An Indian Wedding - Guest blog by Julianne

India, a country of 1.2 Billion. Yes, 1.2 BILLION! Over 3 times the size of the US and only surpassed by China which currently sits at 1.4B. This is important fact to set the tone, because a country this large is a hard thing to even imagine and it wasn’t until I went to India, that I started to fully grasp the number of people it has. Put all of US, Canada and Europe together, it’s ______ - that equals India! 

Indian weddings are known worldwide as something of great extravagance. I’ll set the tone for the one I attended.

Indian weddings can be love marriages or arranged marriages.

This one was an arranged marriage. Having an arranged marriage does not mean that either party is forced into it, it generally means both parties let their parents know their parents that they are interested in getting married. The parents will then start arranging introductions to other children from *good* families who are ready also ready to get married. After a few meetings, the two people will decide that it is correct and a 3-6 month engagement will begin to plan the wedding. It is completely acceptable to ask a couple if they we’re a love marriage or an arranged marriage. Of the couples attending the wedding, the majority were arranged marriages. I could not tell any difference between an arranged marriage couple versus a love marriage couple. I asked someone at the wedding what the % of love versus arranged marriage is, and they guessed around 80% of marriages are arranged. I asked the unmarried first cousin of the groom what she thought of arranged marriages, she was about 27 and told me that she had told her parents that they should start introducing her to potential people to marry. I asked her what she thought of this, she said - she was very happy with it. She has had boyfriends but hadn’t met anyone she wants to marry so feels happy to have her parents leading the match making for her versus staying alone. 

Weddings can be destination weddings or local weddings. 

Many of the traditions that revolve around an Indian wedding are formed from the idea of the groom and his family going to the home of the bride and taking her back to his house. Couples will traditionally live in the house of the groom parents (never the brides parents) immediately after marriage as they look or save up money for their own home.  If the bride lives far away, it is her responsibility to move to where the groom is. In this case, the bride had been living in Mumbai and working. In preparation for the wedding she first moved back to Delhi to stay with her parents during the wedding preparation. After the marriage, she will move to Agra to live with the groom and his family. India is a big country, like the US. To give context of distances, this would be like leaving a job in New York to live with your parents in Los Angeles. After the wedding she would be moving to San Diego. I heard of another arranged marriage where the groom was living in New York and the bride in India. After marriage, she joined the groom in New York - the first time she left India. As this was a destination wedding, the overall wedding was smaller (150 people versus 700+) and the beach hotel we stayed at represented the home. 

The worst person an Indian could marry is a Pakistani. 

My experience: 

I attended the wedding from the Groom’s side. Unlike in American weddings where most of the parties are combined, for an Indian wedding - it makes a big difference if you are invited by the bride or groom. The majority of the parties are focused on that side of the family / friends and only occasionally come together. 

I arrived a few days early for the pre-wedding parties that resembled (what I assume) a bachelor party would be like. Some of the differences is that those who we’re already married brought their wives and children along. As this was a fairly well off family, everyone who brought a child also had a full time nanny to help take care of the kids. I’m not sure of the nanny pricing, but I think it is quite cheap. One of the couples I met from Mumbai said they have a cleaner / cook every day for $68 per month. 

Day 1: We arrived to Goa. Goa is a beach province of India that was colonized by the Portuguese. All of the architecture resembles Portuguese buildings and many of the restaurants and streets we’re named after Portuguese words. Evidently the local language is a mix between Hindi and Portuguese. We we’re staying in an entirely rented out villa complete with a pool and its own kitchen staff. Shortly after arrival, we headed to an opening lunch at - a greek restaurant! Being really excited to try Indian food, this was a bit of a disappointment for me but the setting was excellent with all white tables and walls over looking the Arabian Sea. After lunch we headed to a beach restaurant where we spent hours drinking beer and jumping into the water. 

We decided we wanted to go clubbing that night. I quickly found that timing in India worked similarly to timing in South America. For the club - the latest we could possible ever leave was 10:30. This was repeated over and over again. We got in the card at midnight. The club we arrived to, La Cabana, was among the best I’ve ever seen. As it was for a wedding, they insisted we do the VIP section. The VIP section cost $25 a person and included any custom drink with expensive international liquors you wanted as well as a special section of the bar and unlimited hot food snacks. I was having some of the nicest cocktails of my life as we sat on the cushioning chairs in this hill top tropical club. We could over look the club’s pool. 

PICTURE 1. (Greek Restaurant) PICTURE 2: At the beach. PICTURE 3: the club’s pool. 

