was reminded of my family. (They were having the conversation beside the equipment which I am repairing hence I could hear everything. I did not purposely eardrop on them) Why you may ask. Well, my family has a history of cancers and at this point, one member of my family is in the mist of receiving treatment for her illness. I wondered if there will be a cure her or this illness which is plaguing my family.

I started to feel emotional again as I know that my aunt is suffering before treatment started for her. She had kept her silence all the while as she was afraid of the type of treatments she has to go through as our other family members did. However, the way that the scientist and the pathologist were discussing it was like they were disussing the weather or any other thing. All without feelings. But to me, they seems to be discussing about my aunt. I know that they don't mean things that way but I just felt a little sad. Maybe I felt this way as I felt that there were a lot of uncertainty for my aunt. I felt lost that I could not help her to feel better or as before she contracted the dieases. I am lost.

Honeymoon Booked!

2008-06-30T23:02:00.001+08:00

Yeah yeah, we have confirmed our honeymoon to Bali yesterday. Initially we wanted to have our honeymoon in Tokyo as there was some promotion by SQ for two to fly. On top of that we will be able to stay at Dear’s company hostel when we are there. Hence we will be able to save a bit for the trip itself while the only expenditure that we have to fork out will be for our food and transportation.

While search for our renovation contractors, we realised that cost of the renovation is pretty high. We will like to hack a lot of things in the house as its old. With more work required in the house, the cost is definitely higher then expected. In addition, we have our wedding which is up and approaching. That will cost us a bomb too. With so many upcoming events which require a substantial amount of funds, our trip to Tokyo has became a dream which cannot be fulfilled at the moment. We prefer to renovate our home to the best that we like it to be and go for the trip another time. Hence we started searching for alternatives.

We chanced upon Bali as we wanted to go a place where we can really rest and relax after the wedding. Hence we decided to go to a beach resort. In order to try to reserve our cash, we decided to try if we could redeem our mileage which we have accumulated over the years. When we redeemed the mileage we were unable to redeem for both parties at the same time as we have only sufficient mileage individually for only one return trip. Hence we had to sit in front of the computer with phone in hand and started clicking together hoping that we will be able to get flights together. Finally we got the same flight and even managed to choose our seats first. Fantastic!

Now it is only left with booking of the hotel. We have yet to confirm which package that we will like to book with the Hard Rock Hotel.

Project Discovery 6

2008-06-24T23:14:00.002+08:00

Dear participated in the recent Project Discovery 6 from the 13 to 15 June 2008. This time they walked all the way from Sungei Buloh to Pasir Ris Park within 3 days. Thus they covered the entire Singapore by foot. As Dear was had always taken part in such events with Touch, they made him the Team Leader of one of the teams for the walk. As he is always maintaining his good health by exercising, they naturally made him the leader for the more athletic members for the event.

The first day, they started off at Sungei Buloh and ended at Raffles Institute, which is near Bishan. That is a lot to cover for a day. If memory did not fail me, they cover a distance of 35 km. I do not remember the rest of the journey but they passed thru MacRitchie Reservoir, Bishan Park, Kallang River, East Coast Park and finally ending at Pasir Ris Park.

At the end of the second day, everyone was physically exhausted. Some of the participants even developed blisters on their legs. This was no different for Dear. He developed a blister on his toes. A check with the Podiarist, whom Touch has arranged on the second night due to large no. of them having blisters, showed that it was fine for him. They just paste a plaster or tape over his blister and he was fine to go on.

The end of the 3 days, Dear was really exhausted and he looked burnt! Hahaha. However I am proud that he was able to accomplish the trip without much problems. I am sorry Dear that I wasn’t able to participate in the event with you, I will try to participate whenever its possible.

Pay and Pay and Pay

2008-06-22T18:42:00.008+08:00

We will be going for our first HDB appointment this coming Friday, 27 June 2008. I am a little excited and scared. This is a huge investment where most or all our savings disappear. In preparation of the appointment, we started to get our documents ready. While reading the document which informs us what we require to prepare, I read that we need to pay the stamp fee or somethings like that. This fee is approximately 3% of the sale price which we are paying for the house. How much is that??? $8850!! That is a lot of money. I hope that we do not need to pay cash at the moment for that fee, hopefully we can use our CPF to make that payment.

With further reading, we also realised that we need to pay a CPF HS Premium as we will be using our CPF to pay our loan. That is about $120 annually. Oh my...... Paying and paying and paying. Where can one afford to pay for so much things at a time?? We have been working for a while and we have some savings. What about those people who does not earn as much as us? What about those people who are young??? Its really really not easy to own a home to call your own.

I also finally pushed myself to contact the Fengshui Master that my friend has recommended. After talking to her and the date was set to view to house on 20 July while the review will be on 6th August. Its a little late but her schedule is fully booked. Wow, there must be a lot of people who purchased house and wants her to view the place. Hopefully the house is a good one for us with minium amendment required. *Fingers and toes crossed*

Oh, I forgot to mention that I am currently using my office laptop to write this blog. My office has finally decided to issue us the laptop to replace the slow computer with CRT. The laptop is a Dell Vostro 1400. Its a pretty good laptop and I almost wanted to buy it together with the company as I could get a good deal, but with the on going payments which I need to make for the house and wedding, I have to forgo the deal. With the laptop, it means that I need to work from home this way. Sigh. This may be a good thing too since I have a lot of paper work to do but there is no time for me to go back office to do them.

After the meet the parents session two weeks ago, we decided to head over to Chinatown to check out the things which we need to purchase first. We chanced upon the first store as we saw the large xi wordings hanging at the front of the store. They practically have everything we need from the face basin, lamp, tea set to the basket for GDL. They also have the xi stickers which we will need to stick on the oranges or wherever we want to. There were a total of 4 shops but one of them owned by an Aunty who keep asking ask to buy from her. We did not purchase anything from her as we did not drive that day. The items were also pretty bulky and heavy. So I want to drive over and we purchase the items then. On the other hand, its still early, I plan only to purchase the items only in August as we will only need them in Sept. This will solve the storage problem. Kkekek

We still have a lot of things to plan and prepare and schedule. We will have to get our butts into doing them fast. I am still dragging my feet to do these things...

Busy busy

2008-06-14T22:44:00.004+08:00

Finally we have gotten the meet the parents session between both of our parents over and done with. Both of us were so nervous that day when they were suppose to meet up. We wondered if they were to come to blows with each other. Haha. Maybe we have a fantastic imagination.

Well, things went pretty smoothly that day. When Dear's parents arrived, we all sat down and starting chatting. They then hitted off by chatting about the various renovation works which was done in my house especially the kitchen. Both Dear and I wondered if they remembered the actual aim of this meeting when they all went into my kitchen to take a look.

Finally they started chatting about the things which each family will like from each other. Its a lucky thing that both our parents did not want complicated things and wanted only the basic things. For my side my parents only asked for the following:

16 Oranges
2 Bottles of Sparkling Fruit Juice (My family does not drink hence asked for none alcholic things)
16 Boxes of cakes for relatives
Front leg of a pig (Replaced with red packet)
Ping Jin

For his family, they asked for the following:
Basin
Piss pot
Lamp
12 Colour threads
Sicssors
Measuring Tape
Tea Set for AD
Towel

Its a lucky thing that the things that are listed are not tough to find. All these will be send to the two families on the 7th Sept which is the 8th of the 8th Lunar Month. We will have to do the An Chuang that day too. His cousin as told us to just do it ourselves since we do not know who should we get to make the bed. We will also need to get a set of red bedsheets for that day. Oh dear...... We need to go shopping soon since its the Great Singapore Sale. I am sure there will be sale for the bedsheets.

The date for the food tasting has also set to be on 5 July. Oh my, it seems to me that I do not have much time left. I still have a lot of things that is undone........I will also need to find my transport for the day. Yes, the bridal do have vehicle for us but it is with a fee of $500. I wondered since it will be cheaper to rent a car and drive it ourselves instead. Why don't we rent a mini cooper since Dear loves it. Hehe. We will check the prices out and some of my friends have given me contacts for it. Hmmmm......

Ganbateh!

2008-05-28T23:24:00.004+08:00

I was chatting with Mum recently and we touched on the topic of Dad. Dad is or now was a heavy smoker. Whenever I see him, he always have a cigarette lited. Recently he has been coughing a lot and it has been so long that I can't remember when did he start to cough. Well, the coughs are so bad that sometimes it will wake me up from my sleep. He is unable to sleep at times due to the bad cough.

He has visted the doctors numerous times. Each time the Doctors just give him a different cough mixture and he always finished them but the cough will persist. Finally, he decided to go for an X ray. The initial results were pretty bad as he has been smoking since he was 18 years old and now he is 57. However the results he obtained from the specialist was that he is fine but he needs to stop smoking.

Dad went to sign up for the Quite Smoking Course and attended the counseling sessions without fail. I was so impressed. I have always tried to make him go for such courses and I will either get an earful from him or he will just say I don't understand. The best thing that he has done is reducing the amount of cigaretts from 40 sticks to just 14 sticks a day! Wow!

When I was on my way to the kitchen just now, I saw him counting the number of cigarettes left in the box. After counting, he just placed the box back onto the table and did not lit up any cigarettes to smoke. I am proud of him. I hope that he will perserver and reduce the nos to even a single digit and finally to zero. I know that its not easy for him since he has been smoking for more than 27 years, but I really hope that he can do it.

Dad I am behind you and supporting you in reducing your cigarettes.

Back from Hong Kong

2008-05-25T19:25:00.005+08:00

Yes we are back from Hong Kong after 5 days and 4 nights of "holiday". It was a incentive trip for us in the Company and Dear got to go with me after paying a little. While on the plane, the air stewardess congradulated us for going on the Honeymoon. Dear and I were very puzzled on why they knew that we are newly weds and going on Honeymoon. The fact here was that we were not. hmmmm. After much pondering, we concluded that it must be my colleague who had informed them about it. For that, they have given us a cake which we had for breakfast.

