Dear Ken,

You never did tell me if the pictures I sent you from Hapdorn made it okay. As you can tell from the enclosure I assume that they did.

Note to the reader:Melissa should have known that the pictures would not turn out, so you just get the descriptions. I guess Melissa sent this letter before she got my reply.

These are some pictures of my wedding!

• The first picture was taken by Harshan’s father when we went to pick up my mother at the Fomin spaceport. This is the same place where I arrived on Homeland, except that I had to catch an airplane to the Grand Duchy of Thorgelfayne. My mother is the exuberant one in the yellow dress, and I am the embarrassed person on the right.
• This second picture shows my mother trying to learn how to pronounce the name we chose for our marriage. It is really not necessary to make a funny face like that. We are now Melissa and Harshan Lahtissimon. “Lahtissimon” is Halakanian for “from two stars,” and you do pronounce the H. It sounds like Lah-HTEE-see- moan. You might say my name is “Melissa Twostars.” We thought that was a really good name. No single person can be from two stars, so the name only suits us when we’re together; which we plan to be for a very long time.
• This picture shows my bridesmaids in their lovely blue dresses. I’m sure you’re wondering why they have such sour looks on their faces! (This picture was taken at the Nagala house before the wedding.) They were all excited in participating in a human wedding ceremony, and they loved the gowns; but they were very dejected when they found out that all the dresses look alike. For some reason, Homelanders do not like dressing alike. Not even the police have any uniforms! That’s Harti on the far left (she’s one of Harshan’s cousins) staring hopelessly at her shoes.
• This fourth picture bears some explaining: our wedding took place in Chalaka Park, right next to the chapel we had booked. It rains a lot in the Chalaka River delta, so we were very lucky to get such a sunny day. We had planned to use the chapel next to the park; but when the weather turned out to be so nice, we improvised. I’m glad we did! After the wedding, Lanni went back and got this shot of the site.
• Harna grabbed the camera from Lanni just in time and got this absolutely perfect picture of the crowd. They’re turning around to see the wedding procession. The sudden look of shock as they notice that the wedding party is dressed alike is just precious!
• Here we have a picture of Lanni Hargelstope attempting to keep everyone’s attention as she delivers her speech on the meaning of the ceremony. As you know, we used a ceremony from Illinois, translated into Thorgelfaynese. The cute little kid with the toy balloon is Harti’s 7-year-old boy.
• Lanni took this picture of Harshan and I saying our vows. Isn’t Harshan handsome in his tuxedo? Well, it isn’t really a tuxedo, but it’s as close as we could get. We wanted to carry out a theme of “two stars,” —it worked out quite well I think. Since the weather cooperated, we had a Solar ceremony under a Tau Cetian sky! Behind us, you can see that we had about fifty or so guests.
• This is a portrait of the Reverend (or whatever) Kahliniman standing in front of a stately bimbka tree. This dedicated soul spent long hours with Lanni, Harshan and me to work out all details of the ceremony, and then refused all payment! (I must admit that Lanni and Harshan looked at me strangely when I brought it up.)
• You know the custom of throwing rice at the newlyweds after the wedding? They tried to imitate it, but the closest they get were dried red peas! If you’ve never seen a bride go into hysterical laughter at her own wedding, look at this picture more closely. Even though the peas were dried, they did make a squishy mess all over the walkway.
• And now, the traditional wedding banquet! Those bridesmaids’ gowns and usher outfits sure did cause a lot of stares. (If I had it to do over again, I wouldn’t make them wear identical clothes.) I don’t know who took this picture. If you squint real hard you can see Harshan and I toasting each other at the head of the table (center- back). It was a wonderful restaurant, the food was fabulous, and we all had a good time. The most amazing thing was that the tab was free! I had such a wonderful time, I don’t even remember how it ended. All I remember was Harshan, Harshan and more Harshan. Everyone left except for Harshan, and I didn’t even notice. (I hope I wasn’t rude!) All I saw were blue eyes that smiled at me.

We’ve decided to spend our honeymoon back in the Grand Old Duchy of Thorgelfayne, after we see some sights along the way.

I’ll keep you posted!

Yours,

Melissa