If you miss the buzz and mishmash of Australia’s marketplace, pop by to Singapore’s latest shopping concept space – PasarBella at the Singapore Turf City.
Newly opens less than 4 weeks ago, PasarBella is an European-themed marketplace with lots of interesting stall concepts. Here you find Singapore’s largest community of fresh food traders, crafts retailers, bakers, connoisseurs and niche concept shops. From the second we stepped into the space, PasarBella reminded Felicia and me of Perth’s Fremantle Markets. The diversity of offers and the way the stalls are decorated made this place a colorful treasure trove of multi-sensorial discoveries. If you are a novelty-hunter like my Auntie Amy, you must pop by this “beautiful” rustic market!
Thanks Juliana for recommending this new place to me. (Enjoy the Photos!)
Never judge a lady by her cover. For those who don’t know Tracy well may find her bubbly and sweet. The truth is, Tracy is a gutsy lady. She has more guts than most “macho-looking men” in my circle. I am very selective whenever we pick a holiday destination. She would “pressure” me to accompany for some dare-devil stunts. She is one person who doesn’t know the concept of fear.
Tracy’s birthday is here again. 4 birthdays ago, I gave her a “Reverse-Bungie” experience at Clark Quay. This year, I decided to give her a gift of “unusual-experience” – Diving with the Sharks at Sentosa. Unfortunately, Uncle Bay (her dad) disliked this dare-devil stunt gift and tried to dissuade her from accepting this gift. Tracy hated me for spilling the beans about her South Africa Bungie Jump to her old folks 3 years ago. (Wait till I tell them about her Skyfall at Macao Tower…)
Tracy’s dive with the sharks attracted my entire clan. My mum, dad and wife came specially to see the “show”. We were expecting to see her diving with the big white sharks. Luckily for Tracy, the great whites were in the other tank. What a shame, no drama.
Bradly, our business associate from Hong Kong also joined in the fun. I told him just in case if there is any shark attack, shield my colleague and buddy from harm. After all, I will be answerable to Tracy’s dad if anything bad happens to her.
The dive took place at the Singapore Underwater World where an experienced diver guided them for the 30-min dive. I had a back door access to go behind the scene where the water tanks are. There, both of them wore their diving gears and a quick crash course on “dos and don’ts”. It was more “don’ts” than “dos”. “Don’t catch the sharks, don’t wave your fingers at the sharks, don’t wander elsewhere and don’t take photographs here, sir!” The last “don’t” was for me. I was snapping the backstage of the underwater tunnels and the guide stopped me.
In the end, Tracy and Bradly had fun but struggled a little with the dive. Tracy made a couple of bumps. She wasn’t heavy enough to dive and the guide had to add more weight. We, the audience, were standing inside the tube under the water watching them. For a few minutes, Tracy and Bradly were enclosure attractions. Tourists snapped photos of their clumsy moves. It was certainly fun for the watchers (the children were wild when they saw them walking in the water). For Tracy, this is another different birthday experience she will remember for a while.
Thanks to Phooth Photo Services – Great props and superb instant photo printing! All of us had so much fun at the Lionnel & Joey’s Wedding Photo Booth last night! Many guests were so engrossed in the photo shoots and the wedding helpers had a tough time to get them into the banquet hall. Check out all the funny shots at Phooth’s Facebook Page!
Every wedding, I learnt new inspiring “Words of Wisdoms” on marriage and love. At Franics-Echo wedding, Juliana taught us the difference between a promise and a vow. “A promise is a pact you make with a person. A vow is a holy pact you made with God”, she said. Last night at Lionnel & Joey’s post wedding dinner, Jimmy reminded us the difference between wedding and marriage. “Wedding lasted only a day but Marriage lasted a lifetime. A lot of young people dreamt of a perfect wedding, they forgotten about the lifelong journey of a marriage.”
Last Friday, I flew back specially to attend the most important wedding celebration of the year – as one of the Men of Honor (aka “the brothers) for the matrimony of my best brother/friend Lionnel and Joey! This is one wedding all of us have been waiting for a long long time! Lionnel possesses the best traits in our clan – he is without any doubt the noblest one within the band of brothers. He is humorous, selfless, attentive and most importantly, Lionnel is a man of filial devotion towards his loved ones. And he is possibly the richest golden bachelor in our group with all the thick hongbao collections he shamelessly collected over the decade.
