Shoes

How many pairs do I need ? Or rather, how many pairs do I have ?

40 pairs ...... & still counting.....

Am I a born centipede ? Or millipede ?

Hee

Crocs

I was at the Crocs section this afternoon over at Isetan Scotts with an intention to buy a pair of cleo sandals.

While I was browsing through the racks of cleos, I overheard the conversation between the sale staff of Crocs and the sale staff of another footwear brand. They are standing within a metre from me.

The conversation of the 2 young (male) adults went on like this. They are conversing in mandarin.

The sale staff of Crocs said to the other,

"Do you know how cheap is the manufacture price of these (pointing to the racks of crocs)?"

Coincidentally, I was looking at those cleos.

He continued, "you know that we all, can get a staff price and it is a 80% discount of the retail price."

At this moment, I felt stupid I actually have the intention to buy something that is so overpriced.

The 2 boys continued the conversation of a customer who came by to complain about some unsatisfactories. Then, I heard something that the sale staff of Crocs said that I think it shouldn't be said at all ! He said, " these (the crocs) are selling so expensive. What's more, they are all made in china."

At that very moment, I really felt like a fool and cut into their conversation immediately. I told the boy that it is absolutely incorrect to speak bad things about the brand (he is working for)right at his workplace with so many shoppers walking around, moreover, worse still, telling all the bad things right in front of a customer who has the intention to spend money which eventually part of it goes to his salary.

The 2 boys stopped the conversation immediately and the sale staff of Crocs was embarassed and walked away for about a minute.

I am also working in the service industry. As a member of this line, my responsibility is not just to give what the customer wants, the staff attitude, the passion for the job is also very important. Can you imagine if there is someone around there who heard the conversation and turn out to be the boss of Crocs ?

So, what happens after the episode ? The sale staff apologise profusely and I explained to him the consequences of what he has done earlier on. Eventually, the fool bought that pair of 'overpriced' cleo.....

To be honest, majority of the products are now made in China and therefore it is absolutely not a surprise...... Tell me, which branded stuffs are manufacture in China and cost only a fraction of the nett cost?

National Day - Preview Part 2

Hey, this evening I got new discovery !

Remember I mentioned that the helicopters are flying in from the front of my flat to the back of my flat in this earlier post ?

Just now, I stood at the corridor waiting for the helicopters approaching and was surprised to see 2 big helicopters carrying the natioanl flag..... but isn't only 1 will appear in front of the crowd and on national TV ?

The first one was flying much ahead and the 2nd one behind it and was escorted by the apache helicopters.... when they are approaching above the condo block across the street of my flat, the first helicopter turned right, making a u-turn. Then I realised this was a reserve one.... ha ha ha....

Eh? Isn't reserve should be at the back ????

Nature Trail @ Bukit Timah

It has been don't know how many donkey years I have not waken up in the early mornings (when the sky is still dark) for exercise.

But I have to do that last Sunday. Yes, you didn't read wrongly. SUNDAY.

My female colleagues and me were somehow being compulsory volunteered to join the nature trail walk of XX cdc briskwalking club.

The starting point was at Diary Farm. To be exact MOE Dairy Farm Adventure Centre.

Wow ! That sounds very interesting ! I mean the adventure centre lah....

I have very fond memories of Diary Farm because this is the place where we did abseiling during my poly days when I was once an active (never study) member of the poly adventurers. And so therefore though I (my bosy) resisted waking up to go do the walking, but most of brain was looking forward to it. I really wanted to go back there to take a look at the place.

As we walked into the cemented trail leading us up to the open field. I was very very excited and was yakking away our gungho days of climbing up and down to my fellow colleague, also from the same poly but I was almost 10 years here senior lor.... okie...stop....

What befell me right in my eyes when we reached the open field was a disappointment. The tranquil surrounding is still there.... but...but..but...... the cliff we used to do our abseiling was almost half covered by growing trees and branches !

There's no way you can access to the bottom of the cliff. It seems like this cliff has not been used for a long time. I still managed to find the 'opening' where we usd to climbed to the top of the cliff but it was almost covered by greeneries.

Even the nearby cliffs where rock climbers used to do their practice also look 'abandoned' for quite some time.

I couldn't helped by feel like a lost for something.

Hey, haven't SPA been doing abseiling ? Where have they all gone to ? Anyone can answer me ?

My Wedding - Last Update

I have dedicated many posts to my weddings and I think it is time to put a closure to it.

Since the beginning of preparation to the banquet ends, I have always put down what I have done, what I have sourced, the happy the sad parts of it and many many other things into different postings, scatterring over various months.

