Unexpected Reaquintance

7th June 2006, Wednesday

YES!!
The supreme satisfaction of working on my on, without the irritation of JxMMy...
He was showing sign of falling sick when he was sneezing and sniffling away the whole of yesterday and indeed he took MC for the 2nd time this month...perhaps the girls were right...he and his spouse tend to not cover themselves with blanket while sleeping naked at night...

So I went for the banquet last evening and took my own sweet time to prepare myself to an extent that it was a good quarter past 8 by the time I reach Marina Square when the guests should be well seated by now...
Then I forgotten about the fact that despite remembering the sight of Conrad International Hotel everytime I strolled along the sky garden from Suntec city to Marina Square, I never really know where the actual entrance was....

I made my way up the sprial staircase in the main lobby and the ballroom where the banquet was held was just in front of my eyes.
Then I saw her, as pretty as she could be in her princess-like gown, being congrtaulated by the arrived guests.
I duly congratulated her as well and I could sense happiness and bliss oozing through her radiant smile...

The ballroom was dimly litted by the time I got in and had problem locating my table.
Then I saw the likes of Weiyao, Angela, BH, Peixing and Guozhong from our SRJC clique seated side by side at one half a table of 12.
Then by surprise, I realized someone else was beckoning me which happened to be my ol' pal from Secondary Sch, HC who played an integral role (which ended up to nothing) in my wooing of the bride of the day as I mentioned yesterday...

For the entire dinner procession, beside catching up with each other, he kept chastising me about not making an effort to meet up with him or Rizan who I heard from him would be holding his wedding coming Sunday and yet he had not notify me at all..
He also updated me the affairs of some of our old classmates since he had been keeping contact with them which I blatantly disregarded.
Now being a sales executive of a supplier of automated parts for industry, he continues to live that high life with well-travelled working schedule as well.
Nevertheless he is the same with his bloated physique well maintained despite regular recreational football sessions, but the booze and the tobacco sure had taking the toll.
His language is still that colorful and though some of his corny jokes might not be appreciated by many with the exception of myself, we were still able to keep ourselves entertained all night.
Oh yah, he also kept coaxing me to join him and his friends for some game of soccer which I had to kindly declined.
Despite a recent surge in stamina due to my daily runs, I doubt I will have the same body with agility, balance and skill not to make a fool out of myself with a soccer ball though I still passionately love the sport..as a spectator of course...

The funny thing is that many people present are interconnected with each other...
Among the SRJC clique, Peixing was an ex-classmate in Secondary School of ours for 2 years while Guozhong too had a year in the same class as us, thus despite the seggregation amongst us, it seems like everyone knows each other.
Then BH used to be in the same amatuer soccer team with me,HC, Rizan, my buddy TW and CS; and if Weiliang was present he is also part of the transient squad...
Of course the bride is from the same Primary school as myself though different session and was classmate for years with HC and her best friend, a lady called Xueyun had been with her at every level of academic progression and naturally know HC as well and guess what CS was holding a candle for her as well...boy we were really connected...
Then now the bride is a school teacher in our alma mater, which is why there were a bunch of familiar faces in the table across ours when we recollected that there were actually teachers who had taught us before in our Sec. Sch. days including old fogeys who had been around for eons...
Guozhong been the social dude, when to have some nostalgic reaquintances with some of the teachers while the rest of us couldn't care less...

The food was exceptionally bad...not that the service was fantastic as well...
Seriously for once in my lifetime I actually could not finish a bowl of shark's fin soup with more broth than anything else...
There were almost nothing notable in the menu which tantalized our taste buds and we even gave the dessert a miss as it was late with work beckons the next day...
The newly-wed showed 2 videos:
One is a slideshow of their life and how they got together and seems like from the number of "high cost" locations they had travelled to, I am for sure that guy is well off...
The second is the video chronicling how the groom went to fetch the bride and what obstacles the "sisters" pulled to hinder the process including monetary demand, asking him to say "I Love You" in 7 languages and other mushy oath taking.
Talk about mushy and how my goose pimples had be massive taking suicides was when the groom started singing for her...yes the ladies will say it's romantic...but he's surely tone deaf...but I was taking reference nonetheless about everything for sure...

Among the crowd was this really tall lady with her Caucasian partner HC labeled as "John Dykes" (from ESPN)...The guys were examining her features and vouched that she is actually a transvesite and they got it right as verified by Angela that she/he was a guy from their JC class...woo yeah...we had really a happening crowd in the house...

Caught up with my SRJC gang and realized that Weiyao is doing his traditional wedding in November therefore we can strike off each other from our invitation list while the rest would start to sweat about more "red bombs" at the end of the year.
Peixing will be expecting his baby daughter in September as both he and his wife had yearned...
And I got to know that BH since leaving my workplace had been getting a pay package much higher than me but sure would be shitty job and he was contemplating of moving on soon...
They felt that I should be the next one to organise an outing so as to distribute the invitation cards for my banquet...

We left at around 11 and also congratulated the newly-weds once more with HC taunting me about what possibility it would be if I had successfully courted her...
Got a free ride back in HC's company pick-up van (those Renault type) as he bemoaned to me about this girl who he had been going after for so long now yet leaving him stranded there...
He made use of a lot of footballing terms which was quite interesting..afterall he was the catalyst that introduce me into the world of football years ago
Well he sounded pretty serious especially with his character...but it had been a good time reaquinting with him...

Japanese word of the day: 接続される(Connected) The world is really a small place at times with my friends all connected to one another despite from various sources