Day 2: Day 2 we switched to a larger hotel as more guests were joining. We spent the day playing ball games in the hotel pool. Weather was around 80-90F. That evening we attended the first groom side only wedding event. Here was a priest blessing of the marriage to the groom and his family.  After this, we had a hotel lawn dinner. This dinner resembled a lot the (Food Poisoning) Christmas Dinner we had in Thailand. I was having bad flashbacks hoping not to relive my Food poisoning Phi Phi island boating experience. At the dinner there we’re belly dancers - I asked the significance of this… the groom replied: “there isn’t any. My dad just wanted to get belly dancers.” Where this differed from our Thai Christmas dinner is there was an open bar and everyone went to the lawn stage after the performance for a dance party to Bollywood music. We returned to our rooms after this party and continued dancing and playing music on the balcony of one of the rooms until 3am. Evidently they are not very strict on hotel noise rules. 

PICTURE: Pool Games, PICTURE: Religious blessing, PICTURE: Hotel with belly dancers. 

Day 3: 

Morning: Dance Practice! This morning we started off the day joined by a choreographer who was leading the group in dance practice. Evidently a lot of dance rehearsal had already happened before the wedding and this was the final round of rehearsal. We practiced both a friends performance and a flashmob that would happen at the wedding. I was immediately surprised when everyone clearly was an experienced dancing and whipping out a fully choreographed routine seemed normal practice for everyone! 

VIDEO: Choreagrapher

Afternoon: In the afternoon we switched to the largest hotel yet where the wedding would be held. This was a 5 star hotel of such luxury that when you walked in the door the first time, they got two people to play the drums as you walked through the entryway and they placed a shell necklace around you. It is customary for the bride and groom’s family to pay for all the guests accommodation at the hotel venue. The hotel was so big that it could take 10 minutes to walk down the hallway and reach the room. It reminds me most of the Marriott we have stayed in Palm Springs with Peggy and Alex with the golf course to the side. We had an event that officially started at 2pm by the beach, the Mendi. (spelling?) I arrived at 4pm and was among the first to get there. This event over looked the ocean and had a henna tattoo artists painting all of the women’s hands. Here is a picture of me with my hand drying - you have to be really careful while they dry! This is also the first event where you meet the bride and her family. As the bride approached it was a giant dance party. She came through the gateway with multiple full on dance breakdowns from various members of the family. This is also the first time you can really tell that it is an arranged marriage. I’m used to seeing couples get married that have been together for years, in this case - when you saw the bride and groom together you could see that they were still quite nervous around one another. They we’re trying to act natural but it just didn’t seem like that. This being said, meeting arranged marriages who had already been married for 1 year did look completely natural and in a good relationship. There was another dance party as the sun went down. 

PICTURE: my hands drying from mendi. PICTURE: beach venue. 

Evening: Another evening, another party. This party featured soooooooooo many choreographed dances. I’m talking 30+ performances. Thinking every combination of family member and friend had prepared a fully reheated performance. This was to the extent of: Brides parents, groom parents, bride siblings, groom siblings, children on the bride side, different children on the bride side, cousins on the bride side, cousins on the groom side, friends on the groom side, friends on bride side… etc etc etc. I awkwardly danced at the back on the friends of the groom side performances. One of the guests emphasized to me: Weddings in india are not about just the bride and groom. Each side’s family has put so much time into preparing the routines this wedding is for everyone. Hence why it is important people are coming from the right families. After the performances we stayed dancing with a DJ until 3:30am. I’m talking dancing a lot too! Like no breaks going crazy on the dance floor to Bollywood Music for hours!!! (This is the third night straight of this so while I was having a lot of fun, you could say I was starting to get tired!)

Day 4: 

The wedding day had finally arrived! 

Early Afternoon: Haldi, Rain Dance and Pool Party. This was another party that was separated on the bride and groom side. In this ceremony where the family blesses the marriage by having everyone spread Tumeric on the bride and groom. The actually putting of Tumeric happens in different locations. After the Tumeric everyone cleaned up with a rain dance dance party. (Don’t worry, we had a bollywood DJ for this one too…) They brought in a giant rain making dance floor and everyone danced around as the water washed the tumeric off. Afterwards we started a pool party where the choreographer lead a zumba class. Eventually the bride side joined and had a rain dance of their own then the groups combined for a pool party. 

PICTURE: Turmeric, Rain Dance, Pool Party. 

