News Stories - Space wedding
The bride wore a traditional white dress and arrived in a sleek car, but that's where normality ended as twenty-seven year-old Yekaterina Dmitriyeva married her sweetheart Yuri Malenchenko. Since the groom was unable to be there in person, guests were greeted by a cardboard cut-out of the forty-one year-old cosmonaut. He's due back from an extended mission on the International Space Station in October, but the couple decided they couldn't wait that long to tie the knot.

The groom's tailcoat and wedding ring were flown out on a cargo ship, a fellow astronaut agreed to be the best man - and the scene was set for the first-ever cosmic wedding, which went ahead via video-link at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas. The bride says the physical distance in the run-up to the big day has not been a problem. But the wedding wasn't without controversy. Both NASA and the Russian Aerospace Agency tried to get the couple to wait until Yuri returned to Earth.

 
- vocabulary:
her sweetheart: the person she loves



a cardboard cut-out: a photograph or drawing of someone or something, cut to shape and stuck onto thick card
an extended mission: an official trip that is longer than planned


to tie the knot: to get married


a cargo ship: a ship used to carry things, here a spaceship
the best man: the man who acts as attendant to the groom at a wedding
cosmic: belonging to the universe or space
went ahead: took place, continued

the run-up to: the time before, the preparation time
controversy: a disagreement about something which leads to a lot of discussion and argument
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