Hari Raya also known as The Day of Wedmin

This year we have been really lucky with most of the Singapore public holidays. Almost all of them have fallen on either a Monday or a Friday, which has made for plenty of glorious long weekends (unlike last year when the majority were silly mid-week days off).

            There are just two that do not fit in nicely alongside the weekend. One coming up in November, and Hari Raya, which was Thursday.

             A lot of our Singapore friends headed home to the UK for the long weekend – it seems there was a flurry of weddings this week, and then with a number of the boys being lucky enough to get tickets to the Rugby World Cup, that left just a small handful of us here in Singapore. The result being that Hari Raya was a gloriously empty and very chilled out day.

Wedmin - go go go!

            

Nick had volunteered for a day of “wedmin”, and that is precisely what he got. In the few hours that we set aside for wedding planning we sorted out our table names, we completed a load of paperwork for the venue and our photographer, we followed up with suppliers on some points that we have left unsorted for a little bit too long and we generally made it a lot further through out To Do List, which was ideal.

A narrow escape

Things very almost went off the rails when we went out to buy healthy supplies for dinner and we got distracted by the newly opened Hamleys, where Scalextrics was on sale and Nick was desperate for a new toy. Somehow we managed to keep ourselves on the straight and narrow and returned home with nothing other than salmon and salad, but after such a productive morning, it was a close shave!

 

Back on best behaviour, once again

It’s been a while since I have really been back on good behaviour, but it’s time! Following a long and pretty intense weekend it’s most definitely time for another fresh start.

            This week has been a week of gym sessions, early nights, veggie dinners, and buckets of water being consumed. My life for the next few months is going to be work-gym-sleep-work-repeat. It might not be the most exciting way to send time, but it’s going to be worth it once we get to the end of the year.

            Onwards and updwards! 

New girl

Our little team has been the same size for around half a year now as we’re still waiting to find a new MD, and the US were keen to keep the team smaller until they had been appointed.

            However, it’s all taking too long, so today our first new friend joined us, and it’s very fun having a bit of a change in the office.

            Sonya is from London and she seems great – perhaps a little mental, but surely anyone who has chosen to live on their own in Singapore, or in Singapore at all must be a little crazy! Still, it’s fun to have another girl on the team, another English person in the office and another buddy to add to our little group. 

Hen Planning

We are now just three months away from our wedding (three months to the day on Sunday) which is ridiculously exciting, but also on my radar is the fact that it’s only five months until Erin’s Dubai wedding, and as Maid of Honour, I’ve got some serious work to get done before too long.

            The most important job I have is helping with bridesmaid dress ideas, which I think we are now just about sorted on, and planning the hen party/parties. I’ve had a think, I’ve sent some emails, and it looks like we’re on track for a couple of great celebrations before the big day! 

Beginning of the Banns

As part of the build up to our wedding, we have three churches having to read out our Banns, during three consecutive weekends, over the three months before the big day.

            Thankfully, as we’re not in the country, and as my mummy is a little star, we’re not under huge amounts of pressure to make sure that we’re in the country for all three rounds, which is helpful seeing as it would be a long 14 hour flight just for an hour long church service each weekend for the next few months.

            First up was St James’ Church, in the parish where I live but not the parish where we’ll be getting married. That’s one ticked off the fairly extensive list. One down, eight more to go!

All Go for F1 Weekend

The weekend of the Singapore Grand Prix is always quite intense for us. We like to get zone four walk about tickets for all three days, which means that whilst we don’t have specific seats in a stand to watch the action we can get onto some stands for a good view, we can wander around the entertainment stages, bars and food stalls, and at the end of each night we can head in to the main stage to watch the main performers for the evening (this year we have Bon Jovi which was pretty impressive!).

Myself, Elly, Nick and Jules (making the most of Nick's ticket while he had to work!)

On top of all the action on the track, we also always have friends in town who we like to catch up with, and Nick has to balance socialising with a string of events and parties with clients that he has no way to escape from. Generally we end up getting to bed at later than 2am every night, and then having to fill the days with activities and events too. It’s not good for my skin, my diet or my sleep patterns.

Soaking up the atmosphere 

Following a long and testing week at work I was not very enthusiastic about all the action we were facing this weekend, but we also knew that it was going to be even more intense than normal this year.

Late supper of street food on Friday night 

Nick and Elly are both massive F1 fans. Whilst Nick and I like to go along and join in the fun, they had strong opinions on who needed to win, who needed to place in what order, and there was quite a bit of focus on being close enough to the action at all times to ensure that we’re 100% making the most of the tickets. On top of this, Nick had select the Saturday day of their visit to propose to Elly!

Enjoying a bit of Bon Jovi 

My Nick had been heavily involved in helping him to make a plan, to work out when and how to do it, and so on Saturday day, following a late Friday night during which I somehow managed not to spill the beans, we all got in a taxi on the pretence that Nick and I had to go for lunch with an uncle who was in town, so we were going to drop them off by the beach on our way so that they could get a little bit of sun whilst we were otherwise occupied.

            Four hours later, after Nick and I had enjoyed a very low key lunch (without any uncles present) and a twenty minute emergency nap the happy couple were back at the flat, ready for bubbles, celebrations, congratulations, and then more F1 action. Nick had a full evening of work events, so I was in charge of the evening, which lasted us through to 4am. I was exhausted by Sunday.

Grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup for dipping helps everything!

Thankfully we had a quick lunch booked for Sunday and then nothing else until the racing action in the evening. Following a mammoth grilled cheese sandwich and another sneaky 40 minute nap we were ready for the last night of F1, the official race day, a quick burst of Bon Jovi on the main stage, and then finally managing to drag ourselves to bed at just after midnight.

            It was a great weekend, but one that I will be aggressively working to cleanse from my system for the next few weeks. Nick and Elly will be flying out of Singapore to continue their touring around Borneo for the next two weeks, so whilst we will be seeing them for one more night stop over on their way back through in two weeks time, I am now excitedly anticipating a week of sleeping, cleaning, laundry and just generally betting my life back on track again.