Blessed Christmas & Happy 2015!

As we reflect 2014 and resolute for a better 2015.
Let's thank God for everything He has given us!

Enjoy this meaningful festive holiday with our loved ones
and cheers to joyful days ahead!

First Impression

A student interviewed me on the topic "First Impression for Dating" for her school project. I thought it would be wonderful to share what I've replied to her questions here as well so that more singles could benefit from it.

1. Do you think first impressions are important? Why / Why not?
Yes, creating a good impression makes people feel that you are friendly, pleasant
and safe to be with. When you have establish good impression, they would want to have the opportunity to know you more.

2. What are some positive and negative body languages you can take note of on a date?
- Posture that shows that he/she is at ease with themselves and their surrounding.
- Relaxed shoulder with straight back but not tensed.
- Good eye contact that shows interest in what their date is saying.
- Leaning slightly forward that shows interest.
- On on first dates, do not get too close as your date might feel that you are invading into their space.

3. How can a girl/guy leave a good impression?
a. Appearance – dressing elegantly during dates, without revealing too much or appearing as too sloppy.
b. Mannerism  – being attentive, appreciative, polite and gracious.
c. Body language – smiling naturally. Positive and friendly posture make people feel at ease with you.

4. What are the worst three impressions a girl would not want to leave for a guy?
1. Appearing as too princessy (demanding)
2. Emotionally unstable and needy
3. Slutty

5. What are the worst three impressions a guy would not want to leave for a girl?
1. Irritating, offensive with poor social skills
2. Con man
3. Persistent stalker

6. How would these impressions affect both parties in the long run?
If the impression was bad, you can only dream about having more dates with this person in future!

7. Is it possible to change the overall impression of a person even though the first impression has been made? How?
Apologize for inappropriate dressing or behavior and make sure that the mistake is not repeated again. Hope that the other party is gracious to accept your apology.

8. Do you think that good first impressions usually lead to a successful relationship?
It does affect possibilities to develop the relationship.

9. Should a girl change/fake to leave a good first impression?
We dress appropriately to life's different occasions to show that we respect the host and  ourselves. Similarly in dating, dressing well to create a good first impression is about presenting your best and making a sincere effort towards dating. We do not have to deck ourselves with branded bags or expensive jeweleries to shout that we have expensive taste – this might back fire and turn some people away. We only have to dress appropriately to show that we care to leave a good impression.

Dating Tips on Air

Interviewed by hot babe- Angela of 938 Live, 9pm -10pm on blind date safety measures.

For those who are keen to know about current and practical dating precautions, please click here.

Golden Days

Trust God's golden goodness overflowing abundantly in our lives.

During coffee shop talks, it is so easy to compare and lament how affordable standard of living was, and easier to earn a living during the 80s and 90s... While these "Good Ol' Days" conversations may seem harmless, constant exposure might affect our mindset in the long run— causing us to be more skeptical, uneasy and fearful.

Today, I woke up and saw the STI dropped. My waves of thoughts start to turn choppy. I felt the desire to pray and God reminded of me Psalm 23.6 — an uplifting, assuring promise that gives a mighty sense of tranquility. I felt much at ease after reading it and God prompted me to create the above poster to bless the folks online. 

Now that I am better aware, whenever I hear bad news, I would chose to focus on this precious promise of His and envision His bountiful supply of grace to continue to overflow in all my days. Hope this verse blesses your days too.

Parental Matchmaking

Took a quick photo at Singapore Turf Club before the parents come

Parental Matchmaking (家长相亲会) is a session for family members to network with each other, and exchange details of their single adults family member. It is up to the singles to follow up and develop the relationship from there. 

When running the 4th Parental Matchmaking session today, I received a pleasant surprise! An elderly lady gave me a big mama hug. Aw... So sweet of her! Ultra encouraging to feel appreciated and loved.

Another beautiful thing about this lady is – her daughter. She signed her parents up to attend today's Parental Matchmaking! Cool eh! Unlike some singles, this eligible bachelorette is very open to her parents joining this event. She is an established busy career women with limited singles in her social circle and industry. And she is more than grateful that her mother could network on her behalf! What a blessed, appreciative and confident lady!

