Be Prepared

With the total number of H1N1 patients soaring above 1,000, I fear that one day, just one day, I might add on to the statistics, considering the fact that my job puts me into contact with hundreds and hundreds of people every month.

Now, if that happens, and should I be home quarantined, I want to let me clients know that the Wedding Photographers Network (WPN) will be right behind me to back me up. WPN is a collective of some of Singapore's finest wedding photographers. Any one of them, whoever is available on the affected date of wedding, can be called upon to replace me and provide excellent coverage for the wedding couple. Likewise, clients of other WPN members are also covered under such an "insurance policy".

Of course, nobody wishes this to occur.

However, clients who might be affected should have a peace of mind.

Wrong side of 30

I am genuinely touched by the well wishes of friends and clients who have wished me a happy birthday.
I think I've mentioned this before, my wife and I have the same birthday, and also the same age.
Birthdays don't mean much to us after we passed 30, and I've postponed our celebration today because I have a football game coming up (guys out there, I've set a low benchmark for you)!

Being on the wrong side of 30, I find that I am taking longer to recover from shoots and football games. Exercise is of paramount importance at my age, and diet is to be strictly observed if I were to keep my body in good shape.

One thing that no amount of cycling and football-playing and pills can help is the deteriorating performance of my favourite organ.

Nowadays, the brain can't remember things very well. Sigh.

Morning Scare

When my wife and I were at a lift lobby this morning, we overheard a woman on the phone (speaking in Mandarin):

"I'm sorry.....for the past two days, I had to stay at home because my family was served a notice to stay home for 7 days due to the H1N1. My son's school was affected.

I couldn't stand it, so I came out of the house after two days and I'll be faxing the document to you right away!"

When the lift door opens, I whispered to my wife not to follow her into the lift.

Such irresponsible behaviour. I'm sure there are many such examples around. I think this virus will be amongst us for a long time to come.

Afternoon Fun

Finally decided to bring the kids to the Singapore Flyer, after passing it by almost everyday while sending Yu Wen to and from school. We would often talk about it, referring it as the gigantic ferris wheel.

I have been confronted with questions such as:

Q:" Who are those people inside the ferris wheel?"
A:"Tourists."

Q:"What are tourists?"
A:"Err....people who travel to another place and have fun."

Q:" Why are some (cabins) empty?"
A:" EERRR....there are not many tourists nowadays. The economy is not doing well, and people have not enough money to fly on an aeroplane."

I was trying to use some big words here to stump her, otherwise I don't know where all these questions will lead to. Luckily, it worked. (Bad daddy)

And when we were actually inside one of the cabins, she asked:"So, are we tourists now?"
Bravo! Yes, we are tourists now! (Good daddy!)

We brought along Yu Wen's cousin Xin Ying, a spritely 6-year-old who has wanted to hop onto the Flyer for the longest time.
They had a wonderful time, not so much awed by the view but (I think) more by the novelty of it.

After that, it was water play (again!) at Marina Barrage. I reckon after spending $60 on a 30-minute ride on a giant bicycle wheel, a free-and-fun place of interest is certainly high up on my priority list. True enough, I think they had more fun with the water than the air at 400m above sea-level.

But never mind, it's fun playing local tourists and doing the touristy things once in a while.

Yue Liang Dai Biao Wo De Xin

The very fair weather these few weeks have contributed to some clear blue skies, spectacular sunsets, and equally fascinating moonrise.

Water Play

What better way to cool down from the sizzling heat these days than having a dip in the pool? Both of them enjoy it so much that the parents were made to promise to bring them to the pool more often. My pleasure.

Pre-wedding-turn-family session

Yew Shen was one of my schoolmates from the now-defunct The Chinese High School. He was also one of the "brothers" for two of my CHS clients. I was glad my work made an impression on him so much so that he called me up one day to task me for a pre-wedding session with his wife, Vicky.

Now Yew Shen is a very busy lawyer. And I mean real busy. On the day of the shoot, he had to go back to the office at short notice, and had his handphone glued to his ear for almost the rest of the shoot, which incidentally was more than an hour behind schedule because he got home late.

It was a stressful shoot because I had one eye on my watch to check the time, another eye on the sky to check the light, and a third eye to check on him (to make sure he's not on the line).

But what was more memorable was at the end of the session, his parents, sister, brother-in-law and his niece and nephew had all gathered at the last stop for a family photo. Before that, he and Vicky had to pull off all the right moves and kisses and hugs for the camera, right before their eyes.

I say, that's a hallmark of a closely-knitted and liberal-minded family. I can't imagine myself doing that in front of my own folks. My family is close-minded and liberally-knitted. Whatever your interpretation is.