Foreword
We were invited by Mediacorp Styleweddings.sg portal and Baliway to survey sites in Bali suitable for weddings and photography earlier this month. Jace of Baliway was the most generous and attentive host, always fussing about and making sure everything is ok for everyone. The trip was an exciting one with a wealth of wedding possibilities that I can’t wait to share with prospective brides and grooms who have been thinking of a romantic honeymoon or destination wedding.
I’ve decided to dedicate a mini-series to share what I’ve gained. To kick start the mini-series, of lesser relevance and rather on a more personal note, this entry serves as a prologue to the series, which I wrote a day prior to the tour. Hope you like it.
Prologue
Forrest Gump had it easy. He believed his mum when she told him, “Life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you’re gonna get.”
For the rest of us on this finite journey of life which began with infinite possibilities that slowly gets siphoned off by the sands of father time, some of us wish there were easier solutions to discover and realize the meaning of life. As I laze in the comfort of the hotel room while waiting to be enveloped by the intoxication of Bintang, my last conscious thoughts inevitably go back to the seemingly endless quest to understand life. Perhaps an overly ambitious attempt that amounts to unraveling mysteries of the universe that exhibits the expected humility of humanity.
Life is the beating of the aortic pump that sustains the bodily functions – says the white robed bespectacled scientist. Life is unquestioning submission to The Almighty, says the black robed father. At this moment, with little distractions from the expectations of life – self-imposed or otherwise – on me; as the beauty of being ‘tipsy’, which first heightens the senses before diminishing it like the pinching of the flickering flame, still allows me to logically (hopefully) express myself, I felt compelled to describe the emotions that stirs with my uncomfortable gut.
I didn’t quite expect to go on a business trip to Bali. You see, Bali was the place I married Liz (and still happily married to). Every year, we had been taking annual trips back here. We love Bali and the romantic sojourns that cut off our mundane ties with life and her incessant demands of us. It is one place where her clutches can’t touch. It’s our place of solace. It’s our haven, so to speak. Coming back to Bali without her seems… unnatural.
On my part, the intention of taking this trip was to scout for potential locations for bridal shoots. Paid trip. Favourite location. Beer. Break from ‘life’. What’s there not to like? On this day, the only day without items on the itinerary. instead of excitedly seeking possibilities of a vacation, I am clicking away on the keyboard as I lay half-awake, missing my family.
When I first started typing aimlessly, I was half expecting to wax lyrical on life. I’m never gonna get a box of chocolates that I don’t know what I’m gonna get. At this point in my life, the box of chocolates or whatever that may lie within, seems predictable. One thing I do love about my life though, is the fuzzy feeling sitting in my heart – images of my lovely wife and canine son, as well as the memories of the warm fuzzy feeling I’m blessed with when I’m with them.
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