Mr & Mrs Amorim

When I created this blog, almost a year ago, the idea was to have a shared journal of my MBA experience at INSEAD. The name of the blog - mbaround - could either stand for "MB around" or for "MBA round", where MB and MBA stand for Marta Bento and Masters in Business Administration. As a consequence, this blog should theoretically be down already, as I am officially a MBA graduate now.

However, I found out that mbaround can also stand for "MBA round" - Marta Bento Amorim round. Say what? I have an excuse to keep this blog alive! And, to celebrate such decision, I wanna try to write about our wedding. What a wedding!

On Wednesday, the 19th of July of 2017, Mom, Dad and I drove south to Vila Nova de Milfontes. Most of the pre-work was done, but we wanted to be in situ to help solving last minute issues and make sure everything was fine. Gorda and his parents drove down later that day too. My family stayed at Herdade do Freixial. His stayed at home, of course.

We hang out all together for a few days, talked to every neighbor apologizing in advance for the upcoming noise, bought some last minute supplies, supervised the guys putting the tent together, received suppliers of food and drinks, talked to the police, decorated the church... And welcomed our friends and family that literally came from all over the world. Inês from Australia, Luísa from Brazil, Dan, Sofia and Miguel from California, Chantal from Lebanon, Thomas from vacay in Bali, other Berkeley and INSEAD friends from all over Europe, and it goes on...

Gorda was a bit stressed out, although he does not admit so. Other than that, the days went pretty smoothly.

On Friday, my bridesmaids met Mom, Dad, Mico and me for dinner. The girls and I then left all together to Herdade da Matinha. They spent the night with me in the place where we were going to get ready for the big day and where I would spend the evening with Gorda after the wedding. We gossiped a bit and discussed which dress each of them could wear. Yup, Catarina brought 6 potential outfits, Carolina 4, Alice three, and Maria 2. Thank God there was a normal Brazilian in the room, who just brought one dress with her. Hehe. I then took a Zyrtec and slept like a baby for 6/7 hours.

Day D then arrived. I got up around 8:30 am, and put my workout clothes on. Did plenty of push-ups on my own (yes, I wanted my little arms to be as fit as possible) and then Maria joined me for a quick HIIT workout. In the meantime, Catarina attempted to do some yoga (didn't really do anything), Alice filmed herself and us for her weekly vlog, Carolina laughed about us, and again the Brazilian was the only normal person in the room. Alice started getting ready earlier than anyone else as she would be our hairdresser for the day and had no time to lose.

Breakfast was great. There were gluten and lactose free stuff, decent coffee, good fruit, and enough eggs to feed me. Herdade da Matinha is the cutest place too - charming and laid back at the same time, you know? At breakfast, Lu gave each of us a small souvenir: a fridge thingy with an image of the church.

The make-up artist, my irreplaceable Annija, then arrived. Things were getting real!

Alice kicked off with the hairstyles while Annija started working on the make up, and, one by one, my bridesmaid became more and more gorgeous (if possible). Mom and I where the last ones to be taken care of. Around 3 pm, my Grandparents, Mico and Dad arrived, but I made the men wait for me to be 100% ready. I wanted to create full impact. And I guess I did: both dad and me cried when he saw me for the first time.

Before heading to the church, Rui Valido and Sérgio - one of our photographers and our camera man - took a few pictures and clips of us all. Herdade da Matinha is cute a nice setting for any photoshoot. I am so looking forward to seeing those pictures and movie!!!

People started leaving to the church. Dad and I where the last ones heading there. When we arrived at the center of Vila Nova, and I saw the church and everyone standing there, I felt butterflies in my stomach and my heart beat increase quite a bit. We stopped for a few minutes, made sure that my bridesmaids where inside and that the photographers where ready, breath deeply, and stepped out of the car. Carolina made sure that the doors closed before I got in, and that created an even bigger impact on my entrance.

The unbelievable choir led by Miguel Cunha Monteiro started singing "Can't help falling in love with you", the Luka Bloom version, and we walked to the isle. I could hardly stop smiling and putting my shoulders up, as a sign of excitement, and Gorda got slightly teary. That was a first. Dad and I actually cried - getting teary was not enough for these tough but highly emotional Bentos.

