The Day Before The Big Day - Melvin

10 Nov 08 - This was my day before the big day. Some years back, I spied my brother staying up in bed to memorise his speech during his day-before-the-big-day. My brother usually puts on an impassive countenance, but that night, there was an almost tangible air of nervous energy around him. I didn't have to ask him to know for a fact that butterflies must be churning in his belly.

I finally understood why he felt that way. It's the feeling of being on the verge of making one of the most (if not the most) important decisions in your life. That night was the last night that the world would recognise him as being a single individual. From the next day onwards, his entire world will be shared and melded with that of another person's. Also, relatives and friends will now mention this other person's name in the same breath whenever they enquire about his well-being.

I thought that I would not feel as anxious since Her Royal Majesty and I had already been living together for more than a year since our wedding solemnisation at Mandai Orchid Garden. Yet somehow, it still felt every bit just as momentous.

I had taken leave for the day so as to take care of any remaining tasks for the wedding. The day started feeling like any other. I even woke up at the same time so that I could escort Her Royal Majesty to the MRT station in the morning. Later in the afternoon, I would be left stranded outside her office for 45 min when I went to pick her up from work.

We went home and continued packing the items needed for tomorrow. Initially, we had wanted to start packing for our honeymoon too, but there just wasn't enough time to do so. In the evening, Her Royal Majesty left for her manicure session while I took my stuff over to my mum's place. Since we were already living together, this was the self-imposed day of separation when both of us returned to our parents' homes, in accordance with customs that mandated the fetching of the bride.

I then went to collect the bridal car, a Mercedes SLK. In preparation for this moment, I had gone on several refresher driving lessons, and rented a car on numerous occasions to familiarise myself with the routes. I'm now reasonably confident that I should be able to make it through the day in one piece, even though that may mean driving the supercharged sports car at 50km/h.

The bridal car was rented through Weddingcars.sg, a car rental company specialising in bridal car rentals. We had originally selected the TD 2000, a replica of a vintage car:



Unfortunately, the TD 2000 broke down a week before the wedding, and we had to quickly pick another vehicle from the company's stable. We were not left with many options since we wanted a 2-seater convertible for our wedding. In the end, we picked the Mercedes SLK as it seemed the most stylish among the rest.

Like most sports cars, the car was built much lower to the ground, and packed full of electronic gadgetry. Even the rear view mirror was designed to automatically dim the glare from passing headlights. It was with some trepidation that I clambered into the driver's seat and slowly maneuvered the $200,000 mechanical beast out of the multi-storey carpark.

The machine was built for speed, but with me at the helm, it bounced at the slightest bump and watched helplessly as uncles in Toyota Corollas zoomed past it. Throughout the drive home, I kept reassuring myself that, at the very least, I was a safe driver.

Back home, I busied myself checking the stuff for the wedding and shifting some of it into the car. I'm still not very sure what it was that I was busy with, but I managed to keep myself engaged until about 1.30am. As I forced myself to shut the lights, I remember thinking that I should really get some sleep since I had to wake up at about 5am the next day. Perhaps my brother had gone to bed with the same thoughts during his time. And just perhaps, he also had the image of his wife firmly etched on his mind before he finally fell asleep.

The Day Before the Big Day - Phebe

The day (10th Nov 2008) was a flurry of activities. Thinking back, I can't help but feel amused of how the day before the wedding went. In order to save my precious leave, I only took half a day off instead of a full day. I spent the morning finishing up my work stuff and left at 1.30pm. The Cat (aka Meowvin) had been waiting at the lobby for 45 mins as I came out late, lol.

We went home and finished packing up all the wedding required items, then in the evening, he went to pick up the wedding car and I went for my mani-pedi session at Fingerworks. Note: I still have not finished packing my stuff even then!

It was 8pm by the time I finished my mani-pedi session and I hurriedly took a cab to my mum's place. Didn't want to take the risk of having some blur bloke stepping on my toes by taking the train.

9pm. I reached mum's place, pick up the car and went back to my house (it was only a stone's throw away, about 5 mins walk?) to finish packing up my stuff. I didn't even have time for dinner!

11pm. I left my house and sped to Meanie's house at Toh Guan. She was supposed to stay overnight at my mum's place and we were to finish up preparing the "torture the cat" gate crash items. Liew, it was so difficult to get to her block and by the time I reached, it was 11.25pm!!!

I then realised that Kitty had forgotten to bring with him his precious nose spray, and thus had to drop by one of his bros' house to get him pass the spray to Kitty the next morning before he comes up to be tortured. Liew... almost midnight by the time Meanie and I got to my mum's place! Liew.. people always say that a bride should sleep before 11pm so as to look pretty the next day, me leh??

I had to finish up preparing the "Agreement Letter" and other stuff... by the time we went to bed it was 2.45am!!!! My make-up artiste and photographer were supposed to report at 5.15am.... there goes my beauty sleep...

I woke up late the next morning, lol... I will blog about that in our website soon under "Our Customary Wedding". Stay tuned!

2 Doors and 4 Wheels

I have never been fond of driving. Unlike most other males, the thought of speeding down the highways in a petrol propelled, steel and glass encased machine does not send me into dizzying heights of ecstasy.

Nevertheless, it has always been one of Her Royal Majesty's wishes to arrive at her wedding, chauffered by her groom, in a carriage that makes onlookers go wow. Perhaps she is trying to fulfill the fairytale equivalent of prince charming entering on a white stallion to sweep her off her feet. Although I'm not sure of her exact motivations, I do know that I will try my best to grant her wishes whenever possible.

