Nice Day for a White Wedding

Last weekend was Coworker C's wedding, as I had mentioned before.  They had the ceremony at a resort in Kawaguchiko, a place that's about an hour and a half bus ride outside of Tokyo, right near the base of Mount Fuji.

Last Saturday the weather was brilliantly warm- so warm in fact that I went out in short sleeves without a jacket!  Caught a train to Shinjuku around 1pm, then from Shinjuku Station I took the highway bus to Kawaguchiko.  Was picked up at the station by the hotel's shuttle service.  The driver was very nice, at first talking to me in English until I let slip a word in Japanese.  He asked, "Oh, you speak Japanese?" and looked very relieved when I confirmed, so he switched to Japanese after that, haha.

View of Fuji from my hotel room

Got to the hotel and checked in and was greeted by the bride's mother.  She's a very sweet lady, and was very happy that I could come.  Apart from Coworker C's family who was able to fly in from Columbia (only his mother, little brother, and a good friend), I was the only other person there from his side.

There was time to change and freshen up in my room (got a room all to myself, woohoo!) before the ceremony and everything began. 

It was amazing.  A lot of people wore silly costumes and I regretted not bringing mine!  There was a box of silly costume accessories there to choose from so I did end up putting on some bunny ears.  Everyone headed outside after the "Welcome Party", where everyone just had some refreshments and chatted for a bit.  We all lined up along the sides of the red carpet that was rolled out and lined with little tea candles.  Each guest also held a candle, and the first person on each side had their candle lit by the bride's father, and then each person passed the flame along to the next person, all down each row, and the bride and her father proceeded down the aisle as each candle was lit.

Words were said, they said their vows and exchanged their rings, and then there was a surprise fireworks display over the lake.  Not even Coworker C or his wife knew about it!  A very exciting touch.

It was pretty chilly around that time so we were all glad to head back inside for the reception and food.  I ended up seated across from a couple university guys who were studying English, so we chatted quite a bit throughout the dinner.  There were quite a few speeches, musical performances, slideshows, and dancing throughout dinner too.  Partway through, Coworker C and his wife left to go change from their Western wedding clothes (tux/wedding gown) into some traditional Japanese clothes.

They are so cute together!

Then there was the after-party, and they changed again into some traditional(?) Columbian clothes. There was more eating and drinking and singing and dancing.  And of course in true Japanese style there was a karaoke machine, so me, Coworker C, and a couple of the bride's English friends got up and did the YMCA.  Later CC and I also got up and did Backstreet Boys' "Larger Than Life", including the dance that the older boys at the preschool did for the Christmas performance (don't ask me why we did BSB at a Christmas performance..).  Lots of people loved it and asked us if we had practiced the dance specifically for the wedding, lol.

The after-party went on until midnight or 1am, I don't remember, and I headed back to my room and crashed.  Got up at 7am to shower and get dressed in time to make it to the breakfast buffet.  Had some time afterwards to relax a bit in my room before the shuttle bus was scheduled to take us to the station.  Got back to Tokyo just in time to be greeted by the huge dust storm that blew in that day.  Had to battle my way home against the wind, and by the time I got back a bunch of dust had collected in my tear ducts.  Gross!

A very fun weekend though, and I was very happy CC had invited me.  Will be sad once work ends and we won't get to "hang out" every day anymore.

Oh, yesterday was the kids' graduation ceremony.  A couple weeks ago I had a dream about the graduation and it was terrible, but in reality it actually went fairly well!  Though Cruella (as I've come to call the evil boss lady who is the reason everything at that company is shit) was not happy and was running around yelling at everybody, as she does..

Sorry for this novel.  I've decided I'm incapable of summarizing anything!