WEDDING On the way to get married the first time … only to find the registry office shut.
SHOTGUN COVID WEDDING runaway kids, language barrier & two bags of rice ittle did they know, they’d have a shotgun wedding in Thailand with a wedding party of strangers off
BY JODI BRYANT
When Sara Smeath and fiancé Christopher Saunders fled a covidridden China with their three young children and only one bag between them, they thought they’d return in three weeks.
as it was affordable to fly to last-minute. Sara remembers passengers were spaced apart, masks were worn and, arriving at the deserted
China and cities and towns around them were being closed off to stop the spread.
airport, Thailand had already put temperature testing and sanitising stations in place.
other side of the world. “We were only intending to wait it out in
“Ambulances were turning up with people in hazmat suits taking sick people from nearby
Checking into a hotel, they put themselves into a 14-day isolation period while keeping
Thailand. The messages we were being told was that everything would go back to normal
buildings. There was no test back then so fevers, coughs etc were not to be treated
watch on the news as the virus began to evolve around the rest of the world.
after a few weeks,” explains Sara. Northland-raised Sara, 36, met Chris, 32,
by your local doctor and you had to go to a special clinic.
Within two days, New Zealand, Singapore and Australia had put a ban on people who
the street, before finding themselves back in New Zealand with all their possessions locked away in storage on the
in Australia, his home country, nine years ago before moving to China following Sara’s career as a fashion forecaster. Chris worked as a web developer and they had three girls, now five But early this year, the world around them began changing at a rapid pace. “In January, we were already in lockdown in China - sanitising, wearing masks and staying
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“We also learnt that if you were suspected of having the virus, you would be put in isolation. With three small children, we didn’t want to take the risk.” After discovering one of their children’s passports was due to expire, they booked flights and left almost overnight with only one bag between them. Almost half their expat friends also left and
had been in China for the past 14 days. “We had no intention to go back to New Zealand and didn’t worry about the 14-day rule as we would be in Thailand longer than 14 days,” Sara explains. But, as their third week in Thailand approached with the virus affecting more countries and further flights and restrictions put in place, they took another precautionary step.
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the couple decided to head to nearby Thailand
various places,” Sara recalls. Flights were being cancelled in and out of
and two-year-old twins.
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