We willed it

Ladies and gentlemen, I’m a married man! My partner Chimwemwe “Chimz” and I got married on Valentine’s Day this year. Four and a half years ago we first met at Lake of Stars in Malawi, stayed in touch, met up when I travelled Africa in 2017. After that, Chimz would come to join me in Jo’burg as often as was possible (here and here and here), and we’d travel quite a bit through Zim and Zam (here and here), and of course through her homeland Malawi, last in September 2019. Two trips to Germany later (here and here and here), we’d made it happen – against all odds. For us.

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When you want to get married in Germany

We knew it wasn’t going to be easy, and now that we’re happily married it may seem strange to go back to all those obstacles that were raised by one authority or another, by all those snide remarks that were thrown at us, racist micro aggressions which people here in this country are still largely unaware of. Although some of my friends avoided the trouble of getting married here in Germany and went to Denmark where things are easier, I didn’t want that to become a wedding tourist. I find as a citizen of this country I can expect service delivery re what the laws entitle me to get. I didn’t want the local authorities to get away with making it sound difficult. I wanted to make them work for us!

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