17. Paris (2021)

 (the playlist)

My wedding day wasn't one of my favourites. You'd feel the same way if you hate having your hair out of your face and a different woman looking back at you in the mirror. I was lucky to be among the few who value the marriage instead, and only when the groomsmen and our photographers left did I feel like myself again. This time, better.

We had to have our honeymoon in singapore, with the borders still not open yet. I couldn't complain, with my everlasting hatred for flights and travels. We spent two nights in a loft hotel and one in a fancy, expensive one in orchard. Both we marveled at, even the loft despite it being significantly smaller. Despite the fancy hotel being walking distance from my own workplace, as if I weren't always in the area.

The first thing we notice when we check in new hotels is the floor we are on. We gasp in pleasant surprise when we realise we're on the highest floor, already excited about the view that is to come. Maybe we take pictures, maybe we share them with lurking eyes or maybe we don't. 

The next place we stayed at was on the 18th floor, and already we wondered about the perspective. Even before seeing the unit for the first time, even before signing our names and taking congratulatory pictures with the property agent. Even before we got our keys to the house and had our impromptu wedding photoshoot in one of the empty rooms.

The view from our new home wasn't much but it was everything. 

At 18, you could see ikea and my old hometown in the distance; you could see our 2017 selves, 22 and lonely on a bus, 24 and free on a newly owned motorcycle. Once ants on the expressway but from our new home, we had a good view of both our past and the future we wanted to build together. The house itself needed some work, furniture to buy and kitchen cabinets to rework.

It was nothing much, but with the right person, it may as well be Paris, it may as well be the whole world. And that was how our honeymoon, though confined to the walls of the country, was extended until now, where he continues to make me laugh, where I continue to hug him from behind. Where our laughter is joined by genuine friends and now, our toddler. Two years honeymoon, and still going.