after 3 sep was done and dusted, i could finally sleep properly.
han yang and i also went back to work on 5 sep. i know right, we are workaholics.
my wedding journey was not over yet! i had a balik kampong version because most of my relatives are in malaysia. yes, my parents are malaysian, and i was malaysian too till last year. we've been based in singapore since i was born, because papa felt that singapore was better place for us to grow us in, since it was a society that upheld meritocracy.
anyway, we held our 2nd wedding dinner in malacca, where most of my mum's relatives are. it was also somewhat central as we had relatives coming from JB, KL and penang as well. we picked restaurant beizhan (ι¦ι ) for dinner because it had great food reviews, was within a white colonial looking shophouse, was a mix of east-west nostalgia (which was perfectly malaysian) and didn't look gaudy cheena:
not bad la uh!
the prices were also reasonable and because we only needed 10 tables, they could partition a part of the ground floor for us. even though their decor was not spectacular + they put up some tacky cheena wedding sign like that during our dinner:
i was willing to accept cos it had a malayan 1980s chic to it. haha!
anyway, the wedding was on 10 sep.
han yang and i took leave from 8 sep onwards and travelled to malaysia in the afternoon so we could get some time to prep.
we stayed at holiday inn, near the mahkota parade area, and it was surprisingly clean and comfortable. (i confess i never had a good impression of holiday inn, but it changed my mind).
anyway, i couldn't really remember the order of tasks in the whole 2 days of prep, but we did several things.
i remember it was alot more stress-free than singapore, and i had gotten more sleep prior. it was evident from how much fresher i looked in the photos.
anyway, we didn't plan the programme at all beforehand! my capable mama settled the tables and the menu and beer and wine and all. she also booked the restaurant sound system because we were showing our prewedding video. han yang and i intended to just let the programme ran organically. we didn't need to walk in, just greet the guests, play video, give wedding speech. we wanted it to be as personal as possible.
but anyway, when we went down to recce the restaurant the day before the dinner (for the first time), the manager told us the sound system came with an emcee. and he was quite pro cos he's done hundreds of weddings before. he was shocked we didn't want walk in and anything else, so he sat us down and walked us through the flow and since it seemed like he could coordinate everything, we decided to just let him do everything and we didn't need to plan anything else! it was so awesome. i was very glad. we did a check that my comp could be connected to their system cos i wanted to use our playlist.
they also convinced us to do walk-in, yam seng and pouring of champagne. they wanted to offer us fake blue champagne but i said no, thank you. we went to buy our own real champagne.
my mum also convinced me to buy a banana choco cake cos it was also my birthday and then can distribute. since it was all about family i was totally cool.
so chill! han yang kept joking that it was our real honeymoon :D
yipeedoods
we also went to some photographer's house to engage his services for dinner. mama's suggestion was so last minute but it was the best idea ever cos i got to relive the day's events. the photographer wasn't that pro or anything but he managed to capture alot of random moments. it was good enough for a balik kampong 80s wedding!
i wanted to pick up fresh flowers at the nursery for the venue, but my sis told us that she got all the flowers settled in singapore! so sweeeeet of her :)
i also wanted to get my hair done by a salon too, so the day before, han yang and i went to explore the mahkota area for salons. the first few were cheaters and when i said it was for wedding they immediately jacked up the price. i was furious you know, i hate these wedding cheaters.
stop emotionally blackmailing brides now!
anyway i found a random salon and told them it was for a dinner without stating anything. similar to singapore, i wanted an updo first, that could be let down into waves since i was also changing into the 3 outfits. they charged me standard price, so i made an appointment with them for after lunch on the 10th!
on that day my family had lunch with my in-laws
and then after that i went back for a quick bath, and went down to the salon, which was a stone's throw away. han yang stayed in the hotel and picked out songs for the wedding. since my relatives were mostly chinese-speaking, we decided to do up a chinese playlist:
then i found out that han yang is a closet cheena music lover like me and hence we had a lot of fun putting everything together! we chose a mix of pop songs, old chinese theresa teng type songs + just a few english easy jazz.
meanwhile at the salon, i was abit worried when they started to do my hair cos the curls didn't look that professional. they also braided my hair successfully only after several attempts. eventually it wasn't spectacular but at least it was very neat.
i learnt my lesson and used a pin for my fringe! and yeah as you can see my makeup looks nicer here cos i wasn't time strapped. it was a good eyebrow day! glad i managed to redeem my wedding look.
