The last two months have been a complete blur, but now that I'm finally (and bittersweetly) back in Minnesota, I've had a bit of a chance to reflect on everything that has happened and how blessed Kris and I are.

Over 60 non-Ugandans (mostly from the U.S. and Canada) traveled to Uganda to attend our wedding. I know there were lots more people who would have loved to travel to Uganda, but couldn't for a variety of reasons including the high cost of plane tickets, not being able to secure time off work, or not being able to leave a beloved toddler behind for to weeks! There was also an additional 600+ people from or living in Uganda who celebrated with us on this monumental day.

The weeks leading up the wedding were definitely a stressful whirlwind of hundreds of last-"minute" details (that often took more than one minute given the way things work in Uganda!), and dozens of arrivals of guests who were newcomers to Uganda. But we had fun doing all of it, and with Kris there, we had fun together. I was incredibly overwhelmed by the network of support we have in Uganda--literally hundreds of people who were willing to help in whatever way they could to make our wedding a memorable and magical day.

The day of the wedding, I was completely calm. I didn't feel nervous, hot (despite the fact that others tell us it was a pretty warm day!), hungry, sweaty, tired (even though I was deep into a major sleep deprivation). I just felt calm, happy and immensely blessed.

So as not to somehow take away from the magic of this day, I will not detail the day's events but rather briefly reflect upon two moments of the day:

First, the mother-of-all-wedding-day-lines that was (at least to me) noticeably absent on that day: "You may now kiss the bride." We both knew that at the vast majority of Ugandan weddings, the newly married couple does not kiss, but rather exchanges hugs or--in the most traditional churches or families--handshakes. In contrast, I explained to Kris that almost every American girl looks forward to the moment of her wedding when the kiss is exchanged, that that moment is played up in every American movie that involves a wedding, and that many American wedding guests consider it as one of the most romantic and sentimental moments of the day.

Kris and I had to attend pre-marital counseling sessions at Namirembe preceding our marriage, which were...for lack of a better word...interesting. In a first counseling session, when we had to get our order of service approved, we nervously asked a very understanding reverend if the Church would allow us to kiss after we were officially married, explaining to him that it is a very special moment in American culture. His answer pleasantly surprised me--he said, of course it would be okay because we were entering a marriage that would require us to navigate through two cultures and two sets of traditions. He said if was important to me and my side of the family that that kiss be there, Kris should by all means honour that tradition by kissing his bride. We left the Church that day feeling great that we had been underestood, only to hear at the next counseling session from another reverend that we could "absolutely not" kiss each other at the wedding. This reverend seemed offended by our request and he told us that no one in the history of weddings at Namirembe Cathedral had ever kissed in church. He said that if we wanted to kiss at the reception that was up to us, but we were getting married in a very traditional church that simply did not allow such scandulous behaviour.

We left when I was quite disappointed. I was let down that this second reverend had not been understanding and had not understood how we viewed this as a blending of traditions. And I was annoyed that sharing a first kiss as husband and wife was considered scandalous and offensive, at least by this conservative reverend. Kris told me not to worry, that he would find a way to fix it.

Sure enough, on the wedding day, after the bishop proclaimed us husband and wife, he leaned forward to kiss his bride. On the one hand, this was an act of rebellion against an overly rigid church with more rules than you could list in a lifetime. On the other hand, it was Kris standing up for me to make sure that I had my moment, something romantic and sweet to look back on for decades to come. Of course the bishop didn't announce, "you may now kiss the bride." It was a spontaneous kiss, but a kiss nonetheless. So spontaneous and unexpected, in fact, that the professional photographers didn't even catch the moment on camera (although we are looking forward to watching the video so we can see the expression on the bishops's face!).

The other moment I want to write about happened during the cutting of the cake and it is the moment my mom has identified as her personal favourite. The cake is a huge deal at Ugandan weddings. I've written about Ugandan cake before (dense, rich, dark, long-lasting fruit cake covered in a hard "helmet" of icing), which is quite different from light and fluffy American cake with its soft, melt-in-your-moth frosting. There are also several traditions centered around cutting the cake that are of particular importance at Ugandan weddings. First is that individual cakes (large enough to serve 50 people) are presented to important guests at your wedding. There is a whole politics behind who gets a cake at your wedding, and getting this list wrong may seriously offend a key person who did not receive a cake to take home. So the cakes are wrapped and then there's a whole ceremony around handing them out, one by one, to these VIP guests and people who have helped a lot during the wedding (parents, youth wedding committee, adult wedding committee, important relatives, bridal party, etc).

Another very important cake-moment at Ugandan weddings is when, after cutting the cake, the bride kneels down to serve her new husband a bite of their cake. For months leading up to the wedding, many people were asking me if I was planning to kneel. I avoided answering these questions, but listened to a range of opinions that ranged from kneel for him to show respect for his culture, to don't kneel as an act of liberation for women! Kneeling is common in Ugandan culture (children kneel for their parents, traditionally wives kneeled for their husbands, etc). Kneeling is said to be a sign of respect rather than a sign of subordination, as it would be viewed by many Americans. In day-to-day Ugandan life, I never knelt for anyone, always maintaining that it was not a part of my culture. This was never a problem for me. However, knowing that the kneeling during the cake feeding moment was of particular importance at Ugandan weddings, I knew I would have to deal with the issue. Kris and I discussed it in advance and made a secret plan that we didn't reveal to anyone.

At the reception, to the surprise of many guests, I kneeled when I served Kris his wedding cake. It was something I wanted to do, a symbolic gesture to show my respect for Ugandan culture and traditions. Then, a few moments later when it was time for Kris to serve me my bite, he kneeled down for me! The whole audience - Ugandans and Americans - were blown away by this gesture. While it is extremely common, and even expected for women to kneel for their husbands, I don't know of a single case when a man has knelt for his new wife. As for me, I felt like a queen with the most respectful husband! By both kneeling for one another, we felt that we had honored a Ugandan tradition at the same time that we showed our belief that men and women should be treated equally.