Chief Celebrations 2008

"What a tangled web we weave, When first we practise to deceive" -Sir Walter Scott

So we've been lying to the Chief lately. Just a few white lies. After all, what the Chief doesn't know would not hurt, right?

Well it started off when we received an email from YKLS regarding a jazz performance by Finn Peters at Alexis Ampang. That got us hatching a plan that we, um, rather the Chief didn't know about. What better alibi or premise then to say that we were keen on attending the performance as we heard it was rather good? Given that it was also at Alexis (and the Chief loves their tiramisu) we thought buy the story.

Of course, it turns out that we couldn't keep it as simple as we hoped. Things got messy and we soon needed to lie a tad bit more. But we must be rather good at keeping a straight face because the Chief never suspected anything.

Until, of course, Saturday night itself when we arrived at Alexis Ampang. The both of us walked into Alexis only to be greeted by a long table of friends and a birthday cake.

See, come the end of this month it's the Chief's birthday, and we won't be around to celebrate it as we'll be in Barcelona for some work thingy. The Chief was not happy the way things have been turning out really for this month. So we decided not only to celebrate early, but to make it a surprise too.

So with emails sent out, an initial reservation for ten set, the theme thought out (bowties, not necessarily formal etc), a Tiramisu Torte (with brandy!) ordered from FBB, the birthday card collected by Junior for everyone to sign, the stage was set. We started with dinner at a deserted Shanghai 10 in Sungei Wang (the food was still good) before making our way to Alexis. Unfortunately, we forgot to factor in traffic and we ended up 45 minutes late. Sorry ya guys!

After drinks (Salisbury Cabernet Shiraz 2006), cake, presents and listening to the performance, it was off to Marketplace as the Chief has never been there before. More drinks, a quick tour, hellos and then we headed home.

Results? A slightly stunned Chief that didn't show too much expression in being surprised, but yes the Chief was definitely very happy.

Oh well. The more lies bit? We told the Chief that tonight mum was gonna be hosting dinner for her friends, and we needed to go collect a turkey from Porto Romano. And we wanted the Chief to help us to carry the turkey, deposit it back home and then we could both go off for dinner.

Oh, and that we'd need to dress up as well because Porto Romano wouldn't let us in for any reasons if we didn't dress nice, even if it was just to collect a cooked turkey.

As the both of us entered we were greeted by another table of friends and two empty seats.

The results of more emails, reservations for six at Porto Romano, a theme to dress in blue and 'guys wear scarves and girls wear ties', lad helping us to buy the birthday present and get the birthday card signed by everyone, and a stop to Baskin Robbins for an ice-cream cake 45 minutes before the Chief was due to arrive to pick us up.

The Chief, seeing the table, thought that it was a coincidence and headed for the kitchen. We'd to forcibly push the Chief into a seat. After dinner, birthday song and presents, the group of us headed to lad's place to play a bit of Guitar Hero and House Of The Dead on the Wii.

All in all, this weekend we managed to pull off two surprise birthday parties for our Chief. Oh, and next year we think we shall look for venues where there's ample lighting. Both places that we chose this year had nice candlelit ambience but made for horrible photo-taking. And now, the thanks to the following peeps:

Paul, Alexander & Jin, Sam & Lance, Adrien, Lifebook, Earl Gray Tea & Daemon, William, Apollo and SK - Thanks for making it for the party and waiting for us while we struggled through the traffic!

Jason - Muchos gracias for having to drop by to collect the card as well as getting the cake!

FBB - Loved the tiramisu. Could smell the brandy as the Chief was cutting the cake!

Lemon, Esteban, Juangtis - Mierci beaucoup for making it for the dinner!

lad - Thanks ya for all the trouble of running about getting the presents and signatures!

It's because of you guys the Chief is very happy.