Writings By Location| A Perfect Balinese Wedding | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 |
Now that we were all ready, all we had to do was wait. Of course, waiting takes on a whole new level when you're waiting for your wedding to start, and you can't even sit properly because your outfit is so tight. But wait we did, until a quarter to four, when we had Norman, our trusty driver, drive us over to the Sheraton Laguna. With my giant crown on, I had to bend over to get into the car...only to find out that the roof was too low, so I had to hold up my forehead with my hand. The car was sweltering, until Norman thoughtfully turned up the AC to high. Then Norman even found Balinese music to play in the car while we drove over! It was very sweet, but the longest five-minute car ride of my life!
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| The Temple Gardens |
Dewita, our wedding coordinator, met us in the Sheraton lobby, and we all walked down to the temple garden for the ceremony. The only drawback with our location was that it was quite a long walk, so we were all very hot by the time we got down to the garden, and we hadn't even started yet. But it was all worthwhile when we saw the decorations in the garden: simply breathtaking. They had big white flags swaying on long bamboo poles (umbul-umbul). In between the poles, they was garland made out of coconut leaves. Then in the center of all this was a long red carpet with a white satin border strewn with flower petals. It was lovely!
Keith and I walked down the aisle hand-in-hand. We met the minister at the end, and waited for John to set up the video camera. When all was set, the wedding ceremony began. The minister had a pretty thick accent so it was a little hard to understand what he was saying part of the time, but it was easy enough to get the gist of it, and the ceremony was very nice. The minister started out about what marriage meant and then he prayed over us and posed the vows and questions.
After that, it was time to exchange our own vows. I knew I would break into tears eventually. I almost lost it when Keith said his vows to me — I LOVED THEM! They were perfect. Then it was my turn with my vows, a.k.a. "what I love most about Keith". I only got to the second one before I totally busted out crying. I had to whip out my "something blue" to wip the tears, and just hoped the mascara would hold.
After our vows, the minister blessed our rings before we exchanged them with the usual "with this ring" statements. Then the minister blessed us, snuck in a Jesus reference, told us to kiss, and we were finally married! Finally husband and wife!
The ceremony closed with a reading from John and Ali. We chose the Blessing of the Apaches for our reading, which Ali did a great job on, but John, being a little nervous, stumbled over a sentence or two. Still, it was really beautiful, and a fitting end.
