Before we get to the Wedding – why not read here about the foundation of this nation in 2013 – founder interview with the President
Tell us a bit about yourselves – Career / profession? Jobs / interesting jobs?
Anna is a Swedish-Norwegian singer, songwriter and performer based in Oslo, Norway. She’s been working professionally in the music industry for many years, writing music for herself and other artists. Anna also has a degree in Coaching and Communications, and is also a social and political critic, which has lead to some of her articles being published in Norwegian newspapers.
Christian has been running restaurants and nightclubs all of his adult life, and has worked as a professional DJ for over 30 years – playing at different prestigious clubs in Oslo, Norway. He is currently working as a woodworker and engineer after his nightclub after 17 years had to close its doors in the aftermath of the Covid-19 lockdowns.
“It was kind of symbolic – the club was formally closed on Liberland’s birthday – April 13th – a day we actually both were in Ark to celebrate Liberland’s 8th anniversary. It was a surreal day full of both tears and happiness.”
Where are you from? Tell us about your family, your hobbies and so on.
Anna was born in Sweden and her Swedish mother and Norwegian father moved to Norway when she was little. Christian is born and raised in Norway.
“Both of us found happiness in music from an early age, and have followed our dream to create and perform music in our different ways.”
What’s your educational background?
Anna started law school, but chose to quit the studies after the first year in order to work with music instead. Christian went to college for two years, but chose to leave because he was headhunted to the restaurant business.
Where did you meet? How long have you been dating?
Anna: We’d met briefly in Oslo a couple of times at parties in 2006, noticing each
other with interest, but nothing happened. The third time however was accidently at
Christian’s club, Horgan’s, and we’ve been together since.
Christian: We’ve now been formally together for 17 years, actually on October 27th the day we initially planned to marry in Liberland. We changed the date to October 28th though, due to the weather forecast, which turned out to be a good decision, because exactly at 3 in the afternoon on the 27th, Liberland got hit by a pretty nasty storm, which would have inundated the wedding completely.
On our wedding day the next day though, it was beautiful and sunny, and there was a full moon and eclipse as well. It was totally magical.
When did you discovered you shared libertarian values?
Anna: I guess we’ve always been libertarians, as we’ve strongly believed in
freedom and individualism our whole lives.
Did you become citizens together or separately?
Christian: We both stayed in Liberland for 25 days in October as part of the citizenship program, and decided to get married during this stay. The decision was made on Liberty Island 11 days before the wedding. It was our third stay in Liberland; The first time we walked on Liberland soil was actually when the first group of seven people entered the border on August 6th, which was an epic moment, and the second time we visited for 4-5 days in the occasion of Vit’s birthday. We also visited the Liberland community (Ark) in april on Liberlands 8th birthday, and Anna was also allowed in the boat with Niko Omilana and camera crew (as featured in the YouTube video – Sneaking into a Banned Country), trying to land on Liberland – unfortunately unsuccessfully at that point.
Who proposed and when? At what stage did you decide to consider a wedding in Liberland? Was it a humanist wedding / religious/ civil?
Christian: Anna and I were sitting by the camp fire surrounded by our fellow settlers, listening to music, watching the beautiful night sky and enjoying each others company when she suddenly turned around and whispered; “Darling, we’ve been together for 17 years the 27th, and I’ve been thinking – why don’t we get married that day?” I was really surprised, but there was no doubt in my mind and I said: “Yes, let’s do it – let’s go for it!”
It was actually very romantic, because it was so genuine and beautiful. Liberland has brought us both closer, and this was the right occasion and the perfect timing.
Anna: A few days earlier Christian had the idea to start a church on Liberty Island, and we decided to call it ‘The Free Church of Liberland’ and it was built with sandbags in a joint effort by settlers, while I described the belief system. In many early settlements the first building was a church, and the settlers agreed on this first building that was already in progress, to become just that.
I also started to think about a possible wedding during those days, but kept it to myself. In short, the Free Church of Liberland is an eclectic religion and we believe in absolute spiritual freedom and no dogmas would ever interfere with this principles expect three:
- harm none,
- respect every living creature and
- respect that no one owns or holds the truth.
