Still in love with you (#keepcalmandsayido – Part 5)

This blog post is a follow up from:
1) "Why so susah wan?! (#keepcalmandsayido – Part 1)" 
2) "The Video... (#keepcalmandsayido – Part 2), and
3) What we didn’t tell our guests (#keepcalmandsayido – Part 3)
4) A Walk Down The Aisle (#keepcalmandsayido – Part 4)

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“I think I must be dreaming that you are here with me
Must have died and gone to heaven and it’s all that I hoped it would be
When the eagles forget how to fly, when it’s twenty below in July
And when violets turn red and roses turn blue
I’ll be still in love with you”

— Brian Mcknight

If it was up to me, Brian, would’ve been singing it LIVE. It just so happened that we let our wedding budget decide, so I ended up walking down the aisle (or more like an entire flight of stairs) to a CD. *laugh*

As promised, here’s the video from that very special morning.  

Video Credits:
Director/Producer: Yee Wen
Video Crew: Ryan /Andrew / Francis / Tze Ken / Sandra / DG
Ayria Consulting
Forza Pictures

Music Credits:
Still In Love With You by Brian Mcknight (iTunes)
Love Will Be Enough for Us by Joe Moralez (theMusicBed.com)
Marry Me by Jason Derulo (iTunes)

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READ NEXT: DIARY OF A WIFE

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A Walk Down The Aisle (#keepcalmandsayido – Part 4)

This blog post is a follow up from:
1) "Why so susah wan?! (#keepcalmandsayido – Part 1)
2) "The Video... (#keepcalmandsayido – Part 2), and
3) What we didn’t tell our guests (#keepcalmandsayido – Part 3)

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Hey guys! Hope you had a good week so far, in spite of the haze.

Continuing with the #keepcalmandsayido series, you would’ve already known by now:

1) What we susah people actually subjected ourselves to during the #weddingmonth (by choice, so unfortunately we can’t blame anyone ) Click to read more...

2) How #babybaby and I “fell in love”; and how he proposed (hope you had a good laugh with our dumb down version of the video reenactment) Click to view video...

3) The things we DIDN’T tell our wedding guests…(not to mention how much $$$ we saved by DIY-ing the little things that made the difference) Click to read more...

Sorry. Side track a bit – If you’ve emailed me from the previous blog post requesting for my wedding planning/budget templates, you should’ve gotten a personal reply from Moi with an attachment of the files; but if for some reason it didn’t reach you, please let me know in the comment box below ya!! Mwah mwah!!

Ok, back to this.

So yeah, I didn’t wear a Vera Wang, yet I still felt like the most special girl in the world because the man I love thought I was worth the commitment of a lifetime.

Out of all the 4 events we had, I'll admit that the last one at the church was the most emotional one for me. I don’t remember crying so much in public. So embarrassing.

Unfortunately for me, our very efficient videographers caught every embarrassing detail, so you’ll have the joy of seeing the red-nosed version of this Panda in next week’s video. Lol

For now, here are the pictures from the actual day, from my hair and makeup with Joey Lau just before 6am (thank you Joey for waking up at such an ungodly time for me!)… 

…to the quest of “getting Hannah into that impossible dress”; spearheaded by my mummy-in-law and aunty-in-law (please excuse my English lol), assisted by Joey and mum. The 2 superwomen probably grew instant biceps from the exercise of holding up that dress and trying to lace me up. Mafan but totally necessary. What to do? Lol

BTW, thank you Suzanna for the veil, and thank you Aunty Kelene for fixing my dress and bedazzling Suzanna’s masterpiece for me. Loved the bling!!

Point to note for all future Brides: If you’re going to wear a dress like mine for your wedding, you’ll want to make sure you have strong bladder control.

Meantime, at the church, our helpful family members Christian, Joel, Ru and Nancy had their smiles on to orientate our very punctual guests upon arrival.

I was told that my Japanese family, including Akiko Mama and lil’ brother Tomoki were the first to arrive. Early and before time somemore. I call this the "Japanese timing", from which we Malaysians have a lot to learn.  Tabik [Respect]. 

Everything was going well and according to schedule that morning (or so I believe) until the team discovered that some of the most important people to the wedding (including the father-of-the-groom and our 2 opening emcees) were stuck in a plane that could not “park” according to schedule. I’m not sure if those were the exact details but that was what I was told; apart from the standard “don’t worry”. Yes, I understood at that time that nobody wanted the bride to have an anxiety attack. 

Dunno whether to blame the airlines or the airport , but really kesian the people in the plane and also kesian the guests at the church who had to wait.The entire family felt so bad, and I felt even worse for not having a contingency plan to keep our poor guests entertained during the wait. 

[p/s: Perhaps something for you to keep in mind when expecting out-of-town family members at your wedding.]

Anyway, we thank God for such patient and understanding guests who made all the difference, especially since they had every right to get upset about the delay.

Thank you David Oh for keeping our guests updated in the hall during the wait. 

Thankfully, once the event started with Su Yen and Su Lin’s opening, everything else just fell into place…

We rolled this video...

...following which, Dad walked me down the back of the auditorium (which was no easy task in that poofy dress and tall-shoes).

Reverend Kevin – our spiritual father, mentor and friend – graciously committed his entire morning to us and undertook the ceremony in spite of his hectic travel schedule. I'll save the details of the ceremony for next week's video post. :-D

Before we knew it, the BIG day was over... 

...and it was time to toss the bouquet. Guess who caught it?!!! 

1pm. A sigh of relief, as that meant I could finally drink something and stop worrying about bladder control.

