A Big Fat Indian Wedding

Hello folks -


I am going to digress from the topic I had mentioned in the last post and share something else.

I attended a wedding a few days ago, and am so full of happy memories that I HAVE to share them with you -

It was my friend U's sister H's daughter getting married.

I had last met U during HER marriage 21 years ago and there had been no contact in the years between.


The wedding was to be in a biggish but sleepy town which stealthily, imperceptibly wraps you in its slow pace.

H's husband's village was on the outskirts of the town and a number of rituals were to be conducted in his ancestral home where he had grown up and his brothers and families still stay.

This kind of a long drawn-out wedding in this time and age was novel to me.

In the cities, I am used to going off to the Wedding Halls after the rituals, some time before the boy and girl garland eachother, meet friends and relatives, EAT and come home.

The day I joined the festivities, there was the ritual of applying turmeric to the bride.

Turmeric has many, many medicinal qualities and is an excellent skin-cleanser.

The big bowl of wet turmeric was placed before the girl as she sat on a sheet on the ground right inside the hall in the house.

It was prayed to.

Five women relatives took turns to put it on her forehead, cheeks, throat, hands and feet.

The best part was the accompanying songs sung by some of the women which evoked the blessings of gods and described the rituals and their significance.

One song was about going to the potter to request him to give a strong, sturdy pot for the wedding rituals to begin.

After the bride - to -be was painted yellow to everyone's satisfaction, there was a free - for- all !

EVERYONE present got turmeric on their faces and necks and hands and there was great screaming and laughter.

The girl had a bath, we washed off as best we could, nobody minded yellow patches at odd places and then with great devotion, we went in a procession to the three presiding godesses of the village.

Two of the goddesses are sisters and the elder one is to be prayed to first.

Their temple looked no different from the other houses of the village, it was more like a neighbour's house.

Three steps and a verandah, a room about 8x8.

The simple statues were beautiful, with newish cotton sarees draped, as if dressed for the wedding.

The two sisters looked happy, seemed to bless the girl like an elderly, much-loved person of the family.

There were songs in their praise and then we went to the other, bigger temple which was 'modern'!

Stand-alone!

The ambience was still homely.

A lady was sorting cashews in the cool hall.

Another lady had come to seek blessings for her twins, a boy and a girl.

This was immedeately taken as a good omen for our bride and there was teasing.

In our normal custom, the new mother does not step out of the house for 40 days, takes rest and recoups her strength, then visits a temple to seek protection for her children and herself and then starts to go out when required.

Villages and small towns still follow these customs.

Working women and nuclear families find it difficult.

After the girl and everyone else offered prayers, we sat for a while.

There were more songs.

There were no instruments to accompany, no mike or even clapping.

Just singing from the heart, the joy of the occassion and happiness.



The menfolk and children had lunch first, the ladies of the house served them.

There came our turn for our sit-down (on the ground) lunch.

The young, teenage, girls served us, thrilled and enthu and excited.

The men threatened too, but were chased away !

It was an extremely tasty spread of traditional dishes prepared by the ladies of the house themselves.

They had stayed up till 1'o clock the night before to make the stuffed, sweet parathas, then got up at 5 to make the rest of the feast.

Yes, for about 60 people - maybe more !

And this was, like, so normal - their joy was in our joy.

It was a daughter of the house getting married.

Then came the bangle-woman and again the beautiful strings of brilliant, plain green bangles were prayed to for blessings by the bride-to-be.

Again there were sweet songs and everyone had a dozen bangles on each hand.

It didn't matter if the colour did not match the colour of your saree on the day of the wedding, these were auspicious and the whole place laughed with the tinkling of so many of them, catching the sun-rays.


The next day, there was a ceremony in which both the boy and the girl were made to sit next to eachother with one close member of their family sitting behind, and now wet turmeric was applied to all four!

There was a lot of laughter and screaming as there was a free- for- all, but everything was within limlts.

The boy and the girl then had a collective bath too, with pots of water poured over them to everyone's merriment.


I liked the fact that all the children were part of all the rituals - they stole lumps of turmeric, applied to eachother, battled, screamed, hollered, came in the way of the elders - none was shouted at.

There was no' sit-in- one- place- and-dont-get-your-clothes-dirty'.

Everyone enjoyed all the celebrations of the wedding.


It was a collective participation, the seeds of which were obviously sown unconsciously, naturally, by H, my friend's sister, ever since SHE had come into that house as a bride, so many years ago.

She had pitched in similarly in all the functions over the years, maintained happy relations with all, ignored what she had not liked.

There are times when we wish to lead quiet lives, by ourselves, or just with our own nuclear family.

We think it is ideal for individual growth, independence, but many facets of ones personality like sharing, adjusting, pitching in, being there for somebody and knowing someone would be there for us -

In our considered choices, sometimes, we seem to lose a lot more than we gain.

I met some friends after 30 years, caught up with news about many more.

Some of their memories of our childhood together were different from my remembered incidents, so I relived many good times.

It was warm and nice and calm and peaceful and it was like hot chocolate on a cold wintery night.

Its good to go back, unwind and bow in gratitude for those times.

It definitely peps one up for the coming tomorrows!