Marriage - French style

We were working in the garden during one of the rare breaks in the rain in April when Nicole, our neighbour who runs the farm with Dominique her husband, came down the drive to show us Awen, her new grandson, (three weeks old) and give us a wedding invite for the marriage of their oldest daughter, Sophie. She said it’s traditional in Bretagne to invite all the neighbours to a wedding (we hadn’t actually ever met Sophie – she lives in Angers). It was extremely kind of them to invite the auto-constructeur Rosbif neighbours to the wedding; the invite was to the civil ceremony in the Mairie followed by the church service and a vin d'honneur.

It was the first time we had been to a French wedding - lots of things were similar but there were a few puzzling and entertaining differences for us:

The couple arrived together in a specially decorated car that had seen better days - and probably wouldn't get through a Controle Technique ....

Arriving at the Mairie: L to R: Vincent, Vincent's mother, Dominique, Sophie, Vincent's father, Nicole

Note for English readers: In France the church and the State are completely separate and so the "official" marriage ceremony can only be performed by a representative of the State, in this case the Mayor. Actually in this case the mayor wasn't present so it was an ajoint to the mayor who conducted the service.

The ceremony wasn't nearly as solemn as we expected - everyone piled into the room at the Mairie trying to get the best place to take photos from - the prime place seemed to be behind the table looking over the ajoint's shoulder.. Those who couldn't get in chatted loudly to their friends in the foyer. I'd guess that the Maire isn't absent very often and it seemed like it was the ajoint's first marriage ceremony judging by the number of times he had to stop and thumb through the book he was reading from.

But everyone was in a good mood and the ceremony completed with Sophie and Vincent being declared as married and everyone applauding,

Not sure who was more hesitant - the newly married couple or the ajoint

Next, everyone left the Mairie and headed the 100m over to the church - it was our first time in a French church for a service and, I guess, we'd expected things to be a bit more solemn than at the Mairie. Not a bit of it - the bride and groom were led down the aisle by the priest to Snow Patrol's "Chasing Cars" - a bit different to "Here comes the Bride" - and the priest had to chase the same posse of amateur photographers  away from the altar area where they had taken up residence. The singing was good although only printing 50 service sheets when there were 200 in the church meant we weren't able to join in - maybe a good thing .... !

In the Noyal Muzillac church

After the service everyone walked over to the Salle de Jeune France for the vin d'honneur and in a convivial setting we met up again with the singer from Claudette's garden party last year. Instead of a Liste de Mariage people queued up to meet the bride and groom, wish them good luck and give them an envelope with money or a cheque, appropriately given Sophie's background these were then posted into an elegantly painted milk churn.. Being English we had brought them a gift that they couldn't post in the churn! 

During the vin d'honneur Lucien, Sophie's grandfather and our neighbour from over the road, came to talk to us and took care to introduce us to his new friend - an elegant lady who we have seen at his house a number of times ....