Well, at some point while wandering through downtown Canberra (About where that hotel went on fire the other month, but of course years before the actual fire...) I proposed, she evinced the desire to spend the rest of our lives together, but not actually being interested in weddings and similar frippery, so instead when NZ brought in civil unions, we got one of those while back there for a holiday. We informed her parents a couple of hours beforehand (As they were getting on a plane to Norway) and my parents a couple of hours afterwards, and our witnesses ten minutes before. The registrar was really chuffed, he'd never done a civil union before, and the legislation was all new and shiny. Apparently we were straight civil union couple number 35.
We needed/wanted the legal status without spending the money/dealing with the social and relationship implications/baggage of wedding ceremonies. At the time we were not certain whether we would be staying in Aus/NZ, and in particular the legal standing of our NZ civil union was never tested in Oz, which we had thought would have been interesting to watch (I think at the time Australia was not accepting NZ civil unions, but because we are straight, probably would have just treated us as a de-facto couple).
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regna
(no subject)
Date: 2011-07-07 10:58 am (UTC)We needed/wanted the legal status without spending the money/dealing with the social and relationship implications/baggage of wedding ceremonies. At the time we were not certain whether we would be staying in Aus/NZ, and in particular the legal standing of our NZ civil union was never tested in Oz, which we had thought would have been interesting to watch (I think at the time Australia was not accepting NZ civil unions, but because we are straight, probably would have just treated us as a de-facto couple).