I thoroughly enjoyed planning baby's birthday this year. It was madness trying to inform everyone involved, and make sure the right thing's have been booked, cake has been ordered, etc... This entry will only contain details, and i'll add in the photos in the next one.
Day 1, Pre Birthday, Thurs 05 Nov :
We found out that Bai's condition was getting worse and the doctor claimed the cancer was now at stage 4 so went over to his and Yatee's place to see how he was doing. This part is sad and has nothing to do with baby's birthday, but that's how the whole group got together.
After leaving Bai's place we decided to go prawning and stopped at DBS at Kovan to withdraw some cash first. Feroz and Bidin decided to get a cake so they asked the rest to go first. Surprised baby at the stroke of midnight with it. You could tell he didnt see it coming at all, so that was good fun. Especially when me, Perot and Feroz were trying to light all the candles and Arman wanted to run ahead first and tell his Uncle Didi. He ended up stealing the chocolate roses on the cake when he thought no one was looking. One in a million i tell you...
Day 2, The Big Day, Friday 06 Nov :
Went to work as usual and throughout the day he kept on asking me where we were gonna eat so i finally gave in and told him Sakura. To my dismay and utter disappointment he refused to go, saying he had already eaten and thought the food at Sakura sucked anyway.
I quickly called the rest and came up with a plan B. Went down to Beach Road after work to meet him then we went to highlight his hair. By this time i had no choice but to confess my plans to him, as it was too late to go to Sakura and he was hinting that we should just eat somewhere nearby.
Anyway. So we met up with the rest at Mac and headed down to Simpang Bedok, or so he thought. We actually managed to make last min reservations at the Cash Studio there so at least something worked out right. Haha. Had a good karaoke session (i swear the rooms there are super huge!). Also surprised baby with cake number 2, chocolate fudge cake from Awfully Chocolate, his favourite. Luckily i had managed to pre order it and Maria, being the kind soul that she is, helped to pick it up for me from Vivo.
Day 3 & 4, Post Birthday, 7-8 Nov :
The most exciting and biggest surprise of all, us turning up in Batam! That Saturday he headed off to work as usual, on the 9.20 ferry. I scrambled around between packing stuff that he might not have brought, to putting overnight parking coupons on his bike, and collecting our ferry tickets. Me, Rachel, Jepon, Bidin and Niza headed in on the 12.10 ferry and were picked up from the ferry terminal by Iain. As soon as we reached the park Long came out of the office and signalled for us to quickly run in before baby see's, coz he was out on the water riding. After we were all safely hidden behind the tinted glass, he paged for didi to come in. That look of happiness on his face when we shouted surprise and he saw us will seriously be a great memory i will always remember. Long gave him a beer and added on saying that he was gonna sponsor us to stay the night at Holiday Inn. I of course already knew this and had previously discussed all the details with Long. That really made baby laugh coz i know he was totally not expecting anyting like that. Then he got drowned in beer by Adi and made to wear some bugs bunny arm bands by Iain.
The rest of the day went on well, managed to get some riding in. We managed to sabo baby in the afternoon, eggs and flour courtesy of the Batam Cable Crew. Funny thing was when i planned this with Adi, Alice and Lisa, they said they'll handle it. So me being me, thought they would bring enough for everyone to sabo him. But err.. they got like 6 eggs, a small plastic bag of flour, and some pink food dye. Oh well, at least a got to throw 2 eggs at baby. Haha. Most of of ended up messy after that, and boy did we smell!
Headed to the hotel to check in after the park closed for the day. The feeling of being able to have a hot shower and get ready in a clean air conditioned room after a day of wakeboarding is the best feeling ever. Adi had gotten a driver to bring us out to dinner, and they came to pick us up at 8. Jun tagged along and we headed to Golden Prawn 555. The food was AMAZING. As soon as you enter the place you can see all the ponds with every sort of seafood you can imagine. You point to the guy what you want and he'll catch it and weigh it for you on the spot. As you'll see in the photos later on, the seafood is absolutely fresh. The meal we had was seriously awesome.
Extremely full, we moved on to our drinking plans. Initially i had planned with Iain to go to this club called Pacific, but since all of us were in shorts and slippers we scratched that idea. Instead, we met up with Alice and Lisa and went to apparently, what is the only club in Batam that doesnt have a cover charge and shorts and slippers were allowed. It was called Steps. The place turned out to be how you would think any club in Batam would be. Very hot and full of sleazy Batam girls trying to pick up "orang bulih" (ang moh's). Some of the songs they played were ok la, but most of them were old tracks, and when the live band came on i almost fainted. The 3 girls were dressed up really slutty and i swear one of them even gave this guy a lapped dance while singing i'm yours by jason mraz. The other thing that really cracked me up was the fact that they would walk around shaking everyone's hands while singing, like they were some international superstars or something. I almost wanted to ignore the guy when he came up to me to shake my hand. Anyway, at least we had fun dancing and stuff but we didnt stay that long.
Stopped off at Iain's place on the way back to the hotel, should definitely make plans to stay there one day, he has more than enough space! Were supposed to continue drinking the vodka we bought from DFS but some were too tired they headed to bed first. Some people (whom i shall not name here) seriously got so drunk, i wish i had stayed awake to watch the action.
Next day waking up felt like shit, and everybody was physically tired. A few of us managed to wake up early enough to catch the hotel breakfast, while baby headed off to the park for work. We arrived later on and met up with a few other ppl including my bro and Aisha and the Asmawi sisters. Had a really relaxing and lazy day chilling and riding. Highlights were the cupcakes my brother and Aisha brought. This was my final surprise for baby, and also a gift from my family. Also, Jason Chia sort of losing his memory and going around asking everyone what happened. The stories became wilder and wilder as the day went by. Most funny thing i found out was that no one actually saw him fall. Go figure. Anyway, another highlight was jepon getting whacked in the chin by the wakeskate. Err, not really a highlight, but at least something exciting did happen. The ferry ride home was a quiet one, apart from baby's snores. I wouldnt know, i was alseep too. :)
All in all, i had the best time celebrating baby's birthday, and every penny and time spent was extremely worth it. Till next year!