standstill

now things are paused. actually this weekend vin and i realised we have alot of things to do... confirm the caterer, think of church decoration, check out wedding invites, decide on honeymoon destination, talk to pastor about order of service, talk to josh/jordan about wedding montage, etc... all these things piled up cos partly we were preoccupied with home hunting and also cos we were slightly lazy hahaha...

but now everything has come to a grinding halt cos suddenly we don't know how many people can be seated in our church sanctuary!!!!! all along i thought that we could sit 500 pax but over the weekend, our church manager told my coordinator that it can only sit 420 people at most... when i heard that, everything froze for that few minutes...

i already tentatively booked my caterer based on 500 pax... if i reduce, think they will flip... also, vin and i would need to reduce our guest list by 100??? oh gosh... we already wanted to invite almost 700 people, now we need to even further cut our list???

these are the biggest 2 things that we need to accomplish and yet we are stuck. at least only for 1 week cos this sunday we are meeting our church manager to discuss again. we so want to invite our friends and relatives to join in our celebration of love, so really really really hope that the church can sit 500 guests!!!!!

also, all thanks to gloria's timely reminder, we need to book a tentage... and it is estimated to be about $400!!! another addition to our already long expense list... holding a wedding is really quite scary if no proper financial planning and mental preparation is done prior to the proposal and preparation stage... but we trust that God will provide our every need!!!!! yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah!!!!!

just 4 months plus to our wedding!!!!! it is sooooo exciting for vin and me... thanks for sharing our joy and excitement... so glad to have you all with us ^_^

going for a hair trim tonight... looking forward to it!!! =)))

property prices are rocket high (and still going higher!!!)

some of our friends are commenting that i blog rarely, but actually it is cos i don't have any interesting pictures so show you all... have la but i not as on as the past to download and post for you all... hahaha... wenhui say i should blog more about our wedding preparation process, so ok tell you all more about our home-hunting process... =)))

as you can see from my title, and should have already known (if you are living in singapore), that property prices are CRAZILY high... i tell you, the market is irrational... completely irrational... you will understand why after reading about our experience...

for the past few weeks, we have been very hardworking, going to many house viewings over the weekends. last year, we were considering 4/5 room flats but this time round, we decided that we cannot afford it, due to the high cash-over-valuation (COV) amounts and the high absolute values of the flats, so we stuck to viewing only 3-room flats. you would have thought that 3 room flats are very affordable right... read on...

looking at Q407 average prices for a 3 room, the estimated Q108 COV should be about SGD 20k... imagine having to fork out SGD20k in cash on top of an already expensive 3 room of an estimated SGD 190k... 1 year back, my aunt bought a place in kallang for SGD 190k... and kallang is a very good location loh... now, even a place in far away hougang, dream on if you want a home near the mrt for SGD 190k... my aunt's place is 5min from the mrt and 3 stops from city hall. an hougang home that is 10min from mrt and *counts on fingers* ok whatever, i duno... many many stops from outram mrt and then we need to change train and take another 3 stops to city hall *takes a breather*... this home cost about SGD 215k...

*sigh* how to buy house now you tell me??? anyone out there who works in the government office? can help or not?

*silence*

yea yea i know... unless vin and i are earning a combined of SGD 3,000 then there will be help... but in this grossly inflated property market, shouldnt there be some more help given to new start-ups like us??? hahaha ok nevermind my ranting... let me continue my story...

so one of our agents suggested for us to take a look at redhill area since vin wants so much to continue being a town kid. 'go there and see then vin will stop wanting to buy a town home la' my agent recommended. so i happily agreed. 'else how to let him stop wanting to considering a place there' i thought. and i told my church friends that yesterday too. but they say what if i become the one who wants to buy the place and vin is turned off by the price? i laughed it off...

so we went to the redhill place yesterday. it is at the highest floor, 16th floor, just above the redhill market and less than 5min from redhill mrt. totally unblocked view and is very windy. it is also the corner unit and pretty big for a town 3-room flat - 68sqm... but their offer to us is SGD 270k!!!!! would you pay this amount for a 3 room flat????? but i almost wanted to get it and vin was the one who kept talking about how expensive it was, till i finally realised that oh ya hor, it sounds abit mad to buy the place leh...

imagine a conversation:
Jean: hey everyone!!!!! we finally got a home!!!!! =)))))
someone: wow congrats!!!!! where is it and how much you pay???
Jean: it is at redhill leh!!! so good right????? we paid SGD 270k!!!!!!
someone: waaaaa redhill very good leh!!!!! 4 room ah?
Jean:errrmmm it is a 3 room leh...

