THE wedding

Nov 27 was a day to remember. It was Shawn & Pamela's wedding day and it was fantastic.

Shawn’s wedding from my point of view

Pre-event

Suren and I went around getting the clothing and hair cut to fit the occasion. A suit was needed for the dinner and I got a set from G2000. A grey shirt was gotten for the day event and another black shirt to go with the suit for dinner. I also bought a new belt and a pair of shoes to go with the outfit. Basically, the dress up was new from top to bottom.

We spent a lot time shopping for the stuff and Suren was a great help in advising me on the standards of formal wear since I never wore any in my life. He also brought me to his list of shops to get my haircut and contact lenses.

Suren had no shoes to wear for the wedding and we only managed to get them on the day before the wedding since it was hard to get a pair of shoes that fit him.

Being the wedding coordinator, Suren was under a tremendous amount of pressure to ensure everything goes like clockwork on the actual day. His phone was ringing nonstop and the never ending last minute changes made was a nightmare.

We gathered at Shawn's place two days before the event to discuss the event scope and schedule.

The actual event

After weeks of tedious preparation, it’s Showtime.

Waking up at 4.30am in the morning, I sent a mass sms to all the brothers (Contents: Commencing operation H.E.E (Operation Happily Ever After)). Yes, the H.E.E was a typo error on my part since I didn’t get much sleep the previous night and I was also excited to be able to participate in this joyous event of my good friend.

The brothers arrived at Shawn’s around 6am and we had breakfast prepared by his parents. We went though the checklist of things to bring and also run through the events again before we depart. After the customary rituals, we left his place to pickup the bride.

First major hiccup

On the way there, Shawn suddenly realized he had forgotten to shave but more importantly, the bouquet of flowers which he was supposed to carry was left behind at his place. The convoy stopped at a carpark and Alvin was sent back to get the bouquet while we waited. Lucky for us, we still had some spare time since we left early.

The gate crashing

We stopped at the bride’s place and were confronted by the sisters at the corridor for the trials. We had to put on a pair of disposable underwear with alphabets written on it by lipstick and got blindfolded also. The underwear was too small for me and I ended up tearing it. The groom had to arrange us to form a message by telling us where to go but not allowed to touch us. After that, we ate the customary items consisting of sour (toxic waste sweet), sweet (super thick Milo), bitter (herbal tea) and spicy (chili padi stuffed biscuits).

After a few angpaos were given and still not able to enter the house, Kelvin Tan, Kelvin Wong and me resorted to sneak from the rear window but it was locked and guarded. Samuel proceeded to use his shoe and hit the fire alarm bell to simulate the fire alarm.
Samuel and Kelvin Wong then proceeded to hide the sister’s shoes in the basement stairway to make things difficult for them when they want to leave but we returned them later since we were on a tight schedule.

After dancing to “nobody” and the final angpao, we were allowed into the house and Shawn had to read aloud a list of things they have prepared for him to the bride. After picking her up, we left for Shawn’s place.

At Shawn’s place

We had some refreshments prepared by his parents and wait for the couple to go through some rituals. Kelvin Tan, Benny and I left ahead of others for the church to help out with the carpark allocation.

At the church

After confirmation of all the cars’ arrival, we shut the rear gate and proceeded to guard the main door of the church as no one is suppose to open that door during service. We were waiting for some sisters to do the walk in and Amelia rushed over complaining about the locked rear gates which she had to get out of the car to open it and close it after coming in. We were actually waiting for the sisters in her car to start the walk in and I was the one who closed the gates after Suren and Kelvin Tan confirmed all the cars have arrived. After the buffet lunch, we proceeded to the hotel.

At the hotel

We unloaded tons of stuff and proceeded to check-in the rooms. Lau kau and I went over to the nearby 7-11 to get a six-pack of Heineken to relax in the room. Shawn’s laptop was apparently missing and we finally found it in Eric’s car after discovering the luggage was relocated to different cars when we were packing the stuff before we left Shawn’s place. His script for the speech and lyrics for the song he was supposed to sing was still missing though. Ansley was down with flu and was also nervous for the speech as he was the emcee for the night.

