Wuhan, China

We only had a couple of days in mainland China, and most of that was taken up with wedding preparations for G&L. L took us to “Breakfast Street”, a street food area where we tried lots of yummy snacks and soup. One of my favourites was the grilled squid legs — tasty!

Since Wuhan isn’t a huge tourist town, we were given a lot of attention. R in particular, being a tall redhead, was frequently called out to by kiddies wanting to practice their English “hello”s.

There were even some kittycats to say hello to on the street:

The wedding day was huge — multiple different events and places, starting with a traditional ceremony at L’s mother’s place, where the guests were greeted with a band and dancers in the courtyard, before coming to see G and his groomsmen begging for admittance to the house.

Once the boys had bribed their way in past the bridesmaids and family (red packets FTW!) G had to formally ask for L’s hand in marriage and find a pair of wedding shoes hidden somewhere around the room.

They completed a tea ceremony with L’s mum, where G paid his respects and promised to look after L. Then we traipsed back to the hotel where the tea ceremony happened with our mum, with L promising to look after G. The car trip back was hilarious, as the three cameramen were driving like lunatics to try and get good video and pictures of the happy couple in their car. They hung out the window, drove on the wrong side of the road, but everyone seemed to take it in their stride as totally normal wedding behaviour.

Then came a “relaxed” lunch (of multiple courses and about 50 guests) and we were able to have a couple of free hours before the evening event: the reception. This was held in a reception centre where four or five weddings happen at once, so there are literally thousands of people wandering around trying to find the right wedding. While we were waiting for the action, we were treated to a slideshow of G&L having a photoshoot a couple of months before.

The reception speeches included a gameshow-style introduction of G to the crowd, where he made a speech in Mandarin, and answered trivia questions about L from the MC and from L’s best friend:

Then there was a more Western-style wedding ceremony with L in a white gown, and the two lovebirds walking the catwalk through the crowd.

Then time to eat! There was a huge amount of food on each table, with each person having only the smallest taste of each dish because of the sheer numbers of plates! One thing I learned was that Champagne isn’t a thing at Chinese weddings apparently, so we brought our own to toast the happy couple.

There seemed to be a set time for packup, and the leftovers were shovelled into bags to take home, and off we went! The boys and L decided karoke was on the cards, so we headed out again after changing out of our glad rags.

Karaoke isn’t generally my thing, but after a few fake vodka lolly water UDL type drinks (they came in four different colours but all tasted like bubblegum!) it was time to take the stage with my brother. We belted out “Sweet Child o’ Mine”, which opened the floodgates for the rest of the night. Strangely, the one my family is still teasing me about is “Barbie Girl”…

After who knows how long (the drinks were coming in in trolleys: there was beer, vodka, the UDL thingys…) we decided it was time to leave. I’d stumbled my way to the bathrooms and given a shock to the poor lady trying to clean it by tripping over the step at the door and faceplanting on the floor, which is always a good signal that it’s time to go home, especially in a place where all the other karaoke rooms were inhabited by quiet groups taking things very seriously. The Australian contingent was like walking into a madhouse, with the music as loud as it would go, the floor awash with bottles… yep, definitely time to take our loud celebration elsewhere.

L found some street food places still open, so we hunkered down for fried rice and meat sticks in the attempt to dilute some of the booze. Soon enough though, we retreated back to the hotel in order to nurse our impending hangovers.

Unfortunately, due to the night before, our second sightseeing day needed to be scratched, and we didn’t see the Yellow Crane Tower or the botanical gardens. We did manage to leave the hotel long enough to go out for dinner at a place where you pick food on sticks from the fridges, and cook them in a hot pot type of boiling, oily spicy soup in the middle of the table. We consumed a record number of sticks, but some of us were still feeling a little under the weather from the night before and found the oily, steamy atmosphere a bit difficult to cope with. It was such tasty food though! Hopefully we can visit it again next time.