Wedding– part II
on Jana Gana Mana (India), 07/Feb/2011 05:28, 34 days ago
Sorry for the delay in reportingthe events of wedding– as Daniel has explained we have been somewhat “otherwise engaged”!!!! Just over a week later we seem to be emerging the other side!Anyway– I digress …….. we attended part 2 of the wedding, which was the formal marriage ceremony. It took place on a Friday evening, outside. This was the first outside, January wedding that I had ever attended– although even in India it was still quite chilly! The whole road had a number of wedding venues and it did take us quite few minutes once inside to be sure that we had come to the right one, and weren’t just a group of interlopers – not that anyone appeared to really mind, even if we were! The main area had brightly coloured fabric canopies and areas of comfy seating round tables for sitting around. Out of the main area was a dais area which was beautifully decorated, where later on the bride and groom were married, away from their guests– almost as a “side show”. The main event of the evening seemed to be the arrival of the groom who slowly appeared in a decorated, horse drawn carriage accompanied by a band, drummers and his friends and family. We were able to hear the volume of the drums increase for about thirty minutes until finally the groom appeared– standing, dancing in his carriage – which was drawn by two white horses. He seemed to be being supplied with “dutch courage” by his friend - this it would appear, is an international“duty” (as it has been confessed that a couple of JD’s were consumed just before Daniel “walked” up the aisle!). What really struck me was the attention to minute detail – the patterns that the flower petals had been arranged on the floor. Our hosts were very generous, again, with their hospitality and we all had a really lovely evening and wish the bride and groom many years of happiness.