The Dinner Reception

And finally... here comes the last part of the wedding - the dinner reception!

It was a freaking mad rush from our outdoor photoshoot back to our wedding venue for the dinner reception because we (and our vendors) only had turnover time of about 2 hours before the dinner reception starts proper!

There was a whole lot of madness that happened between that two tight hours but if I were to list them all.......... I will finish writing this entry only in the year 2020 lah kan. But if there is one thing that I really want to mention and express my thanks for is the fact that I was so freaking glad I opted to top up for fresh make-up!!! Penting wor!!!

My face was thick with oil and grim and what disgusting have yous by the time we returned to the venue - I actually started feeling very icky during the later part of the sanding reception already so to be able to wash off the thick gunk and have fresh make-up for the dinner reception felt SO GOOD.

We have A WHOLE LOT of people to thank particularly for the success of our dinner reception but I'll leave that to the 'Thank you' entry that will precede the end of this blog (Yes, there will be a 'Thank you' entry lol) so let's just jump straight in to the story now lah okay:

Us, getting ready for the night:

And this is us, all ready to get the party staaarteddddddd!

Orang orang kuat! Roll out!

We marched in to Mozella's Love is Endless, as mentioned here.

I look damn toothy in all the march-in pictures, but that's because I was grinning so hard, I was so exhilarated!!!!! I really don't know how to describe the whole experience but it was truly a special kind of joy to see beaming, happy faces of all our friends who made the time and effort to come celebrate our love and happiness :,) 

Us, giving our half-baked speeches lol (I dilly dallied on preparing my speech and ended up with NO speech prepared on wedding day. So I just blurted a quick impromptu one, as did Saliheen.):

Settling down to give way to the video highlights and our speech givers...

Love love love our wedding video highlights, by the way! Well worth the same-day edit top up and the video editor used the song we suggested (Love is Easy by McFly) so it was nice to groove to something we like :D

Ahmad and Nadiah were our speech givers that night. Sayang korang!

Not posting up the picture of Nadiah giving the speech because... she will haunt my dreams as a cik pon if I do hahahahahaha. (Tip to all photographers: NEVER EVER photograph a plus-sized person from a bottom angle. EVER.)

Lainlah kalau it's someone skinny like my brother-in-law.....

(Brother-in-law seh...)

And yes, my brother-in-law ended up giving a speech, too! It was a last minute addition because he told my mamat he wanted to give a speech about two weeks before the wedding. Ngawww. The addition kind of dragged the time for a bit though, and I was feeling slightly anxious about making people wait for their food but I guess it turned out fine in the end? :/

(My mamat specifically didn't want to make our guests wait for the video highlights and speeches to be over before they can makan the food macam Chinese weddings so we explicitly stated in our wedding website AND we made our wedding emcee announce that guests were free to take their food before the ceremony started (before we marched in) and they were free to eat during the speeches as well.

But nobody moved an inch towards the buffet tables pun so everyone ended up waiting for the video highlights and speeches to end before they had their fill!!!!! This one I blame my mamat bulat bulat okay! I told him it's natural for guests to wait until after the video highlights and speeches before they help themselves to the buffet so no matter what you do, it will happen that way - after all, it's only good manners, and I would think all our colleagues and friends have that, right?! 

But nooOOOoooOoooOoo, he insisted that if we give notice and the emcee makes the announcement urging guests to start eating first before our march-in and during the speeches, people won't have to starve through the video highlights and speeches. PFFT. Yet another instance where I am proven right but will this rebel without a cause listen to me the next time we try to sort through a possible issue?!?!?! NooOOOoooOoooOoo)

Ho well. Dah terjadi. At least everyone enjoyed their food in the end! :D

And yes, that's our guest seating chart which I love love looovvveeeee ♥ ♥ ♥

But I wished I had left the description of which group goes to which tables... apparently some guests didn't know where to start bila nak cari their names! 

