Overseas Weddings: Fad Or Fun?

August 9, 2012 in Lifestyle, Marriage, People, Relationships, Religion, Self, Society, Travel, Wedding

Sam de Brito writes All Men Are Liars* from his Bondi apartment in Sydney’s Eastern suburbs

I read a lot of blogs but one that I follow religiously is Sam de Brito’s All Men Are Liars* which runs in The Sydney Morning Herald and The Sun Herald paper. He always has a knack of being honest about life’s shortcomings or just things that we, as a society, put up with. Sam de Brito doesn’t put up with much. He calls a spade a spade which just goes to show that the name of his opinion column couldn’t be further from the truth.

I had the pleasure of meeting Sam, somewhat shyly, in Dymocks George Street late last year as he was releasing his latest novel, Hello Darkness the sequel to The Lost Boys. I was burning to ask him a question about writing and get my book signed. I didn’t know what to ask so I asked him how he copes with writer’s block (how boring!) His response had me floored and blushing. “I don’t get writer’s block,” he said cheekily. “And if I do, well, its nothing a wank won’t fix”. That’s Sam.

In June, just before I departed for Fiji to be a bridesmaid at my cousin’s wedding I read his latest column and his timing was impeccable, as usual. Sam is usually inside my head you see but he always just says it and doesn’t have time to be politically correct.

The column read:

It usually begins with a text message to your mobile phone asking “What’s your home address?” Then, two or three weeks later, “it” arrives in the mail. “You are invited to the wedding of Jack and Diane,” says the embossed, heavy-gauge flap of tasteful, cream cardboard. You think, “Sweet, this will be fun”, and then you see the suggestions for accommodation in Byron Bay, Bali or friggin’ Bangladesh.

Yes, you are invited… to spend a shitload of money.

Surely you’ve had this happen? A friend or family member ties to knot, but because they had their first kiss on the powdered slopes of Queenstown, they decide to re-create the magic for 100 guests on the South Island of New Zealand

I almost snorted my morning coffee through my nose as I was in the process of organising my travel insurance, transporting my cat to stay at my mum’s for the week while photocopying every important document in sight. I did this while trying to keep everyone cool, calm and collected since my family aren’t the greatest flyers. Did I say my family? I mean my dad.

Me? I have no problem with flying. As soon as I’m in the air with the seatbelt light off and a whiskey in my hand – I’m on holiday, thank you very much. But this isn’t the case for a lot of people. Some people are terrified of flying which is why I’m wondering since when have overseas weddings become all the rage? Whatever happened to tying the knot at the local church with a bunch of nitwits you’ll probably never see again until you’re in a casket being lowered into the ground?

Prince William and Kate Middleton revealed recently the original guest list to their wedding last year contained 777 people neither of them even knew. That’s a lot of awkward conversations around the buffet.

This got me thinking about my own wedding and I’ve joked recently that I wouldn’t invite anyone. People say that I often like to be the centre of attention, and while this can be true I could think of nothing worse than getting married in front of my family and friends. Sorry guys. I would elope for sure and then have a big party… in Spain… and I want presents! I jest.

As Sam puts: “Weddings can really help crystallise who the people are that matter in your life. I’ve never been married, but for years I’ve carried an imaginary wedding guest list”

I’ve thought about this as well as who would be in my bridal party, what our song would be and who would walk me down the aisle. But the older I get the more I realise I don’t want a wedding – I’ve never fantasised about it like some girls and I wouldn’t wear white.

I would want it to be something just between my partner and I. No one else.

That said, I love weddings – the love, the happiness and joy that shows on the bride and groom is wonderful to witness, as I did in Fiji. I think overseas weddings can be magical with the right planning and time to prepare the guests to save their pennies. But it’s not for everyone – just like marriage isn’t for everyone, but hey isn’t it nice to have the choice?

Have you ever been to an overseas wedding? Would you have one yourself? Have you ever envisioned your wedding day? Or if you’re married, do you wish you did it differently?

*Except Sam de Brito

Featured Image

Sam de Brito

Author Info

Rose Russo has written 56 posts.
Rose is a freelance writer, blogger and self confessed chocoholic who could quite easily live on a diet of turkish delight and English breakfast tea. She loves the fast paced nature of online media but sometimes feels like she’s the only member of Gen Y who still gets excited to pick up the newspaper on weekend mornings. If anyone has a Sportsgirl addiction cure please let her know [I may be on a first-name basis at my local store] She also writes a weekly column focusing on relationships, friendship and life stuff on her blog at The Budding Rose
Follow on twitter: @thebuddingrose

13 Comments »

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Whippersnapper

I don’t like overseas weddings. Well, I don’t like most weddings to be honest, I think the actual “wedding” part is just the same every single time. The strapless white (or various shades of cream about which I don’t care) dress, the perfectly arranged generic bunch of flowers, the formal up do that no-one has ever seen the bride wear before, etc. I could go on and on and on.

But I think that the overseas wedding has got to take the cake. I would never travel overseas for a wedding, unless it was for my very best friend or my brother. Different, if a good friend was living overseas and I had to travel to her wedding, but the destination wedding thing, I am not into and I would never have.

The last wedding I went to, in Brisbane, we seriously spent almost $1000. First, we donated money at the engagement party ($150 betwen me and Mr W) as their present, then the hens night and “kitchen tea” (another $150 or so, where we were all expected to chip in for the brides meal), a new dress ($150), got my hair done for the wedding($80), taxis to and from the evening ($40), then a donation to their honeymoon fund as a present ($300 between Mr W and I, so $150 each). Mr W went to the bucks which was a fishing trip away and that was about $300.00.

