Wedding Dinner - Take 2!

After our wedding in March, we went back recently to Penang to have another dinner for our relatives there.


Of course, I also extended the invitation to my friends from Church and FF Island Plaza.

With PCC friends

If not mistaken, mom-in-law's friends

We actually wore back our wedding clothes in March, as we bought them instead of renting- one of those things I learned from a show on E! channel.... Buy instead of rent for the most important day of your life.

Somehow I was distracted


At the entrance


With FF Island Plaza friends

Guess what? I'm now related to Dato' Lee Kar Choon!

Picture with my new uncle :)

Time on the invitation card stated dinner at 7pm but we only started at 8pm- not that bad, considering that the next day we attended my cousin's wedding dinner which started at 8.30pm.

We did the same opening in KL, with the video and singing. This time, the sound system was definitely better as we had rented the sound system.

Singing "A Whole New World"



Opening prayer by Pastor Lydia, one of the pastors from my home church Penang Christian Centre


At the table

The wedding in Penang was kinda packed with the traditional tea ceremony.










As I had about 20 tables of relatives, wife actually had quite a lot of people to serve tea to.



exhausting time!



On the other hand, she only had 4 tables so it was quite a breeze for me. I think it took me less than 10 minutes to settle her side while she around 45 minutes.


I was quite glad to have the ceremony done.



Daryl, the brother I never had

The first performance of the night, not counting our entrance song, was from my parents-in-law. Being professionals, they actually brought their own DVD to dinner for singing.

Grinning while I was introducing them


Singing 爱的路上只有我和你(old song, not that recent one)

Based on their singing, you can probably guess where wife got her talents from.


My 17-yr-old niece, Janine

After singing, it was the cake cutting and wine pouring time.


Deja vu



飲.........胜！

After which, I gave my "Part of my world" speech. Wife opted out as her "Finally" speech was not applicable in the Penang wedding.


All I'm saying... Thank you for being... Part of our world....

Finally came the long awaited first dance in Penang.


Started slow with Rod Stewart's "Till There Was You"

Just like in KL, there was a slight change of tempo halfway through.

"And I'm losing control..."



"Coz the power you're supplying...



"You're the one that I want... ooh, ooh, ooh.. Honey!"

That was the last performance from us. We didn't do the finale in KL as our dance crew were not with us.

As substitute, first I had my eldest bro singing.



The interesting thing about this wedding is I really had a difficult time addressing my relatives. Most of them I hardly see them at all, not even during CNY but are my mom and dad's cousins and uncles-aunties.
I honestly dunno who these people are


Anyway, we went back to the tea ceremony again but this time we were being served.


We missed our my sis-in-law in KL's tea ceremony

Finally, the highlight of the night was my mom singing 夜来香. Truth be told, my mom used to have a very good voice, but that was way before she had 4 children.

Now?

See my reaction.



Anyhow, mom did her thing and bro and niece decided to have a impromptu dance.


Doing the cha-cha


Mom still has her fans in the form of her cousins


Timing and pitch was good, just the quality of voice is not what it used to be

There was another last min performance from an uncle, at mom's request but timing was a bit out. Fortunately by then, we had reach the end of the dinner.

Overall if felt more like a wedding for us as we were in our wedding clothes the whole night, as opposed to KL where we changed to smart casual for our finale performance.


I think that was a kiss of relief

One of the reasons I've not been blogging...

In case you didn't know, I just got married 2 Saturdays ago. And honestly, the whole ceremony and dinner were anything but conventional.

For starters, there's no customary "cip san leong". Instead it was just the best man Leslie and I going to her parents' place to fetch her and her sister.

the Looi clan with the Bentley!

Setting off to get my maiden


If you're wondering why we were dressed in such a manner, coz the wedding's theme is musical. So we decided to dress up ala the 60's like the movie Grease. Thank God I bought my uni jacket and finally put it to good use. :)

We were quite early because there's no obstacle and stuff to overcome. So what to do? Camwhoring!

Just when I thought everything was well taken care of, just as we were about to reach church that I realised I forgot to bring 2 very important things:

1) My shoes

2) The 2 wireless mic for the dinner

While The bride and the bridesmaid get their make up done, Leslie and I were rushing back to my place in his gf's car. It was quite an anxious moment as the traffic on MRR2 was horrendous as always. I was worried that I might be late for my own wedding!!

Fortunately, we still managed to get back to church at about 45 mins before the ceremony- pity Leslie didn't get the time to do his hair. So we just quickly changed into our clothes and got YH's hairsytlist to comb our hair.

All set to go

Ceremony was slightly delayed because my family thought my wedding was at 5.30pm. At about 4.30pm they were still in Kepong and it would take about 20 mins to drive to Ampang on a good day!! Arrgghhh...

Somehow, they all arrived just slightly over 5pm and we started the ceremony at about 5.15pm.

Father-in-law passing her hand to me

Ceremony was sweet with Rev Ronnie Chin of Revival Centre Kuala Lumpur sharing a simple message before proceeding to the vow. We had signed our marriage certificate the day before so the ceremony was even shorter compared to the ones I used to attend back in Penang Christian Centre.

"With this ring...."

Mr & Mrs Shades walking out to the song "True To Your Heart" from the movie "Mulan"

Looi clan photo with my uncle's family joining in

With friends from Penang

Dinner was at 7.00pm which was at Kelab Darul Ehsan. I had a difficult time deciding who to invite to the wedding and eventually settled for the GXMs, GXIs and the freelance instructors I consider close comrades.

6 of these people can collectively teach 9 programmes in club

My sis Hilda who's working in Beijing's Westin

My 26-yr-old nephew Daryl serving tea to his new aunt

The first part of the dinner was quite straight forward with only a duet "A Whole New World" which was preceded by a opening video.

Halfway, we had the speech time and both of us sang out our respective speeches- Me singing "Part of that World" and YH with Fergie's "Finally".

Then came the fun part- the first dance.

We started nicely with Rod Stewart's jazzy "Till There Was You"...

...which ended abruptly before Grease's "You're the one that I want" took over. The whole thing was supposed to be cheesey, so we just had fun with the song.

Shaking that shimmy, baby!

Before the end of the night, we came out again with another performance - Grease's "We Go Together".

Waving goodbye to everyone as we finish the dance and proceed to the exit to thank everyone as they leave the place

So unlike other wedding dinner where you sit down and watch some dance or listen to songs by professionals, here you get entertained by the bride and groom. What to do... we're cheap We just like the attention so much we just want something different for our guests to remember our special moment.

Picture with my ex-colleagues from my first job in Padini after graduation

With the GX people

With the matchmaker Zen

Honestly it was kinda fun doing all those things for my wedding. Before the actual day, part of me did not feel like doing the performances but the other part of me was saying "this is the ONLY time you get to do it" I'm glad we did it though it was tiring and we didn't get to eat much.

Looking forward to our honeymoon this Saturday!!!!