India: Part 4 - zzzzzzzzz

We are beat. Heather is still asleep. It’s been a long few days.

Two days ago, we went to a party hosted by the groom’s side. I’ll just call him JS from now on. JS’ party was just that. A huge engagement party. Drink, dance, and food. There was a tradition that we did before the party. The bride’s side brings gifts to the groom’s side. All of us on the bride’s side were given a few gifts to give the the family. We all walked in, carrying the gifts and set them on the table. Then the engagement was formally accepted and the party started. Just like previous nights, there was plenty of food and drink. I think this called a Roka ceremony (at this point I’m on sensory overload)

P1000852 Yesterday was the actual wedding. In the morning we had a private pre-wedding ceremony called Chuda for the bride. This was attended by the bride’s side close family and friends. I can’t pretend to understand everything that happened, but we got small bracelets, and there was feeding of sweets to everyone (and like everything here, very tasty). And bangles were put on the bride.

Indian weddings can be very different. Just like in the states, there are differences in West coast, and East coast, the south, etc… There are the same types of differences here. This was a Punjabi wedding. One of the big differences was flow. The groom came in on a white horse. Then there was Varmala where we exchanged garlands with the other wedding party. I wore a hat to signify I was with the wedding party. It was all really cool.

P1000933 After that the bride came in and the reception started. The bride and groom go to a stage and everyone gets pictures with them. There’s tons of food (starting to see a trend), and then it’s dinner time (it’s about 11pm at this point). I felt so bad for MD, her dress weighed as much as she did! After dinner, not all the guests stay for the actual ceremony. I actually like this flow better. Come for food and drink and celebrate, but split if you don’t want to sit through the ceremony. The wedding started late (1-2am) and lasted for about 2 hours. There was a lot of ritual, however it was very informal at the same time. The staff would bring us tea/coffee during the ceremony, and not everyone was silent like in western weddings.

We got back to the hotel at around 5:00am, and slept in. Today, we’re going to just hang out, get some rest and get ready for Delhi which we’re flying to tomorrow. We’re in cars and tours for the rest of the time (even in UK and France), so probably won’t post as often.

(Sorry, no pics of the actual wedding. I don’t want to post pics of people without asking first. Both of them looked great. The traditional wedding attire was very elaborate.)

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