personals -

Dear cousin Bob, Weddings are joyous occasions and I had the opportunity to attend one not long ago. This is a special day that belongs to the bride and it is the bride’s prerogative to make it as beautiful, memorable and romantic as possible.

In order to achieve the ultimate romantic occasion, the right location is vital and the wedding I was invited to was organised at a very special and romantic spot - the beach at Swakopmund. We were welcomed with champagne and everyone was casually dressed in white and barefoot, as per the invite. Waiting for the bride, we mingled under perfect sunny sky, constantly spitting out the sand that somehow found its way into the champagne.

The bride appeared looking radiant in a dress made of some sort of delicate, floating material that billowed in soft waves and swirls in the soft breeze that started blowing as if on command. She wafted towards the groom, hair a halo around her head. They smiled adoringly at one another as the choppy wind blew everybody’s hair and clothes into disarray, and the minister launched into his sermon - which went unheard as his words disappeared in the wind.

The salt spray started plastering clothes and hair to bodies and sand turned the smiles into sandfilled, gritting grimaces. Parents were hanging onto their kids to stop them from blowing away and the bride’s carefully applied make-up was being abraded by the howling wind. She was still smiling bravely, or it was it the force of the gale-force wind drawing her cheeks back. The mist started rolling in from the sea in impressive banks of roiling white.

The bride was still smiling bravely with seawater streaming from her soggy, drenched dress. The groom was smiling at his bride myopically as his glasses, wig, wallet and the best man were whipped away by the wind. Luckily the mist soon obscured everything except the sand-encrusted teeth of the smiling bridal couple - although it might have been the lights of a ship being stranded by the raging storm. Huge waves were pounding the beach though without deterring some fisherman that would later claim there was only a light breeze blowing at the time - but the big one still got away.

As it happens along our unpredictable coast, the wind suddenly stopped, the mist disappeared and it was a perfect sunny day again in no time. The bride and groom still stood clutching each other, clothes in tatters but still smiling through tears and pretending that it had been the most perfectly romantic wedding ever. On their wedding day, brides are can be tougher than Rambo.

The minister was found a week later almost at the Angolan border, cowering behind a rock and eating a raw galjoen. He was gibbering about only ever doing funerals in future. Oh yes, most of the wedding presents were found off the coast of Spain. Until next time your cousin Kapana