Love and Marriage

A friend recently forwarded me this. I found it very meaningful as it illustrates love and marriage in a very simple way.

A student asks a teacher, "What is love?"

The teacher said, "in order to answer your question, go to the padi field and choose the biggest padi and come back. But the rule is: you can go through them only once and cannot turn back to pick."

The student went to the field, go through the first row, he saw one big padi, but he wonders....maybe there is a bigger one later. Then he saw another bigger one... but maybe there is an even bigger one waiting for him. Later, when he finished more than half of the padi field, he starts to realize that the padi is not as big as the previous one he saw, he knew he has missed the biggest one, and he regretted !!!! So, he went back to the teacher with empty hands.

The teacher told him, "...this is love... you keep looking for a better one, but when later you realize, you have already miss the person...."

"What is marriage then?" the student asked.

The teacher said, "in order to answer your question, go to the corn field and choose the biggest corn and come back. But the rule is: you can go through them only once and cannot turn back to pick."

The student went to the corn field, this time he is careful not to repeat the previous mistake, when he reached the middle of the field, he has picked one medium corn that he is satisfied with, and went back to the teacher.

The teacher told him, "this time you bring back a corn.... you look for one that is just nice, and you have faith and you believe that this is the best one you get.... this is marriage."

- Author Unkown

reno update

I went down to check on my renovation progress yesterday with hubby, papa, big sis and bro-in-law. Both the toilets were hacked already and there was 1 worker laying the new tiles in my master bathroom. If there were no change in our toilets, yesterday should be the handover date. But looking at the progress, it was definitely impossible. Our dining benches arrived while we were there.

Anyway, was quite happy as I finally can see something in my living room. :)

Some pics on my renovation. Presenting our model of the day, my ELDER sis......*clap clap*..*whistles*..

dream bathrooms no more...:(

Received a bad news today..mum-in-law doesn't like the colour of our bathrooms. As you all know, the older generation will always prefer bright colours to dark colours. She found that our bathrooms are too dark, both are grey in colour, and she doesn't feel comfortable with it.

Well, our bathrooms were (past tense now) grey as both of us liked the idea of the dark bathroom. It gives the modern and classy feeling. But then again, since my in-laws doesn't like it, and also mama and papa mentioned it before, we decided to change with much reluctance. Besides the part that we have no more dream bathrooms, there will be cost incurred and delay in handover.

Since this is something that we have no control over, we decided to be optimistic. Went to the bookstores today to check out some ideas of bathroom design. Kind of choosen a brighter colour, light earth tone. It looks nice and classy from the design books and hope ours will have the same effect. Looking on the brighter side, we can take this chance to re-route the piping, so that hopefully, they can be concealed, and also, for the designer to remeasure the size and distance of the vanity cabinet to the toilet bowl. Come to think of it, it may be a blessing in disguise. In any case, everybody is happy, and that is the most important.

Anyway due to all these changes, the handover date (originally next week) is estimated to be end of august but I have already requested it to be slightly earlier as hubby will be moving in early sept. Hope everything turns out well.

10 August 2007 - "Moving In"

Today is supposed to be a "ji li" day for moving house. Thus, we chose to "move in" to our house today at 5pm. Hubby and my in-laws came out from JB, with all the stuffs that are required for a small ceremony to before we "move in". We had to do it before the renovation finish as lunar july is round the corner and as chinese, we believe that it is bad luck to move house during the month of lunar july.

Before actual moving in, my mother-in-law put "xiang lu" at five corners of the living room. Hubby then have to pray and leave joss-sticks at all 5 corners. After that, my mother-in-law gave hubby a cup of holy water and dunno which plant leave to sprinkle the holy water all around the house, especially at every corner. When all these are done, we then started the simple ceremony.

As most may already know, we need to have charcoal burning at the entrance and we have to step over the charcoal and into the house. At the same time, we have to bring in 7 items for luck. They are, "chai" (charcoal), "mi" (rice), "you" (oil), "yan" (salt), "tang" (sugar), "cu" (vinegar) and "cha" (tea leaves). As we already have charcoal burning, we brought in the rest of the items. Also, to signify that we have moved in, we have to boil water and eat our take-away dinner there.

Check out the fotos below: Can you find the "lu" with the charcoal? We also put a red cloth at the entrance of our house. See the electric kettle that I bought? Costs me $89.90!! We sat on the cardboards at the platform for our dinner. Interesting and fun. *smile*

auntie??