Then the ceremony was beautiful. Our priest - Padre Ricardo Gonçalves Pinto - is young, modern, and knows us well. He talked very well and briefly enough. The texts read were beautiful and the songs and choir performance made the ceremony even more magical. Most of our guests noticed how cute we where throughout the ceremony, and they made fun of how many times Gorda kissed me. Hehe

We left the church in an old open body dark grey Defender, sitting in the back. We cheered with a beer and a cider, and everyone clapped to our happiness. Salvador Colaço, the other of our photographers, came with us and made a small photo shoot before we headed home for the cocktail.

The cocktail went by pretty fast! As soon as we arrived, most people came great us. In the end, we had a small photo session with the most important people: family, best men and bridesmaids. In between, we briefly ate (I don't really remember what was served as finger food!!!) and drank, and we had the chance to talk a bit with our friends. Somehow, in the middle of the cocktail, a bee managed to sting my back. How fortunate...! It did not ruin the cocktail a bit, though.

Around 8 pm, the wind became stronger and stronger and we decided it was about time to move inside the tent for dinner. The best men and bridesmaid gathered the bride and groom and all of them, and they made me wear a costume of a super muscled man and gorda wear the costume of an old fat lady. The initial plan was to get inside the tent dancing to the sound of "Can't stop the feeling", from Justin Timberlake. However, Zé Maria Spínola (aka Spike) had a last minute idea of us going inside to the sound of "Call on me", with me pretending to be their fitness instructor. It was EPIC! And so appropriate. The names of the tables where fitness exercises, and the table markers where hilarious pictures of gorda and me "performing" them. Props to another of our best men, Zé Diogo Lucena (aka Zedi) for handling all the graphic work for the wedding - save the date flier, invites, website, table markers, ceremony scripts, and so on. We cannot thank him enough.

Dinner was super yummy, the yummiest I have ever tasted. The caterer wais our old friend Francisco Amado. Everyone wants to meet him now! He served a seafood vichyssoise as a starter, and then a marvelous self-service buffet with plenty of options: cold seafood salad with wasabi, peppers filled with codfish, beef with mustard sauce, roasted lamb, Arabic rice, crispy chips, taboulleh, grilled vegetables, plenty of salads, and so on. There was a buffet for desserts later as well. During dinner, we managed to toast with each of the 34 tables. Some where louder than others. Props to the INSEAD tables and to the TDJ ones!

Just before we cut the "cake" - 3 levels of palmiers do Careca and tortas de Azeitão -, Dad made a brilliant speech: short, funny, personal, emotional and universally understood, addressing both Gorda and me, his family and mine, and all of our friends. Cutting the cake was again a cute moment, we both of us truly happy and cute.

As a last event before we opened the dance floor, ours bridesmaid and best men prepared us a hilarious movie making fun of Gorda and me, in the format of a talkshow!

Then Dad and I danced the valse, followed by gorda and me. I would dare to say we did pretty well. The dance floor was then open and, until after 5 am nothing stopped us - not even a electricity blackout and the police complaining about the noise. We danced literally non-stop - at the dance floor, at the upper level where our table was, by the buffet, around the tables. Our friends where super into partying too. By 5:10, when we left, there was still so many people partying with us, even though the sound was less loud than desirable due to the neighbors complaints. Props to Chumbinho for killing it as a DJ, and to our friends for partying insanely.

It's been a few days already and we still cannot stop going back to such a perfect day.

Special thanks to our parents for letting us have the wedding of our dreams, and to Tudo é Festa for making it real. Special thanks to to our bridesmaids (Alice Trewinnard, Carolina Perry, Catarina Calha, Luísa Schettino, Maria Raimundo, Sónia Teixeira da Mota) and to our best men (António Amorim, António Menéres, António Monteiro de Barros, Diogo Mourão, Francisco Amorim, Francisco Empis, Francisco Pena Monteiro, José Diogo Lucena, José Maria Spínola) for all the help.

Official pictures coming up in a month!