I begin this post with a picture of Ligu, Millie’s dog, since he played an instrumental part in their union. While working in Seattle, David took notice of a beautiful woman at his bus stop. He could do nothing about it until one day, happily, the woman appeared at the bus stop with a little white dog in tow. David, having dog sat for friends, felt qualified to approach the woman through her beloved beast. He actually recounts the story with his own musical composition and animation in the intro to their wedding website.
One of the first things Millie and David told me about their wedding was that it was important that the day be captured spontaneously and that there would be no time for a portrait session. Of course I am used to shooting ‘PJ’ (short for the fairly overused ‘photojournalistic’ in the biz) but I wasn’t convinced that they knew what they were doing not scheduling time for a portrait session. That was until I saw the massive book of portraits on display at their reception at the UBC Boathouse. In Asia it is common for couples to have wedding photos taken before the wedding… lots of them… think two or three days, a dozen outfits, makeup/hair changes throughout those days. It’s really quite impressive, but I could imagine that they were tired of posing—and although I would approach the portrait session quite differently, it was lovely to spend the whole day PJ too. There were, after all, two tea ceremonies, three outfits, dance and musical numbers, and strange door games. I’ll explain with a little intertextual commentary:
Bridesmaids defending the door.
Once David was inside, he and his men had several more mildly humiliating tasks to perform. One involved jelly beans and whipped cream which is too unsavoury for this blog. This one I thought was quite clever. Blindfolded groomsmen had to lipstick him so he could add his ‘O’ shaped lip marks to complete a double happiness sign. Good, eh?
Tea ceremony at the bride’s home.
After the tea ceremony with the groom’s family, David’s father expresses his best wishes.
Bling tweaking.
Millie gets into her white dress for the ceremony out on the dock, which is a big slab of concrete almost flush with the river. River water comes over the side at times.
The UBC Boathouse was decked out in pink and white outside and in.
Although Ligu was not able to attend the reception, his presence was felt.
Millie enjoys a serenade.
