I tend to keep personal aspects of my life… well… personal, but this is a very exciting time in my life so I wanted to share. We’re both really excited and still have a few things to take care of.
I can’t believe it’s in 26 days! In about 20 days some guests from America will arrive so that gives us a little less than three weeks to finish everything up. I know we can handle it and I’ll be memorizing itinerary to help everything go smoothly, but I still need to finalize my vows, I need to write a speech for the reception as well as a few other things I want to say, and memorize some lyrics of a Japanese song for one of our duets (luckily I have the easy part!). We’ve added some events to our wedding, removed some, added some new things. Then I have to figure out where to take our honeymoon in Japan.
Mai’s good friend in Tokyo is a designer and has been working on a unique wedding dress since September. I haven’t seen it of course but I hear it looks amazing so far.
How do other foreigners have their wedding in Japan? I’m not quite sure. So far I’ve seen the traditional Japanese wedding with full kimono and I’ve seen the ‘western style’ type of wedding at a chapel or restaurant with a reception dinner following. We’ll be having a western style with a touch of Steve and Mai and our closest friends and relatives will be attending. I’ll probably post some pictures next month.
Congrats!!!
Where is the honeymoon?
CONGRATS! You shoulda told us sooner!!!! I expect lots of pics! To answer your question….we got married in Hawaii and just had a reception in Japan for those who didn’t make it out to Hawaii! (A little less expensive that way…. tee hee)…
Yeah, congrats! Looking forward to the pics.
Congrats! I got married in January of this year and know how it feels! We are still talking about it and looking over the wedding pics and the video! We saved lots of money by getting married in a nice French restaurant. My friend works PT as a Wedding “pastor” and was kind enough to do the ceremony for free. Another friend is a wedding designer and she also made/designed the dress for a very very good price. The restaurant wedding came out to a little under 900,000, but more than half was paid by our guest! (each dished out some cash to be there) and the gift money. my suit was bought at Aoyama for 60,000 yen. Dude I could go on and on Im so sorry for blabbing! Get some pics up!
Nomadic Matt – Thanks! The honeymoon isn’t a big priority to us since we’ve traveled in the U.S. and have done some here in Japan. We were thinking of a few different places and might be spending it between the San Diego and Orange County area in California later this year.
jyankee – Wow! Hawaii sounds nice! We considered having a big wedding in the U.S. or Hawaii but we really wanted Mai’s grand parents to be there so we decided to have it here.
billywest – Thanks, I can’t wait!
Patrick – Your wedding sounds like a great experience, and only 900,000? That’s awesome! A lot of places and people talking about weddings in Japan mention 1,000,000 – 50,000,000 Yen. (Up to $50,000 USD) which is pretty expensive. We’ll be saving money here and there with the wedding dress, a friend of a friend photographer, videographer, and a few other things. I think every little bit helps.
We’ll probably have 2 parties following the reception since we’ll have a good mix of guests from Japan and America. I like the fact that it’s a custom in Japan to give money at the wedding instead of physical items.
Congrats! My wife and I had both a traditional Japanese\Okinawan wedding and one in (something like) a chapel, in Okinawa. We changed costumes several times.
Travis – Thanks! I have a few questions for you. How long did your wedding ceremony last? Did you have a reception? What did you wear to that?
Wow! Time flies, doesn’t it?
I get married tomorrow, and I’m really looking forward to it. My Reiko is already crying about things as she realizes that this is the last day she’ll spend at her parents’ home … but I’m sure we’ll still have a great time tomorrow.
Be sure to post lots of pictures of the big day!
ジェイソン (Jason) – I’m sure Reiko is emotional because she loves her parents but happy to be starting a new chapter in her life. Congratulations on your wedding!
Congratulations on your upcoming wedding! : )
Hmm, the whole where to have the wedding thing, was the toughest question we had. Let me explain why. : )
I am an only child, so I wanted it in America besides we were living in America already at that time.
However, my “husband to be” at the time. Now husband, lol. Wanted it in Japan, because he is the first born son, and that is supposedly a big deal. So we thought and thought some more and we came to a decision we both could live with.
We got married in Osaka Japan (where he’s from). However we had a traditional Catholic ceremony since I’m an Italian American Catholic girl. (Catholic school all 12 years and the whole bit, sigh, lol) but anyway, I was happy because I got the Catholic ceremony I had dreamt of my whole life. And yes about 10 family and friends from my side flew to Japan for the wedding. And my husband was happy because he had it in Japan where he wanted it. So a compromise that made us both happy. : )
So after our wedding. We all went to a hotel and we had booked a whole reception room, and we had a catered dinner. And the unique thing we added is we had karaoke after our meal in the big wedding/reception dinner area. That really got people relaxed. My American family sang songs that my new Japanese in-laws recognized and my new Japanese family sang songs that my American family and friends, clapped along with. My dad sang “My Way” in English and my husbands aunt sang it after in Japanese. : ) By the end of the night many people were a bit tipsy and some were down right dancing to the karaoke. And singing god knows what! Ha ha ha! My husband and I had a room booked upstairs and when it was time to leave we waved and went upstairs and relaxed….it was a long day! But a good day! : ) Even now after being married 11 years, people in my husbands family still tell us our wedding was the funnest wedding they ever went to, ha ha ha. Like you said…it sorta had our own sorta thing added to it. : )
Oh and for what it’s worth…I changed my outfit/dress before I entered the dinner at the hotel. But my husband stood in his tux the whole time. Hope that helps some. : )
Hope this helps some (just said that didn’t I : ) and I look forward in reading your wedding story and seeing your pictures of you and your new gorgeous bride!!! Congrats again! : ) And sorry if this was a bit too long, he he! I’m sorry about that! : )
Gina – Thanks for sharing your experience. I heard that there can be many outfit changes during the wedding. I’m just 1 week away, and I can’t wait!
Tetsuro and I were married in Kumamoto in 1999 in a sweet little place called Rosunjin (has since changed its name), which looked a bit like an Italian trattoria. We had a gorgeous buffet dinner for about 70 guests, our friends put together a special rock band for the occasion (Tetsuro is a guitar player), and we said our own vows. We also had an open bar and everyone danced to rock music for a couple of hours. Tetsuro’s parents were surprised and pleased because they’d never been to a wedding like it. Tetsuro’s same age friends also couldn’t believe how much fun it was. They said it was the best wedding they’d ever been to. We celebrate our 9th wedding anniversary this Saturday, June 14, and we’ve never been happier. Gambatte to you two!
Maruchan – Thanks for sharing your story, that’s awesome! I can’t imagine having people dance to rock music at a wedding in Japan, must have been very interesting.