Wedding Feast

On Thursday I attended my first Indian wedding. Granted, we weren't there for the whole thing, but I got to experience a part of it. Weddings around here, to my understanding, are at least a three day process. There is an evening for the women to put henna on their hands. There is the wedding ceremony, and then the following day, there is the feast and more celebration. What we attended was the dham, the feast.

Somehow, I knew people on both sides of the marriage. The bride was the daughter of Dr. Barbara's cook and the groom was the brother of Phillip's landlord, who attended our combined birthday party and invited everyone there to the marriage. We, however, didn't get to see the bride and groom themselves.

Anya, Kelly, and I, dressed in our finest suits, trekked across several fields, managing to pick up an escort of all three Nishta dogs on our way, before we reached the wedding. When we arrived, the feast had already started, and what I saw was much like the village feast of earlier this fall. Sitting on long mats on the ground with leaf plates in front of them were wedding guests. People with baskets and bowls of food ran up and down the aisles between the plates and dumped food onto each plate as they passed.

Here, odd numbers are auspicious, so wedding feasts usually have either five or seven courses. Likewise, when we gave our offering envelope, more or less to pay for the food, we gave 151 rupees between us. Giving 150 would have been back luck.

Everyone was wearing beautiful clothing, though there were no saris even there. It was fun to look at what everyone had chosen to wear to the celebration. The father of the bride wore a bright red scarf tied in a sort of turban on his head.

There was not enough room for everyone to eat at once, so as soon as one group had eaten it's seven courses, they would throw out their leaf plates, wash their hands with whatever water was left in their cups (this is a finger food occasion), and then the next group would flood onto the area and find a seat.

While people were eating, women from the wedding party would pass out little bags of bangles to random guests. I think this is another auspicious thing to do.

After the feast, we sat in the shade for a a while, then went up to Phillip's apartment for coffee before heading back home.