I am not the person with a lot of friends, nor do I get the chance to attend lots of weddings during my stay on this planet. However, last weekend I was blessed to attend the wedding of a former college classmate who changed my perspective a lot about this kind of event.
Actually, my friend did not expect me and my sister be able to attend her wedding for two reasons: one is, that we are living around 500km apart and that resulted in a 7 hours long drive on the way to her homeplace, and secondly, that on Monday (1st September) it was going to be my sister and I's birthday, so she assumed that we will take advantage of that weekend to celebrate the new level achieved.
However, September is a special month not just for me and my sister being our birthday, but also because we have quite a few other family members born in the same month, and it's been a few years already since we all pick a weekend to use to celebrate all of us, rent a chalet somewhere in the mountains, and meet after a while if this haven't been possible during the rest of the year. So after speaking with our family members that we will be busy that weekend (29-31st August) with our friend's wedding, we picked the 12-14th September weekend to celebrate all of us, so there won't be any reason for any of us to miss the chance of attending our celebration.
At first, we wanted to take the train on the way to Galati, where the wedding was going to take place, but we had no direct route from Sibiu to there and it would have resulted in about 16 hours spent on the road, which would have made us hard to be able to party anymore after all the fatigue gathered on the way there.
That's when our parents decided to take us there, having our father drive all the way to Galati and then back to Sibiu, as an excuse that this is also an opportunity for them to see Galati, as it was one of the few cities we hadn't visited before.
There aren't many stories to be said about the way there, as no important event occurred on the way and we also had no highway at all (Romania has very few highways, sadly), so we ended up crossing tens of cities and villages that didn't stand themselves in any way.
Once we reached Galati, though, things were a bit different as it's a city with an opening to the Danube and the view was stunning. It almost felt like being on a vacation rather than attending a wedding.
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Unfortunately, we arrived in Galati at around 4 PM, so we missed the religious wedding from 3 PM, but took advantage of the time left to rest, socialise with the friends we hadn't seen for years and then get ready for the party that was set to start at 8 PM.
I never felt comfortable wearing dresses, so the moments when I get to wear one are quite rare. Not because I don't like how they fit on my body, but because I feel like I don't know how to wear them. And there is no chance to wear something that makes you feel uncomfortable, especially since you should be ready to dance and have fun till the morning. Hence why I am a person who dresses up in costumes pretty often.
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When we arrived at the place where the party was about to start, we were welcomed by an emotional welcoming panel stating: You can travel all around the globe, but the place where you feel the happiest is still next to your loved ones.
The interesting part is that both the bride and groom are very friendly people, and that's how, on their wedding, there were people coming from 15 different countries. Yet a new thing, I believe, for anyone attending a wedding. But the most beautiful art was that you could see so many different nationalities and cultures dance and have fun all under the same roof, where the language spoken did not represent a barrier, but actually made things a lot more interesting. At the table I was sitting I had a very lovely girl from Turkey and my sister's boyfriend from Lithuania. There were around 50 people from foreign countries among the total of 200 people attending the wedding, so you could see interesting faces at all the tables.
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Once all the invited people were in, the party was opened by the bride and groom having their dance, followed by lots of great music that kept most of the people dancing till 5 AM in the morning, almost forgetting about food and capturing this beautiful moment in pictures.
I am also guilty for not taking too many pictures, especially with the plates that looked and tasted stunning, but when you attend such a beautiful moment, it's hard to remember about the phone or any of your habits with so many happy people all around.
Anyway, I decided to name this blog post True Love Exists because both my friend and her husband represent for me the visual definition of what love actually means. In 2022, with just one night before our flight to Venice, Rebeca announced me and my sister that she's in Sibiu and would like to meet up even for just a couple of hours, so when we met we caught up with a lot of events in each other's life since we didn't meet so often after moving away from the city where we followed our university studies. Among many things discussed, she was also sad that she has just a couple of years left before being 30 years old and that she still didn't have a relationship, being a person who thought about her life at this age a lot differently from what it was looking like at that time. We tried our best to encourage, but we all know that no matter how much advice you give, you will never be able to heal one's soul entirely.
One year later, at exactly the same time of the year, she was again in Sibiu and wanted to meet, but surprise! She was accompanied by a lovely boy who presented to us as not just her boyfriend but also her fiancé, having the wedding set to happen in 2 years already. "Things moved pretty fast!" we thought, but the reality is that there is no amount of time that can predict when things should happen, as the best sign to determine all of this is nothing but what you feel and what your heart says. And no doubt they got all the signs needed to take this step, the happiness being able to be seen on both their faces that shone so powerfully.
It's been one week already since I attended their wedding, and all the happiness, freedom and atmosphere in general still bring a smile to my face. I had attended a few weddings before, but none of them felt as special as their moment. In the end, I think it's not even about the traditions you keep during your wedding moment, the people you have all around, or anything else, because if you are able to shine so brightly during this unique moment in one's life, most likely it will become "contagious" and make the whole night a memorable one.
We left the party at around 5 AM in the morning, and despite having two years in a row since I fell asleep between 10-10:30 PM because of my cats, I really felt no need for sleep for the rest of the night, being way too excited for everything good I've seen happening in my friend's life. And I can only pray for at least as much happiness as I've seen on her face to also happen with me when, and if, this moment ever comes.
Gabriela Travels is the FOUNDER of "Festival Mania" who started this community from the passion of attending various festivals and with the purpose of encouraging more people to explore festivals all around the world and share their experiences.
At the same time, Gabriela is an independent Graphic Design Freelancer since 2019 completing over 600+ orders in this time and collaborating with various businesses and people from all over the globe.
Additionally, Gabriela has her own corner on the internet since 2017 where she writes various articles for her blog, the most popular being the travel ones (300+ articles written on this field), but also approaching other topics as well, like game reviews, lets plays, movie and series reviews, photography posts, cooking recipes and more, boosting the total number of articles written to 750+ blog posts.
Gabriela is also a gamer since she was 11 years old and gaming remains one of her biggest passions along with traveling, owning a YouTube channel for each of the two.