The next hour happened in a twinkle of an eye. We snapped some photos with my side of the family & friends, drank some “tong shui” for prosperity, and headed to Luke’s place for our 1st tea ceremony session. As we only offered tea to his immediate family, the tea ceremony was a rather short one. While the groom and the rest of the family were getting ready to go to the church for rehearsals and receive guests, I took the perfect opportunity to cool down and stripped out of the wedding gown. And it felt sooooo good. Ethel & Cecilia were such darlings, helping me put on and off my gown at least thrice (I kept feeling the urge to go to the loo) and feeding me in-between!

It was 10.55am when the bridal car arrived at the entrance of the church. My heart was filled with butterflies – all excited that in a few minutes, we were going to be “officially” married! The car door opened, and as I stepped out, I could feel a huge veil of joy enveloping me. At that instant, I felt so ready, all prepared for the doors to open, to march in. I even forgot my concern of wobbling or tripping on my 3.5 inch heels! My mind was filled with nothing but joy & pleasant surprises – seeing the many smiley faces, realizing that so many guests were here to witness our beautiful matrimony – that meant and said a lot. At that moment, my initial laments of having such a long aisle to march in dissipated too. Every step I took as Pachabel’s Cannon in D was being played, was magical. The kiddies were perfect too. No tantrums, no confusion or sudden shyness from the multitude as the doors opened, but pure perfection & dedication in every step. I managed to take a peek at the floral deco along the aisle too. It was done the way I wanted it, and again I was blessed with such a wonderful florist (so you see, t
he earlier incident when the former florist played out on me was a big blessing in disguise).

We had a very lovely church service. Although there were little booboos like Luke slipping the wedding ring on my wrong hand, which resulted in me slipping and FORCING & JAMMING his wedding band in his wrong hand (before some quick correction after the videographer whispered), and walking towards the wrong direction to sign the marriage certificate (it was different from our one and only rehearsal!), it was indeed memorable. Guests later told us during the lunch reception that they teared during the bridal march-in & vows, and also shared with us how much they enjoyed the church service. It was good to know that the guests were having as much fun as we were!

Fast-forward 2 hours later, we were in the Raffles Hotel suite getting ready for our wedding dinner in The Ballroom. Bobo was getting as much rest as he could from not sleeping a wink the night before and being sick. While I was busy going through with BR on the co-ordination of the dinner, and getting ready for my 2nd makeup session with JH. :) Managed to get about 20 minutes of shut-eye before slathering another face & eye mask in an attempt to re-awake & rejuvenate the skin, before JH arrived. She was another sweetie too. Called me earlier to ask if I wanted more flowers since she saw some very nice white roses at the florist.

I’m not a fan of sitting and waiting, especially when it comes to makeup, hair & nails! But with JH, it was very different. We would giggle, joke and talk about almost everything, and she was also very accommodating, allowing me to do my stuff in-between hair and makeup, check in on the groom etc. She was another angel. An angel who did such beautiful work on my canvas that garnered nothing but praises and compliments!

14 June 2008, 6.45pm: We were 15 minutes late for our tea ceremony with my side of the family but it was all “well worth the wait” (in JH’s words). I changed into my fuchsia pink embroidery tea dress, and headed with the groom for the Jubilee Hall Lounge. Being “Bounapartes”, the family chit-chatter for a good 15 minutes more before we could finally get everyone’s attention and start the tea ceremony with mum’s side of the family. I think Luke must have been overwhelmed – we served at least 30 cups each!

Photographers Terry & Gino suggested that we take some “creative nostalgic” shots in the Jubilee Hall Lounge before receiving our guests at the cocktail area. It was fun, attempting to look serious at Luke for one of the pose, and I can’t wait to see ‘em photos!!!

The cocktail reception outside The Ballroom was astounding too! Our band, 3 sessions, did such a great job entertaining the guests with their instrumental jazzy tunes while I managed to say a few “HIs” before Ethel dragged me away, reminding me of time check to change into the wedding gown. Thank goodness for nannies like her! Hah. I was also grateful that the Queenies took charge of the reception, sorting and escorting the guests. BR was also busy running around, checking that everything was running smoothly, and deepest appreciation to her too. I’m sure all of them must have been feeling burnt-out from the early morning start, but it was very heartening to know that they loved and cared for us so much in their gestures.

The 1st march-in to the Ballroom was different. Perhaps because now Luke & I were marching down as husband and wife for the first time, or that it was a completely different mood & atmosphere from the church, I was actually more eager to start the evening than before. Luke felt and looked better too, after managing to rest a little earlier, and I could sense that he was all ready to boogie and have yet another time of his life too! One of our favourite songs: At Last, played as the doors opened and on top of the dry ice, dazzling shimmering silver strings hanging down from the balloons, there were also TONNES of rose petals tossed over/at/onto us! Everyone was cheering us at their best.

