CHOOSING YOUR REFLECTION TITLE: Dress Without Stress DURATION: 24:47 Getting married is an event that holds a different meaning for everyone. For some, itÕs based on religious traditions, and for others itÕs a validation of an earlier choice they made to live with that special someone they love.Ê Hi, IÕm Lauren, and welcome to Choosing Your Reflection; a series of discussions that reflect upon the reasons we have for choosing our wedding day outfits.Ê Our guests are diverse, but they all share a common journey.Ê As they share their stories, theyÕll help us unravel the mystique that exists around choosing that special outfit, and what they learned about themselves along the way. Alexandra: My name is Alexandra and I'm 28 years old. I was born and raised in Canada, where I also did my university studies and degree in theater acting, and also where I met my now husband. We met in my third year of university and his first year of his master's and both finished our studies at the same time. We met via two common friends of ours. They invited us both to the same dancing event. And at the time, I was really into salsa dancing. And I was taking salsa dance lessons with these two friends of ours now and my husband was just a really good dancer. He had never taken salsa lessons but he just got the beat right away. He got the point and he could just dance better than like those guys that have taken lessons for a while. When I saw him for the first time at the event, there was like a little mini buffet there and he was just like eating. He was just like gathering up all the little stuff he could to eat. But granted in his defense, the average age at this event was like 65 years old. We were like in our 20s at the time and I was just like also confused as to why I was invited to this event. But it actually ended up being a really great night because I met him. And for me, the first time I saw him I É like I felt really, like he was a good É I don't I just felt like he was a good person. And I really liked him a lot after the first meeting. So that's how we met and then subsequently we would go to dance events every single week for the next year and a half that we were still in Canada. We had a club that we would go to called On The Rocks and every Thursday night was salsa and Latin night, so we were there every Thursday. And then there was events around the city Saturdays and Sundays. So that's really how we spent the first year and a half of our relationship was just dancing. At the time, I really wanted to move to Paris. It was my dream to go study theater in Paris and to try to do film in Paris. In Paris, in Paris, everything was about Paris É about France! So when I got into the school that I applied to my husband also, well my now husband, my boyfriend at the time, said he would also try to get into a university program in Europe. And there was a really good one in the Netherlands which he managed to get into. But if he hadn't gotten to that one, then he would have also come to France with me. But he did get into that one. So then we both moved to Europe together a year into our relationship. I moved to France, obviously, and he moved to the Netherlands. And yeah, I lived in France for two and a half years. So we obviously did long distance for that time. And yeah, as I was saying, I just continued with my theater studies. I did a few shows, I tried to get into film and to navigate Parisian life as best as I could. And then two and a half years later, it was getting pretty hard to be apart so I decided to move to the Netherlands since my husband still had two more years left of his work/degree because he did a PhD degree, but it was also considered a working position. So I moved to the Netherlands, where we lived together for two and a half years and a series of somehow unfortunate events happened. It was just super hard to get work in the Netherlands and it was really poorly paid. All acting work was extremely poorly paid and difficult to come by. But that winter in 2017 when I moved there, we did our first trip to Iran because my husband is Iranian. And it was in Iran that he proposed to me, which was pretty exciting because it really was a surprise and it was really well kind of orchestrated. It was my birthday and a few weeks before he had said he was going to the dentist so his sister and I went to hang out. And then that night on my birthday everybody in the house was like bustling around. And everyone was like putting on makeup and dressing up really nice. And I was just like, ÒMaybe like I should dress upÓ because I was just wearing like normal clothes but I É like his sister was just going full out. And I was like, ÒI don't really know what this is about, because it's my birthday!Ó And then at like 9pm, they went out to get a really nice birthday cake. And I was like, well, but it's 9pm. And they were like, ÒYeah, it's okay.Ó And they also went out to buy me a gift. And then they came back and they sang Happy Birthday to me. The cake part is important to me on my birthday. I feel like if I don't have a cake, I haven't really had a birthday. And then, after I like, made my wish, I just wanted to like sit down and eat some cake, but his sister was like, ÒNo, no, no, we have to start dancing now.Ó And I was like, ÒOh, okay.Ó So I was like, ÒOkay, let's dance.Ó So we got up and we started dancing, and then they turned the lights off. And like they tried to make it kind of É like a club type of atmosphere, which was É it was cute. It was really fun because it was just us, it was the family. And then his dad came up to me all of a sudden and he was like dancing. And he was like, ÒAre you happy? Are you having a good time?Ó And he was like, really happy. Like, he was, like, so happy that I was kind of like confused by why he was reacting like that. I was like, ÒYeah, yeah, yeah, great!Ó And he was like, ÒOkay, well, we have one more surprise for you.