Kerina Shah

When all else fails, make someone you trust the bad cop who would put the foot down for you, shares the new bride who just tied the knot half a year ago.


Women tend to fall for men who remind them of their fathers, as the saying goes. That is indeed the case for Kerina Shah, daughter of the late Dato’ Kadar Shah Sulaiman.

Following up on our Wedding Series, we speak to the new bride who just tied the knot half a year ago. Instead of hiring a professional wedding planner, she decided to take on the ordeal herself, with a little help from her mother, Datin Fauziah Haron, and a few of her closest friends. What she learnt is that battling it out for her ideal wedding venue and hunting down everyone in her family to confirm their RSVP became all worth it in the end.  

 


"He reminded me a lot of my late father."

Married in January in a beautiful traditional Malay ceremony to Ikhwan Nafik, the first thing that struck Kerina Shah about her husband when they first met was how much he reminded her of her late father. 

A chance vacation to Bali with a few friends introduced the pair, who hit it off right away. Stressed out from her studies and nursing a broken heart from the passing of her father just 6 months prior, Kerina was simply looking for a holiday to get her mind off things. Fate decided she deserved more after such a tumultuous year and brought into her life the man who would become her future husband.

“What stood out about him was the fact that he was a perfect gentleman and chivalry definitely played a role in his life,” she reminisces fondly. “The more time I spent with him, the more I didn’t want to be apart. He reminded me a lot of my late father.”

They began to officially date when she returned to Kuala Lumpur upon completing her studies in Melbourne. A love story unlike any other bloomed between the two, who found out they shared a lot more in common than they thought.

“Our relationship seemed so effortless,” she says. “We discovered we shared the same friends and that our families were so alike that even our parents shared the same friends.”

More importantly, they were like two sides of a coin – contrasting in nature, but balancing and flattering each other's differences.

“Our personalities complemented each other,” she shares. “He was the reserved, serious guy with a quirky sense of humor, whereas I am much more of a talkative and excitable girl who loves to laugh. I think from then on, we knew our relationship was going to move towards the path of forever.”



A Bride's Worst Nightmare

Forever happened a year and 9 months after their encounter in Bali. They tied the knot at the grand ballroom of the Shangri-La Hotel Kuala Lumpur in the presence of their closest family and friends. It was a beautiful day marked by equally precious memories, but behind-the-scenes, plenty of hiccups and roadblocks littered the journey towards that big day.

“I used to watch the show 'Bridezillas' on TV and think why would anyone want to marry someone like that?” she exclaims, “but after going through it, I can now completely understand why there’s a whole show dedicated to ‘Bridezillas’.”

To minimise the damage on your well-being, she suggests that brides begin the process of planning the wedding at least a year and a half before. “The planning started the day I told my mum Nafik had proposed! She was over the moon with excitement,” she recalls. “My mum does interior decorating for a living and always did my cousins' weddings, so she was already a pro!”

She was lucky to have her mother on her side because if she had to do it on her own, she admits it would have been a nightmare. “Looking for a venue in KL is about the worst part of it all. You will never get the date you want, especially in hotels, because people reserve ballrooms a year in advance, so you should too.”

She adds, “Another part that is quite hard would be the invitations. Contacting everyone for addresses and getting in the RSVP is sometimes bewildering!”

But like everything else in life, there is always a solution to any difficulty that arises. In her case, Kerina credits her husband as the savior of her sanity, as well as her mother and her group of girl friends whom she names as her biggest pillars of support for helping her to pull through.

“I was fortunate enough to have my husband who is supportive and who constantly reminded me what our goal was,” she says. “Also, my mother who, although is a tough cookie, gave in to everything I wanted and she enlisted a good team to help her.”

She was also extremely careful as to who she chose as her bridesmaids and, most importantly, the maid of honour. “My best friend, Nadine is by far the best maid of honor any bride could have asked for. She was constantly there for me through the laughs and the cries and I couldn’t have gone through the whole process without her.”


Good Cop, Bad Cop

Now that she has braved through the wedding storm herself and surfaced wiser, she has the following to impart to other brides-to-be. 

“Create a support system that consists of positive and responsible friends and family,” she states. “Make someone in your family the bad cop. This person will put their foot down for you and be the bad news breaker for everyone else.” 

If all else fails, just letting go and having fun is the best solution, as taught to her by her best friend, who just recently got married as well. “If on the day itself things don’t go quite as planned, forget it, brush it off. No one else noticed it except for you,” Kerina stresses.

When asked of her fondest memory of her wedding day, she names the few hours right before her husband-to-be was due to arrive with his entourage as her favourite. “My family and I were all ready and he called me and whispered, 'Wait there, sayang, I’m coming to get you'. The anticipation was giving me butterflies and I couldn’t wait to see him.”

As much as the whole planning of the wedding was tiring, she says she does not regret any part of it. In fact, the days that followed have rewarded her with more happiness than she thought possible.

“I feel a lot more settled,” she confides. “I’ve always been an independent person. I’ve been in boarding school since I was 14 and have lived on my own through college. Knowing that by the end of the day, you will be with that special person –  your soul mate, your best friend – is the icing on the cake.”

She is taking the next step in her life as someone’s wife with two rules -- patience and the openness to communicate.

“Have patience,” she advises. “You have just started a new life with that special someone, so don’t be so quick to bail or give up when all the flowers in your wedding have wilted. Be positive and work it out.”

“Communicate,” she adds as a last note. “You won’t solve a problem by turning away from your spouse. Turn to each other to fix the problem.”

 

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