Destination Thailand

Just 15 more days until I leave for my romantic destination celebration in Thailand! Unbelievable! This month of May that I thought was going to drag on for ages actually passed quite quickly...must be the bazillion things on my "To Do" List! Now I don't want to underestimate the stressfulness that ANY bride has gone through in planning a wedding ceremony...it's a lot of work, right? But I do want to tell you some of my experiences in planning a cross-cultural ceremony in a THIRD country! People have always told me that my ideas are too ambitious... Nah!

After several weeks of watching the news and hourly updates on the political situation in Thailand, it looks like we are finally able to be cautiously optimistic... Thank goodness! This "peace" could not have come any sooner... How in the world do you go about making a Plan B for a ceremony with people flying in from 3 different countries and more than 10 beginning destinations? And not only that...how do you take 6 months of preparations and squish them all into 3 weeks? I'm so thankful that we don't have to worry about this...thanks to all of you who were lifting this up.

Some of the logistics involved in planning our wedding celebration:

* LANGUAGE. At our wedding we will have 32 people from 4 different countries speaking at least 5 different languages (or dialects). This means we are translating everything! Not only do we need to think about how to say and do everything in our mother tongue, but we also need to account for that 2nd native language. We have two officiants, one speaking English the other translating to Chinese. We have programs and menus made in both English and Chinese. We have very carefully orchestrated seating arrangments for the reception so that everyone will be comfortable using at least one of their languages, without feeling isolated. We are going to try to say our vows in both languages (which means I have to say them in Chinese, yipe!) We have an MC for the reception who can speak both English and Chinese (she's German, by the way). Oh! And I forgot to mention...along with coordinating everything in Chinese and English, I am working alongside my wedding planner who is Thai which means that her English is also a bit broken therefore communication, at times, requires some repetition!

* COORDINATION. As I mentioned, our guests are coming from 3 different countries. Even though my wedding planner is amazing and has done a ton to make this trip easier, most of the logistics, coordination and decision-making still falls on Tony and I. We have helped our 32 guests with flights, both international and domestic. We have organized and coordinated an entire 2 weeks of vacation, hotels, transportation within country and activities for our guests. We've answered questions about converters, vaccinations and money exchange. We've had my wedding gown and bridesmaids dresses shipped all over the U.S. and to China in order for everyone to have the right measurements...for everything.

* THE CEREMONY. In order to not let my Western traditions take over, I've really leaned on Tony for some ideas about how to incorporate Chinese customs into our ceremony. We've decided to do the traditional Chinese tea ceremony as a part of the Western-style program. This is where we honor our parents by serving them tea and when they drink the tea, they are accepting us into their family. We've also asked my Chinese sister, Yiqi, to sing a popular Chinese looooove song for our music during the ceremony. And, of course if you remember the Hunan wedding, there will be toasts. Yes, there will be many toasts... :) And along with the Chinese aspects we're also doing a sand ceremony (much like the unity candle), wearing Western wedding attire and having our loved ones stand up with us. We have a live jazz band to play for our garden reception and we're even including a bit of Thai tradition...more to come on this later! My sister is REALLY disappointed that we're not riding elephants into the ceremony...yes, this was actually offered. :)

* OTHER DETAILS. In case you're interested, here's the resort where we're celebrating and will be spending our first week in Thailand: http://www.bellevillaresort.com/chiangmai/index.php (the second week will be spent in Krabi, an oceanside city). Be prepared for a LOT of stories and pictures to come later!

Oh...and I hope I didn't make this blog sound like all of these things have been a burden for me to take care of. In all honesty, I've really enjoyed planning the trip and helping all the guests with their plans. After planning numerous trips over the past 3 years for friends visiting China and now planning this ceremony, I believe I have a new career calling....