Two middle-aged men in matching linen suits emerge from a small room, smiling and holding hands.
"For once I was glad to be second," murmurs one as they collect a certificate and slip out the side door of the town hall in the Berlin district of Schoneberg.
It is not even 11 a.m., but they are the second gay couple to officially register their partnership.
Upstairs, the first couple to tie the knot pose with fixed smiles in front of a wedding cake with two brides on top.
Over and over again they go through the motions of cutting their wedding cake for the horde of television cameras.
Ms Gudrun Pannier and Ms Angelika Baldo (both 36) have been together for five years and yesterday became the first same sex couple in Germany to legally register their partnership.
Dressed in matching tuxedos, the women answered questions patiently, admirably holding their nerve against an intimidating media circus. "It is a great honour, but also very exciting to be the first German lesbian couple to have a legal partnership," said Ms Baldo.
"There is still a lot more to do, but it is the first step. It's important to show now that we are as good mothers and aunts as anyone else," said her partner, Ms Pannier.
Gay couples registered their partnerships at town halls from Hanover to Frankfurt as planned yesterday, despite a last-minute legal challenge by the conservative states of Bavaria, Thuringia and Saxony.
They argued in court that the legislation contradicted the constitutional protection given to the traditional heterosexual family.
Although the challenge was rejected, couples in Bavaria were still unable to register their partnerships yesterday, as the state government has yet to change the necessary laws.
The legislation grants homosexual couples many of the same privileges and obligations previously reserved for heterosexual married couples.
As well as sharing a common name, same-sex couples in Germany will now enjoy greater rights in areas such as inheritance, tenancy, health insurance and welfare benefits. However, the law stops short of granting equal adoption rights and leaves tax provisions unchanged for Germany's estimated 41,000 homosexual couples.
"I am going to take the name Pannier, it just sounds better," said Ms Baldo, who has multiple sclerosis and uses a wheelchair. In the far corner, her new mother-in-law is perspiring heavily, pinned into a corner by a succession of camera crews.
"As a mother I can only be happy, because my daughter is so happy," she said, between considered bites of wedding cake.
"When I was young these people were persecuted and imprisoned in Germany. It has taken a long time, but now look at what is possible," she added.
