Meine Heizung singt!

Heute um 9:00 Uhr war ich schon im Büro. Wie immer arbeite ich schon fleißig an meiner Thesis. Also, heute war es außergewöhnlich sonnig, so dass ich das große Fenster geöffnet habe. Plötzlich, höre ich einige Stimmen vom draußen... das klingt wie eine Gruppe Leute, die zusammen singen. Dann, habe ich draußen nachgeschaut, aber habe ich niemand gefunden und die Stimmen waren plötzlich weg. So habe ich das Fenster zugemacht und habe
weiter gearbeitet.

Nach 2 Minuten, ... die Stimmen kommen wieder!! und das war von meiner Heizung!!! Ich habe mit meinem Stift auf die Heizung geklopft und die Stimmen gehen wieder weg. Die Heizung singt, das kann nicht sein, ich bin doch nicht bescheuert oder habe ich meine Ohren nicht geputzt?! Dann ging ich gleich zu Leo und Christine und habe die zwei zu meinem Büro gebracht.
Als die zwei an meiner Heizung waren, ist NIX passiertet, es gibt keine Stimmen mehr!! "Warte noch eine Weile, die Stimme kommt gleich!", sagte ich. Und jetzt kommt die Stimme vom meine Heizung und haben wir alle darüber gelacht und uns gewundert.

Ich hatte also kein Problem mit meinem Ohr oder dass ich bescheuert wäre, es war nur Gesangsunterrricht im Stockwerk unter mir.

Mein Kind

Also, endlich schreibe ich wieder was auf Deutsch. Also, das Thema heute ist mein zukünftiges Kind. ...........
Aber bitte nicht falsch denken, ich bin nicht schwanger.
Aber ich habe mit Alex schon ein Kind.
Wie ? hee hee ...
ich war im Internet unter http://www.morphthing.com ,wo man von zwei Gesichtsfotos ein Foto daraus verformen kann. Diese Seite haben auch schon viele berühmte Leute benutzt. Ich finde das sehr cool.

Kannst du die Zwei?



Also, unsere Baby ist da!

My Wedding - Part V (The Surprises + Party)

After the main course, the friends of Alex, Jessica, Maik, Jens, Tim , Ben and Laura have organized a surprise for us which we LOVE that great idea! They have prepared a lot of balloons and postcards, which each of the guest had to write down what they would want to do for us, eg. clean our house, baby sitting, grill party...etc. The cards are then attached to the balloons and are let loosen in the sky. Depending where the balloons and cards landed, whoever(probably somebody that we haven't met before) picks them up on the street, will send this card back to us. We never though of getting any one of them back but can't you believe that after the wedding we received 4 cards back!! One from the brother of Opa and the other one from Alex's friends (the ones who organized this game), the one from Alex's uncle and aunt and the last one from Arne, the video man. I have to say that was a really great idea cos all our guests got involved in the game so it was a special memory for us and the guests.

After we are done with the balloons, we started the "Wedding Cake cutting". The wedding cake that we had is not the conventional cakes that we usually see. There are in total 4 cakes and the each of them are home-made by a friend of Alex's mom. Beside the wedding cakes, Alex's mom and relatives have baked a lot of cookies and cakes for us. Unfortunately, didn't have a chance to eat much that evening because my wedding dress was so tight that i hardly could let any food in the stomach!! =-T

Our next surprise was organized by the cousins of Alex. They gave us a big yellow plastic boxes and asked us to open it, hinting that there would be surprises for us inside the boxes, of course, without telling us in advance what was in the box. They were hinting snakes and spider....etc. to scare us off! Anyway, we slowly opened the box and thanks god, they were just sand but inside the sand hides the treasure (a lot of 1 Euros!). So our task was to dig up all those 1 euros from the sand with the tools they provided us. The idea was that we have to "work hard" for our "money".

