Day 221… Tuesday 31 October
Trying to arrange a wedding in Zambia has sadly been a little vexing. Although the legal jargon is very similar to UK law, the process is very different. Despite our best endeavours, the marriage vows had to take place at Chongwe district council offices but the marriage certificate would be post dated for 4th November the actual planned wedding day and therefore the marriage would be legal on that date. With the witnesses, wedding attire and rings all still in the UK, Sydney kindly agreed to be a witness and arranged for another witness to attend. Thought it appropriate to attend the council offices on Halloween. I was very tempted to wear a witches outfit 😊 Of course the day doesn’t go without a hitch (excuse the pun). Mrs Banda the wife of one of our witnesses was very concerned about her husband visiting the offices for a marriage and had called the police. Before proceedings began, a soldier with an AK47 turned up and checked with the marriage registrar just who was marrying whom. Deciding that the pending marriage was not a sham, the soldier left so we could proceed. Mrs Banda joined us to check all was above board and had a few cross words with her husband afterwards.
Allen’s perspective…
We had arranged to arrive at the offices for 2pm, although in true African fashion we arrived about 20 minutes late after having some lunch and picking up our friend Sydney. Once at the offices we then spent over 2 hours waiting for the registrar, Webby, to SLOWLY complete (incorrectly) the paperwork, have a fight with his printer, question us about the meaning behind Adam’s punishment in Genesis, and generally faff. The ‘ceremony’ was reasonably short and official, although made more comical by the Mrs Banda saga, something of much discussion now in Zambia. The photo above doesn’t do her facial expression justice… with a face like thunder the entire time. Then, once we finally finished around 5:30pm Webby had the cheek to ask us if we had anything for him.. so much for a ‘Enthusiastic Senior administrative officer’ (according to LinkedIn).