Weddings in Poland 2010

During the first couple of days in Poland, Linda and I were on our own. Our tour had not started. We had purposely left the time uncommitted to give a chance to get over jetlag and to allow for things like late arrival, which an earlier post showed was very possible.  On Saturday, July 24, we walked around primarily in the Old Town part of Warsaw. One thing we quickly noticed, every church had a wedding going on; and, as we spent the day walking around, every church was always having a wedding. And, every wedding had a chauffered old car for the bride and groom which had every door handle decorated with fresh flowers.

When on the private part of our tour, going to the Mozdzen home area, we asked our guides about what we had seen. True in every church there are so many weddings that on Saturdays, beginning at 8 AM, and Sunday, beginning at Noon, there is a wedding scheduled for every hour. At present old cars are the preferred mode of transportation for the newly weds. Weddings are scheduled as much as 2 years in advance to get a particular date and time.

Weddings are very expensive in the major cities, like Warsaw.  Weddings go on for 2-3 days beginning with the exchange of vows; and, the bride and groom are expected to be present till the very end of all celebrations. An average wedding costs 80-120,00 zloty (pronounced: z-wa-ty). The current exchange rate is 3.3 zloty per dollar or about $30,000.00 for an average wedding.  It is not unusual to have weddings cost 500,000 zloty ($140,000.00). Our guide telling us this, said that she has a 23 year old daughter who had been told that she will get 100,000 zloty for her wedding. She can spend it as she wishes.

Our guide also went on to say that most young people in Poland today do not get married, they just begin living together and become married by law automatically after 5 years.  They do not see any reason to get married in a church. However, that is not so true in the country towns, they get married and do not have such expensive weddings, even though the celebration still goes on for 2-3 days.