HONEYMOON

After a rather exciting week of a wedding we went to the Philippines for our honeymoon!

Since our resort was on a small Island it meant that we had a night in Manila first. I guess we hadn't done our research very well because Manila came as quite a shock to us. The Philippines are actually very poor, and almost everyone we met warned us to keep our belongings close. We stayed in a hotel that was pretty near the airport but it was quite hard work. It was very hot and there was no window, also the shower water was very brown, I don't think we would have minded too much, but since we were on our honeymoon I guess we we're feeling a bit on edge after a rough start.

But the next day we took a plane to Busuanga Island and everything changed, the island topography looked more like what I would expect Africa to look like rather than southeast Asia, except for giant mole-hill looking hills that were distinct in the landscape, I think they are called chocolate hills in some parts of the Philippines. We took a minibus ride for about 30 minutes though the countryside before arriving at a little mangrove river where we jumped into a traditional filipino style yacht along with our luggage.

The river was fantastic, we had come from cold Korea into a warm tropical climate and now we were cruising down a beautiful river with hardly any man made structures in sight, save for a couple of river side settlements or river houses on stilts. The river then opened out to the estuary where we travelled a little way out to sea, just as the sun was setting all the way to our tiny little island. The Island is called 'Dimakya' and your could easily swim all the way around it if you wanted. There is only one resort on the island and it's called 'Club Paradise'. We we're welcomed with a little band on the beach singing the Club Paradise theme song (very catchy, I wish I recorded it). All in all it was a fantastic turn around and introduction to our honeymoon resort.

The resort was fantastic, we had a cottage on the beach only a few metres from the sea, all the staff were so friendly, we hardly met any other guests except for during meal times, and it was in such a stunning and well preserved location. One of the best things was the food, it was full board and everyday the buffet was full of exciting new dishes to try. Me and Eun-mi would often look forward to the evening meal and enjoy taking our time eating as much as we could fit in our stomachs. One evening they moved all the restaurant tables out on to the beach so that we could eat by fire and moonlight on the white sand.

Another cool thing about the island was that every night thousands of fruit bats would come from the caves and trees and fill the sky. it was a truly spectacular sight to see each evening as the sun was setting in front of our house.

We often went snorkelling, as there was so much to sea on the house reef, but somedays there were just too many jellyfish. We also went on a banana boat, and played tennis, table tennis, pool, and darts. We swam in the pool we went for walks, then we decided to go scuba diving!

Scuba diving usually requires a license so we had to go through the training before we could go for a proper dive. The instructor was a very friendly dutch man who luckily had a version of the explanation video in Korean, so we watched it and I understood just about enough haha, then we had practical training in the swimming pool. We had to do various exercises underwater like retrieving your mouth piece if it falls out or how to clear your goggles of water when you're under water. Anyway in the end we both passed, but I think Eunmi was feeling a little nervous.


Then we went for a real dive on the house reef. I thought it was excellent, you just breathe underwater and get to look at the world beneath the surface. We saw lots of beautiful things I don't know the name of but then at the end we met a couple of sea turtles! and we got to touch them and feed them. pretty amazing really.



The next day we went out on a safari tour, this meant that we got to go back down the mangrove river and head toward another part of the main Island Busuanga. This time, however, we were on a small 6 man speed boat. At one point the driver seemed to slow down and begin navigating a path even though it just looked like open water, but when i took a closer look at the water I realised it was only about 2 feet deep, so I guess he knew what he was doing. The safari was good fun, it was just me, Eunmi and another couple and we saw Zebras, Giraffes, warthogs, snakes, crocodiles, and a few other animals. The highlight was being able to feed and touch a giraffe from the roof of our land rover.

So all in all it was a fantastic honeymoon, I hope that one day we can go back for another adventure, as well as a happy trip down memory lane.

THE BIG DAY PART 2

Like I said in the previous post the wedding felt like it all happened so fast it's hard to remember all the details, but I'll try my best to give you the overall summary.
Originally they told us that there would only be space for 100 people at the wedding but we had at least 140 guests (in Korea some guests come uninvited or because they heard about the wedding from someone else) but it felt nicely intimate and it was great to see so many of our friends and family all packed in the venue together.