Photo taken while we were on the plane...

Isn't the cake nice? Hehe

When we arrived in Hong Kong on the first night, we headed over to Shenzhen! Haha in less than 2 hours in arriving in Hong Kong I was in China with my colleague and her friend who is a local. The food there was really really cheap. It cost only S$ 40 for 8 course meal for a group of 8. Hahha... However as Dear was tired, we headed back to the hotel while the rest went on for their massage and pedicure.

The hotel which we were staying in was called the Dosette Hotel. Its located in the Tsuen Wan which is at the outskirts of the city centre. The hotel was a little small. We did not have much space to move around at all.

The toliet. Look how small is the area for bathing. But my bathroom is already the biggest compare to my colleagues' room. Their bathing area was just half of what I have. haha.

The room where our beds are. Opposite to the bed is the tv which is hang on the wall.

The next day we headed to the Ocean Park. Hehe. Was very excited to go over there as that was a place which we wanted to go very much due to its rides.

Dear getting excited about going there....

The queue before we could board the bus to Ocean Park. All of the people from my company in the queue.

That night it was a free and easy night and all of us headed over to Niu Ren Jie where we shopped. Haha... We bought an apron at the markets. It was a pretty cute one. I did not take a photo of the apron but I will post it once I do. Bought 3 cute fans for our friends and a passport holder for myself.

Dear being excited to fix up the fan.

Our dinner for the night.

The next day we headed over to the peak and went to Macau in the afternoon. We were in for a pleasant surprise as we expected the hotel in Macau to be the same as the one we had for Hong Kong. To our surprise the hotel was a four star hotel. Look at the photos of the rooms. We felt that we were in heaven and were actually reluctant to leave when we need to.

That night we had our dinner at the central of Macau before heading to the gambling dens. Haha. We went to Venice, which is the newest and biggest casino in Macau. It was a theme Casino which is model to be like in Venice. They even had 4 canels at the 4 corners of the Casino which has a mall too.

Entrance of the casino

When we all go oversea or when people come to Singapore they all know that Singapore is such a "FINE" country. When I was in Macau, we saw these cartoons on the wall informing the locals not to spit or throw litter around if not they will be fine too. Haha...

Here are some photos of the girls in my company trying out the act cute poses.

Photoshoot

2008-05-11T18:16:00.005+08:00

Yeah, we completed the photoshoot for the wedding on Friday, finally. The day before the photoshoot, I twisted my neck and was unable to turn my head the entire day. I panicked and as the neck got worst, I decided to head over to Ma Kuang to get it fixed. At the end of the day, I had to get my nails done and headed over to Novena where the shop is. To my horror, the shop isn't there anymore. My last min resort was just to go over to any of the nail shop at Novena and just get it done.

I wanted to do french but the lady recommended me to do nail art instead. Love the contrast between the white flowers and the pink background.

We arrived at the studio at about 9am although we were suppose to be there at 9.30am. We were n0t sure of the place and the traffice hence we decided to be a little early rather then late. Haha we were a little too early this time. The studio is at a typical industrial estate which has practically nothing at all. The makeup artist finally came at 9.35 and we started off with my makeup. While doing that we discussed with her on the no of outfits that we have and decided not to take the traditional gowns as I have 3 EG, 1 WG and 1 casual outfit.

The first EG which I just selected for the photoshoot as its a mermaid style gown. As its difficult to walk in it, I will not choose this as my EG.

These are the two EGs which I have to make a choice between. Hmm, red or gold?

The outdoor look and shots. I kind of like the look that I gotten for the outdoor. The flowers in the hair made it look pretty nice.

The last but not the least the AD WG. I am not sure but I kind of feel that I look old in it. Maybe its the hater neck gown that gives me this feeling. I chose this gown as my EG is a bustier gown already and will like to have something different. Now I am keeping my fingers cross, hoping that it does not turn out as bad as it seems now.

Huge Purchase

2008-05-04T22:24:00.004+08:00

We finally have purchased our home today. Initially when we first viewed the place, we already liked it. However, the cash value that the owners were asking for were a little high base on the location and condition that the place is in. We were in a delimma. We wondered if we should get a place which is higher in level and has a better location to speak of. Better location like nearer to the MRT station or to other amenitities. After thinking for about 5 days, we decided to look for more flats first before deciding.

Over this weekend, we viewed more places. We found places with good locations, however we found some problems with the flat. The houses are not in their original condition, the house owners have hacked away one wall to either to enlarge the living room or the master bedrooms. Both Hubby and I decided that we will like to have the house in the original conditions so that if we have more kids its easier. In case if we do not have that many kids, we can also invite our parents to stay with us if its necessary. Hence with one of the rooms being removed, wasn't really ideal to us. In order for us to have the wall back will also cost us quite a bit of money.

The houses in general all have crack walls or ceilings. This is a worrying factor for us as we are pretty worried that we will have to repair all the cracks even if after we mend it now. Hence we decided to look at newer flats with not as good locations. When we viewed newer flats at Bedok Reservior View, we were more certain that we like the house which we had viewed initally. The houses are Reservoir View were smaller and more expensive. The house owners were asking for more COV even though the location is not as good as other places.

We were lucky that the house we were interested in was still available. We offered and was asked to sign the option to purchase form with a deposit of $50 today. Now we are just waiting for the approval of our HLE and we can proceed from there. Now... we are a lot poorer! Hiaz...

The ceiling in general is either cracking or leaking. The house is not in the original state as we will like it to be. The previous house owner has knocked down a wall to make the living room or the bedroom bigger.

Trip to San Francisco

2008-04-30T21:42:00.018+08:00

We recieved a request from office to go over to Sunnyvale, California to assist our counterpart in performing a Factory Acceptance Test for a customer in India. As it was a short notice, I did not have much time to prepare and off we flew to San Francisco. It was a long long flight there. We first transited in Hong Kong and flew for another 12 hours to San Francisco. During the flight, we were amazed that the guy who was sitting at the window seat did not move the entire flight. We had to even wake him up for his meals! Amazing!

Upon arriving at SFO Airport, we headed over to the car rental bunk and got our rented Mazda 6! Hehe... We had a little hard time in adjusting to driving in US as its the left side drive instead of our normal right side drive. But we managed to adjust after a few days. The hotel was pretty ok as we did held onto high expectations for the stay there. We had a living room and a bedroom. Something that we did not expect it to be.

After a refreshing bath and nap, we headed out to Walmart to obtain some goceries that we will need for the days that we are there. As it was pretty late when we were done, we just ate something fast and headed back. While online, we searched for all the possible places we could visit the next day, which was a Sunday. We received some suggestions from our friends and we headed over to Gilroys the next day.

Both of us went on a super shopping spree over there. the shops over there are selling the items at lower price compared to the shops in town as these items are practically out of fashion. We were amazed at how cheap the things are over there compared to Singapore. Imagine, I could get a Levis Jeans for just $26.99 USD only! Oh my haha... Hence both Shannon and I went a little berserk over there. Having heard a lot about a particular brand of body lotion, we headed into one of these shops and we both almost 10 bottles each. Ok ok, its a lot but they are as gifts to our friends back home. So, all the bottles bought are not just for myself. I also went a little bersek at the Coach Factory Outlet there. Hehehhe

Work started the next day and we met Guillaume at the office. Oh boy was he shocked to see us at the US office. I did not email him to inform him that we will be going over as I am not really sure where he was stationed and did not want him to do anything to pick us up from the airport. But it was sure good to see his shocked expression when he saw us in his own office. Once we started to work, we practically did not have any time to enjoy ourselves at all. We practically work to about 9 pm each night trying to rush out the things that is needed for the customers to visit us. It was only over the weekend that we had arranged to meet Guillaume and Stacy for a short San Francisco Town trip. They did not really have to bring us there but they were really nice to offer to show us around the town. Thank you Guillaume and Stacy.

During our trip into town, it was Guillaume who drove us. It was werid to see him at the wheel when most of the time it was me who drove him around when we are in Singapore. (Guilluame is a Product Manager, who used to help me a lot in some of the instruments that I was in-charged of together to Robin). I could not help it and took a picture of him driving. haha. Later I realised that he had just passed his driving test in US just 6 months ago. While we were driving over to San Francisco, which took us about an hour, we saw that a petrol car was driving across all the lanes sliding from the first to the last and to the first lane again. Stacy then explained that the petrol car is trying to control the traffic speed as another petrol car up ahead has reported something to him. This is usually done so when there is a dangerous driver up ahead or there is something on the highway up ahead hence they want us to slow down. This is something we don't see in Singapore.

Our first stop was the Golden Bridge. This is the bridge which we always see when we watch television. We did not stay long at the place and we headed over to the Fisherman Warfs. We walked a little and saw various kinds of things that the Fisherman Warf was famous for. We also tried the sourdough bread which was fantastic. I wanted to buy some back, but it will not be able to last all the way back to Singapore. The taste of the bread was so unquie that I wanted to buy some of the premix too. But that was also not available there. Hiaz...

To end the day off, we had dinner at the CheeseCake Factory at Union Square. The food was fantastic but the portions were so big that we could not finish what we had each indivdually ordered for ourselves. Oh its was great fun going out with Guillaume and Stacy. We might have induced some arguements between them and we were so sorry for that especially to Guillaume. I am sure if I were to visit again, he will not dared to allow us to get near to Stacy at all. ahaha.

Eye Lashes.

2008-03-21T20:11:00.006+08:00

Yeah yeah PH today. It has been a long time since the last PH, hmmm actually its just one month ago. Hahha.. But it seems so long already. Went for my free compilmentary back massage today and I was pretty angry with their services.

