Sergiu's Church Wedding

When I told a fellow Peace Corps Volunteer that I was going to a church wedding this week, he responded "That's the bad part. Why are you going to that? That's the bad part." What his reaction shows is the reality that this is not the wedding celebration most guests are invited to attend. On the first day of a Moldovan wedding, the bride and groom are married in the eyes of the Church. On the second day, in the eyes of the state (this is probably a rotten analogy in a post-Soviet society), and then that night there is a big party which is called "the wedding" or "nunta."

To mark the beginning of the wedding, the parade of three decorated cars serenaded the town with their horns as they made their way from our neighborhood to the church. From this point forward, the degree of casualty was a little suprising. The bride, groom, "nash" (a couple designated to counsel and support the newly weds) and less than five others stood in the church courtyard waiting for a baby's baptism to finish, then we all went inside just as the altar boy, in his street clothes, rearranged the materials on the pulpit for the ceremony. The groom's sister paid the woman selling the church candles and idols 500 Moldovan lei for the ceremony. Random townspeople entered the church throughout the process to prepare another ceremony that is carried out every Friday, called Pomana, to remember the dead.

A fresh carpet was laid before the couple to be wed and the nash, just as the priest buttoned his costume and walked in the room. The four stepped onto the carpet, lit their candles, and the ceremony began. My favorite quote from the ceremony was captured on video, but since it is in Romanian, I'll try to relay the humor here:

Priest to the couple: "And you promise that you have never been married?"

Couple: "Yes"

Priest to the Nash: "And you promise that you are married?"

Nash: "Yes."

Priest to Nash and couple: "And you promise that you all have been baptized?"

Nash and Couple: "Yes."

Priest to everyone in the room: "And you all heard this declaration?"

Everyone: "Yes"

Priest: "Well that's nice, but it really only matters that God heard it, and he already knew."

In this photo, the couple is crowned. According to my host mother, this is the official act that marks them as man and wife. There was a small peck at the very end of the event, but I blinked and missed the first half, also the absence of applause after that moment solidified it's non-significance.

In the video below, the priest tells the group to cross themselves, and then "let us pray." The singing altar boy is not only unseen in the video clip, but unseen to the guest as well. There is a box near the front of the room that he stands in so as to allow his voice to carry over the curved ceiling like the ominous voice of the one they have come to worship.

Finally, like all other things at church that occur in sets of three, the newly weds and the nash walked around the altar three times, stopping where they started each time to cross themselves. The second time around, the skirt of the bride was caught on something, producing a longer than short, awkward silence. In the photo, note that that bride and groom literally have their hands tied together. Also, they are trying to balance the crowns on their heads, and there is a person behind each of them trying to keep the crowns from crashing to the floor as well. The nash couple still carry lit candles. When the dress was snagged, everyone in the party literally stopped, helpless, and waited for the bride's sister to divert disaster.