I Now Pronounce You...Broke

I've never been accused of being a romantic guy...and probably never will be. Love and romance seem to call for extravagant gestures to prove the undying nature of the affection, but, truthfully, I always thought they were somewhat fake: insecure people trying to make a statement that they could not make with words or actions. I'll admit to being somewhat cheap as well, but that's just now. My sweetie's first "engagement" ring came from a gumball machine, and even the first "real" ring had a diamond so small that her friends all thought THAT one came from a gumball machine as well. Flowers? not me...they just wither and die, creating (for me) a potentially painful depiction of what COULD happen over time to a relationship (as well as that cheap thing). I remember bringing flowers to the hospital room after our first child was born: I stopped in a field and picked some wildflowers to present the new mommy. Cheap or sentimentally thoughtful? You decide.
Anyway, I was left shaking my head by Zhao Peng today. That guy is in for a pressur-filled married life, if you ask me.
Peng, from Jilin Province in China, didn't want the traditional wedding with a dinner and an orchestra (or polka band, I presume). Still, he wanted to do something on a grand scale to impress his bride so he combined his wedding with a record for the Guinness Book of Records folks.
With the help of his aunt, a seamstress, Peng designed and constructed a wedding gown that was 7,083 feet LONG and covered with 9,999 silk roses. Really. It took 200 guests 3 hours to unroll it at the ceremony. Total cost for the wear-it-only-once dress? 40,000 yuan ($5800)
How does this compare to what we could spend here? I have no idea, but an Oleg Cassini gown on EBay (where else?) was a mere thousand bucks, while a gown decorated with 1,000 Swarovski stones would be a mere $4000. Uh...yeah.
In case you're wondering, the old record for longest wedding gown was set in April of 2009 in Bucharest and measured a mere 5,180 feet long.
I get the grandness of the gesture, but the groom's mother was a bit less impressed. She said it was a waste of money.
My thought? What's he going to have to do for anniversary gifts? I don't give this one very long. After all, how can he top this?