Having ran Parental Matchmaking for years, it is always very heartwarming to see parents enjoy strong ties with their adult children. These wonderful parents could relate so well with their children, that their adult children could entrust them to help enlarge their social circle and hopefully find marital bliss. During the first 3 sessions of the Parental Matchmaking, some of these singles even attended with their parents.

Before this elderly lady left, she has asked me to keep her updated of my singles events so that her daughter can join. Totally adore her loving, positive and proactive attitude!!! She is happy to be able to help her daughter meet more friends. I wish to meet more supportive folks like her.

How NOT to ask a woman out

 

A lady gave me permission to share the screen captures of her conversation
with her admirer.

My comments are in red

A lady friend revealed to me she met a guy in a networking event. After that he had been messaging her over the phone. She is alright that he kept talking about boring IT gadgets topics and responded well towards him until he claimed he knows her age. So creepy!

It is a social boo-boo to ask about someone's age at the initial stage of knowing. For this guy in the above conversation, he talked so much to prove that he is knowledgeable and chatty. Instead of impressing the lady whom he wish to date, he end up irritating her! Needless to say, she turn him down. I must comment that she had been patient and polite towards him.

This lady and I hope that people will learn from this conversation; avoid common mistake while making new friends. This would help singles to enjoy the dating process better. :)

Qualities of good lover

Often, people would associate a desirable partner as someone young, pretty and well-endowed. Based on my years of relationship coaching and matchmaking, I find that physical attractiveness has little to do with keeping the long term relationship alive. After asking many happy couples on the essentials required to keep their lengthy relationship glowing, I gathered 9 attractive characteristics that good lovers embrace:

1. Faithful 

Adultery cuts the heart deeply. A good lover recognises the drastic effects of betrayal. As they cherish you, they try their best to protect your heart from being hurt. They give you the priority and commitment as their spouse.

2. Assuring

They reaffirm their love through words and actions. When you have done something wrong unintentionally, they are not over critical or condemning. They are gracious to give you the safety net to be imperfect. Besides accepting you for who you are, they make an effort to demonstrate their love, eg: cooking your favorite oxtail stew and giving you a massage after a tiring day.

3. Respect

• Personal choices
  Good lovers respect your choice. They will not force you to change your preference or do anything against your will. 
• Feelings
  As they would listen patiently without passing mean judgemental remarks; you know you could share your views and feelings with ease. They care enough to cushion their words with kindness so as to prevent hurting your feelings. They appreciate the efforts you have put in for them with encouraging words.
• Honor
  They sincerely honor you in their communications with you, they treat you with respect and love; not just in public but in private as well. I have a relative who would smile sweetly and agrees with her husband in public’s eye. Weather would turn completely when others are not around— She becomes cold and demanding toward him.
• Exclusive relationship
  They give you reverence by mentioning you to opposite gender whom they have just met. I've noticed people who evade their marital status so they could flirt around as if they are single and available.
• Ties
  They treat your friends and family with respect. They are supportive to attend social occasions together with you.

4. Trust

Partners with confidence in you would give you space to pursue your hobbies and enjoy some time alone. In the stressful city, you need time out to connect with yourself or your buddies. Good lovers are understanding but not self-absorbed in their insecurities.

5. Affectionate

Hugging is the simplest way to build people up emotionally.  Valuable lovers understand humans physical need to feel accepted and hug their partner liberally. My hubby and I give each other a number of loving hugs every day. We enjoy every magical moment of our embrace. In addition, we feel lighter and happier after each hug.

Good lovers are not detached or distant; they are comfortable to hold your hands or hug you without sex in their agenda.  They are more than willing to show the world their love for you and spend quality time with you too.

6. Stable

Being emotionally healthy; they are able to communicate their thoughts and feelings peacefully without staging any “drama”. In other words, they do not spite, wail, scream, threaten or slam things to get their point across. They avoid actions which are destructive to the relationship.

7. Teachable

They are open to evaluate themselves, listen to feedback, willing to learn new ways to better themselves and try new things to add sizzle to the relationship. Neither stubborn or self-centred, they have good self-esteem and humbleness to know they do not have to win every conversation. They are willing to compromise for the benefit of the relationship. And thoughtful enough to buy you a new wallet when they see that it's worn out. 

8. Responsible

They are involved in the home-making, holiday planning and parenting. They take care of their health and spend within their means. They are mature to carry themselves well and are there for you when needed. 

