You know you're at a chinese (wedding) dinner when...

1. You reach the restaurant by 7.45pm when the invitation card says 7.30pm, and the event only really starts at 8.15pm.

2. You realise there is not enough places to sit because some obscure relative of the bride or bridegroom decided to bring his/her whole family (including the 6 kids and Indonesian maid) and only gave one RM50 angpau to the newlyweds 'cos they're not that close to us'.

3. You will become very pek chek when you're giving a speech onstage because offstage, no one else is listening to you, instead they're all eating and giving their own 'speeches' at the top of their voices. And no, they won't stop even if you say something like “为了传承华人的传统美德，台上致词，台下肃静” and everyone still chatters away as before.

4. You see the bride (and sometimes the bridegroom as well) change clothes 4 or 5 times throughout the night, and each outfit is bigger and grander than the last. Oh, and all are bedecked with mountains and mountains of shiny sequins, just in case people can't see them amidst the crowd.

5. You (okay, more specifically, me) can't really get to drink any alcohol because the 'elders' at your table would give you seering looks if you so much as take a sip from the 'grown-up' glass of red wine containing a measly 12.5% alcohol.

6. You have to bear with the over-enthusiastic 'elders' as they take turns belting out tunes from the Zaman Batu (free karaoke lah!) onstage and manage to get the key and lyrics and timing wrong all at the same time, yet can continue singing for the whole song.

7. You see the (tired) newlyweds going to table by table and screaming YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAM.........................................Seng! and schmoozing with all the people that came for their wedding when the truth is, they don't even know half of the people that came to eat their food and drink their liquor. (tip: to prevent getting a sore throat, all newlyweds should consider getting a 'YamSeng' team consisting of parents, loud-mouthed relatives or kind friends who happen to have a large lung capacity, so they can cover for you when you run out of ammo after yamseng-ing for 50 times consecutively.)

8. You get kaypoh relatives asking you for the umpteenth time, 'girl girl ar, when is your turn ah??' then after they find out you don't even have a boyfriend, 'harh?! you poor thing, must faster find one lor, if not old already no one will want you anymore...oh you know my sister-in-law's cousin's colleague's friend ar? very handsome one, accountant some more, make a lot of money, you want me to introduce ah?' (and this is my cue to go to the washroom.....quick!)

9. You realise there is always, always at least 10 courses for the dinner and shark fin's soup is always the 3rd course, and 百年好合always the last. And the dishes are never finished, the rest is either dumped or tapau-ed by other frugal people.

10. You always leave the restaurant at the end of the night vowing not to have this kind of wedding celebration for YOUR own wedding, yet in the end you always end up having this exact same sort of wedding dinner. Don't believe me? Then wait another 5 or 10 years and you'll see that I'm right. I always am. =P


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Okay, I know I owe you guys my report of our KK trip, and it's been a few days since I came back, but I haven't really sorted out all the photos properly and think about what to write.....I'm considering to skip the photoshopping part of my editing process, and I still can't choose which photos to put here since the amount of photos I have with me (my own camera, friends' cameras, the rafting CD) is simply massive...though I reckon a few days would be enough....I think.

Stay tuned guys! =)


xoxo