Japanese princess marries 'commoner'

Wearing a simple white dress and pearls, Japan’s Princess Sayako bid farewell to palace life today to wed a Tokyo city employee in a low-key ceremony, marking the first time that an emperor’s daughter had married a 'commoner'.

Thousands of wellwishers cheered as an official black car slowly drove Sayako, 36, out of the gates of the palace to the elegant Imperial Hotel, where she married Yoshiki Kuroda in a wedding that was austere by royal standards.