More Wedding Wonders

so there i was that fateful saturday... dressed up in one of my favorite shirts, faded jeans and leather shoes. i honestly thought i look like a chinese john wayne, just without the swagger and the spit. the plan was to attend the wedding, stay for an hour and slowly slip out and go back home. nice plan.

the event was supposed to start at 11 am, so we opted to "visit" at 1 pm when the ceremony has finished and the send-off has begun. Here in churachandpur, the bride will have a send off party, hosted by the bride's family (of course) where friends, neighbors and family members will have the last chance of "seeing"the bride with the family. After the send off party, she will be "fetched"by the dashing groom to live in a castle far away from the meddling in laws. or she would be living with her husbands parents, who she probably does not know or like. such fate!

while waiting for the 1 pm toll, i decided to go for lunch at the posh-iest place in town, hoping for my usual pork ribs and chowmien. there i was clickety-clacketing my way through the market, the bust station and the dusty streets of c'cpur in a get up my mother would be ashamed of.

the lunch was amazingly delicious and spicy - that was the best part of the day if you ask me. and at exactly 12:30 i went down to the send off party. half way through i met khaipu and seilen who escorted me and provided the "guarding" necessary for my attire.

at 1:15, there were no familiar faces yet and i was getting agitated. i called the other expats twice but it seems that someone's dress doesn't fit with the shoes. it's like: hey this isn't sex and the city and you are not carrie!.

so anyway, the ceremenony started and we were escorted to take a seat. thinking that it would be impossible for us to escape the ceremony if we were in the front part (facing the bride), i asked seilen and khaipu to sit with me at the back. I saw the smug smiles on the two guys -- and i thought - aha! they too, have plans!

the back part of the garden was covered with a tent and some pieces of beautiful cloth so it looked exclusive -- just us having a party, don't mind the neighbors look.

three minutes into the ceremony, seated at the back, i started to gag. not the one needing the heimlich, but the one when you smell something. i started joking to seilen that he should change his aftershave, but when i looked at him, he was covering his face -- apparently smelling something odd and fetid as well!

it was then that i noticed that the ground was covered in pig shit!

khaipu started to feel the wall behind the cloth and the tent and true enough, behind us was a pig sty! we stayed, for two minutes smiling and gagging in between, then raced off to the nearest door. halfway out, i met one more of our staff who greeted me (without batting an eyelash): "my you look human, today!"

i'll never attend any weddings here. not if i can help it.

Weddings:Wonder or Woes?

i am attending my fourth wedding invitation here in manipur. i have been to different kinds of weddings all over the world - from the festive island wedding in vanuatu, to the orthodox christian ceremony in ethiopia, the quiet tribal/christian weddings in ccpur and recently the glamorous wedding in imphal. the recent one in imphal was nice and colorful, though we didn't stay for a long time.

i love weddings. it is a good time to see people in different states of emotions: happiness, especially the parents who'd probably thought "i finally got rid of this person after 30 years"; anxiety ("does this man snore when he sleeps?"); hope ("I finally snagged a man after a long wait"); anger ("why can't i marry sally?") and more anxiety ("how am i going to pay for all these?"). it is also a nice time to see all the glitters (bought, borrowed), the clothes (renovated, re-covered, re-layered and received) and the make -up (minimal, natural and over the top).

all in all, the ceremonyand the formalization is a wonderful event. i think it is nice to say vows and pledge that for the next 6 months i will not sleep with anyone else... or promise that i shall never leave you until the next one comes along.

in the philippines, which has been very americanized in terms of the whole sheebang, a bride MUST wear white. and have a blue garter (no less!) to throw it to the expecting bachelors (or ex-married guys) for the fun of finding his future bride. the event has become a pre-dating bonanza and a matching ceremony for those who are : (1) over 25 years old and not yet married (2) 20 years old and never had a relatioship (3) successful men/women who have the face of a horse (4) mommy's boy/daddy's girl (5) stuck to internet porn (6) masculine women/feminine men (7) was in previously bad relationship and (8) just about for anybody who plays the game.

i know you sense some bitterness in my tone. hehehe. so i have to stop here before i destroy the romantics in you. but should the day come for me to get married, you can rub this blog on my face and say: "that's what you get!".

if there is one thing i love about weddings and you really have to press me on this, i would answer: free food and booze. tough choice, but hey, one's gotta live!