Wedding again

Saturday was full of Singapore wedding activities -- lunch and tea ceremony in the afternoon, wedding dinner and marriage registration in the evening. The tea ceremony and lunch were held at the Chen's house. The registration and the dinner were held at a Chinese restaurant on the thirty-third floor of a skyscraper downtown. In from Penang were Eileen's parents and sisters, brothers-in-law, nieces, and nephews. Mr. Chen's sister came from Ipoh, and Mr. Chen's brother and his family from Kuala Lumpur. The rest of the Chen's are living in Singapore. As for Mrs. Chen's family, I didn't get to meet any of them. I had already met Mr. Chen's brothers and sisters several times before, and I'm friends with some of them. Everyone was excited to meet the first born of the new generation. Bobby doesn't have any cousins yet on the Chen side of the family.

I've been to several Chinese weddings now, and I've got a routine for meeting extended friends and family. Mostly I just try to stay close to Christine, smile politely, and wait to talk to people once I've got a hunch they can speak good English. When people talk to me in Chinese usually my jaw drops while I try to understand what they said and then think of something to say back. Usually this takes so long the person has either walked away or Christine has bailed me out before I can even eek out a word. I should just say "I don't speak Chinese." I can actually say that in Chinese...

Bobby getting warmed up for the day's wedding festivities. He's sleeping with the bride's bouquet.

Christine with her mum. The lunch was catered. It was very Singaporean -- Chinese dishes, including fish, plus a chicken curry.

Eileen being welcomed into Wei Hao's family by Mr. and Mrs. Chen, who accept tea from her and acknowledge her as "daughter."

Bobby receiving his red packet from his uncle Wei Hao, also known as is jiu jiu, after his dad poured tea on his behalf. Everything was done in Chinese, and I'm just such an awkward white guy who doesn't know what's going on. Learn from my mistakes, Bobby; learn Chinese better.

The newly extended family after the tea ceremony.

A few more members of the newly extended family after the tea ceremony. Awkward white guy included.

And all of Mr. Chen's brothers, sisters, and progeny -- only a few missing. Mr. Chen's parents are sadly no longer with us.

The view from the restaurant. You can actually see my old office on the very left hand side of the frame.

Waipo with her baby Ze Kai. She was worried the wedding music would hurt his ears so was shuttling him around trying to find a "quiet" spot. The music, by the way, was recorded solo piano renditions of popular Western songs -- a bit more recognizable than the electric organ music at the Malaysian version of the wedding.

This is the first Singaporean/Malaysian wedding I've been to where they had a solemnization at the wedding banquet. The old guy on the right, Mr. Tan, said some words about marriage and asked the betrothed whether they promised to stay with each other until death does them part. Mr. Chen and Eileen's mom were the witnesses.

Waipo and Waigong held Bobby for much of the evening and also gave him a bottle during dinner, letting daddy focus on eating and drinking.

Three generations of Singaporeans.

At Singaporean Chinese weddings, it is traditional to have several toasts where the crowd shouts "Yum Seng!" -- three times, first for a blissful marriage, then for eternal love between the couple, and then for fertility. Yum seng is, I believe, Cantonese -- remember that Singapore is an amalgamation of Chinese dialects as well as races. I think it is the same as saying "gan bei" in Mandarin, which means to "clean your glass" or drink everything in the glass. At weddings people want to shout "yum seng" as loud as possible because, I gather, the louder you are, the more you care. The yelling unfortunately scared Bobby and he started to cry. But we calmed him down fairly fast afterwards, and daddy continued eating and drinking.

Bobby stayed up past his bedtime and was a heap of tired baby when we got home, having slept all the way home from the restaurant. All in all, he was a good wedding baby -- and didn't poop his pants during this wedding.

Sunday morning I went to breakfast at Serangoon Gardens, a local hawker center, with Mr. Chen and his brother's family. They live in Kuala Lumpur. The oldest boy, on the right, is studying engineering at Nanyang Technological University (NTU) in Singapore. It is one of the top 50 universities in the world, so everyone is very fired up about that. Of course it's Singaporean tradition that I am constantly told everyone's school results when they're good. Mr. Chen's brother asked me to give his son some advice for meeting girls while he's away at college. I told him that he needed to get his own apartment because Singaporean girls all live with their parents and appreciate having some privacy once in a while. I'll check back in a few years to see how that advice was put into practice.