Wedding Season

Since I have been in India I feel as if I have been going non-stop, and I am not complaining...  Last night we were fortunate enough to attend the wedding feast of our colleague Kartik's two younger brothers.  The weddings here are a three day affair where over 1,000 people we invited and in attendance.  While we did not observe the actual ceremony the dinner was just as interesting.  Kartik's village was roughly 50 km. outside of Bhubaneswar but took almost 2 hours to get to due to one-land back roads and a lack of GPS.

Sunset on the way to the village

Over the past few days we have driven by numerous wedding celebrations.  Evidently some of the summer months have very auspicious days for couples to get married.  They are usually accompanied by a caravan of trucks and cars decked out in lights and flowers with people dancing in the street, blasting music and shooting off fire crackers.

Once we arrived in the village we were greeted by an exuberant Kartik, still glowing with pride from the marriages of his little brothers.  Kartik introduced us to all of his family, which is quite large due to the fact they lived in a joint-family home where both his father's family and his uncle's family resided.  There were massive tarps tied to the roof to protect the party-goers from the monsoon rains.  After meeting most of the family we were presented to the brides and bridegrooms, who were essentially put on display for people to take pictures with and congratulate them.  The room had a huge spot light in it and felt like it was about 110 degrees.  I did not envy them having to stand there in their suits and saris.

Kartik, me, Mrs. Singhdeo, Ben, Katrina, with the brides and bridegrooms

We were then ushered out of the room and taken around the back of the house where a spot was cleared for us in the banquet hall.  The elder brother and family members were carrying around pails of food and filling out plates with rice, mushrooms, paneer, and all different types of curries.  After declining many offers of second and third helping we were given kheer, which is a rice pudding seasoned with cardamon and cashews but almost has the consistency of tapioca pudding.

The banquet hall

 The firepit and massive pots used to cook for the thousands of guests

We have noticed that once you are finished eating people do not sit around and chat, usually this is done before the meal and immediately after they leave the home.  We said our goodbyes thanking the family for inviting us and thought we were heading home.  However Apurba, one of the other men that works in the office took us to his village or "native place" and we were introduced to his wonderful mother who he is almost the spitting image of.

Our schedule for the rest of this week is going to be quite full with the celebration of Madhyam's founding on the 8th and the our departure for Sambalpur (a district in North-Western Orissa) where we will get to see what life is like in a more rural setting and some exposure to some of the Scheduled Tribes.