The Wedding

We set out this morning for the wedding. The ceremony was pretty fluid with people coming and going throughout. It seemed like people weren’t really paying much attention to the ceremony itself. Everyone was talking and laughing, standing around, or wandering.

In the centre of the hall there was a platform and when we arrived a number of women were preparing the bride for the marriage ceremony. They seemed to be throwing rice on her and doing all sorts of things to her. Sometimes she was laughing, but other times she looked slightly annoyed.

The groom arrived to great pomp and ceremony, the kind that we would save for the bride if we were in Canada. Then they went through putting some sort of garland of a holy plant on them. They had to make promises about providing rice to each other’s family and eventually people began to pour milk on their joined hands and toss rice on their heads. This seemed to be something that honoured guests and relatives should do. It went on for quite a while and eventually even Nadim and I and the girls were asked to come and do it for them as well. I think it is meant to give them prosperity.

While all of this was going on, many of the guests went down to start their lunch. There were over a thousand guests so I guess they had to get them going. We waited around because the original plan was to have the Baha’i ceremony directly after the Hindu ceremony, but that wasn’t to be because people began to come up to the bride and groom and offer them their best wishes and give them their envelope containing their offering to the new couple. So we went down to eat first.

In the lower level of the hall, they had long lines of tables and stools. They served us on a plate made from leaves that were stitched together. I think they had run out of banana leaves. First they gave us the plates. Then they splashed some water on them so we could wash them off. Then they scooped handfuls of salads, then scoops of rice and curries. There were no spoons so we had to eat with our hands. The food was really quite good and we managed quite well with our hands. We washed up at a row of taps at the back of the hall and went back upstairs for the Baha’i Ceremony.

The Baha’i Ceremony is very simple. There were a few prayers and the bride and groom said their vows and signed the certificates and before you knew it, the ceremony was over. There were of course lots of photos of the event as well.

My overall impression is that the wedding was very informal. Some guests were dressed in beautifully embroidered and beaded saris, but more were dressed in much more common clothes. We felt almost overdressed. The traditional man’s dress is a shirt worn over a cloth that looks like a long skirt, but can be folded up so that it is above the knees too (this is called the loongi). Over the man’s shoulder is a scarf or cloth that often matches with the trim on his loongi. I found it funny that many were wearing colourful scarves that looked like towels to me. I wore my silk kurta, Nadim wore a Kurta too and the girls wore their Punjabis (see the picture from earlier this month).

We were quite an attraction again. Many of these kids don’t see foreigners that often. The girls were shy and quite happy with a hello and some smiles. Some boys apparently have seen their share of foreigners because they came up to us asking for 50 rupees. It really saddened me. Nadim told them they should stay in school, get jobs and make their own money so they don’t have to depend on others. I am not sure how well that was received.

We made it back to the Baha’i centre by late afternoon and are planning to go out for pizza later this evening with the same couple we attended the wedding with. We haven’t had a pizza in a while (since Krabi, Thailand) and the girls are pretty excited.

CM