The months of July & August have been deemed “Wedding Season” due to the large influx of Kosovo expats who flood back in their shiny BMW, Audi, and Mercedes and evenings punctuated with automatic “happy fire” from weddings. Celebratory gunfire is just one of those things that probably will never be considered against the norm in Kosovo. Occassionally people do get injured by stray bullets but I imagine that until a child is tragically killed there won’t be much public outcry against the AK-47 “happy fire”. Despite the negative aspect of celebratory gunfire, a neat thing about Kosovo weddings is the vehicle procession.
It is hard to give true justice to a Kosovo wedding vehicle procession in describing it but I’ll try…basically, you gather all your relatives and friends who have vehicles. You decorate the lead vehicle with the biggest (and I mean BIG!) Albanian flag you can find and some plastic flowers/streamers if you can find some. All the other vehicles that will follow the lead vehicle will put bath or dish towels under their windsheild wiper to signify that they are part of the wedding party. If your guests have a sunroof, someone must be poking out of the sunroof, dancing to the traditional Albanian music blaring from everyone’s car stereos. If you don’t have a sunroof, you are obligated to either sit on the windowsill of the moving vehicle, put your arms out the windows, or dance in place in the car. Don’t forget to honk and flash your lights at oncoming traffic… Like I said, it’s hard to give the experience justice for those who have seen a wedding procession here!
It is hard to give true justice to a Kosovo wedding vehicle procession in describing it but I’ll try…basically, you gather all your relatives and friends who have vehicles. You decorate the lead vehicle with the biggest (and I mean BIG!) Albanian flag you can find and some plastic flowers/streamers if you can find some. All the other vehicles that will follow the lead vehicle will put bath or dish towels under their windsheild wiper to signify that they are part of the wedding party. If your guests have a sunroof, someone must be poking out of the sunroof, dancing to the traditional Albanian music blaring from everyone’s car stereos. If you don’t have a sunroof, you are obligated to either sit on the windowsill of the moving vehicle, put your arms out the windows, or dance in place in the car. Don’t forget to honk and flash your lights at oncoming traffic… Like I said, it’s hard to give the experience justice for those who have seen a wedding procession here!
