Sometimes you just don’t have the juice. A lack of sunlight in the morning can be a real juice-sapper. In any case I struggled once again with what to write today, I guess I shouldn’t have been so quick to move on from talking about myself. I could have just let that story drag and drag and drag for weeks, giving you a daily play-by-play of literally everything that happened to me in the last 2 years. What a bloody bore that would have been. Nevermind all that then, I guess I will continue with my handbook on weathering the economic shit-storm that trust me, we have yet to feel.
Now, when I say don’t have Weddings, I don’t actually mean it. I just mean don’t have THOSE weddings. You know THOSE weddings…the ones where there are over 500 people and you spend a small fortune. Trust me folks, the fact that your seven hundredth cousin twice removed won’t be making the big day, is no big deal. The reason I really want us to tone these events down, is not just because they can become extremely expensive (although that is a big factor), it’s because the couple involved at the center of the whole thing gain little to no real-life advantages out of the damn thing. Don’t get me wrong, I had a wedding myself, and it was really nice, especially the fact that we had to change venues at the last minute, making the whole affair pretty spontaneous. I’m actually glad my wedding went very, very off-plan. I imagine the whole affair would have been extremely boring if literally everything went according to plan. This way it was filled with much more excitement, trepidation and ultimately happiness as it all worked out in the end. All that being said though, I’m sure you are all wondering how many people were at my wedding. It was 300 people, although if it were up to me it would have been much less. 300 though is considered a pretty small wedding in Egypt, and I would have personally been overwhelmed if it were any bigger than that.
What I originally wanted was a small wedding by the beach with maybe 100 people max, obviously that was not going to happen, because there is no stronger force in Egypt than the unrelenting locomotive that is the concept(!) of tradition. The reason why I say concept is because that is really what we believe in. We believe that we should follow tradition, but pay little to no regard as to what tradition actually means, or where it came from. Some traditions should be followed, some should be learnt from, but not repeated, and some should be forgotten. Tradition is nothing more than the supposed values of a previous era or generation. It has no real purpose in life, other than to show us what our ancestors or elders valued and what they found to be most important. Tradition does NOT dictate however, that you have to spend hundreds of thousands of pounds on a 6 hour event, because you simply have to invite everyone and put them all in the nicest ballroom in all the universe with the best food and the open bar tucked away in a corner, for all the young people and the cool old ones.
Now this is not to say that I do not value the importance of seeing ones family and friends during important periods in one’s life. I think that is long lasting tradition that is extremely important and is something that holds communities together. But if you have ever been married in Egypt you also know that all the people that matter will be visiting you in your new home (something I will also talk about later) after or before your wedding, rendering the custom of inviting all the humans who have ever heard of you, more than slightly pointless. Now, more than ever it is time for us to grow up, and start being smarter with our money. My proposed plan for everyone out there planning a wedding or who will be in the future is this:
- Take the budget you have planned for the whole affair, and take out 75% of it.
- Use the remaining 25% on a classy dinner/event for 50-100 people maximum.
- Give the remaining 75% to the couple, who will use that money to start their new life.
- The honeymoon also comes out of that 75%, and the couple plan it using whatever amount the deem appropriate (If they are smart it will not be much, and they will honeymoon somewhere in Egypt because going abroad is now frankly, ludicrous).
There is nothing at all shameful about the above plan is there? Does it anger our ancestors immeasurably? Will our great grandparents be rolling in their tombs (we use tombs in Egypt, how cool is that!) because the entire gene pool was not in one place at the same time for 6 hours. I don’t think so. This way the couple get a good start to their new life with the money you would have frankly wasted on your now very expensive tradition.
Most young couples like myself who I talk to want a small wedding, but it is their parents who force the huge affair. Well I am happy to inform the young generation, that with a full blown collapse on Egypt’s economic horizon, hopefully weddings are about to get a whole lot smaller.
Be smart. Don’t have (huge) weddings.
More (after)tomorrow.
NoteWorthy 