My wife Sumie and I married on 12th February 2004 in Auckland, New Zealand. We deliberately decided to have the Banner of Peace hanging at the ceremony and also had our marriage vow based on the Manifesto 2000.

Sumie and I come from different cultural backgrounds and we have different upbringings from Japan and Hong Kong, therefore respecting and understanding each other's culture is crucial in our marriage. We would like to use our cultural understandings to create friendships with people from different cultures and we would also like to share our cross-cultural marriage experience with others.

The Banner of Peace - Manifesto 2000 is made up of the "Roerich Pact" and "The Manifesto 2000". The "Roerich Pact" was created by Nicholas Roerich, a great Russian artist and philosopher who lived from 1894 to 1947. It signifies the concept of "peace through culture" as well as "the protection of all cultural treasures."

The Manifesto 2000 was initiated by a group of Nobel Peace Laureates, a pledge with six simple guidelines which they believed - if followed - would help build a culture of peace.

We feel that two of the statements - "Share with others" and "Listen to understand" in "The Manifesto 2000" are part of the guidelines to our marriage, whereas the rest of the statements - "Preserve the planet", "Rediscover solidarity", "Respect all life" and "Reject violence" are something we as a couple would like to work on together in our marriage.

We hoped that having the Banner of Peace at the ceremony could emphasize our aim and the essence of our marriage. We felt that our wedding day is the perfect occasion for expressing our beliefs and values to friends and family which we hope could help promote and create a culture of peace.