I sat across from Arthur, biting into my burger. We had planned a lunch together. It was then that I noticed a ring on his finger.
“Did you get hitched?” I asked, expressing surprise. Arthur nodded with a shy smile. Arthur is a work colleague whom I am getting to know better.
“It was a small wedding,” he said. “We chose a beach wedding in Miami. After the ceremony, we hung out there, stepped into the water, and watched the sun go down. It was beautiful.”
Arthur is Brazilian. He is a quiet sort of guy who tends to speak in short phrases, but I could understand why he was moved to eloquence while describing the setting of his wedding–azure waters, warm sand and molten sky. He told me that his partner and he chose the beach, because they wanted the moment to be associated with a place that would remind them of the promises they had made to each other instead of a big church wedding, scrutinised by hundreds.
A destination often serves as a physical embodiment of vaporous spoken words. Almost a contract one doesn’t have to read, but travel to. Arthur’s wedding reminded me of my sister-in-law Mridu’s wedding that I had attended only a few months ago.
Mridu lives in Seattle and had planned hers at an art gallery that doubles up as an event hosting site on off days. The studio had an exposed brick and mortar ceiling, the rough outlines of which abruptly ended into neat, whitewashed walls decorated with artworks by local artists. While waiting for the ceremony to start, the guests had drifted off to the walls, studying the art on display, many of them in such a place for the first time.
“We wanted our guests to witness something beautiful,” Mridu told me when I asked her about the choice of the venue. “We thought that making art a part of the celebration was a good idea.”
The conversations with Arthur and Mridu made me think of the role a destination plays when it comes to one of the most important events in one’s life and how it has to be a thoughtful choice. Or so I thought, until I spoke to Conrado.
“For my wedding, we plan to go to the city courthouse, sign the papers and get out as quickly as we can,” he said. Conrado is an Argentinian friend with whom I play paddle and who is planning to get married soon. We were in the middle of the game when the conversation around wedding destinations started. I stopped mid-game and wondered loudly about such a sterile choice of venue.
“Well, firstly, it’s my second marriage. So, more than the venue, what matters is who I am getting married to. Secondly, we both want to wrap up the necessary legal requirements and save our money to gather an experience afterwards. In our case, as soon as we are married, we will take an active vacation and go to the trails in Texas for biking in the forests. Dirt biking is what we both love and that was how we first met,” he explained.
I remembered my own wedding, which, like Conrado’s plans, was minimal. For our honeymoon, we went on a road trip that took us across half of India. That month on the road was what brought my wife and me closer than a destination wedding and a five-star experience would have. Taking turns at driving, finding cheap hotels to spend one night in before hitting the road again, are reminiscences that we look back on even today with a smile. That month went a long way to make us the team we are today.
Can a wedding, or any celebration, be disassociated from the space it’s held in, I wonder. Perhaps not, for the place where the event–the union itself or the days spent afterwards–unfolds gives a background for memories to stick to. Sometimes that place is a beach, sometimes an art gallery, sometimes a courthouse, a forest trail, or a cheap hotel off a highway.
The best wedding destinations, I now think, are not always the most beautiful places. They are the ones that keep reminding us why we began the journey.
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