Weddings,
no matter what kind, are precious. It's the bond of two people to make a new
family. Love is patient and love is kind. Weddings are the best and love is
amazing.
While
in India I was fortunate enough to attend an Indian wedding. Now the thing to
know about Indian weddings is that they are so extravagant, detailed and
beautiful. The wedding was for the nephew of my friend from the USA. Before the
wedding we spent about a week or so in Chennai, which is where all of his
family is from. I had the pleasure of meeting the entire family and becoming an
‘adopted’ cousin.
Before the wedding even happened there were so many things
to do and prepare. The first event that I attended in preparation for the
wedding was a ceremony that served as a blessing to the marriage. It started at
5 o’clock in the morning and members from the groom’s family attended at his
parent’s house.
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The mehndi on one of my hands |
Another thing we did was have a gathering for mehndi. This
is where intricate designs are applied onto your hands and lower arms. It is
said that the darker the mehndi, the deeper the love is from your husband. For
this gathering, all the aunties and women from the groom’s side came over to
one house. Two women from the local community came and did all of the designs.
When I had mine done, I sat on the floor and one woman did one hand and the
other woman did the other. Both women did separate and remarkable designs. They
started out with the designs on my palms and the underside of my arm. After
that dried for a bit they did the top sides of my arm and hands. The mehndi
comes in a little tube and is usually a paste from the leaves of a Henna plant.
The whole process is truly incredible and the women are true artisans. After my
design was completely done, I had the task of trying not to mess it up or touch
anything until it was completely dry.
The morning of the first day of the wedding, the whole
family traveled from Chennai to Mumbai. All 20 of us took the same airplane and
it was a blast. People gave us funny looks because there were so many of us,
but that’s quite alright. We arrived in Mumbai in the morning and was greeted
with some rainy weather (which wasn’t very surprising because they are in
monsoon season here and it had been raining all week before we arrived). We
then loaded up a big bus and traveled to the apartments we would be staying at.
It was a giant sleepover because we all shared rooms.
The first day of the wedding there are two things that
happen, an engagement ceremony and a sangeet. From what I understand, the
engagement ceremony was meant for the bride and groom’s parents to exchange
gifts and for the festivities to start. The priest did some special things with
both the bride’s parents and the groom’s parents. All of the dialogue between
the priest and the families were done in a different language, so I didn’t
always understand what was going on. After this was done, all of the cousins
and aunties went to change for the sangeet. The sangeet is basically an evening
of music and dance. The groom and bride’s side of the family prepared a dance
for the sangeet. The dance that the cousin’s prepared was the story of how the
bride and groom met. Various bits of songs were strung together to create the
ultimate dance performance. We rocked the stage and I had a blast. We even had
a giant cardboard cut out of the groom for one of the songs. After both sides presented
their feature performance, the bride and groom did a little dance for everyone.
Then it was time to kick off your shoes and dance the night away! Songs were
blasted in the reception hall and everyone was dancing. If I were to describe
the dance party, I would say it would be pretty close to a synchronized dance
from a Bollywood film. During most songs everyone was dancing with the same moves,
and if there were not specific dance moves, then someone made them up and the
rest followed along.
The second day started early with the festivities beginning
at five o’clock in the morning. Throughout the morning there were various
ceremonies that both the bride and groom went through together and separately. The
big and main event of the day was when the thread was tied. This signified the official
marriage between the man and wife. Prior to this event, people were moving
about through the wedding hall, sitting to watch the events, going down to get
breakfast, taking pictures, and having side conversations. When the thread was
to be tied at about 9:30am, everyone stopped what he or she was doing to witness
this event. Then after it was tied, people went back to what they were doing
before. Later that morning there were more and different little rituals that
took place. Some were to bless the newlywed couple and others were to educate
the couple on what it means to be husband and wife.
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All of the meals were served on a banana leaf |
During most of the day I was a fly on the wall, just taking
everything in and observing all that was going on around me. I enjoyed just
sitting back and silently viewing the festivities. I did not understand
everything that was going on, because like I mentioned before none of the ceremony
was in English, but you could just sense the joy and love radiating out of
everyone in attendance.
All in all my first Indian wedding experience was amazing. I
am so appreciative of all who included me in this special occasion. I loved
having the chance to dress up in traditional Indian wear. I got so many
compliments on my beautiful pink sari. I am thankful for friends who took the
time to explain the meaning behind each part of the ceremony. The bride and
groom were absolutely adorable. The way that the bride looked at her groom throughout
all of the ceremonies was enough to melt anyone’s heart. Love is so sweet and
so kind.