some people who are members of Yenoh Merkeb (Noah's Ark, the parent
NGO of the PAAV program). I had met them one year back when they
helped us to translate during the Living Word trip last summer.
Actually, this was a double wedding. The groom in one of the couples
and the bride in the other were brother and sister. I was told that
this is not common, but when it is easy to do they may have a double
wedding like this to save some money. It was nice because they also
invited me to the pre-wedding party. It is for close friends and
family and it is a chance to see the bride and groom and wish them
well. Since these people are part of Yenoh Merkeb, they invited Frew
and the rest of the PAAV staff to this and I was invited along as
well. It was very nice, some injera and wat. Some singing and dancing.
I didn't understand most of the words, but it was still nice.
The actual ceremony is very similar to an American wedding. The pastor
gives a sermon about marriage, they exchange vows and rings. One thing
that was different was that they signed the marriage certificate as
part of the ceremony. And it seemed like a total of 3 extra people had
to sign it other than the married couple. There was some singing and
dancing as well. But, the main difference that I noticed between an
Ethiopian wedding and an American is the size. My guess is that there
were about 2,000 people at the ceremony and about 1,000 at the
reception. They said that this was the common size. It was a lot of
fun. I remember a few years back when I was in Hungary I went to a
wedding as well. I have always found it interesting seeing how other
cultures have their different ceremonies for the different rites of
passage.
That's about all that I have to report from today. The wedding took
the whole day. We left for the pre-wedding party at 10:30 or 11 and
didn't arrive back home until about 8pm. At that point we ate some
dinner, watched some TV and now I am typing this. And now I am going
to bed. We have a few errands to run tomorrow to prepare for going to
Sendafa on Tuesday.
Tebarek!
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