We got changed for the dinner and proceeded to help out in the reception area while the guests arrive. On a side note, Carolene and Thomas couldn't recognise me for a while when I appeared in the suit, with my new hairstyle and wearing contact lenses. We ushered in the guests when the ballroom opened. Here, we met Wanda who was alone and looking for company. Apparently she was an old riding friend of a few guys here also. She was complaining she didn’t have a table and I offered her a place at our table after consulting Freddy since he was supposed to be at the AV console to run the videos and music for the night. Being a gentleman, I accompanied her to go smoke a few times and this became a joke later.

Ansley started his speech in Teochew and made everyone laugh with his "kantan" accent and broken Teochew. After that, the couple proceeded with the first walk in. The dinner started and as we ate, Freddy came back and confusion started. In the end, our table had 11 people. We made a lot of noise singing loudly to “stand by me” when it played. Everyone was looking at us but we didn’t care. We were trying to induce the mood for everyone since we are the brothers and it was fun also. Even the sisters who were sitting next to us were stunned.

We had to do the second walk-in together so we left to go outside to prepare after the third dish. Here we walked in to “Shanghai tan” with the sisters in front posing, while we walked in like mafia with guns and the couple last. They were dressed in the big boss and big sister outfit with Shawn swinging a big bottle of liquor. The rest of us wore mask and carried toy guns.

Eric took the stage and proceeded to deliver his speech and brought everyone to their feet for the toast. Shawn sang “Tian mi mi” onstage and we had to sing along by the side as the script that Shawn was supposed to sing with went missing earlier on. After that, we were ushering at different tables to get them ready for the photo taking as there was almost 50 tables and we were running out of time. We accomplished the task in record time.

Whilst doing that, one of his uncle wanted to sing “yue liang dai biao wo de xin” for the couple but the hotel didn’t have a karaoke system. I tried downloading the karaoke version on my iphone and it was fast on 3G. We proceeded to link it to the main system and played it using my phone all the way for his uncle to sing. The Iphone saved the day.

After the dinner

We moved to the reception area for our own drinking session. Here, Shawn had many things to say to each of us personally. After that, we went back to the room for a gathering before we depart. While waiting for the couple, we had a talking cock session involving a drunk Suresh and lau kau about “then lang”. Suddenly, lau kau talked about the “chee hong” who will “fight against china for one girl” which was me due to having Wanda in our table and ousting Freddy from it. They also made fun of me for not getting her number and instead it was Suresh who got it.

I was arrowed for a while but didn’t want to explain too much since I was tired and they were drunk anyway. Explanations are useless when people already have a bad opinion of you and explaining probably make it worse anyway. I explained the situation to Shawn later anyway.

Shawn had his speech to the brothers, asking us to stick close together and help each other. He also gave out his angpaos for us and concluded the event.
I decided to leave for home with Thomas since he had to take a cab and also Benny who stayed the same area although I was thinking of staying for the night previously.

In the end, Suresh drove us back and we insisted on dropping off at his place even though he was insisting on sending all of us back home directly. The wave was at Shawn’s place so I sent Benny home on it while Thomas went over to 824 for the coffee he wanted.

The band of brothers
Suren (Ah Neh) Wedding coordinator
Kelvin Soong (Lau Kau) Bride car driver
Kelvin Tan (Short) Helper
Kelvin Wong (Sabbath) Helper
John (Mona) Photo and videographer
Freddy Foo Photographer
Ansley Jones Emcee
Weixiong (Bear) Helper
Eric Junkai Shawn’s parent’s driver
Alvin Lau (Ah Lau) Driver
Samuel Armstrong Driver
Benny Koh Helper

The brothers who have gathered, rose to the occasion even though we haven't seen each other for a very long time. I am glad we are still as tightly knitted as ever.

The wedding was a success as the brothers worked hard to make sure the event was running smoothly. We had a lot of fun during the event and I would like to thank Shawn and Pamela for giving us this opportunity to be a part of this important event in their lives.