It was a long tiring for all the old boys. At 7:45am, the brothers arrived at Lionnel’s home. All of us were already in our gears and he was still in his pyjamas! Lionnel’s mother and sister served us well. They prepared breakfasts and meals for us. While the brothers were discussing the strategies of “gate crashing”, Lionnel’s mother and sister were giving him their blessings and “Words of Wisdom”. It was a heart-warming moment. No matter how old Lionnel is, he is still the little boy in their eyes.
At 8am, the boys set off. Felicia came to provide videography support and Elkan was our secret weapon to woo the young bridesmaids at the other side. Lionnel and Joey picked a nice tall jeep for their wedding car. It is certainly the perfect vehicle to take them through all terrains in their new life.
8:40am – The Men of Honor arrived at Joey’s home. We did made our presence felt as the boys woke up the whole neighbourhood with loud horns at 8:40am on a Sunday morning. Many people stood by their windows looking down at us. We waited for 10 minutes… no one came down to fetch the groom. We horned again and this time, some of the neighbours responded with loud vulgarities and angry faces. Yifu reminded us to be mindful that some watchers may secretly taped and “stomped” us on social media. Hahah.. apparently, Stomp (the local citizen’s online news portal) has successfully instilled fear in Singaporeans. No one wants to be “stomped”.
8:57am – Time to attack the Bridesmaids! We sent our secret weapon, Elkan to woo, whine and tackle the ladies. Our strategy was to let Elkan dragged time closer to the auspicious hour so the old boys suffered lesser on those gate-crashing pranks. However, those heartless b**** destroyed our little boy effortlessly. Elkan walked back sobbing in tears.
In the end, the boys sweated it out. We have no choice because Joey put one tigress inside the door. The boys were abused and commanded to consume 4 standard items (Sweet, Sour, Bitter and Spicy dishes). Gareth and I weren’t push-overs too. We put the hong baos at the most inconvenient parts of Gareth’s body (the chest and the you-know-where) and dared the girls to take the packets out. In the end, the keys to the door were hidden in a bucket of worms. It didn’t shock the boys as we were too seasoned for such pranks. Gareth grabbed the keys out of the bucket and we opened the gate. There was another door between Lionnel and Joey. Lionnel was compelled to pledge his life for Joey with a long matrimony contract of poo-clearing tasks, long-haul holiday trips and branded-handbag-pampering. Oh dear, my poor brother signed his life / freedom / rights away at that moment.
4:05pm – After a short 2-hour break, we arrived at the hotel where Lionnel and Joey held their wedding dinner. Joanne, Tracy and Kalinda were there since 3pm to dress up the space. Kalinda and Felicia spent weeks to make the props and decorations. The theme colours were in blue and white. Even Elkan’s Lego parts came into play! The girls constructed a Lego Ring Stand for the couple. It is so creative and cute!
6:13pm – Lionnel and Joey officially formalised their marriage in the presence of the Peace of Justice, families and friends.
8:10pm – The wedding reception was a great success! Instead of the conventional sign-in book, guests took instant photos and hanged their greetings and wishes on the branches (a great idea by Kalinda). The couple also engaged an onsite photo-taking services, Phooth(see next blog posting). The guests were so engrossed in taking the photos that I have to terminate the service in order to help the wedding helpers to usher the guests into the ballroom.
9:45pm – Dinner went on well smoothly. 2 perfect walkin and a powerful energy-charged Yam-Seng toasting. Walking though the tables was a breeze for the couple. Lionnel and Joey’s friends were pretty tamed – there were not much sabotaging or spiking of drinks.
The Wahbiang Clan were having a great time – photo taking and catching up with one another. Kalinda was snapping photographs for her port-folio.
By 10:25pm, the wedding dinner ended and most of the guests left. The Wahbiang Clan presented our wedding gift to the couple. It is a handmade photo-frame of little drawers filled with goodies and hong bao money. In the middle of the frame, it holds a printed book (produced in Australia) of our wishes and photos. A priceless and precious gift indeed as it has taken Felicia and Kalinda many months to produce. This may be the last Wahbiang Wedding Gift we made, unless we hear more wedding bells from the last 1 or 2 remaining members of the clan.