I reached there at 10.15 as appointed and I had to wait 45 mins before it was my turn. If I had to wait so long, why is there a need for an appointment to be made? I almost wanted to leave and they approached me and it was my turn. The massage was pretty painful, maybe its because I have not been for any massage. It had relieved some stress on my body but it was a torturous experiance. After the massage, they tried to ask me to sign up for package and I signed up for the facial and foot spa package for $198 for two sessions of facial and foot spa each. In total I took 24 sets of $198 which they are having. I was willing to take up as my face sorely need some care with the upcoming wedding. In addition, I have also tried their facial services 2 years ago and was happy with their facial. Hence I was willing to sign up.

When payment was made, I felt a little cheated as they did not tell me that I need to sign up as a member and have to pay a sum of $53! I gave them a black face and showed my displeasure. I would not mind if the lady had told me in advance, but she did not. Hiaz.

After reading and watching how to put on fake eyelashes on Xiaxue's blog, I decided to try it out myself. My eye lashes has never been nice and long. I wanted to try something so that I can look better when I go for dinners. Today we went to purchase the items required after the movie.

The fake lashes.

The curlers which does not have the sides blocked so that I can curl the fake ones as well.

Oh the Bridal called us up this week and told us that we will have to go over for another fitting before the photoshoot on the 12 April. It has been set on 6th April. Haha so excited.

Random Posting

2008-03-17T23:54:00.003+08:00

Read one of the famous blogger's blog, Xiaxue, on Sunday. I have heard so much about her and I decided to read a bit to understand why she is so famous. I am pretty amazed with what she posted on the website. She isn't afraid to offen anyone, she pretty much blog on what is actually on her mind. I admire her for that. Sometimes when I blog I wondered if I should name the names of the people or even mention about the event. Why? I am afraid that people will be angry with the things that I post as they might consider them to be private.

What I am truly amaze with is her teaching others how to edit their photos with Photoshop. She gave a basic tutorial on how she actually edited the photos to make herself pretty online. That is pretty daring if you were to ask me. Haha, too bad I do not have that software or else I will definately try to do the things that she has taught. Kekke.....

I also have decide to post the things that needed to be done on the blog. Haha. See whether I will strike them off item by item, hoping that i will see some progress. It is only about 6 months more to go but I don't know what I will need to do for the wedding preparations. Seems like nothing can be done as its too early to do anything. Haiz....

Ailin has left for US already and I have asked her to help me purchase the Coach bag if its cheap. Has decided on the Coach bag instead as the LV bag is really expensive. Will try out the Coach one first and see how things go. Haha Was really thinking of whether I should get the longer lasting LV bag as its leather compared to Coach which is more fabric. Have been thinking of getting LV with the ERS money that the government is giving me. As I have not withdraw a single cent since the day they started it, I have earned myself with a larger sum. Hehe..... Should I?

Dear has finally purchased his HP after much thoughts. He decided to change his phone as he was always having problems answering the phone or even talking with it. He decided to change away the old one before it even give up on him and this allow him to earn a little amount of money back. The choice was between the Sony Erisson P1i and W960i. We decided to go for the W960i as its a newer model although both of them has the same functions. It was about a hundred dollars different and we felt that it will be more worthwhile to purchase something newer so that it will have a higher resale value next time.

I have tried using that phone and it took me a while to get use to the phone. Unlike the normal phones, we need to use the stylus and the screen for certain function. Being a impatient gal, haha, I find it a little too slow. Sorry Dear, for the comment. I just did not do it on purpose. It just came to my mind and I just said it without thinking. Sorry.

My Bratty Princess

2008-03-11T23:04:00.003+08:00

I am glued to this drama serial which is showing at 7pm on weekends. It is a story about this girl who is the General's daughter, who dresses up as a man and does good deeds. While doing some of these deeds, she meet the emporer and a marquis son and they became sworn brothers.

The funny part is when she always get herself into trouble while helping other in need. Her brothers will then try to save her and when they realise that she is a girl and not the brother whom they thought he was, they fell in love with her. As she calls herself the Little Lobster, she also behave like one. She will not tolerate anyone who bullies her or the weak. She will fight back with all her might with her claws. Haha... it is really a good meterphor. This show is interesting as it can be quite funny at times with the tricks they pulled up with. Its a little like the Hung Zhu Ge Ge show, both funny and romantic. Haha.

I found the show showing on Crunchyroll and has been watching the serial almost every night. Oops. Hope that Dear will not scold me as he always warns me not to sleep to late while watching the show. Sorry Dear, I will sleep early....

Broken bottle.

2008-03-10T22:18:00.003+08:00

Arrghhh... the bottle of protein hair spray which I bought has a crack. I wanted to use the hair spray today after I had washed my hair, but a lot of liquid was coming out of the bottle and leaking instead of being sprayed out. I checked the bottle and found that the top part of the bottle has actually cracked!

Yesterday when I brought it back, there were some liquid leaking out. I assume that it was just some excess liquid. But little that i expect that the crack was so huge! I hope that they will allow me to change to a new bottle as this is not cheap. Each time I tried to spray, the liquid will just spill on me instead. Hiaz......

Its expensive being a Woman

2008-03-09T21:37:00.003+08:00

Just went to the hair dresser today for a hair treatment. My hair is getting from bad to worst. The ends of my hair are so dry that they are all tangled up. I think it became worst after my trip to Munich as the weather there was very dry. On top of that, the last time I went for a hair treatment was like a minimum of two months ago.

I was lucky that I went there early, cos after I stepped in, there were numerous people who wanted to either cut, colour or re-bond their hair. Some of them had to be turned away or asked to come back later. The hairdressers were not able to handle that many customers at a time.

There I also trimmed my hair a little while still maintaining the length of my hair. I don't want my hair to be too short for the photoshoot or the wedding. The makeup artist told me to leave my hair longer so that she will be able to style my hair better. Now I am contemplating whether I should colour my hair has a huge chuck of it is black, while the bottom portion is brown. Wondered if its necessary to ensure that the whole head has the same colour cos now its not really that obvious. Maybe I will only do it when its nearer to the wedding itself.

The hairdresser also had advised me to treat my hair to protein spray and protein oil. I have used the products which he had recommended and they work pretty well. I bought both of them together as they were having a 20% discount promotion. All in all, I paid $52. Hiaz. This is part of the price to pay to be pretty.

I often see girls who are well dressed and looks very pretty. Personally being a lazy person, I doubt I can ever be like them. I am too lazy to wake up early and spend the time grooming my hair or make up. I just put on some basic makeup and out I go. Hahha, maybe that is why I can get ready faster then the colleague whom I picked up each morning for work. (Long story, not going to elabrate here). I also do not shop that often to have that many nice clothings to change or wear. My office wear is so predictable. Its always the same as I just repeat them each week. Haha. Ok ok I will try to look for more office stuffs to wear. Try ok?

Last week, Wanida, my ex-manager came back to Singapore for a week as there was insufficient manpower in office. Leong went to US for studies while Jo and Duke went US, Sunnyvale for training with regards to the financial arrangements for our company. While Wanida was here, we went to visit Karin and her son, Kayden! He was so cute and has definately put on weight since the last time we saw him. As usual, he was sleeping all the time we were there. Hahha. No matter what we did, he just kept sleeping and ignoring the environment. Karin told us that he is a terror at night as he refuses to sleep and torturing his parents. Haha.

Cute cute Kayden who is sleeping so soundly

I started to question myself, am I ready for motherhood? Seeing how tired Karin is looking after her son, I wondered if I could really cope. She has to feed her son once every 3 hours and express her milk for about half an hour each time. Hence she has very little time to rest. In my case, Dear will not be able to rest well each night if its so and he has to wake up so early in the morning. I really wonder if we will be able to cope in this sense. Maybe its a little too early to think now, will start thinking after the wedding.

Expensive Thoughts

2008-03-03T22:36:00.004+08:00

I am contemplating whether to get an expensive and branded bag. Hehe. I always wanted a branded bag in this lifetime. Although I always wanted it, but I lacked the urge to really get the item as the price on these branded bags are really high. This year, my dearest husband has suggested that he will get one of these for me! yeah!

Hence we went branded bag shopping last weekend. We went to Coach initially and it was crowded with people. It was almost as if the items were on sale. We found only one or two bags which were ideal as they were smaller. Being not such big in size, I do not think I can carry those huge bags that they have to offer.

LV was next. We had to queue to get into the shop. Wah, is the items or the shop really that fantastic? As both of us has nothing else on hand, we just queued. It took us about 10 mins to just to get into the shop. Things inside were very pretty, however I was admiring and looking at the humans beings inside rather than the products. The customers were all quite nicely dresses and looks very high class. I guess I was the only odd one out since I was in my three quarter pants and t-shirt. Haha. Finally I settled on the LV bread looking bag but the price is twice of that of Coach. Feeling a huge pinch even before we buy the bag, we decided to head over to another outlet before deciding.

We finally went to Gucci as we saw a few people carrying Gucci. Hence we headed over to check out the prices. We were kind of thinking that the price of Gucci maybe cheaper when compared to the others. We were so wrong. The price was quite similar to LV. I felt that the price is not worth it since the items were more cloth then leather. Knowing myself I doubt I will be able to take care of the items well to maintain it in good condition.

Whist attending Kayden's full month's celebration, Ailin told me that she is heading towards US later this month. She said that she will be able to help me purchase Coach if I will like to as its cheaper over there. My eyes went wide! Shannon then added that she will be also be able to obtain some discounts for LV if I were to really wish to buy. Oh oh, which one?

Inaugural Entry

2008-03-02T21:57:00.004+08:00

Hehehe this is my first blog created. I have always read blogs which other people have created and enjoyed them tremendously. I am amazed at their life which can be really colourful and exciting. They also seems to have a lot of zest in recording them and taking so many pictures to update their blogs. I will always enticipate their next update and I will especially enjoy them if they have lots of photos. It is always like being part of their life even though I did not join in the fun.

Do I have a multiply account? Of course I do, haha I have all sorts of account, Facebook, Multiply, Connect, Friendster. Hahha, although I have those account, I do not update them that much. I am not sure if I should or if I can. I am afraid of the consequences that it may have if I were to blog things that are on my mind. Ohh... I am known to be too direct or spurt things without going through my big head. hehehe....One example is today, I have said things at the wrong time to give people the wrong ideals about things which I don't meant. Hiaz. So resolution for the year: NO SPURTING OF WORDS WITHOUT MORE THOUGHTS.

