Egyptian Wedding – with a touch of English & Welsh
When I first met Jean and her Mother at a pre-wedding meeting at St. Pierre Hotel in Chepstow, I was grilled to make sure I was prepared for what was to be a huge wedding.
“There will be a lot of people at my wedding” the bride, Jean, warned me before the day, “Egyptian weddings are pretty full on, are you sure you can handle this crowd?!”
Well a crowd it certainly was! Hundreds of people filled the ostentatious church ceremony in Abergavenny, and what a colourful, charismatic crowd of the most loving and warm people ever. The ceremony was a traditional Welsh church affair, complete with Welsh make voice choir to set the ambience. We then travelled through the Welsh valley winding roads to St. Pierre, a regular haunt of mine, for the afternoon celebrations. The day was an eclectic mix of Welsh, English and Egyptian touches, with all three flags blowing from the turrets at St. Pierre. It was a beautiful, light and airy October day.
Here is Jean and Ben’s story in photographs.