Although most young Argentinians aren’t even thinking about marriage these days, they seem quite fond of wedding ceremonies. So they’ve come up with a bizarre party trend of fake weddings, where groups of 20- and 30-somethings get together to attend wedding-themed parties complete with fake bride and groom.
雖然大多數阿根廷年輕人根本沒考慮過談婚論嫁，可他們似乎都還很喜歡參加婚禮。所以他們開啟了“假結婚”的奇異潮流，一堆20或者30多歲的年輕人齊聚一堂，參加婚禮主題的聚會，不過新郎和新娘都不是真的。

The idea was the brainchild of 26-year-old publicist Martin Acerbi, who, a couple of years ago, organised a fake wedding with four of his friends in La Plata, about 32 miles away from Buenos Aires. “It all started two years ago with a group of friends: we realised we hadn’t been to a wedding in a long time because hardly anybody is getting married anymore,” Acerbi says.
26歲的公關馬丁?阿克比想出了這一主意，幾年前，他與他的四位朋友在距離阿根廷布宜諾斯艾利斯51.5公里遠的拉普拉塔組織了一場假婚禮。他回憶道：“一切始于兩年前我和一群朋友的經歷：由于現在很少有人結婚，我們意識到我們很久沒有參加過婚禮了?！?/p>

To his surprise, the event was a huge success which got him thinking about a new business. The friends went on to found ‘Falsa Boda’, a fake wedding organising company, in November 2013. They rent out real wedding locations, hire caterers, florists, and DJs, and make everything look like a real wedding. Except, there is no ‘happily ever after’.
令他驚訝的是，他們組織的假婚禮獲得了空前的成功，這使得阿克比想到了新商機。這幾位志同道合的好友于2013年11月成立了一家組織假婚禮的公司Falsa Boda。他們租賃了真正的婚禮舉辦地點，雇傭了宴席承辦者、花匠和DJ，讓一切看上去與真正的婚禮一模一樣。唯一的差別在于，婚禮過后沒有“從此之后的幸福生活”。

The bride and groom are hired too, as is a secret boyfriend or spurned lover who arrives unexpectedly to disrupt the ceremony. There’s a fair bit of drama when the bride or groom abandons the wedding and elopes with the third actor. There’s a different storyline for each event, and sometimes the ‘bride’ even throws her bouquet to the female guests.
新娘和新郎也是雇傭來的，假婚禮上還會有秘密男友或者感覺備受冷落的情人前來鬧場。有時新娘或者新郎會拋棄婚禮與第三名演員私奔。每場假婚禮最后都會有不同的故事結局，有時新娘會將捧花扔給女性客人。

“These wedding professionals have become our strategic allies, we organise it like it’s the real thing, except the marriage itself is fake,” Acerbi said. “Our guests get all the fun of a wedding party with none of the commitment, or the problem of finding someone who is actually getting married.”
阿克比說：“這些婚禮專家已經成為了我們的戰略同盟，我們將它當做一場真正的婚禮來舉辦，只有婚姻本身是假的。我們的客人可以充分享受這場沒有承諾的婚禮的樂趣，就算看中新郎新娘也沒有關系，因為他們不是真的結婚。”

Each fake wedding event can accommodate 600 to 700 guests, who all pay about $50 to attend. According to Acerbi, the events are mostly targeted at women, who end up buying the majority of the tickets. “The romanticism around weddings is clearly still alive, at least in that respect,” he explained.
每場假婚禮能容納600-700名客人，每位客人需付50美元入場費。據阿克比透露，假婚禮的主要目標是女性，她們購買了大部分入場券。他解釋說：“雖然婚姻本身是假的，但婚禮的浪漫氛圍并未減少?！?/p>

32-year-old marketing manager Pablo Boniface, who recently attended a fake wedding, said: “The girls were euphoric, as if a cousin of theirs was really getting married, but it was just an actress. When the bride arrived, everyone went crazy, pulling out their phones and snapping pictures like she was a Hollywood star.” He agreed that the fake weddings were a big hit because hardly anyone his age ever talks about getting married. “I’m single and so are all of my friends of both sexes. Marriage is something we don’t even think about. It’s a formality that has nothing to do with love.”
32歲的市場經理帕布洛?伯尼菲斯最近參加了一場假婚禮，他說：“姑娘們的情緒都很高漲，感覺就像她們的親戚真的在結婚一樣，但其實婚禮上只有演員。新娘入場之后，每個人都很瘋狂，拿出他們的手機拍攝照片，感覺她就像一名好萊塢明星?！彼姓J假婚禮特別受歡迎，因為他的同齡人很少會考慮結婚?！拔疫€是單身，我身邊的男女朋友們也一樣。婚姻是我們不會考慮的東西。這是一場與愛無關的儀式?！?/p>

There’s plenty of data to prove Boniface right. 22,000 couples tied the knot in Buenos Aires in 1990, but that number nosedived to almost half that – 11,642 – by 2013. According to government statistics, the people who do get married are much older. So people these days don’t have many opportunities to attend wedding parties, which is why Acerbi’s fake weddings are so popular.
不少數據顯示1990年布宜諾斯艾利斯有2.2萬人結婚，而這一數字到了2013年暴跌至11642人。據政府統計，真正結婚的人年紀都比較大。如今阿根廷的年輕人沒什么機會參加婚禮，阿克比的假婚禮才會如此受歡迎。

“They are going to see something they don’t do in real life any more,” explained sociologist Victoria Mazzeo. “The fact is that very few young people get married anymore.”
社會學家維多利亞?馬澤爾表示：“他們會見識到現實生活中看不到的東西。事實上，現在很少有年輕人結婚了?！?/p>

And as Boniface pointed out, it’s apparently easier to meet someone at fake weddings than at real ones!
正如伯尼菲斯指出，很明顯去假婚禮結交朋友遠比去真婚禮方便。

Vocabulary

brainchild: 創造性腦力勞動的產物（如思想、發現、發明、計劃、藝術品、作品等）
publicist: 公關人員
spurn: 冷落；一腳踢開
euphoric: 情緒高漲的
nosedive: 暴跌

英文來源：Odditycentral.com
譯者：張驍
審校&編輯：丹妮