Shadi

The day that Hannah and I got back from Jaipur, we had the privilege of attending an Indian wedding.  My fellow ETA, Sean, was invited by Vishu, one of his students, to Vishu's cousin's wedding.  True to his gregarious and generous form, Sean asked if he could bring along four foreign girls, to which Vishu delightedly said yes. In India, to say that weddings are a big deal is a major understatement. In a country where society revolves around celebrations, weddings are THE most important of all celebrations. Especially because of the rising middle class, weddings have become the utmost status symbol. As far as invitations are concerned, the more people in attendance, the better, and foreigners at a wedding are an exciting and precious commodity. I say commodity because, as much as we went to the wedding out of our own selfish desire to experience such an important cultural event, the four of us who went were on display from the second we arrived to the moment we left.

Remembering our last sari debacle, Hannah, Tangi and I started getting ready two hours or so before we had to leave.  We had all gone together to the market the week before to get Tangi a fancy sari for the occasion, as Hannah had bought one already and I had a silk brocade sari my parents had brought me when they went to India. Patricia had gone away for the week, but the three of us trooped upstairs to have our saris wrapped by Reena, our landlord's lovely wife, who kindly wraps our saris when we wear them.  We had bought matching bangles and bindis, not wanting to skip the details that would be noticed by every auntie (slang for older woman) in the room.

Bangles, bangles, bangles!

Varanasi silk sari. Thanks, parents!

Getting on the metro, we were stared at in a way that even now, after three months, was noteworthy. As we descended into the metro, a woman did a double take before literally taking a step back to make sure her eyes were not deceiving her. We met Sean at the metro station, where the staring continued and we photographed ourselves looking as Indian as four goras can get.

Sean's awesome shoes!

    

The groom, flanked by the mini-grooms 

Vishu and his cousins

Wedding party

Vishu met us at the metro, from which we walked to the groom's house.  The groom was still being decorated when we arrived, and a team of drummers and dancers was moving from room to room, getting everyone (especially us) to dance until our breath was gone. While Sean and Tangi took a considerable pressure off me and Hannah (thank goodness), it seemed like every time we tried to rest a moment, the drummers were back and the cousins were yelling delightedly for us to dance. After an hour or so of waiting at the groom's house, we heard loud music and ran to the balcony to see the wedding procession begin.  Just as in Western weddings the most exciting part is when the bride walks in, Indian weddings are all about the groom's entrance. A little (or sometimes big) parade is formed, complete with marching bands, horses (or sometimes elephants), drummers, fireworks, lights, dancing, plenty of flowers and noisenoisenoise.

Wedding procession from above

Wedding procession from the ground

The groom's carriage

 After watching what we came to understand as the first set of fireworks, the whole party walked down the street, banging and clanging and singing and dancing, while the four of us piled into a car with a whiskey-drinking uncle to take us to the reception site near the bride's home.  Traditionally, the whole parade would travel from the groom's home to the bride's home, but the vast expanse of Delhi makes this procedure highly unpractical. As a compromise, the whole parade walks down a few blocks, where everything is dismantled and resumed next to the reception.

The groom's home,
decorated traditionally

The groom in his carriage

We walked into the reception hall, having tempted fate with our boozing driver, to a tent filled with light and color, not to mention at least a dozen tables piled with Indian food of every type.

The golden tent

Food, glorious food!

Plate piled high

Stuffed to the gills, we waited a while longer for the blaring music to start up again, at which point we went back outside to see the groom's procession move down the street for his entrance. 

In the tent

Awaiting the groom

We then witnessed a ceremony in which the pandit (equivalent of a priest or rabbi for Hindus) said mantras while men from the groom's family and men from the bride's family exchanged garlands of marigolds.  I thought this would only take a few minutes--how many relatives could there be?--but after half an hour the men just started recycling the garlands when they ran out so everyone could have a chance at this honor of becoming one another's family.  We went inside and waited for the bride. At one point, I think on Teacher's Day, I mentioned that in India, everyone loves giving speeches but no one likes hearing them. The same may be said about brides--everyone loves a bride but no one likes watching them. As the bride entered the hall, everything remained as usual. No one crowded around her except for the giant crew of photographers and filmers.  Everyone kept eating, talking, doing whatever; the bride's entrance seemed no more exciting than anyone else's. Even the groom's mother was inattentive, asking me to sit down and chat and fussing over gifts while her daughter-in-law was entering.  To be fair, the wedding lasts for several days, with different events on each day, so it's not like this was the only ceremony that bound them in marriage, but still! I suppose it could be the same for the groom's entrance at a Western wedding, but to me it was weird that no one, not even the little girls, found the bride's appearance as exciting as I did. She came in surrounded by her female relatives--mother, sisters, cousins and aunts, under a canopy held in each corner by four male relatives. Her traditional red dress was so completely covered in beads and sequins, she absolutely shimmered as she walked. 

The bride enters 

Wedding paparazzi

Least comfortable wedding garb ever

The time at this point was after midnight. For their first appearance together as a couple, the bride and groom stood on a platform, decorated with lights and flowers, in the middle of the room. There, they exchanged garlands, placing them around each other's necks (several times, so the photographers could get a perfect shot), while the platform they stood upon revolved.

On the platform after the garland exchange

After exchanging garlands, the couple sat on an elaborately decorated sofa on a stage next to the platform, in the middle of the room, and sat for over an hour getting their picture taken with anyone who wanted to come up for a "quick snap," as they said. Everyone wanted their picture taken with the foreigners, so up we went, three or four times; awkward, considering that's when we met the bride and groom for the first time! Throughout the whole ceremony(ies), it was so clear that this occasion had so little to do with the individuals themselves, and so much to do with tradition and everyone else in the family.  The actual people getting married are in some ways inconsequential--the ceremony follows a strictly prescribed order and decorum, planned by and for relatives and the community. In some ways I found this way of handling the wedding a more honest and straightforward approach. Weddings here rarely follow relationships; all the women I work with had arranged marriages, and a marriage symbolizes, more than anything else, the union of two families.  It is therefore appropriate that the celebration should be so focused on the families; the joy of a marriage is shared as much by the communities surrounding the two people as by the people themselves. We left the wedding around 2AM, tired and cranky and squabbling with each other. But the truth is that we had been invited to witness something so basic to Indian culture, something we never would have experienced without this connection to Sean's student, something I will remember and enjoy the memory of for a long time to come.  I love how much people here treasure celebrations.  I love how full of life and color and food the celebrations are here, that a family would be so delighted to share such an important personal experience with a group of complete strangers. Sometimes it feels like this country is here with open arms, inviting me in and welcoming me in a way I've never experienced. I will remember this wedding when I am waiting for an auto in the rain, or watching a mouse scurry across a restaurant, or standing in a line that keeps getting longer because so many people are cutting in front. Thanks, India, you owed me this one.
P.S. To those of you loved ones reading this album and hoping I will find an Indian to marry while I am here just so I can have an Indian wedding that you can come to, you are in for some serious disappointment.  If you think for one second that I will wear a dress that weighs fifty pounds, sit on a couch for two hours of the wedding getting my picture taken with randos, not get to eat the food, not have anyone be excited when I enter the room, and wear a nose ring the size of a bangle, you've entirely overestimated my tolerance for discomfort. Sorry, guys. Not. Going. To. Happen.

To see the rest of my photos of the wedding, click here and enjoy!

The happy couple:)