Polish Wedding Toasts: Cheers, Speeches, and Customs

Who speaks, and when

• The parents greet the couple with bread and salt, and a short blessing, as they arrive at the reception. This is the most important spoken moment.
• A toast from the parents or the witnesses opens the meal. Long speeches are less common than in English-speaking countries.
• The room sings 'Sto lat' to the couple, more than once, and that is the toast everyone remembers.

How long

Short. Toasts are a line and a glass. 'Sto lat' takes a minute to sing and does the work of a speech. The party itself runs to dawn and often into a second day.

What you’ll see

• Bread and salt: the parents offer the couple bread, so they never go hungry, and salt, for the hard times, and the couple shares them before entering.
• 'Sto lat, sto lat, niech żyje, żyje nam' is sung with raised glasses whenever someone starts it.
• Vodka on every table, often with a toast from the host to each one, and the first glass is usually downed together.
• The oczepiny at midnight: the bride's veil is removed, she throws it to the unmarried women, and the groom throws his tie.
• Poprawiny: a second day of the wedding, with the leftovers and the same guests, is traditional in many families.

If you’re the guest from somewhere else

• Learn 'Sto lat.' You will sing it several times and nobody is excused.
• Pace yourself with the vodka. It is refilled, and the night is long.
• A short toast is welcome. Say it with a full glass and finish with 'na zdrowie.'

A toast you could give

Short, warm, specific to the couple, and ending on the phrase. Swap in your own names and your own detail; the shape is what matters.

Kasia once talked a border guard into letting us through with the wrong papers, and I have never been afraid of anything with her since. Piotr, you are in good hands. Sto lat to you both. Na zdrowie!