In this case, I am really thankful for the support that I have been getting from my Husband. Whenever I am feeling fustrated or lost, he is always there for me. He listens to me without fail and gives me sound advices that I need. I admire his "coolness" in handling things and seldom throw his temper. He knows when to say certain things or when not to say too much. This is something I got to learn from him. Dear if you are reading my blog, thanks for being there for me at all times. You are also my idol as I admire the way you handle things in like and being so optimistic about life. Just the total opposite of me. hehe

Today I attended Karin's son, Kayden's full month celebration. He is so cute! He is definately much bigger than when we saw him two weeks after he was born. When will it be my turn? Stop asking, haha I will want to have kids, but only when I am traiditionally married to Mr Tan. Give me sometime to adapt to married life and staying with my in-laws first. Then I will have kids. Hope that this will answer everyone's question.

Trip to Germany

2008-02-05T07:41:00.000+08:00

We will be going back home tomorrow after spending about 12 days in Germany. I had training for the first part of the week, while my dear husband had to entertain himself while I was working. However I am thankful that he is around as I had fallen sick when I reached here due to the dry air on the long flight here and the dry and cold air in Germany. Thank you dear.

After the training ended on Friday, we headed off to Salzburg with Herbert's Family and Krissy. That day it was really cold as it had snowed the night before the day and it was still snowing when we left Germany. Herbert had to avoid the highways and took the smaller roads through all the towns. It was horrible as he wasn't able to go as fast as he could on the highway, which he is able to go about 190km/hr. However I am really thankful that Herbert and family took time off to go to Austria with us.

We visited the Castle at Salzburg and it was really nice. The view from the castle down to the village or town below was magnificent. We took a lot of pictures over there. If you are interested to view the pictures, head over to my photos and you will see all the photos there. We also had dessert over there which was a speciality of the town. It is made of egg white and sugar. It wasn't as sweet as I thought it was. Eating some of this dessert was ok, however if you have too much, it was a little disgusting. We had dinner at Krissy place and Krissy parents were really nice. Her mum even cooked a 3 course meal for us!

The next day, we headed over to the mountains in Austria, where Krissy's other home was. The weather was fantastic! The sun was shinning and the snow was fresh. This was our first experience with that much snow. I was actually surprised that the snow was really like powder, very soft and fluffy. We spent a little time on the ski mountain and went down pretty quick as our feet were getting really cold. After that we headed over to play the miniature sleigh that Krissy brought along. It was fun!

We also visited the legendary Cinderella Castle in Germany. It was said that this castle had inspired the creation of the Cinderella Castle in Disney. However this castle wasn't finished before the king died. As such, the castle was never really completed internally.

Today we attended a Fashing Carnival as it was the last day of the carnival in Munich. We arrived at MarienPlatz at 10 am and they started drinking at 10.30 am. Everyone was dressed up, but we just had some hats on. Some people were dressed as Penguins, men as nuns, men in dresses, bananas, etc. One of the kangaroo was down and out before the actual carnival started for the day and had to be sent to the hospital in an ambulance. Herbert said that they must had drank the entire night away. We actually had a good laugh watching these people dressing up and all. Even the little kids were all dressed up. I will post the photos for the carnival another day.

Gown Choosing

2008-01-09T07:40:00.000+08:00

We gotten the videographer finally after much search. This one fits to our budget and from his portfolio does a pretty nice job. They were having a promotion till CNY and was only charging S$688 for the entire day. The other videographer whom I have checked are all charging for at least S$1000 and more. We met up with him on at his place in Redhill. Oh boy, he stays on the 26th storey and the view was fantastic. There was wind blowing in all the time, I doubt that he need neither the fan nor the air condition. Hiaz... when will I be able to get a place call my own?

After meeting the VG, we headed over to the bridal for the first trying of the gowns. Oh my they were all pretty nice. I was so worried that I will not be able to find anything that will fit me as I am not that tall, but I was in for a surprise. Not only that I was able to find gowns that fit me, I had a tough time in choosing the gowns. I had to enlist the help of the seamstress in choosing as she was more blunt and showed me things that I had overlooked. I had a fun time choosing the gowns. In fact I took a break in between to allow other people to try theirs first.. Haha a little rest allowed me to try more and go a longer way. hehehe. The people at the bridal were also pretty nice, they did not show me an unhappy look when I wanted to try on more gowns. They even brought more gowns for me to try on. Sorry, I do not have any photos to show as the bridal did not allow us to take them. I will try to do that on my final fitting hehe.

In the end, it was hubby who had a tough time. He was a little too small in size and all the coats that they had were a little too big. We had forseen this problem and had wanted to tailor make a suit for his own use. Hence when we saw that X2 had a promotion, we purchased the suit that fits him nicely. Of course he had to still altered the suit but at least it fits him nicely enough.

Now that all is selected, we will wait for the photoshoot and the final fitting before the photoshoot. Although it seems a little early, but I won't mind as I do not want to rush things later in the year. I know that there will be still little little things to do and we might not have the time to do such things then. So why not.

My only wish now is just to get a place of our own soon.

Merry Christmas!

2007-12-26T07:35:00.001+08:00

Merry Belated Christmas everyone! Christmas just came and went by so quickly. Next week its 31 Dec and we will be welcoming the new year, 2008!

We had the company Christmas dinner this year on 18 Dec. Our CEO, Chairman of Entertainment, Karin did not want us to know the venue for dinner and made us meet at Clark Quay's water fountain. Following that we proceeded to HOOTERS! hahahaa. We had a very fulfilling dinner there and was well entertained by the guys who were ogling at the gals in their uniform. Haha. The guys seem to know that one of the entrainment by the restaurant was playing the hula hoops. They amazingly disappeared when the waitress wanted to ask the guys to go onto the stage.

Following dinner we proceeded to Party World where we had our gift exchange and lucky draw. My gift was purchased by Kelvin. He gotten me a scarf and a hat for winter. Thanks a lot, I wanted to purchase it too. Then we had our lucky draw. This year it was a little different. The lucky draw prizes were in the envelopes which bear the part no of the items which our company was selling. We had to guess the part description before we could get that prize.

Wanida asked me to get the Cation Suppressor. I hesitated to choose that part as it always gave me problems. I placed the envelope back onto the table and they all warned me that I cannot regret if that was the first prize.

The prize which I had won!

In the end I chose the envelope and guess what. I really won the first prize! Hahah.... The prize was 2 GV Gold Class movie tickets and $300 Takashimaya Vouchers. Hehe Now I can go and buy the curtains that I saw and liked a lot. HEhehe....

Before Christmas, we "renovated" his room by painting the entire room. We purchased the paint from IMM at the DIY store. It was an eye opener as they were able to provide the paint colour for the various series of paint such as Odourless, Easy Wash,etc etc. We were not restricted to the catalog which certain colours for certain products only. They will only need to add the colours to the white base paint and there! We have the paint in the colour that we wanted. Oh oh, the paint was mixed with a shaker which we were able to find in a laboratory, Sonicator, but a huge one! Haha Those who are working in the laboratory will know what I mean.

Before we start to paint, we had to remove most of the paint on one wall as the paint was peeling. After we finished the ceiling and one layer of the white sealer paint on the wall, we were dead tired. We went back to my place to sleep as the smell of the paint was horrible and his room was not in a state for him to sleep in. The next day we started off early and started painting the wall lemon yellow. The effect was perfect! After that we painted one of the white a darker colour called Bone. We wanted a dark colour so that it will be our feature wall. However the colour we chosen was a lighter than what we wanted. But still the effect was good. Now we are waiting for the furniture to be delivered to his place and we will be almost done. I will post the photos of the room once we complete it. For now its still a little messy as some of the things are still not packed as there isn't any cupboards for them. Hopefully we will be able to complete the mini renovation by this weekend.

The Hunt is On Again!

2007-12-07T07:34:00.000+08:00

It was a hectic week to begin with. There seems to be more jobs on hand compared to before. Although only two of our team members were not present this week, one came back on Thursday, we seemed so short handed. There were more than normal problems being reported and the problems were not the normal ones. These problems were never encountered nor were they easy to resolve. Then there was the stupid security guard at our office. I shall not mention it anymore. He had just simply spoilt my days at work.

Now that we have settled the bridal shop and the venue for the wedding, I am wondering if there is a necessity to engage a videographer. Our photographer is someone we have gotten from the bridal as there is a promotion on going. We only paid $388 for the entire day with 200 photos printed and the rest return in CD. The portfolio of the photographer seems ok, however I wondered if he is really good. It is not easy to capture almost every moment but I will really hope that he can do his best. Moments of not only of us but of our guest as well, I will like to see what happened that day that I might have missed. Then I will be able to sit down one day and just flip the pages to recapture that moment.

As the photographer has been decided already, I think I will not employ another or ponder over it anymore. So I am thinking of getting a videographer. Haha. If I did not decide the photographer properly, I hope that I can get a videographer to capture the moments that the photographer had missed. But.... but... I am lazy... Haha.... I am very lazy to go to the internet to look at the portfolios and find out more. I have tried and most of them are just photographers and do not have portfolio for their videos. Hmmmmm........ try. I am try to push myself to do it.

The Aftermath 2

2007-11-20T07:32:00.000+08:00

Being married for just 3 days, I don't feel any different. Maybe we do not stay together after we are married hence we don't feel that difference? Some of our friends stay together with their husband or wife after ROM. Some will bunk into their in laws place while others start to stay at their own place over the weekends.

Now I start to wonder if it is a mistake to ROM first before the actual day. It seems like a lot of people is asking me why aren't they invited for the ROM. Some even commented that I did it secretly. Oh my. I just did not announce it to everyone. I just told people who were close to me as well as those who ask. I will definitely invite the others on my actual day. If i were to invite everyone this time, then I will have to cater to a lot of people. This is meant to be a small private event to me.

