Troy had been asking for help and advice from all Yi's siblings for over two weeks now, but we can say that things were not always going smooth for him. One idea was to involve her friends, have them invite her out to a park for a concert that he'd already arrange in advance. Once there, friends and family would sit in the audience. He would disappear only to reappear on stage once the music began. As he sings, he moves closer and closer to Yi. Until finally, he is on his knees in front of her and proposes. He remembers how shy she is so, that idea never panned through. It then occurred to him that she likes watching Disney cartoons so, he finally comes up with the perfect proposal idea. Make a cartoon. Summarize last few years with each other. Have lead character eventually sing on stage. Then, as the lead character proposes; he, in real life, would propose too. Perfect!!
The idea was brilliant, and he already had in mind which two characters to use. The main character would be, "Chocco", a Sanrio Pochacco rip that He personally sewed together by hand when they first started dating some five years ago for Valentines day. The other was the female version, made for her a year later also on Valentines day. It was never really quite the same. It was very deformed. Head was much bigger, Nose was totally wrong, and feet had no soles. I guess when you make things by hand and not use patterns, no two will ever be the same. Any how, he decided to put a pretty little purple shirt on it and call it a female doll version of Chocco intended to be it's female companion. They later named her Aileen, short for alien. The cartoon came to be titled "Chocco and Aileen".
The entire week just before the proposal. Troy had to make sure he did everything he could to mask his intensions. Everyday he would be extra nice to her and on occasions would just give her flowers just to give them. He took her out dinning to different nice places to keep her guessing.
On November 17, 2007 he surprised everyone by going to the airport to pick up Hong Moui, who was in on it all along. Hong Moui is Yi Hong Ling. She's the baby sister of the family. After Hong Moui's home coming surprise wore off, he asked Yi to come view a cartoon he had found in the laptop in her room. It was just the two of them now, alone in the room. Yi's eyes widened as the frames rolled along. Troy secretly got down on one knee, engagement ring in hand, while Yi's attention was diverted. Now the idea here was that at the end of the cartoon, he would present the ring to her and say "Will you marry me", but that didn't turn out exactly according to plan. (Troy: I gave her the ring and dumbfoundedly said "here's the ring.. it's real..") Lost in the confusion of the countless arrays of English words to choose to convey countless messages racing through his head. One of them was that "the cartoon ring is actually in real life", he nervously handed her the ring and said that it was real. Good God, what was he thinking. In that moment, he was sure that she would slap him across the face as he starts to black out, but quietly the words "Yes, I do" whispers from her lips. (Troy: "It was the happiest day of my life.") It was the happiest day of his life.
The live action video of the proposal was candidly shot by Qing, the middle sister, and the actual "Chocco and Aileen" cartoon can be viewed here.
