The Twins

Hong Kong, the home of many hikes, non more intimidating than the Hong Kong Island "Twins". 

Bali

Being invited, or not invited to a wedding works both ways. Sometimes you may be surprised at being invited to a wedding. Sometimes you're not invited to a wedding, maybe it isn't a case of being surprised or disappointed. The challenges of keeping a short guest list is not lost on me. There was a time in my younger years where I would see an invitation and say "Oh, that's nice, they're getting married, I did not expect getting an invite"; I found myself selectively declining invites. Not to say that I had the luxury of picking and choosing weddings to attend, but that was when the social circles were larger and people at our age were getting married. Being based in London also meant that a lot of weddings were back in Sydney and the cost of travel was something that I had to think twice about. 

Fast forward now, most of the friends are married, the frequency of weddings in my social circle has slowed down (we're in our 40s) and now that I think about it, there's not too many more invites or wedding that I really expect. With that in mind, I was truly a surprise when I was invited to a friend's wedding earlier this year. I knew that he had gotten engaged but we'd lost touch over the last couple of years. The wedding would turn out to be a small wedding of 60 people. The groom shared that he really  appreciated our friendship during the early stages when he moved to Hong Kong. What did this look like, it meant emailing him on his work phone during a time of whatsapp to keep him abreast of weekend/social activities. It's interesting to see how little gestures can mean so much to others.

Weddings do feel more special as you get older. So here I am heading to Bali with negative annual leave. Lots of highlights here, the pre-wedding Stag party on the Saturday. I didn't really know many people in attendance, bar a handful of old friends. It was nice catching up with old friends, meeting all the guests, the upside to a smaller wedding, a lot more intimate (duh) but fuller conversations and maybe some new friends. Plenty of relaxation which was also nice.