Thanks to Lionnel and Joey - they connected the brothers and sisters on their special day. Years of separations have eroded the bonds and ties of the clan. On this special day, the brothers and sisters spent lots of hours together – mending bad ties, laughing, gossiping and sharing. This is the perfect reunion we always wanted but ever have the time or commitment to make it happen. Thanks for this great night where new friends and family portraits were captured and printed! Those were precious keepers!
And thanks for making the brothers “feel young” again with the quirky pink-shorts-pink-bow-ties attire. We looked terribly attractive – surely defines the meaning of Ah Men to Boys! Congrats Lionnel and Joey – always live well, respect each other, protect each other and be happy in the long course of marriage. Always keep a healthy balance – work, life and love. Both have to be giving and forgiving. This will be the sole longest journey you ever embarked together as friends, lovers, spouses and soon to be parents. The marriage path is never easy but it promises tons of rewards and happiness if you walk well together. Hand in hand, heart to heart.
Today – We had one of the largest Wahbiang gatherings ever! A total of 33.5 pax (14.5 kids and 19 adults)! We were just short of Joanne (away in Batam) and Tracy (away in Cebu) to complete this gathering! Why 14.5 kids? Well, we just found out that Jimmyand Sereneare expecting their 2nd child! Congrats to both of them! Just like what Karen said on WeChat, this may be Wahbiang’s “Photo of the Year”! (We should switch off the TV – the kids were all looking at the screen instead of the camera. Hahahah…)
Thanks to Duuk and Juliana who played such great host to our growing clan, we had such an enjoyable time together! Food (steamboat and the side dishes) was excellent! The Lo-Hei tossing moment was unforgettable! Zach and Juliana were sprinkled with good fortune sesame seeds! This was also a very special CNY gathering, we celebrated MC and Yifu’s birthday. Meijie and Joey received their last pre-wedding hongbaos. For one very rare occasion the children didn’t give the adults any headache. Unlike the last Eunos gathering, the kids drove the parents crazy! This time, the kids played in an orderly manner – all thanks to mountains of toys at our host’s house. What a huge difference it made!
From the post-gathering messages on Wechat, everyone enjoyed themselves. Hopefully, we didn’t trash up our host’s home too badly. Now, the clan is looking forward to Meijie and Joey‘s wedding on 17th March! Surely, this will be the last Wahbiang Golden Bachelor’s matrimony of our generation. Time to plan a big B-Party for both Joey and Meijie!
Maybe we have been away for a long time. Christmas is so different without the company of friends and family. It is so much quieter this year without the presence of my wahbiang buddies, Singapore family and that noisy HK indian buddy. So many of them are away on holidays (Joanne in Phuket, Cousin Yei & Echo in Shanghai, Chester in Japan, Leon and family in Xiamen, Harshad and Tracy in Bhutan, Yifu & Family in Hong Kong) with their friends and families. I guess this is a pretty lonely and quiet Christmas season for many. I received more “I miss you” messages than “Merry Christmas”. Just finished my late wee-hour greeting chats with Echo and Aunty Amy, we certainly need to organise a big gathering next year. For them, too, it has been a very quiet Christmas.
On Christmas’ Eve, I tried to connect everyone to gather some noise and “festive moods” on mobile through WeChat. Not ideal but this helps to connect the whole clan together. Thankfully, I managed to gather all my family and a handful of my friends. (I shouldn’t have deleted my Whatsapp but I won’t bow down to intrusion of privacy! So, Chester, Kalinda, Karen and Juliana – please install WeChat!). I asked everyone to send me their Christmas moments (be it a card, photo or even a voice memo!) Thanks to all, I managed to receive lots of amusing voice memos and many beautiful happy photos. It is always a great joy to see Wahbiang’s Annual Christmas Gathering (since 1992!). While the adults are away and mellowing down, our kids are making the gathering bigger and filling the void with their laughters and noise. Like what Felicia said “Someday when the kids are going for their own Christmas parties, will leave us the same old Wahbiang gang.”
It is becoming a tradition in our household. Thanks to Felicia, she put up a new “Christmas Tree-Wall” at my tiny apartment this year. It reminded me of our wonderful Europe trip – a Eiffel Tower Christmas Tree! It blinks every night. Another special mention – I got her to design this year’s OgilvyAction’s DIY 3D Christmas Card(and big thanks to an old friend Timmy for sponsoring the production!). Thanks to all my lovely clients and friends for taking the effort to make the cards and sent me those photos! (I am so glad that my friends received the cards on time – sorry, we have been away for our tour.. we sent them out late!).
