Day 7: The wedding

The day dawned bright and sunny – just about the perfect English day. My mother would always remark that one could get what she referred to as an Indian Summer in September. It did cloud over later but the sun broke through and the weather did not spoil the day’s festivities.

I awoke as I remarked yesterday after 9 hours and 16 minutes of solid sleep – practically unprecedented. I think I was awoken by the gentle rocking of the boat caused by the wake of a passing vessel. Not a bad way to wake up, and even better when The G is beside me. The Thames is a tidal river and the ebb ad flow if the tide is pretty strong. At high tide the houseboat is afloat and rocks very gently.

The famous houseboat - we are in the one on the left and we are staying in the room behind the two windows you can see

The boat never seems to be quite level. Taking a shower involves standing in a bath that is clearly on a slope giving one a peculiar sense of insecurity. As with many boats, the doorways are designed for midgets and everything is squashed up. As I write The G and I are sitting on the bow of the boat drinking our coffee and watching the traffic crawl by from south to north. As we all know north London is by far the superior part which is probably why all the traffic is struggling to get there!!

I have no sense of being English anymore. I am quite comfortable being in London: I quite like the place and it was once home and the place where I worked. But it is not the London that I used to know and because I haven’t been part of the change the difference now is very marked to me. Perhaps that’s an obvious observation but I think the corollary of it is that I shan’t be disappointed to leave tomorrow on the Great Scottish Adventure.

The pull of family is a weak one for me. My younger sister’s death in February put a strain on what were already pretty weak links between my brother and me and even between my other sister and me (and we have always been very close). Indeed my brother refused to engage with me at all at the wedding: his loss really. It is very odd talking to a man who stands sideways on to you with his arms folded. But then he was a banker so perhaps that explains it!!

I enjoy seeing my parents – my Father has an irrepressible sense of humour. Though he finds it hard to get about now and walks with a stick he will still struggle to his feet when my Mother comes in the room. My Mother is a human dynamo: still doing yoga at 86 she is alert and as active as can be. We will be spending some more time with them when we return from Scotland.

My Mother and Father

We were due to meet my brother-in-law at the Elizabeth Gate of Kew Gardens at 14:00 in order to assist with the construction of the famous arch. The G decided that we would walk over Kew Bridge and walk eastwards along the north side of the river. This took us to a row of very attractive mainly Georgian (late 18^th early 19^th century) houses that we can just see from the boat as we look through the arches of the bridge. There were several pubs each of which seemed to offer increasingly tasty meals. We shall eat in one tomorrow (well today as I write). The pubs were full of people eating their Sunday lunch and everybody’s lunch seemed to be built around a massive Yorkshire pudding!!

Swans are revered in many cultures. The Queen's Court has a "Warden of the Swans" who works with the "Marker of the Swans". They conduct an annual census of all swans on the Thames.  The Queen owns all the UK's mute swans, but only exercises her right of possession around Windsor.

This is such a typical London street that I could not resist taking the picture

One of the houses was for sale and rapid research showed it to be a three bedroomed house with a guide price of £3.25m. A snip!! It has lovely views though. We also passed the B Hopkin Morris Homes of Rest. A plaque on the wall informed us that “Two of the houses [were] built by R Thomas Child [and] one by M Soloman Williams [and] one by William Abbot Carpinter (sic) at [their] own charge for the use of [the] Poor of Chiswick for ever”. It is dated 1724 and another plaque records that the houses were repaired in 1816. A third plaque is dated 1933.

45 Strand on the Green just up the river from us. Yours for a cool £3.25m

For the benefit of the poor ... forever

We wandered back to Kew and decided to take a look at St Anne’s Church. I have a morbid fascination with graveyards because the inscriptions on the tombstones often tell such intriguing stories. In this case I was taken aback to see the grave of Thomas Gainsborough. I didn’t take a photo because I had not thought it was the Thos Gainsborough. I should have guessed because on Strand on the Green was a blue plaque commemorating the painter Johan Zoffany (of whom I had never heard) and on Kew Green was another plaque to Camille Pissarro (a French impressionist of whom I had heard). There must have been a bit of an artists’ community here.

Gainsborough's grave in St Anne's churchyard

St Anne’s Church dates from 1714 and, to my eye, was interesting but not particularly attractive. I think that English architecture went into a bit of a lull between the Middle Ages (say 1600) and the end of Age of Enlightenment (say 1775). By about 1775 the English mindset had begun to develop into something identifiably different than continental Europe. Of course I have no idea what I am talking about.

St Anne's Church

Now here's a grave: this person came from "North Britain". This is a euphemism for Scotland which I have never heard before!!

We made our way to the Elizabeth Gate at Kew Gardens to meet Peter in order to construct the famous arch. 

A VW microbus at Kew Green

The wedding itself was in the Nash Conservatory. The Nash Conservatory is the oldest of the 19th Century glasshouses at Kew and is of major historical and architectural importance.  It was originally one of two pavilions designed by John Nash for the gardens at Buckingham Palace, but King William IV moved the current conservatory brick by brick to Kew in 1836. They seemed to have the time, money and inclination to do that sort of thing in those days. Good old Bill IV: a year later he was gone and Victoria ascended the throne ushering in a new age where even greater feats of foolishness were carried through.

