Coffee Dates

Love walked right in & drove the shadows away
Love walked right in & brought my sunniest day

One magic moment & my heart seemed to know

That love said "Hello" though not a word was spoken

One look & I forgot the gloom of the past

One look & I had found my future at last

One look and I had found a world completely new

When love walked in with you

You, Me & Coffee
With words unspoken & dreamy gazes.
Blissful moments over coffee & stealing glances.
My world is complete because of you.

Love Is Strange

I just had a surprise call from an old friend, Reg. Reg & I go a long way back. We've given each other love & support when needed & she's seen me through some of the toughest periods of my life. With so much behind the both of us, it feels really good to see us both nicely settled & happy with our lives.

We talked a little about the boyfriends & the future. Life is good now & though it took a trip to hell to get here, I wouldn't change a thing because it is the past that has made me & moulded me into the person I am now. The past has given me a strength I never thought I had & most importantly, the past has made me appreciate all I have now so much more. Sometimes I ask myself what did I do to deserve all the good I have now?

I am surrounded by such wonderful loving people. From the love of my life, to my family, an additional family & precious friends. All is good now & there is really nothing more in life that I yearn for.

Someone once told me that God watches. He lets you sink as far as you can handle & just when you're about to snap, he will gently lift you up. I didn't believe it until it happened to me. He has given me a life now that I never dreamed I would have.

I never though I could love again but I can. And I can in a much greater way. In a way I never thought possible.

Thank you God. For everything. Really everything.

Love
Love is strange
Lot of people
Take it for a game
Once you get it
You never wanna quit
After you've had it
You're in an awful fix
Many people
Don't understand
They think loving
Is money in the hand
Your sweet loving
Is better than a kiss

How Much Bigger Can It Get???

I just realised that there is so so much to do, think & plan for a wedding. No kidding! It's crazy & me wanting everything to be perfect is so not gonna help. Thank God for Ade & Chris - my wedding planners.

As for our engagement, we are going to keep it really small. As in just his family & mine, over dinner, exchange rings & talk about wedding plans. No party, no drama. Cool!

Anyway, the wedding is going to be so extensive so we don't see the need to make the whole engagement a drama thing.

Beat this. We will have the following events for our wedding...

1. Church wedding (in Singapore) which ends with lunch reception in the church itself.

2. Chinese tea ceremony (in Singapore) where I'd like it to take place at home. Makes it so much more meaningful & intimate.

3. Hotel dinner (in Singapore) which is probably gonna have to be at least 50 tables.

4. Monastry ceremony (in Burma). This is a tradition for all Burmese weddings. Basically, the bride, groom & their parents make offerings to the monks through a ceremonial thingy. It's like for special blessings for the marriage.

5. Tea reception (in Burma) where it will be held in a hotel over brunch. The purpose is mainly to announce the union of the couple.

6. Hotel dinner (in Burma) which is the same thing as the one in Singapore except different set of guests.

So we have a total of 6 events to plan for before we can spend the rest of our lives together. Is this a test or what??????

P.S. Please bear with me if the next 500 blog posts are about wedding plans etc. With 6 events, I'm not surprised it'd take 500 posts!!!!!

P.S.S. Any form of help volunteered would be greatly appreciated...hee

P.S.S.S. Sponsorships will be even more appreciated! :) :) :)

* Ted was right. The wedding is NOT about me. It is all about the parents & the only thing I am going to get to choose is my shoes....sigh

Burma Through Mine Eyes

Some random pictures of the streets of Yangon. Feels a little like Thailand but the culture is so amazingly different. Makes you see the world in a different light.

Bogyoke market

This is something like a pasar malam. Only it's more organised. Each stall has like a little shop of its own. The only thing is because its a touristy place, things are slightly more expensive than elsewhere.

Tons of jewellery shops sells gemstones. Not surprising since most of the gemstones come from Burma. Darling's mom's friend has a jewellery shop there so we went to take a look. Mom bought 2 pairs of earrings. Ruby & Sapphire with diamonds. Pretty!!!!

Mom getting all excited about shopping...

Most of the street hawkers carry their stalls around with them - literally. Like this guy. I ran after him to take this picture.

Most of the streets looks like this.

A typical street stall. Cool huh?

The streets are usually really crowded. It is at these street stalls that the locals buy food & groceries that are affordable. Malls are totally out of the question.

This is what a market looks like in Burma. More along the style of a pasar malam.

We found this little boy sitting along the street. All he was doing was painting & painting. He didn't stop to look at anyone or to talk. It's like he was part of what he was painting. In a completely different world & his paintings were AMAZING!!!

1000 kyat is roughly about 1 USD. The paintings that he was producing were so amazing that it is a real waste for him to be painting by the road side. But it seemed like for him, it wasn't about the money. He was in a different world. One where all that poverty & corruption didn't exist. One of just peace & serenity.

To support him, we bought a painting. This is it. Kinda blur cos I took the picture in the van but when you see the real thing, it is so gonna take your breadth away...

Can you imagine a little boy sitting along a dirty street & painting this? This is probably the kind of peaceful that he imagines for himself.

Most buildings are left un-maintained. So they end up looking really old & dirty.

