Secret wedding! Karina Banda and Carlos Ponce sealed their love in an intimate ceremony

Karina: We are super happy. I think that happiness really cannot be hidden and the truth is that something very funny happened to me right after we got married, people told me that they saw a special shine in me, they even asked me if I was pregnant, that it showed something different in my face and I think that‘s it, that I was happy because it really was knowing that I am going to spend the rest of my life with him, if God allows us. It wasn’t so much that we didn’t know; but I am already his wife, we are officially a family and yes, I am happy because… I even gained pounds because love makes you fat (laughs).

Carlos: They also asked me a lot if I was pregnant (laughs). It is a very beautiful moment in life, we went through this pandemic where people were affected and very nervous about the future. We are still living those moments, but we who always see the light at the end of the tunnel, who are both very big believers, who are a man and a woman of faith, we knew that there was no moment that stops that happiness and that attraction in every way that we feel for each other that we are going to join forces, we are ready, it is our turn and we are going to follow God‘s plan, which was this for me.

Carlos: It was not an intention to get married in secret, that was not necessarily the intention; I think I speak for both of us. Simply, the commitment was in the new year, welcoming 2020 and our union and my commitment to Karina and to God that we are going to make a life together forever; however, well, things happened that tried to derail our plans, but the wedding was also planned for the same year. This is simply a union that we made, but we considered that we needed the wedding. That is why I say that it was not in secret, we simply decided not to necessarily make a lot of noise with this because our families also deserve to see us in this union and happy and we owe it to them, and we owe it to each other, a beautiful family reunion.

Karina: Yes, and to be able to celebrate it with everyone as well. I think the pandemic also brought us many lessons, one is that “if you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans.” I think that this pandemic also helped us a lot to get to know each other even more and the issue of coexistence was also a challenge for both of us, so I think that all those things made us feel that emotion and desire to want to formalize and officially become husband and wife ; And above all the fact that you know that whatever happens, the circumstances you are living through, it is always good to have someone who is supporting you every day, who is telling you that everything is going to be fine and that things happen. He was there for me and here I am always for him.

Carlos: The only ones who knew were our parents and they weren‘t there. Her parents were out of the country, mine were here but each one was in quarantine and at that moment, just when it was our turn, they were locked up because they are of population at risk due to their age and we did not want to expose them to anything. There were two witnesses who are my daughters Sienna and Savannah, they were the only people present and some friends that we have, an excellent photographer, a florist who lent us their house so that we could document the moment, because for us it was very important.

Carlos: That is private, it is still hidden.

Karina: That was the question: where are we going to get married? How are we going to do it because if in the end it‘s just the two of us? Siena and Savannah who were our witnesses, and the officiator or the notary, were ok, how are we going to do it? I thought of a restaurant, I thought in many ways, but we still wanted photos, so the moment that happened people were going to realize that something was happening, it was going to be inevitable. We needed a private place, but I also wanted a place that looked special and it occurred to me ... we have a very good friend who is a photographer named Alan Phillip, who has a beautiful studio and we have confidence with him, because also this was something so intimate that obviously we couldn’t share it with everyone, and when I said to Alan, ’You wanted to take pictures of us, what do you think: well, you’re not just going to take pictures of us, we want to get married in your studio, can we? ’, we told him the plan. He knew it was something small and the truth was that everything turned out very beautiful.

Carlos: The idea was to do it in Mexico, even before. That same weekend, before we entered the quarantine, we were in a very nice place in Mexico that we had decided that this was going to be the place for the photographs. Later, I had a work meeting and they told us: “run to Miami before they lock you up in Mexico.”

Karina: Yes, we want something like that little one. Honestly, we have never envisioned our wedding with many people, 500 people. In that regard, neither of us is like that, we would love to have a lot of people, of course, but we also understand that at this point one has valued family and obviously friends as closer. In that sense, we do believe that it would be something more intimate, more familiar and to be able to have those moments to enjoy it and celebrate it with our family and the people we love so much; but we do want it to be something very special, something like a novel because I‘m with a soap opera heartthrob (laughs).

Carlos: Coexistence made me reiterate that Karina is the woman I want to be with, Karina‘s coexistence made her learn to cook my favorite food. Honestly, there are many things, we knew that we are a couple that complement each other very well but for now new things are emerging and they are all good. Usually one has to learn to live with each other, there are little things that bother you here, in my case (I don’t know, I can’t speak for Karina) everything was like a bonus: ’Ah, that too! How good that was, how wonderful! ’ I am still very surprised by many things.

Karina: One of the things that I love about Carlos, from the beginning, is that he has a good attitude, apart from his intelligence, that he is very handsome, that he is a super good dad, he is very funny and always has a good attitude. Given the circumstances, I identify a lot with him. I could not be with someone negative, I cannot even have a friendship because it goes against everything I believe and in that aspect, he and I fit very well because we are both the same and we laugh at things and we turn them around. The same thing happens when one day we get to have an argument ... it‘s happened, and really, it’s no joke, everything we experience we know it is a learning experience.

