ROM 20 March 09 - Mission Accomplished

One down. It went smoothly as planned.

Day 1 - 19 March 09
兵分两路
Miao2 took half day leave on Thursday to fetch my parents at T1. I drove my Materia and paid $20 for the first time. The feeling is good because I didn't have to rush for bus, MRT and then another bus. I took my own sweet time in the morning yet reached office in ~40min vs. ~90min if I take public transport.
At about 12pm, I left office and picked up stuff from home. Making sure nothing important left behind. Then started my long long journey to the airport. AYE - ECP. No jam, no ERP haha... I reached T1 about the same time as my parents so they didn't wait too long. They were surprised to see my car. They didn't expect Daihatsu Materia to be so spacious and cute looking.
We were starving, need food! Took skytrain to T2 for a decent meal at Crystal Jade. Ordered "5 grain hot pot rice" and some other stuff. Well, the food was delicious. Out of curiousity, we asked the waitress what the 5 grains are. No surprise, they don't know. They started to name a few grains but only 3 or 4. That's the standard of service in Singapore. People don't really know their own product. One of them went on extra mile to stir the rice in the hot pot and continue to name the grains. I think that is too much and say, "You can check with your kitchen and please don't stir my rice over here...". Luckily she got my message.
After lunch, we shopped at T1 while waiting for 3rd sister. Tired...

3ung went to JB custom to fetch parents to Sg. Task is equally tough. Jam at custom for 1 hour. Eventually arrive at Aloha Changi and check-in. The place is big. 2 storey with all 4 bedrooms on the upper floor. Living, dining and kitchen on the lower floor. Only shortcoming there is only 1 toilet!


We can finally take a rest after 4pm when everybody reach the chalet. Later on, we had dinner at Changi Village. At night, people want to go shopping but we decided not to bring them anywhere. Instead, 2 of us drove to Novena to collect matress and buy bouquet at Novena Square. The shopkeeper recommended Hydrangea.
Shopkeeper, "Tie the flower with some leaves, ribbon. Can make it very beautiful..."
Miao2, "How much?"
Shopkeeper, "For ROM should make it nice.. With other smaller flower..."
Miao2, "Ya, how much?"
Shopkeeper, "Around $80, $85..."
Miao2, "Too expensive, I just want a simple one."
Shopkeeper, "Ok, maybe I just put some leaves and tie with a matching ribbon..."
Miao2, "Ya, a simple one will do. How much?"
Shopkeeper, "Maybe $25, $30"
Miao2, "$25"
Shopkeeper, "Maybe $25, $30" (Miao2 thought, "Walao... she cannot hear what I just said meh?")
Miao2, "OK!"
In the end, I paid $30 for a simple bouquet.



As we returned to chalet, it's already 11pm. Time to sleep. zzzz



Day 2 - 20 March 09

This is the day! Woke up early to fetch 3ung's sister from T1. I was disgusted by the chalet toilet so I am more than happy to drive to T1 so that I can use the sparkling clean airport toilet. The flight has touched down on time. Met them up and return to chalet for make-up session.

The rest of them were almost ready. I took only 30min to makeover, of course with some help la.. My 3rd sister did my hair while I put on make-up. 1st & 2nd sisters later touched up my eye brown. Then we are done. Arriving at Peony Jade 3omin earlier, just in case anything went wrong. Luckily everything is fine. Friends reached the place one after another.

We started solemnization at 1130am. It was a short and sweet ceremony. We exchanged vow and rings and took pictures by the sea. Actually is between the pool and the sea. At 12pm, we had our dinner. Let's the guests entertained themselves and talked to strangers. I just want to sit down, take a rest and have my lunch quietly.
Photos uploaded in facebook album

The food is good, environment is relaxing but the carpark charge was high. When the guests heard $2 per 30min, they started to kao beh already. We tried to get complimentary carpark coupon from the manager but our effort was in vain. In the end, we paid $7.32 per car.

The weather was good in the morning but cloudy in the afternoon so we can't go anywhere. Lucky! All of us returned to the chalet and do nothing but chit-chating.

