STORY OF A WEDDING

By: Trond Norén Isaksen. Thank you for rewriting your report especially for my website.

On 22 May, I travelled by plane from Oslo to Trondheim, where the wedding of Princess Märtha Louise of Norway and the writer Ari Behn was to take place. There were quite many wedding guests on the plane: Ari Behn's mother Marianne Solberg Behn, stepfather Jan Pahle and brother Espen Bjørshol sat in the seats right across the aisle from me, in front of me was the pop singer Morten Abel and in the seat behind the author Erik Fosnes Hansen (whose authorised book about Princess Märtha was published to mark her 30th birthday last year), and Vibeke Ulrichsen, the Princess's second cousin and sister of her maid of honour. At the airport in Trondheim, Marianne Solberg Behn and her husband and son were met by two air force officers in full uniform with lots of medals, but the rest of us had to take the airport express bus to Trondheim.

In the town of Trondheim, two of the main streets, Munkegata and Olav Tryggvasons gate, were decorated with banners in the official wedding colours, pink and mint green, which I was not too fond of. But luckily, in Munkegata, were the wedding procession was to take place, most of the banners were hidden by the trees. Many shop windows displayed the official wedding pictures and decorations in their shops; but many shops had made their own "exhibitions" and I was impressed by how creative they had been. Many displayed items in pink and mint green, from underwear to furniture. Also quite many of the town's inhabitants, and especially the elderly ladies, had dug out some of their clothes in pink and mint green for the occasion.

At the town square, one large and one small stage were erected, in addition to a tent where beer was served. A three-day-long street party was opened by Liv Sandven, the acting mayoress, later at the day, and there were concerts almost non-stop until the wedding ceremony started.

While I was on the plane, the press conference took place in Stiftsgården, the royal family's official residence in Trondheim. The most surprising thing which emerged from the session, was that Princess Märtha and Ari Behn had made a secret pilgrimage on foot from Svorkmo to Trondheim for three days before their arrival in Trondheim for the 17 May National Day celebrations. The Princess and her then still fiancé said they were to write a book about this together. Questions were also asked about the photographer Per Heimly, Ari Behn's former friend who had sold lots of private photos to the gossip magazine "Se og Hør". Later that day, Per Heimly declared that he would give 100 000 NOK ("parts of the money I received", he said, so we can only guess how much the magazine paid...) to Fattighuset ("the poor people's house") in Oslo. Ari Behn gave them the 100 000 he received from a hotel chain he sued for using him in an advertisement campaign last year; that equalled up 1/4 of Fattighuset's annual budget, but a spokesperson for Fattighuset announced they would not accept Per Heimly's "Judas money" - "We don't accept anything! What does he think this is? Some sort of rubbish heap?"

In the evening there was a private party at the restaurant "Bølgen & Moi" in Carl Johans gate (a street MUCH smaller than the street by the same name in Oslo). One of the owners, Trond Moi, is a friend of the bridal couple, and they are frequent guests at his restaurant in Oslo. This party lasted until about 3am, and the street party lasted almost as long. I guess the atmosphere was improved because of the weather; normally it is 10-12 degrees in Trondheim at the end of May, this day it was 26 at the warmest.

That was also the temperature the next day. I went down to the town centre and thought I should go and see how far the preparations at the Cathedral had come. Outside Trondhjems Kunstforening, just to the left of the Cathedral, there was a little crowd and a huge, black limousine and police motorbikes, so I stopped, and a few minutes later the King and Queen left after having viewed an exhibition about coronations and consecrations in Trondheim. Later in the day, the King and Queen visited an old age home and the King also visited the war sailors, while the younger royals visited the football stadium Lerkendal and the science institute SINTEF.

In the afternoon, I went to Erkebispegården (the Archbishop's Mansion), where a "Princess test" took place in the courtyard; lots of small girls in Princess costume tested if they were real princesses. They had to lie on a pile of mattresses to see if they could feel the pea under the mattresses, try on a shoe, do the "wave-and-curtsey-test" and kiss a frog to see if it turned into a prince. Nothing happened to the frog until Princess Märtha, wearing a fake crown, kissed the frog and Ari Behn appeared.

In the evening there was a concert in Olavshallen ("The Olav Hall"), which was a present from the city of Trondheim. There were many different types of music, and Ari Behn's best man Kåre Conradi hosted the show, something he did very well; he both acted, sang, danced and read poems. The "grande finale" was when the Norwegian "Brazz Brothers" and the South African "Women United" played an African song together, and after they had finished, the Princess and Ari Behn came on stage and thanked the city and the participants for the show, before the musicians struck up again and managed to get both the Princess and Ari Behn to dance along to the African rhythms.

After the concert, the government hosted a reception at the Royal Garden Hotel, right across the street. The guests walked from Olavshallen to the hotel through an alley of flag-waving children. The Prime Minister, Kjell Magne Bondevik, is a priest and represents the Christian People's Party, so it was perhaps not a surprise that a psalm was sung. This brought Princess Märtha close to tears, as it was "Kjærlighet fra Gud", which her late maternal grandmother, Dagny Haraldsen, used to sing for her when she was a child. The Princess also made a short speech, where she pronounced in Trondheim dialect that "Vi glær oss!" ("We are looking forward [to tomorrow]!")