Ó And then he got out of the way and my husband was on one knee with the ring box open. And I was just like, stunned because I really wasn't expecting it even a little bit. Like it wasn't even on my mind. So that was really nice. And the ring box was the other way around because he was super nervous. So the ring was like, hanging there instead of like proper, it was like hanging. And his voice was shaking. It was a really, really nice moment! And then I didn't sleep for that whole night. I was way too excited, but he slept like a baby because he had been nervous for like weeks. So that was sweet. So we were engaged for over a year, and then we kind of decided out of the blue É not out of the blue but we decided in like February I think 2018 we decided we'll get married in August 2018. We had the wedding in Canada. And it was due to a series of things that my mom was gonna move away from the town where she was living. And most of our friends were close to that area. We also wanted to do it in the town because we knew it would cost us less money than if we did it in a city. So we decided six months is enough time to plan a wedding and we can totally do it. And so we did. We started planning, which was a lot easier I have to say É like planning a wedding in a small town, because you you don't have like 17 halls to choose from. There's just one. So thatÕs the one! And we have a friend who's a pastor and he did a nice little thing for us. Yeah, I think it was stressful. Surprisingly I wasn't so stressed about the dress. I was mostly stressed out about making sure that everything would look nice and people would feel good. And actually the guest list stressed me out because I wanted to make sure most of our friends could come so that we had like, a lot of young people there and a lot of dancing. And as far as the dress goes, my number one criteria was that I wanted to have a dress that would allow me to move really easily and that I could wear the whole day and night because I didn't want to have a day dress and the night dress. I just wanted to be able to wear that dress all day. And I really like dresses that when you spin, they like spin out really nicely as well. And in salsa dancing, of course, it's impressive if the dress spins out, that's why I wanted a dress that spins out because for our first dance, we also did a salsa routine. Lauren: It was not only a salsa routine, though. You created that routine together. Alexandra: Yeah, we did. We chose our favorite song É one of our favorite salsa songs, La Vida Es Un Carnaval. It's one of the classic ones by Celia Cruz and É we did, we choreographed our own. We didn't choreograph it 100%. But we did most of it and then we went with it as we as we started dancing. So it was É yeah, it was really special. Because that was a big part of how we met and a big part of what created even a stronger attraction I think between us. But it's funny because after we moved to Europe, we barely danced salsa anymore. So it still has a special place in our heart, but it's funny how like you change as you go. It's not that we miss it or I'm sad about it at all, but it's just yeah, it's just É it was a part of our Edmonton time of our Canada time together. What brought us close. So that was the dress and I also wanted a dress with lace at the back. It didn't have to have a lot of lace but I wanted lace. And I wanted it to my back because I think I have a nice back and I knew that was a nice feature to have. So then I did also look for dress that would that would show off my back. And I had like a nice keyhole back and then I had lace going up a little bit to my hips. And then the rest was like a, like a net I think it's called, like a netting or something. A see through netting. Lauren: Where did you end up finding this dress? Alexandra: I actually didn't find it. My mom was in Romania, because she had some stuff to do here in May. And she went to a few dress shops because she was like, ÒWell, I might as well take a look for you.Ó And she found three really nice dresses and she would call me and show me. My mom and I are almost the same size so she would try them on and I would be like ÒOkay, no, okay, yes.Ó I just chose it honestly via Skype and pictures. So, yeah, it just worked out I think. But I knew that dress part would work out if I didn't stress about it. And I really didn't stress about it. It wasn't É yeah, I don't know why I didn't stress about it. Because I wanted a nice dress for sure. Like everybody wants a nice dress and you want to like feel special on that day. But I also kind of knew it would come. The alterations were a little bit tricky because we did have to do some alterations and the lady was É she was okay, but in the end, it worked out fine. Lauren: So you ended up with a dress that your mom found and tried on for you in Romania, then got married in Canada, which is, you know, unique in and of itself, but then also, can you talk a little bit about your sort of pre-wedding wedding as well? Alexandra: Oh, yeah. So because my husband isn't Canadian we decided to get our civil wedding, like to sign the É the whatever it's called the civil É the civil papers, we decided to do it in the Netherlands because it was just where we were living at the time. We thought it would be easy, but it was not easy. So we started in April 2017, and we had everything like in April 2018, all the papers they asked for it with all the stamps and all the like É Yeah, it was actually I did not expect it to be that difficult to get married. They asked for a lot of stuff. And then after we finally got all the paperwork we went to like, to É to give it to them so that they could approve it all have like a whole like a stack of papers. And then the lady was extremely rude. I was so mad that they but it was just because she was rude. If she would have been nice, it would have been fine. But she was like, ÒYeah, well, since you're Iranian É since your husband, since he's Iranian, then we have to send it to whoever, Foreign Ministry of whatever, that has to like double check his papers.