Fear and Loathing at the Big Apple Greek Wedding - Part 1

As I once read in the foreword of a book, I am surprised at how long it has taken me to get here. An old adage goes something like “good writers borrow, greats ones steal!” Thus, I feel entirely justified in opening like this, because it happens to be very, very true.

One piece of larceny still does not sit with me, the “Fear and Loathing…” used in the title. A tribute to the late and great Hunter S., my initial article featured the Hot Blonde, a Hostile Brunette, a bit of fear and a whole load of loathing. Thus did I justify it.

As these entries continue, however, the guilt has started to mount. If you have no idea what I am talking about as I write this, you know that whatever little phrase starts all these entries was a later addition. Currently I am toying with “Cruising and Shmoozing…” but my instincts are against it.

Anyway, none of this is particularly relevant right at this instant.

I am currently on a NJ Transit train heading for Point Pleasant Beach, a part of the Jersey Shore in the state of New Jersey, USA. My iPod is playing a random selection of individual songs stored on it.

“Ahh-ayehhhhm, waiting for my man…
Twenty six dollars in my hand,
Go the Lexington, 125,
Feel quick and dirty, more dead than alive.”

A few stops back the way was Red Bank, which I have been told is where Kevin Smith (of Clerks, Mallrats and Chasing Amy fame) is from. I had this desperate urge to leap off the train and immediately go hunting for the now-famous 7-11 store where Clerks was filmed, but I manfully and prudently quashed them as if it were a Soviet General with ability in Stalinist Russia.

Obviously, by the time you read this, all this is in the past, and therefore irrelevant.

One of my best, and oldest, friends, got married last Saturday. For some reason, he desired to have me in his wedding party. His wife, a perfectly matched Greek girl called Constantina, or Tina for short, hails from Dover, New Jersey.

Delighted and honoured to be asked, I agreed immediately, deciding to take a week’s holiday in New York City, one of my favourite places.

I love New York. I always have. Terrified I would be disappointed the first time I visited; the summer I spent there in 1998 is definitely one of my most memorable summers, even if it did kill my relationship with my girlfriend of the time.

I have a very unorthodox approach to New York City. One of the most vibrant and active cities on the planet, I love doing nothing there. I go into Manhattan to do some shopping, I chill out in my uncle’s apartment in Woodlawn, browse the internet, watch films on cable, and eat pizza.

This tends to be source of controversy with people, who feel I am squandering the opportunity to do other things, such as wandering around the Natural History Museum, or go to comedy clubs in the East Village.

I am now back in New York, having had an eventful 24-hour stay on the Jersey Shore, but more on that later. Monday Night Football is on the television, and the Philadelphia Eagles have started a pre-match 'fight' with the Atlanta Falcons. Needless to say, the show presenters are almost wetting themselves in the hype. Inexplicably, this has offended the drunken Flaming Redhead (with a nod to Paul Zimmerman of Sports Illustrated). It seems that sitting on a couch watching football is not 'manly' enough an activity for her and her friends.

Fortunately, since I am a gentleman and she is 'halfway in the bag' as they say over here, and it is 0400 in the morning, I did not have the heart to point out the logical fallacy in her criticism.

It seems very strange that it is just over a week ago that I arrived in New York for the wedding. It seems like so much longer. The Groom met us in JFK, superfluously informing us that Ireland had lost 1-0 to France. The pilot had announced the result as we landed, but it was gratifying to hear that Ireland had been unlucky.

It was obvious the Groom was mad for beer.

The week prior to the wedding was quite stressful for him, with the family spread across the city, and the assorted chores that weddings inevitably conjure had dragged him all across the city.

Unfortunately, we were all pretty wrecked and had all our bags with us. We went for some food in a bar near Grand Central, and he headed downtown as we went our separate directions.

Speaking to him the next day, he had hooked up with his family, and they all got absolutely hammered that night.

Thursday was 'wander around Manhattan and gloat at all my friends for not being in Manhattan' day. I love the City. Every single time I walk through Grand Central Station, I skip a breath. Every single time. I love that horrible diesel smell of the underground tracks, I love the warm and humid smell of midtown. I bought some comics and ate at KFC (I prefer the American one, I like the biscuits and the wings), and generally bummed about having myself quite the time.

We met up in Hoboken that evening to try on our wedding outfits.

Words cannot describe the view of Manhattan from Hoboken Pier, nor would photos do it justice. Having eaten (and kept a close eye on the NFL season opener between the Oakland Raiders at the New England Patriots), the Groom declared he was way too tired to have another night on the town, and so we all went our separate ways.