9. Humour

Humour is a amazing tool that helps people to relax and connect. Good lovers would joke and cheer you up at the end of day. You enjoy their sense of humour and they enjoy hearing your laughter. Most importantly, both of you are able to relax and revel in each other’s presence.

Please note that you do not need to have all these factors to have a wonderful lasting relationship. These are common points that I've found from my observations and discussions with couples. The keys to loving relationship are not exhaustive. 

National Day

National Day is a day to celebrate the birth and success of a nation. It is also a time to give thanks for the peace and prosperity that we had enjoyed in the past, and pray for these two essential qualities to continue to last in Singapore.

4 Types of Lousy Lovers

I categorize 4 types of men to avoid in romantic relationships and offer advice for these men (in blue). As a fair person, I will cover on the types of females to avoid in my next post.


Natural Charmer — treat relationships as hobbies
Usually very good-looking, affectionate or sweet talker, the natural born Casanova genuinely love women, enjoy dating and wowing them. Because of his magnetic personality, ladies will approach him. His playfulness will prevent him from staying in a relationship.

He might settle down with a woman when he gets tired of changing partners. 


Wannabe — treat relationship as social tools 
Insecure and self-absorbed, women are objects to satisfy his lust and ego or validate his social worth. As he are very manipulative, he could get women and dump them who are no longer useful to him without blinking his eyelids. He does not treat women with care, love or respect. Love scammers belong to this category. They will keep lying to suck more money from women.

He needs guidance to fill his deep emotional void and develop healthy perspective about females and relationships.

Self-proclaim expert — treat relationships as qualification
Being eligible, he could go into relationships with ease, however he could not maintain it for long due to his jaded arrogance, unwilling to compromise and lack of self-evaluation. He tend to complain and conclude that women are difficult based on the huge number of ex-girl friends he had. He feel that having more ex-girlfriends than usual people qualifies him to judge women and reject feedback from others. People like him makes me ponder "does having more ex make you a better lover?" More does not equate better.

After he consider others feelings plus feedback and get healed from his stubborn ways, he might become the love expert that he claims to be.


Faithful on paper — treat relationship as room mates bound by social contract
Neither good-looking, charming nor loving, he remains with the spouse for decades not because of love; but simply because of convenience or lack of better alternatives. Outsiders might see him as faithful to remain in marriage but his partner view him as unappreciative, uncaring and irresponsible. His wife have tried to encourage him to be romantic but he is too bored to be bothered. His sense of commitment is paper thin, as he does not provide any form of support to the marriage —  doesn't helping out at home during his off days, does not attend family birthdays or festivals nor shower the family with attention, gifts or money. He is busy with his own life. Men in this group are emotionally, physically or financially uninvolved towards their family. It can be unbearably lonely to be married to him.

He has to find out the causes for his need to be detached from his loved ones and deal with it.  He has to recognise that conscious effort has to be made for a marriage to glow. Women are easy to wow if he sincerely cherish his long time partner. Putting a little effort and creativity would add happy spice to his mundane life, put smiles on his partner's face and win him the golden title of a good lover!

Dating Safety Guidelines

Ladies, safety on first date is important irregardless of age. Lydia, principal life coach of LoveAgain.sg and CliqueWise.sg, shares some valuable tips to ensure that your first date experience is both safe and rewarding. She has been designing and facilitating singles events since 2006.

Before You Meet
Ask a lot of questions when communicating and look out for inconsistencies or requests for money. Take note if you are suspicious of anything. Use common sense. No need to feel obliged to meet that person just because he or she pressured you to do so.

Meet in Public
When both of you decide to meet face to face, pick a public location where other people are in close proximity. Avoid secluded places. Inform a close friend, colleague or family where you're going and who you are meeting. Let them know when you return from the date or you could arrange to meet up with friends after the date. When meeting for the first time, never allow your date to pick you up from your home. At the end of the date, your date might offer to send you home. You may suggest to him to walk you to the bus-stop or taxi stand instead.

Bring Your Mobile Phone
Carry your mobile with you so that you can contact your family or friends for help if need be. Please ensure the battery is charged.