Ó And I was like, ÒAre you kidding? Like they're all stamped by your government! Who are you sending it to? Everything is stamped by the Dutch government! We just spent a year going out after these stamps that were not easy to get!Ó And they were expensive, right? Nobody stamps your paperwork for free. ÒJust for you to tell me that you need to check it again? Like by who, like it's your own people that just checked it!Ó Anyways, again I was just pissed because already the whole process had taken so long. But in the end, it came two weeks later that it was obviously fine. And then once we got that, then we were able to book an appointment. We thought well, a bunch of our European friends won't be able to come to the actual wedding in Canada. So we decided to throw a smaller type of wedding in Holland. And at the time we were living in an apartment where our landlord was downstairs and she had like a really, really nice yard that she would take care of. Actually I had tons of compliments on the pre-wedding dress, more than on my wedding dress actually! Everybody that saw the pre-wedding dress was impressed. So it's a white dress and it cuts off just above the knee. And it has like a v-neck with shorter sleeves just below the shoulders. So it's all white and when you just see it from the front, you're like, ÒOh, wow, that's a really nice white dress!Ó But then when you turn it around, it has like a crisscross kind of back on the top part of the back, and then the rest is also white, but it has a really nice open crisscross back. And one of the bands that crisscrosses has a bunch of stoned jewels in it. So it's like a nice little surprise when you turn around. I love that dress and actually I have I it was great because I don't really have that many occasions to wear it, it being designer and white and me living in like the Netherlands where it rains most of the time. So yeah, of course. And where did I get the dress you might ask? I'm sure everybody here is wondering where I got the dress. Actually one of my best friends in school in Paris she gave it to me when we went to the Cannes Film Festival. So that dress has a special story. Lauren: Yes, her name is Lauren. Her name is me. Alexandra: Her name is the host of the show, Lauren! Alexandra: Yeah, so I love that dress I really love it. Actually to be honest I would have even won that as the main dress but I felt like being traditional and like I should have a long dress. Yeah not necessarily princess style because originally I wanted like a tight fitting dress. Not mermaid style but like just tight fitting all the way down. But then I thought I took into consideration what I É what I mentioned before that I really wanted it to spin out and I like those types of dresses a lot. And we invited our friends, we had about 30 people. And we threw, like a really nice afternoon/evening party. And then we went out. I think we went out in the evening, you know, I actually don't even remember if we went out or not, but I know we had a really nice day. But even that was stressful to plan because we just had to do all the food stuff and all the drinks and the activities and music and everything by ourselves which É it worked out. In the end, like it was a really nice afternoon, but it was a lot of work too for just 30 people. Lauren: ItÕs like you planned another wedding for a bunch of other people. Alexandra: Exactly. Yeah, exactly. And it was, yeah, it was a bit stressful too. But it was really nice. Overall, I would say the wedding was stressful, like more stressful. Not the wedding itself, but all the planning and the preparation. And even the day of I don't think I was as like, relaxed or had as much fun as I've had on other occasions, for example. Because, like, for me, it was important that people felt good. And I did want to make sure that people were happy that they were having a good time. And also my husband and I really kind of learned who our real friends were planning the wedding. And yeah, asking for help with some stuff and seeing how people treated us on that day. It was really a lesson for both of us. So it was good, actually good things came out of it. But it was a stressful É a stressful period of time. Lauren: Could you talk a little bit about the tradition of not seeing the dress beforehand. Your mom and your dad are from Romania, but you're from Canada. You've lived in multiple places in Europe. Do you think that your sort of global vision of the world and global feel of like marriage or that concept of partnership affected the way you look at tradition and weddings and marriage? Alexandra: Yeah. Yeah, definitely. I think that's a really good question. Actually we had a photoshoot, Mo and I, and before the wedding with just him and I because I knew there just wouldn't be time to get good photos the morning of with everyone there. And my mom never talked to me about what the traditions were in Europe, and she was never like she didn't care about what the traditions were in Canada, I guess because she immigrated to Canada. She was already married. But I do know from like, for example, my maid of honor she's so into, like, every single tradition of marriage needs to be kept and done right. I guess the North American traditions. I don't know if they're valid everywhere, but like for yeah, like she would never let her husband see É her fiancŽ see her dress before. Or like, yeah, all of that stuff needs to be done right. But for me, that wasn't so important because I É maybe I just don't place as much importance on it. I was gonna say because I know how much my husband and I love each other. And I know that I didn't need to impress him with a dress for it to be a really beautiful moment. I think part of that is also like the, just the shock and the emotion of it. But I don't know if that's the reason because obviously everybody else who gets married and they don't want their partner to see the dress. They also love each other a lot so it has nothing to do with it. But yeah, I think the bottom line is I just didn't care