Nicest Thing Ever

Over on Taken4Granted, my dad writes about a recent event for our family. My mom and my sister were in Toronto shopping and they were just about to get onto the 401 highway when the tie-rod for one of the front tires fell apart. Had that happened on that 401, it could have been a major accident.

My dad relates how the tow truck driver happened to come from China. Since my mom and my dad have been there, and since my sister taught English there, the driver went out of his way to pull some strings and tow the car for free all the way from Toronto to London, giving my mom and my sister a ride along the way. It saved everyone a huge headache. In my dad's words, "That was the greatest act of kindness that I have experienced in my life."

That statement kind of shocked me. Seriously? A complete stranger did the nicest thing ever? Shouldn't we expect some family member or close friend to have done the nicest act of kindness in our lives? What does something like this really mean?

So I'm reviewing my life a bit today, trying to consider this over-the-top form of generosity. Why would someone go that extra mile? Does it come down to the type of person you are? Is it based on relationship, or some moral code, or some Good Samaritan example? Maybe it's mere circumstance - if you don't have serious problems, there's less opportunity for extravagent gestures.

I can think of two moments in my life when someone has told me that something I did for them was "the nicest thing anyone has ever done." One of those times cost me very little but it meant the world to the other person. The other act was physically almost impossible to do but I pulled it off and it's still a cool story.

On the receiving end, there are a few times in my life that stand out for me. My wife Cam planned a number of activities and gifts and other things to celebrate my recent 30th birthday, including a surprise breakfast with many of my friends. That was the best birthday ever. And before we were dating, I used to work as a manager at AV-Base Systems and when I left Cam organized an amazing scrapbook to commemorate my time there. I aptly called that the Best Parting Gift Ever and it's my favourite single gift of all time.

And what about you, Dear Reader? Can you think of anything that anyone else has ever done for you that just amaze you to this day? And can you think of something that you have done that had an impact like that on someone else?

My Everything

We're married!!!

It all happened on Saturday June 21st, 2008. It was wonderful to have so many family and friends join us and help celebrate such an amazing day. Cam and I have so many incredible memories.

Rather than detail every part of the day, I just wanted to list a few of the highlights...

• After the Bridesmaids had completed their processional, I close my eyes and offered a quick prayer to God to thank Him. When I opened my eyes, there she was. She was so beautiful she brought me to tears in an instant...


• During the entire ceremony, I couldn't take my eyes off of her. I hardly noticed the audience at all, and she was definitely glowing.


• Cam and I served tea to our parents in a traditional Asian ceremony to thank them for raising us. Then we all poured four different colours of sand into one vase to symbolize the joining of our families and our lives.


• I wasn't actually able to get through saying all of the vows that we had written for each other. I was too emotional with the final two sentences and all I could do was mumble the final word. Cam and I were both standing these crying and completely in love.

The entire day took place on my parents' property in Dorchester. The ceremony took place along the Thames River and the reception was held inside a large tent that we had rented.

• My parents worked so hard to groom the landscape, my brother was our caterer, my sister handled desserts and Cam's mom cooked a lot as well. Add in all of the work that our friends did with the flowers and so many other arrangements and we couldn't be more grateful. There are too many people to thank here, actually, but we'll be sending our thanks to everyone individually within the next few months.


• It rained in the morning but fortunately that dissipated around noon and allowed us to set up. It was a bright day with a cool breeze but nicely overcast skies, which gave consistant lighting for the pictures. The best part was that the rain held on just long enough for us to make our official introduction at the beginning of the reception. And then once the rain came, it downright poured! A bunch of my guys immediately jumped up, suits and all, to grab the "walls" for the tent and hang them up. It was hilarious! Cam was so concerned about how wet my friends got but they were awesome (like Abe). As my dad said, that tent was certainly worth the money that day.

Finally, we had the best photographer ever. Joee Wong and his assistant were there for about ten hours, capturing the setting and the casual shots and the formal photos and the intimate ones. We saw a selection of his final work yesterday and the photos were stunning. As one friend commented, they attended the wedding and these photos look even better than real life!

In any case, I have included a selection of our photos here and you can see more on Joee's blog. And once again, our thanks to everyone. We couldn't be happier to be married, the day was fabulous and now we can look forward to spending the rest of our lives together!