Last weekend my husband and I went to our dear friend Marc's wedding in Wittenberg, a small town in the former eastern Germany.

He and his fiance Antke live in Bochum, but they chose to have a wedding in a castle. They said this is the only place they could afford because things in former western Germany are very expensive.

Achtung: the castle is not a church. If one wants to get married in a church, one must first become a church member, which tax for church will be deducted from their salary every month (!!!)

That's why the number of Christians are decreasing in Germany :P

The lady came from the district office, to assist them in signing the wedding contract and annouce that they are legally wedded.

Friends and guests

Exchange of the ring. Too bad, I couldn't catch the kissing part.
They kissed too soon :P

The bride and the groom on the way out.

They were told to drink water and eat bread. Who finished first would become the leader of the family. Of course, Antke finished the task first :P

This is a German wedding tradition. The bride and the groom helped each other cutting a log. The meaning is they would help each other going through any obstacles in the future. Good meaning, eh?

Antke really enjoyed the job, I suppose :)

Another task for the newly wed, cutting the heart and walking through it.

Friends of Antke from the choir. They sang very beautifully.

Group photo with family members

Cutting the cake. Unlike Thai tradition, these cakes are all real (3 lb each, 3 layers)

Marc said having cakes and coffee with guests and relatives is a real traditional German wedding. However, the pair also provided us a buffet dinner too.

What I liked about this wedding is it is very engaging. Guests would be asked to do all kinds of activities, for example, drawing a picture according to the sample that was given. These small parts would then be compiled as a bigger art piece and was a present for Marc and Antke.

This is my part. Not too bad, huh?
(Man, I really tried hard not to embarass myself!!)

This is the complete picture!

I think the idea is really cool, but it won't be practical in a Thai or Asian wedding where you have hundreds of guests. What do you think?

Game: Marc & Antke were asked questions, such as, who cooked best, who cleaned up dishes, who did the shopping, who slept too long? etc. And they must answer questions by raising the shoe of the person. They got 19 out of 20, not bad eh!?

And they danced. The party ended around 2 am, but we left earlier because we drove almost 500 km that day.

It was an eye-opening experience, I must say, for I have never been to a German wedding. It's an interesting experience and I hope I get to see more international wedding in the near ture :D