Tying the knot: DIY or with the experts?

Damar Harsanto, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Anyone who considers marriage a once-in-a-lifetime event must dream of one-day having a "perfect" wedding party, where guests are served with great food and drinks, entertained with good music, and dance in a beautifully-adorned hall.

Unfortunately, many young couples do not have the time to plan such a perfect wedding party as they are usually busy with the demands of work in the early days of their career.

"There were many details and technical things, which I found difficult to take care of, especially on the wedding day, such as menu set-up, photo sessions, flow of party-goers, etc.," said Shaddiq, who tied the knot in July at the Balai Sudirman Hall in Tebet, South Jakarta.

"That's why I ended up getting a wedding planner/organizer to take over such things. And, I am happy that my wedding was successful," said the resident of Cidodol, West Jakarta.

His wedding party was enlivened by a dance performance by boys and girls in Middle Eastern costume, accompanied by a band playing Middle Eastern music.

Similarly, Suprihadi, who held his wedding party at a hall belonging to state pawnshop company PT Pergadaian on Jl. Kramat in Central Jakarta in June, said he asked a wedding planner/organizer to handle his wedding party because he simply had no time to do it himself.

"I don't have time to prepare the party. And, I don't want to put other people, especially my family members and relatives, in these tiring jobs," said the resident of Cawang, East Jakarta.

He delivered Rp 40 million (US$4,000) in cash to a wedding planner that settled everything for his wedding party that included makeup, catering, decorations, costumes, photo and video records and even a plush wedding car.

However, some people like to organize their own wedding parties rather than getting a wedding planner/organizer.

Egidius, a resident of Pasar Minggu in South Jakarta, organized his own wedding party at the Ministry of Social Welfare Hall on Jl. Salemba in Central Jakarta early last month.

"We decided to organize our own wedding party since we believed we could do it perfectly ourselves and we didn't want to pay for a service that we thought was unnecessary," he said.

According to him, most wedding planners offer their services on a "package basis", which means clients have to pay for all the entire services included in the package, even though they don't use all the services.

He said that he and his wife Dian had prepared their wedding party for a year and did surveys of wedding packages and services and attended various wedding exhibitions.

"Later, we found that planning a wedding party is actually not a difficult task to do. The only job I allowed the professionals to take over was to decorate the wedding venue and provide the catering," he said.

He spent a total of Rp 60 million for his wedding party.

Thanks to the experience in handling their own wedding party, he said that his wife also later organized several wedding parties for some of her friends.

Like Egidius, Lenny Tambun, who held her wedding late last year said that she did not use a wedding planner as all matters were managed by her relatives as well as her husband's relatives in accordance to Batak traditions.

"We only prepared the money, invitation cards, gifts and food. Other things, like the traditional wedding ceremony and holy ceremony at the church, were handled by a special team comprising members of my family and my husband's family," she said.