After Nipha and myself were staying together already more than two years, we've made the wild and urgent decision to marry.
Next thing to do: We had to ask the fortune teller about the proper date: The 28th of August in the morning is to be the lucky day!
So it be...
Me and my good friend Dave followed on Wednesday (27th).
Our destination was the village of Nong Phai, a good 550km (6 hours) ride away from Bangkok in the North-East of Thailand (Isan).
A quite place until that day, as you can see above ...
Dave is, by the way, a Canadian and married to a Thai too. You can see them both sweating over a game of checkers in the yard of Nipha's parents.
And this is as usually accompanied with 110 dB bass booster beat.
Around midnight the noise of partying was replaced by the noise of hard work.
A good party needs good food! So two buffaloes went into the pots.
The one here beside was lucky.
This time...
I had to parade through the village towards the house of the bride.
Some guys from my company team came over from Bangkok and stood in as the groom's family, since my parents could not make it.
They did a good job!
The groom had to go through some procedures:
First my feet had to be washed.
After dropping some cash I was allowed to go upstairs.
But easy to overcome!
Just a little bit more cash and the Golden Gate opens.
The really hard thing for me is to sit on the ground quite a time,
and the nice cosy temperature of 30++ degrees Celsius.
The ceremony is performed by "The Old Man" of the village.
The proclamation of the marriage in public and the wishes for good luck (and lot of kids) is the purpose of all of this.
The paperwork comes later...
The elder people start, the younger are following. It must have been fifty. A lot of good wishes! Our wrists are covered with "fur".
But we didn't really commence of course.
Just posing and a little kiss for the photographers.
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