This year’s Chinese New Year is especially different. It is warmer than usual… Maybe it’s the weather — it’s been quite hot lately. Maybe it is the lion dance that came to our house (courtesy of the developer, SP Setia). Or maybe it is the first time we’re actually celebrating Chinese New Year in Setia Alam. But I think it’s because this year, we had very dear friends dropping by to visit us.

On the second day of Chinese New Year, Steven & family and Jonathan dropped by for a visit. It was Jonathan’s first visit to our place. As for Steven & family, it was not their first to our place but we are equally happy and very touched each time they dropped by. It’s hard to see both of them since Jonathan lives in Singapore while Steven’s family is in Perak.

On the third day of Chinese New Year, we had Derrell & Su Fei, Dean & family, Kean Lai & family and Jude dropping by! Both Mrs Tai and I were extremely delighted by the visit! To me, visits from old friends are even better than visits from ‘Choy San Yeh’ (God of Prosperity). This year, besides the usual chatting and catching up, we also compared notes on being new parents — yup, Dean, Kean Lai and Derrell became fathers last year too (it’s the second one for Dean)!

Here are some photos of the lion dance (mouse-over the photos for caption)…

And here’s a photo with three of the babies — Katherine (Kean Lai), Matthew (Derrell) and Gabriel. But have to really look hard for the babies in the photo… heh heh…

Thank you everyone for making this CNY so special… And yes, I know there’s going to be another group coming this Saturday!

Hmmm… If you’re waiting for an invite, please don’t. As always, you dun need an invitation to drop by our place. We welcome family and friends all the time!

Our original plan was to celebrate Merdeka Day by singing our hearts out in a karaoke session. But response was not too good. So we decided to just meet up for dinner…

Sorry, but this post is also ‘dry’ and without any photos. The few of us met up for dinner at a place called Shanky in SS2. The highlight, to me, was of course Jude and his girlfriend, Soo Pyng. Besides them, others who were at the dinner were Derrell and Su Fei (by the way, they have a blog now — visit them at thechinsblog.wordpress.com), Kim Chuan and Lee Yen, Sherman and Eu Jin.

Updated 2009-07-13: Added a wikimapia map at the bottom…

First of all… When I say Seaportian, I mean my batch la… Of coz we’re not saying we don’t welcome those not from our batch, but I think it would be kinda odd if someone from another batch turns up and we don’t know one another…

But if you do know the people from my batch, especially Jenny Tan and Saw Swee Cheng, then by all means, do drop by and join us…

As mentioned earlier, the gathering will be held in July… So, here are the details:

Date: 17th July 2009 (Friday) <— that’s next week!!!
Time: 1830hrs onwards (that’s 6:30pm)
Venue: Secrets of Louisiana (see below for map)

Note: Stalkers are NOT welcomed

Updated on 2009-07-13:

Next Seaportian friends gathering will be in mid July (that’s about 2 weeks away). I’ll be posting more details here and on Facebook over the next few days…

And we should be having two special guests with us — Jenny Tan and Swee Cheng. If you’re keen to receive news on this upcoming gathering, please post a comment…

A few old friends, mainly from my primary (SRK Kelana Jaya) and secondary school (SMK Seaport aka Sri Permata), got together earlier this evening.

Some were people I’ve not met in a long, long time. It was great to see them again after so many years. I’m glad to report that everyone has not changed at all. They still look like school kids.

The place was relatively quiet and ideal for small gathering like the one we just had. Food was good (I asked around since I was the organiser this time around and wanted to make sure the food served is good). Host and owner, Elwin, was around and very helpful. The place is actually called Secrets of Louisiana but I prefer to just call it Louisiana.

We actually try to meet up at least once every 3-6 months. I think it is to meet up every now and then as we have all known each other since those crucial and formative years… These are the people who have formed part of our early lives! In a way, its a travel back in time! We do hope to see even more new faces the next time we have one!

In the meantime, take a look at the photos taken with my camera phone (not a good one).

Those present this evening were:
Josephine Yong and hubby Chia; Sharon Wong, hubby Jimmy and daughter Haley (the left before we started taking photos); Teik Joon and wife Lilian; Kim Chuan; Sherman; Eu Jin; Jude and Dean.