Looking back at the event and hearing comments about it, I realised that I was too anxious that day. Did not walk slowly enough, I heard that I was rushing to the table. OMG. ahhaa. Things like this. I realised that I should had tried to enjoy the event and take my own sweet time. So what if the weather is a little hot? I should enjoy the moment. Hiaz. Now that its all over, I guess I will only have to look forward to the actual day itself

Married!

2007-11-18T07:33:00.000+08:00

Today is 18 November 2007, one day after being MARRIED. Oh my. Feelings of being married? Erm but I am sorry to say, not much different. Just that when I wake up this morning, I turned my head and saw someone beside me. I just can't seems to believe that I am married!

On Friday, I just could not sleep. I wanted to as I was pretty tired, but when I laid one the bed, I just could not go and sleep. Got up and watched Ghost Whisperer. I tried to sleep again and I am not sure what time I fell asleep. Woke up at 6.30am! Oh my, I could not sleep anymore. Toss around in bed till around 8am and watch some tv and surf the net a bit more.

After breakfast, we headed off to collect the bouquet from the florist and reached the hotel for check in at 12pm. While waiting for the cab to head towards the bridal shop for my makeup, we saw Tiffany, our primary school classmate. She is working at the hotel as a sales coordinator! Oh my! haha she was a little angry with us for not telling her that we were getting married. ahhaa.

After the makeup, Huiping came and pick me up from the bridal. Thanks a lot gal! When I reached the hotel, both my parents and his parents were there! Haha.. Guest then started to stream in. We took some time off to take photos before the event started, while my cousins helped out with the reception.

The event was pretty funny! We kind of walked too fast! Haha My cousins were laughing at us. I guess I was also too nervous as when I read the vows! hehe. Finally all was over after the ceremony. Took photos with all my friends and all. We did not get to eat the fabulous food that was offered during the high tea. We packed some of the food into the room but we can't seems to eat at all. Then we drank some champage which I had bought when I was overseas. After a glass or so, we just fell asleep at around 8 pm hahaha. Very tired!

Guess what, we woke up at 12 midnight with a hangover. I guess it was because we drank on a empty stomache. Took some aspirin, we feel asleep till this morning. Haha what a way to spend a night. Luckily I am on leave tomorrow and will be able to rest more. Poor hubby, has to work tomorrow.

Less than 48 hours!

2007-11-15T07:30:00.001+08:00

In less than 48 hours, I will no longer be just Miss Tan. I will be Mrs Tan, Mdm Tan and Ms Tan. haha. Although after the soleminzation, we will still stay at our own homes, its really a reality check that we are no longer that young anymore. We are really adults that have to be responsible for our own actions as we are setting up a home call our own.

Although we have past the 21 year old mark a long time ago, but it just seems that on the day we sign on the dotted line, we are really ADULTS. haha. Sometimes I still forget the fact that I am already 27 years old, I am no longer 18 or 19 where I still can play around and just don't act my age. I still ask myself this question, am I really that old already?? When I was young, I wondered when will I get to wear that nice pretty wedding gown. My answer will always be not so fast, I am still so young. Hmmm, now.. haha am I really that young? Another 3 more years and I will hit the big 30 already! Hiaz, how fast time flies.

Things that have been done for the ROM:
- Booked and confirmed the venue- Confirmed attendence
- Wedding Bands
- Shoes
- Shirt for him
- Tie for him
- My dress (still deciding between the pink and white one)
- Red packets
- Order the bouquet
- Wedding favours

Things yet to be done:
- exchange money for red packets
- Iron his shirt- Pens for signing ( provide by Hotel?)
- collect bouquet
- manicure and pedicure (tomorrow)

ROM Cert Collection

2007-11-14T07:29:00.001+08:00

Today I took leave and went to collect the Marriage Certificate from ROM. The process was pretty fast. We just need to take a queue no and wait for our turn while we fill up a form.

While waiting, we saw couples waiting for their turn to enter the room where the soleminzation is being conducted. They were all waiting outside for their turns. When then its their turn next, they will be informed to standby outside the room as they will be next. Once their name is flashed across the screen, in they go.

Seeing things like that, I think I have made the right decision to have my soleminzation at the hotel instead of having it at the ROM. Everything there seems to be so rushed. With it at the hotel, at least I will not need to rush to the venue and wait around like everyone. After the event, I also do not need to worry about getting to another venue for high tea or lunch. We don't have vehicles hence getting from one place to another is not that convinient either. Hence we decided to have it at the hotel instead of the ROM.

Now its less than 3 days! Getting more and more nervous. Oh my headache now.

Wedding Blues?

2007-11-07T07:27:00.000+08:00

In less then 5 days at this particular time, I will have signed on the dotted lines and change my status forever! OMG. I am getting nervous and excited at the same time. I have having some difficulty sleeping now. Keep thinking about the things that has yet to be done or done. Whether I have forgotten anything. Now I am so tired that I can't think straight

I am also starting to wonder if I had done all these in a rush. Looking back I know I did not rush into things however as the date draws near, I start to be a little unsure about things. It does not help when I start to irritate him with repeating my questions about whether this is the right thing to do and so on.

Things are not that easy to me, its not just signing on the line. Your entire life will change. You will have to be more responsible then what you are right now as there is someone else apart from your mother, father and siblings. You also loose your "freedom" to do things the way you want to. You have to respect his feelings and consider how will he feel if you do certain things that might affect him. Hence your entire life will change.

I have gone for my final fitting at the bridal. The pink dress seems ok at that point in time. The people at the bridal was saying that I look ok in it as it suits me. They also mentioned that since I will be wearing white on the AD, why don't I wear pink for now. Something different from the actual day. I showed the photos to my friends, they were all saying that I should wear the white one which I bought it myself instead of the pink one. They felt that it looks nicer on me. Hiaz I really don't know.

Earrings

2007-09-28T07:22:00.000+08:00

Although we have been together for more than a year, I have received numerous earrings from him. Why? I am not sure too, but the first started with my birthday in 2006. We met up and he gave it to me. Of course I was surprised as I did not expect him to remember my birthday after all these years (15 years to be exact). Haha because I don't remember his at all even though there are reminders coming from various sources like Friendster.

I took the pictures of all of them and here they are in order!

The very first pair of earrings received in 2006.

Second pair of earring. I lost one of it as it became loose. Kind of like this one a lot.

For Christmas

Another one

The most recent pair.

Marriage Benediction

2007-09-22T07:21:00.000+08:00

May your marraige bring you all the fulfillment of a marriage should bring and may you have patience, tolerance and understanding for each other.

May your marriage be full of joy and laughter as well as comfort and support

May you discover the true depth of love through loving one another.

Remember that every burden is easier to carry when you have the shoulders of two instead of one.

May you always need one another, not so much to full your emptiness as to help you to know your fullness.

May you always need one another but not out of weakness.

Be faithful to one another in your thoughts and deeds.

Remember that you are not to hold your partner captive but to give them freedom to become all that they can be.

May you embrace them and hold one another but not encircle one another.

May your minds be renewed so that you look to draw out the best and the potential in one another.

Look for things to praise, never take another for granted, often say, "I love you"and take no notice of little faults.

Affirm your parenter and believe in your partner.

If you have differences that push you apart, may both of you have enough good sense to take the first step back.

May the words, "You are right", "Forgive me" , and "I forgive you" be close at hand.

Update Again

2007-09-20T07:18:00.000+08:00

Finally we managed to get the invites for the ROM ready. We just used the idea which our friend has used previously and there! Our invites are ready. Just went to get some of the nice papers from Popular and they were done. Is it nice??

We have also changed the wedding date from 14 Sept to 13 Sept. This is because we have to change the ballroom to a bigger one as the guest list is longer then what we had initially enticipated. As we have already paid for the deposit on the smaller ballroom we can't change the hotel. The only thing that we could do was to change to a bigger ballroom in the same hotel. Luckily we were able to change to an earlier date, which is just one day different.

It was a little disappointing as we like 14 Sept a lot (the fifteen day of the lunar 8 month, mooncake festival). However we felt that if we change the ballroom we will not be so constraint with the guest list. If we were to get the smaller ballroom, we are not even able to have even one reserve table. Its too risky already. Its our own fault, we forgotten about a few friends and hence less a few tables. hhahaha

Another Update

2007-09-17T07:11:00.001+08:00

Its just 10 more weeks to go before the actual day itself. It seems so fast and so long. Fast that time passes so quickly but long that it seems still a long way to go. I am not at all excited or panicky now. Maybe it seems like a long way to go before the actual day itself.

We have already finalised our invites already and chosen the paper which it will be printed on. The invites are in the form of a lottery ticket. Telling them to come and attend a lottery that is going to happen once in a life time. Haha. Gotten this idea from a friend whose invite was a summon ticket, but we changed it to a lottery ticket instead.

I have also gotten the wedding favours from Thailand. Its those cute little things that we hang on our phone. But these come in pairs. They are actually hand drawn by the artist himself. I just find them very cute hence I decide to get them.

The handphone accessory which I had bought in Thailand

When its split apart. Other designs which I had gotten. Monkeys! I love them. As for the hand bouquet, the bridal will not be providing them for us. So we planned to get it from the florist at the wet market near my place. It come as highly recommended in the forum. We went there once and were told that we will just need to provide the photo of the bouquet that we want and they will do it. Dear was very sweet and he went get a bouquet on Saturday to test the skill of the aunty. haha. Take a look at the photos. I feel that the bouquet is pretty nice. I love them a lot.Thanks Dear.

His 27th Birthday

2007-08-03T06:59:00.000+08:00

It was Dear's Bday last week. I bought him a Sekio Automatic watch and he was escatic. He should be since it cost me a bomb! hahaha.. That is not the main reason. The main reason is that he chose that watch himself. As this present is an expensive one, I will rather he chose a model that he likes rather then something I choose and he may not like it.