At night, after 3ung's sister left, I brought them to IKEA for dinner. My siblings were ok with IKEA. But the parents were disappointed and shocked seeing so many people at the food court. They reluctantly ate western food, reluctantly shared table with strangers and reluctantly sit on a different table away from us. That's a lesson learnt for them. Don't ever say "随便" when I ask, "what do you want for dinner?" Haha...



Day 3 - 21 March 09

The phrase that I heard mostly for these few days

Rank #1 "What's the activity later?/ Where are we going later?"

Rank #2 "What time do we eat?/ Where do we eat?"

Rank #3 "Now what?/ What's next?"

No room to think, they want immediate answers. After breakfast, have to think about lunch. After lunch, have to think about dinner. Bring them to one place, they want to know where to go next. After taking 1 picture, they ask you when to download the picture... Tougher than taking uni exam.

We when to Marina Barrage in the morning. It wasn't very hot nor very sunny. But people just hide under the canopy. Come on! Marina Barrage is the most "in" thing in Singapore now! We visit the gallery and get to know more about water body in Sg. The best part is, parking is free here...

Then we went to a teochew restaurant in Chinatown for lunch. Then we started to shop for the first time. My mum bought 肉干and some 鲨鱼骨. My sisters bought some packet tibits and mua chi. Before the heavy rain, we manage to take cover at the Smith St multi-storey market. We shopped in the market and took some dessert while waiting for the rain to stop.
In the evening, after the rain stopped, we took a 30min flight. The shortest flight I have ever taken. Yes! It's the Singapore Flyer. The highest ferris wheel in the world standing at 165m height. When there is a big group, it became very hard to please everybody. We even argue on how many tickets to buy...

3ung is sick.. He cannot speak and cannot say "ung ung ung ung ung ung ung ung ung ung~~~~~~" Enjoy the quiet moment for a day or 2 :)

On this day, there is a promotion. Buy 2 adult tickets and get 2 senior tickets for free. I won 1 ticket from lucky draw and received 1 from Madaliene (as a gift, Thanks gal!). So I bought 2 tickets and got 6 of us into the Flyer. The ride was interesting because we get to take wonderful pictures. Getting 3rd sister up there is most value-for-money. Because she kept saying things like, "wah! nice~~", "let's take pictures", "wow!", "see see... that one is xxx, that one is yyy" etc etc. But the parents didn't seem to appreciate. Sg Flyer, state-of-art ferris wheel leh.... Well, paying $60 for 6 persons to go up. That's considered a good deal la..

After the flight, we find our way to the dinner place. It's dinner time. This time we went to PuTian restaurant at Kitchener Road. The food was good but there was a group of celebrity-wanna-be singing KTV next door. It's disturbing because they sounded like pig slaughtering. Very irritating and unappertizing. This time we were smart to park the car at Park Royal Hotel nearby. $2.20 for 1st hour. The cheapest carpark I have paid so far. I need to come up with a list of cheap or free carpark in Sg. That's all for Day 3.

Day 4 - 22 March 09
Parents flying back to KK on Jetstar from T1. It's a wise decision to fly them directly between KK & Sg on Jetstar. Booking Aloha Changi was also a wise choice. It's near to airport. No matter how procrastinate my 1st sister is, we can always make it to airport in time. They took off at 740am. Then we returned to chalet and continue to sleep.

Checked out at 10am and paid additional for aircon useage. The way they operate is funny. They give you 25 unit of credit for 1 day. Anything exceed the limit is chargeable at $0.20 per unit. We were quite consicous at first but from Day 2 onwards, we just switched on the aircon when needed. Anyway, in the end we paid extra $1.89 for the additional aircon unit consumed. That's cheap.

Lead 3ung's parents to Woodland checkpoint by TPE - SLE - Turf Club Ave. It was a long drive. I finally activated my N78 GPRS for the first time. I really took long to detect the signal. When the KL group left, we were 90% relieved. Dropped my 3rd sister at Causeway Point for shopping and we were 100% relieved... It was a like a military training simulation. I so feel like not working on Monday :p

Getting married should be very easy. But we chose to make our logistic so complicated. One day we looked back, these will be sweet memory.