So, the Royal wedding has now finally passed us by and I can’t help but wonder how extreme the post wedding blues will be for a bride with a wedding that size? Or does the official entry to the Royal family with the almost certainty of one day being Queen of England counteract those post wedding blues somewhat!
Amazingly Niue was a feature in the run up to the wedding with their very own limited addition wedding stamp with a perforation line separating the happy couple. Of all the small remote countries to have played such a part as to release a controversial stamp I had to smile that it was the small remote island we happen to be living on at the time, makes the world seem that little bit smaller!
This is as far though as Niue went in marking the happy occasion, we had no street parties, no bunting, no one dressed in drag or walking around in plastic tiaras, what we did have was the closing concert for the arts festival which has been on this week, a small (possibly the size of Wills & Kate’s reception) affair under the stars in Alofi with many Niuen’s returning from overseas to perform in this very impressive small scale arts festival in their home country. There’s an awful lot of love and respect in Niue and for Niue, Niuen’s and visitors alike, and it was nice to witness this last night.
The top Niuen made big would easily be Che Fu, who until a fortnight ago I had never heard of. But on Tuesday night we were treated to a private gig by him, his band and his Dad. The NZ contractors working for us had all chipped together and bid on this prize at a charity auction for the festival a couple of weeks ago and had put the night on for everyone they’ve met over here. And a top night it was too, Che Fu was excellent and his Dad was absolutely captivating. Surprisingly Che Fu had not been to Niue before and found the whole experience incredibly touching and has discovered a spiritual connection with the place it seems he wasn’t expecting, to the point that he decided to get married here – and did! You heard it here first!
So other than mixing with the stars and pondering the post wedding mood of the future King & Queen of England life in Niue is continuing to treat us kindly. The weather is more settled with less rain and is cooling off in the mornings and evenings (not enough to want to put a pair of jeans on or anything drastic like that though!), more and more people around the island know us now which is nice but also means I have to pay that much more attention when driving.
In Niue it is customary to acknowledge pretty much everyone you pass when driving, a bit like you would going for a long walk in the countryside or the bush where you don’t see that many people. Sometimes this acknowledgement is just a raised finger, sometimes a whole hand with a nod or smile, and sometimes a full two handed big smiles full on wave. I find your mood varies day to day with the kind of wave you might use depending on how distracted/hot/tired/hungry you might be and how many cars you actually see. So the problem with knowing more people around the island is that you don’t want to seem rude with a mere raised finger when just the evening before you were having a great get to know each other conversation. Sadly though I always seem to notice at the last minute that I actually know them – and everyone drives very similar cars, so I’m working on number plates at the moment and trying to recognise everyone that way as of course they all have a massively unfair advantage with me pootling along in my nice new shiny Golf sticking out like a sore thumb!
I know most of you were obviously thinking of us yesterday when the Royal’s wed in a far more formal way than we went for 6 years ago to the dot (time as well – I couldn’t believe it!) but at least they had the good grace to wed in a different time zone so we’ve had today to remember and celebrate our wedding and marriage in peace, tonight we’ll be heading out for dinner, leaving Daisy behind with the babysitter. I wonder what Wills and Kate will be doing 6 years from now – if someone had told us we’d be living in small Pacific island 6 years from our wedding I’m not sure I’d have believed them and I’d certainly of wondered how on earth that would come to be – it’s a funny old life!
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