Karina: When you are going to give yourself the opportunity to meet someone, I think the most important thing is to know that you are both on the same page and that you are going the same way. I do not waste your time nor do I waste mine, nor do I get excited or have illusions. He told me: what are your plans? And I told him: ‘look at the truth: I would love to get married, I would love to be a mother’; And casually, : “Are you going to marry me?”, communication. The worst thing you can do is assume, right? Then things are asked, they are spoken.

Carlos: It is one of the things that I have learned a lot from her because you keep things to yourself and then get angry because you assume that the other person has to know what is bothering you, what you are dissatisfied with and you do not have to have a fight about something the other person was not aware of. ‘Here you are dying and learning,’ my grandmother said, that is, every day you are going to learn something new, you have to adapt, you may like it, you may not like it, but it does not have to be the end of the world if you talk things through.

Carlos: It has been a very difficult process. I did keep it very guarded because it was not in me to comment about it. Even with family members at some point she begins to open up a little, to tell more. I do not want to talk much because I do not know how much it corresponds to me, but I can say that she is a very good girl, she is a girl who when she is happy is very happy and that yes, this has its process and I believe a lot in God, I am a man of a lot of faith and I have seen him perform miracles in my house. I know that we are going through something that is a learning experience and we have seen it improve a lot, so the things that scare us have their purpose. I know this is part of the divine plan and there are many people in the world who are going to benefit from it, I feel it in my heart.

Karina: These are things that we wish we were not experiencing or that people close to us were going through something so strong or so sad. In my case, I lost my uncle, a brother of my mother, it was a very difficult time for me. It is important to have someone who motivates you and I think the fact that he is with me and that I am with him, because we cheer each other up, we literally get up and see that he had a hard time dealing with when he sees someone suffering because he does not know what to do.

Carlos: We already took a little getaway, we went to Los Cabos. We knew it was a time when it was very quiet (precisely because of the pandemic) and they let us know how well they were taking care of those places, the precautionary measures that were being taken, so we arrived at a resort where we were almost the only ones.

Karina: Carlos loves Mexico, obviously that is why he is with a Mexican woman, he loves Mexican food, it fascinates him, and indeed Mexico has some beautiful places and it was really a very beautiful destination for the occasion, very romantic. But we do want to go to Europe to continue enjoying ourselves.

Carlos: Her sense of humor is wonderful, she has a genuine sweetness, she is innate and not only for me, many people that I have met, friends we have in common, immediately tell me: ‘how wonderful, how sweet, how lucky, take care of her… ’I get an award. She is simply a very real, very genuine woman, she is a woman of the family, of her home, those values are carved into the last bit of her being and simply a gift from God.

Karina: Well, I admire him both professionally and personally. On the personal issue I admire his attitude a lot, because I know that sometimes it is difficult to have a good attitude towards things, I admire that he is very patient, that part I think has been something important that has given us a balance because there always has to be someone patient to help you achieve that balance and that is him. I am Leo, I am a little more explosive. Another thing is that he has a super heart, he is a simple, humble person and I liked that a lot about him (and extremely handsome). My family loves it. And last but not least, the fact that I saw him as a father, when we started dating and I saw the father he was, I thought of myself and my future, I said: ‘Wow, this guy is going to be a super husband! ’, which he is, and he’s a super dad.

Carlos: She is not counting the 3 months that I was chasing her because she is doing the one that: “oh, we were immediately so beautiful” (laughs). Not so pretty and not so immediately. For me it‘s three years, I even once told her (and that’s why she calls me a good father): “No, I can’t anymore, I’m going out with my daughters.”

Karina: He was behind me for a long time, asking me out, but the fact that I was a public figure honestly that was what made me think twice and if it gave me a lot of nerve how I saw him so handsome. Sometimes he insisted so much that he sent me corny things like that and the day I finally told him ‘ok, let’s go out, let’s have dinner’, some friends of mine were visiting on a trip. I did not want to go alone with him, I wanted my friends to come because it made me nervous to go out alone, I forgot about it all afternoon with my friends and at 10 at night I write to him and say: ’ok, we are ready, see you in such place ’and he tells me:’ oh sorry, since you didn’t write anything to me, I already made plans with my daughters and they are coming here. ’

Carlos: I have my big plans and I visualize myself a lot, because I do believe in visualizing you and I believe in decreeing a lot, I do it constantly, but I don‘t get discouraged when things don’t happen the way I want because I’ve had many samples from God that for there it was not. I am very happy, at this moment there are little things happening in our lives, there are moments; In other words, I cannot be fully happy when we know that there are many things in the world that are beyond our control but that are not right.

Karina: There are many things that are out of our reach and I hope is that we are always happy and the people around us also and that bad things never happen, that tragedies never happen. What we can control is that we are well, try to be happy, have a beautiful relationship and give ourselves happiness.