Cape Town - While couples incur a mountain of debt while planning their wedding, this Western Cape man said the simplest things mean the most after he married the love of his life on Saturday.
Ebrahim Samboe, 26, from Worcester finally wedded the love of his life, teaching assistant Tayla Samboe, 28, at the weekend and did things differently.
The couple, who met six months ago at church, may not have the world’s riches but their love far exceeds any material wealth.
Ebrahim, a former JCY gang leader turned his life around and has since dedicated his life to the Lord. After going through the trauma of losing a child, he thought finding love would not be on the cards, however, miracles do happen and he his now a married man.
“It still feels like a dream to me. If I look at my past and where I am now, wow! There was a time I had nine criminal cases for murder and attempted murder. My friends are either high-ranking gang members in prison or dead. The Lord gave me a second chance and now I have stepped into a marriage and I could not be more grateful,” he told IOL.
Ebrahim said when he met Tayla he was down and close to a depressive state and never believed he would ever get married or close to a woman again.
“Not knowing at the time I was actually speaking to my (future) wife at the time. I am currently unemployed and Tayla is a teaching assistant so she doesn’t earn that much.
“We told each other stressing about money for a wedding is a distraction for what God has planned for us.
“If we were going to worry about money, it will never happen.
“Pastor Fritz told us he would charge us R1 000 to wed us (it usually costs over R2 000). We didn’t know how we were going to pay the money, but God put people on our path.
“Put your trust in the Lord and He will provide and He truly did,” he said.
Ebrahim said with zero in his bank account, he did not know where he would get a suit, shoes or a dress or even what they were going to do for their wedding reception, but he had faith it would all work out in the end. And it did!
“My aunt placed a R200 in my pocket. At the time I didn’t know what we were going to do after the ceremony. Something said, let’s eat. I then told her let’s go to McDonald’s because it’s a general place where people in the area eat. It was a spur-of-the-moment idea.
“She (Tayla) likes to eat, so I told her we’re going there. I told her to order anything she wanted and she did,” Ebrahim said proudly.
His advice to other couples who may want to get married but feel constrained due to finances is to just do it.
Ebrahim said there is no need to indebt yourself, but once you are financially stable as a couple do the big wedding and invite all your loved ones.
“We live in a generation where everything needs to be fancy, but sometimes the most simple things carry so much strength and power. I thank God for this,” he added.
IOL