Day 99: Korea's Las Vegas

If you think Las Vegas is a one of a kind place, think again! If you think that getting hitched at some tacky house of love from an Elvis impersonator is something only found in Las Vegas, you'd be wrong! Guys and dolls, Korea has places just as wacky and tacky, if not more so because they consider it totally legitimate and in no way an improper way to tie the knot. We call them 'wedding halls', and if you think weddings are about a union of two people with God, then you've obviously not been to a Korean one. In essence, it's a performance, and a rather expensive one at that. We can't all be Chelsea and spend three million dollars on our wedding, but Koreans sure as hell try! Basically, the ceremony and the reception are merged into one massive party where you eat while they get married, and let me tell you, this is a brilliant idea! But what gets me are these wedding halls, especially how crazy they can get. This picture is just one, and let me say it's quite normal compared to other ones. Castles, palaces, and 'starry night at the prom' are but a few of the thematic wedding halls that exist in Korea. I can see over zealous couples loving this idea, but when the parents are the ones paying for it I find it hard to believe that they are on board with their children getting married in a place that looks like it was taken from the castle at Elsinore. But it happens! Every day at that! I would go on and on about getting married in Korea, but besides the money they spend on it, the lack of 'religion' from the ceremony, the fact that guests have to give them money and they have a table outside the hall where they collect it, and that the 'walking down the aisle' is more like 'posing on the catwalk', it's pretty uneventful.