Wedding Ceremony (結婚式) - Is it worth it?

Over the weekend I went to a wedding ceremony- called a "kekkonshiki" in Japanese. This was a traditional American-style affair, and I had a great time. There was all of the things a usual wedding has- musicians, a flowergirl, "you may kiss the bride," a glorious view of the beach, a table with wedding photos, a reception with music and dancing, and the most important, a loving bride and groom. Optional things that weren't included this time were a chocolate fountain, photo booth, or open bar. But to me, good for them, because those latter things are part of the wastefulness of weddings- they're just sort of putting up a sign of wealth, a show of wealth for the sake of showing that one is wealthy, which I think is wasteful (もったいない). In fact, many people argue that having a wedding is unnecessary, and you might as well spend money on a house, or the honeymoon, which I'm starting to agree. Based on everything I've heard- the wedding is more for the guests- the guests have a lot of fun, which I've had and will continue to have (it's wedding season, after all, and I have another wedding coming up this weekend. According to the married couples I've talked to, their feelings after having had the wedding vary from "it was too expensive- I dropped $40 grand in one one day!) to "I barely remember it, it was a blur," "Looking back at the photos I really didn't recognize some of the guests that were there" to simply "I made a big mistake."

I don't consider myself necessarily "cheap" or penny-pinching, but I do like to get the best value in things, and I think the wedding business is one big......yup, if you've read this blog you guessed it....pyramid scheme. I mean, to be married is one thing, finding one's partner life and making the commitment and sharing one's love and getting the tax benefit from it by making it official, but is a wedding really necessary to show that? I think society (or the wedding industry) has ingrained this sense of "it's not official until you've been married at a wedding" and a sense of accomplishment and success to the idea of a wedding, and it leads to a LOT of excess. Why can't you just invite all of your friends to a barbeque at the park or something? That seems to entail a lot less hassle and more importantly financial distress, and most importantly, time. I've heard people spend a whole year in advance planning the wedding, figuring out who to invite, what song to walk down the aisle to, what should be included in the registry....I mean, are those things really improving one's livelihood or contributing to society in anyway, except to have one big party for half a day? I mean, I get upset if I waste a few hours time, not to mention a whole year planning for something that lasts one day and costs me half a year's salary. Sure you only need to do it once in a lifetime (ideally, that is) but it definitely reminds me of the "everyone's doing it, so it must be cool" idea from high school. 

For me, I'm still planning on having a wedding "to celebrate the joyous occasion," but I could definitely be convinced by a loving wife (hopefully, cross fingers!) NOT to have a wedding and just go to Aruba or somewhere exotic instead. Rant completed. 

I also went to a Bar association dinner over the weekend- if you want to talk about wasteful, THAT was wasteful!