While this is the season to get together with your loved ones and spread laughters, joys and love, it is also the time of the year when we reflect on what we accomplished and learnt for the past year. While we are celebrating this special day, do remember there are so many more unfortunate people out there who need our constant attention and help. Do spend some time and teach our children the origins of this special day. It is more than “gifting”. It is all above giving. That is the best gift we gave as parents. It is a tradition and values we must build in our children. Be thoughtful, be kind, be selfless and be good.
Now, we are looking forward to the return of Aunty Bay and Uncle Harshad. It is no fun celebrating and unwrapping our Christmas gifts without them. For the least, Elkan can wait till their return. After all, there are 12 days of Christmas and we have a brand new world to celebrate! It will be a happier 2013. I can hear wedding bells and birthday songs.
Merry Christmas to all of you. I miss you guys so much.
Behind every love story, there is always a twisted version. The minute I received these candid photos from Joey, I decided to publish them into a beautiful movie storyboard. I thought of an uncanny tale of a “38-year-old golden virgin” and “Sinderella” plus “hangover”. Surely it is one epic love story – as twisted as Twilight. Your hearts & show must go on. I bet Lionnel and Joey are speechless right now (after seeing this stunning post on my blog!).
Today is a very special day for one of my brothers.Scott, my dear playboy comrade from Singapore, married Zoe – a very beautiful, caring and loving girl from Hong Kong. This is one special day that I have been waiting for a long long time. Life is just full of surprises. This is the reason why God brought Scott to Hong Kong. “It was so unreal, I couldn’t believe Scott’s finally married”, I told Harshad and Tracy at the church this morning. For so many years, Scott has been waiting for that very special girl. I guess it was a Scott-Joe Curse, none of his previous girlfriends he introduced (to me) last long. They were great girls but they weren’t fated to be his special one. So, I made a pact with Scott 2 years ago when he tried to introduce his new girlfriend to me. I told him “Bro, I am not going to meet your girlfriend. I will only meet your wife!”
This morning, I finally met Zoe for the first time. There she was, walking down the aisle with her daddy. Zoe is gorgeous and wonderfully beautiful. There is something about her. She is certainly the one who is able to tame this brother of mine. Scott and Zoe are perfectly made for one another. I feel so happy for both of them.
Something else in the church caught my attention – a statement marked on the side of the matrimony desk. It says “This Do in remembrance of Me.” A simple vow that marks the beginning of a great journey of will, commitment, strength, faith and love. The statement reminded me of the day when Felicia and I said “We Do” – Scott was there for me. And now here, my heartiest congrats and wishes for Scott and Zoe. And may you two remember this special day and time – 11:45am – your new chapter begins.
40 hours of Echo - Just 10 minutes after I said goodbye to Tracy at the airport, Echo arrived! She filled my quiet weekend with lots of chattering, shopping, eating, sake-drinking and wee hours category III movie! (Hahaha, she wasn’t that delighted when Harshad and I got her to watch 3D DG-style porn with us last night!) Can’t believe we did so much during her very very short visit! I managed to convert her to switch to Android platform. And she saved me from burning a big hole in my wallet when I almost bought that “magical HKD36,000 fish” today. Good to have Echo around when Baybay is away. Now she is back in Shanghai. Waiting for the next Echo, my friend!
Gareth will be surprised to see this blog and all these photos the minute he touches down Singapore. (Good heavens, he is still in the air and I have another 30 minutes to finish uploading this post!)
It was a sinfully long weekend for 2 of us! Sloth, greed, lust and gluttony! We managed to cover all 4 key Pearl River Delta sin-cities within 4 short days (starting with Hong Kong, Shenzhen, Macau and Zhuhai)! What do you expect from 2 most notorious pranksters? It was an awesome escapade of some really hot and heart-pounding actions! We had one of the best brothers’ moments in years!
First stop, we took a bus to Shenzhen for a nice clean spa treatment at our favourite joint “Gold Coast”. We had a sweating good time! Gareth indulged himself in some soothing hot-stones massage while I played table-tennis with a couple of young Chinese dolls. (It was Singapore versus China. Not bad for me, I managed to win a couple of matches for Singapore! Of course, some cried foul as I won over small petite girls.)
