Taken place at one of the top 3 castles in the Bohemian region of the Czech Republic, a Disney inspired castle no less, this is my coverage of a Czech fairy tale wedding.
Before that...
The plan: Kian and I were supposed to fly out Friday evening after work to Prague, wait for a few others to land at the airport before taking the organised group shuttle from Prague to Hluboka, 2h away. We were to reach Hluboka around midnight, have a good rest before waking up for a nice breakfast and meeting in Marketa's room 301 to help out with our assigned tasks. I was supposed to make sure the tables are labelled correctly with the name tags for each guest.
The drama: Kian and I arranged to meet at 4pm at Stratford to take the National Express bus to Stansted airport, 40min away. I was held up slightly at work and arrived at 4.10pm to find out we missed the bus. The next bus was scheduled to arrive at 4.40pm but somehow it arrived at 4.20pm which I thought was quite unusual but in a good way. The traffic on the road was unbelievable. The bus was crawling most part of the way and instead of taking 40min, we took about 1.5h to arrive. Everyone in the bus jumped out and ran into the terminal. During the security check, for some reason they decided to pick my hand luggage to check. We ran to the TV screens to check our gate number and realised it is in the other wing which means we needed to take a sky train over. Great, this is so not within our control because we need to stand there and wait for the sky train to arrive. We arrived at the gate 10min before the plane was due to depart and it was empty save two Easyjet personnel. We told them we are here to board the plane and I will never forget the lady's cold response "You guys are 5min late. We have closed the gates and you can't board." The plane was still there and we were almost begging her to let us on but she insisted the "paperwork's done and we cannot let you board". I literally felt like bursting into tears. This has never happened before and to happen for the wedding for one of my close friends?? OMG!!
I tried calling Marketa to tell her what happened and Kian and I were stuck at the departure lounge. We had to wait for someone to come and pick us up to bring us back to the ticketing desk. We found out there was only ONE ticket left for the next flight out tomorrow morning to Prague. We panicked and our logical minds said I should be booked on that flight first and we will try to find other flights for Kian. You would imagine being here you can get a ticket anywhere around Europe quite easily but unfortunately no. There is only one airport in the Czech Republic and not even Ryanair flies there. We went home with sullen faces, in disbelief. I felt bad to trouble the bride on the eve of her wedding with such a silly problem. She assured me if I am going alone, she would make sure someone picks me up and bring me to Hluboka safely.
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| ARRIVED!! |
I woke up at 630am the next morning and started my journey to the wedding. I seriously felt like I was on the Amazing Race and even wore my red dress ready to board the plane. The flight was at 9am and I landed at 12noon. Luka, one of the family's friend came to pick me up and in his limited English, he told me "we have to hurry!" Oh god, the journey wasn't any better than yesterday in London. There were road works on the motorway (4 lanes merging into 1 can you believe it) and he told me we would be one hour late and I would miss the ceremony. I did my make up in the back of the car and changed into my heels. My heart was racing but Sarah told me "Bel you are doing your best to get here so you will get here when you get here. Just relax!" I guess she is right. 2.5h later at 3pm we reached the castle and I jumped out of the car with Luka and ran into the garden. I was one hot and sweaty Bel. Someone told me the ceremony was just over. All the guests were lined up ready to throw flower petals on the newlyweds. Sigh. Ben came running telling me to go and say hi to the couple before they walked down the aisle which I did. It was a HUGE sigh of relief I tell you.
OK drama over, I had time to calm down and it was Czech wedding, full swing! Let the photos begin :)
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| Us girls |
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| Helping to arrange the big dress in front of the Disney inspired castle |
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| Even the sky and clouds looked perfect |
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| Of course they had to play Antonin Dvorak's music ;) |
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| Now we know why Rahul always go to the gym |
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| With Antonin Dvorak III |
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| Ben said he would eat on Kian's behalf :/ |
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| Missing Kian here :( |
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| Bride and her brother, Antonin Dvorak V! |
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| At our dinner table with the huge roses |
Czech Traditions
Of course we need to have some traditional stuff in a Czech wedding.
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| A relative broke a plate and the couple had to clean up as husband and wife |
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| Answering some questions in the Czech language and in Bengali (cross cultural wedding here) |
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| Rahul had to pass the test by making a Czech Schnitzel |
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| woohoo they have passed! Rahul had to carry Marketa over a string of Czech sausages and let the dinner begin! |
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| First dance |
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| We had really long sparklers at night |
The next day, we all had some time to hang around the castle. We all stayed overnight at the hotel on the castle grounds which was really beautiful.
Again it was hot and sunny (really intense heat) and us group decided to walk around a bit before going to the cafe to join the newly weds and friends for some coffee/ tea and cake (the remaining wedding cake).
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| Climbing up the tower |
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| View of the well manicured gardens from the tower |
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| My traveling companions |
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| A new Andy Warhol exhibition in the conservatory |
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| In the really warm conservatory |
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| A parting shot before we left the castle |
It felt like a whirlwind trip for me, especially I had arrived on Saturday afternoon 3pm and to leave Sunday afternoon 3pm. I was not looking forward to the long travel back if I be honest, but at least I had some traveling companions. We took different flights back: Ben & Gabby continued their trip to Croatia and Sarah took an earlier BA flight back. I was on the same flight as Jan and Kine. We all left the castle at 3pm and with a dinner break in between, guess what we arrived back in London Stratford past midnight! The amazing husband came to pick me and my friends up at about 1am and sent everyone safely home.
I was so glad I made the decision to go to the wedding alone because I wouldn't have wanted it the other way. Really happy for the couple. Here's wishing them all the very best in their new life together!
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