CHEEEEESE, c'mon Hiro!

On Monday we spent an entire day getting our photos taken by a professional photo studio. Such photo studios are easy to come by, with most couples having a photo portfolio taken months before the big day. From 8am, both Hiro and I got our hair and makeup done. Yes, that is right - getting makeup done, another first for Hiro, one of the many firsts in Taiwan.

Then we went to a flower growers about 1-hour away from Taipei to get our photos taken outside. The sun was peeking out of clouds and it was really hard to open our eyes to get our photo taken. The photographer kept yelling at us to open our eyes, yelling out 加油, 加油 in Chinese, which means 頑張って, which means 'go for it.' Just after a few shots, we were sweating from the scorching sun. Hiro is not used to smiling so wide, so to him, it felt unnatural, as a result, the photographer kept yelling at him, "c'mon Hiro, smile!"

I am not the best at posing and neither is Hiro, so you can imagine how awkward we felt and looked! After that we went to the oceanside and harbor to take photos, photos which didn't turn out so well due to the blasting wind and bright blinding sun. I was so happy to return to the indoor Taipei studio around 4pm...after which time we had to survive another 4 hours of indoor shooting.

We told the photographer not to make us take any overly cheesy or cloyingly sweet shots, like many other couples did. For the most part, she complied but a few shots she made us touch, nose to nose...we could not stop laughing - needless to say, the shots didn't turn out so well. In the end, she took about 200 photos in total...from which we chose 50 shots.

The end of the day finished off with xiao-rong-bao at a very famous restaurant, which is, according to my mom and the guidebook...the place every Japanese tourist much visit while in Taipei. It was really tasty and a good way to wind down.

You cannot see our photos before the wedding day...hee hee...so you will just have to wait and see this little teaser shot of us at the beach. Also pictured, my super-long false eyelashes that go a longggg way.