Dinner commenced earlier than we predicted (which is always a good thing) as everyone immersed themselves in the bossa nova tunes played by the band, and feast. I enjoyed the double-boiled soup dish quite a bit (save the sharks!) as well as the deep fried wasabi prawns, before being reminded to change into my cheongsam.

JH was all ready, waiting for me outside the ballroom as the group of us walked back to the suite for the 2nd change of the evening. The girlies, Cecilia & Ethel & Sam were busy cam-whoring while waiting for me to get hair & makeup done. I kept asking if I should wear my girdle or bodysuit beneath the cheong sam, since I went through so much effort to source for a suitable one. It turns out that all 3 girls said I looked fine without anything beneath the cheongsam and realization dawned on me that I had lost more weight in the last 2 days, and could amazingly fit into the cheongsam without any “creases”. Yay! Received plenty of compliments on the cheongsam too :) And again, reminded myself how blessed I was to have Candy as my tailor & designer – she was so perfect that even 1cm of amendment required me having to do another fitting! And I must say after this experience, I do enjoy wearing cheongsams. The cheongsam certainly maketh a woman.

In-between, a very artistic, “wong-kai-wai” video of the wedding morning and church ceremony was shown to the guests. Yang, the videographer, did such a fantastic job that we received lots of praises for the video. The guests absolutely loved it (amazed at the speed of editing), thankful that we didn’t do the common powerpoint slides displaying our baby-to-childhood-to-teenage photos followed by how we met etc. We weren’t for that idea either! And although we hadn’t seen the video ourselves then (we were busy preparing for 2nd march-in!), we were assured that Yang lived up to our expectations. *note: Indeed he did, because when we finally watched in on Monday evening, it brought tears to us. I just had to keep watching & re-watching the video!

“Crazy little thing called LOVE” played as we did our 2nd march-in for the night! The atmosphere still remained lighthearted and happy (nothing serious & sombre) as we proceeded to the stage for the toasting. That night heard 3 beautiful speeches & toasts from people who loved us dearly too: Cheryl-Anne, Helen & Samantha. Hearing those beautiful words being spoken brought tears of joys. Its one thing to know that these people love you, and another to hear for yourself how much they really love you. Luke went on stage and did a thank-you speech which made me choke on my tears silently too. I wasn’t aware of the speech he had prepared. So when he read it – every word spoken was absolutely beautiful. It got most of the family in tears too, as he teared towards the end as well, talking about his late father. He wasn’t afraid to show his emotional, vulnerable side in front of many and seeing that reaffirmed my blessings of marrying such a wonderful man and husband who wasn’t all egoistical, but sens
itive to others as well.

We did away with the traditional yum-seng from table to table, as well as the “standard” table-photography. :) Instead, we mingled with our guests on a more personal level. While most of the relatives had a whale of a time dancing to the “live” music. We were so caught up socializing with our guests that we nearly missed out on bidding our guests goodbye! Time really flies when you’re having so much fun!!

Needless to say, the brothers and jie-meis were the last groups remaining as the night came to an end. The brothers weren’t going to let the groom and the bridal entourage off so easily, after what the girlies did to them this morning. But it was all in good fun and poor bobo had so much to drank that he puked out twice. Being the wifey, I chose to take care of them, got the hotel to bring in some hot water and honey and lemon and panadol, and told the Queenies and Bs that I could not join them for our pre-arranged chill-out session. Even the private place we reserved at INK bar was left empty, as most of us got high/drunk even before stepping out of the ballroom!

Heartfelt gratitude & kudos to our main co-ordinator (and my bestie BR), Jasmine Choo. For a wedding that was put together within months, without engaging a professional wedding coordinator, Jas was utterly helpful in calming me down in the weeks leading up to the wedding, organizing schedule, calling up various vendors and even organizing a memorable hen’s night for me 2 weeks prior to the wedding. I remembered flustering on the day before the wedding about not being able to do all the things I needed to do & Jas suddenly shifted her meetings around just to meet me at the bridal shop. BIG thanks also, to the pro-active Queenies – initiating meet-ups for discussions, Kris – for making time off to ferry me around despite his very busy schedule and ending up being very sick, BFF – for helping me in every little way possible and being utterly supportive during my fittings and makeup trials, Cecilia – for always being there & assisting me in and out of the gown, Sam – for helping with the painting & dresses etc. As well as the many others (the brothers!) who offered help, gave us beautiful gifts, sound advice etc.

It was definitely our wedding to remember. And thank you to every single one of you who contribute to this very special event.

:)