Now, as a write this entry, I am sitting on the floor in Terminal 4 of JFK Airport, valiantly trying to kill the time abundantly bestowed upon me by the five-hour-Hurricane-Ophelia induced flight delay.

It has been hard for me to sit down and write this for some reason, and already my friends have commented that I have not been in touch nearly as much as they have come to expect from me. The only reason I can give for this is that I have just had a fantastic week, and yet, there is little actual motivation for doing the writing, despite the fact that I desperately want to chronicle it all.

Our suits all fitted and organized, we travelled to Dover for the wedding. I had travelled by train once before in the US, going from Chicago to Milwaukee for GenCon 2000. I knew the rail system in the US was good, but I was quite unprepared for something this impressive.

Simply put, it is inexpensive and very efficient. Looking out the window on the Jersey side of the Hudson, I immediately switched my iPod over to “Woke Up this Morning” by Alabama 3, the theme tune to the Sopranos television show, and lost myself for four minutes or so as I watched the Manhattan skyline fade into the distance.

Having reached the hotel, I had a full double room to myself, noting with self-disgust the free broadband access available in the room. I had left my laptop behind me in New York, rationalizing that I would be too busy to use it. Raging with myself, I showered, changed, and joined up with the others for the wedding rehearsal.

I had no idea what to expect about the Greek Orthodox Church where the wedding ceremony was being performed. The Groom had told us the Bridesmaids were sound, attractive and taken, and his description was on the money.

From a purely ceremonial perspective, the Orthodox Church has a very different approach to weddings. Dogmatically speaking, the Orthodox and Catholic Churches are almost identical. Like most things, the differences are in the details.

Firstly, there is no Wedding Mass. The Wedding Ceremony is a ritual in its own right, and it lasts about an hour.

Secondly, the Orthodox Christians wear the wedding rings on their right hand. I am not sure why this is, but all their ceremonies and gear towards this. The Priest informed us that many switch it over to the more traditional left-hand after the ceremony, but it is supposed to be on the right.

Thirdly, their Priests can marry and have children.

Fourthly, their churches are amazing, especially in America.

Fifthly, the most important person in an Orthodox Wedding, after the Bride and Groom, is the Goombada, or Sponsor. This person (and spouse) will be the Godparent for the first child of the marriage. He also has a role to play during the ceremony, which I did not realize at the time.

One of the most surprising things about the entire wedding was how impressed I was by the Orthodox religion. In America anyway, the Churches function as both a place of worship, and as a community centre. Downstairs, underneath the church was a huge open area, which reminded me a lot like our Community Centre back in Drumlish, where I grew up. The Groom informed me that it is standard for the congregation to go downstairs after Mass (assuming that is what they call it, I never found out) and spend a while interacting with the rest of the Greek community.

The simple wisdom of allowing Priests to marry stunned me. The Priest was quite a young man, in his early forties I would imagine, and was very helpful and friendly. He lined us up, informed us of the routine for the following day, and told us how to walk down the aisle.

Inexplicably, as Partner I (more on that later) took my arm, I felt a huge surge of nerves well up inside me. My only guess at the reason is that this was the point it became real. The Groom, a man I’d known since before I started school, was getting married, and I was his Groomsman. We slowly walked down between the empty pews, separated at the altar, and waited for the rest.

The practice took around ten minutes, but the Bridesmaids very quickly informed us that it would take about an hour, and we stood the entire time. Stern instructions to not drink and eat a lot were given, lest some of us start to faint at the altar due to all the incense and warmth.

Once that was done, it was barbeque time at the Bride’s home. Naturally, all the other Irish guests were late, so the four of us were left to huddle in the corner, praying that people we knew would arrive soon, nervously and quietly talking to ourselves lest the Greeks notice the outsiders.

Finally, the Groom’s family arrived, and with them came the Crazy Croat. A friend of the Groom’s cousin, I had met her before, and had forgotten how attractive she was. Of course, her moniker was not for nothing, she is mad as a broom, but she was female, attractive, and fun.

Naturally enough, there was a problem. My friend had been with her. In the past, this would be a regrettable strikeout, but I have recently begun to adjust my philosophy in this regard. Besides, she was looking well fine, and is quite a lot of fun.

As I may have mentioned, I have never been to a Greek wedding before, so I was eager to learn the traditions. Also, I was expected to do the Greek wedding dance thing right at the start, so that had to be learned. There was to be no smashing of plates, however, which was disappointing. That I could do.

