1-month anniversary
Yes, today is the one month anniversary of our marriage. Surprised? On August 12, 2006, so were we. We decided to get started on the paperwork to register for marriage, find out the designated hospital for those health tests we kept hearing about, and the first set of what was bound to be a ridiculous number of red stamped documents. Half an hour and $1.12 later, the Chinese government proclaimed us husband and wife. The bride was dressed in a beautiful, brown Chinglish-nonsense t-shirt, and the groom wore a handsome navy blue Bloomsburg Fair t-shirt.
I still find it kind of difficult to fully describe the sheer disorientation and confusion of our little Chinese "ceremony," so you can start here with Dan's blog entry on what is sure to be one of the most surreal experiences of our lives. He's also put together a photo essay, with the help of the friendly government photographers in the Shanghai Marriage Service Center.
So technically we're already married. But I'm not sure that I can say that we were both fully convinced by the surprise ceremony the government threw at us. Thankfully, we're still having our real ceremony, which we fully expect to be a thousand times more meaningful, in Koh Samui, Thailand, on September 30. We'll finally exchange vows and the rings that have stayed in the box, as it somehow didn't feel right to start wearing them yet, despite being married. We expect to have a bunch of photos to share upon our return. We both promise to clean up and dress nicely this time.