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Saturday, July 25, 2009

What do you get for someone who doesn't need anything?

I messaged Vanessa on Tuesday, asking if there was anything she's lacking and would want us to get for them as a farewell gift. She said she's not missing anything, and has all the photos and sweet memories to bring with her. Just as well, as I had just sorted out a full range of photos taken together with her and the Choons since I got to know her in Weber Shandwick Singapore in 2001. I got her an album full of selected photos (all 273 of them), a hand-written card (miss the personal touch these days in the e-world), and a thumb drive stored with soft copies of the photos and home videos we'd taken in Beijing (she'd lost her laptop a few years back storing most of these old photos, and this thumb drive came in most handy for her).
As we went through the album when she came over yesterday, it brought back a full flood of memories, like the first photo we took together at a Weber Shandwick BBQ at Sentosa in 2001 (!!!)- that explains the tie-knot-at-Tshirt fashion faux pas...
Or having dinner at Pete's Place (since closed) with another good friend Belinda...(note my visibly huge cheeks).
Or even the farewell sessions we had for Vanessa upon knowing she was leaving for Beijing (at that point, I did not know I was going to be reunited with the Choons 3 months later in Beijing).
Over the years in Beijing (from 2003), we had various pigging out sessions...
And of course, drinks binge and party sessions!
Who can miss the classic past-time of young people in China (yes, we're young...at heart...) - KARAOKE!!
And the weekend trips to the outskirts for icy-cold skiing times (Wayne and I never went skiing again after some bum collided into him from the back, causing him to hit his forehead against the skis and suffer a 6-stitch wound on the forehead).
Vanessa and I also went to Hong Kong/Macau on two separate occasions, for eating, drinking, and SHOPPING! We were rather bimbotic on our first trip to Macau, at first walking 20 minutes in the wrong direction to get to the ferry terminal, then getting there in time to miss the ferry (next one was an hour's wait away), then shopping around to while away the time and realising 10 minutes to ferry departure time that we needed passports to get into Macau (and thus marked the fastest ever taxi chase to and from the hotel to get our passports)...
We also enjoyed going around Beijing with visits to places like Summer Palace, Botanical Gardens, and camping at Feicui Island (where we had to do our business behind bushes...).And always enjoyed fun sessions with colleagues at Weber Shandwick Beijing.
We had a blast dressing up at our Annual Dinner 2007 (the theme was 'Movie Night' and Vanessa was a pirate, and me - a Shanghai starlet wannabe).
Both Tim and Van were also most crucial for the Singapore leg of our wedding in October 2006, with Van being around most of the day, and they were our coordinators for the night (also giving a speech during the dinner).
Even for our honeymoon to Switzerland and Italy in February 2007, Tim and Van were coincidentally spending their last day in Rome on the day we arrived, so we had a good catch-up lunch session with over-priced pizzas near the Pantheon.
Christmas 2007 was a most crazy affair where we decided to do away with the hustle of the crowd (and forking ridiculous prices for drinks), and had Italian at our place, drinking up all the bottles of alcohol in our house, and messing around with the gingerbread house the Choons got from a restaurant.
February 2008 came, and the Choons announced to us that they were expecting, and wanted us to be their child's godparents - yaaay! We celebrated, and little did we know then that I was also expecting - double yaaay! In the spirit of keeping happy, we continued our get-togethers to the Great Wall, to Tianjin, and of course, pigging out (minus the drinks of course)...
The first time the girls met, they were about 3 months old, and Rosabelle looked massive lying next to Rachel!
When Tim and Van wanted to leave for Beijing the month after in February, they also paid us yet another visit.
Wayne sent them to the airport early this morning (Tim and his Dad drove the car to Shanghai), and as I wrote in the card for them, this isn't exactly a farewell as I know we'll be meeting up soon before we know it, and we'll continue to be in each other's thoughts and prayers. We'll cherish the precious moments close to our hearts, and wish the Choons all the best in Shanghai!

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