Bobby and Raluca's wedding

Hello everybody! Cris and I had a very interesting cultural experience yesterday when we went to Bobby and Raluca’s wedding. For those of you who are not aware, Bobby is the leader of OSCEC, the campus ministry we are working with. We have also gotten to know Raluca over the last two summers, so this was a wedding of two friends.

Romanian weddings are not very much like American weddings. Although this wedding was not totally like the Romanian Orthodox weddings that are more common here, it still was very different from any wedding in America I have been to. This is the case even though as Baptists their theological positions and worship styles are similar to ours.

First, the ceremony is long. It was right at two hours, which is quite a lot longer than our 45 minutes or so last December. We enjoyed it. We had the vast majority of the ceremony translated by one of the pastors’ wives. She is a servant! We were thankful we weren’t totally lost for two hours. The message delivered by Adrian (the pastor who founded proDeo) was very similar to what Cornerstone would have said about the same subject. He preached that men and women are equal in the sight of God but have different God-given roles in marriage. It was a great sermon. The ceremony started at two and was over by four and the reception began two hours later.

At six, we were at the reception. If this were in America, it would probably be over by nine, or maybe even ten if it were a rockin’ place. Well, this reception was quite short by Romanian standards. We left at 12:30 am. Seriously. Cris and I were tired. And I’m serious about the reception being short by Romanian standards. We were told that most Orthodox receptions last until four, five or even six am! Radu, a good friend of ours who is getting married in October, told us that his reception will probably last until 4am. His will not go later, because the restaurant said that they will close at four.

You may be wondering what we did during a six and a half hour reception. We ate food. We ate lots of food. This was a five course meal, and that does not count ice cream or a table appetizer. It really could be called a seven course meal. And that doesn’t count the big pile of fruit that started on the table. In between courses there were table competitions, live music, and games for the bride and groom. But my favorite aspect of a Romanian wedding reception is when the bride is kidnapped.

Catalin, Marius, Serafim, Sorina and Lance all conspired together and took Raluca away from the restaurant while Bobby was in the bathroom. Serafim came back to present the ransom demand. The only ransom Bobby had to pay was to sing a song performed by a female vocalist. This was an easy ransom to pay. Typically, the groom is asked to do something he is very uncomfortable with, mostly to embarrass him in front of a large group of people. It is hilarious.

Anyways, it was fun. The climax of it all was what Cris called the “parade of cake” at about 12am, when we had our last course. They dimmed all the lights, played a Romanian song that everyone but us sang along with, and rolled out a five tier cake. We really did enjoy it and enjoyed sleeping in this morning!

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