This is a train station. Can you believe it? There is no proper platform. The train is just smack there in the middle of nowhere!!! I initially thought it was either an abandoned old train or it was there just for show until the boyfriend told me it's a functioning train in a "train station"!!!!

Yes, that's a real horse & carriage!!!!

Basic Education High School 2, Bahan

This was my darling's school!!!

Never thought I'd ever see where he got educated. But this is it!!! It was like his primary school. Can you imagine little Hein walking through these gates? Soooo cute!!!!

As I looked into the compound, I suddenly thought of Megan. Saw a vision of her carrying her school bag & walking into her school. In her super duper cute uniform.

This is a promoter at the Northpoint supermarket selling the milk that darling's dad's farm produces. It is also available on a daily basis on the shelves of other supermarkets. Cool huh? I forced him to take this picture...hahaha

Silvery Pearl Milk (the direct translation)

There are options for everyone. Some are packed in plastic bags so it's more affordable. The milk is NEVER EVER diluted & nothing artificial is added. This is as pure a milk as you can get. Thick & creamy.

They call this a bus?????

Seriously! Everyone piles up on a lorry like this & a row of people will be standing behind & just holding on while the lorry whizzes through the traffic. When you get to your stop, just hop off. If you fall, too bad.

Fruits are aplenty in Burma. I think it's also because of the weather cos the fruits are really sweet & juicy there! Honestly, I didn't eat a single fruit there that wasn't sweet & juicy. I ate like an entire bag of lychees!!! Yum!!!!

The watermelons are hugeass!!!! Like double the size of the biggest watermelon we can find here but they're not round. They're oval. Funny huh?

Mobile durian stall. Cute eh?

Vegetables are also super tasty & fresh!!! I swear if you ever taste the kang kong there, you'd never want to eat kang kong here again!!!

Black corn. They're not rotten but they're just a different specie of corn. They have a little of a sticky texture.

Bamboo shoot stall. Burmese cuisine comprise of quite abit of bamboo shoot as an ingredient so it's not usual to see little stalls like these along the streets selling bamboo shoot.

Flowers are also damn pretty & cheap...mmm..I like!!!

Slipper shopping!!!! :)

Darling mom's friend's son is a slipper wholesaler in Burma. He sells wholesale but just for us, he sold loose sizes & we didn't have to buy in bulk to enjoy wholesale price. :) Thinking of bringing in some to sell here. Any suggestions?

Feel Myanmar

One of the first places we ate at & also where we bought the kick ass "belachong" (a mixture of the Burmese chilli with dried prawns & fried garlic...super yums!!!)

Part of our dishes at Feel Myanmar. Ate so much I wanted to puke!!! Hahaha...the kickass chilli was the driving force lah...

On the right side of Feel Myanmar is where they sell the ever famous "Mohinga". This place sells the best Mohingas.

Mohinga

Mohinga is basically made up of rice noodles which feels like its in between of mee sua & bee hoon. The soup is a thick fish based soup with not a single bit of fishyness. Most of the other chewable ingredients come from different vegetables that also give flavour to the soup. Really yummy & I am already missing it!!!!

Us on the last morning of our trip. Sealing it off with a superb mohinga breakfast.

Just us enjoying a quiet morning together. One of the really special moments of our trip.

Mommy & baby searching for food. So cute huh?

And there was more & more eating during the trip. Plenty of Burmese food which mom enjoyed but I think it scared Dad a little. Hee...

I can't remember what this is called but it's damn yummy. It is a flat pancake thingy that is made up of glutinous rice. Chrispy fish floss is sprinkled on it together with a sprinke of some fried garlic and chilli oil. Damn good!!!!

These noodles are a little sticky. Somewhat like glutinous rice but in the form of noodles. Reminds of the noodles at Din Tai Fung. I really enjoyed this too.

This was just the tip of our order! Hahaha...

Then it was shopping. I enjoyed this the most. Ratten & baskety stuff!!!

Darling looking around. We bought hell of alot of stuff. Some really nice cane stuff for the house. Will post pictures of them soon. A real hassle to carry back but oh so worth it!

Pretty huh?

Dad & Mom bargaining & the price we paid for all the things we bought was crazy cheap!

That's our driver & our tour guide in the sarong. They were both really sweet. Tour guide helped us with bargaining while driver was damn on the go with helping us carry our stuff. I didn't even have to touch the bags from the time we paid till we got back to the hotel room. Hee...

More pictures coming up soon especially on the traditional Burmese wedding. A real eye opener for us too. Am still uploading the pictures so please be patient with me ok guys?

Daph hearts Burma. So so much... :) :) :)

"Culture is the widening of the mind and of the spirit."

All I Ask of You

Say you love me every waking moment
turn my head with talk of summertime
Say you need me with you now & always
Promise me that all you say is true
that's all I ask of you

All I want is freedom
a world with no more night
and you, always beside me
to hold me & to hide me

Say you'll share with me one love
one lifetime
say the word & I will follow you
Share each day with me
each night, each morning

Say you love me
Love me - that's all I ask of you
Anywhere you go let me go too
Love me - that's all I ask of you