The hotel was bustling with guests in the midst of carrying out their own agendas.  Many were there for business meetings and conferences, others to enjoy the famed Orlando theme parks, and some to find reprieve from the intensity of the Florida sun by enjoying the on-site water park.  But the group that captured my attention for days in a row was a delegation of refined, well-dressed Africans sporting native silk garments and head wraps.  Everything about them spoke of reserve and formality and I was intrigued.

Three days into our stay, I mustered up the courage to ask a hotel employee where the delegation was from and what they were all about.  The writer in me calls it curiosity, my husband calls it nosy, but either way, I had to find out the story waiting to be told.  Not only did my questions get answered verbally, but just a few short hours later, we watched the unfolding of a beautiful event.

A wedding party gathered around a Nigerian princess who had traveled to America to give herself away in an arranged ceremony.  An event orchestrated by two sets of parents both presumably wanting the very best for their children. [Read more...]