So, thinking of getting married in Japan...?

So, perhaps you came here to the land of the rising sun, as a lad and/or lass with a song in your heart and cheeks red as red apples, and without you really realizing it, you have hooked up with the girl/guy of your dreams. You are enjoying the company of your partner (ok, "partner" is a stupid word for lover, but it saves me the time and effort in typing out "boyfriend or girlfriend") and after a while you start to realize that it's getting time to settle down and think about the future.

So you propose and if you're lucky you might even get a "yes" of varying degrees of enthusiasm back. At this stage you are probably happy, which you should, since you are still unaware of the horrors that lie await in front of you; a wedding in Japan...

Unless your partner (again, it's just to save me the time and effort in typing out "boyfriend or girlfriend") happens to be an orphan without any living relatives you are in for quite a ride... You might think that you can take the easy way out and just get married overseas and then come back to Japan married and avoid all the Japanese wedding fuss, but believe me, if your partners' (again, it's just to save me the time and effort in typing out "boyfriend or girlfriend") group of family and friends is of a reasonable size, you will still be required to hold a "second wedding" like party in any case, making it easier to just get it done with here in Japan.

So, it's been decided that you will be having a wedding in Japan. You now have to make a choice:

1. Leave all pretense of pride and good sense aside

...or...

2. Trying to manouver through the whole planning with at least a trace of dignity.

As you might have figured out, I am in this process and I did chose the second option, even though the first might provide more entertainment for you readers, my apologies but I put my own well-being ahead of this blog...

If you decide to go ahead with option "1" above, there is an assortment of things to chose from, doing a traditional "shinto" wedding is one, where you have to get decked out in a kimono, drink alcohol from the same cups and have some general chanting going on.

The second one is going to a crappy made-up chapel pretending to be vaguely Christian and having a fake priest (a foreign English teacher or "model" trying to make some extra money on the side) and go through something akin to a Christian wedding ceremony singing hymns that no Japanese guests obviously knows how to sing (unless there happens to be one or two actual Christians among the guest fluent in Japanese).

But no, me and Ms. Sunshine decided to take option "2", but believe me when I say that there are plenty of hurdles to navigate through there as well. Rest assured that I will guide you through the process here! To be continued...

(I actually did not intend to blog about this topic, but there just has been too many good stories so I can't restrain myself here really...)