From Joy of Learning English
How was your wedding? I know everyone had a very special and memorable one.
Keiko and Akiko in Mrs. Betty Takahashi's class were not exception.
My Wedding
by Keiko
My husband Takashi and I have been married for eighteen years. We first met at a party when I was invited by a friend. Takashi called me for a date after the party. After that we met many times for several months. He asked me to marry him and I said, yes.”.
We had a wedding in Tokyo. In Japan people spend a lot of money on their weddings. We invited many relatives and friends and I appreciated that lots of people came to celebrate with us. They made thoughtful speeches for us at the party.
Japanese wedding styles are very traditional. For example, the order of speeches is decided as an order of the status of the people. Cake cutting and candle services are normally held at the party, too. The bride changes clothes as much as three times. I wore Uchikake, which is a kimono, a white wedding dress and a pink evening dress. I remember that I was very tired, but was very happy.
We are still happily married and have two wonderful sons, Takuya who is 17 years old and Kota who is 13 years old.
My Wedding
by Akiko
The first time I met my husband was in April 1997 in Frankfurt Germany. I met him when one of my colleagues left our company to go back to Japan and he was invited to the farewell party. At that time he was living in Dusseldorf for three years because his company had transferred him to Kola. Although Dusseldorf was 200 miles away from Frankfurt, ( like the distance between Tokyo and Nagoya), we had a good long distance relationship. A year and seven months later we got married.
Before getting married we had to fill up many extra papers because we were foreigners. In Japan we only handed in the registration of our marriage paper to City Hall and it did not matter who brought the paper. But in Germany we had to make an appointment and the couple had to show up with at least two friends as witnesses.
On December 11, 1998 we held our wedding ceremony with our parents from Japan and some friends in Dusseldorf City Hall. There was a special room where we said our vows, exchanged our marriage bands and signed our certificate.
On the following day we held a wedding party with fifty people at the restaurant in the old Castle Hotel. Since we planned the party in a Japanese way the German people found our marriage custom strange in many ways. For example we separately sat in front of all the guests called HINADAN and some of the guests made speeches for us. The hotel staff had a lot of questions, which to us were normal customs, but explaing it to them was very exhausting.
Although the preparation was hard and we met some difficulties, our wedding ceremony was unforgettable and very memorable for us. We had been married for five wonderful years.