A Civil Wedding

I had never seen or attended any civil wedding before but recently I went to one. For info, civil wedding is a non-religious wedding act and Wiki has defined it as "An Act respecting certain aspects of legal capacity for marriage for civil purposes"

Kak Liza, a Malaysian lady I have befriended ever since coming to Germany, has actually been married to his husband since 2 years ago by Islamic wedding act (akad nikah). But the problem is, since they were married in Frankfurt, German´s government does not recognize the marriage certificate. When the marriage is not recognized, therefore Kak Liza´s spouse (who is a Malaysian) is not eligible to obtain the visa to live in Germany eventhough Kak Liza is already a permanent resident here. Actually the civil marriage is not the only requirement for the visa things, there are various requirements need to be fulfilled before Cik Dee, the husband can get the visa. For example, he had to pass the Deutsch language test before he can apply for the visa. For the application purposes, there are thousands things to submit, the spouse´s annual income details, the accomodation contract, health insurances and so on. And all these working papers took 2 years before Cik Dee is granted with 3-month visa last month. So the civil marriage is the next step for 1-year visa application.

The ceremony took place at the local Rathaus or townhall and carried out by a female registrar. The act was very simple, the registrar read important articles from the Marriage Act, then she asked each bride and groom on their agreement to be married. To be honest, I didn´t understand a thing. When suddenly the people in the room cried or eyes reddened or some were brushing their eyes, I was confounded. I guess the groom too, was bewildered. Apparently the registrar had read a heart-touching poem about marriage. Too bad I didn´t understand...

The registrar

While the ceremony being held....

This is the moment most of the people cried or emotionally touched...except me and the groom...hehehe

After 2 years, finally it´s official...

We were the ladies of the day....

My girls were the flower girls on the day, along with their new friend, Rachel, a 5-year-old, Philipino-American descendants. At first she was unfriendly to the twins but it just took a while before she started playing with the twins. The spoke different language, she of English and the twins, of course la Malay. But surprisingly, they understood each other. She couldn´t remember the twins´names so she called them the PINK and PURPLE according to the colour of the twins´ dresses. Luckily, after the wedding ceremony at the Rathaus (and afraid they would smear dirty their satin-creamy gowns!) I changed them to another dresses (one pink, another purple), otherwise I wonder how would Rachel address these girls.

Aren´t they cute?

After the wedding, we had a small luncheon at Kak Liza´s house. Though it´s Germany, we were served with authentic Malay foods...of beef rendang, lamb curry, nasi lemak, prawn sambal and so on. Just no nasi minyak and bunga telur!

To Kak Liza & Cik Dee: Semoga berbahagia!