Almost immediately, the Greek music started and the Greek dancing began. The wedding dance is a very simple dance done in an infinite loop at weddings. The lead person holds a white towel in the left hand, and leads the way. The second person holds the other end of this towel and then people form a long chain, going in huge loop around whatever space is available. The steps are quite simple, yet look very complex, especially if you have no idea what you are at. Never one to shirk a challenge, and secretly proud of the Irish dancing I did with kilts in Scor when I was eighteen or so, I was determined to pick up the dance.

The steps are two steps forward, crossing the left leg behind the right, then back two steps, uncrossing them. Leading with the right, you then cross the left behind it again and then skip out the left and step forward left and right for eight steps, with the left leg again finishing behind the right. The dance then goes into an infinite loop.

All this time, the dancer’s hands are held straight out of the body. When done well by a bunch of Greek men and women who know what they are doing, it looks brilliant (more on that later).

I did not have the benefit of perspective on this, but of all the words that could be used to describe myself, the Groom (normally a good dancer, to be fair to him) and the three other wooden sticks colloquially known as the Groomsmen, I am pretty sure impressive is amongst them.

The night before the wedding, we invented the Greek Wedding Dance, Longford Edition.

This dance is even simpler.

You blunder along in a big circle with people who know what they are doing, step completely out of time with as little coordination as possible, trying desperately to avoid breaking the Greek girl’s toes. To break the monotony, change direction at completely random intervals in an honest attempt to simulate the swaying motion of the dance.

The lads gave up straight away, consoled by the fact that none of the other girl’s husbands had got it either. One of them, the husband of Partner I, had dubbed it the “Ten Hour Dance.” After about twenty minutes, I could understand why.

Your humble narrator, however, was made of sterner stuff.

Utterly determined to make my mark on the wedding, I resolve to learn the dance and be able to do it at the Wedding. Alas, this resolution came as the dancing ended, so I’d have to learn it AT the wedding.

Did I mention I had promised to drink at the wedding?

Still my tribulations were not yet behind me. Us being Irish, the singing began, and quite a few had remembered that I knew all the words to a “Boy Named Sue” by Johnny Cash. Naturally, the call came in mid-shmooze with the Crazy Croat. Never one to shy away from attention, but not particularly enthusiastic, especially with a guitar for backup, I wandered over to the group.

“Well my daddy left home when I was three,
And he didn’t leave much to Ma and me,
Just this old gee-tar and an empty bottle of booze.”

Everyone was singing a bit and laughing, and I was going great guns, when I realized the ENTIRE HOUSE, including the Greeks who had no English and had no idea what the fuck it was I was talking about, had gone silent to listen to me.

It freaked me out.

Around “Well it was Gattlingburg in mid-Jew-lie,” I began to get really self-conscious. Despite knowing the words, I began to second-guess myself, fluffed the words and stopped singing as my mind went blank. I completely fluffed it. I do not get embarrassed very often, so my face lit up the entire back garden. I desperately tried to finish it, but one of the Groomsmen started complaining, so I stopped before the end.

The cheering that ensued did little to salve my wounded pride.

Still, at least I did it, even if my less-than-impressive display had done little to improve my chances with the Crazy Croat.

Having availed of the Bride’s family’s hospitality for long enough, we Irish returned to the hotel, making a beeline for the bar, politely ignoring the fact that it had been closed for thirty minutes prior to our arrival. The barman, a pleasant balding man called something English name I cannot remember. Like Albert, but not.

I do remember it was about six or seven letters long and had an ‘l’ in it because he preferred the shortened version. Like Al, but not.

Lots of shorts ensued, much of it bought by Partner I’s husband, an Irish American guy whose family originally hailed from Armagh. The Crazy Croat and the Groom’s cousin had gone straight to bed, along with all the other Groomsmen, though not in the Biblical sense. Thus, I decided the only thing to do was get hammered with the Groom, on this, his last night of freedom:

G: What are you doing, Mick?
YHN: Well, I figured since you were getting married tomorrow, I’d like to have a drink with you.
G: Yeah, ya bollox!

Unfortunately, he wandered off outside at that point to talk to his mother, so I ended up drinking with a bunch of pissed, married men telling each other how great they all are.

At some point, the Groom decided enough was enough. He needed some sleep if he was going to get married. I took that as my cue and retired as well, seeking solace not in the arms of a warm-blooded lady with mischief on her mind, but several hard-backed volumes of “Ultimate Spiderman,” recently purchased in the city prior to the trip to Dover, New Jersey.