I will

Last Saturday we went to the wedding. I was a bit reluctant to go as I’d promised to take some photographs for the couple and I guess the idea of such a responsibility made me nervous - what if I mess it up! Also being anxious made me foolishly touch more unknown buttons on the camera and discover new settings that I wasn’t aware of. I figured, if not now, when? So I changed a few settings (not sure which ones), either for better or worse, who knows? After all, I’m not a professional photographer!

The ceremony and party were really lovely! So relaxed and enjoyable. To be fair, it was their second wedding, because they got officially married a few months ago. And luckily the weather turned the bright side before having a celebration on top of the hill, but because of the downpour of rain beforehand, wellies were a necessity. 

It wasn’t a traditional wedding I’d learnt to know in England were you spend a lot of your time sitting at the table on an allocated place with three courses being served and between your meals listen to the speeches by the groom, bride’s father and finally by the best man. The latter is supposed to be naturally funny, he should talk loads of jokes and have plenty of good stories about the groom up in his sleeve.

In Estonia we are trying to have fun too at the wedding, not relying on the best man though, but traditionally we would have someone who’s leading the whole party. We call him pulmaisa (father of the wedding) and (s)he is the entertainer of the party who organises games for everyone. Basically it’s like being at a kid’s birthday party, but those games are meant more for the grown-ups, for example let’s say about ten women, including the bride, are sitting in a row and blind-folded groom has to touch and feel their legs to find his bride.

Also instead of throwing the bouquet of flowers to the single ladies, there’s a singing and dancing game where the bride and groom pass on the daisy chain to the chosen couple who they think should marry next, so not that hopeful for the single girls.

There are many jobs/roles been given by ‘pulmaisa’, like someone at the wedding has to shout several times during the party ‘kibe’ (direct translation - bitter), then everyone joins in and it means that the married couple has to kiss. So there’s a lot of public kissing, including someone’s role as a ‘pulmapitser’ (wedding stamp/seal) who has to kiss (more as a peck on the cheek) for example the winners of the games.

Oh, and let’s not forget that there’s also someone who’s job is to kidnap the bride if possible (obviously no one knows who that person is, apart from the kidnapper himself of course who usually is a man). So groom should better stay close to his bride at all times. As I said - like a children’s party - with strict rules, but lots of fun.

And additionally on the same note - I can’t really remember many weddings I went to when I was a kid apart from once when there was a boy who had a motorbike and he took me for a little ride on it. And now I’m not so sure if it happened at a party, but quite likely considering that our parents weren’t probably aware of that ride as they were busy eating, drinking and playing their grown-up games.