So first we sang a hymn in korean
and then later a hymn in English (love divine, all loves excelling) and despite there being considerably less English speaking guests I was surprised to find their singing efforts more convincing than the Korean contingent.

In Korean tradition we then said our final farewells to our parents by bowing respectfully to them, my bow took me right to the floor haha. But it wasn't too strange until I decided to extend the same courtesy to my own parents which felt quite strange! but I wanted to include them into the Korean tradition as well as give a big (and humbling) gesture to express my gratitude toward them.

We then exchanged our vows - mine in Korean and Eunmi's in English. Just like my Parents had done at their wedding in switzerland 30 years ago. I was pretty good in practice but stumbled over a few lines in the moment, I guess that's kind of expected, but I just really wanted Eun-mi to hear my promise of commitment in her own language. It was also great for us to take the time to learn the vows before the wedding and have a chance to really think them through.

One thing I really appreciated was that the guests we're pretty quite throughout - normally in Korea the guests are a little talkative during the ceremony, most probably because they don't know the bride or groom very well and were invited by a family member or work colleague.

Another thing that quickly comes to mind is that the photographer kept asking us to kiss for a photo. In Korea public affection is somewhat frowned upon and for that reason couples don't often do the whole 'you may now kiss the bride thing' but we did. and what's more the pastor only said those words in English, so to the great surprise of the whole Korean congregation I suddenly kissed my wife at the end of the ceremony. And maybe it was just because I'm a foreigner, i don't know, but the photographer kept on asking us to kiss at various points throughout the day and I just remember a moment when Eun-mi's youngest brother turned to us and said in Korean 'Enough with the kissing now ok!, you'll have time for that later'. I've also had a lot of other people at work and at church also comment on the affectionate climate of our wedding... oops.

So then we had lots and lots of photos with everyone, including a classic korean pre-arranged bouquet throw. The superstition goes that you must marry within 6 months... or you'll never marry... so it's not always a favourable thing to catch the bouquet, therefore it has become standard that the bride will choose her friend most likely to marry and simply throw the bouquet to her.

After the ceremony me and Eun-mi went off to get changed into our reception attire (in Korea normally the bride only wears the wedding dress for the actual ceremony). At this point the guest were upstairs eating. Happily I hope.

We soon joined the guests and only managed to greet a couple of tables before the performances began. We had a song from our some of our friends at our English speaking church, then a song from Eun-mi's Korean church, and then a letter read out by one of Eunmi's friends which was quite emotional for her, actually Eun-mi told me that she was very surprised not to have cried very much at the wedding, but it was too much of a happy occasion to be sad.
Then my Dad gave a great speech all about 'surprises' and he even managed to speak a little Korean himself! But the speech was being translated for the Korean guests. and then another two songs, one from Eunmi's friends and one from Jesse and Stef who sang a famous Korean song called 'Americano' with some adjusted lyrics, this went down really well since most people in the room new the song and joined in on the chorus.

Lastly me and Eunmi performed a little song together, it's a song written by one of Stef's friends in California, and it's got great lyrics about saying your vows to be married. I also gave a final thank you speech to all who attended and helped out.

Perhaps one of my favourite moments of the day was then going down to haeundae beach and walking part of the coastal path with all my family and friends from the UK and Switzerland. It was a deep red sunset with the moon already visible (we got married on the weekend of a full moon). It was a lovely way to wind down before going to have a final meal together with all my family and my new Korean family.

THE BIG DAY PART 1

Finally, after all the planning and fretting the big day has arrived. It's been a fun cultural learning curve trying to plan a part Korean part British wedding ceremony. But we somehow managed to get there in the end.
It's hard to know where to start; It was such a wonderful, wonderful day... and yet it all seems like a blur to me now.

I suppose I shall just start at the beginning.

The first slightly surreal thing about our wedding was hanging out with Eun-mi while she received her makeup and got into her wedding dress, they offered to give me makeup too, but i politely refused. and then when asked what style I wanted for my hair I bravely told them I liked it just the way it was.