Tune To Your Instinct
During a date, listen to your gut feel, if you are feeling uncomfortable with that person, leave immediately. If you need a second opinion, excuse yourself and call someone you can trust to discuss.

Dressing
Don't overdress or dress too revealingly as you may project the wrong image and invite unwanted trouble.

Be Alert
You are going out on a date with someone you barely know. Take your time to get to know the person, one step at a time and at your own pace. Never let your guard down because you are having great chemistry together. Never assume a man is safe just because he claims to be religious or a gentleman.

Alcohol
Alcohol or drugs affects your judgment and lessens your inhibitions. If possible, avoid alcohol on your first date. Drinking heavily and getting drunk on first date does not reflect well on you too.

Getting to know your date can be fun and exciting. By creating a safe environment to know the person, you’re creating a better opportunity for yourself.

Written for Wow-Her.com on 22th May 2008

Love Scams 4

After I've blogged about love scams, a lady —Ms M— shared with me a terrible experience she had with John, a local guy she met online recently.

According to Ms M, she had spend about S$ 4000 during their dates and lend him S$ 1000 before he disappeared. Later, she found out from his online profile that a few ladies had been cheated by John too. They had made a police report and requested that I help to inform the rest of the singles about this man.

Ms M had provided me his photos and screen capture of his profile. My comments are in red.

Please click on the image to read the details

Above is the screen capture of his online profile which he used to meet ladies and get them to pay for his expensive toys and meals. After that he will borrow money from them and disappear. One of the ladies commented on his profile that he cheats women of money while the other threatened to make a police report. He might have changed his car plate and telephone by now.

Here is Ms M's account in blue:

"I recently met a guy from Tagged who goes by the nick-> John T. He says his name is John Tan and his chinese name is called Shao Liang. His mobile no is 9793 4XXX. By the way he tells people that he works as a flight engineer. According to him, he said he is working with this company called Bombardier (which is located at Seletar Aerospace). He drives a weekend plate Mitsubishi Lancer which is red in color with no plate as 1068. He claims to have an elder brother who is already married and he is single and living with his mum. He mentioned that his dad is a retired chief SIA pilot trained in 747 and his mum is a retired teacher and he says he stays around East Coast. He says his birthday is on the 9th June. 

I met him on the night of 30th May 2014 (Friday) and we proceeded to a place near Haji Lane for drinks and talked the whole night through. He says that he knows how to play the piano and is also completed his grade 8. We chatted the whole night and we ordered only 2 Fiji Mineral Water and 1 Normal drink (Lime Freeze). Subsequently I went to the toilet and he settled the bill which I saw he paid using credit card. 

We went out again on the 1st June 2014 (Sunday) and I treated him to a dinner at Prive. He ordered so much food which was impossible to finish by 2 people. Subsequently I treated him to drink at 1-Altitude as well.

He acted to gentleman and even drove all the way down to my office at Tanjong Pagar during lunch time to give me flowers and said the ERP and the S$20 for the red plate charge didn't bother him.

Then on Tuesday, 3rd June 2014, he booked an expensive place-> Shinji Restaurant at Raffles Hotel and we went for dinner. He again ordered the most expensive set and I only ordered the cheaper set and he even ordered Sake. Once again, he said i owed him a treat cause I lost my bet and i was made to settle the bill again which was a whopping S$ 950!!! At the time, I asked him as a flight engineer how much does he earn exactly and he said about S$ 10000 a month and he even showed me his wallet had about S$ 3000 in cash.

I told him his standard of living was way too high and this isn't the high of life I am used to. So he said its ok Thursday (5th June 2014), he will bring me to Equinox and buy me back a meal. Then he suddenly told me since his Birthday is coming on the 9th June 2014 and he wanted a remote control car.

I told him sorry I am not able to afford what he wants but he insisted that we went to see since he already ordered the car. The shop is at Orchard Plaza called S'wan Trading. I refused to pay for him and told him since you ordered it yourself you pay for it yourself. But he beg and beg and he said why don't you pay for it first and I'll pay you pay in cash. Naively I believed him and I paid for it using my credit card which cost another S$ 2000. After that as we felt it was too early to proceed for dinner, we went to Marina Sqaure -> Yamaha Music School and he even showed me that he knows how to play the piano. He played 2 songs-> Canon in D Major and 听海 by 张惠妹. After that we left for Equinox. 

