Ahoy,
The next day, for the wedding, we moved rooms to another section of the resort that had converted old train cars into hotel rooms. This room was awesome! All of the wedding guests were lined up in the trains that had working bathrooms, tv and everything! Everything you would need in a hotel room. Such fun!
We spent Saturday before the wedding going to various malls looking for an outfit for A. We rode on the auto-rickshaws/tuk tuks, which are a lot of fun and inexpensive. We came across a big shop that had everything from clothing to housewares and groceries - kind of like costco, but much smaller. Everyone was out shopping for provisions on Saturday. There was another giant fancy mall that had all the stores an American mall would have. We tried McDonald's here- a veggie burger and spicy paneer wrap. Our last stop was an open air market, Sarojini Nagar, that seemed to have a lot of locals doing their daily shopping. We got A an outfit that looked like pajamas for the big Indian wedding the next day. There weren't that many shops for traditional menswear, but a lot for women.
Back at the hotel, we had some time to watch the national geographic channels. I love watching tv at hotels because we don't have a tv and we never have cable channels.
The first wedding event was a sangeet. It was a lot like a cocktail hour, but then there was a gift exchange, make-up thing, photo session, which I"m told is traditionally 5-6 hours long, but fortunately was much shorter. And the finale is a showcase of dances put on for the bride and groom by various combinations of family members. It was a lot of fun and entertaining. There were also men walking around with appetizers during the whole thing. Quite the contrast to Chinese banquet style dinners, where the food doesn't come out for 2+ hours after the guests arrive. As the evening went on, I thought maybe it would be just appetizers for dinner, but then after all the activities, there was actual dinner! It was a lot of food to eat. And all of it so delicious and meat-free! There were so many varieties of curries I had never heard of in the States. Copious amounts of food would prove to be the theme for the whole wedding.
The following morning, we had breakfast at the hotel and ventured out unsuccessfully to find a temple we had ridden past. India is the least walk-friendly place we've been. There are mostly no sidewalks and no pedestrian paths. Roads aren't paved, and really dusty and uneven or poo laden. Where there is pavement, it is mostly used as urinals. Street carts abut right into the road where you would have to dodge motorcyclists, bicyclists and other street carts. I've never encountered something like this to this degree. We missed a turn that involved crossing a big intersection with no lights and found ourselves walking a lot farther than we thought our destination was. Crossing the street is a whole 'nother ball game. Traffic doesn't stop, you just have to step out and trust that everyone else will dodge you.
The lunch event would be a more traditional Western style wedding. My friend walked down the aisle flanked by both parents in her grandmother's wedding dress. The appetizer servors had to be ushered out of the aisle as the procession was happening. Their duties would not be shirked for the march if they could claim ignorance. The ceremony was quick and personalized, like most Western weddings nowadays, with written vows and a friend as the officiant. We moved onto a big lunch to accompany the speeches and dances. Everyone dispersed in a timely manner because the wedding party had to prepare for the traditional Indian wedding that evening.
The Western guests were always the first to arrive, and the Indian guests would trickle in later. They knew something we didn't know, and also had probably seen it all before. The RRS changed multiple times before finally changing into his entire Indian outfit after seeing everyone else at the event. I think his life would be so much easier if he would just listen to me all the time. There were multiple food stations in addition to the floating appetizers that would come to us. There was a whole row of all the street foods that we were warned to be cautious of when we encountered them "in the wild," but was safe to eat at the wedding. There was a whole 'nother corner of food I never made it to. And inside was a whole array of buffet style Indian dinner.
The ceremony felt like hours long with a big fanfare for first the groom entering with an army of drummers and then the bride with her party. They sat at a table where they gave offerings in front of a flame that they later had to walk 7 times around. There was someone chanting in sanskrit that, I heard later, my friend tried to modify to make more feminist. There was another photo session that is traditionally 5-6 hours long that was much shorter. Later after the wedding, the new husband said a lot of the elements missing from a full Indian wedding were at his request. It's difficult to imagine what it'd be like to sit through a full length event. I don't think anybody really watched attentively the whole ceremonies. People would mingle and watch for a few moments and then wander off again for food or conversation. Background noise grew as the ceremonies wore on. It must be quite the task for the bride and groom to sit through all of the fanfare. We had copious amounts of Indian food, seemingly the theme for the weekend. I was never hungry when it was time to eat because we had been eating the whole time. I guess it was always time to eat. But it was always so delicious.
delectably adjoined,
jt
The next day, for the wedding, we moved rooms to another section of the resort that had converted old train cars into hotel rooms. This room was awesome! All of the wedding guests were lined up in the trains that had working bathrooms, tv and everything! Everything you would need in a hotel room. Such fun!