To be fair – I did not have to get my hair done or buy a new dress for the wedding and we WERE generous with our gift donations because they are pretty good friends of Mr W’s. But still – I shudder to think of the cost of attending a wedding overseas.
- Rose Russo
  
  When you put it like that it does add up doesn’t it?
Melissa Savage

I have been so conscious of not putting too much a of a financial burden on people for my wedding: paid for the bridesmaid dresses, no engagement party (I think they’re stupid anyway), no gifts or wishing well, small, local bachelorette party, bridesmaids doing own hair & makeup. Weirdly though, people seem not to mind spending money on weddings, particularly when it’s a close relative. All of the girls were happy to pay for their dresses, Mr M’s mother bought a fancy outfit, other friends have said they wouldn’t have minded an out of town bachelorette.

We’re getting married where we live, but some people will always have to travel and there’s not much you can do about it. Overseas I would travel for a immediate family or very close friend only. However I suspect some people have overseas weddings deliberately in order to keep the guest list down and discourage troublesome family members and that is a circumstance I completely understand. I also know a few inter-country couples so that is also quite difficult to manage.
- Rose Russo
  
  I think it’s really lovely that a bride can take time out to consider these things. My cousin did for Fiji… she always insisted on no presents and if people couldn’t make it she tried to organise a dinner or something with everyone that would miss out on the wedding itself.
http://tamsinhowse.com/blog Tamsin Howse

I’m happy with the way my wedding worked out, cost-wise. The bridesmaids paid for their own dresses, but they also picked them so they were able to determine an appropriate price. They varied between $1,400 Lisa Ho to a $30 made-at-home one and all looked great. I paid for hair & makeup and for those who didn’t want to pay to get their nails done, I painted them for them on the morning of the wedding.

Gifts were optional (gift, money or nothing was fine) and that was made abundantly clear, I know this as about 40% of guests did not give a gift, which is totally fine.

The whole wedding FELT like us. It was short, no drawn out speeches, and we looked how we look, only a bit better.

I have nothing against destination weddings, to be honest, but I strongly believe that people who have a destination wedding have to do so expecting people to not be able to come. Sometimes people they really want there (and if you really desperately want them there, you should pay for them to be there).
- Rose Russo
  
  $30 made-at-home dress I am IMPRESSED!
  
  Do you have a pic??
  - http://tamsinhowse.com/blog Tamsin Howse
    
    There’s a stack of wedding pics on Polka Dot Bride including one of the 5 bridesmaids. In the pic of all 5 the centre dress (MOH) is Lisa Ho, and one to her left is made at home.
Valentina B

I say each to their own!

But as mentioned, if you choose to have a destination wedding then you waive the right to complain about who didn’t come along.

I’ve thought about mine, and I’m sure it’ll end up being something that I don’t really want. But I’m not fussed on weddings anyway so I’d be quite happy for mum and sister and whoever else wants to get involved to plan it!
- Rose Russo
  
  That’s interesting you said it’d be something you didn’t really want. I think they’d be pressure on me to have a proper wedding but you know what? I don’t care. Not going to happen.
  - Valentina B
    
    In all honesty, I don’t see marriage as being a necessary step. But I know that it would mean alot to my family and partner for me to be married and I’d happily do it for them and my partner because, well I love them and I want them to be happy. And considering it’s something I’m not heavily against or even for, why wouldn’t I do something that, either way doesn’t make a difference to me if it means a lot to those around me?
    
    I think it really depends on how you see it and what it means to you.
PerthWife

My bro-in-law and his fiance are getting married in Switzerland at Christmas. They expected all family members to go and it turns out that only 4 people can afford to attend. Did you know that Switzerland at Christmas is crazy expensive?! Husband and I were looking at about $10,000 to attend. We have declined and the future sister-in-law is mighty pissed!
Mazi Gray

When I lived in Japan the O.S. marriage was a big thing due to teh RIDICULOUS cost of weddings in japan. I think that is also a consideration, a wedding in Fiji is pretty cheap, and a weekend Jaunt there for a lot of family is pretty reasonable IF they can take a long weekend.
Naz Kovacs

I had a pretty traditional wedding in that I had the whole white dress, church, reception wedding but honestly I wouldn’t change a t hing, well maybe the photographer who messed up most of our photos but other than that no. We had 150 people there and I was happy with 99% of them, some now that I think back I’d probably no want to invite but overall it felt like one big party for close family and friends, we had comments all throughout the night about how cozy our wedding felt as everyone pretty much knew someone at the wedding and even months after we kept being told the same thing.

I’ve been invited to a few destination weddings but the only one I ever made it to was when I was 14 and my cousin was getting married in England. My whole family, plus my other aunt and cousins treated it as a big family holiday/reunion and we spent 2 weeks in England for the wedding then my family went off to see the rest of Europe for 4 weeks. It was such a fun holiday and so many crazy things happened that it’s something I’ll remember and cherish always. The other weddings happened mainly when I was at uni or working and couldn’t take time off.

I can understand why some people would have destination weddings if they have their family there, for e.g. my friend is getting married in Toronto towards the end of this month. Her whole family live in Toronto, minus her twin sister who lives in London, but other than that 99% of her family and relatives live there, she was born there so that’s her home. But her husband to be and herself actually live in Melbourne (I met her at uni in Melbourne) so naturally she wanted her wedding in Toronto, which to me makes sense.

On the other hand my cousins wife decided that for their wedding, which was 7 years ago, wanted to get married in Bali just because. Both his and her family were all mainly in Perth but she just decided that she wanted their wedding to be in Bali and that was that and who ever could make it good for them and who ever couldn’t well too bad!

I can’t say I agree with that, even if Bali is cheap compared to other destination weddings sometimes it’s just not easy for people to drop everything and travel for your wedding.

KiKi & Tea