At Equniox, he ordered a lot yet again. Like he have never eaten in his whole life. We sat through and chatted and when it was time to settle the bill, he said "oh no, he can't find his wallet" probably left them in his car and he needs to go to his car to find. The restaurant manager was pressing for me to settle the bill and he didn't dare to come up and asked me to settle it for him first. I eventually did and the meal cost S$ 700+. In the car, he told me he didn't have cash and he needs to borrow S$ 1000 from me. I told him I didn't bring my ATM card then he was like begging and begging and I finally relented and went to withdraw S$1000 from him. 

Subsequently I haven't seen him from Friday till today (Sunday, 8th June 2014). I suspected he blocked me on Whatsapp but he didn't block me from calling him. I need to warn ladies about this guy. From what I know he borrowed S$3000 from another lady as well and disappeared." 

From the information Ms M provided, he looks physically fit, have dark skin tone, big nose, small eyes (single eye lids) and short black hair. He wears white polo tee-shirt usually.

The ugly face of greed

Ladies, please take note as he is still active online looking for sugar mummies. He even got intimate with some of the ladies whom he had taken money from. Imagine the anger, betrayal and disgust these ladies would have felt after they know his true colors! Friends and families, please forward this to all the single females to protect them from being hurt emotionally and financially!

Love Scams 3

Last month, I was approached by a Chinese guy name "Alex Haung" on my social media (although "Alex" might not be his real name and he might not look as handsome in reality).

Usually I will block and shelf unsolicited stranger messages to my spam folder. But I smell something interestingly fishy. Usually these unsolicited messages came with handsome Caucasian men photos but this round, I see someone of same race as me. I was in the mood of investigative fun, hence decided to chat along to dig out more.

Here is the screen capture of our conversation. Comments are in red.

"Alex Haung" claimed that he is Chinese, doesn't know how to speak mandarin and lives in United Kingdom... Although he wants to make friends with me online but prefers not to make new friends face to face when I offered to introduced friends to him in UK. Very shady! He could not handle most of questions and out bursted his honest opinion of Asian ladies after some questioning.

I would have continued to find out his purpose of looking for foolish girls? Are foolish girls more attractive? Or are they more loaded with spare cash to be conned? Do they make him feel smarter? But after his confession that he is approaching Asian girls "bcos they are fools", he deleted me from his profile, so I could not message him again. Too bad!

Even though Alex is so keen in looking for friends online, the current approach is unlikely to bring him any nor a single cent. If his motive is to cheese people off, he is already there. If he wants to scam money, he would need to learn more from professional con-artists.

Previously, I've written 2 articles on love scams in this blog, please click here to read them.

Happy Earth Day

Thank God for this wonderful home call earth. It houses about 7 billion people.

God bless our one and only earth! 

Let's do our part to keep it beautiful, peaceful and safe!

Easter Sunday

Easter is more meaningful now that I discovered this...

God's timing is always perfect. ;)

Happy Women's Day

To all the pretty ladies who had made someone smile. Happy Women's Day!

Love Scams 2

I was invited to share on Romance Scams for Channel News Asia documentary series "Undercover Asia". This topic was also in my blog sometime ago.

I used to received a lot of messages on my Facebook from foreign strangers. Interestingly, after I posted about this interview in my Facebook, no more invitations from any of these potential scammers. Praise God!

The key message I hope this documentary could achieve are :

• Create awareness of the schemes of online romance scammers.
• Anyone could be a victim of these scams. 
• If you suspect that you might be a victim, please get opinions from someone trustworthy and wise or consult the police. 
• If you are already a victim, please make a police report and seek help so that you could move on and love again. 

With the documentary producer

Sharing to create awareness on how scammers seduce for money

Catch the documentary here

The Journey (Movie)

2014 movie, made in Malaysia

Movie review from a recently married lady's perspective

I had the honor to watch the preview of this Malaysian blockbuster in Singapore.

Married last year, I could identify with the stress of preparing for a wedding. My hubby and I wanted a simplistic wedding. However our families do have certain expectations on how it should be done.

Even though my wedding is over, I still wish that my family could gave us more space and time to plan the romantic wedding I dream of, at times. It's about hubby and I getting married anyway, why should we let others interfere when, where or how it should be done?