After I finished doing my chores, we headed over to Clark Quay and proceeded to Settler's Cafe. We thought of spending the day doing nothing and maybe playing games. However, as we did not make any reservations, we were not able to get a seat there. I guess it would also not be much fun since there is just two of us.

We headed over to Central since its just opposite the road. While we were shopping around, we were approached by a group of students. Initially I thought that they were doing some sort of survey or trying to get us purchase certain things. But their intention was to help them for their Freshman Orientation game which they are in. This kind of reminded me of the times when I had taken part or organised such an activity. They had approached us bcos they need someone who was wearing Nike shoes, which Dear was wearing that day. Hahha. After we helped those students, we went to Starbucks to lazy the afternoon away. We took some photos of the present I bought while we were at starbucks. Nothing to do hence started taking photos.

We wanted to watch Transformers however we were unable to get any movie tickets thus we proceeded to my place to watch tv instead. We bought sushi from Istean and just went home to have dinner in front of the tv. Haha What a romatic way to celebrate his birthday. Sorry Dear.

Discover the 90/10 Principle.

2007-07-18T06:50:00.000+08:00

Discover the 90/10 Principle.

It will change your life (at least the way you react to situations).
What is this principle? 10% of life is made up of what happens to you. 90% of life is decided by how you react.

What does this mean? We really have no control over 10% of what happens to us.
We cannot stop the car from breaking down. The plane will be late arriving, which throws our whole schedule off. A driver may cut us off in traffic.
We have no control over this 10%. The other 90% is different. You determine the other 90%.

How? ……….By your reaction.

You cannot control a red light. but you can control your reaction. Don't let people fool you;

YOU can control how you react.

Let's use an example.
You are eating breakfast with your family. Your daughter knocks over a cup of coffee onto your business shirt. You have no control over what just happened.
What happens next will be determined by how you react.

You curse.

You harshly scold your daughter for knocing the cup over. She breaks down in tears. After scolding her, you turn to your spouse and criticize her for placing the cup too close to the edge of the table. A short verbal battle follows. You storm upstairs and change your shirt. Back downstairs, you find your daughter has been too busy crying to finish breakfast and get ready for school. She misses the bus.

Your spouse must leave immediately for work. You rush to the car and drive your daughter to school. Because you are late, you drive 40 miles an hour in a 30 mph speed limit.

After a 15-minute delay and throwing $60 traffic fine away, you arrive at school. Your daughter runs into the building without saying goodbye. After arriving at the office 20 minutes late, you find you forgot your briefcase. Your day has started terrible. As it continues, it seems to get worse and worse. You look forward to coming home.

When you arrive home, you find small wedge in your relationship with your spouse and daughter.

Why? …. Because of how you reacted in the morning.

Why did you have a bad day?

A) Did the coffee cause it?
B) Did your daughter cause it?
C) Did the policeman cause it?
D) Did you cause it?

The answer is "D".

You had no control over what happened with the coffee. How you reacted in those 5 seconds is what caused your bad day.

Here is what could have and should have happened.
Coffee splashes over you. Your daughter is about to cry. You gently say, "Its ok honey, you just need to be more careful next time". Grabbing a towel you rush upstairs. After grabbing a new shirt and your briefcase, you come back down in time to look through the window and see your child getting on the bus. She turns and waves. You arrive 5 minutes early and cheerfully greet the staff. Your boss comments on how good the day you are having.

Notice the difference?

Two different scenarios. Both started the same. Both ended different.

Why?

Because of how you REACTED.

You really do not have any control over 10% of what happens. The other 90% was determined by your reaction.

Here are some ways to apply the 90/10 principle. If someone says something negative about you, don't be a sponge. Let the attack roll off like water on glass. You don't have to let the negative comment affect you!

React properly and it will not ruin your day. A wrong reaction could result in losing a friend, being fired, getting stressed out etc.

How do you react if someone cuts you off in traffic? Do you lose your temper? Pound on the steering wheel? A friend of mine had the steering wheel fall off) Do you curse? Does your blood pressure skyrocket? Do you try and bump them?

WHO CARES if you arrive ten seconds later at work? Why let the cars ruin your drive?

Remember the 90/10 principle, and do not worry about it.

You are told you lost your job.

Why lose sleep and get irritated? It will work out. Use your worrying energy and time into finding another job.

The plane is late; it is going to mangle your schedule for the day. Why take outpour frustration on the flight attendant? She has no control over what is going on. Use your time to study, get to know the other passenger. Why get stressed out? It will just make things worse.
Now you know the 90-10 principle. Apply it and you will be amazed at the results. You will lose nothing if you try it. The 90-10 principle is incredible. Very few know and apply this principle.

The result?
Millions of people are suffering from undeserved stress, trials, problems and heartache. We all must understand and apply the 90/10 principle.

It CAN change your life!!!

House first?

2007-06-23T06:46:00.002+08:00

Today, we went to Bai Long Zhi to get the date for our actual day wedding. We were not really sure of the place hence we went a little earlier. We were told to go there at 4.00 to 6pm. We did not know that its actually the time which the shop is open for business. However since we were early, we were the second in line.

I am actually surprised that there are actually so many people who goes there for various reasons. Apart from choosing the wedding dates, people were there to actually choose the names for their unborn child.

When we went in, we were even asked to proceed to a certain room no. Its just like going to the Doctors where we get a no and the number flashes on the number board with the room no. After we gotten the dates we were happy as there were about 6 weekend dates to choose from.

But our happiness seems to be a little shortlived. We came to realised that we do not have a place to call our own at the moment. We had applied but we were so far away in the queue to be actually be able to choose a place that we like. The application for the houses in Bedok area is worst since its a mature estate. On top of that we are also not sure whether Bedok would be one of the estate that will be offered in August exercise. Oh dear.

We can always stay at either one of our parents place initially. Dear is willing to stay at my place with my parents. However I doubt that we will do that. Most likely we will stay at his place instead. hiaz. But do I really want to do that? Or should I wait for the house to come first?

Money Money Money

2007-06-19T06:42:00.000+08:00

Although we have already decided to go ahead with the plans for our future, I can't stop thinking where would we get our money from. Money is required for ROM, Bridal Shop, Photos, House, Wedding Banquet, Renovation, Furniture and the list just goes on.

Although we are earning an income which allow us to live almost comfortably, we have just started working for just two years after graduating from Uni. On top of that we do not come from a very well to do family. How are we going to ever be able to afford the things which we want?

Well, we worked out the money which we have saved up as well as in the CPF to know that we can't afford to buy a big house. In order not to stretch ourselves, we are able to only get a 4 room HDB flat. But, there are also a thosand and one people getting that particular 4 room flat. From the HDB bimonthly sale, we could see that there are so many peoply applying, when will we ever get lucky enough to be able to get the house of our choice? In this month's bimonthly sale, we applied for Sengkang and Pungol. However I have heard enough negative comments to make me regret my decision. Then again, would I be able to get a place in Bedok, which is a town of my dream?

Everyone is also eyeing the houses that are built in central, but how many are actually left from the En Bloc sale to allow us to get it? Even if we are able to choose, I am sure we will only be left with those low level ones or those facing the MRT tracks. Get resale? Hmmm... house owners nowadays are asking for high cash values on top of the valuation done by HDB. As mentioned, we just started working, we will need the cash for other purposes. Therefore, we will never be able to afford the amounts which they are asking for.

Hence now the question will be whether we should take the flat in Sengkang or Pungol if the choice flats are avaliable. Ok, after discussion we have decided to shortlist the flats that are avaliable and go and select only if those are avaliable. If not, we will wait for those in Bedok. I hope that we will not regret our decision on this. I am just afriad that we will miss the chance for Bedok.

After getting the house, it will be renovation. It will be pretty expensive to renovate. Both of us will like to have a house which is "ideal" to both of us. I am sure that will not come cheap. The house is a place which we will stay for a while. I seriously doubt that we will ever shift unless necessary. We are lucky that there are such things as renovation loans. However, I am not sure how long will we take to finish this loan.

Oh, let's not forget about the furnitures and household appliances that we will require. Of course, we will purchase things which are a necessity first. We will not purchase a bed but just the mattress. Hahaha. Just sleep on the floor for the moment. We have also agreed on just purchasing the television first. I am fine without the sofa. Just sit on the floor will do.

Last but not the least will be the wedding. Although we have almost settle everything for the ROM, I am starting to question myself if we are spending too much on this ceremoney. Its just signing of the cert, do we really need to spend so much?? We will need to spend even a larger amount during the actual day. Hiaz. Money will grow from trees or drop from sky?

Progress Update Part 2

2007-06-17T06:34:00.001+08:00

We have gotten a photographer for that day itself. We initially wanted to get our friends to be our photographer for that day. However we were not able to find anyone suitable thus the hunt for photographer. We have gotten this photographer based on recommendations which we had gotten from the forum. Viewed his portfolio and it was pretty ok, in addition he is the cheapest which we could find.

We have also collected our wedding band. His ring has be custom made as he has a ring size of only 10. Most guys have a ring size of 16 onwards. They suggested to us to purchase a female ring for him instead but he was reluctant since the female rings are thinner. Hence they told us that we had to wait for 3 months for the ring to be custom made. However it was ready within one month.

This is just a simple ring, there isn't much design on the rings or are there a lot of diamonds. Saw and heard that a lot of people bought eternity rings which has diamonds covering the entire ring. Some bought half eternity ring which have diamonds lining up till half the ring. Personally I don't think that its necesarry since we would be wearing that ring the entire day, day in day out. I would feel hard pain if the ring was scratched. On top of that I am also not a very gentle kind of person who can take very good care of the ring. Hence I did not want to get a very expensive ring. I have also head that people loose their ring. Just in case that happens, I think we better not purchase anything that is too expensive.