Next morning, we took a boat to Macau. This is Gareth’s first visit to Macau and Zhuhai. I promised to bring him to all the newest and biggest casinos. It is the best time to get my dear brother “high”! The devil inside me included another evil itinerary for my good old brother. Knowing Gareth has acute height-phobia, I tricked him to Sky-Walk at the Macau Tower. I wanted to drag him out on the ledge for that “priceless photo moment”! He was about to experience / overcome the fear of his lifetime!
Well, Gareth did completed the Sky-Walk. Shamefully, it didn’t go exactly the way I planned. Gareth walked inside while I took the ledge outside. He broke into cold sweat and he escaped a few minutes before the stunt! In the end, he forsaken me and I have to complete the sky-walk alone. Remarkably, he was able to overcome his fear and walked near to the glass panels to snap some good photos of me. For that, I forgave him.
We didn’t have much luck in Macau. Gareth has absolutely no “Beginner’s Luck”. We did a quickie on the betting tables. We lost everything in just 15 minutes. Thanks goodness, we limit ourselves to just HKD100. Next, most of the places we planned to go were either closed or fully-booked. We have no luck with the Ice World (the show was over) and House of Dancing Waters (tickets sold out). Even the pole-dancing strip bar was closed (before 11:30pm)! In the end, Gareth and I went to catch a very good movie “The Bullet Vanishes”at Galaxy Hotel. Just when we were to leave Galaxy Hotel to our next joint, we bumped into our Secondary School friend, Minjuan outside the toilet! Trust me, it was an amazing moment! And Minjuan’s first words to me were “Why are you still here in Macau? I thought you were here last week?”(mmm…she saw my facebook and blog posting, I guessed. Not sure if she was sent here by my wife to spy on us?)
Having no luck in Macau, we headed for Zhuhai the next morning. There, we found our little shopping paradise! We shopped the entire day. Gareth bargained hard and we managed to get a lot of IT accessories at very attractive prices. We also bought stuffs for our little boys back home ~see, we are such lovely dads. In the evening, we went cycling by the beach park and played an hour of table-tennis back in our hotel. What an unusual vacation itinerary for 2 obese men. Dinner was at a local Chinese restaurant where we had very authentic Singapore craypot Bak Kut Teh! We chilled out at Starbuck Cafe and spent the rest of the night at a local massage parlour.
It was a superb brotherly bonding time for 2 of us. Short, packed and rush but we had so much happy moments together. We chatted so much about our families, careers and the usual men’s stuffs. I am looking forward to our next brothers’ gathering. And next trip, we should get more brothers to join us! Thanks Gareth for the great company! Enjoy the photos and short video! (Haha..Just in time before Gareth touches down at Singapore! )
SiNGAPOREAN BASED IN HONG KONG - 7 years away from home - Singapore. Writing my stories here for my lovely mum & dad, friends and most importantly, for my wife & son back home. A self-confessed gadget freak, a spontaneous prankster on the outside and a warm loving heart inside. Enjoying a happy life with loving families, friends plus a dream job. Realising mum’s motto – “Exceed Yourself Every Day”. I believe, “Simplicity is Beauty”.
07 Jan - Felicia
10 Jan - Karen
24 Jan - Echo
28 Jan - Ivy
06 Feb - Hock
12 Feb - Mann Chuan
04 Mar - Francis
08 Mar - Hovman
24 Mar - Joanne
12 Apr - Gareth
26 Apr - Charlie
16 May - Tracy
15 Jun - Joe
17 Jul - Juliana
16 Aug - Meijie
27 Aug - Duuk
31 Aug - Kalinda
11 Oct - Sam
03 Dec - Jimmy
14 Dec - Lilian
17 Dec - Lusia
SiNGAPOREAN BASED IN HONG KONG - 7 years away from home - Singapore. Writing my stories here for my lovely mum & dad, friends and most importantly, for my wife & son back home. A self-confessed gadget freak, a spontaneous prankster on the outside and a warm loving heart inside. Enjoying a happy life with loving families, friends plus a dream job. Realising mum’s motto – “Exceed Yourself Every Day”. I believe, “Simplicity is Beauty”.
