the happy family

Celebrating their 10th anniversary next month, Joanne Peh and Qi Yuwu share never-before disclosed details of their love journey-with no holds barred-at the family's first-ever media shoot together.

- CHARMAINE HO

Joanne Peh and Qi Yuwu have just come out of hair and makeup and the studio is bustling with activity to prep for the photography session ahead. There’s a sense of anticipation in the air, with everyone having been told that the couple’s nine-year-old daughter and seven-year-old son will be joining us later in the afternoon for the family’s first-ever media shoot together. The parameters have also been clearly set: No photos of the children are to be taken and posted on social media at any time of the day. As for the shoot proper, their faces are to be partially obscured in every shot to maintain the anonymity that their parents have so fiercely protected for them all their lives.

Which begs the question of why Joanne and Yuwu have agreed to let a magazine photograph them with their children— and for a cover story, no less. After all, the celebrity couple’s need for privacy when it comes to their family is so well known that it’s public fact: Even on their own personal social media platforms, the children have their backs to the camera and their faces are never shown in their entirety; their names secreted away like in the fairytales of old, replaced with affectionate nicknames like Baby Qi (or, more recently, Mimi) and Qi Didi.

I’d very much like to claim credit for having convinced them to go ahead with today. To say that my words of assurance and promises to fully respect the family’s boundaries led them to trust ELLE Singapore with documenting this very special familyfirst occasion. But as I soon discovered during our surprisingly candid hour-and-a-half-hour interview, that is not at all the case. Their decision has less to do with my trustworthiness and salesmanship than the fact that Joanne and Yuwu—who are celebrating their 10th anniversary next month—have simply reached a stage in their relationship where they’re comfortable revealing certain private aspects of their lives.