A Day In Marriage and Civil Union Court

Curious City

WBEZ Chicago

Society & Culture, Education, Public, Chicago, Arts, City, Radio, Curious, Investigation

4.8 • 642 Ratings

🗓️ 13 April 2023

⏱️ 24 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Reporter Araceli Gómez-Aldana spent the day in Marriage and Civil Union Court in downtown Chicago, where she met all kinds of couples who were there to say “I do” and a clerk that’s helped thousands of couples tie the knot over the last 50 years. She’s seen it all, including brides left at the altar at the last minute, and Chicagoans lining up for hours to wed on the same day as Prince Charles and Princess Diana.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey, it's Curious City reporter Adriana Cardona McGigad.
0:03.3	Spring is here. The weather is warming up and the days are getting longer.
0:08.4	It's the perfect time to celebrate important occasions with family and friends.
0:14.1	You know, birthday parties, proms, graduations, weddings.
0:22.7	Yep, spring is one of the most popular times of the year to get married.
0:31.7	And this week, we bring you an episode by our WBEC colleague, Araseli Gomez Aldana. It's about her experience
0:40.1	going through marriage court here in Chicago. See, Araseli always dreamed of having the perfect
0:47.6	wedding. She wanted to tie the knot in the same church where her parents got married back in Mexico. And she did. Araceli and her
0:57.6	husband Ricardo's big day was December 27th of 2021 in Halisco. So magical. But before that, she and
1:07.9	Ricardo had to run down to marriage court here in Chicago to get legally
1:12.9	married because it can be hard to transfer all the official paperwork from country to country.
1:20.1	So a part of me was like, you know, this doesn't really count.
1:23.3	Like the real big day is going to be in December.
1:25.4	But when you're there and you're in front of the judge and what the judge says to you
1:30.3	and you have to look at each other and you say I do and you make this big, big promise.
1:35.0	And I was like, okay, no, this does mean something.
1:37.0	Like that was very real and it was legal.
1:40.1	Not only was it legal.
1:41.9	It was recorded for this podcast.
1:44.6	That's right.
1:45.8	While Araseli was making a lifelong commitment,
1:49.4	she was also answering a question that came to us at Curiosity.
	...

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