And I think the best way to close one of the important chapters of my life is to review all over all the hardwork I have and my 'ang' and friends had came together and made 3rd June 2007 a very SPECIAL MOMENT in my life.

So here, I share with all of you...... MY WEDDING e-ALBUM.

Enjoy... 227 pictures ...

National Day - Preview

It has been almost a month.

Every Saturday, for the past 4 weeks. deafening roars overwhelmed the skies at 6.50pm....

Ha ha... It's the National Day Fly Past....

The fly past used to be in the front of my flat when the National Day celebration was at the National Stadium. Even when the celebrations were in Padang, it was still flying past in the front of my flat.

This year, the National Day celebration is at Marina Bay and it will be there for at least the next 3 years. Helicopters have been zooming past my flat - this time from the back of the flat - for every Saturdays.

But there is a difference this time, the helicopters have flown so low that I can see the gigantic national flag flapping gracefully above my head. YES, IT IS INDEED GIGANTIC !

Within minutes, thunders roars of the fighter planes zoomed across.... er.... too fast for me, my camera, my hands, my brain all cannot coordinate at the same time to capture the moment of fly past.

Next time this year, I will not be staying here anymore. I wonder will I get such luck at my new flat ....

Wedding Again

08 July must be a good day to get married....

Besides my BIL's wedding, I rushed to my bestie fren wedding on the same day. Luckily, hers was in the afternoon. The bride will only be ready at 12.30pm as we were told and so I gathered the wolveys to 'fall in' below her block at 1.00pm so that we won't create a mad rush to see the bride and the groom.....

We helped ourselves to the food and yummy 'kuehs' and dessert while the bride and groom were busy taking pictures with friends and relatives at the dai. When we are about to move over to see the bride, the pair is about to leave ! Very Very fast, we thought.... & so, we ended up taking pictures along the corridor of the void deck, under the hot sun ! But we felt like superstars coz there were so many cameras clicking away at the same time. Wow ! My own wedding also never got so much attention leh.....

And we managed to see the bride and groom marching off to their parked vehicle, with kon pangs and a contingent of people following behind them... But my dear bestie was frowning so hard that she looked as if she is being forced to marry the groom.....


ha ha ha ...... and so she is finally smiling happily. But poor her....... I think he head must at least be 1 Kg heavier that day. As she talked to us without big movement, the accessories on her head 'ding dang' non-stop.

By the way, did you realise the groom is not smiling in both pictures..... Haiz, looks like it is the bride is forcing the groom to marry here.... stress !!!! Ha ha ha ha

MIL

MIL = mum / mother in law..... BIL = brother in law..... FIL = father in law

I am pretty amazed by my MIL when I look thru my wedding pictures and realised my MIL was enjoying taking pics at the ballroom foyer after the banquet.

It was until 1 month later at the wedding banquet of Alvin's youngest bro's wedding that I realised she was named Cai Qin lookalike during my wedding banquet....

In fact, Amy the make up artist who was also tasked to do the make up and hairdo for my MIL is very stressed doing up my MIL then for the bride ! Haa haa haa.... Bcoz MIL told her she doesn't want aunty aunty look and must be modern...... She wanted to look young and modern...

Ta ta ........ so this is Cai Qin lookalike on 3 June.....

An so, 1 month later, on 8 July..... Amy got stressed again coz she is doing up my MIL again for my BIL's wedding. She have to change her hairstyle WITHOUT comprising MIL's request of young and modern.... so what do we have ?

As my 2nd BIL put it..... 'La Ma' (hot mum) and looks like You Ya. Must be some 70s or 80s female singer which I have no idea how the singer looks like.... MIL was so happy that she snapped so many pictures in the bridal suite already.... so you can imagine how many pictures were snapped at the banquet itself....... haa.....

My FIL just shook his head and mumbled..... 'what You Ya......You Tiao more like it'..... and shook his head more....

And so, allow me to resent you You Ya lookalike !

Good Contacts to Share

A lot of efforts were put in to put the whole wedding together and I didn't have a package - all ala carte, I need a lot of referrals, word-of-mouth recommendation, friendship or just luck that help me to manage to put everything into place.

There is so far no setback and I am more than 100% satisfied from what I have planned for both of us.

I didn't want to buy my wedding gown in the first place. I went to see a number of bridal studios and renting one is at an unbelievable amount. For that cost, I can actually buy 2 at the boutique where I bought my gown...

Allure Charix, 92 Amoy Street. Tel: 65 6323 7868.

It's off the rack piece of gown. For every design, there's only 3 pieces and in S, M, L only. When it's gone, it's gone forever. I know about this boutique some time back but doesn't know they sell such affordable gown until Alvin's cousin told me. This piece that I bought was priced at S$699. During my purchase, there was some credit card promo going on and I brought home the gown at $594 !!!!

