Just married

Yes, yes, we know, this post is way overdue.. We already married last year and the German version of the post was already up ages ago. But cut me some slack. A wedding does not organise itself. ^.-

Well, long story short, we decided last year that we actually wanted to marry while we were still in 2011 (before the groom turned 30 :D, no? *pokes Shinji*). Therefore, on the 03.12.2011 we held our civil marriage.

A nice little ceremony with only those nearest and dearest to us (from the bunch already present at this little ceremony with only the closest family and friends you can guess at the crowd we expect for the real do in September 2012 … @.@ ).

After the wedding we adjourned for food and drink to a nearby restaurant, sponsored by the parents of the groom, and after a grand total of three hours the whole thing was over and we retired to demolish the wedding cake we had completely forgotten to bring along. Well, as much as three people (our guest from Germany was staying with us) can demolish a two-tiered megacalory bomb.. Shinji had to take the rest to work and have his co-workers help dispose of the tasty fare..

We have now been married for just over four months and the Steampunk do is coming along nicely. Of course, there are still some hitches and glitches along the road (such as the supplier not realising until half a week later that the placecard holders are actually out of stock and discontinued or that the fabric intended for lining bodices and coats is too flimsy, etc.), but all together everything is working fine.

Our connubial felicity is still untarnished even to the point that we have to actively remind ourselves that we are now actually married and not “just” boyfriend and girlfriend (the times we caught ourselves referring to us as gf or bf … ). But that’s just as it ought to be.

Stay tuned for more (frequent, hopefully) updates.

Location, Location, Location

After having finally decided on a theme for the wedding, we were ready to take the next point into consideration:

WHERE are we going to have our big do?

It was clear from the beginning, that most of our guests will be from the Basel-area or from Germany. But we were also going to have guests from Estern Switzerland. So our first idea was to look for a location in Central Switzerland to more or less equally distribute travelling times.

Our very first brainstorm came up with a paddle steamer to give a really Steampunky feeling to the whole business.

For example the MS Unterwalden on the picturesque Lake of Lucernce:

Only problem: That thing would have cost us round about CHF 10’000 (EUR 7’500-8’00 or USD 11’000), sans food, drink and personnel!!! And knowing that a real “Yes I do”-thingy will definitely take more time than two hours, the price for the whole bells and whistles would have been humongous. And we weren’t going to win Euromillions anytime soon, either.

Plan B: The Villette in Cham (Canton of Zug)

Very pretty restaurant villa on the lake of Zug.

A mystery shopping trip convinced us otherwise, though. The park and the optical feeling of the place were just so, but we didn’t quite see eye to eye with the staff about how to wait on people, regardless of their chequebooks. So, nix that.

But we also had a plan C, just in case plan B would prove to be not quite feasible (we were thinking in terms of capacity and schedule as it, frankly, is a holy horror to find a comme il faut location for roughly 100 people that doesn’t cost an arm and a leg).

On an exploratory visit to Lucerne we happened on the beautiful house of the society of the “Herren zum Schütz”.

Vastly pretty, enough space and not too expensive in terms of rent.

We were just going to arrange for a tour when the Mother of the Groom suggested another building:

The “Wenkenhof”.

An exquisite villa in Riehen (Basel-Stadt) close to the border of Germany and easy to reach for more than three fourths of our guests. But it will cost a bundle, we were absolutely certain about that.

You can imagine our surprise when the steward told us the rent and it was the least costly of all the alternatives we had looked at. There had to be a catch somewhere.

After the tour we waxed ecstatic however. Such elegant rooms, so much space, and such a pretty garden. Plus the park just adjacent..

We were so going to have the ceremony there.

What’s the time?

As you can guess from our blog title we intend to have a big Steampunk “do” for our ceremonial wedding. But until we finally hit on this theme we had a long way to go.

First we had to consider whether we actually wanted to have a big “do”. Wasn’t the small wedding at the registry office enough? Or do we prefer a bigger party with friends and family apart from the civil wedding?

Shinji was sure he wanted to share this happy day with all his friends and family and Kawaii was also rather in favour of including loved ones. So we started planning.

The first idea was a traditional white wedding at a church. But as neither Kawaii nor Shinji were regular church goers and are both rather sceptic about institutionalised religion that notion stood about a snowball’s chance in hell.

In previous flights of fancy the first thoughts were of historical weddings – Middle Ages, American Civil War or whatnot. But the Middle Ages are a rather long period of time with many entirely different eras and the Civil War was a long time ago and half way across the globe into the bargain.

The Renaissance sported a completely different style from the Romanic period, Tudor fashion is still another thing, and then there was Baroque and Rococo, too. Not to mention regional and the infinitessimally small chronological differences like codpieces and ruffs.

What we perceived as the main problem, however, was: All of these styles seemed to be rather “lopsided”. We never hit on anything where both boy and girl looked equally good. If the fashion made the ladies look ravishing, the gents looked like nincompoops, if the gents looked peachy, the ladies couldn’t breath. Frustrating, I’m telling you.