Well, then came the "first dance" of the bride and groom. Before the dance, Alex and I took the chance to thank our guests and some more special thanks to our parents and friends. Anyway, It has been the German tradition that the bride will wear "her dress" to do the first dance and that each of the guest has to dance with the bride and the groom. So Alex and I started the first dance and then people slowly came to the dance floor to grab us and danced with us. After changing, I don't know 20-30 dance partners, the dance floor is now opened to all the guests!!!

Before leaving the dance floor, it's time for the tossing of bridal bouquet. All single women were asked to get to the dance floor and they were supposed to catch the bouquet. Of course, whoever caught it, was supposed to be the next one to get married. Well, as expected, everybody was running away from the bouquet, instead of catching it. HEE HEE. And who was the lucky girl who caught it? Julia, the girlfriend of Alex's cousin, Christian!

The guests then slowly got back to the dance floor and the real fest started. Men took off their ties and loosen up their buttons of their shirts and some of our female guests also took the opportunity to change to something more causal for the dance floor. I, of course, also took the chance to get changed to my silver evening dress, which is much lighter than my heavy wedding dress. I really like the design of the silver dress cos it integrates traditional Chinese design with a western style. It has the traditional V-neck collar and Cheongsam-style and the tail of the dress gave a bit more western style.

The rest of the evening, we were just sitting from table to table to chat with our guests and of course dancing the whole night! At around 12:00 at midnight, our guests are severed with sausages and cheese with bread and coffee. At around 2:00 1/2 of our guests have already gone to bed, but of course, the bridal couple have to say until the last guest leaves the party. I think we chat and drink until 4:30 and finally got back to our nice and lovely suite!

The next morning at 10:00, all of the guests who stayed overnight at the hotel had breakfast together. Everybody looked extremely tired. Not to mention that the breakfast buffet was great in the hotel.

After our wedding party, we didn't have a chance to have a good rest cos we would like to spend time with all our friends that came all the way from Canada, England and Hong Kong to the wedding. So the day right after the wedding, we went to do some sight-seeing in Stuttgart. The following days sending friends and family off to airports and finally we also joined Victoria and Elliot for 2 days in Paris. Some pictures of our trip can be found here.

So that's pretty all about my wedding. This is one of the happiest moment in my life and Alex and I had a great and nice memory of our wedding in Germany. All of my Chinese friends agreed that our wedding was really quite different from the Chinese ones, which usually is more like a show. And our wedding was just exactly how I wanted to be, everybody party, have fun and enjoy themselves!! It was really my dream wedding!

Special Thanks to my friends:

Maggie, my Bridesmaid

Maik, Best man + driver

Melissa, for everything

Chris, camera man

Arne, video man

Why are they holding a wooden frame? Well, our friends want to make us a "guest book" with pictures so every guest have to take a picture with the frame!

Oops, Almost forgotten one thing, there was one more surprise from the lovely girls, Viktoria and Antonia. They have prepared a nice and speech for us, just before the dinner. Plus lots of drawings.... hee hee


Note: My good friend Kai has also written a post about my wedding!

My Wedding - Part IV (The Dinner)

I have always wanted to hold our wedding in a castle-like restaurant which gives that European flair. Well, after months of searching for the best location, believe it or not, the kinda castle that I wanted, was really hard to find in Germany. The so-called castle in Germany is just like a very big abandon house. It is completely different from the Neuschwanstein Castle thatI had in mind ;-) Anyway, after months of restaurant hunt, Maik's gf, asked us to have a look at the hotel (Mönch's Waldhotel) where she is working at. And since then, I have fallen in love with this Blackforest hotel. It is not a extremely luxury hotel but definitely has a very strong European style and very classy.

A typical German wedding ends very late, say until 4 or 5 the next morning. And of course with a lot of drinking. Therefore most of the guests stay overnight at the hotel. So when our guests arrived at the hotel, everyone was busy with checking in and having some small refreshments. We have also checked into our suite, which was barely acceptable as a "Bridal room". The thing is that Laura has shown us the nice and luxury "Bridal couple" room on the top floor and what we have got was the old "Bridal room". And of course, I have requested them to upgrade us to their 80 qm Suite! =-) So after a small pause, we went down to take more pictures with the guests and then at 19:00 dinner starts.

