But with respect to Hindu (esp Tamil Iyengar weddings , to be precise- somethign Ihave grown up with, literally), I have a submission : no matter the age, social standing, venue or the bride or the groom or anything to do with a hindu wedding, I must admit its ALLLLLLLLLLLLL the same ! Right from the nischiatartham to the coconut (play) at the end of the muhurtham its like shutter-click-shutter-click- .... and one could replace the bride and groom (with new sets of bride-groom) and I can assure you with veracity that they all look stunningly and astonishingly similar !! Upto the slightly yellowed dhoti of the groom to the way the hair is parted (or fallen apart) to the MIL applying (read streaking) the poor SIL’s eyes with kajal (chambor or to the (now ancient sounding) brick red madisaar podavai that somehow looks that the cat has dragged the bride to its end ... and the bored looking audience!!
Of course, in the initial years, as a youngster dragged to these weddings along with my grandparents meant manna to me - it meant days of bunking school and coming home (call it lugging) with plastic bags of vettalai packs of coconut , dried betel leaf(which got passed on to the maid, somehow), probably a rupee or so (which in promptly went into our rust coloured post office shaped piggy bank) and yes, the icing on the cake (not literally, stupid) the laddoo and khara boondi (which was the prize for attending the function, which needless to say would melt in our mouths (or be stored in little plastic days to be distributed – this quantity being directly proportionate to the proximity of ur relationship with the bride/groom, pref the former) !
Not to forget that the ladies back home once back from the weddings would compare the texture, colour and quality of the blouse pieces (recvd as gifts in innocuously packed in little brown paper covers – the paper covers later migrated to zip locs for those NRI type weddings), and you could consider lucky (even luckier than the bride?!) if your mom/aunt /grand mom received these from the bride’s mom (or the groom’s) .... it’s almost a sin to refuse these....although I heard that recently NRIs have migrated to swarowski (sic!) as return gifts ! Sometimes, makes me wonder why we as parents cringe when our little one wants return gifts for her/his birthday! Haven’t we demonstrated that a little pampering is good for our egos ?
But, really the male counterparts who do most of the running around (ferrying us to and from the venue, the groom, father of the bride /groom, the best boy(s)) don’t really get much in return, except probably a few (decently) decked females scurrying around as if it were the G9 conference in attendance!
It only makes is realise that we have gone through several stages of evolution at these weddings - from (a) stealthily stealing those laddoos into your mouth in your childhood to (b) stealthily stealing glances at wannabe-husbands- and ogling males in your teens to (c) discussing which ‘aunty’ was the most badly dressed in your late teens again to (d) declaring to yourself that you need to have a better wedding (read flashier / hotter groom) in your early twenties to (e) declaring that you would fund you own wedding once u earn the rokda to (f) settling for a grander wedding than you thought and discarding your holier-than-thou thoughts of a simple temple wedding having given into threats, endearments and what not from the grand aunt you never thought existed) in your (hopefully) early thirties to (g) discussing why a man/lady shouldn’t marry once you have had your second blood mary or single mart, depending on your gender (or not) !
Man (and woman) does truly evolve !!
Oh ! and did I miss out to stage H, I, J (which incidentally begin with hoarding gold/money/ULIPs for your daughter’s wedding) slowly evolving to .....
....and the great Indian saga continues..... ..not to speak about Inter culture (clutter?) weddings that are oh-thats-the-norm-sweetz nowadays, but let me save that for the next blog...
Till then, ur son/daughter would be busy updating his/her blog on FB/twitter declaring (and almost ensuring u positively faint) "I Do" online to someone u positively dont approve! Global Village, anyone?
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