A look back at 2010 – Part 2: The Fairytale Wedding

Growing up my parents often moved from one country to another – by the time I was 9 I was living in my fifth country, which inevitably meant that friends came and went into my life. My 11-month older brother and my one year younger sister therefore naturally became my closest friends. The only other two kids that also played a constant role in my life growing up were my two cousins, Jan and Lea. The five of us became very close and they have always been more like siblings to me than cousins. 

The good old days

So when, at the tender age of 25, my cousin Jan got married this summer to beautiful Khairin in an unbelievable four-day fairytale wedding in Malaysia, the first of the five made a huge step towards becoming an adult. Growing up, Jan was a year older, always at least one head taller and a considerable amount more level-headed than the rest of us, so it was always going to be him who tied the knot first. But no matter how long you anticipate something happening, when it eventually does, you can still be taken by surprise and wonder where all the years since your childhood have gone.

The bride

Seeing how close we were growing up, it was two of life’s coincidences that brought Khairin and Jan together, and I am happy to have been a part of both.  The first time they met was at our house in Cuba in 2004. Khairin and her family were our neighbours in Havana and Jan was visiting us for Christmas. The second time was two years later in Belgium.  Khairin and her family were again living in the same city and Jan was again visiting us, when he heard that she was also in Brussels at the time. He followed his gut feeling and decided that he had to see Khairin again and so he called her up and we all went out for a drink. That’s how their love story began. 

The young couple

The wedding this summer was surreal. Following the customs of a Malaysian Muslim wedding, there were four different nights of celebrations, each with a different purpose. The first was for the bride’s female family members to bid her ‘farewell’ through prayer and singing. The bride’s and groom’s hands are decorated with henna. The second was the signing of the marriage contract, or Akad Nikah, which was presided over by a Kadhi, or religious official. The night following the Akad Nikah was the Bersanding, or enthronement ceremony. The bride and groom are treated like royalty: the groom was led in by a procession of us family and friends, alongside musicians and traditional Malaysian warriors. The main part of the third night was the bridal couple sitting together and relatives, friends and guests coming and sprinkling them with yellow rice and scented water as a sign of blessing. The fourth and last night was a dinner, reception and celebration.  

Bersanding ceremony

Each night Jan and Khairin wore different clothes. Khairin wore beautiful dresses and jewellery worth a small car while Jan wore silk robes, a Sultan-like headdress and a dagger, of course. With each consecutive night, the number of guests increased. From 100 to 300, to 600, to 1000 on the last night. That’s not an exaggeration...one thousand people actually attended the dinner and celebrations on the last night in one of Kuala Lumpur’s finest hotels. Among them was the country’s Sultan, Foreign Minister and a host of other celebrities, dignitaries and ambassadors. In other words, the who’s who of Malaysia was at this wedding while Jan and Khairin sat on a throne in the midst of it all. The 25 or so German family and friends that travelled to Malaysia were driven to each evening’s celebration in a bus that was escorted by police officers on motorbikes. Their job was to wave and guide us through Kuala Lumpur’s rush hour traffic. We all felt a bit like celebrities. 

There were countless customs that made the wedding so magical, especially to my inexperienced eyes.  It was all new to us – like Jan having to wash his hands, feet and neck right before going to be married by the Imam, to enter into the new bond cleansed of his past. Or each family presenting a number of gifts to the other family, as a sign of respect and strengthening the new ties. Or even that each guest received a decorated hard-boiled egg, as a sign of future fertility.

All Ze Germans with the couple

So the wedding between Jan and Khairin was very special in that it didn’t just bring together two people, or two families, but two different cultures... and my family is much richer now because of it.  The integrating of two cultures is what a family friend of Khairin, and guest of honour at the wedding, the famous Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf (the Imam who was at the centre of the plans for the Mosque close to Ground Zero in NYC), who works tirelessly to build bridges between the West and the Muslim world, spoke of so eloquently at the wedding. Bridging the divide between these two cultures is undoubtedly one of the most important challenges of the 21^st century. The world needs more love stories like that of Jan and Khairin.