We were so happy to be able to collect the ring but I was so angry when we collected the rings. They first misplaced my ring and took about 15 mins to find the ring. On top of that they had charged me $29 more for his ring. They said that the price which I had paid was for ring sizes 21 and above. How could that be? When they told us that his ring is so small and had to be custom made I even asked about whether it can be cheaper. They suggested that I should get something else and they would offset the amount. I did not want to buy anymore things. I am not a person who would wear a lot of accessories. They also provided suggestions that maybe I can get something as a gift for friend's kid. I told them that nowadays we are pretty practical and would give red packets. I guess I looked really unhappy and they finally decided to give me a refund. They were unwilling to give me that initially as it would require a lot of paper work. Haiz.

We also did not engrave anything on the ring as we felt that the front provided by them were not very nice. Maybe we would go elsewhere to get them engrave. We are also not sure what would we like to engrave on the ring too. So for now its "clean" haha.

Progress Updates

2007-05-31T06:31:00.000+08:00

Here are some of the updates of our progress. Signed up with Amara Hotel for the event, gotten a JP and finally a bridal package for our wedding. Although the actual day has not been decided yet, we wanted to get a package for the ROM. In that way we would not need to think about the dress, makeup and other things.

I am not sure whether we made a right choice in choosing this bridal. The people there are pretty friendly. One thing I like about them is that they were pretty frank with everything. They have some "copy" gowns from other bridal. Hence I felt that I would be able to have a wide variety of gowns. Dear and I like the gowns as both of us liked simple gowns. But some of the gowns which they showed me seems a little old. Oh well, we paid for the deposit already. I guess we shall not think so much about it. What is done is done.

We did not hunt a lot for the venue. Just choose between Amara and Merchant Court. In the end we chose Amara as we would be able to have an area for the ROM as well as the buffet Hi Tea together. On the other hand the guest would have to be ushered from the poolside at MC to the cafe downstairs. Dear thinks that its hassle and in the event if it rains, we would have a difficult time to go to the poolside as its a long walk from the shelter.

I went a little paranoid when we were unable to invite a JP for the solemnization. We called two of them and they were all fully booked for the day! I almost fainted. Its already 6 months in advance and they are all booked. One of them even informed us that he has 8 appointments that day. OMG. Dear and I quickly looked for other JP and finally managed to get one.

So what is left is our march in song, whether we would want to give out invitations and the wedding favours. It still 6 months more and we have gotten most of the things settled. Oh I need to get my shoes and his shirt. Maybe try to grab something during the GSS. haha.

The aftermath

2007-05-15T06:28:00.000+08:00

Although it has been 4 days only after he proposed, I don't think it is registering in my brain yet.

Yesterday, I just told my manager regarding the proposal. She mentioned that she wanted to see the ring. Hence I brought the ring along today. However, I did not put on the ring as I did not want the other colleagues to know about it yet. I had placed the ring in the glove compartment in the car. When I was at the customer site, I felt insecure and took the ring out to wear. While working, I was also admiring the beautiful ring that he has bought. But I was taking great care that I do not spoilt the ring which he took almost two hours and 3 cups of tea before deciding to purchase this one.

Although we would be going down to the temple to seek advise on the ROM and wedding date, I am also pretty excited. I wondered what kind of dates would they allocate us with. Is there any clashes with anyone with our 8 characters? All these would be answered soon.

While waiting for the dates, we have source for various hotels and venues for the ROM. We had narrowed it down to Armara and Merchant Court. We like Amara for the price and venue. However, the guest would have to sit in the area without air condition while having their high tea. On the other hand, Merchant Court has a nice pool and scenary and the food would be served in the Market Place Cafe where its air conditioned. But, this comes with a higher price to pay.

Is it really necessary to pay so much for just a ROM? Can we make it simplier? The main reason why we are having it at a hotel is that it would easier for our parents. We don't want our parents to be waiting at the ROM itself and cause any unhappiness if any. That is the main reason I guess.

Then again, who should we be inviting for this ceremoney? More friends or family? Dear seems to favour more friends. As the situation would not be that tense. On top of that, inviting family seems to be more for the actual day itself, aka the wedding dinner. Oh headache!

The Proposal

2007-03-14T06:26:00.001+08:00

He proposed on 11 May 2007.

This is the day which I had been waiting for. Although we had discussed about getting married, he did not really actually proposed. We viewed houses, seek quotation for ROM in various hotels but I just feel that something was still missing. I know that doing such things with the other party is only when we are serious with each other. I also know that he would not ask me to do such things together with him if he w asn't serious with me. But I just want to know that he really really really really meant it. He proposed when we were in KL over the weekend.

When we initially book the trip, I wondered if he intends to propose over in KL. However, with some interrogation, I understand that he did not have such intention. When I mentioned that I would be away for the weekend, my colleagues speculated that he would propose. I told them that it would not be the case as I had questioned him on when would he propose. He was very determined not to let me know and I had to twist and turn the questions to get the answers that I wanted. Hence I did not suspect a single thing.

He had kept the ring in his bermudas pocket the entire bus journey there. He knew that I would sit inside and had even placed the ring in the other pocket so that I would not find out! When we reached the hotel, he asked me to go into the toliet. Haha, of course naturally I asked him why. He refused to tell me and even told me to go in. I relented and went into the toliet, but I already suspected that he wanted to propose. At that point I was full of anticipation as I wanted to know what kind of proposal he was going to present me with.

When he was ready, he led me out to the room. I saw the bed covered with rose petals and 3 stalk of white roses. I asked why he did so, his reply was he was going down on his knees. His whole body was shaking! When he knee down in fornt of me, he brought out the ring that he had kept in his pocket. I was in a state of shock at that moment as I did not expect him to purchase the ring. We had agreed that we would go and purchase it together as we do not know my ring size. However, he know my ring size when we purchased the wedding band. Yes, we purchased the wedding band already. Hiaz.

The Roses with the Ring

The Ring

Everything is not going in order, but I am not complaining. I am happy with what I have right now. The order is not that important to me The first thing that came to my mind was to hug him first. I wanted to calm him down before I answer whether I would accept his proposal. After he calmed down, I told him yes. YES I WOULD MARRY HIM.I did not expect him to do so much for me. I know that it must have taken him a lot of guts to knee down in fornt of me and ask me to marry him. Knowing that he had spent so much time at the jeweller to choose the one ring for me melted my heart. Thanks dear for everything!

He would not allow me to wear the ring out in KL as he was worried that its not safe. Hence he restricted me to wear the ring only in the room or when we are back in Singapore. Till now I am trying to remember that I had agreed to the proposal. My statues has not change but will change soon. All these are still sinking into my thick skull. I wonder how long would I need to absorb all these.

At the begining

2006-04-29T23:24:00.000+08:00

Today I went to watch the musical The West Side Story with Tec. It was nice but not as amazing as Snow Wolf by Jacky Zhang. The ending is a little like Romeo and Juliet just that its a 1900s show.

After the show, we went to Holland Village for waffles. It was a fruity waffle, we shared it as it was nearing dinner time. Subsequently we went East Coast for Wanton Mee. It was nice, I will bring Wanida and Phi there next time if I have the chance. I would also bring my parents out for dinner there too. We would be able to relive the time whereby we would go there for dinner after a day of fishing at the Bedok Jetty when I was a young kid.

After dinner at East Coast, we went to Changi Beach and talked about work, life and other things. Actually started talking since we met though hahaha. It was enjoyable having a companion for a day. If I were to have a bf, I might be doing such things with him. Isn't it nice?

Although everyone is asking me why I dun have a bf, I myself would also like to have one. This way then I can share my troubles with and someone to talk to. Go out with, share his problems etc etc. But still I would not just get a bf for the sake of getting one. He must be someone whom I can relate to and he to me. Communication is the most important thing to me.

Busy

2006-04-26T23:23:00.000+08:00

Busy busy day at work again. The problems that I encountered with is always extraordinary. For example, I tried doing something the normal way, it just don't work. But when I changed the method of doing it it works. And all the other things remained the same. Werid!

I guess the worst nightmare today was realising that two of our users are changing jobs. They are leaving their current company. Its so sad to hear that although its normal that people would usually leave after a certain period of time. But I had build good relationship with them that I feel sad that they are no longer there. However that was not the worst part. The worst was realising that another of our customer is replacing them. This customer whom we guess is not a very nice one. She would call one of us up and obtain certain information. Then she would call another and another and another. If all of us give the same answer, she would be satisfied. However if anyone of us gives a different answer, she would demand to know why the answer is different. OMG.

In addition, I do not believe that she has two years of experiance operating our equipments. She would call us at the slightest problem and demand us to go down to troubleshoot. Haha and the worst is that the problem is usually very minor. I doubt from that day onwards we would like to go to that customer site anymore. Not like now anyway.

Today I heard from Gulliamie that Phi is very scared when i drive. He mentioned to him that I drive very fast. Yes, I do agree that I drive quite fast. that is bad. I will try to slow down a bit, but sometimes its very fustrating on the roads though. Nevertheless, i will try to reduce my speed since speeding also kills. But am I really that fast??

Sushi!

2006-04-25T23:19:00.000+08:00

Haha Had that for dinner with the rest of the company after a day of hard work in NUS while performing the installation for LC. It was a problem after another. The worst thing is that after we took the parts apart, things did not get better. We were also unable to detect what was the faulty part. However after we put the things back and just wanted to try to perform a run. It was ok! What is going on? Haha I also not sure what had happened that causes things to happen. Haha Was it.........

Anyway Wanida told me during dinner, that Krissy asked me to help her eat her portion as well. Haha That made me want to take photos of the things we had and to show it to her!

Wah look at the tempura! Yummy. We had tons of things to eat. Like tempura ebi and quite a few othes. It was nice! Haha We ordered a lot of red plates, this is somethin which usually do not order as its expensive. However since its on the company's account we ignored the prices and just continued to order. Haha I think I am putting on the weight that i might have lost these few weeks if i continue to eat this way.

When are u getting married?

2006-04-24T23:17:00.000+08:00

When are you getting married?

