The wedding day finally arrives - part one

Our wedding invitations and buttonholes
photo credit: James Dorrington

After months of planning the wedding day finally arrived, and we kicked off with an early wedding breakfast for family and friends at one of the village restaurants of which we are particularly fond - Eddy's Place.

We were so pleased that a group of friends who we had met through our blog were over from the UK on  holiday, and it was brilliant that they managed an incredibly early start to get themselves from Oludeniz to Uzumlu for 8.30 in the morning to join us at the breakfast. It was great to meet them and their Turkish friend who drove them here and we look forward to meeting them all again when they return to Turkey later this year.

In spite of a rather dubious weather forecast we were able to enjoy our breakfast outside in the sunshine and it was a great start to the day.



Enjoying the wedding breakfast with family and friends in the sunshine at Eddy's Place in Uzumlu
photo credit: James Dorrington

The ever patient David being given his list of things to do!
photo credit: James Dorrington

As I wrote in my previous post my daughter and I had been unwell for several days so there was lots of things I should have done but hadn't. Because I am a perfectionist, it doesn't come naturally to me to trust other people to do things to my standards and the thought of leaving other people - unsupervised- to carry on with the wedding preparations would normally freak me out completely. But I must be developing the more laid back Turkish attitude since living here, because as my daughter and I had to leave the breakfast to go on to Fethiye for the hairdressers at 10.00 am I had no option but to leave the fate of my special day totally in the hands of others. So with the kind volunteers in control of decorating the restaurant, David left with a list of things to do and our friend Eddie who had kindly offered his car as my wedding transport going to Fethiye to have it decorated, Jo and I left Uzumlu and headed off to the metropolis to have an overhaul. I was however, expecting to return to the village with a couple of hours to spare to go to the venue and do any last minute bits and pieces. Wrong!!!

I had visited the hairdressers some weeks beforehand, taking with me my wedding day hair adornments and with the help of a Turkish friend as translator had painstakingly explained how I wanted my hair to be and had made a booking for that morning. So it was more than a little shocking when we arrived that the hairdresser was nowhere to be seen, and the staff that were there seemed to be more than surprised to see us and spoke no English. We eventually pointed at their bookings diary and I opened it at the right date and triumphantly pointed at a 3 hour booking in my name. It didn't however, do me any good as for some reason the hairdresser was not there and had no intention of being there that day. After much arm waving and pointing we established that the first step was for us both to have a manicure and pedicure and this was started straight away.

I think it would be fair to say that Turkish people in general have absolutely no sense of urgency and words can't describe my frustration with so much left to do to be stuck in a chair unable to explain that they needed to step it up a notch. 11.00 am passed, midday passed, 1.00 pm passed and still we had not got beyond feet and hands, even though we had expected to be back in Uzumlu by then checking the venue was OK. With wet hair and nails, I went outside and smoked three cigarettes while I tried to call a friend to get them to print off the table plans that I had typed up at 6.00 am that morning. When I got no reply I felt utterly helpless and alternated between hot and cold sweats and total panic. By the time I had finished my third cigarette I thought there is nothing I can do about it so I will have to calm down - would it really be so terrible if people sit where they like at the wedding?

Finally make up was on and our hair was started. Obviously we couldn't explain what we wanted so we just went with the flow, and finally we left the hairdressers at 2.20 still in our slobby attire with a 25 minute drive home and the wedding vows due to take place at 3.00. So instead of being able to go to check the restaurant, we sailed past it on the way home to change and watched everyone already there waiting for the bride to arrive!

In the UK it is of course quite normal for the bride to be late. In Turkey with the council official booked to carry out the ceremony together with  a translator it is not quite so acceptable, and I heard afterwards that they were saying we can't wait much longer we have to go on to a meeting! We have never changed so fast in our lives and feeling rushed and hassled we set of to the Camlik restaurant almost half an hour late.

Finally leaving home for the wedding
photo credit: James Dorrington

Meanwhile down at the restaurant and with everyone waiting for the brides arrival the florists chose that moment to demand 650 tl more than we had agreed, and the 'discussion' became so heated that David had to take the man behind the restaurant to continue the discussion. The florist became very nasty and David had no option with my arrival imminent but to pay him and get him out of the way. So there is a company that we will certainly neither use nor recommend in the future.

The band start drumming heralding the arrival of the bride
photo credit: James Dorrington

Oblivious to this Jo and I were finally on our way, Eddie sounded the horn the whole way through the village and as we got within a mile of the venue we stopped the car so that he could phone and warn the band that we were on our way and they started to beat the drum as we came down the road. We put the car windows down as we drove the last part so that we could hear the drummer and it was the moment of no return.

Next post - Our Turkish wedding