Went back to balestier today to get 1 more "hamburger" light for our balcony. Decided to save money by just buying something simple since hubby say we might not even have the time to sit at the balcony to enjoy the moonlight, so wat's the use of getting something nice? Decided to save even more money not to buy lights for study and dining. hehe. So the remaining one is the light for master bedroom which we have asked our designer, Mr M to help us source for it.

Had a yummy dinner at TCC @ Bugis Junction.

Do you know if you spent 88 bucks, you can get be a TCC member for lifetime? Good thing is that it is not a one time thingey and you can accumulate the receipts up to 88 bucks. As a member, you are entitled for 15% discount when you spend 20 bucks and above. I knew this when I went TCC with my sisters a few weeks back and I told myself to keep the receipt so as to accumulate. Shitty thing is I threw the 64 bucks receipt when I cleared my wallet few days back. Tonight I just spent another 54 bucks. I could have become a member and get 15% off!!!!

Anyway, just a realisation today, that I'm becoming more and more aware of my expenses. Happily upgraded to the blue kopitiam card (entitlement to 10% discount when you dine @ any kopitiam) during lunch today, taking note of discount at Fairprice, was outraged by the 3 bucks difference between AZONE and Popular foolscap paper, feeling absolutely stoopid at wasting away a chance of getting 15% discount at TCC...is this a sign of me becoming an auntie? Or was I taking money for granted when I was young? Maybe I have finally realised that all my money are hard-earned and how I need to start to control my expenses now that I am married.

Hmmm...anyway, remind me of my "realisation" today when I shop for clothes, bags and shoes the next time yah?

happy birthday to QINGEE and HUIQI

We had an early birthday celebration for Huiqi and Qing yesterday. It was Huiqi's 21st birthday and they rented a chalet @ Downtown East. It has been too long since we last have chalet together as a WHOLE family. Had fun having BBQ food, playing @ the arcade, and playing gin rummy with my cousins. It was definitely a relaxing evening. Hope Huiqi had a memorable 21st birthday celebration. *smile*

shopping @ balestier

Yesterday was another day for "shopping @ balestier". Becoz of our renovation, we have become so familiar with Balestier and Jalan Besar now. Just ask us anything, we know it all. Hahas. Wanted to shop for lights, in the end, still couldn't find suitable light of our Master Bedroom but have already shortlisted one for study and balcony.

As we were waiting for the shop where we custom-made our sofa to open at 2pm, we decided to have lunch at the famous BAK KUT TEH at Balestier Rd. Queue was long most of the time and we wanted to try how GOOD issit. Since there was no queue, we decided to have our lunch there. The walls inside the shop were "decorated" all with pictures of the owner with celebraties from hongkong, taiwan and also our local scene. Before the food came, we were wondering, the food must BE good! It was quite a disappointment as the soup turned out to be too peppery for our taste, but at least the bak kut was not too tough. Anyhow, we finished all.

We have made a custom order for our sofa. Initially we wanted it to be in fabric but we were worried bout the maintanence in the long run, hence we decided to change it to leather. Yesterday, we went to change our order and to select the colour and texture of leather. This custom-made shop, Sanctuary Dian, was highly recommended in the Singapore Brides forum. They are able to make any design of sofa, bed, coffee/side/dining tables, console, armchairs, etc to the way you want it. If you like any specific design that you have found from the magazines, just show it to them and they will do it for you. On top of this, their service is good! It is managed by hubby and wife and both of them are attentive, patient and nice. They are not pushy and hard sell. Below is a perspective draft of our sofa. We have changed it from 3m to 2.7m.

reno update

AGAIN, updates on my renovation. Hope I'm not boring you to tears. Yesterday, we were supposed to meet our co-designer, let's name him Mr H, at 1030am to walk through our house together so that he will know what are the things that we are not satisfied with. BUT, at 1130am, he had not arrived, and there were no answer despite our repeated callings on his hp. Qun was also at my house, and only then did I realised that Mr H was supposed to meet Qun at 930am at her house, and he did not appear too! That's why Qun decided not to wait anymore and came to my house to take a peep. Mr H called back later, when we were leaving, and apparently, he overslept as he went to bed at 5am in the morning. Sigh. I guess everyone will experience unhappiness and displeasure with their contractors/designers at 1 point or another during the reno process yah? I hope I'm not the only one though. ANYWAY, below are the pics.