*silence*

someone: errr... ha ha ha... errr... good buy... *silently under breath* siao ah!!!

ya so we thought... siao ah!!!!!! but then again, we can 'rationalize' that we are paying so much for location loh... redhill is just 4 stops from tanjong pagar, so vin will only need 15 min at most to reach his office... but then again... we thought that we rather buy a place for SGD 200k and spend half hour more on the journey to and fro home ba... SGD 70k can do alot of things right... ya la... SGD 70k is alot la... ya la... SGD 70k is alot... (still trying to psycho myself until now that i should not buy the place actually...)

=Pp

irrational market = irrational me

Happy Valentine's (to all your wallets) ^_^

2 of my colleagues have flowers. the first one got a small bouquet of 6 red roses with beautiful decorations of pearls etc... another got a huge bouquet of lilies which was not as nice (but hey, it is the thought that counts i guess... she like can liao hee)... so my other colleague remarked that 'wa the flowers are getting bigger and bigger!!!)

but i was really impressed with the 1st bouquet cos it looks so nice... so i asked my colleague if there was a website i can go to so that i can copy some ideas for my bridal bouquet... (everything in my mind is about the wedding hor? HAHAHA)

so i went to take a look at the pictures and the prices and MY GOODNESS!!!!! a small bouquet of 6 red roses (which are very common flowers) cost more than $250!!!!!!! is the economy booming or what????? you mean en bloc sales = high property prices and even spill over to expensive bouquets?????

ok maybe cos i am not a guy... maybe the prices has ALWAYS been like that since 5 years back... but seriously, are you serious????? my friend just got a bouquet of 6 pink roses for his friend to be delivered yesterday and it was $66 and i already thought it pretty expensive... i remember getting a bouquet of more than 10 blue roses for my mum last april and it was only more than $30?

hee anyway anyway, happy valentines to one and all... just called my mum to wish her happy valentines and tell her i love her... hee... felt weird cos my family is a very cheena kind of family where no affection is shown commonly... but i want to let God's love shine through and saturate my family!!!!! God loves you!!! ^_^

5 months to our wedding... we are so excited loh!!!!! kekeke... =)))

it's the lunar new year again!!!

haha as expected, nobody will shout out these days... even when they get the 8888 number hee... oh well nevermind... =)))

it's chinese new year eve today and i am so excited!!! i love reunion dinners cos we go to my grandma's place and all my beloved relatives are there!!! i love my paternal relatives... they are a down-to-earth, sincere, honest bunch. they might not be living in condominiums and driving luxury cars, but what matters most is that they are who they are and accept everyone as who they are. you know for some families, cos they are slightly richer than others, in a higher income bracket than others, their noses tend to be slightly higher than others, and they tend to talk less to those whom are not in the same social circle as them.

furthermore, from next year onwards, i won't be able to spend the whole night with them during reunion dinner... so this year's reunion dinner and even chinese new year visitation holds a very special meaning to me... small things like that would make a difference, i realised. i used to think that marriage makes no difference to the couple cos in the first place we already are used to each other's schedules etc... but as the day draws nearer, God shows me things that i need to manage, and expectations that need to be changed, etc... cos it is not about 2 people but 2 families. 2 people is already very tough, 2 families is extremely difficult... all the nuances, the habits, the culture, the attitudes towards certain things, etc... wow totally can't do it with my strength alone...

anyway, as promised, show you the process of our wedding band hunt!!! actually only 3 pictures la... all from the same shop. we visited 4 shops (excluding the usual lee hwa, sookee etc) and short listed 2 shops. to keep you all in suspense, won't show you the proto-type of our final wedding band!!! why i say proto-type is cos our wedding bands are customized!!! =))) we decided to go with the one that vin really likes most... from fairysinc. this pair is also the one that i am most comfortable with and like the most out of the many places and pairs that we have seen... =)))

vin's first choice. my last choice

my first choice, vin's last choice

our 2nd choice... notice that all the rings have gold HAHAHA... we decided to not go for the 'traditional' silver wedding bands... ^_^

have a blessed lunar new year everyone!!! for the married, enjoy giving!!! for the singles, enjoy receiving!!! most importantly, have a great time with your family and friends!!! GONG XI FA CAI!!!!! ^_^