Finally we hit on a compromise: Victorian Times (1837-1901)! Known from books like “North and South” or “Little Women” these times are still rather present even today.

But here the next obstacle presented itself: A themed wedding can only be successful if all (or at least most of) the guests stick with the time frame. Shinji’s family delights in donning fancy dresses for all occasions but even they cannot be expected to whip up suits and dresses at a reasonable price but still be period accurate. That’s utter nonsens.

Well, suits and dresses should match a period but should allow for flexibility and budget. And it shouldn’t be neccessary to hold a degree in costume history to whip up something snappy. Enter compromise number two: Steampunk.

Although Steampunk classically is situated in Victorian Times it can be extended to comprise the time from the 17th century (watch the most recent Three Musketeers film and you’ll know what I’m talking about ^.- ) to the Roaring 20ies and can even include some Fantasy elements like magic &c. to allow for personal taste and creativity.

How to (not) make the perfect proposal – Part 2

So that’s the story of how the whole proposal was planned.

But things usually don’t turn out quite the way they are supposed to. Same happened here.

While the whole family already kept asking when they both would finally marry, Kawaii and Shinji kept joking about how they actually could marry.

Because Shinji didn’t want to spill the beans too early, though, he started making remarks like “remember, we’re not even engaged yet” which – to be honest – wouldn’t appear to be a very nice thing to say to your girlfriend.

During the last months, a few changes occured. Shinji’s comedy as well as Kawaii’s intense studies started to take their toll and signs of wear and tear were beginning to show. Shinji and Kawaii therefore decided a week off of everything was very much in order and went on vacation to France in July.

During this vacation Shinji started to wonder again: Was this kind of proposal such a good idea? Wouldn’t it be somewhat forcing Kawaii to say “yes” if he proposed to her in public? And would she consider the song to be funny – as it was intended – or would it seem insulting to her?
While pondering, Shinji became more and more quiet and when both returned home, Kawaii asked him if she had done something wrong.

The answer can only be quoted.

“Hmm? Oh.. nono… it’s just… I shouldn’t be talking to you about it… but I was thinking on how I could propose to you at the Connichi and if I should really do it in public or not.”

Thus started a discussion on why he didn’t want to force her in public to say yes and how he wasn’t sure if she would even be able to attend the Connichi at all.
So about ten minutes later he asked her directly if she wanted to marry him. And Kawaii said yes (obviously ;)).

Consequently, on that day, 09.07.2011, both wrote text messages to all their friends and family and went to the Walhalla Store in Olten to buy a pair of very becoming engagement rings.

How to (not) make the perfect proposal – Part 1

When does one decide to marry?

For Shinji the decision was pretty much clear after the first year of the relationship:

Due to external circumstances Kawaii and Shinji had already been living together in the same flat for more than half a year at that point and still neither felt the urge to strangle the other. A good sign, wouldn’t you agree?

Shinji had already made up his mind to propose to Kawaii after she finished her bachelor thesis. And when after 2.5 years of peaceful relationship he learned he would be again performing as a stand-up comedian at the biggest German Anime convention – the Connichi – right around the time Kawaii was to be done with her bachelor thesis it was just the PERFECT timing.

So the small gears in his head started turning: where to get engagement rings? how to figure out her ring size without asking? and most importantly “How should I propose?”

In the following months he devised a plan. He would perform his program per usual but right at the end, when the customary encores would be demanded, he would sing a song from the German Band “Die Ärzte” to propose to her. She would never be able (or dare ^.-) to refuse this proposal in front of a jam-packed auditorium.

How it all started

Every story has its beginning and ours starts several years back. Years before we fell in love with each other, even years before we started talking to each other.

In 2000 there came to be a place called Mangaforum and it was the first possibility for Swiss Anime and Manga fans to get to know each other and talk about what we all had in common: A huge interest in Japanese animation and comics.

Back in the days Anime fans were usually treated as “speshul” and even if we didn’t like each other, we generally considered ourselves as a great big family (including the weird smelly cousins you only see once a year).

We pretty much subscribed to this philosophy. But Shinji in his younger years was always having discussions for the sake of stating his point and/or being right or just because “someone had to [state this particular point/be of this particular persuasion/…]”. Thus he often caused a ruckus in the forum and therefore Kawaii – who was rather a stickler for rules and propriety and very often strongly opposed with his points of view (probably just for the sake of disagreeing with Shinji) – really really loathed him back then.

Several years later, after a brief vacation from the forum, Kawaii came back and even started talking to Shinji as he was one of her friends’ boyfriend at that time.

They discovered that they actually shared some of their interests (including LARP, medieval fairs, etc.) and were generally very much alike (though Shinji still being the more outspoken and Kawaii the more retiring person). Consequently, reluctant aquintance turned into an interesting friendship. And friendship gradually and – again – reluctantly turned into love after their respective relationships with their former partners ended because they just didn’t work out as envisioned.