Alex's parents have organized live music for us. The music he played is typical German wedding/fest music. The idea of German wedding is not to have something really formal but have a fun and great celebration where people can get a bit drunk, laugh a lot and dance a lot! And of course, eat a lot! Anyway, before the dinner starts, the mother of Alex asked the musician to play a song that was dedicated to both of us. The song was about "Her son", which was very touching. The next song dedicated to the "mothers", to not be too sad about "loosing" their sons and daughters.

So after all that, the dinner started, with the so-called, Swabian ravioli, Maultaschen Soup and Swabian Wedding soup. Then came seasonal salad. And the main course is pork fillet and grilled steak with onions with red wine sauce and musroom cream sauce, serve with homemade Spätzle and German sautéed potatoes. And for dessert, we have the wedding cakes and ice-cream! YUM!

... Go to Part V ...

My Wedding - Part III (The Church)

We finished the photo shootings at around 14:00, however, Maggie and I just had a bread for breakfast this morning before we did our hair, so we were already striving to death by 14:00. So we quickly stopped by Alex's parents place for a Brezel (I just ate half) and then we had to head to the catholic church , Heilige Familie in Keltern-Dietlingen, where the church ceremony was held at 15:00.

Most of the guests were already waiting outside of the church when we got there. So we were busy talking with guests and my dad and I were a bit concerned about what was supposed to happen in the church cos he was supposed to walk me in and so we had a mini rehearsal right in front of the church. When the church bell rang, the guests slowly settled themselves for a good place. When the music started, my Dad slowly walked me in and at the altar, he handed me over to Alex. Then, came the speeches from the pastor(how exiting, Leslie told me that he was struggling very hard to keep himself awake, we even caught our guests asleep on video!! ;-)) Finally, came the highlight of the ceremony where Alex and I exchanged vows. I was a bit worried about it before cos I had to read the text in German out loud and there was this two sentences that I am supposed to memorized:
"Trag diesen Ring als Zeichen der Liebe und Treue. Im Namen des Vaters und des Sohnes und des heiligen Geistes." (Take this ring as a sign of my love and fidelity. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit)
The funny thing was that Alex has forgotten some part of the text, which before the wedding he has reminded me million times to memorize. ;-)

In between the speeches of the pastor, Alex's mom organized a singer to sing 2 songs with a guitar for us. One of them is a German song (I will have to find out the title of this song) and the other one, played almost at the end of the ceremony is "You are still the one"! At the beginning, we were thinking of skipping the church ceremony, but I am so glad we did that cos the ceremony was way more special than the civil !!!

After some more preaching, we were escorted by the pastor. When we got out of the church, Viktoria and Antonia, the daughters of Alex's relatives gave us a nice surprise by showering us with a flock of white little hearts. Next came the surprise prepared by Manfred, the guy who owns the company where Alex and I met 7 years ago, gave a very romantic surprise. He placed two big wooden boxes in front of us and suddenly he walked to use with two doves in his hands, one for me and one for Alex. And we are supposed to hold each of them in our hands. I could even feel the heart beat of the dove. We then released the doves after the small speech given by Manfred. At the same time, he unlid the two wooden boxes and more pigeons flew out from the boxes. All of the guests got a glass of sparkling wine for a toast. Every guests came up to us to give us their best greetings and blessings one by one. After some photo shoot, we decided to head to Mönch's Waldhotel Kapfenhardter Muhle in the Blackforest.

BTW, our wedding is of course, Alex's favorite brand name, Audi. He has chosen the exclusive version of A8! Check it out!

... Go to Part IV ...

