Final Word: And who exactly are you?

by Paul Moore

Some years ago a colleague and I were attending a conference in England. It was over a weekend and on the Saturday the hotel also had a wedding booked in. Conferences can be tiresome, either waiting for your speaking slot or hanging around afterwards after you have spoken. I know one is supposed to listen to all the other speakers but sometimes it seems like too much work.

In the late evening of the Saturday my colleague and I found ourselves somewhat restless and he suggested we might gate crash the wedding. It did not occur to either of us that two Belfast accents in an English wedding might well arouse some suspicion and since the wedding meal was clearly over we ventured into the after dinner party/dance.

Like most weddings it was a dire affair but I do remember the canapés were good and we were almost caught when we were asked which family we were with and simultaneously he said, the bride, as I said the groom.

I have dined out a good deal telling that story but sadly it seems it has now been out-storyed.

The BBC reported last week the tale of one Andrew Millhouse. Andrew was invited to a wedding with his partner David and crucially for this story only knew his partner and the bride to be at the wedding. He was given the location in Ayrshire and duly turned up at the venue. Not knowing anyone and assuming his partner was with the bridal party he took his place and awaited the ceremony.

After the wedding the bride and groom noticed this man in the photographs whom they did not know. It took them four years to find out it was Andrew. His partner had given him the wrong venue and he was at the wrong wedding.

He is apparently not someone who is easily missed – as he said himself, “So you can see my big head in the back row, trying to get out the way.” But as he had been seen he had to double down and brazen it out taking time to drink a cola before making his exit and finding his way to the place where he should have been all along.

When the explanation emerged all at the first wedding were relieved since they thought they had been infiltrated by some mad stalker but the crucial comment came from Andrew, “It was much easier to crash a wedding than I’d have thought – I was in and out like an assassin, even if I only got a bottle of cola for it all!” An unfortunate turn of phrase for a wedding guest but an example of how easy it is to gate crash anywhere when everyone’s attention is on other things.

I am reminded of the West Ham supporter who, fully kitted out, jumped onto the pitch as the teams were entering and managed to get himself into the photographs with no one noticing until after the game was finished and West Ham had a player who could not be identified.

There is, however, an important aspect to all this nonsense.

As I have previously suggested, I have never met anyone who does not complain about having to attend a wedding. They are generally full of people, and family, whom you have known for too long and generally try desperately to avoid and once the ceremony is over you have to sit through interminable photographs and conversations until you get fed and then watch people getting progressively drunker.

Would it not be much preferable to go to weddings of people you do not know, meet new people and get to go home early once they realise you should not be there and you get thrown out? I can feel a whole new definition of the wedding planner being born.