Why? You dun have a boy friend yet???

SIGH. Why everyone seems to be asking me the same two questions? Is it really that hard to believe that I do not have a boyfriend at all?? Who doesn't want to have a soul mate whom you can turn to when you have problems. Someone who can lend you his ears and shoulders when you need them. Give you a hug and make things seems ok immediately?

But then again. It is not easy to find such a person. Someone whom you feel comfortable with and willing to share your life with. Its not that I do not want. Just that it seems to me that the right person is not around. Not found yet.

So STOP asking me why I do not have a boyfriend. I would have one when I find someone suitable and he finds me suitable for him as well.

I have been reading my friend's blogs recently. I realised that she just broke up with her boyfriend and hence was feeling down. Another guy came along the way and treated her well. However as fate deems, he gotten himself another gf although he told her that he is not ready for a relationship. That kind of hurt i guess. I began to realised that I might not want to go through the ups and downs in a relationship. I am afraid of getting involved and getting hurt again. I am not sure of relationships anymore. Unless there is really someone like Kiat who is able to show me that he really cares for me and is willing to invest committment and time into the relationship. I doubt i would be willing to start one.

2006-04-05T23:15:00.001+08:00

Been reading other people's posts and realised that I have not been blogging recently. Ok I will try try to make a point to blog. Of course it would not only be the sad ones, it would include more happy things that had occured.

Today it was fun at work, was shopping more than working since we had to go to various places to do purchase things. Since I was in the Bugis area, I went to the temple to pray as well. Been wanting to do that as I have met with a few mishap as well as unusal things recently. Well, I should say various mishaps. Robin hence commented that I should maybe pray a little so that things would not be that bad.

He started to comment on this when we went to Pfizer for training. After waiting at the guard house, we proceeded to the conference room where the safety training was to be held. On our way there, a door opened outwards and hit me. It did not happen to any other person just me. What a concidence.

Today, while we were having lunch, I went to ordered drinks for the others. While I was waiting for my drink, the aunty accidently spilled the ice over me. Only happened to me again. haha

In addition, I realised that I always will meet with unusal problems while troubleshooting. Things will not happen when Lee is in charge, however when I take over, things will bound to happen. Yesterday was the flow cell leaked. when I asked the others, they had never faced with this problem before. And I meant never. Haha So the problems i meet are always the unusal ones, ones that the others never meet before. haha

So today after we finished with our purchase, Robin and I went to the Guan Yin Temple to pray. I prayed for normality at work and life. I don;t need the extra things at work. haha. I hope that this will improve things though.

Oh the new Chemist started work on Monday, but she has been on medical leave since Tuesday due to food poisioning. Poor thing though. The amazing thing is that we were secondary school mates and polymates although she is a year younger then me. Haha What a small small world!

Stress!

2006-02-10T23:12:00.001+08:00

Stress that is what I have right now. Still unable to solve the problem at S company and I have tried everything I could already. Hence I done the most wicked thing, I told my manager about it and knew that she would consult our Thailand counterpart on it. Haha and she did. The next day our Thailand counter part called me and advised me on certain things which I had performed today.

When I Yihui about this, she mentioned that it was nothing wrong about that since I was inexperiance on this matter. Unless its something that I should already know about which I am not. Hmmm. It does make sense doesn't it. However I felt that I should had tried my best in thinking of solutions to solve it rather than keep seeking advise or opinions on how to do it. Am I asking too much of myself?

Next week I would be taking over the New Company. I wonder if I would be able to cope with things over there. The only up side to it is that I would get to drive home. Haha, drive leh. Seem so interesting to me. I am so excited about it.

However , these coming weeks we would be so busy as the other Specialist are coming. Manager also placed me to learn certain things with one of them. I start to feel the stress already as I would be expected to know certain things when I follow them around. Any installation in the future would depend on me already. Oh dear!

2006-01-31T23:08:00.001+08:00

It has been quite sometime since I last entered a blog. I have been too busy recently to have the time to sit down and start writting things in.

Whenever I read other people's blog, its always filled with both happiness and sadness. When I read my, I realised that its only filled with sadness or troubles. It seems to me that I do not blog in anything that is happy in my life. Haha. I am trying to add things in which are happy in my life too. This way maybe it would fine the fun in blogging rather than only sadness.

Today is the 3rd day of Chinese New Year. The past few days seems to have pass in a flash since I was enjoying myself and wasn't requried to work. Have been gorging myself with all sorts of new year goodies as well as food during meal times. Wherever I go, the food that was prepared at mealtimes were all so delicous as well as plentiful. The food were never finished, there were always excess food. These food were usually kept for the next meal or threw away! So wasteful. I kept thinking of those people who were not able to afford a decent meal. How wasteful are we.

Last night, we went to Ailin's house for CNY celebration. Dinner was terrific as usual and we started to gamble after our meal. haha. Played Blackjack and had won a small amount. However, Krissie did not understand the rules of the game and in addition they spoke in Chinese most of the time. Hence she didn't quite understand what was going on and how to play the game. I had to interprete most of the things and explained to her how to play the game.

The lucky thing was when Weide called and asked if I would be interested in joining him and Kevin for ice cream at Siglap. I agree immediately and asked Krissie if she would be interested. As I had asked her directly in fornt of the others directly, it may seems that they were unhappy that I dragged her out. I may had handed the situtation in an untactful manner. Did I?

However, Kriss seems to be more at ease and happier when she was with Weide and Kevin as we spoke in English all the time. They made her feel included in the conversation since all of us spoke in English. Haha At least I made one person happy.

One thing I realised about myself is that I tend to complain a lot. It dawn upon me that I might had told one too many people about the problems that I face at work. This may had resulted in the irritation of the others when I spoke of the same thing again. This is what I saw in the faces of Ivy when I repeated my stuffs to Fenglei and when I tried to tell Fenglei about it. Oh dear, am I more and more like mom? hahaha

Finally I solved a problem at work today.

2005-11-22T23:01:00.000+08:00

Although I have seems to solve it, there is something in my mind which tells me that there something will go wrong somewhere and it is not solved yet. This always happens especially when my eyelids twitches.

When my eyelid on my left twitch, something good will happen, while my eyelid on my right twitch, it’s something bad. Now it’s my right eyelid. Something bad is going to happen. I just do not know what is going to happen.

But the feeling that I have solved a problem was great. I had already deduced the problem and the source of the problem but I just couldn’t seem to be able to solve it any way or another. When I gotten the expected results I was elated! Finally I could do it on my own.

Today I do not expect anyone to go to that company to help me with the troubleshooting. However the manager kind of asked one of the engineers to go down and help me out. Although I was not the person who asked for their help or presence, I am afraid that the engineer will think otherwise. They have their own plans but because of me, they have to change it. This isn’t the first time already. I am just afraid that there are misunderstandings. Although in the end he did not come, he did try to help me out over the phone.

Nowadays the others would also call me and ask me things pertaining to IC. Haha. It feels good to be able to answer their questions. But I know that I am still far from being a good application chemist as there are still quite a number of things that I have to learn first. But the feeling is damn good!

Recently I have been going out with my primary school friends. Haha. Its fun to go out with them. The previous week we went on a food trail all around Singapore and had the following:

Ice cream at Serene Centre
Tea at Tea Party at Sixth Ave
Dinner at Ikea
Supper at Five stars Chicken Rice
Desert at Hong Kong Café!

When I mentioned it to my other friends, they all mentioned that it’s so fattening! Haha But is really fun you know. Not everyone would be willing to do such things. Its kind of crazy I think. Imagine we go till Bukit Timah to eat and eat all the way back home. Haha. I dun think that I will be able to do this again unless that bunch is a crazy one. Travel around so much. Oh boy.

Arrghh. My stomach seems to be getting bigger. There doesn’t seem to be any reduction in my weight. Wondered if I have really lost. Hmmm.. but I doubt so as we have been eating a lot at night. When? With my colleagues as there was a French guy who came to visit the customers and introduced LC Packings to the customers in Singapore. We eat a lot of food. Tonnes and tonnes of them. There were times when I just skipping the dinner and went home. I also controlled my intake during the dinner or else I think I would be one size bigger by now!!

My Inugural Singing Session

2005-10-26T22:59:00.001+08:00

Dr Dew was in town yesterday hence we had dinner together. I was also told that we would be going to the KTV for a singing session after the dinner. That was what I dreaded the most. I can't sing!

I had told Dr Dew during the interview session previously that I do not go to the KTV as my voice sucks. In addition, I think the glasses would also break when I sings hence i do not go to these places often. Haha. He insisted on me singing. Robin also mentioned that I would not be able to run away from the fact that we have to sing last night. He was right.

Right after dinner, we headed straight for the KTV place at Tanjong Pagar. I was in for a surprise.

Surprise 1:

Robin asked the others if Ray had taken beer. I looked at him curiously. Why did he ask that? Is something wrong? Well, soon I realised why he said that. Haha. Ray sang the songs with all sort of actions that you can think of. He also does not need to use the mike. He is loud enough. haha You should see him with all the actions and hand gestures. Dr Dew even commented that Ray should be in the MTV. When he started to rap in one of the songs (Jay Chou's Dad I am Home) he was so funny. He changed some of the words and its sounded really really funny.

Surpise 2:

Wanida could really sing! She can even sing the Shanghai Tan cantonese version! She is a Thai!! I was so amazed that my jaw just dropped! haha

We went home only after 1am last night. When I was home, i could not sleep at all. Laid in bed till about 3 am in the morning and went to work at 8. I look like a panda now. haha

That was all the fun yesterday. Today, I have yet to complete the two applications that I need to do. The 7 peaks reappear today, but the retention time shifted. I cannot use the program that was being set earlier. The peaks are too closely separated. Running a few more different programs tonight. I hoped that tomorrow I would be able to continue running the real calibration and continue with the Catalyst C application.

I am not sure if I would able to get the results. If only I could use carbonate eluent instead of sodium hydroxide. Hiaz. Headache.