We believe that no world view, religious or non-religious, have a higher rank than another. There might be parts of the truth in every world view. Also, if you are non-religious and still believe in the same values as us; righteousness, empathy, integrity, love, respect and truth, you are welcome in this church.
We believe in always asking questions in the search for human enlightening. To be open minded and ask questions is essential for the goal of this church. The Free Church of Liberland played a significant role at the wedding, and a small part of the ceremony also took place in the church.
Did you write your own vows – what were they?
Yes, we did. If you want to hear our vows, you can visit Liberland’s Youtube channel to follow the ceremony.
https://www.youtube.com/@LiberlandOfficial
Was there a best man and bridesmaids, and who performed the wedding?
Yes, we had four wonderful fellow settlers and friends as our best men and bridesmaids; Veronika, Julie, Mirek and Quentin, and our dear Navid Saberin performed the wedding in a beautiful way. We couldn´t be happier with the ceremony. It was really personal and magical.
Is marriage an outdated concept (I know, funny question to ask – maybe how do you view the institution?)
Anna: We’re not the typical traditional people and believe that people shouldn’t follow the expected norms of society if they don’t genuinely feel like doing so, so some people have been surprised of us wanting to get married. We also think that people are somewhat tired of the old dogmas of institutions that they might feel leave no room for the free, independent individual, and therefore the thought of institutional marriage can trigger negative responses in people and marriage could be viewed by some as an ‘outdated’ concept. We totally understand that.
It is our opinion that weddings first of all should be genuinely personal commitments to another person that is free of stereotyped dogmas, just as we experienced in Liberland. We had our Norwegian ceremony only a month later – on November 25th, in a lovely church in a small mountain village where we live part time, surrounded by our loved ones in Norway – and that too was really beautiful.
We actually chose the traditional way this time for, among other, cultural reasons, but arranged it to be very personal, and we had a very understanding priest who respected our personal beliefs.
Christian: Since Liberland has played such a big part in our decision to get married in the first place, we let pictures from the Liberty Island ceremony run on a TV screen at the wedding venue, it was mentioned in several speeches, and the flag was of course present as well.
Was the day as magical as you thought it might be?
The day was magical beyond our wildest dreams. We knew it was going to be beautiful, but couldn’t even imagine how much effort that was going to be put into it. It isn’t an easy task to plan a wedding when you´re in the process of starting a new country; It isn’t easy to bring cake, food, rings, drinks, flowers, decorations and wedding garments to Liberty Island in such a short time and on such a short notice, but our amazing fellow settlers and liberlanders really went out of their way to make this day totally amazing – everything was brought to us, and they even made furniture and wedding arch under the harshest conditions during the storm the day before.
They even threw us an unforgettable bachelor/bachelorette party the weekend before. We are humbled and forever deeply grateful to each and every one involved with this wedding. We also want to thank all the guests who showed up to celebrate us, our sponsors who bought us supplies, and all the people working outside of Liberland such as media, administration, organizers, artists, suppliers, drivers, boat captains, etc.
And non the least – we are deeply grateful to the generosity of Vit and the Liberland cabinet who supported us in such an amazing way.
What next for Mr and Mrs (or do you keep your own names)?
Anna will keep her full name, but add the surname of Christan, Ditleff. We will continue our Liberland journey, and keep on making plans for the future there. One part of that is Radio Liberland. We started Radio Lib August 6th, and it was born with the intention of sending the country’s first music radio broadcast from the Liberland mainland. The purpose was mainly to boost the morale of Liberlanders by showing that it still was possible to, without special training, visit the country at a time when the borders were closed.
After August 6th however, Radio Lib was developed further, and more episodes have been broadcasted, and more are planned for future releases.
You can read more about Radio Liberland here: https://liberland.org/en/news/493-tune-in-to-radio-liberland-a-symphony-of[1]resilience-and-unity
You can also listen to the full episodes at https://soundcloud.com/radioliberland, and the official site of the radio: https://radio.ll.land.
We will also formalize the Free Church of Liberland, and we’ve also been thinking about starting a bar or restaurant, but as for now though, we will work for Liberland with whatever is necessary at this stage. We also have a wonderful place in Norway, which we have some future plans for, and we hope to see some Liberlanders visiting us there in the near future – we’ve made friends for life, and look forward to meet many more, and we wish of course to return to Liberland in the near future