so much about traditions because it was only six months and because I had to think about getting the paperwork done before, I had to think of my husband's visa to come to Canada because he can't just come to Canada when he wants to. And his visa application got rejected in May, and the wedding was in August and like he had to apply again. So there were more important things to think about at the time for us. And also my husband is from Iran so they have a whole different, like set of traditions. So for him as well, like we both of us came with a mixture of things. And I think yeah, I think we just wanted to be married. For him, I have to be honest, for him being married was more important than for me being married, but of course, it's important for both of us. But yeah, growing up in his culture, it is more important for a man and a woman to be married. But for me because É also because my parents are divorced, and also because I grew up in North America, and even Europe now, whenever people find out I'm married, they're like, ÒOh, you're married? But you're so young!Ó So it's becoming almost weird if you're married nowadays, whereas in the past it was really weird if you were 28 and not married. So it's really, like, times are really changing and the idea of marriage is changing. But I think, yeah, sorry, to make this this answer short, I think because we had other stuff like paperwork to worry about, which has been a large part of our relationship is dealing with paperwork. Lauren: I remember you stressing so much about that and, you know, youÕd call me or message me and you're like, ÒI'm still not married. It's taking too long and this is ridiculous!Ó Alexandra: Yeah! Oh my God! Lauren: And I I'm curious about what you see marriage as, because I think that's a very interesting thing considering that I know you didn't need to be married to Mo to love him. You were together for what seven years before you É Alexandra: Five. Lauren: Five years. Five years. And so you know that's a very long relationship and I knew you for a good portion of that. Not the whole time but a good portion of it. What is marriage to you? What is that concept? Alexandra: I actually don't really know to be honest. As you were like, talking, I was like, ÒOh, she's gonna ask me, but I don't know what to say.Ó I guess marriage for me is just, um, I don't know. Okay. So I'm going to take a step back. Finding somebody you really get along with well, and somebody you can share your problems with or share like your joys with or your happiness with. And like finding someone who really respects you and who you can who you respect back, obviously, I think that that's really the bottom line. And it doesn't matter if you're married or not. Although marriage does add É it adds maybe a sense of security or it adds a sense of like, reality kind of? Like this is real, you know, like we're in it for the long run together. But also I have to say like marriage isn't that for me because I know that if something doesn't work out I can get a divorce. And that doesn't scare men and it doesn't make me feel like I failed anything. Whereas I know for some people, it feels like a failure if they end up divorcing. So maybe that's why also I was more relaxed about it because I knew I found the right person but I also knew that realistically if it doesn't work out, it doesn't work out. Like it's, it's not the end of the world. And I knew it was important for him for us to be married. And of course, it's like, it's an exciting day, because you get to have all these people in your life together, and you get to kind of better define the relationship youÕre in. I donÕt know if those are the right words to use but it just makes it a bit more official. And it makes it a bit more like yeah, this like they're É they're married. Yeah, I think the most important thing is just being in a loving and respectful by like, respectful both ways, relationship because you can be maybe like you É You love each other but you don't respect each other for example so that obviously for me is never gonna work. But like if you respect each other and you love each other and then I think, I think that's the most important thing whether you have the means to get married or you don't have the means to get married. Lauren: Do you believe that this dress found you or that you found it? And how do you define a perfect or dream dress personally? Alexandra: Um, I think the dress came because I also wasn't stressed about it. And I knew I would have a nice dress come my way. I also knew it wouldn't be perfect because I didn't spend so much energy thinking about it. But definitely I think the dress came to me. And it was really good for the event for my wedding. Not the event but for my wedding. It was really it was really nice. And I think the perfect dress is just a dress you feel good in, and you feel pretty in, and you feel beautiful and maybe more special than then other events, other important events you'll have in your life. I think because yeah, weddings are important and especially in North America there's a lot of importance placed around a wedding and the dress. But sometimes I feel like there's just too much importance placed around the dress and I think it just puts unnecessary pressure on brides because it's really hard to find the perfect dress like perfect price. And then for it to look perfect on you and for the alterations to be perfect, and the people serving you to be perfect, like there's a lot of stuff that needs to happen for it to be perfect. Yeah, it's just not necessary to put so much pressure on. I think you just need to go and look and have fun. And at some point, you'll be like, ÒOkay, I really like this dressÓ or maybe also the opposite like, ÒWow, this is it! ÒLike you'll know for sure this is it!Ó But I don't think it's a rule. like everybody's like, ÒOh, yeah, this is it.Ó Maybe you just also can make it work and can make it be beautiful without, without the stress without all the stress behind it.