Actually the initial draft had the description of all the groups e.g. 1 - TNPS, 2 - TNPS, 3 - TKGS, 4 - TKGS, 5 - TP, but the descriptions made the design look jarring + Saliheen and I have mutual friends yang cannot be categorized into a description (Macam mana nak explain eh????? Susah.) so we scrapped that off. Heh. So sorry kepada mereka meraka yang had to spend some time trying to find your names eh hehehehehe

Besides our guest seating chart, one of the stars of the evening was Dessert Artisans' freaking amazing dessert tier, of course!!! My mamat and I were extremely pleased with it and so were the guests!!!!! But of course, reviews will come in a separate entry lah ye, macam tak tau pulak the SOP by now :P

SO AWESOME HOR?! ♥ ♥ ♥

It was SO awesome, someone was caught on camera hijacking desserts off the setup that night.......... 

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. EVIDENCE KUAT PE ILI!!!!!

And Nunu, you jangan nak ketawa ketawa eh, what is this I hear about you running around with a plate of Puteri's desserts around the hall????? Hahahahahahahaha!

Oh oh oh, by the way, I should also mention that Dessert Artisans did not just set up our wedding dessert tier that night - they were also responsible for the maha lovely guestbook and guest reception table for our dinner reception tau!!!!! This guest reception table setup came complimentary with the package that we booked with them at last year's wedding exhibition held by Jentayu Gallery (See, this is why people go to wedding exhibitions, you know. To get discounts and freebies. Although we went to that exhibition with no intention of booking anything lah actually :P)

Yummy nak mampos macaron favours from Ola Lola for our dinner guests! ♥

Favours were arranged by my little fairies tau! Little fairies being my sisters, my cousin Mimi and our family friend (who is also my middle sister's good friend) Haziqah - I enlisted their help because I knew my bridesmaids would have their hands full, what with the tight turnover time to clean up and get everything running, and having extra (helpful) hands wouldn't hurt.

I was so happy with them in the end because they were such great help!!! Oh, and apparently, salah satu of them was the one who came up with the brilliant idea of displaying the macaron favours on the table in an 'S ♥ F' arrangement and I totes love it!!! So teratur and pretty!!! Made for pretty pictures for our guests, who snapped pictures of the arrangement and posted them on Instagram!

I would have been happy enough if the macaron favours were just stacked up nicely so this is above and beyond my expectations ♥♥♥

(Side story: When I first enlisted their help, I told my sisters I'll call their group "my little elves". My baby sister, being the cute, naive and maha selenge bacin girl that she is, actually asked innocently: "Huh??? Kakak nak kita dress like little elves during the dinner???" HAHAHAHAHA LEPAK KE APE KAU BUDAK. 

Was almost tempted to rent elf costumes for them after that!!! Tapi takpe lah, nanti orang ingatkan early Christmas dinner lah pulak :P)

And of course, the other star of the reception would be our Hello Forever photobooth, of course!!!!! AKU MAHA SAYANG ITU PHOTOBOOTH TAU!!! But more on that in my review entry, lagipun you guys would have seen the video of all the photobooth shots which I posted here, and reproduce below:

Hello Forever | Saliheen & Farhana from Hello Forever on Vimeo.

Another thing that we were very happy about was our wedding emcee pairing up with our videographers during our dinner reception to walk around and get guests to record video dedications for us!

We didn't catch everyone's video dedications while they were ongoing because we were busy walking from table to table to mingle with our guests when we weren't on the pelamin taking pictures, so now we can't wait to see the actual video footage of all the dedications!!! (We can't wait to watch the whole wedding video lah, period.)

Oh, and in case I didn't make it clear enough - our dinner reception was made up of our colleagues and friends only, by the way. Right from the start, we'd already agreed that we'd want an arrangement that can separate our families and relatives from our colleagues and friends for our wedding.