The Nash conservatory

We should have known that the arch would take longer to construct on the day and so it proved but we eventually got it assembled. The florist, who was due to decorate it, was very impressed and told us that she would be able to hire it out at £200 a throw and that there was a fine business opportunity for Peter should he wish to become an archmaker. I think he was not attracted to the opportunity!!

Here is the arch (or chupah) erected in the Nash conservatory decorated by The G

The wedding was at 4:30pm so until then we repaired with Peter to The Cricketers pub to enjoy and glass of Good English Ale (The G drinks cider).

Peter and I enjoying a swift one before the wedding in The Cricketers

It was a pretty big wedding as my experience of weddings goes: about 140 guests. It was the first Jewish wedding I had been to. In fact the happy couple had been legally married in a civil ceremony that morning to which, I am delighted to say, Will wore his jeans and T-shirt as a mark of protest. This is because you cannot perform a marriage ceremony at Kew Gardens: the one we went to was a proper ceremony of course but would not have been recognised by the State. This, of course, is different to Australia where The G and I, for example, were able to ship a celebrant out to Montague Island and get married with the Sea Eagles and Whales.

The G and me tying the knot on Montague with rainbow

I will not regale much of the ceremony itself, which was mercifully brief, but at one point Jodie circled Will while the Rabbi sang a song. I don’t know the origin of this, perhaps it is to enable the groom to do a final check on the goods!! I looked it up and I discovered that the bride circles the groom under the chupah (that’s the wedding arch to us philistines) to demonstrate her awesome power over her!! Way to go, Jodie!!

The deed now done, the bride and groom emerge from the decorated chupah

The groom - glass in hand and a day's work well done!

Jodie looked absolutely gorgeous in the most stunning and flattering lacy off-white wedding dress ever made!! As The G said she was the Princess Grace of Kew Gardens. At the end of the wedding Will was required to break a glass under the chupah. This is about recognising that to come together a couple has to have been apart; a conscious choice is made to be together. There are also historical poarallels with the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem 2000 years ago.


Of course no serious wedding can happen in one venue so, before getting to the wedding breakfast in the Orangery, we all repaired for canapés on the Duck Pond Lawn. The G would be disappointed if I did not tell you what we ate. There were 9 different canapés which we recall as: salmon roulades, Peking duck cornets, quails’ eggs with mustard mousse, courgette soufflé, caramelised onion tartlets, foi gras bites, herbed chicken croquettes, asparagus tarts with quince paste, and stilton rounds with onion chutney. This we washed down with Charles de Muret champoo.

Kew Palace. This is the third palace on the location. This one used to be called the Dutch House and George III lived there for a while. He was the so-called "mad king"

The Duck Pond with the Duck Pond Lawn behind

Let's get to the bottom of things...

I sat with my Father while the speeches were on and we were enjoying ourselves hugely before my Mother noticed that I was causing his glass to be refilled. She warned me that he would not make it through the evening if he had too much grog. You and me both, Father!!

The wedding breakfast was in the orangery.

The Orangery

The setting for the tables at the wedding breakfast was very attractive. One bridal grandmother had sewn hessian runners while the bride’s mother and a multitude of aunts had decorated bottles and jars with hessian, rope and stringy ribbons. Someone had sawn yew trees into sections to stand the decorations on and to hold the place cards. The florist had then done some serious floral work (as she had done with the chupah).

Beautiful table decorations were the result of much hard work

There was a fine (and rather too loud) band with a lead singer, a brass section, guitar, bass, drums, and three back-up singers. 

The happy couple ... and that dress

They were very good – tight, as we musos say, as a duck’s arse. Before getting fed we were treated to the Hora. I read that no Jewish wedding is complete without the Hora, or chair dance. In this tradition, a few strong and brave guests hoist the bride and groom high above the crowd on chairs to the infectious sounds of some rousing tune. Friends and family dance around in an ecstatic circle as the elevated couple tries not to look (or fall) down.

Jodie and Will hoisted high for the Hora

The G will not let me close without a look at the menu. We had opted for the lamb which was, I may say, succulent.

Left: The menu and (right) what was written on the back. 

Desert arrived on old movie style trays. There was a large selection of petit four style deserts: salted caramel milk chocolate lollipops, lemon meringue tartlets, white chocolate truffles with gold popping sugar, mini-pavlova with berries, chocolate gateaux, tiny ice cream cornets and little jars of lemon posset and Eton mess. There was more confectionary and fruit on sticks at a side table and an open bar. After all this my sister’s wedding cake was handed round. I rose to the occasion as a loyal brother should and much enjoyed a slice.

We knew that the party was going well when tequila shots were brought out for the dancing youngsters (well late 20s and early 30s). This reminded me of my daughter Sophie who is a keen tequila shot drinker. She is going to Mexico this Christmas to practise. I am not sure whether my Father moved on to the tequila but The G and I were delighted to see him dancing with my Mother – an activity that cannot have occurred for many years. So enjoyable were the festivities that even I danced with The G!!

But all good things come to and end and we left the revellers at about 11:30 to walk gently back to our riverboat. We were out like lights!!

A Mini Clubman in Bush Lane just near the houseboat