Today I was looking for wedding planning checklists online, since this was the day before the wedding, and I thought that maybe I could learn a thing or two about what all we needed to do to get ready for the wedding tomorrow. According to the website, today was supposed to be spent getting a manicure and pedicure, packing for the honeymoon, and the going to a health spa to top off the day. Hmmmm…that did not seem to fit the situation at all, so we didn’t do any of that stuff (Although it would have been nice).
Instead, this morning started off with an early morning shopping trip to the local market to get all the food bought for the wedding. Since there is no refrigeration here, buying food has to be a last minute detail. We did not have a truck, so we had to hire a motor bike with a huge long trailer to get all the food back to the dorm, where the kitchen crew took over and sat out on the porch chopping vegetables and getting all the food ready all day long.
Weddings are a little different over here. For instance, we could have ordered the wedding cake today if we had wanted to, and they would have delivered it tomorrow morning for us. We got a little ahead of the game and ordered it earlier in the week, so that we would not have to make all those decisions today. The other really different thing is that it is like the bride and groom are putting on this wedding for the benefit of the guests. It isn’t like in America where it is their special day, but it feels more like they have to put on a wonderful celebration in thankfulness that their friends and relatives let them get married! Maybe that is not how they think of it, but that is how it seems to us. For example, they will not be able to leave right after the wedding for their honeymoon, but will have to clean everything up afterwards instead.
As different as it is here, we are still really enjoying this experience, and we will end up having a new daughter! Khen and Andrew have dedicated their lives to serving God as missionaries, and this is just the first step in their journey to fulfill this dream together. We are so proud of them. God truly has blessed us with a wonderful wife for our son.