Nuptial Numbers

Aura of Luck (and Ease of Recall) Appeals to the Marriage-Minded

H oa Nguyen will have no excuse for forgetting his wedding anniversary. Neither will Steven Dodd, Chris Holder, Yusuf Guler or any of the other grooms from around the Washington area who picked yesterday -- 8/8/08 -- to tie the knot.

Eight is considered a lucky number in China and elsewhere and is so auspicious that the Summer Olympics began at precisely 8:08 p.m. Beijing time. But yesterday's abundance of eights was also a handy way for even non-Mandarin speakers to avoid awkward interspousal conversations along the lines of: "Of course I know what day it is. It's Tuesday."

By 3:30 p.m., 26 couples had filled out the requisite paperwork on the sixth floor of Arlington County's courthouse, then walked the half-block to the basement office of Gerald Williams, one of the county's three official civil celebrants. Some had appointments; most did not. They just knew they wanted to get married on Aug. 8, 2008.

"We like the number because it's lucky in Vietnam," said Thao Ho, a 34-year-old project manager from Arlington.

"I proposed on 7/7/07, so it's a good date for a wedding," said her new husband, Hoa Nguyen, a 43-year-old engineer from Fairfax.

"I'd like to have a baby on Sept. 9, 2009," Ho added.

In China, the word for "eight" sounds like the word for "prosperity." In any language, the number has a pleasing symmetry: two circles arranged like a pair of interlocking wedding rings. Resembling an infinity symbol turned upright, the digit suggests that marriage lasts forever, even if, statistically speaking, it often doesn't.

Tara Goodman, 36, and her fiance came from Hyattsville to get hitched. She said the pastor at their church, Reid Temple A.M.E. in Glenn Dale, told her that the number eight symbolizes "new beginnings."

"And it's easy for me to remember," said her new husband, Chris Holder, a 35-year-old glazier. "I know I ain't going to get in any trouble."

At times yesterday morning, the wedding parties were stacked up in Williams's office like jets over a busy airport. There were similar reports from elsewhere in the region. The room used for weddings in Montgomery County's Circuit Court has been booked to capacity, 20 weddings, for five weeks. Howard County had two dozen scheduled.

Couples who want to get married in the District have to wait 10 days between getting their license and tying the knot. There's a 48-hour waiting period in Maryland. In Virginia, however, you can meet someone at Starbucks, fall in love over coffee, get a $30 marriage license before lunch, then walk over to Williams's office. It takes him about 12 minutes to get to "I do" and costs $50, cash.

The silver-haired 75-year-old real estate lawyer has been performing marriages since 1982. He estimates that he's pronounced 40,000 couples husband and wife. He's performed the ceremony in a hot air balloon, on board a bus and in numerous churches, but he most often officiates in his nondescript conference room, the bride and groom standing next to a bouquet of red artificial roses from Costco.

The setting may be mundane, but the sentiments aren't. Steven Dodd hadn't gotten much beyond "I, Steven Dodd" when his fiancee, Frauke Nitschke, started blinking back tears. Nitschke, a 32-year-old World Bank lawyer, is from Germany, and the couple will have a big family ceremony there in October and another in the states in May. Yesterday, it was just the two of them, dressed in "Life Is Good" T-shirts.

"There are two days you must never forget," Williams told Dodd, a 33-year-old civil engineer from Vienna. "Your anniversary and your wife's birthday."

July 7 was a big day for weddings last year -- 7/7/07 -- but that lucky day fell on a Saturday, when many civil celebrants don't perform last-minute weddings. Williams said other top days for weddings are Feb. 14 -- he performed a personal best 42 weddings one Valentine's Day -- and Feb. 15. Fridays are popular because couples can squeeze in a quick weekend honeymoon. So are Mondays, when a whirlwind romance is brought to its logical conclusion (not that marriage should spell the end of romance).

Not long after Dodd and Nitschke filed out of Williams's conference room, Yusuf Guler and Iris Benitez filed in.

"We didn't want to miss the 8/8," said Guler, 29, who runs Pasha Bistro in the District.

Twice during the ceremony, Guler's cellphone chirped in his pocket. But he didn't stop to answer it, surely a good sign for the future.