날 사랑 해요?

The shortest distance between two points is a straight line while the shortest distance between two hearts is Love Itself. – Austin Ogwu Chinuwa

My co-woker, Sunny got married last night at the Intercontinental hotel in Gangnam. It was an absolutely gorgeous venue and the bride looked even more stunning than usual. Plus it was my first Korean wedding experience!

We left work at 6 and debated whether to take the bus and subway rather than a taxi because with rush hour it would have been tight to make it there by 6:45 (even though it’s a 10 min drive!). So we opted for public transportation and ended up at the venue with a few minutes to take a picture with the bride in her ‘sitting room’ before the ceremony.

Beautiful Sunny!

The wedding hall was beautifully decorated. very similar to a reception room for a wedding at home, except that there was a raised aisle going down the middle of it. The ceremony started promptly at 7, as the groom walked down the aisle followed by Sunny and her dad.

The ceremony wasn’t too long… apparently the priest talked a lot about Jesus and religion but obviously I couldn’t understand what was being said. Even though we didn’t know what was going on, us foreign girls were the only ones paying attention during the ceremony! Everyone else was on their phones, taking pictures of themselves or eating the rice cakes that were on the table. It was quite bizarre and I was glad that Sunny was turned away from the crowd so that she wasn’t offended.

After the service, the dinner started right away. It was delicious; there was a really yummy smoked salmon to start, then a very creamy mushroom and oyster soup. Each course was brought out JUST as we finished the previous one. It was all very efficient but it was clear that we weren’t supposed to linger over our food. The other courses included a prawn and steak dish, green salad, spicy traditional wedding noodles, then coffee and an amazing raspberry mousse cake. NOMS!!!!

During the meal the bride and groom were still up on the stage/alter thing, where they took picture after picture; cutting the cake, toasting with their parents, lighting candles, and standing with their friends and relatives. One of their friends serenaded them but there were no speeches otherwise.

As soon as the last of the mousse cake was downed, people started leaving. We stuck around for a while to take advantage of the free wine and flower arrangements but basically the whole thing took an hour and a half.

Everyone was taking the flowers… the waiter just happened to hand me the most ginormous bouquet!

There were a lot of parts of the wedding that we didn’t witness, such as the traditional ceremony that usually happens with the groom’s family. Also the couple took wedding photos a few weeks before the wedding and had them as a slide show during dinner.

Saying their ‘thank yous’ to each table.

I wouldn’t say Korean weddings are better or worse than weddings at home as I’m not a huge advocate of big white weddings in either place. The bride looked gorgeous and the groom had a huge grin on his face the whole time so I would say it was a huge success ;)!

so precious 🙂

Pics are all from facebook – hope you’re ok with that Sunny 😉