Wedding weekend recap

My wedding weekend came and went. Just like everyone mentioned, it goes by really quickly. Time flies when you’re having fun with your best friends and family. Today, I’m writing a really long blog post to document everything from that weekend. Hopefully I can look back on the post and reminisce on the weekend one day.

On Thursday, we kicked off the weekend with dinner with my parents and Sophia’s parents and aunt. We went to Cafe Macaroni in North Beach and the food was fantastic as always. My Dad wore a sport coat which was pretty funny to see because I don’t think I’ve seen him dressed up in many years.

Afterwards, Sophia and I went to meet up with some friends at a bar in the Marina. There’s no real better feeling then seeing close friends that you haven’t seen in awhile. Also memorable from that night — Sophia and I rode in a Cruise driverless taxi on the way home for the first time.

Friday was spent nursing a bigger hangover than I’d like in the morning. I ended up going for a quick run and steam room session to kill the hangover, and then spent the rest of the afternoon running errands for the wedding.

At 4:30pm, we had a ceremony walkthrough that took about 10 minutes. The groom and bridal parties got together along with our parents for the first time. It was surreal seeing everyone together in one place.

Afterwards, we walked to our welcome party at 15 Romolo. It was the perfect venue and event that we wanted to set the tone and kick off the weekend. We had some speeches from some people in wedding parties as well as a speech from my little sister, Cali. Her speech definitely was the star of the show as she turned it into a 2 minute comedy routine. I’m not sure where she gets her charisma from, but it’s pretty entertaining to watch for an 11 year old.

Sophia and I had a quick stop at a bar with some friends after, but we were in bed by 11pm on Friday. Saturday morning's wakeup was not easy. Sophia was out and about by 6am. I had plans to get up at 7am to go watch the USA world cup match but decided to sleep in an extra hour. I definitely needed it. Of course, neither of us planned to be be this hungover on our wedding day but it seems to happen to every couple so we went easy on ourselves.

Sophia and the bridesmaid along with my grooms gals all got a nice house in Pac Heights to get ready in. It was the perfect house to rent for the day… and it turned out to be a big tech CEO’s SF home. Thought it was a funny coincidence. After a casual morning of running some errands, I got showered, shaved and ready to go.

Every guy I speak to always says to be ready to take a million pictures on your wedding day. And my day was not an exception. We had our first look around 2:30pm and we romped around San Francisco taking photos for the next couple of hours.

The ceremony began at Plant Connection at 4:30pm. We had wanted to do it on the balcony, but ended up having to take things inside because of the rain. While it was not an ideal situation, we made it work. The ceremony was everything we wanted - quick, relaxed, and fun. Sophia and I wrote our own vows for each other and they ended up complementing each other perfectly.

After the ceremony, Sophia and I took yet more photos at Plant Connection and in Chinatown by where our reception was. There was no better relief than being told that we were finally done and being told we could go to the reception. We were announced as a couple as the first time to the cocktail hour and had our first dance right away.

If you could make up a perfect wedding reception for Vieje and Sophia, I don’t think you could’ve done it much better than what we had at Moongate Lounge. The night started with some amazing appetizers including oysters and shrimp cakes. I didn’t want the cocktail hour to end as I was having such an amazing time talking to everyone and drinking old fashions and slurping oysters.

The dinner though was amazing. The food was of course the main reason we chose Moongate Lounge which is on top of Mister Jiu’s which is a Michelin starred restaurant. It did not disappoint at all. We started off with a delicious salad followed by black cod and bok choy. Beef heart fried rice was the carb of the night and that was all finished with their signature dish, the roast duck. We had many complements that this was the best wedding food our guests have had.

The wedding speeches went on throughout dinner and they were absolutely perfect. It was a crazy feeling seeing your closest friends speak about you and your lives together. There’s years of friendship and love that goes into these speeches and it always shows.

The dance party began after Sophia and her Dad’s first dance. It was a good one. My Jewish friends decided to do the Jorah for us and that was hilarious. We also had thunderstruck played for my fellow Dawg fans. I was completely shocked when the DJ said that there was only going to 1 more song… the night flew by way too quickly. We ended the dance party with “Empire State of Mind” by Jay-Z as an ode to NY where Sophia and I met.

After Moongate, we all headed to Chief Sullivan’s for the after-party. Only about 20 people actually made it there. We all had noticed one thing about the night and that is people drank like it was a damn good party. Many had already tapped out by the time 11pm hit. We stayed at Chiefs for a couple of hours, and then Sophia decided it was time to get home and finally sleep.

I was originally someone who didn’t want to have a wedding. I had thought it was a bit excessive for one day and that the stress was not worth it. After this weekend, I can safely say that I was wrong. Seeing your friends and family together in one place celebrating you is a special feeling.

I could write thousands more words on the weekend and the festivities. Hopefully our videographer does a good job of documenting most of the fun that happened. It’s a shame that weddings are supposed to only happen once in your life… I wish I could do it all over again.