After watching this comedy, I learnt that observing the Chinese wedding traditions (personally hand-deliver the invitation cards) are not just rara to keep the traditions alive or to show off how filial or well-off we are.

As Chinese, we hardly express love. These traditional Chinese wedding rituals are to helps us to convey our love sincerely..

~ Love for our spouse.
~ Love for our families.

~ Love for our relatives.

Preparing Chinese wedding is the teething moments as the couple learn about both families's expectations. As we get to know one another, understand their thoughts, we grow to love them. Along the way, somehow all the ideals of a fairytale wedding fades away. This process is an excellent opportunity to learn about compromise. From this touching movie, I learnt the most important thing about a matrimony is not the banquet or the photos, but to receive blessings and acknowledgement from people who are close to our hearts.

7 Cool Factors:
1. Biking road trip with father-in-law! Need I say more?!

2. Reminds us of Singapore in the 70s and early 80s.  In olden days, people had their wedding banquet in their own house. How meaningful it is to hold a wedding party at the home that we grew up in?! Certainly more memorable and authentic! Perfect movie for kids who are keen to see the Kampong era which their parents had grew up from. Ok.. I am a sucker for Nostalgia...

3. Covers very real prevalent issues – cross cultural marriages with globalisation, old age, parenting, death and even "Pang-dang" taboo Chinese traditions.

4. The giant DIY balloon is truely an icon of Malaysia's unity.  Impressive massive effort is required to collect plastic bags from different parts of Malaysians – no joke in a big country like Malaysia!

5. Achievement for Singapore as we can see the censorship are relaxed for dialects movies. I love dialects as they are colorful languages that connect us with our roots and our old folks. Even ministers connect with the masses through dialects!

6. Captivating cinematography of undulating green farms, beaches and Chinese festivities around Malaysia.

7. I especially liked the fact that the family "U-turned" for their loved ones. They are willing to go off track and go the extra mile to make their loved ones happy. A symbolic scene of love.

Movie Synopsis:
SPG (without the sexy sarong) seeks permission and blessings from stubborn farmer dad to marry clueless Ang-mo boyfriend.


Cast:
Organic !
Most of the casts are not professionally trained in acting. They are just typical Malaysian Chinese who speak fluent colloquial dialects – which retains the original flavour of the multi-racial country; comfortably.

My impression for the lead male character grew as he grew up. Ben Pfeiffer is a promising actor who could develop the character with depth.

The lead actress, Joanne Yew, is a very sweet, fair lady. Her lushious hair reminds me of the Korean actress, Gianna Jun, in My Sassy Girl. What attracts me about her is her outstanding screen presence. However, I would hope to see more soulful expressions than her rolling of XL black contact lens.


Date-friendly:
Yes, teens and family friendly too! A movie without the Hollywood glamor but will capture the audience's heart.


Tips:
Bring tissue along.


Lydia's Ratings:
8 out of 10 stars.


Release Date:
Singapore - 20 Mar 2014. Cathay cinemas.


Trailer:
Please click here to view.

Coastal Settlement

It's been a while since I brought 83 year old Mum out for a date. Her idea of eating out is the standard Chinese round table restaurant or Zhi-char. Once in a while, I will bring her out for something unusual for her. I love to expose her to theme restaurants and see her expression. Hehee... As she puzzled why this queer restaurant owner picks up junks she looked around fondingly at the stuffs we used to have. Mum and I had an incredible time basking in the peace, greens and nostalgia of this unassuming house.

The Coastal Settlement 

Address:
200 Netheravon Rd, Singapore 508529 (Changi)
Opening hours: 10.30am - 12 midnight, closed on Monday.

The Charm of Karung-Guni Randomness

Green & Serene

Retro Cheeky Contrast

Hung Up Oldies

Almost every household used to have this TV

Mayo Dip, Luncheon Meat

Crispy without the oil. Addictive!

Portobello Mushroom Fries

Prawn Bisque
Would be much better if served warmer

Half  + Half = Double the fun! 
Prawn + Mushroom Beef Pizza

Yuzu Tart
Burst of freshness and textures...The ultimate finale of every ideal meal 

Ambience: 9 out of 10

Cleanliness: 9 out of 10

Remarks:
Uber-friendly to humans, pets and wheelchairs.
Warm helpful staffs (from the waiters to the valet drivers). The waiter volunteered to wheelchair my Mum to the handicap restroom with me. The valet driver offered to help me carry the wheelchair into my car. Excellent service!
Free private parking in the restaurant or public carpark at Turn House road.