i wore my diy cheongsam! back button wedding cheongsams are ridiculously impractical cos someone else has to button them for you. i read somewhere that that's how they disempower girls of the past - by putting zips/ buttons/ corsets at the back. hur bopian. the back buttons are so chio.
more selfies cos im happy with my makeup! getting ready for my parents to pick us up!
my parents brought us to a home stay location near beizhan, where all of papa's relatives were being hosted for the night. it's a super huge 3 or 4 storey house with many rooms.
look at how mama and jie decorated the gate! <3 so divine.
she did up the dining table inside for the tea ceremony!
with my εε and ε©Άε©Ά :)
started the tea ceremony! with ε€§ε§ and 倧ε§δΈ
δΊε§ and δΊε§δΈ
such a hugeeee angpao! it was the pandora necklace
ε°ε§ and ε°ε§δΈ ! another pandora :)
δΊθ
ζ― and δΊθ
hehe my ε°ε§¨ and δΈθ
. see su qi and su ping at the background. they were roped in to be last minute tea girls. heh so sweet of them!
i think beyi enjoyed the longan date tea the most! :D
su ping and su zhen 葨ε§
totally enjoying her drink
<3
harng harng giving her blessings!
with bing yong!
calvin, and bing guang
i know, turquoise tongue! it was from a strange sweet that my cousin gave me.
my normal family
my funky family
after this we quickly packed all the decorations and drove to beizhan, where it was like 7+ already. but anyway, chinese wedding so everyone was late. i went to get changed.
mr photographer, what's with this vignette effect?
my ε°θ
and ε°θ
ζ―
chilling! the only full table then!
during singapore wedding we didn't even get a chance to take a photo together! it was so nice to have the luxury of time. strange effects again
my dear cousins, the table coordinators who got assigned last minute to the task and rose to the occasion!
more relatives from my mum's side. her family is huge and them cousins still meet up frequently.
my ma, pa, papa, mama!
i think this is one of few photos that jie and i have some sort of resemblance
my eldest grand aunt, she is a darling <3
this is the strangest photo ever, we are typically serious and i don't know what the photographer did to get us in this state
seriously
mama and her school mates.
more beautiful cousins are here!
<3<3<3
so much fun with so much free time
they made us do strange things which han yang was not accustomed to
time for our walk in!
went on stage and gave a short speech in mandarin which we prepared on that day, again (heh, we never learn our lesson)
i think papa was very happy i spoke mandarin. haha
cute folks
aw so cute (save for vignette)
hahaha any one would have mistaken an and my sis as a couple
the older folks were more onz about toasting than we did.
i changed outfit and my curls looked so bad so i salvaged them by tying my hair to the side. i still look fresher than 3 sep heh. han yang and i working out our script for the longer speech!
time to pour champagne! the emcee was really super experienced and jazzed up the dinner alot with his hosting.
and then half way through, an decided to join in to be the english emcee! it was awesome cos he's really a natural. was a nice touch for the few people who didn't speak mandarin. it was like everything self-coordinated and fell into place! anyway they took out the cake and the emcee played a kiddy birthday song and everyone sang a birthday song for me! it was hilarious.
han an hyping up the crowd heh
time stamp: 1980
i love you!
in singapore we did a toast. in malaysia, it's yamseng!
my in-laws were clearly amused and found it a cultural immersion
and then it was time for speeches! we wrote 4 paragraphs in chinese, hehe, and thanked my relatives for always being so generous and hospitable, and for watching over me in my formative years, and for coming down from everywhere to grace the event, and stepping in to help out. :)
papa is happy and smiley everytime hui xin speaks mandarin
and then after that we opened the floor for karaoke session! initially i really didn't want loud blaring music and bad singing but decided to since mama already paid for the sound system, and it was all included. we also thought, since they had come all the way down, might as well make this a true blue malaysian wedding. it was indeed, and actually everyone who went up could sing rather well! i was quite happy we made the decision cos i could tell my relatives really loosened up even more
time for table photos
i love my cute beyi!
mama's cousins
papa's side of the family
i dunno what's this, but it's a cute photo. with my beloved gong gong's siblings :') missed you gong gong, i wished you were here..
more mum's cousins!
and more.
mama's school mates and my cousins!
and then my δΊε§ went up to sing and she really blew us away. like professional singer type voice that could rival theresa teng. we were like, eh, how come you never told us you could sing!?!?!?!? she was amazing!
old folks starting to get rowdy ah!
even my cute grand aunt joined in!
and then han an also sang a michael buble song, it was as usual, superb!
my ah bee auntie enjoyed herself the most that night.
in true blue malaysian style, a family portrait!
wouldn't have wanted this to be done any other way!