The next morning, heavy grey clouds had gathered over Trondheim, and it was also only half as warm as the day before. I reached the town centre at noon, and found myself a position outside the West Front of the Cathedral where I had a splendid view on the entrance. After an hour and a half, the police changed their mind - we were not allowed to stand there any more. So there followed a rush for new positions; I found mine in Munkegata, the parade street between Stiftsgården and the Cathedral. I stood quite far up in the street, just opposite the courthouse. Luckily, I managed to grab one of the last front line positions.

I had a huge exam the following Monday, so I tried to read a little while sitting there, but I had not been seated for long before things started to happen. A few guests came walking up the street; the first ones were Odd Roger Enoksen, leader of the Centre Party, with his wife, and Trine Skei Grande, leader of the liberal party Venstre's parliamentary group.

A newly wed couple that emerged from the courthouse was loudly cheered by the growing crowds, but they looked embarrassed and did not seem to appreciate it.

After a while, a few cars and busses started coming up the street. The kids standing next to me claimed to have seen Crown Princess Mette-Marit in every bus that passed, but it was still more than an hour to wait before she appeared. The first buses contained friends of the royal family; one of the first I recognised was Ilmi Horn, who was Queen Sonja's maid of honour in 1968 and Princess Märtha's godmother. The first relative of the bridal couple I saw was the Queen's brother Haakon Haraldsen with his wife Lis in a minibus with the bride's former nanny Berit Tversland, now the King's private secretary, and two others. Haakon Haraldsen, on whose 50th birthday Princess Märtha was born, is also one of her godparents.

Now the time flew towards 16CEST, when the wedding ceremony should start, and the cortege was obviously behind the schedule, for the passing cars and buses drove faster and faster; the government (also known as Kjell's Angels) rushed past in a minibus before the first black car came up the street. It contained "only" the Master of the Royal Household (hoffsjef), Lars Petter Forberg, and his wife. Then followed the President of the Supreme Court, Carsten Smith, with his wife, Professor Lucy Smith, former Chancellor of the University of Oslo. In the next car, the attention-loving Prime Minister Kjell Magne Bondevik, waving and smiling his dentist smile, together with his wife, followed by the President of the Storting, Jørgen Kosmo, with his wife.

Soldiers and scouts lined the route, and I was happy to have some rather short scouts in front of me - after all it was better than a tall guardsman. But it can not have been easy for the scouts: first came the scout leader and asked them to take a step forward, then came a policewoman and asked them to take a step backwards, then came the scout leader and asked them to take a step forward, and then came the policewoman again and asked them to take a step backwards etc.

15.30, 20 minutes to go before Princess Märtha should leave Stiftsgården with her father, and no royal had still been seen. But shortly thereafter came a minibus carrying, among others, Count Flemming and Countess Ruth of Rosenborg, who celebrated their 53rd wedding anniversary on the same day. The lady next to me was very disappointed when she found out that Prince Nikolaos had passed without her noticing - luckily for her he was to walk past after the wedding.

By now the crowd had grown; police estimated around 45 000, about the same as in Oslo in August (I had expected more would come, as such events use to attract larger crowds in places where they are not every day-events than in the capital). Of course it is natural to compare these two weddings, and I concluded that I liked the wedding in August better than this one, but that is of course a matter of taste. This crowd did not cheer as loud as the crowds did in Oslo in August, only the car carrying Ari Behn, his best man Kåre Conradi and the bride's maid of honour Marianne Ulrichsen received an especially loud cheer. There was a much more joyful and enthusiastic atmosphere in Oslo when the Crown Prince married than it was in Trondheim now. Also, in Oslo, there were no demonstrations, but in Trondheim there was a group of demonstrators across the street from me, calling for the privatisation of the monarchy.

The last cars to drive past were the cars carrying the groom's parents, Queen Margrethe, Princess Astrid and Johan Martin Ferner, Princess Ragnhild and Erling S. Lorentzen, the bridesmaids and page, and finally the Queen with the Crown Prince and Crown Princess. They received a loud cheer, only surpassed by the cheer when Princess Märtha and the King drove past in a horse-drawn landau (a rare sight in Norway; the royal family mostly uses limousines). The bells tolled as the landau came closer and closer to the Cathedral, and I have rarely seen the King with a broader smile.

From where I stood, I could see the big screen in the town square, but not hear a word. And something that surprised me: no one in the crowd paid the slightest attention to the wedding ceremony. In Oslo in August the crowds fell silent and watched the ceremony, but in Trondheim everyone chatted and cackled throughout. Most people did not even have a clue about whether they had yet said yes! What was also a little disturbing for us in the crowd, was that the scouts retreated and were replaced by schoolchildren, who of course made a lot of noise. Also the 561 metres long grey carpet for the guests to walk on was rolled out during the service.

Although I could not hear a word of the service, I saw Princess Märtha Louise and Ari Behn say "Yes" (or rather, when I saw it on TV later, Ari Behn did not say "Yes" but "YES!") Those of us who did pay attention applauded each Yes and when the Bishop declared them "rightfully married".

