The Surprise And Its Challenges (Edited)

The interest to visit Singapore was born from a small conversation. From this, I learned that Jeremy did not visit Singapore for over 15 years (!) and Evon has never been to S'pore. So, the four of us, Jeremy, Matt, Evon and I planned to visit Singapore on the 12-15th May 2010 during our term break. Deal! Two months before the pre-planning of this Singapore trip, Elisha told me he will be landing on the 14th May 2010 at Changi Airport, Singapore. I thought, hey, why not kill two birds with one stone? We will go to Singapore on the 12-14th May and, on the 15th May, we'd hop on to the causeway link bus to Johor (where he and his family live) and give him a surprise.

Challenge No.1: Parents and Accommodation>>>

Having a rough idea was a good start. The first challenge was to get parental approval to go on holiday with this wild bunch of friends (just kidding). I guess my parents were more concern about safety and accommodation for the entire trip. To cut the long story short, I gave my sweetest eyes (like the pussy cat in Shrek 1) to my dad and he gave me the green light. Yey! It took me two days or so to get a good accommodation in Singapore for a reasonable price. In the end, we booked a two-bunk beds room at Footprints Backpackers Hostel for $27 per bed per night with facilities: Wi-Fi, free internet access, hot showers, air-conditioned rooms and free breakfast. Haha.. And, of course, the counter guy *inside joke*.

Challenge No. 2: The Surprise Plan>>>
The planning took place one month before today. Step. 1: SMS the sister and get the dad's email. Step 2: E-mail his dad, the pastor of Wesley Methodist Church. His dad was very kind to offer transportation from CIQ (Johor check-point) to his house despite his busyness at church during the weekends. Pastors are usually very busy on Saturdays. I also contacted both of his sisters, Susanna and Sophia. Sophia became my spy and she told me what Elisha was doing while I was on my way to his house. ;) The whole family knew about it. And I'm thankful for them.

Challenge No. 3: To Keep the Surprise A Secret>>>
Keeping the surprise a secret was not at all straight forward. For some reason, I learned that quite a number of aunties and uncles from church knew about our Singapore trip. Once the parents knew, the news spread like fire. Few of my friends accidentally posted comments on Facebook, indicating that I am going to Singapore! Twice, I had to send a message and ask politely if they can delete the comment immediately. Why? Cos' I didn't tell Elisha about this trip. On my side, I admit I almost let the cat out of the hat twice. But, I managed to cover it up and Elisha did not questioned me further. So, fhew, I was saved. Then, Matthew posted a group picture of us in S'pore..and I was like, "No...you have to delete it." Hon Yau even sent a message to sort of 'warn' us. Thankfully, on that day, Elisha was flying on air so he won't be able to log on Facebook to check my profile. On the 14th May, he landed at Changi Airport at 2 a.m. Haih.. so near yet so far. You see, I was staying at Little India and I can actually travel to the Airport via the very efficient SMRT. The bad news is my phone does not have roaming services, so, he wasn't able to get me the whole day of Friday. I felt guilty because I knew he will be calling me a million times until he reach me.


Challenge No. 4: Surviving the MAZE in CIQ and Planning the Surprise>>>
CIQ, Johor Check-Point was really huge. Uncle told me not to cross the overhead bridge. Little did I know that there were actually three overhead bridges and what he meant was the last bridge, which takes us to City Hall. It took us quite some time to locate his car. Finally, we met. I crossed my fingers and wished that Elisha will remain in his room when I come over. Still, he was unaware of this plan. So, we went to the house, silently stepped on the wooden staircase, knocked on his door for three times. He opened the door and we shouted, "SURPRISE!". Hehe. He said, "What's going on here?"

It was extremely good to see him after 1.5 years of being physically apart. It's really hard to pen down how I felt at that moment when I saw him. To me, it was like a dream came true. "Wow, I can actually see him face-to-face, not on SKYPE anymore!" I can only testify that it is by God's grace that we can stay together despite the distance and different time zone. It was never easy. Like all relationships, this was tested. I believe that there are two things that kept us going: prayers and the effort to sustain this relationship. No 1: We prayed that God will strengthen our relationship.No. 2: We take the effort to spend time with one another on the phone or SKYPE. We speak our thoughts out and make the effort to appreciate each other's differences.

Credits:

Well, this surprise would never happen without the help of the key people.
Thanks dad and mum for sponsoring my Singapore trip.
Thanks Pastor Joshua Hong, Sophia and Susanna for keeping in touch with me.
Thanks to my bunch of friends, Matt, Evon and Jeremy who spare their time at J.B with me. I hope you enjoyed yourself and loved the Chocolate Ice-Kacang.
Thanks to those who prayed for our relationship.

Thanks Elisha for travelling 23 hours on plane to come home and see me! I love you very much.
You're so sweet. ;)

Now, I look forward to spend time with you.

Please pray for us!