There’s something sweet (or sad, depending on your perspective) about Indonesian couples that can’t afford a grand wedding venue instead utilize whatever space they can get to host their big day. Usually this involves weddings taking place in the middle of neighborhood streets or alleys, but there have been a few famously viral cases of weddings taking place in such unusual venues as on a railway and in a cemetery.
But recently, a couple in Jakarta decided to hold their wedding above Angke Canal, one of the capital’s notoriously filthy waterways. A wooden stage was constructed above the body of water to keep the bride and groom and their guests dry — until it didn’t.
A video showing the aftermath of the wedding stage’s collapse has gone viral on social media. In it, several guests can be seen trying to lift themselves up from the canal after falling through a hole where the stage collapsed. The bride and groom were also dunked into the water, the bottom of the former’s pristine silvery dress stained black due to contact with what appears to be very dirty canal water.
https://twitter.com/RockersPantura/status/1094830523803873280
Police in Jakarta confirmed the stage collapse occurred during a wedding reception in Cengkareng, West Jakarta, on Sunday, celebrating the nuptials of a couple named Hartini and Alan.
“It so happens that the stage was built above a canal,” Cengkareng Police Chief Khoiri told Kumparan.
“There were no casualties. Everybody was safe.”
Khoiri added that, soon after the stage collapsed, it was fixed and the wedding reception resumed.
Hartini and Alan are now on their honeymoon.
Stage sturdiness and safety is often an afterthought for many events in Indonesia, particularly those held in rural areas. Temporary stages are often constructed out of cheap wood, and, as such, stage collapses are quite common in the country, as can be seen in this Twitter thread compiled by our Associate Editor Nadia Hamid.
[THREAD] Kompilasi video panggung ambruk
— Nadia Vetta (@nadiavetta) February 5, 2018
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