The main reason for this was because we wanted to have more time to interact with our colleagues and friends during our wedding rather than a quick phototaking session and a rushed "hi! congratulations! bye!", which is something that usually happens when we go for our friends' wedding receptions.

This became one of our best decisions because we were really happy with how the dinner reception turned out and we definitely got what we wanted - we had time to chat and mingle with our different groups of friends, even took photobooth shots with some of them, and our friends didn't have to worry about "kena kasi family members ambik gambar dulu" or anything of that sort. Senang cakap, they didn't have to compete with our relatives for space and attention, and we were very, very, very pleased with that.

And with that.......... THE WEDDING IS OVER, SUCKERS!!!!!!! 

OVER! FINISH! FINITO! THE END! HAAAAABIS!

Aku punya blog entries je yang macam tak habis habis ni.

The Sanding Reception

So, after the most nerve-wrecking part of the wedding (also known as the solemnization) is over, comes the noisy merrymaking sanding reception!

We went up to the changing room (given as part of venue package by Silat Federation for pengantin usage) after the nikah to rest, ambik aircon, have a quick lunch and change into our sanding outfits.

My mamat sharing a light-hearted moment with Onan, his pak andam, before putting on his tanjak:

Wish I can post up something else that made our mak andam, pak andam and photographers laugh so hard hahahahaha but that shall remain as an inside joke between the people in that room hahahahaha and as a conversation starter for those who have the privilege to flip through our official wedding album in hard copy hahahahaha

And here's my MUA putting together my next look for the sanding hehehe

And my bridesmaids putting on their war paint for the next round! 

Hadang time!

I know some people wonder whether there is a need for hadang for a combined reception and if yes, how to go about doing it. Traditionally, hadang is meant for separate receptions, where the groom and entourage will come from a different venue. Once they arrive at the bride's venue, the bride's entourage will "bar" the groom and his entourage from seeing his bride and will only grant the groom's entourage permission to pass through the "barriers" after they are given duit hadang (Which is usually a small sum of money. Kalau nak kasi NTUC vouchers pun boleh tapi makcik pakcik pihak pengantin perempuan mungkin akan tanya kau dah buang tebiat ke ape). Obviously it works differently for combined receptions, since the groom is already at the same venue as the bride.

This was a quick mutual decision for my mamat and I - we wanted to retain the hadang tradition since it is something that we do enjoy participating in and watching so we did want to have it for our wedding. 

Well, okay, more for me than him, really. Hehehehehe.

So our arrangement was: Bride to come down to the reception hall and sit at the pelamin first, then the groom and his entourage will come down, get ready in front of the entrance and start walking in about 5 to 10 minutes later with the kompang to pass through the hadang barriers. 

Might sound silly to some partypoopers but we didn't care - we just wanted to have fun!

First hadang: My uncles and male cousins!

I imagine his uncle must be saying something along the lines of "Lek, lek, ni semua boleh berbual" hahahahaha.

Negotiation, rowdiness and berbalas pantun kecohness ensues:

Abang sachok who is also the tukang kasi duit hahaha

Dah lepas!

Second hadang: My aunts and female cousins!

Another hadang barrier - lepas! This second hadang includes an amusing impromptu dance by my female cousins at the end lol

And then the last one - bridesmaids!

Look at NAD'S UNIMPRESSED FACE, YOU GAIZE HAHAHAHAHA JUST LOOK

#UNIMPRESSEDNADAI 

Cannot take it, obviously giving her famous "NIGGA PLZ" face hahahahaha

Love how happy everyone looks in the last two shots! :D

(Well, except his uncle, of course, he looks like he is done with hadang negotiation for life hahahahaha)

I think one of my favourite moments came from my bridesmaids' hadang - they were hankering for more money during the hadang, obviously, and after awhile one of his uncles actually pekik from the back, telling them to "Baca doa Qunut dulu!" HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA ah kan terperanjat akak sekejap kena baca doa Qunut petang petang buta hahahahaha

But the paling siak part was when my bridesmaids asked my mamat a soalan cepu emas "Kalau Farhana pergi McDonalds, makanan ape yang dia order?" ("What is the meal that Farhana will order when she goes to McDonalds?")

