Overwhelming Birthday Love

I believe I was the luckiest birthday girl. Before my clock was hitting 12am HK time (my official birthday 18th September), a good friend of mine from Sydney already said me happy birthday via whatsapp at 12am Sydney time. Then, I received “red eggs” and red pockets from my mum early in the morning. My birthday blessings had never stopped. In fact, it was just the beginning. I was overwhelmed to receive tons of birthday messages from friends, family, relatives and you guys (my fellow bloggers and Instagram friends). I even got lovely friends doing birthday prayers for me. Can someone pinch my face and tell me it was real?

My lovely friends took me to a popular restaurant later that day. I rarely go to pub/bar/club as I don’t usually drink. Even if I drink, I tend to choose cocktails with a light amount of alcohol. However, I must say the mini bar section of this restaurant looked pretty cool.

Starting my birthday night with drinking a glass of pineapple infused iced tea. Can you believe that I actually stayed sober on my birthday? 😀 In fact, I ordered Mojito as my drink at first (I would love to order Virgin Mojito if they have). It tasted nothing like a regular Mojito and all I could taste was alcohol which I wasn’t a fan of. JK insisted to swap the drink with me since it was my birthday. How lucky I was!!! The pineapple infused iced tea didn’t disappoint me at all. It was ice-cold and a bit tangy exactly how I liked it.

I thought it would be cool to show you some of the food we had that night. However, the color of lighting kept changing a whole night and I wasn’t able to take a good shot of all the food. Well, I guess you already had an idea of what we had by just looking at these few pictures.

We were very full after having our dinner and it was time for us to enjoy the beautiful view here. Well, I wish they cleaned their windows properly so that you could see how beautiful it was.

Honestly, I was already very happy that they treated me to a nice dinner. But, they decided to make me even happier by giving me a birthday bouquet. I was speechless to see how stunning it was and it even had my favorite white roses in it.

The most speechless moment came in when they asked the waiter to serve me the most beautiful birthday cake I’ve ever seen. Massive thanks to JK who designed the graphic and got it tailed-made at the cake shop. It was not only beautiful, but it also had wonderful meanings behind it. As they know how much I love traveling, hot air balloon and the globe were especially designed to wish me travel around the world as my job. Honestly, my eyes were getting teary to receive this meaningful birthday cake. I was completely stuck in the moment of awesomeness.

P.S. All the birthday wishes and surprises I received truly made my birthday an unforgettable one. I’m beyond blessed to be spoiled by all of you. My sincere thanks to you all for making me the happiest and luckiest birthday girl!!! ❤

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More Than Just My Birthday

I know very well not everyone take his or her birthday seriously, but I’m quite the opposite. Birthday has always been a big thing to me. It is not only my birthday, but also a day to appreciate my parents bringing me to this beautiful world. Obviously, it is not the only day I appreciate it but it just has a special meaning.

I celebrate my birthday each year as usual, but somehow I just wanted to make it extra special last year and thus I decided blogging. It was one of the best decisions I have ever made. I got to know all of you my amazing friends who give me love and support through ups and downs of my life. Taking your time to read, comment, like, and even send me personal emails. I know it can be very time-consuming, but none of you never stopped doing so because of that. Your support has been my greatest motivation to keep doing what I am doing. This has been an amazing journey for me. It allows me to connect with you through art, photography, and stories. Most importantly, it allows me to stay true to who I am.

Although it is my birthday today, it is no longer my birthday. I would like to make it our birthday as to thank each of you (my fellow bloggers and Instagram friends) for all your love and support.

Let’s get the birthday celebration started!!! 😉 Shall we?

My mum started celebrating my birthday by giving me “red eggs” and red pockets for a few years already. It is a very traditional way to celebrate birthday in Chinese culture. She usually places it in front of my room door so that I can feel the joy of it early in the morning. As we are celebrating our birthday together, please come and take a bite. Don’t forget to take your red pockets! 😉

The best part of the traditional birthday celebration this year is the birthday note my mum left me. “Wish you (piggy younger sister) a happy birthday and a good health!”, written by piggy mama. I always call my mum piggy mama, but never thought she would take it seriously. How cute she is!!! 🙂

Well, it’s my birthday so how can I not to treat myself with a nice birthday gift especially when I haven’t created any digital art pieces for a long time?!?!?

I would like to stick to the birthday theme “red” and thus the art piece I created was mainly covered with a red color. Also, the color of red often symbolizes luck and joy in our culture. I think it’s perfect to wish myself/you a wonderful year with good luck and joy. What makes even more special was the original photo itself. It was taken during my Porto trip, which I see it as a trip of “dream comes true”. Using this particular photo as a base for creating this digital art is to advocate the positive thoughts of “dreams can always come true”.  With me looking up to intensify the meaning behind the art – hope is always around.  All these positive meanings were well blended in this art will sure make this year filled with dreams, hope and happiness.