Our eventful morning concluded very efficiently, thanks to my Superwoman Jamie, Wonderwomen sisters Gloria and Victoria, Superman Joel Liew, my very gracious mummy-in-law and aunty-in-law, Mui Lin and the brilliant team.

Thank you Cayman and Li-Hsia for coordinating the busy weekend with Mui Lin and assisting Jamie, Gloria, Victoria and Joel in the setup the night before; thank you Sean Teh, Charis Tan, Vincent Kusuma, Wilson Lee, Cheryl Lee, Edmund Lee, Desmond Ng, Anna Leong, Min Yang, Chee Heng, Yuan Yuan, Ed Jane, Johnny Ng and Sabrina Chin for looking after our family and friends throughout the entire morning (not forgetting the venue setup and staying up so late the night before).

Terry and Wei Shen, thank you for sweating for us and managing our traffic flow in the unbearable Malaysian heat.

Thank you Adrian, Angelica, Emloyd, Jacob, Sharon Boon, Tressila, Johnston, Yin Har and Eleazar Ting for leading us in Praise and Worship; and thank you Zia Hao, Kim, Kelvin Lo, and Kelvin Su for making sure our ears were not abused haha. You guys did a brilliant job with the sound!

Thank you Brian Tan and Michael Tong for looking after the lights; and thank you Yee Wen, Ryan Tay, Lee Peng, Grace Khor, Francis, Tze Ken, Andrew Lee, Vernard, Sandra Boon and Dsir Shooter for the making the magic and doing such a brilliant job with the TV/media and cameras. Gordon Lee, Nelson Tan and Thomas Lee – you gentlemen made all the difference by managing all the corresponding facilities that weekend, thank you so very much.

Next week – pictures with our guests, the video that made me cry over and over again and the colour of my wedding shoes (which were not white BTW).

Love you!

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All photos (unless otherwise stated) by Cornelius Lim

Design/Concept/Direction of all “A Walk Down The Aisle” materials (invites, wedding favours, stickers, food toppers, guest photo printout template, button badges, etc) by Joey & Regine Khor. 

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Why so susah wan?! (#keepcalmandsayido – Part 1)

4 events, 4 weekends, 1 occasion.

I’m now a Mrs. Lee; and now you know why I keep calling it a #weddingmonth. Lol

If you know me well enough, you’ll know that I’m one of the most unlikely candidates for marriage to a human being.  My mum, out of all people, actually confessed during my engagement, that she thought I was going to stay married to my work and my laptop for the rest of my busy existence. Such a joker you are, mum. Lol

Aaaaanyway, I’m here, so I suppose that’s a testament to the fact that:

1)    There is a God

2)    Miracles do happen

Lol. So why 4 events just to commemorate 1 occasion?

Here’s the thing. Our initial plan was to keep it really simple and just elope. Or at most, have a small ceremony with our immediate family outside of Malaysia. That way, it would save us the headache, the hassle and to a certain extent, the heartache of cost on a lot of unnecessary things.

Nevertheless, things don’t always turn out as planned, and for us, that was exactly the case. On top of that, we didn’t end up with just 1 “wedding” but 4. Talk about unexpected. Lol

However, I must say that although it was a very “insightful” and, shall I say “character-building” process, #babybaby and I have no regrets. Well, not for me at least. 

I’m not saying that I recommend having more than 1 event to celebrate the fact that you’re getting married (unless you’re looking for every excuse to go bald), but if you and your fiancé come from different ethnic and cultural backgrounds, having something of traditional value to mark this once-in-a-lifetime affair can carry a lot of significance (not to mention priceless memories) in your decades of marriage ahead.

My mum is a Kelabit (they were named as one of the Top Seven Intelligent Communities by World Teleport Association, Dr. Roger Harris, 2007) and my dad is Chinese.

On the other hand, my #babybaby’s dad is Chinese while his mum is part Peranakan, Part Eurasian.

Because of the geographical circumstances – mum and most of her immediate family members live in Sarawak while dad and #babybaby’s family are predominantly in West Malaysia – we decided to have a Kelabit dinner in Kuching…

…and the Chinese Tea Ceremony in KL.

Of course there was also the church ceremony to observe our combined religious practice with closer friends, relatives and associates (more pictures in the coming blog posts). 

So that makes 3.

Granting the fact that it was the first to take place, event #4 was the ROM with our immediate families (although my youngest sister in New Zealand wasn’t able to join us).

I must say that JPN isn’t the most romantic place to exchange vows, but having a fun family with a good sense of humour made all the difference. We definitely had our share of amusement and laughter.

It is said that the attention span of a goldfish is so short that every trip around the aquarium is a whole new experience. That would be me. Lol

But then later, I also learned that the average attention span of an adult is about the same as a goldfish, if not shorter;

so assuming you have better things to do than read my blog for another half hour or so, I’m going to break this wedding blog post into 3 more posts over the next few weeks. *grin*

A lot of you have asked the same questions over and over again,

How did you and #babybaby meet?

How did you get to know each other?

How did he propose?

And why #babybaby? What’s the significance?

Etc, etc, etc.

So to answer your questions, we’ve recorded a short video (with the help of Ming, Bryan and Raffi of Core Studios; and a few other very important people hehe) to reenact the key series of events that happened, leading up to the wedding day.

Will upload it at 9am tomorrow (GMT+8) so till then, have a fantabulous day at work/school! Love you la. Mwah! Big hugs.

Photo credits:

• Kelabit Dinner: Edwin Lay
• Chinese Tea Ceremony: Timo Plattner
• Church Wedding Ceremony: Cornelius Lim
• ROM at JPN: Vincent Cheng
• Video Behind-the-scenes: Bryan Lim