In the morning Derek was quite relaxed considering the importance of this day. They got married in an old brick Church in Jyvaskyla. I was surprised when Derek said I would be standing next to Richard as one of the groomsmen. Finnish weddings typically have a Best-man and a Bridesmaid so I didn’t think I’d be included in the formal wedding ceremony but Derek wanted his friend Jerome and I to be up there with him so I thought that was a nice.
The one and only photograph I took inside the Church was of Panu flashing the Devil horns with giant painting of Jesus standing over his right shoulder. Panu may have hid those devil horns from the eyes of Mr. Christ but Panu wasn’t going to get through the evening without some kind of penalty of sin.
After they tied the knot, Derek and Riikka Versteeg jumped into a little Black English looking car with “suicide doors” I’ll have to find out exactly what kind of car was... The rest of us pilled into a bus and went to the wedding reception hall, which was a part of the same place we had the hot-tub party.
After some mingling and dinner, we heard some interesting speeches from Derek and Riikka’s parents. Riikka’s dad went first in English and then Finnish. He struggled on a few words here and there but got through it. One of kids...i thought it was Rudi but i've since been corrected by Tiina, the very proud mother of Nooa that it was her son who got restless in the middle of Mr.Laine's English speech and yelled out in Finnish, “Shut up Grandpa!” which got a big laugh. If you see my picture of Rudi you can see why i may have thought it was him. Anyways, It actually kind of broke the tension and Mr. Laine was able to finish his English speech a little looser after that. Up next to speak were Derek’s parents Tom & Alvina, and they also read their speeches in both English and Finnish, starting with Finnish.
The thing about reading and pronouncing another language is that if you mispronounce a single letter, the word can become something completely different with a completely different meaning. Somebody who doesn’t speak English might say “Nice to eat you” instead of “Nice to meet you”. Saying “nice to eat you” might be a little embarrassing and a little funny but it doesn’t come close to the Finnish Freudian Slip that Thomas Versteeg unknowingly made. Instead of welcoming Riikka, her parents, her 3 sisters and 2 brothers into the Versteeg family by saying, in Finnish, “I would like to welcome you all into my family” he said “I would like to welcome you all into my ass” Instead of saying “Perhe”, which means family, he said “Perse” which means ass in Finnish. When I heard him say it, I had no idea what he said, all I know is it was really funny and I would have to wait until he repeats it in English to get the joke. The girl next to me finally told me what he said and I got it.
Words of advise: read your foreign language speech to someone who’ll understand you before you read it to 80 or 90 people, or… don’t allow people who flash devil horns inside a church to translate it from English to Finnish for you. Maybe that was Christ’s way of getting back at Panu. Embarrass Derek’s dad so that Father and Son can convey the penalty of sin on him. It wasn’t anyone’s fault, it was a slip that anyone could have made and it’s just unfortunate that if you mispronounce the Finnish word “Family” that it just might come out as “Ass”. Good icebreaker though…
After the Dinner and speeches Derek and Riikka did some dancing with each other and each other’s family and things were starting to get going when –insert that man’s name here- (Rudy’s father) wearing yellow sunglasses and a long haired wig threw Riikka over his shoulder, put her in his car with a couple of Brits and drove off. Riikka was hoping this wouldn’t happen and Derek had no idea what was going on. The Finnish tradition is that the bride is stolen and isn’t returned until the Groom has earned the right to have her back after completing tasks suggested by his peers.
The first test was to name 10 things he loved about Riikka in 15 seconds. I don’t remember what he said but he completed it in about 10 seconds. It might sound easy but when you have a horde of women literally surrounding you, watching you and testing you, you better pass it…and he did.
Test number two was he had to dance. I don’t remember what song he was dancing to but if you look at the pictures it looks like the inside cover of the Saturday Night Fever album so I just think it was Stayin’ Alive. This was a dangerous test for Derek because he once tore his knee up dancing at the Roxy a few years ago. He was on crutches for a month. This time he tore up the dance floor.
Test number three made me cringe, I felt for Derek. The thought of being in Derek’s shoes for the third test made me ill. He had to get up on a drum kit and play something. As far as I knew, Derek has never once sat at a drum kit in his life… I’ve known Derek for ten years. If it was my wedding, and I was asked to sit at a piano or drum kit or pick up a guitar and sing a song to my new wife in front of her family and friends… I’d be dead meat. I’d be getting a divorce on my wedding day and that’s a fact. But Derek put on a brave face, sat down at the drum kit and kicked ass! I never knew he could play…
Riikka finally returned and everyone started dancing. If you know any guys from Finland then he’s probably a metal-head, someone who listens to Iron Maiden and Metallica. At one point in the night there were around 20-30 of us all singing “Enter Sandman” by Metallica. I never thought a song like that would ever work at a wedding but it did. The next song was “Smells like teen spirit” by Nirvana and it worked just as well as the last song. Another word of advice for a good wedding reception…play some metal!
The reception hall could only be booked until 1:00 so we all got back on the bus and headed downtown. Most of us were is good shape and hoping the night wouldn’t end so we decided to go to a nightclub, but I think one of us had a few too many. After getting off the bus one of our guys wasn’t feeling too well. The Fins certainly know how to drink but the ones who move to Canada for a few years and then come back home to Finland seem to have a mix of Canadian and Finnish reputations. This guy…Jesus how do I explain this… got arrested for public drunkenness, cementing our Canadian reputation in Europe. If you’ve seen the movie “Deuce Bigelow European Gigolo” then you may know what I mean by the Canadian reputation.
After all that it was a great day for Derek and Riikka and I’m sure every single person who attended had as good of a time as I did.
|  | 
|
