I’m going to post a lot from this wedding, not only because I spent five days in transit getting there and back, and had the wildest time, but also because Heather and Mike just are rock ‘n roll. Not the kind of rock ‘n roll that they play on the radio but the kind of swagger that the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion brings to a sweaty night on the town. Kick-ass-take-no-prisoners-don’t-settle-for-anything-that-isn’t-out-there-on-the-edge, could be Mike and Heather’s motto – of course its way too long to be a motto, and it would never fit on the family crest, but you get the idea. Who else would fly along with their four closest friends, past the international dateline, get into some helicopters on the cusp of a storm, stand on the edge of cliff in winds that would make superman rethink red as part of his costume, and promise to be together for ever. We won’t even get into the top 10 things that you’d never hear at a wedding – my fav being … that wasn’t a carrot. It was surreal, and on the edge, and rock ‘n roll and I still can’t believe that it happened. We need photographic evidence dammit.

Every year I take on two or three international weddings, and I’m grateful to have been able to go to this one.

from my journal:

Not really sure how many hours have passed, or even what day it is. The flight board says Monday, so I’ve been traveling for three days, but three days where and in what time zone? The large number of tranqs I’ve been downing as we keep hitting turbulence are making the memories a little soft at the edges. I’m about 10 time zones away from where I started, about an hour away, by fast boat, from the international dateline where you actually go a day into the past.

I’m beyond tired, a greasy Spanish looking guy that sat next to me on the plane from Joburg, had taken off his shoes and let the smell of his soaks permeate into the economy seating, the woman behind me kept kicking my chair (apparently its ok to do that in economy), and not even the tranqs I had taken had done anything for my sleep patterns.

I’ve been on steady diet of airline food, tranqs, so that I get on the plane and stay on it, and caffeine, so that I don’t get grumpy and annoy the immigration officials who are still beelining for me despite the fact that I’ve shaved off the goatee and covered up the tattoos. Today, biosecurity has made me unpack my bag and I’ve been selected for the random bag swab for explosives.

Its about 4am, local time, at the Christchurch airport and I’m gulping a large cappuccino that in my chronic jet lag I tried to pay for with a 10 pula note. There are people sleeping huddled on the airport floor. Some are in sleeping bags, some are wrapped in blankets and towels. Its freezing in here. They all seem to be huddled around the electrical outlets, laptops and ipods recharging. I contemplate finding a hotel for the night, but my flight leaves in four hours, I decide to join them. Only six more hours until I land in Queenstown. I’ll sleep then. The caffeine is slowly drip drip dripping into my veins. In a couple of hours I will be in a plane with propellers hitting serious turbulence, the guy next to me pulling out a book of Psalms and mumbling the words … this does nothing to alleviate my fear of flying.

On my way back from a very crazy cool wedding in New Zealand – Frodo must have frozen his ass off out here. Give me a day or two to recover from jet lag and I’ll start replying to the emails.