The service ended at 17 CEST, and just as we saw the newly-weds start on the walk down the aisle, the first raindrops fell. Luckily only a few drops came while all the 227 guests for the wedding dinner in Stiftsgården walked in procession from the Cathedral to the mansion - except Crown Princess Mette-Marit, who broke her ankle some weeks before and was still not fully recovered. It took many minutes before the procession started to come closer to where I stood, but we could hear how the cheers grew louder as they approached.

A police horse chose to "go to the bathroom" on the carpet, and the procession came to a halt while a policeman sacrificed his white gloves to remove the crap from the carpet. That done, the procession could continue, and shortly thereafter, Princess Märtha and Ari Behn walked slowly past, looking very happy. They were followed by the three bridesmaids and the page, escorted by Marius's nanny Maria Friestad Bergseth (whose mother was a nanny for Princess Märtha and her brother). Then came the King, Queen and Crown Prince, and thereafter the other royals. When the Princess and Ari Behn reached the town square, the procession again came to a halt as they stopped to watch some of the several hundreds musicians who performed along the route, a stop which gave us the chance to take a closer look at a group of royals which stood in front of us for a while - it seemed like most people looked quite little on Prince Lorenz of Belgium and comparatively more on Princess Madeleine.

The procession continued, and it was very fun to see all the guests walk past like this. Not only the royals from Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Spain, Jordan and Greece, but also the groom's family, the Ferners, the Lorentzens, the Haraldsens, friends, ministers etc. Alexander Ferner, Princess Astrid's eldest son, supported himself on a walking stick (don't know why, he is only 37), while the eldest guest in the procession was the 87-year-old physiotherapist Marion Rosen, who developed the method both the Princess and her mother-in-law have specialised in. Jon Andreas Håtun, also known as "Jono el Grande", the only member of the infamous "new wine" (a rather untraditional group of artists Ari Behn belonged to) to be invited, was the only guest to wear a top hat.

The newly-weds had already greeted the crowds from the steps of Stiftsgården, when the last guests in the procession went past me. Elisabeth Tarras-Wahlberg from the Swedish Court and some from the Danish Court were the last in the procession. Then it REALLY started to rain, and it rained more and more. While the wedding guests were photographed inside Stiftsgården and had dinner in a party tent in the garden, I went home (or rather, to my grandmother's home, where I lived during my stay). There we watched the TV summaries and reports, and later the King's and Ari Behn's speeches. Ari Behn could of course not NOT end by saying, "I love you", as Crown Prince Haakon said that to his bride last year.

The last thing broadcast was the cutting of the wedding cake and the wedding waltz. The guests waited and waited, but nothing happened. Much delayed, the bridal couple emerged to loud applause from the by then around 280 guests in the tent (50 more guests had arrived after the dinner). The cutting of the cake was obviously not piece of cake, and the butler's attempt to help was not very successful either: he tipped over the Princess's piece (doesn't that mean that one will not get married?) before he stumbled in her wedding dress. But they managed to give each other a bite of the cake and a sip of champagne before the waltz. After a while, the King and the groom's mother, the Queen and the groom's father Olav Bjørshol and Count Flemming and Countess Ruth joined in, and the other guests followed. And then the TV broadcast ended.

Outside, it rained more and more, and I decided not to go back to the town for the fireworks at 23.45. In stead, I went to a nearby viewpoint with a splendid panorama view of Trondheim, where I saw the fireworks very well.

At 2am, the bridal couple left Stiftsgården, to cheers from a few hundred spectators still patiently waiting outside. Because of the bad weather, the street party, which had been very successful in the two preceding days, did not go too well this night.

I left Trondheim by plane on Saturday afternoon, and the plane was packed by wedding guests. Ari Behn's grandparents, great-aunt and other relatives came with the same airport express bus as me, together with the two bridesmaids Betina and Emilie Swanstrøm and their parents (their father Dag is the Queen's nephew). Also in the plane were the bride's second cousin Vibeke Ulrichsen (again) and lots of more anonymous guests, in addition to numerous journalists and politicians. A red carpet was rolled out outside the airplane, and five minutes before take-off a huge bus pulled up outside. Into the plane came the Earl and Countess of Wessex, followed by Princess Astrid and Johan Martin Ferner, her two youngest daughters with their husbands, Princess Ragnhild's son-in-law Paulo Ribeiro, the Queen's niece-in-law Jasmin Haraldsen, and Ari Behn's mother, stepfather and brother.

When the plane landed in Oslo, Prince Edward and Princess Sophie were rushed out (probably to catch the plane for England), while a car picked up Princess Astrid and her husband on the tarmac. The rest of the guests had to go to fetch their baggage just as us "normal" people. A lot of kissing and hugging and discussion of the wedding and the dress etc. also among these family members. Elisabeth Ferner Beckman and her husband were met at the airport by their three-year-old son Benjamin, and their joy of seeing each other again was very evident.

So then the wedding was over, and it is probably at least 30 years until next time Norway will see a royal wedding. Whatever we think about the bride or the groom or the wedding or the match, let us hope they will be happy!