My Wedding - Part II (Morning)

We hardly had any sleep the night before the wedding cos we were still busy preparing this and that. Anyway, the thing that worried me the most was the weather, we were expecting shower during the day. However, when I woke up that morning, I saw a clear blue sky. That definitely lightened up my day. Then all three of us, my mom, Maggie and myself, went to Park hotel to get our hair and makeup done.
Julia, my hairdresser, did a great job with my hair and my mom, who usually is hard to satisfy was very happy with my hair do! Poor Maggie had to have her hair done several times cos my mom was not that satisfy with Maggie's hairstylist.

Well well, at around 10:30 we were back at my mom's office where we were expecting Alex to pick me up and where the Chinese tea ceremony took place.

Most of the guests from my side have already arrived in PF and were already waiting at my mom's shop. We have not much idea what exactly would happen. Anyway, the highlight of the ceremony, was the "giving and drinking" tea part and in return receiving blessing and presents from my parents. =-) There then came thousand of photo shootings and photo sessions at my mom's shop. Then Alex and I left our guests to have our official photo session with a professional photographer at the world heritage, Maulbronn Monastery . And there's where took a lot of nice pictures with an European flair.












... Go To Part III ...

My Wedding - Part I

July 28th, 2007, my big day, was the most beautiful and happiest moment in my life. Before the wedding, I was always thinking that a wedding is just another party. Actually, it is not just a party, but also a very nice and unforgettable piece of memory. I have been to several Chinese and German weddings, I would say, my wedding was exactly how I wanted it to be....
10 days before our wedding, Christine, Leandro, Joyce and I were in London for my Bachelorette party, the so-called Hen party. More detail & pictures can be found in my other post here and from Leandro's blog here.

7 days before our wedding, Melissa, Victoria and Elliot arrived in Germany from Vancouver, However, Melissa took BA and it happened that it was flooding in London so she had to stay over in London for an extra day!!! Victoria and Elliot flew from Vancouver to Düsseldorf and escaped the bad weather in London.

1 days before our wedding, Friday 27.07.7. That's the day where our civil ceremony took place at the city hall of Pforzheim. Weather although was not particularly fine but we had luck that most of the time the weather was great and only when we were at lunch there was a quick shower. The civil ceremony took only around 20 mins and that's it. I was wearing a red-pinkish dress and had my hair down. Alex was wearing normal dark grey suit with a tie matching my dress. On that day, Alex drove his beloved baby blue old-timer, Audi 80 as the "wedding car". Under the witness of my family and friends, at 11:30 27.07.2007, I officially became, Mrs. Tso-Sutter, the wife of Alex! We then had a toast of sparkling wine again at the city hall. After lots of photo shooting, we went to Raskeller for lunch. We then went to the downtown PF to do more photo shot with the parents and then Maik, Alex and I drove to the top of PF and make more pictures there. Then came the highlight of the boys, picking up the wedding car!!! Well, don't even have to guess which wedding car Alex picked, it's gotta be Audi. And he had always dreamed of having an Audi A8 in Black. Although, we've got a dark sliver-grey one, it looked really cool and the guys of course, had GREAT fun with driving the car. For the rest of the day, Melissa, Maggie and my mom where very busy with decorating her shop and the garden with fresh white and pink roses. Melissa also managed to get an arch decorated with pink rose!!
The unexpected:

• Alex's uncle and aunt was supposed to be our official witnesses. However, his aunt must have been too excited and left all her personal identity cards at home, and the thing is that they live around 150 km from PF. So at the end, this has been replaced by Miak, Alex's best man.
  
• Maggie, my bridesmaid was supposed to be here the night before but couldn't make it to the ceremony cos there was a 30 mins delay of her first connection train and she just missed the last train to PF from Bielefeld. It was such a pity. But she arrived in the afternoon after our ceremony but the most important is that she arrived before the real wedding tomorrow.
  
• Joyce and Calvin also arrive that day from England. It was such a pity that I didn't have time to meet them up.

... Go to Part II ...