Thru The Voice of a Returnee

How time flies. It is now into the 10th month of 2006. With just another 3 months to go, we will all be looking at the end of the year once again!

As for me, I just felt like I have only recently seen fireworks displayed at the Tasman Bridge. But actually it took place about 9 months ago, when the end of the year was celebrated with much glory.

Bitterness in me nevertheless. 2005 was quite an interesting year to me. I remember 2005 as times when I could hardly afford to accept the fact that I would have to journey on to the next year because "next year" means leaving Hobart to continue with life's journey. So it was just hard for me to leave 2005.

But as many of you know, I successfully journeyed on. I left 2005, left Hobart and almost completed 2006 in Singapore. Even then I still have dreams on living my life in Tassie, a place where I once called home, still do and where my heart continues to be.

So yes, life has forced me to move on. I was dragged back to Singapore by my boyfriend (now husband), who soon got himself a job when I was still wrestling with the Singapore VS. (Tassie + uni +plenty) other values I picked up and lived by while I was staying abroad.

For a while, I became quite mentally sick and even had suicidal thoughts as I wasn't coping well at all as a returnee. Family and fellow Singaporeans (everyone basically) were infuriating me to the core, I thought.

The culture, values, mindset and even accent of Singapore & Singaporeans were annoyingly irritating to me. Food, on the other hand, was very, very awful as they all tasted entirely of chemicals. Thus 'everything' was just bad, bad, bad to me.

But because boyfriend and I had plans to get hitched sometime in mid 2006, I endured 'everything' and tried my very best to 'live' in this different but very small world.

So my boyfriend and I did get married in mid-2006 but that was just after about 4 months of proposal. It was crazy - the craziest thing ever I have heard of for a 'normal' wedding couple to be doing.

The wedding came and went by very soon nevertheless. Things went well. We enjoyed our wedding very, very much. Of course it would have been different if it weren't for our beloved friends (including my cuz Anita) who flew in (or rode/drove in for our Malaysian friends) at their very own expense.

The Royal Plaza team, which we engaged with for the Saturday event, as well as the boys-in-black for Sunday's Lunch did their parts very, very well. My husband and I were very satisfied with Royal Plaza's hospitality and quality of service that we decided to stay for another night before flying to the Maldives for a week of fun times.

So everything was good, but what was even better was that we DID NOT have a single wedding/honeymoon debt to clear, so we were practically enjoying our newly-married life the whole time we were back.

Life, for me after that, continued on as per normal. However the status of being somebody's wife has changed a couple of things in me nevertheless. One thing for sure, I am missing the times I could depend on dad's finances :(

Looking at all the books that I bought when I was at uni that I have at home now, I thought it was just crazy how I made dad pay for all of them as they should have costed him thousands of dollars in total. Sadly, it is only now that I start to wonder about the 'real' values of money.

So it seems like marriage is the beginning of many 'real' things in life. Hopefully I get to go through marriage life with heaps of mental and emotional strength. Together, my partner and I shall make this happen. Together. Yes, me and my new partner in crime.

Yours,
MaRiNAh