Zion Creation, Golden Landmark #01-34, Tel: 65 9627 4764

I got no intention to tailor-made my evening gown after a visit to another Bridal Studio which I set my eyes on a german lace fushia pink gown. It gonna cost me $1200 to rent ! And after a by chance passing by this seamstress's shop. I decided to scout for similar material and make my own evening gown at a fraction of that rental price. Worksmanship for this pink gown ? $420.

Material was found at Euro Silk, 77 Arab Street,

Tel: 65 6396 3053.

Cost of material for the whole gown ? $155

The Empire, (look for The Dressing Room), along Bukit Pasoh Road (adjacent opposite the hip Majestic Hotel).

I wanted a cheongsam type of tea dress but not the old fashion design.. Scouting this can really kills me until fi asked me to try Empire.... Indeed, within 10 minutes I decided to buy this $199. A lilac cheongsam inpsired one. And it was only until I tried it on, then I realised it's the same as Fi's 'bom bom' dress ! But for me, no way for braless, not enough to bom the dress and so spend $$ to buy a wonder bra....

You like my makeup ? From a word-of-mouth recommendation & turn out to be cousin of my dearie 'Lao Niang'.....

Make up Artist - Amy ! $450 for the bride, day & night wif hairdo....
(let me know if u want to contact her)

Co-oridnator for the evening.... none other than my both lurpy sistas !!!!

Fiona as the Emcee of the evening.... Joanna, tasked the most important job of the evening.... Button Presser ! She is the one to make sure the video montages worked !

Not forgetting our handsome Sam ! The other Emcee for the evening. Fi & him can just hit it off so well that they just rehearsed that evening at 5.45pm, deciding who to do the mandarin or english script... & carried out the show at ZERO hiccups !

Sam was so good that he immediately caught the eye of my mum-in-law and wanted to engage him to be the emcee for my bro-in-law's wedding ! But unfortunately, Sammy is busy with work and have to decline the offer.

Jie Meis aka helpers for the day !

They are just simply needed for the bride for every single reasons from holding the gown, feeding you water, holding mirror, fanning u, carry your things and YES ! collecting yr ang baos during tea ceremony and guarding all your ang baos and gold jewellery like a hawk ! And all these help from friends, PRICELESS......

And these flowers for the car. Fresh purple and lilac flowers on the bonnet of the bridal car. Seriously, I have no idea who did this. My 'ang' gamely took up this job ONLY out of a thousands tasks needed to settle for the wedding. Why ? Becoz one of his frens got lobang to make this.....

And we paid..... $228 for the bridal cars & 2 Jie Mei cars.

And who supply all these flowers ? Hand bouquet to corsages and flowers on my head .... My darling fren who has a skill for these.... She can customise to suit your request or match your gown... And not only that it just suit your personality as well..... She did my hand bouquet for my ROM that made my mum-in-law talks about it until now... her BIG orchid corsage for my parents-in-law mage my mum-in-law so happy too. And I paid for the cost of the flowers only. The worksmanship into putting all together..... PRICELESS....

If you like something different that normally florist or bridal studio cannot offer..... check my friend out..... Let me know and I'll give you the contact.

Any oh yes, not forgetting the person who capture down all these wonderful memories.... a strong recommendation for Sunny who supposed to be the one doing the photography.... Ms Vivien....... and I paid a friendship price which cannot be disclosed... But her normal rate is $800 for a full day wedding event for unlimited digital shots without print. More services can be provided at different rates..... If you like to hire her to be your photographer, let me know and I more glad to pass her contact on.... I seconded Sunny, she's real good.

And my video montages if you have watched them, specially done up by my good fren, Sunny.... It's PRICELESS again, but he charges reasonably if you like to have one done up, for whatever occasion you can think of.... let me know and I'll link you both...

I'm still 'trimming' the pics and will get it downloaded soon...... so, please be a little more patient... hee .....

Compliment Email

Wah, it's almost 3 weeks i haven't touch my blog...... no good no good.... well, actually hor... I haven't completed my updates on my wedding & so I'm going to plastered them all over today & tomorrow....

I wrote a compliment email to the hotel about 1 week after the banquet and I was surprised the GM did wrote back despite my email was sent to him while he is on a family vacation ! That's the service and attitude of a 5* hotel .... this is what I wrote...