I thought that question was GREAT because EVERYONE close to me knows that the only thing I will order at McDonalds is a "double cheeseburger, with no pickles" (+ "yes to upsize, and drink will be iced Milo."). And c'mon, this is the man I married! Of course, he knows what my favourite McDonalds meal is.

But does he prove me right and answer the easiest question about me ever correctly?

NoooOoooOOOOOooo.

Almost wanted to karate my way down from the pelamin when he answered "Errrr... McSpicy"!!!!! Kepala hotak kau bertanjak, ENGKAU yang suka makan McSpicy, budak!!!!!!!!!! Ah kan, sampai aku pulak yang terbukak pantun.

Of course when the bridesmaids tell him he is salah, he panic lah right, so he said he knows what I always order for McDonalds BREAKFAST instead. Mintak kena terajang oppa gangnam style ini anak. Nasib baik his answer for my favourite McDonalds breakfast was correct eh. Kalau tak....... malam kau tido luar McDonalds Tampines Mall sudah, bro.

Our male cousins did the silat ceremony for us after the hadang hadang...

 

And we got to see Kompang Zapin Berdendang in action again! 

Haven't seen them since the last wedding I went to and blogged about here (which was the first time I saw them in action and fell so hard in love haha. Cinta pandang pertama, yo!) So happy to see them again but was also a bit miffed that I couldn't concentrate fully because guests started walking up to the pelamin for phototaking. Heh.

Kompang Zapin Berdendang doing their short performance <3

(I hope our videographers or one of our guests managed to record their performance?!)

The bulk of the sanding reception was phototaking, of course (for us lah, for the guests, it's the makan makan haha) - we had groups of guests intermittently going up to the pelamin to have their pictures taken with us. 

I liked that there were gaps in between for us to take a breather and take in the sights and sounds, and truly appreciate and experience the festivities happening in front of us while waiting for guests to come up and take pictures. I guess this is one of the luxuries you can enjoy if you have a combined reception? Longer period for phototaking and interaction with guests. 

I've been to weddings where photo-taking sessions were hurried and had long queues of guests wanting to take pictures because everyone had to rush for phototaking with the pengantin - usually because the couple has to rush to and fro venues for separate receptions, especially if the groom's and bride's receptions are held at venues which are hujung tanjung from each other.

We didn't have that issue so YAY!

Goofing around with props from Snap A Picture Services photobooth before going down to the bridal table to have our lunch heh heh. 

Ambik gambar bodoh macam gini, kita okay, bila kena ambik gambar look into each other eyes lovingly and hold each others' waists segala, tu yang buat kita geli geman sikit hahahahha

By the way, can I just say how freaking glad I was to have engaged Snap A Picture Services as our afternoon reception's photobooth?!?!?! Kept our guests entertained and occupied + the girls are such sweethearts and they were so energetic melayankan our guests!

But full reviews will be up in a separate entry, of course. Heh heh heh. 

Happy to report that everything was on track for our afternoon reception (We even had time to leisurely makan somemore! Yet another benefit of a combined reception - the time saved from having to bertandang can be used for more time for pengantin's lunch) but about an hour away to leaving our wedding venue for our outdoor photoshoot, the clouds started to rumble and it started raining! D:

But since I've prepped myself mentally a few days before the wedding, I knew I'd be able to survive (lol) not going for our outdoor photoshoot because of the weather - even though it'd be a bummer, I wouldn't be super affected by it or anything.

But in the words of his supermother - "Ramai orang doakan you all, Een" because the rain stopped about 10 minutes before we were due to leave for the outdoor photoshoot! So after saying our goodbyes, we left Silat Federation for Temasek Poly. Woohoo! Time to boogie!