We spent Saturday before the wedding going to various malls looking for an outfit for A. We rode on the auto-rickshaws/tuk tuks, which are a lot of fun and inexpensive. We came across a big shop that had everything from clothing to housewares and groceries - kind of like costco, but much smaller. Everyone was out shopping for provisions on Saturday. There was another giant fancy mall that had all the stores an American mall would have. We tried McDonald's here- a veggie burger and spicy paneer wrap. Our last stop was an open air market, Sarojini Nagar, that seemed to have a lot of locals doing their daily shopping. We got A an outfit that looked like pajamas for the big Indian wedding the next day. There weren't that many shops for traditional menswear, but a lot for women.
Back at the hotel, we had some time to watch the national geographic channels. I love watching tv at hotels because we don't have a tv and we never have cable channels.
The first wedding event was a sangeet. It was a lot like a cocktail hour, but then there was a gift exchange, make-up thing, photo session, which I"m told is traditionally 5-6 hours long, but fortunately was much shorter. And the finale is a showcase of dances put on for the bride and groom by various combinations of family members. It was a lot of fun and entertaining. There were also men walking around with appetizers during the whole thing. Quite the contrast to Chinese banquet style dinners, where the food doesn't come out for 2+ hours after the guests arrive. As the evening went on, I thought maybe it would be just appetizers for dinner, but then after all the activities, there was actual dinner! It was a lot of food to eat. And all of it so delicious and meat-free! There were so many varieties of curries I had never heard of in the States. Copious amounts of food would prove to be the theme for the whole wedding.
The following morning, we had breakfast at the hotel and ventured out unsuccessfully to find a temple we had ridden past. India is the least walk-friendly place we've been. There are mostly no sidewalks and no pedestrian paths. Roads aren't paved, and really dusty and uneven or poo laden. Where there is pavement, it is mostly used as urinals. Street carts abut right into the road where you would have to dodge motorcyclists, bicyclists and other street carts. I've never encountered something like this to this degree. We missed a turn that involved crossing a big intersection with no lights and found ourselves walking a lot farther than we thought our destination was. Crossing the street is a whole 'nother ball game. Traffic doesn't stop, you just have to step out and trust that everyone else will dodge you.
The lunch event would be a more traditional Western style wedding. My friend walked down the aisle flanked by both parents in her grandmother's wedding dress. The appetizer servors had to be ushered out of the aisle as the procession was happening. Their duties would not be shirked for the march if they could claim ignorance. The ceremony was quick and personalized, like most Western weddings nowadays, with written vows and a friend as the officiant. We moved onto a big lunch to accompany the speeches and dances. Everyone dispersed in a timely manner because the wedding party had to prepare for the traditional Indian wedding that evening.
The Western guests were always the first to arrive, and the Indian guests would trickle in later. They knew something we didn't know, and also had probably seen it all before. The RRS changed multiple times before finally changing into his entire Indian outfit after seeing everyone else at the event. I think his life would be so much easier if he would just listen to me all the time. There were multiple food stations in addition to the floating appetizers that would come to us. There was a whole row of all the street foods that we were warned to be cautious of when we encountered them "in the wild," but was safe to eat at the wedding. There was a whole 'nother corner of food I never made it to. And inside was a whole array of buffet style Indian dinner.
The ceremony felt like hours long with a big fanfare for first the groom entering with an army of drummers and then the bride with her party. They sat at a table where they gave offerings in front of a flame that they later had to walk 7 times around. There was someone chanting in sanskrit that, I heard later, my friend tried to modify to make more feminist. There was another photo session that is traditionally 5-6 hours long that was much shorter. Later after the wedding, the new husband said a lot of the elements missing from a full Indian wedding were at his request. It's difficult to imagine what it'd be like to sit through a full length event. I don't think anybody really watched attentively the whole ceremonies. People would mingle and watch for a few moments and then wander off again for food or conversation. Background noise grew as the ceremonies wore on. It must be quite the task for the bride and groom to sit through all of the fanfare. We had copious amounts of Indian food, seemingly the theme for the weekend. I was never hungry when it was time to eat because we had been eating the whole time. I guess it was always time to eat. But it was always so delicious.
delectably adjoined,
jt
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