Church Weddings

Grace Tan In Chinese Weddings, Church Weddings, Weddings

A wedding in St Peter’s Church, Malacca & a Kombi: Kevin & Elaine

I’ve known Elaine since I was a young kid and a wee bit shorter than what I am now. Some friends have told me that convent girls from Malacca have a distinct ‘look’, and I suppose Elaine and I fall into that category. It must be our loud laughter and carefree nature (or I’d like to think so!). Well, whenever a Malaccan girl gets married, and especially to another Malaccan boy, it is a cause for a huge celebration. The wedding was planned more than a year in advance, and I distinctly remember our conversations via MSN about the wedding. In fact, we started talking about the wedding in June 2010.

Yup, it’s every girl’s dream to plan for her wedding. Like waaay in advance. But I wonder if Elaine actually started her wedding planning even earlier than that. You see, she was childhood friends with Kevin ever since she was a 2 year old toddler. I can’t remember a single thing from when I was 2 (could be due to my bad memory). They were best friends till the age of 5, then lost contact with each other for years, until they were reconnected 20 years later! Talk about an amazing story!

So end of 2010, Elaine contacted me again to talk about her wedding and initially she wanted to have it at our old school chapel in our primary school, Convent of the Holy Infant Jesus in Malacca. I was really excited about it because I have fond memories of that chapel, even though I wasn’t a Christian at that point in my life. I always remember it as being serene and ancient.

Unfortunately that plan didn’t quite work out and the wedding was held in St Peter’s Church in Malacca. That church has a 300 year old history, so I was excited about it too! My parents used to attend that church too when they were living in Malacca and so this church was significant to me.

To make this wedding even more exciting, Elaine requested for Smurfette, my vintage VW kombi to make it’s first wedding appearance as the bridal car! Thank you Kevin and Elaine, for making everything so memorable for me. I had an awesome time, and I am amazed at the level of detailed planning that went into the wedding. Elaine, thanks too for the card and gift. It was really sweet and thoughtful of you.

Ok so on to photos from the wedding…

Weiming In Chinese Weddings, Church Weddings, Testimonials, Wedding Films & Videos, Weddings

Church Wedding: Justin & Audrey

Years ago, when I was still a student at Multimedia University, Melaka, I heard about Justin from the MMU Christian Fellowship where he used to be president. Since I was in a band too at that time, I particularly noticed that Justin was in a band (named PG165) together with Vijay (whose wedding we also photographed!). I also heard about Audrey then, as she was the president of CF MMU, based in Cyberjaya.

So 2 presidents from 2 Christian Fellowships, from the same university ended up marrying each other. Despite it being a half day event, it was a big privilege that Johan and I got to document their wedding. I could feel the strong emotion and genuine love they have for each other on their wedding day. And that made it one of my favourite weddings by far.

The wedding was not entirely about themselves but also about their families whom they really love and care for, friends that spent the entire night lending them a helping hand to decorate the church and also about God. What touched me was that they honoured and gave thanks to God for He had handpicked and brought them together. I particularly love the part where Audrey said she sees God in her parents’ lives and wants to be like them.

On behalf of the Stories team we wish both of you much joy, happiness and excitement on your journey together!

– Weiming –

Grace Tan In Church Weddings, Testimonials, Weddings

Vijay & Stefanie’s Emotionally Charged Wedding

Most couples about to be married, fuss and fret over many details that organizing a wedding would bring. Fancy decorations and gorgeous gowns aside, all it takes to make a wedding absolutely memorable is the love shared between the couple, family & friends. I must say that this was one of the most touching weddings I have ever photographed. And it wasn’t only because Vijay and Stefanie committed to marry each other even with a mere RM1,000 in their bank account. Ultimately, it is a story of love and faith… faith in God that He would provide for their every need, down to the last detail.

Their story (as written by Stefanie):

Vijay and I first got to know each other in Multimedia University Christian Fellowship (MMUCF) in 2003. We started dating in 2005 and in December 2010, Vijay proposed to me. While all our friends and family had pretty much expected us to get married to each other at some point in our lives, few people truly realized what a big step this was for us. While most people would have been saving money for years with a house on the side, we started wedding planning with only RM1000 in our bank accounts with no other financial support. Crazy? You bet! However, we both believed and trusted in a loving Father God who gave us several promises that He would provide for our wedding and our married life.