Date: 07 June 2007

To: Mr Sxxxx Sxxxx
General Manager

P** P***** Hotel , Singapore

Dear Mr Sxxx,

Re: Wedding Couple on 03 June 2007, Pxxx Ballroom

First of all, I would like to extend my congratulations to you for having a wonderful team of employees who had put together such a wonderful and memorable banquet for my husband and me on the evening of June 3rd, 2007.

I was attracted to the inclusions that P P has put together for the wedding package at P Ballroom. Highlights of the package which I personally think you have a winning edge over the rest of the hotels (of same category) are the 2 nights' stay in the Bridal Suite, complimentary printing of the wedding cards and the 45 minutes 'live' musical string trio.

My first point of contact with P P was with Mr T. He has been very patient and polite with both of us, especially my husband, A, who sometimes will make ridiculous suggestions during discussion. He is also very responsible where he will always inform me when he is on leave and let me know another point of contact if I need to look for during his absence. A very Big Thank to him and his team for coordinating the logistic required for the wedding.

Also I would like to extend my thank you to K, the Banquet Manager for the evening, K2, the Events Manager and assigned personal butler to us for the evening too, and to the dedicated team of waiters and waitress who has put up very good service (which is seriously lacking at home here) that impress many guests. Not forgetting the AV technicians too. They have managed to coordinate everything so smoothly within such a short notice and ensure no hicupps during the entire evening. Both K and team are so obliging to some of my requests at the last minute and I am very surprised and glad to know later on (from the guests) that they did more than what I have expected, more much than the guests have expected too ! K2 too, was always around us and springing into action so quickly whenever he is needed.

A big applause to the all chefs from HTL, kitchen assistants and helpers for putting together such a wonderful banquet. All the guests that both of us had spoken to have no negative comments on the food. In fact, I was told by many that this is the best banquet they have ever attended at a hotel. The feedback was, the menu for the evening was unique, with more than enough portion for everyone. Most of the guests enjoyed the food thoroughly that evening.

I have also fill in the online survey which I will not elaborate further here.

I would like to make some suggestions here which you may wish to consider.

Perhaps, P P can arrange for some tone of voice speaking workshop for the most frontline employees so that they know what tone to use to speak to the guests. Wrong tone of voice used to speak the same sentence of words could be very different meaning and may annoy the guests. I have encountered this in less than 30 minutes after check in which is really not such a pleasure and I hope future guests will not encounter the same incident as me. I have since feedback to T, K and K2 on the same day that early evening.

As we are throwing a chinese banquet, it makes sense to have chinese characters of the dishes shown on the menu cards that will be placed at each table that day. I was sort of upset and puzzled when I was told that P P couldn't do it despite there are chinese characters of the dishes stated in the contract that we signed.

Overall, our guests and ourselves had such a wonderful time that evening and we will definitely recommend P P as an ideal hotel to throw wedding events.

I look forward to working with P P again for events (not wedding definitely !) in the near future.

Once again, our sincere thanks to everyone who has put in that effort (big or small) to make our wedding banquet and stay memorable and successful. And also, thank you for your attention to have read this long feedback.

To everyone at P P, keep up the good work ! You deserved the applause !


And he actually did reply !

Dear Sheryl:

Thank you for your kind mail! I am most appreciative of the time you have taken to share your experiences with me.

P P has as it's primary mission the delivery of service that is personalized and tailored to each guest's requirements; that experience is really all about the people and hence the name badge that we all wear (which you may have noticed) that includes the Associates name and the statement "I am Pan P".............. A great deal of emphasis goes into encouraging empowerment and "having fun"..................I think it's all these things that creates such a uniqueness in our Associates.

Thank you also for recognizing the many "stars" we have with us that make P P what it is. Genevieve and her team do a great job! I am very proud of all of them and the rest of the team that you may not have had a chance to meet in person, but who support the round the clock services we provide. I will relay your kind comments to all of them! I have had the pleasure to be associated with this hotel for 5 years in the early 1990's and as the General Manager since January 2003. I love my job and feel blessed to work with the people I do.

Thank you also for your constructive criticism regarding tone of voice and use of a variety of languages at certain types of events. Via copy of this to Genevieve and her team, I will ask her to look into both of these areas.

Thank you again for sharing your experiences with us. We appreciate that there are numerous event venue choices in Singapore and thank you for choosing P P. If we can ever be of assistance to you please don't hesitate to contact me; and yes, I will hope it is not your wedding again!

Best Regards,


I dun normally write compliments ad if I write, it will not be long. But this time, I decided to put in more effort and complimented the people who really deserve especially in the service industry. With a little encouragement, it will boast their morale and work satifaction further. These people will service their clients even more with an open heart and more sincerity. Bringing happiness to everyone, whther u are the reciivng one or the giving one.