A love story across continents ends in a packed Vietnamese village wedding

By the middle of the banquet in O Dien Commune in early September, the village cultural house was packed and sweltering. Guests from Ireland, Australia, Switzerland and Brazil searched for seats as the usual six-person table arrangement quickly fell apart.

Five translators moved between tables, arranging extra chairs, bringing ice and drinks, and at times showing foreign guests how to use chopsticks.

Thao, a preschool teacher, had initially expected only 35 to 38 overseas guests. But after sending out invitations she had designed herself eight months earlier, interest in experiencing a traditional Vietnamese wedding spread among her friends.

The final count reached 65, forcing her family to add two tables at the last minute.

Initially, Thao, a preschool teacher, only expected to get 35 to 38 foreign guests. However, after she mailed her self-designed invitations eight months earlier, word had been getting around.

Excitement about a fully traditional Vietnamese wedding spread through conversations among Thao’s friends, and the final headcount surged to 65.

The wedding Thao had meticulously planned suddenly turned into a scramble, and her family had to set up two extra tables at the last minute.

Friends from around the world serve as bridesmaids and groomsmen at Thao and Aylward’s wedding, while the couple wear Vietnamese ao dai featuring Ireland’s traditional green. Photo from MsThaothaoVN

Standing in the corner of the cultural house, seeing her husband Eoin Aylward, from Kilkenny, Ireland, and his family looking radiant in the traditional Vietnamese aodaishe realized her worry had been unnecessary.

They had traveled more than 10,000 kilometers just to witness this moment. That journey began with a chance encounter four years ago in Australia.

In 2022, she had left Hanoi for Australia with the intention of living there for a year or two before returning home. She worked at a coffee shop near where Aylward lived.

Her first impression of the Irish civil engineer wasn’t great: he was quiet and always looked tense because of work pressure.

However, he quietly won over the Vietnamese woman. During the freezing Australian winter, he persistently woke up at 5 a.m. to drive her to work and pick her up afterward.

When Thao decided to study to rebuild her career as a preschool teacher, he became her greatest source of emotional support. “Every time I doubted myself, Eoin would hold my hand and say, ‘You can definitely do it,'” Thao recalls. “Our love was not built on magic, but from car rides at 5 a.m.”

Aylward proposes to Thao with a traditional Irish Claddagh ring in 2025. Photo from MsThaothaoVN

In the summer of 2025, he took Thao to a bridge associated with wish-making tales in Ireland, and handed her a traditional Claddagh ring, an Irish cultural symbol featuring two hands clasping a crowned heart, representing unity, love, and loyalty.

After he proposed, she expressed the wish to host a proper Vietnamese wedding in her hometown, to which he immediately agreed.

The couple had to make many compromises to arrive at the wedding date they wanted. He had originally hoped for a church wedding, but a traditional Vietnamese wedding already runs long, with a series of customs to observe.

She then patiently showed him videos of Vietnamese weddings, and carefully explained the spiritual significance of ancestral rites.

Once he understood that these were not superficial formalities but a connection to her roots, he enthusiastically explained them to his parents and friends. On the big day, the groom’s family prepared seven elaborate betrothal trays. The groomsmen, all tall foreigners dressed in colorful ao dai, walked through the winding and narrow alleys of O Dien.

Villagers poured out to watch, taking pictures with their phones, and the laughter and chatter chased away the smothering heat.

Relatives and friends of Aylward from Ireland, Australia, Switzerland, Brazil, and elsewhere were excited about Vietnamese wedding rituals.

That day, fried chicken from KFC also made a special appearance alongside traditional boiled chicken with lime leaves at the 140-table banquet, because Thao was worried that the foreign guests might not find the local food to their liking.

In the end, everyone was keen to try a Vietnamese village feast, with a guest “eating three large pieces of chicken.”

Neighborhood grandmas and mothers, delighted to have them, kept smiling. When Thao stood on stage to thank her parents, many Irish guests were in tears. “They told me they were moved by the closeness and bond of the Vietnamese people. At that moment, language and geographical boundaries vanished,” Thao says.

Amidst the bustle atmosphere, Aylward looked at Thao and whispered softly, “We did it.”

Irish groom brings 65 Western guests to his hometown wedding, the bride's family 'is on fire'