In the course of our eleven months preparations, we faced several financial and personal obstacles but we kept praying and trusting in God to bring us through. Many times, we were challenged by God to give towards our church’s (Acts Church) building funds while maintaining our regular tithes to church. Yet, we always had enough to survive and contribute to our own wedding fund.

Despite the overwhelming odds, God’s faithfulness prevailed and 2011 proved to be a year of miracles and breakthroughs. I changed my job and my pay increased significantly. Vijay, who works as a pharmaceutical salesman, achieved every single quarterly sales during our entire engagement period. Our salaries and incentives, combined with several surprise gifts or opportunities enabled us to pay off our wedding. Amazingly, none of our wedding expenses were paid on credit but were always paid in cash. God always provided the money when it was most needed. God even provided a beautiful house at half the normal rental price and provided the furniture to furnish it. God’s faithfulness was evident in every part of our wedding!

Grace Tan In Chinese Weddings, Church Weddings, Weddings

The Princess & The Frog: Ian & Joanne

Happy New Year to all our blog readers! I do apologize for the lack of updates lately. One week without a post feels like an eternity of silence! Truth is, we’re really swamped with year-end shoots and edits. It’s been really tough juggling so much work, but we’re moving along! Every year, I try to make and keep my new year resolutions, but at the moment, my new year resolutions look a little like this:

* What the Duck is one of my favourite comic strips!

So yeah… part of my new year resolution is to not be overly nerdy, keep a good work life balance, and to be more up to date with my blogging! There are many weddings which are still sitting patiently in my hard drive, waiting to be blogged.

Here’s one that I absolutely have to share with you. Top 3 reasons why I love this wedding:

1. It’s a fun fun fun wedding! It all started when I read their wedding invitation card…

Seven years ago, in the faraway land of Cyberjaya, Ian met Joanne at a Christian Fellowship gathering and was smitten ever since. Thankfully, Mr & Mrs Lee Kah Meng and Mr & Mrs Chow Cheng Hock approved of their relationship and they didn’t have to elope. So come and witness the union of these two souls on 5 November 2011. They will profess their love and commitment to each other at Good Shepherd Church at 11am, and share the rest of their story with you over food and drinks at The Bankers Club from 6pm onwards.

2. The groom uh, looks a little unconventional.

3. The bridal party were dressed in our Stories’ theme colour! (light blue & brown!) Hip hip hurray!

Grace Tan In Church Weddings, Life, Musings, Weddings

A Myanmar Refugee Wedding: Zwe & Stellar

Photographers: Grace & Weiming
Videographers: Alex & Monica
Wedding Gown: DUMC wedding ministry
Groom’s Suit: Alex’s suit
Make up & hair: Grace Wang (bride) & Katy K’ng (bridesmaids)

On the 19th of July, Alex and I received a phone call from Pastor Margaret of our church. It was a call for help. Two Myanmar refugees, Zwe and Stellar were about to start their new lives as husband and wife, and they needed some help with the wedding.

If you did not read the background story as to how Alex and I got involved with this wedding, you’ll need to do that in order to fully comprehend this post.

So at 10.30pm on the 20th of July, Alex and I drove to church for the wedding ceremony. I was elated to see the bride looking so radiant in a white bridal gown, provided by DUMC’s wedding ministry. Amazingly, some months ago, someone had donated a handful of second hand wedding gowns to DUMC. Considering Stellar is a really petite girl (about my size, 5 feet!), it was miraculous that she managed to find a gown that fit her perfectly (ok maybe it is a tad bit long). Now if only my wedding gown was not in a box somewhere, I could have loaned Stellar my gown and the length would have been perfect.

If Zwe had chosen to wear Alex’s wedding suit, that would have been pretty weird, to see someone else in my gown and in Alex’s wedding suit! (not that I would have minded).

But Zwe chose one of Alex’s beige suits instead, and I think he looked smashing in it!

Did you know that in Myanmar, 55 million people speak a variety of 111 languages, but majority of them speak the Myanmar language.(source: myanmar.net). The Myanmar script draws its source from the Brahmi script.

Translated into English, the bible passage featured below talks about love:

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. (1 Corinthians 13:4)