2013 hasn’t exactly been a dull year, though judging by this journal, you’d be hard pressed to guess that. but as it were, free time seems to actually be a bit hard to come by these days. and when there is free time, i actually forget i even have a blog to post to. maybe i should repin my blog to chrome again. regardless, here’s some fun and noteworthy entries to add to this journal.

VENICE/DUBLIN/BALLYFIN
our friends iris and brendan were getting married in ireland this year, so q and i made some plans around the trip in july. q actually flew out first to travel about europe, and we then met up in venice to see the biennale. i hadn’t actually been to venice since my first time back in college in 1999. some 14 years ago…holy crap. they were still using the lire the last time i visited. now on the euro, things weren’t as cheap as i seem to remember.

our first day there we took a trip out to the island of burano. we strolled the streets and canals lined with pastel-colored buildings, and then had dinner next to a vineyard at venissa. the other days were filled with various venice roamings, and then the biennale itself the day we were to fly out to ireland. we were then in dublin for 3 days, took a trip to the giant’s causeway, hit the bushmills distillery, saw old friends, and then headed to the actual wedding venue for the final leg of the trip. the wedding venue was at the manor estate, ballyfin, which to say was bloody fancy would be an understatement. we were living at downton abbey, wayne manor, the xavier school, or whatever analogy you’d like to make to signify the level of fancy it was exuding…which was to say, considerable.

HONG KONG AND THENSOME
which leads us to the most recent “noteworthy” entry. my girlfriend q takes trips to hong kong most summers to see her friends and family. our ireland trip drained my accounts a bit, so i declined to accompany her this year. or so i told her anyway. in reality, i decided to do a bit of covert planning. while she was planning her trip, i was actually getting in touch with her friends behind her back, for a number of reasons. i contacted two of her closest friends in hong kong to get in touch with her family for me, her friend in london for possible ring sizes, another friend in hong kong that she was taking a side trip with, and numerous other friends for various advice and whatnot. yea, it’s what it sounds like. i did most of my research and sleuthing while at work, away from her prying eyes. this included information on diamonds, engagement rings, the various classifications of diamonds (dear god, every guy should be warned, and then schooled about diamonds sometime in their lifetime), as well other various diamond-related subject matter. suffice to say i became somewhat knowledgeable about diamonds in a relatively short amount of time.

after some prodding to get q to finally book her tickets to hk, i booked my flight and hotel literally the day after in secret, and then i asked her friend she was taking a side trip with to make sure that the trip (to thailand as it were) was to occur hopefully the weekend i arrive in hong kong. after q flew off to hong kong, and as my trip soon came up, i had already 1. made plans for dim sum with her parents the day after i arrive, 2. had high tea plans with her friends for “consultation” the day after that, and 3. procured a ring.

some notes i thought i’d mention when trying to keep anything a secret. one, web browsers note everything you search for, and will “tailor” ads accordingly. therefore if you’d like for engagement ring ads to NOT show up in those ads, might i suggest browsing in private windows and/or clearing your cache daily. also, best not to keep facebook nor gmail logged on your home computer where they could be easily seen by said girlfriend. yea, that was funny. thank god for logmein and my overly paranoid state. and lastly, chatting with said girlfriend while keeping up the appearance of being in the states while you’re actually in asia and in the same time zone as her is as easy as turning off all location settings on your tablet and phone.

i land in hong kong literally the same day q flies out to thailand. i thought there’d be one of those moments in the airport where i’d have to sneak around with a hat and shades, but thankfully my flight flew in 6 hours after hers left. the dim sum the next morning with her parents went fairly well, and they were of course ecstatic, as well as receptive to our sneaky plans to surprise her. the surprise plans were further refined with her friends the next day until everything was finalized. her friend v suggested a restaurant (zhe jiang heen as it were…i thought i’d note that for posterity), went ahead and made reservations, and then sent the information to everyone involved. so the next day i wandered about hong kong a bit while i could until i had to retreat back to my hotel (to avoid any possibility of running into her when she got back in the afternoon). come dinnertime, i meet up with her two friends again and we make our way to the restaurant in wan chai, messaging her family the entire way there. they had a room booked (so empty seats wouldn’t be suspicious) and q was sitting with her back facing the entry. so moment of truth. as her family collectively raised their camera phones (at her confused face), i strolled into the room and laid a bouquet of roses next to her, greeted her, gave a highly abbreviated speech to her dumbfounded face, and popped out the ring. for the record, she did say yes (after a number of minutes trying to process the situation).

as for the rest of the trip, we spent it eating and drinking with friends. light breakfast and/or dim sum, afternoon tea, dinner, and then drinks at night…rinse, repeat. oh and no photos, because we were a bit preoccupied.