Wedding Season

Dear dedicated reader,

Wedding season is upon us in Kadod. Since it is now only 75-80 degrees here during the day, the students are wearing sweaters to school while their parents are planning the marriages of their older siblings. Late November through early January seem to be good times for weddings as they can be outside without inspiring sun stroke or heat poisoning (both of which can put a damper on the generally festive air) and it tends to be good time for NRIs (non-resident Indians) to come and visit their families.

All of this is a long way of saying that Sejalben’s cousin was getting married this week and an invitation was proffered to Melissa and myself to tag along and watch. Despite three days of body ravaging sickness brought on by suspect pani puri (a street food that spreads delight and joy when made with uncontaminated water), we were well enough by Thursday to make the trip to Bardoli. Though not, of course, without the requisite cultural faux-pas.

American Teacher Mistake #1: Melissa and I thought that perhaps simply by wearing our nicest teaching saris and putting on some make up, we might fit in.

We were greeted at the entrance to hall by Sejalben, who though pretty on normal days, looked positively glamorous on this occasion. Her hair had been professionally put back and the ends curled into tiny ringlets which fell about her ears playfully. A glittered headdress of sparkly flowers completed the ensemble, as well as matching eye shadow and bangles which set off a beautifully bordered Gujarati sari. Eyeing the fancy work, I couldn’t help but ask, “Is that heavy to wear?” She assured me that, while it was, it was manageable.

Every other female at the wedding was similarly attired, hair let down or put up in fanciful fashions otherwise unseen. Everywhere in the room the light caught the gleam and glitter of ladies’ outfits and in some cases, powder which they had put in their hair specifically for added sparkle. The overall effect was like walking into a medieval court of old with jewels and gold as far as the eye could see.

At least, this was the case on the women’s side. As I turned my head to survey the men’s side of the room (which of course was seated separately from the women), I was surprised to see most of the young men in jeans and fashion t-shirts or simple button downs. The older men were mostly wearing khakis and shirts of the style that every Indian bureaucrat wears to work. A few men related to the actual bride were in suits, but other than that, any of these men could have been watching a cricket match in their living rooms. “Why don’t the men dress up?” I asked someone.

“Probably because the women feel that maybe someone will see them and think, “I will marry that girl because she is so beautiful…”. Men don’t have to worry about that kind of thing,” She replied. I nodded thoughtfully and turned my attention forward towards the stage.

The ceremony that we were to watch was an afternoon offering to the gods done by the bride and her family. As I understand it, the bride and the groom have separate ceremonies the day of the wedding with their own families and then late in the night, the groom arrives at the place of the brides on a horse and the actual wedding ceremony takes place. For this particular ceremony, the bride and her parents were seated on a bench at the front of the room with their closer family members seated on the floor all around them. A large fire burned in an urn in the front of the stage, letting off smoke into the hall that scorched our squinted eyes and made them water. Just to the side of the fire were all the wedding gifts, which had been carried in procession style from the hall by the male family members. None were wrapped, so that everyone could admire exactly what had been given.

American Teacher Mistake #2: I tried to watch the proceedings carefully despite the talking around me since it was the first wedding I’d seen. After watching for a while, I asked Sejalben what it meant when the priest gave instructions to spoon water out over this coconut, or hold hands with her mother, or move this powder here or there. Sejalben only shrugged. “No one knows what these things, not even the priest, I think,” she said, laughing. “We just do it as a kind of a custom. The smoke of the fire will take these offerings up to the gods.”

After she said this, I looked around me and I suddenly understood why in the background of Sejalben’s wedding video, there was this festive music dubbed over all the real noise of the wedding: the conversational buzz in the room as everyone talked to their neighbor completely drowned out the ceremony going on at the front.

As soon as it started, the ceremony was over and I watched as some of the guests literally almost bolted out of the room. “Where are they going?” I asked, confused.

“Dinner is being served in the downstairs hall,” Sejalben explained.

American Teacher Mistake #3: Coming from my waspy upbringing, I grew up with wedding dinners served in three courses by tuxedoed waiters. While seating cards ensured that guests would hopefully have interesting conversation with the other people at their table while waiting for the food to arrive, there is no guarantee and no salvation if you are stuck at the boring, geeky table. I felt the Indian approach to the wedding dinner had a lot to offer that we WASPs could learn from.

First of all, unlike many other places in Indian life, efficiency at a big feast such as this is prized above all else. Because not everyone can eat at the same time due to space considerations and the large size of the wedding, quick table turnover is of importance. To this end, the tables are set up to effect this turnover in the most efficient way possible. Instead of ungainly round tables like the kind we are accustomed to at large social gatherings in the US, the Indian wedding dinner makes use of long, thin banquet style tables, almost like a sitting at the bar of a restaurant. Two tables are placed facing each other with a space in the middle so that the “waiters” (gangly adolescent boys in t-shirts and jeans) can move down the line as quickly as possible. This creates a kind of conveyor belt phenonmenon where plastic plates, utensils and eventually food can be dispensed quickly. Boys carrying giant serving tureens straight off the cooking fire move down the line plopping portions on plastic thalis (large round dishes). Once they’ve served everyone in this manner, they continue to move up and down the lines between the tables, calling out what they have to offer (‘pooris, pooris, pooris, pooris’). If you need more, you simply hail them and they’ll replenish your plate with verve.

Second of all, there is little to no conversation while eating. Eating is purely business and there will be plenty of time after dinner before the groom’s family actually arrives (at 2 am, most likely) and the wedding will start. Refueling for this long stretch of evening which is ahead of you is essential as you may not get home until five, six, or even seven in the morning. Having not bolted out of the room and thus getting in on the second dinner shift, Melissa and I tried to make polite conversation with our neighbors, but found ourselves rebuffed as they focused on ingestion.

After dinner, we found ourselves in the strange bridal limbo of waiting for the groom and his dancing family to arrive. The groom’s family dines separately and then dances while he rides a horse all the way from the dinner location to the bride’s marriage hall. The groom was scheduled to arrive around 9 pm: it was currently 6:30 pm. We amused ourselves by trying to speak Gujarati and Hindi with the people around us, but eventually that wore thin.

American Teacher Mistake #4: Not bringing any money to the wedding. Sejalben suggested that we ditch the wedding for awhile in favor of taking advantage of the shopping which Bardoli has to offer and then returning to the wedding later. We found ourselves piling into a car with Sejalben, and her mother-in-law, both dressed to the nines, and making our way to one of the fanciest sari shops in town. Sejalben, after looking discerningly at several fancy saris, selected one and purchased it on the spot. Melissa and I contented ourselves with just looking.

On returning to the wedding, Sejalben instructed us to go upstairs with her where we entered a backroom filled with women who were… changing?

American Teacher Mistake #5: Not bringing any other clothes to change into for Wedding: Act II. All the women around me opened whole suitcases that they had brought with numerous outfits and, having gotten the opinion of everyone else in this backroom cum wedding staging area, proceeded to take off whatever beautiful sari she had on and replace it with another perfectly lovely one.

Sejalben looked at us: “Do you want a sari to wear?” She asked me.

I gestured to the one that I already had on.

“No,” she said shortly. “I meant a fancy one, with handwork.”

“Oh,” I said, surprised. “Uh, sorry?”
It was then that we received by messenger the news that the groom was “stuck in traffic” and would not arrive until midnight. This was the point at which we American teachers, not properly attired and feeling fatigued, decided that we would take the principal up on his offer to drive us home early.

We were sad not to see the couple happily married at 3 am, but we wished them well all the same.

Best,
Cat