Indian marriage functions - My take

Yet another marriage season is over and yet another time it has left me with some extra kilos. It’s like an annual tradition for me. Just like you are left with colours in your hair after holi and smell of gunpowder in your hands after Diwali, each year, I am left with a protruding belly, after the marriage season. Every year!

This is not the end of the story. It brings with it a lot of problems which I detest personally. FYI, I am here not concerned about the “ek kunwara.. fir gaya mara” shit-terratti. I have got reasons, much more catastrophic, much more serious. So here I am telling why going to marriage functions is like sitting on a horse with your piles ridden bottoms.

Imagine a plush wedding ceremony going on in a farmhouse. You have just entered with your family. Now at this moment you look around and spend a minute on observing the settings and the decorations. Yet again they are based on an undecipherable theme which you can’t understand. Or rather you don’t care. While the other members of your family are busy socializing, you observe some totally new faces talking to your parents like they know them for years. And you are just standing there as a fool wondering, how should I address them while greeting? This problem becomes more prominent when you are at a relative’s wedding and you have never seen that cousin of yours who’s getting married. So, after struggling for some minutes, to figure out how you should address the lady talking to your mother, you suddenly come up with - %$&@!^ namastey!!! Now here, the first word is just a meaningless and weird syllable or a group of syllables spoken just to fill that void so that neither the lady understands how you have addressed her, nor you have to feel embarrassed if you call her ‘naniji’ and she actually turns out to be your aunt or something. So basically it serves as an arrow from the ramanand sagar’s Ramayana which after leaving the bow, splits into two.

I look around thinking how is it possible that nobody knows me here? I mean come on! There got to be someone. Well apparently there isn’t. The crowd is going towards the food court and I too decide to go along. I serve some items in my plate and some gulab jamuns. Now, when I say ‘some gulab Jamuns’, it means at least 4, apart from the other bland stuff. Man!! I just love gulab jamuns!!!. As far as I remember, Marriages have been all about gulab jamuns to me since I was a kid. I have a strong opinion that if there should be an allegorical symbol for a marriage, it should be gulab jamun and ya, about the invitation cards, the invitation cards should have a big-spherical-brown-syrup-coated gulab jamun upfront. That would be something I would call an invitation card. I sometimes wonder that how lucky are the mithaiwalas. They can eat as much as they can... I feel like having some of them right now…but I guess then this article won’t get done! So I should probably carry on..

So, I fill my plate and go to a corner to gorge on to the stuff in some peace. After eating a bit, I know that now it’s time for the dessert.. The gulab Jamuns. Now here I don’t know why but I get an epiphany that I should put two of them in my mouth and I do it. And I instantly know that it was a very wrong decision. The cameraman with his assistant just saw me standing in peace and is now covering me eating. Embarrassment may come in unexpected ways. There I was, standing like a fool with two gulab jamuns in my mouth, stupidly looking here and there not knowing what to do with them. I am wondering how many people will actually see me in this state once this video tape gets ready. And this cameraman is a huge moron. I just can’t understand why is he so interested in covering me when there are so many other people around here who would so love to get covered. I bet some of these gleaming ladies must have bought new dresses just for this occasion. They will totally love coming on the tape. But this camera man is hell bent on screwing my evening. At last, he moves. Ohh god!! I now take a sigh of relief. And continue gorging on the stuff.

After finishing I decide to come out of the food court and locate an empty chair. Just as I am moving towards it, my mother calls me. She is talking to a lady and a girl is standing beside her. I join them in apprehension.

“beta! pehchana inhe?”, my mother asks me.

Now, this is just one of the many embarrassing situations that my mother frequently keeps pushing me into, at public places. This one time, her friend was at our home with her family and she somehow managed to leave me abashed, even though the topic of the chit-chat was the ear-rings, her friend was wearing. Before that, I was this, poor clueless fool, who did not know that there even exists a possibility of being  left   embarrassed even if the topic is as innocuous as 'ear rings'. My mother for sure has got this talent. But let’s not go into that..

Then you will definitely be introduced to an uncle/aunt of yours who after seeing you, will instantly get hit by this epiphany that you have grown up.

“Tyagiji… main to keh raha hu ab shaadi kara do iski bhi.”, this new uncle, says to my father, with a grin. I instantly curse myself for having come to this torture turned wedding function. I am so put off by all this now that  I avoid going to these functions now. Though these mishaps may happen anywhere, anytime but the reason why I am so pissed off with wedding functions is that they provide the perfect environment and fuel to these misadventures to propel.

Though when I started writing this piece, I thought I will cover each and every thing that irritates me about Indian weddings but I now I am so not in mood to explain each and every whim of mine and I don’t have just sloth to blame for it. I will just mention the rest of the things I detest in marriage functions and I guess you will have a fair enough idea..

- The girls and ladies with the excessive make-up and I do not understand what’s with the blush on their cheeks. The sheer number of such cases present in the function gives this point, an incredible weight. Man, I so like the girls who look decent and earthly.

- The camera man just doesn’t let you have a break.

- The uncles/aunties/relatives asking about your job and when you tell them your employer’s name, no matter what name you say, they do not understand it as they have not seen ads on tv for your company. Go! Stab yourself.

- An evening of yours gets wasted as well as you get nothing but embarrassment and irritation in return. You could have easily stayed home in your casuals and would have read a book.

- You need to shave every time you need to go to such a function.

- The ostentatious antics that are performed at the weddings these days look so preposterous. The rotating platforms, the flower showers/fountains, the stage performances by skimpily clad hired dancers.

- Man! This cameraman needs some help.

- I always overeat at these functions. Come on! There are so many dishes available, to try. What else am I supposed to do in this situation?

Though I feel a lot sympathy towards the couple who is getting married. I can understand the torture they have to endure that starts some fifteen days prior to the day and goes on till ten days after. Specially, the bride to be, is literally tormented. During this period, her privacy goes fishing, and she finds herself surrounded by giggly girls and teasing aunties, all the time. No time of her own. So many relatives, the usual conflicts among the women of the extended family, that are now all together. Crying and leaking babies that accompany them, the always occupied toilets…….

 

You can understand.