With that in mind, we did some research and found WeddingCars.sg, a company specialising in car rentals for weddings. Although our package with the bridal studio already includes the usual chauffered-driven Mercedes Benz, we were willing to trade that for a more exclusive and personal ride. Though WeddingCars.sg, we booked a quaint vehicle called the TD2000, which is essentially a replica of an automobile as it appeared in the Industrial Age. Underneath the hood, however, the manufacturers had placed an entirely modern engine with automatic gear transmission for newbies like me.

Next, it was necessary for me to sharpen whatever driving skills I possessed. At a cost of $45 per lesson, I booked and went for about 5 refresher lessons with a private driving instructor. It was nerve-wrecking to get behind the wheel after such a long period of abstinence, and thankfully, I managed to avoid killing myself and my instructor.

Just as I was all set to be the appointed driver for the day, I received an email from WeddingCars.sg to say that the TD2000 was under repair. This was only a week away from the wedding, and without any hesitation, I picked up the phone and gave the company an earful for pulling such a nasty surprise. They were sent scrambling to look for other TD2000s, even if they had to get replacements from other rental companies.

Unfortunately, nothing else came up, and the few other providers either had the car in the wrong colour or had already rented it out. We had no choice but to settle for a silver Mercedes SLK, a 2-door convertible sports car.

Having only driven Toyota and the like, I was pleasantly surprised at the wealth of features in the SLK, from headlights that turned themselves on, to the Transformers-like movements of the roof when it was sliding down. Driving the machine was not entirely positive though - the ride was hard and seat too low for my liking. For everyday driving, I'll stick to Toyotas, thank you very much.

During the big day, the car, surprisingly, was not the subject of much attention from me. While it provided a good photo opportunity, and grunts of approval from my "brothers", it was merely a means of transportation to me. I could have been driving a SBS bus and I probably won't be able to tell the difference. After all, I had more pressing matters to attend to, such as getting married to the most beautiful bride whom I have ever known.

- Melvin

Goodbye, my Beloved TD2000

3 Nov 2008 - It was one week, one freaking week to our actual day and the company we booked our bridal car from informed us that the car we booked kana repair and won't be available on our wedding day!!! Liew!!! Kitty was more pissed than I was, I suppose, as it was one of the rare times he called up the other party to give them a good dressing down without me asking him to.

Liew, to think that we had actually cancelled the Mercedes (the usual 4 door series with the 2 big headlights) that was included in our bridal package and paid a lot more just to book the vintage TD2000 and now this had to happen!!! And 1 week to our wedding day somemore!!! They think we are very free to go car hunting or what??

Kitty managed to get the company, WeddingCars.sg to compensate our loss by paying for any extra cost (if any) if we book another car from another car rental company. Over the next 3 days, we made countless calls to other car rental companies to search for the TD2000 but luck was not on our side. Of the whole of Singapore, there were only 2 other companies that rent out the car.

1) J&J Auto

2) Funcar Auto

J&J Auto only had the TD2000 in GREEN as they had sent all the white ones for scraping. Of all times to scrape the cars!!!!! The green is UGLY. So thats out of the question.

Funcar Auto had the exact model but we came across a rather negative comment on the forum about the vendor who was said to be quite unreliable. We decided not to take the risk of ending up with no car on our wedding day.

We then decided to book the BMW Z4 series, but WeddingCars.sg only managed to find a Z3 in grey colour.... sianz.

Bye bye. my beloved...

In the end, we booked one of the very few choices left available - the Mercedes SLK. Still feeling bummed about not getting my beloved TD2000, I asked Kitty to demand compensation. As we didn't really like the bridal car decor (from photos that we have seen) that was included in our bridal package, I asked him to get the company to provide free decor for the SLK. Haha, after much debating over the phone, he managed to get WeddingCars.sg to do the car decor at no additional cost! We thus cancelled the car decor service from our bridal package and got them to provide us with 7 sets of following car ribbons instead, haha!

Every cloud has a silver lining. At the very least, we won't be car-less on our wedding day afterall.

- Phebe

Rehearsal at The Regent

3rd Nov 2008 - To ensure that things run smoothly on our wedding day, we arranged for a rehearsal at the hotel with our flower girls and emcees. As the ballroom was only available on 3rd Nov, we had no choice but to hold our rehearsal on a weekday after work.

Thankfully, everyone was able to make it even though it was a Monday. Anyway, guess what? We were late by 10mins, and by the time we arrived everyone was already there! So paiseh. Much to our surprise, we had "guests": Anna, Paul, Jessica and Danny who came to watch the fun. Overall, the rehearsal went quite well and our 2 emcees, Gene (Kitty's oldie) and Angelia (Jcoc)were able to coordinate quite well. It was good to have the flower girls practice walking down the aisle as well so that they wouldn't be confused on the actual day. They were really cute. Three of them paraded on stage and started "performing"! Wahahahahhaa!

Anyway, a big thank you to all of you, Gene, Angelia, and especially the mums of our 4 flower girls, who had to bring their kids all the way down to Orchard for the rehearsal. It was not easy, especially since each of the mums have 2 children! Imagine the hassle! As we had no idea how to explain the procedure to the girls, the mothers served as communicators too. Being the experts in childcare, the mothers explained the procedure to their charges very patiently and efficiently, haha! Thank you for your hardwork and for being so supportive!