8 Sure Ways to Snuff Out Romance

Valentine’s Day is here to remind us to cherish our partner and set aside this day to celebrate with them. At times, we are too caught with the stress of living that we neglected the purpose of this special day. Romance is like candlelight that needs to be maintained with gentleness and care. Snuff out the flame and more efforts would be required to re-light the fire again. Thus, be aware of these behavior that could extinguish the tender feelings silently…

1) Critical
The chicken should be marinated longer...
You shouldn’t use plural whenever you use the word…
You should shave...

Some perfectionist got so WHINY, not only they spoil the mood, they miss out on the fun of the occasion totally. In the bible, Jesus confronted Martha for fretting over the small stuffs and direct her to focus on enjoying his companionship instead.

Nit-picking on the smallest details frustrates people, especially the person who plans the date. The partner felt the critic had undermine the sincerity and efforts that was put in to plan the date. Feeling unappreciated, I wonder if their partner will ever try to romance their demanding partner again…


2) Calculative
Being calculative over the amount spent on your date just spells out loud that your fear of being shortchanged super exceed the love for your partner. That said, everyone hopes their efforts would be reciprocated with appreciation.


3) Dishonest
Imagine constantly trying to catch and match the consistency of the words and actions. It can be very tiring to date a chronic liar. Without trust, how can your date let their guards down and let the loving feeling glow?


4) Unfaithful
Victims of unfaithful partners would be too consumed with bitterness to appreciate any romantic gestures. Some adulterers are unaware of the hurt they have caused their partner; they thought that an expensive bag or dinner would do the trick of rekindling the love. Not so easy! The key to reconcile is to sincerely apologize and repent. Feelings of betrayal and anger have to be appeased before any romance can be established.


5) Insecured
Am I attractive? 
Am I fat?
Do I look good in purple?
There are folks who are so self-absorbed with their own issues and insecurities, they fish for compliments and assurances throughout the entire conversation. Their date end up feeling used as a tool of validation.


6) Offensive
No matter how sexy you think you are; being rude, loud or inconsiderate utterly puts people off.


7) Yo Brother! Hey Sister!
Do this only when you wish kill every possibilities to kiss him or her (applicable to Christians too).

By acknowledging your date as a sibling, you are putting your date into the “friend-zone”. He or she will get the drift and AUTO log-out of “romance mode”. Any idea of romance thereafter would suggest incest. Eeks…


8) Spoilt
Princess or prince wannabes think that by being unrealistically demanding, it will keep admirers on their toes to impress them.

Winning the heart of these haughty might seems challengingly fun for the admirers at first. Over time, it can be very demeaning to be the slave. Once these admirers realize they are looking for an equal partner (to love and support each another), and not a royalty to please. Poof!!! They will scram for freedom!


Hope these 8 tips gives you a better picture of an enjoyable Valentine's Day with your partner. 

Romantic Parks

Romantic Parks In Singapore
If you want to know where all the love bytes are, check out this list of places below. 

1. Bedok Jetty
2. Bishan Park
3. Botanic Gardens
4. Buona Vista Park
5. Changi Beach (Near Changi Coast Road)
6. Chinese Garden
7. Esplanade (seaside walk)
8. Fort Canning Park
9. Garden by the Bay
10. Hort Park
11. Kent Ridge Park
12. Labrador Park
13. Marina Barrage
14. Marina Bay Sands (Helix Bridge)
15. Marina South (New Business Park)
16. Punggol Waterway Park 
17. Raffles Marina
18. Seletar Reservoir
19. Sembawang Park
20. Sentosa (Siloso Beach & Musical Fountain)
21. Singapore River
22. Tampines Wafer Fab Park
23. Suntec City (Fountain & Sky Garden)
24. Upper Pierce Reservoir
25. Vivocity (Roof Top Terrace) 

The cool of the night, the awesome stars, the relaxing ambience and breath-taking scenary... if all these wouldn't bring out the romance in her, what would?! 

Happy 2014

Have a Glorious new year!