I don't and I like it the way it is, thank you.

I hate weddings. Well, not exactly everything about weddings. I mean, the "I do, you do" part is charming and I always get a kick out of what i call the 'champagne cork-flicking stunt'. It's the wedding banquet I don't particularly love.

Why, you ask? Well, consider this. I'm a 35 y/o single man who is (and I don't mean to sound conceited here) considered a very eligible bachelor. Yet, year after year, I have seen many of my friends and my juniors step up to the altar as I dutifully clap my hands from the sideline when the bride sashays past. So, sometime during the wedding banquet, well meaning relatives, friends and church members will inevitably pop the question : When is it going to be your turn?

I have gone from lying about me being shy to lying about my (nonexistant) girlfriend not being able to make it to lying about having just broken up the week before to just plain staring at these people with my 'death stare'. I mean, come on people! Do you really care about my marital wellbeing or are you, as I suspect, just trying to get a laugh at my expense? It's not funny any more after the guy hits 30, believe me. At least not to the poor guy.

Just the other day, I had to atttend one of these dreaded events that was thrown by one of my church home-fellowship members for his son. As expected, halfway through, someone sitting at my table decided that it was time to grill me about the dreaded state of my singlehood. And to make matters worse, my parents happened to be sitting at the same table as I was. As annoyed as I was when the question came up, I could sense that their uneasiness was even more intense. It was as if their hearts had been stabbed with a thousand arrows and they didn't know whether to laugh or cry. I felt sorry that I had been responsible for making them look like failures in this respect. And because we were all seated in the "church members" table, I couldn't be as cynical or sarcastic as I wanted to be. So I had to play along for fuck's sake and hope that they would drop the subject before long.

"Oh, erm.... she's in KL" and ended that with a loaded look at my mom, who at a moment's cue, backed it up with her own story about how my 'girlfriend' couldn't make it 'this time'.

"Yeah lor.... aiyah, she said her boss needed her to do a presentation....."

Sigh. I just condemmned my mom to hell... again.

I hate weddings.