Forget about puppy love.

2011 was the year for "recycled love", as women give long-forgotten romances a second shot.

We cheered when Hong Kong singers Sammi Cheng and Karen Mok reunited with boyfriends of yesteryear.

Sammi patched up with singer Andy Hui after a seven-year split, while Karen's beau was her first love, whom she'd dated when she was a 17-year-old university student.

And in August, R&B superstar Rihanna reconnected with her first boyfriend, Negus Sealy, whom she had dated before becoming famous - thank goodness, it wasn't Chris Brown.

Some baulk at the idea of reuniting with an ex (see our reader's poll), but there's something undeniably sweet about rekindled romances. They're touching and evoke wistful ruminations about how The One might've been there all along. And social networking sites have made it easier to reconnect with a long-lost flame.

"There's a sense of comfort when you get back together with an old flame, like wearing a pair of well-worn shoes," says Ho Shee Wai, a psychologist and director of The Counselling Place.

"It's like revisiting a classic film 10 years later," adds relationship coach Kloudiia Tay. "You re-watch the scenes you loved with a fresh pair of eyes to see what you missed the last time."

Love simmers for 30 years

And "re-romances" are happening here, too.

Best known for her musings on love, relationships and (until recently) her abiding singlehood, The Straits Times columnist Sumiko Tan got married to her junior college (JC) crush, Quek Suan Shiau, last July.

They'd gone on one date in 1980 and lost touch for 29 years after leaving school.

Then in 2009, Sumiko wrote that Suan Shiau, who was based in the UK, had looked her up on a visit to Singapore. Readers of her fortnightly column followed news of their reunion, blossoming friendship, and finally, their fairy-tale wedding.

Though Sumiko and Suan Shiau have a history spanning almost three decades, she insists their love story could've only happened when it did, no earlier.

"It wasn't love the first time around, just a crush that lasted a few weeks or months," she says of their first encounter. "Even if things had gone well, I doubt we would have been a couple as we were both too young."

Sumiko's also famously written about how their first and only date back in JC was "awful" (she griped about his sloppy dressing and their awkward conversation).

"I'm glad that date didn't work out," she reflects. "I would have missed out on all the other wonderful relationships I had before meeting him. I've told him this before, and I'm sure he feels the same way."

If any awkwardness existed in the past, it had vanished by the time they reconnected in 2009.

Sumiko wrote that meeting him again was "one of the nicest things" that happened to her that year. He became a close confidante. When he proposed barely a year later, she accepted.

"Knowing him when we were teenagers helped a lot," said Sumiko. "It cut short the getting-to-know-you process. I was comfortable and could be myself around him." While Sumiko refuses to over-sentimentalise their past, she admits there's something special about getting hitched to a college crush.

"It's nice to be married to someone I knew when we were both young and gawky," she says. "We do look back in wonder at how we finally got married after almost 30 years. Even now, we sometimes can't believe it."

" 'So this is how Quek Suan Shiau turned out', I'd tell him. And he'd say the same to me."

Fated to be together

Sales and marketing manager Katrina McCrindle, 27, has experienced so many serendipitous moments in her love story that one wonders if she and her boyfriend were always meant to be.

The permanent resident first locked eyes with her Singaporean boyfriend, Isaac Christian, at a bus interchange when she was 13.

"He had a cute, 'bad boy' look about him," she says. "Our eyes met briefly, and that was that." She boarded her bus and forgot about him.

As fate would have it, they were introduced by a mutual acquaintance a year later. Pleasantly surprised (he remembered her as the attractive stranger from the bus stop), Katrina got to know him better. They were soon inseparable, spending "every waking moment together", sometimes chatting on the phone till 5am.

"His parents were out of town one Valentine's Day," she says of their sweetest memory as a young couple. "So he prepared a romantic dinner of lasagne at his house. There were candles, balloons and a bouquet of flowers."

Sadly, their puppy love fizzled out in two years. Katrina says they were too immature to deal with disputes. In upper secondary school, both made new friends and had less time for each other, giving rise to more squabbles.

After one especially nasty quarrel, they broke up.

Shortly after, Katrina lost contact with Isaac as he moved to a new address and didn't tell her ("This was before Facebook or mobile phones").

Miraculously, they bumped into each other seven years later at a bar in Holland Village. He recognised her instantly and called out to her. "It was shocking," she recalls. They kept their exchange brief but swapped numbers.

Over the next two years, they remained friends while dating other people. But the coincidences continued. "Our break-ups would coincide," Katrina recalls. "He'd be the first person I called after I broke up. And he'd go: 'I just split with my girlfriend, too!'"

In 2009, when both of them were single, Katrina dropped by his house one evening to hang out. They ended up falling asleep next to each other. "It was innocent," she says. "We just held each other as we slept. I felt safe and comfortable."

After that night, the two couldn't ignore the signs any longer. They decided to pick up where they'd left off as teenagers. Two years on, they're still going strong, with marriage on the cards.

"I had a sense he was The One even when I was 15 because we connected so deeply," reflects Katrina. "There was a lot of love between us then. It's still there today but stronger."

Through the fire

While most "re-romance" stories have peachy endings, the road to bliss can be rough. Like Selene*, 35, a journalist, whose reunion with Ray*, her ex-boyfriend of four years, was practically a miracle.

They had conflicting temperaments - she was a "Type A" hothead, while he was an easygoing free spirit.

"He hated confrontation, while I wanted to settle disputes straightaway," Selene says. "When we argued, he would avoid talking to me for days, hoping I would calm down. But that made me more insecure and neurotic."

One sore point was how Selene and Ray had started quietly dating before he'd fully broken off with a previous girlfriend. Selene often suspected Ray of being in touch with his other girlfriend even after they broke up. It was a source of constant tension, leading to screaming matches at Ray's void deck at their lowest point.

After one such argument, they broke off in 2004 and ceased all contact.

Selene dated other men, but no serious relationships blossomed - she always found herself mentally comparing them to Ray. Despite their troubled time together, there had been a special connection with him that she couldn't find with others.

"Ray had seen the best and worst sides of me. How often do you meet a man like that?" she says.

During Christmas a year later, Selene decided to call Ray to see if he wanted to meet. They ended up having coffee and a cordial chat on Christmas Eve, reviving their friendship. By 2006, they had started dating again.

The turning point was when they discussed how their "second" relationship would differ from the first. Selene noticed that, in an effort to make things work, Ray was consciously trying to change his blase attitude.

"In the past, he would walk away, change the subject or make a joke of it," she says. "This time, he was open to discussing things in a grown-up way. Maybe our time apart had matured him."

On her part, Selene tried to control her temper. Instead of criticising his laid-back nature, she motivated him when he was down or feeling insecure. "We realised that we couldn't fully change each other, and that we would have to compromise," she says.

After a year of dating seriously again, they tied the knot in 2008. Selene says she had no apprehensions about marriage. Ironically, their tumultuous past together convinced her that their marriage would be great.

"No matter how big our fights are, it'll never match the ones we had in the past," she reflects. "We survived the worst, and we can definitely survive the years ahead."