Sari Fitting: I had told the groom that I would like to wear a Sari for the wedding so he had asked the brides mom to give me one of hers. I went to the bride moms hotel room where the bride was also staying and in the process of getting ready for the next event. Her mom helped fit me for a Sari and sewed the top on the spot to fit me. I returned to her room later for her to help me put it on. This was all a real honor!!

The Wedding: Fitted in my Sari, it was time to attend the wedding party! The whole groom side gathered at the hotel. This began one of the most marvelous processions I have ever been a part of. All of the clothing was beautiful. We would all walk approximately half a mile together to where the bride was waiting. This is meant to resemble going to pick the bride up from her home. The groom started the procession on a horse. There we’re drums all around and we all danced to a historic car which would take him the rest of the way. He then boarded inside the car which slowly drove him alongside all of his dancing friends and family to where the bride was waiting. This was a fantastic procession complete with drums and many of the ordinary hotel guests we’re taking pictures of us. When we arrived to the beach venue, as we walked through the gate the brides side was waiting with welcoming gifts. Bracelets for all the women and necklaces for the men. These we’re meant as offering to enter their home. When the bride entered, she looked fantastic in a beautiful embroidered dress, full of bangles and a face noise ring. Together the group ceremony they both placed a big necklace around each other as everyone danced. The grooms side had organized a flashmob dance performance with the choreographer which I participated in. The bride and groom then went in to really long religious ceremonies that no-one was paying attention to and we all eventually went back to our hotel rooms. We returned to the dinner and dancing venue from the night before for another late night Bollywood dance session.

PICTURES FROM PROCESSION

Things we’re a little more chilled now and i got to talk briefly to the bride about their honeymoon to Iceland and Italy. She was a little more calm and comfortable now but you could tell she was a little freaked about how much her life would be changing. Leaving her job, city, family home - it was a lot. With the four others who I was flying to Mumbai with, we decided the party went so late that we should just stay awake until 5:30 am when we needed to go to the airport. Thankfully, like every night, there was an after party in one of the hotel rooms. I was excited because I thought this would be the first time the bride would be joining the party but the groom showed up to the party with out her saying that she had gone to her mom’s room to help get out of her hair and make up then was going to sleep immediately. This was all communicated by the groom’s brother’s wife who was helping her adjust to joining the family. While I imagine it was certainly an exhausting experience. the idea of the bride and groom not being together on their wedding night was pretty odd.

After the wedding:    

Overall, it was a great (and exhausting time). One of my biggest surprises is just how much Indian’s like to dance. They really give latinos a run for their money on the dancing front. I calculate 12-15 hours + of straight dancing over the four days of wedding. Maybe its a hot country thing, but there really we’re a lot of similarities I saw between Brazil / Ecuador and India. From the way it smelled, the way the streets looked, the way people interacted with each other etc. The differences would be primarily around religious and tradition based differences. I really liked one of the couples who i shared my flight back to Mumbai with and we ended up hanging out and touring with them for most of the time in Mumbai. They were a love marriage. This is also obvious, but just huge differences in income overall. You would see slums with cows and chickens in the middle of the street next to beautiful hotels. In the touristy district. I saw a security guard hit a poor man with a stick to keep him away from the restaurant I was at. 

Extra comments about India: 

- Everyone speaks really good english. British colonization years after the fact… but basically everything is written in English and Hindi. Most schools are in english and pretty much everyone you find as a basic if not excellent command of the language. You’ll also see some weird history of colonization in the country. In southern mumbai you would see super Guetto double decker buses and a lot of the architecture resembled what I imagine is how london would be if people stopped maintaining the buildings. 

- The current prime minister, Mudi, de-monitized all Rupi’s and insured new notes to help get rid of fake money in the country. Everyone was really opinionated about this and had not even heard it happen. Evidently the roll out of demonetization was a huge crisis. Would be an interesting thing to research.  

- In 2008, the fanciest hotel in Mumbai, the Taj suffered a terrorist attack from Pakistani’s killing 200+ people. I and no other westerner I was with was with had heard of this attack. Goes to show the biases of western news… 

- When Taylor and I went to Mexico, we coined the term First World Babies after going a few hours without food / water de-bilitaed us. Turns out I am also a baby in the sense that I crave different foods every day. US and UK food is fueled by immigrants - hence italian food one day, greek the next, then lebanese, then indian etc. I thought before going, “I’ll never get sick of Indian food” - 10 days in, OMG, I reallllly wanted to eat a different type of food. I had enough of the fried potatoes. (Still mucho love for Indian food but more love for getting a variable diet and trying lots of yummy things!)