Apart from birthday gift and celebration, I think it would be awesome to show you how I looked like as a baby. I don’t mind to share it, but please make a promise to me not to laugh at how chubby I was. 😀 I always ask my mum what she had when she was having me in her belly to make me this chubby. I looked more like a ball than a baby seriously lol. 😛

I was not only  a chubby ball, but also  a happy baby. I kept eating, laughing and sleeping most of the time.

I told you that birthday is a big thing to me (to my family and relatives also). Look how excited we were when blowing out all the candles before sharing the birthday cake!

From left to right – my elder brother, elder cousin brother, younger cousin brother, me

Not only did we like to celebrate birthday together, but we also liked going to the park together. Let me tell you a secret (shh…please don’t tell anyone). I saw my younger cousin brother as my future husband while he saw me as his future wife at that time.  Obviously, the dream has remained as a dream. He is already happily married.

Wish us a wonderful birthday! 🙂 🙂 🙂

*Sorry for not making this post as cohesive as I can, but I was way too happy and I had no idea what I was doing lol! But well, one thing for sure I would like to give you a big thumb up for being my amazing friends!!! ❤

Porto Trip – Part 4 (A Tribute To My Beloved Grandparents)

The moment I saw this elderly couple at the winery, I couldn’t help it but to think of my grandparents. They always wanted travel together, but they never had a chance to do so. My grandfather spent more than half of his life on earning money to raise his family. By the time he earned enough to retire, his health started to deteriorate unable to travel. I know I can’t turn back the hands of time and make him alive to travel with grandma, but I would like to dedicate this post to them.

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They could hardly sleep last night as they were too excited to visit winery. By the time they arrived the winery, they acted as if it was their first school trip. Their vast curiosity encouraged them to keep looking around and touching whatever it was around them.

Their inner active child had never stopped until it was the time for wine tasting. They sat patiently and waited to be served with the wine. Both of them coincidentally took a small sniff of the wine and swirled it before tasting.  When each sip of the wine slowly evaporated in their mouth, they started remembering the first wine they had together at their wedding.

All good memories kept flashing in their head. Then, he looked at the window when hugging her from behind.  ‘Remember what I promised you when little princess was born?’, he asked. She looked down and nodded with a smile on her face.

I was surprised to find out the promise he made was to have a boat trip with us. What made me even more surprised was he already started channeling my travel desire on the day I was born. The mesmerizing picture of peaceful Douro River, colorful Porto boats and magnificent Dom Luís I Bridge altogether was the main reason why I wanted to travel to Porto 2 years ago.

They asked me to sit in between them and held my hands tightly when enjoying an amazing view of Douro River. I almost felt bad to be in this position until I saw how satisfied they were. I guess it just reminded them of the wonderful time they had when I was very little. Although they seemed to be living in their good old memories, they never forgot to teach me a life lesson as usual. “Never be afraid of all the challenging bridges you may face in your life because they will always teach you something valuable”, they pointed at the bridges we saw during our trip and said.

As I saw how much they enjoyed teaching me a life lesson, I somehow felt like teaching them how to say “hi” in English. They were shy to say it at first, but eventually took the courage to say it aloud to the travelers on another boat “hhh…Hi”.  However, our trip was about to end. They both obviously seemed a bit upset about it, so I offered them a cable car ride to cheer them up.

Luckily, they accepted my offer with full of excitement. He gently held our hands when we first entered the cable car. He even asked grandma to lean on his chest if she ever felt scared of the ride. I knew she wasn’t scared at all, but she still pretended to be just to make him feel good.

I thought it would be awesome to capture the moment when she leaned on his chest, but they stopped me doing it immediately. They took a picture of me instead. It was sweet to see him using his left hand to hold half of my camera while she used her right hand to hold the other half of it. “It feels good to see you’re all grown up now”, they looked at me with tears in their eyes and said. What they said completely melted my heart and made me promise to myself to be the best granddaughter as I could be.

I never made empty promises and therefore I took them to Miradouro da Serra do Pilar to make them even happier after the cable car ride. It was a place where they could enjoy a panoramic view of Porto. They were speechless to see how breathtaking it looked and asked me to pinch their face to ensure what they saw was real. I knew It was the time for them to spend some quality time with each other.

I sat aside soaking up the sun to be grateful for having them as my grandparents. All they did for me was more than just memories. I believe it will make me a better person.

Time flies when you’re having fun. I couldn’t believe the sun started to set. All boats decided to rest after working hard for a whole day. Threads of yellow and orange lights in the sky slowly prepared us for a romantic night. Clouds kept rolling in to cover Porto with darkness gradually.

When the city was covered by a complete darkness, city lights glistened as twinkling stars in the sky.  It became much more romantic than usual to allure them coming closer to the river. He wrapped her in his arms as a gentle breeze brushed up their face. ‘You will always be the woman of my life’, he looked at her with sparks in his eyes and said.  She couldn’t react, but to be deeply intoxicated by his love.