So then my brother, Stef, along with me and my wife to be, fully dressed and pampered all jumped into my friends car to drive to our wedding venue. So much for the English tradition of not seeing your bride until she walks down the aisle.

And so we arrived at 'Maybe Wedding hall', which despite it's dubious name was a good choice of venure. It's a stylish 3 story house type building perched upon the top of a famous hill in Busan called 'Dalmaji' (달맞이) which overlooks Haeundae beach (해운대).

When we arrived we spent the best part of an hour just having our picture taken in a very asian, staged kind of way. I felt particularly awkward in my tux which was a bit too big for me, but all the other tuxedoes were too small... or flashy white. But the photographer was good and quite well humoured so we had a laugh, even if the photos are cheesy it will be fun to look back on in the years to come.

Everyone looked fantastic, especially the Mothers who were wearing matched salmon-pink outfits, but it was strange to see my mother looking so tall since she is normally the smallest in our family. But I was so pleased to have family there with me, as well as a good mix of English and Korean guests, to be perfectly honest i'm not really sure what happened during the time before the wedding began, I know that there were various people doing various tasks and that the guests were supposedly mingling happily upstairs, although i'm not sure how much the different nationalities managed to communicate, if at all.

After the photos we attempted to have a quick rehearsal of the wedding... this was the only chance we would have to find out what was actually about to happen in the following hour... so we hastily rehearsed the running order, the processional timings, and the songs... all this without the bride who continued to have her photo taken with the arriving friends and family.

Although the practice was fun it was also somewhat in vain since I was soon reminded that I was in Korea, a place where plans are seen more as a rough idea, and are routinely changed at the last minute.
"There are too many people, You can't walk in down stairs", one of the wedding hall personnel said to me approximately 2 minutes before the ceremony began.
"So there goes our planned entry song timings" I thought to myself, just before being hurried into the wedding hall...

As soon as the music started I realised our rehearsal really had been for nothing: soft emotional piano music was playing away as the processional began, not the music we had chosen and rehearsed together, somehow the person in charge of the music hadn't been present when we practiced earlier. Anyway the good thing is that I spent enough time in korea to know not to get upset when things slide from under your feet. If anything it made the event feel more classically Korean.

So it was a bit of a shaky start, but as far as I can remember I wasn't shaking inside, seeing my beautiful bride come in, and then walking down the aisle together was, for me, a huge sigh of relief, to have finally begun what we had patiently anticipated for so long: entering into a lifelong marriage covenant.

THE BUILD UP

Well it's been a while since the last blog, and not without good reason...
WEDDING WEDDING WEDDING!
The last few weeks before the wedding were crazy, I think we got our rings only a week before the wedding, and both me and Eunmi bought our wedding shoes only a few days before the wedding... disorganised? perhaps, but there were more pressing and political things to deal with than clothing during those last few weeks.

So, 1 week before the wedding and our guests from abroad started to arrive. The first to come was Stef, along with my friends Matt & Esther. They stayed with me in my flat and kept my mind off the wedding enough to relax and have a good time before the big day. One of the best things we did was to go to spa-land / public baths, it's a bit weird jumping in giant baths with your friends, but afterwards they give you clothes and you can visit various sauna rooms. It was a great way to wind down before the wedding, and good for the other guys to rest with their jet lag.
Unfortunately they took most of the photos so I haven't got much to show, but I did take a few short videos on a phone application called VINE (thats why it's so fast cutting)

After Stef my parents arrived along with Jesse & Julianne and I finally got to meet my nephew Leon!

They were then followed by my uncle Steve, auntie Jenny, uncle David, auntie Dominique, and my great auntie Adele. It was quite surreal suddenly having friends and family with us in Korea, but it was so great to see them all and also for them to all meet Eunmi. We had a lot of fun sight seeing and eating Korean food we also had a large gathering with all of Eunmi's family which was fun since only a few members of Eunmi's family speak English and none of my family can speak Korean save for a few greetings. Sadly the time felt very short but it was also very special.