A Bright Red Veil

The Balaban and Demіr families invited the crew of the Pipedream, and every other boat at the marina, to Esma and Ahmet’s wedding which was held on Thursday November 18, 2010 at the Antalya Grand Alibey Wedding Hall. 

I went to a Turkish wedding.

Ahmet is a guy who works in the office at the marina and he invited all of the staff and boaters to his wedding.  At first I was shocked at the thought of all of the boaters going to the wedding on top of all of his close relatives and friends.  In an American wedding an extra 34 somewhat strangers would cost more money than it would be worth.  Then we arrived at the wedding hall and realized that Turkish weddings are very different than American weddings… big surprise right?

The big problem all of the boaters were facing is it seemed nobody had appropriate clothes to wear to a wedding.  I ended up going out and getting a 20TL dress, 20TL shoes, and a bracelet for the occasion.  It was a daunting task because I don’t wear things that are tight or glittery and along the tourist shops that seemed to be the only options, but with some searching and Dad’s good luck by my side I managed to find a dress I really liked at a price Dad really liked.  When we all gathered to get on the buses it was fun to see people dressed up and excited about a nice outing.

The wedding hall was… interesting.  The walls were done in a stone like façade to make it look something like a castle and there were giant posters of Turkish ruins hanging on the walls.  There was a stage set up for dancing and festivities and a main table where the bride and groom sat.  Fake flowers and bright gold fabric decorated everything and there were people everywhere.  Generally in a wedding in America there is a dress code depending on where the wedding takes place.  If it’s in a church or nice hotel women wear nice dresses and men wear a button up shirt and tie.  If it’s at the beach, sun dresses and casual clothes are more the style.  If it’s a themed wedding the attire follows the predetermined theme.  If it’s in the wild west jeans and cowboy hats are appropriate.  I couldn’t tell what the dress code was for this occasion.  There were people wearing everything from jeans to prom dresses.  There was no defined wedding party but the group of close friends and family members dressed way up while other guests came and went literally wearing jeans and t-shirts or nice dresses. 

This is a shot of the room where the wedding reception was.  Shortly after this we were told we weren’t supposed to be taking photos because the photographer for the wedding had full rights for that and was trying to sell the photos.  He thought we were moving in on his turf.

There was no actual ceremony at the part of the wedding we went to.  It was more a reception where 300 of their closest friends, family, neighbors, mailmen, and boat owners could come and celebrate with them.  Apparently Turkish weddings last about three days and we were at the tail end of the celebration.

The families of the bride and groom stood at the doors welcoming the sea of people coming in from outside and the bride and groom entered from a room on the second story.  The bride wore a red veil and red sash around her dress.  The red is a tradition and is supposed to bring the couple good luck.  That was about all I could find out about it.

This is a very blurry photo because they had turned the lights out and entered on the other side of the room, but you can see the bright red veil that the bride wears coming down the stairs.  Then there are sparklers surrounding the couple and the groom removes the veil to present his bride.

Next the couple goes right into their first dance.  This is a photo of them dancing together.  Her dress was pretty westernized compared to the traditional Muslim dresses or the poofy glittery ones I’ve seen in bridal shops in Antalya.

Everyone was then invited to dance and this continued through most of the night.  Turkish dancing was a lesson.  Stretch your arms out like an eagle and shake your shoulders while doing some fancy footwork.  The men were going around asking other men to dance and would dance together with the groom on the front of the stage.  The bride would have a small circle of ladies or family dancing with her, but it was mostly about the groom which was different from home.  And like I said the men would ask the other men to dance while the women sat and watched, danced with friends, or occasionally danced with a loved one. 

We had heard that there would be food at the wedding, but once we saw the magnitude of guests we couldn’t imagine how on Earth they would be able to feed all of the people.  What ended up being served was Tang, water, and a small plate of tea cookies.  There was cake, but we are pretty sure it was sugarless and tasted more like a cardboard sponge cake.

There was a big cutting of the cake ceremony, but the cake was cardboard.  Ahmet, shown here, took a big knife and posed for photos and then the wait staff at the wedding hall had some of the real cake on standby for more photos.

As I said the only beverages on hand were different colored Tang and water.  The group from the marina eventually found themselves in a small café located right outside of the banquet hall where they proceeded to drain the place of cold beer.  I don’t think they were ready for the group of German, Swiss, English, and American guests that were accustomed to having alcohol at functions like this one.

This is at the little bar outside of the actual wedding.  From left to right: A couple from Sweden I have never met, Jaap from Holland, Winkler originally from Holland but is now a Berlin citizen, and Chris from Sweden. 

There were three full tables of boaters from the marina and then another table with the employees of the marina.  This is our table.  In the front is Stuart and Jenny from England, Dad and I, Bridget and Wolfgang from Switzerland, and a German couple and another Swiss couple I don’t actually know, and John and his wife Chris who is hidden at the end from London.  Behind us was the daycare area for the kids where they were handing out heart shaped balloons… I secretly wanted one of those.

This is Dad and I in the bar before the bus left to take us back.  We splurged and bought a bag of chips to have with our beers since no meal was being served and we hadn’t had a real dinner. 

The one thing we didn’t get photos of because Dad had been asked not to take any by this point, was the giving of the “gifts”.  It’s a Turkish custom for the parents of the bridge and groom to purchase furniture for their new home.  The couple gets all of those types of gifts from their parents so there is no real registering or anything like that.  What the friends and other family give are gold coins, gold bracelets, and cash.  There is a whole ceremony where everybody lines up and gives their blessing to the happy couple by putting gold bracelets on the bride and pinning 100TL bills to the groom.  By the end of the long line they were blinged out and weighed down with money.  Not a bad custom if you ask me.  We took up a collection for Ahmet at the marina where everyone who was going donated at least 20TL and we managed to get 710TL to give to the happy couple.

Overall I can say that there is almost nothing that I would do in the Turkish wedding fashion for my personal wedding, but it was a great experience and worked well for the couple which is awesome.