Tying the Knot day 2

Since it seems I forgot to mention who was getting married in my previous blog - some background: Dr. Sharma is our exchange partner who is currently living in our home in NH and teaching at Pat's school. Sudha is his amazing, out-of-this-world wife who has stayed here in India with their two beautiful daughters - Verajita, 13 and Vipanchika, 7. Sudha and the girls have been taking remarkable care of us throughout our journey thus far, and the marriage adventure was no exception. The marriage was between Dr. Sharma's nephew and a young woman from this village of Miryalaguda where we have traveled. Both bride and groom are young and well educated, she is a mechanical engineer and he is a software engineer. This is an arranged marriage, as is still very much the custom here in India. I have been told as many as 75% of marriages in India today are arranged, and this is down considerably from only a decade ago. Although, we have never met the bride or groom, we have never felt more welcome and we are treated as honored guests.

The second day of the marriage proved to be just as colorful, spectacular, and hot as the first. It all began, of course, with breakfast. Delightful South Indian breakfast foods with sweetened coffee served up with the insistent pleas of our hosts that we were not eating enough (although I felt like I gained 5 pounds in those 2 days). While the puja began sometime around 11, the atmosphere remained social and relaxed despite the seeming intensity of the offerings and Sanskrit prayers. Patrick and I spent the morning socializing with our respected sexes, as there is a social order here that seems to frown upon mingling with the opposite sex without a husband present. I enjoyed very much talking with some of the young women I met, who were very well educated and all very eager to practice their English. Some of the older women spoke less English but with a baby and some sign language we all understood each other.

In the course of all this I was offered a henna tattoo or mahindi on my hand. (My secret wish come true!) For the next hour my newest friend, a cousin of the groom, labored with painstaking detail on my hand. I, however, got to sit back and relax, my children cared for, and listen to the Sanskrit chanting as my hand was hennaed. After the design was complete I could not use my hand for another full hour, which naturally got to be difficult given the fussy baby factor. The fussy baby, taking a page from Murphy’s Law, only fusses when mother: a) is about to eat b) is trying to nap c) has her hands full – or in this case damp with henna. With some help from a dozen random women, Eli was walked, bounced and cooed at for most of that time. When he was finally inconsolable I took him in my left arm and paced him and my arm to sleep.
Evan was, as usual in India, the center of all the children’s attention. He doesn’t necessarily like being the center of attention, but he does enjoy having lots of children around to play with. Between games of tag, Evan spent some alone time arranging the plastic chairs in the function hall end to end in a straight line 15 deep. His focus and stubborn determination had half the room giggling and snapping cell phone photos.

The puja continued through the afternoon, but we returned to the air-conditioned oasis of the hotel for a few hours of rest. At the appointed hour we returned to the function hall for the evening festivities, starting, of course, with tea and a snack.
The function hall seemed even hotter in the evening. But we were ushered to the front in range of some very powerful fans. There was a pergola of fresh flowers and palm frowns set on a stage where the wedding party sat with their respected families. The band was playing. All of the women tonight wore saris of exquisite silk – I was feeling a tad under dressed in my cotton kameez (tunic), but even if I had been wearing the finest silk I think I still would have felt like an ugly duckling in this crowd of colorful silk swans.

The puja began around 7:30 pm with some traditional rituals, including the bride’s parents washing the groom’s feet, an exchange of intricately carved coconuts, offerings of food and blessings. After sometime the bride emerged in a large basket carried by her uncles. She was stunning. Outside of the buttery rich silk sari, jasmine, marigolds and roses cascaded down her braid like a waterfall – easily several pounds of flowers. She had two-dozen bangles on each arm, and intricate mahindi designs reaching each elbow. She truly did look like a Hindu princess – at once exotic, elegant, extravagant and beautiful. After 2 more hours of colorful, sometimes playful, often serious puja, at last the groom tied a knot around the bride’s neck - signifying the official joining of husband and wife (kind of like kissing the bride, only there is no public kissing in Hindu culture). It was lovely. As we went down for another decadent dinner I vaguely recall thinking to myself that a day’s worth of puja followed by a 2 and half hour ceremony was quite an undertaking for a young couple. Little did I know there were still seven, yes, SEVEN hours to go!I’d like to be able to tell you more about the evening’s pageantry and puja, but by the time we had finished feasting it was 11pm and the boys were tired. So we retired to the “luggage room” (since we had all checked out of the hotel, everyone’s luggage was stored in this space). There was one king size bed in the room and it was covered with kids. I claimed the foot of the bed and laid down with Eli, Pat and Evan took the head between us were 4 kids and a Grandmother simultaneously playing and resting. We spent the next several hours dozing on and off as best we could –it was a school night after all. Until 4am when the bride and groom emerged looking faint but happy for one final blessing and the offering of a sweet – the laddu. Bleary eyed, tired and overwhelmed we boarded the bus for home at 4:30. Despite the long, late night it was well worth the journey. A once in a lifetime experience punctuated by heat and feast; silks and jasmine.