Guest List, Card Distribution, RSVP and Seating Arrangement

It wasn’t too difficult for us to come up with our guest lists. Sze had been wondering how to get started and fortunately got his cousin Su to fax us the relatives guest list which she used for her sister’s wedding just a year earlier. It made a great reference as we were also inviting the same people (i.e. relatives).

As for me, I already knew exactly who I needed to invite, so I had no problems in coming up with my guest list. The only other question was to decide on which of our friends and office colleagues to invite.

The most tiring part was the distribution of invitation cards. Most of my relatives’ cards were distributed by hand one month before the wedding dinner, so we had to go from house to house to invite our honorable guests. Sze had the advantage of having his Muslim cousin Harris, organize a Hari Raya open house party at around the same time, so he took the opportunity to distribute most of his relatives’ cards at that gathering (which saved us many trips). Of course, colleagues were the easiest as we were all working in the same office while we also had to meet up or visit some old friends in order to “summon” them. ;)

After the card distribution, we had to find out if our invited guests would be able to make it for our wedding reception. Although some did call to confirm their attendance/non-attendance, not many would RSVP. So one week before the wedding, we would call most of them for confirmation.

Seating arrangement wasn’t that difficult either. We just seated our guests according to their relationships. Most of the juggling was to fit into each table, 10 people who got along the best. As we had used MS Excel spreadsheet program to help keep track of our guest list and RSVP status, cutting and pasting their names to slot into each table ensured that we didn’t miss out on anyone.