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Anatomy of a South Indian Hindu Wedding

June 6th, 2007
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Anatomy of a South Indian Hindu Wedding

As promised, here’s how a South Indian Hindu Wedding works.

I found out that I was going to be the “brother” for my cousin divya’s wedding because her brother couldn’t make it. This means that I got to be a part of a lot of cool traditions! Here’s what I went through:

Step 1: Fly to Hyderabad from NYC via Amsterdam. Sleep to try to overcome jetlag:



Step 2: Help find jewelery and clothes for the wedding and reception in Hyderabad, including a wedding outfit for myself. This was a lot of work.



Step 3. Rest.



Step 4. Drive from Hyderabad to Warrangal where the wedding was going to happen.





These are all the members of “Team Rich”. From left to right, Shashi, Venkat, my little sister Chandana, and me. Our mission was to make this wedding ridiculously fun. This is us on the way to Warrangal.

Step 5. Stop on the way to Warrangal to get mangoes:





Kranthi and Venkat with some mangoes.





Chandi looking like a traditional village girl.

Step 6. More shopping in Warrangal, especially for the Mehendhi party.



We saw some interesting buildings like this one while shopping:





It’s basically a fertility clinic, but the name on the building is hilarious.

Step 7. Wake up early (5 am! because by 9 am it’s 100 degrees at least) and workout so I don’t get too lazy.



Step 7.5 Rest



Step 8. Mehendhi party! It’s a semi-permanent tattoo (lasts for 2 weeks or so).





My cousin Divya getting mehendhi on her arms.









Chandi’s mehendhi.



Team Rich with the bride to be at the party. See the flowers in the background? Me and Shashi did that!





My little cousin Harshita at the party =). There was a dance party afterwards.

Step 9. So the night before the wedding we had another party, thrown by the groom’s family. There was a lot of good food, and I got some money for “blessing” the groom and bride. Also, I was given entry into the circle of uncle drinking. Basically, a bunch of uncles got some beer and indian chicken wings and were having a good time in part of the garden where the party was going on. They brought me over and asked me to “just have one sip.” So I took one sip of beer and then tried to pass it on, but they said that they already had some. Which they did. In India, bottles of beer are huge and they’re basically one step below malt liquor, so I knew this could be trouble. They were all pressuring me too, which statements like, “hey, we finished our beer, what about yours?” It was like some of my friends from college flew to India and morphed into older Indian uncles. I managed to somehow sneak away without getting too drunk the night before the wedding!

Step 10. Because I was the “brother” for the wedding, I had to go bring the groom (his name is Praneeth) to the wedding personally. I think maybe this tradition is to ensure that grooms don’t get cold feet and ditch out on the wedding. So traditionally, all the brothers of the bride would have to literally carry the groom from his house to the vehicle (probably in the past it would be a horse or a cow, but now it’s just a decorated car), but luckily I didn’t have to do that because I was the only one. Because the wedding was at 10 am (the most auspicious time for that day apparently), I had to wake up at 2 am to go get the groom.





As you can see, it was still dark outside and there was a buffalo chewing on something. This is the view from the car as we went to the ceremony (you can see the wedding band marching in front of it):



While this was going on, Divya was also getting ready doing some sort of ceremony:














Step 11. The wedding!

There were too many cool traditions to mention, but I’ll talk about one really fun one in particular. I had to lead the groom to the altar by hand from the “preparation room.” Before he gets on the altar, I’m supposed to wash his feet and take his sandals. The key here is that me and the rest of the bride’s family are supposed to hide the sandals and hold them for ransom while the groom’s family has to pay a ransom to get them back. We took the sandals and hid them in a locked car. Somehow during the wedding, the groom’s family got them back. So we set up a trap between the groom and the people who had the sandals. When they came to try to give the groom the sandals we sprung our trap and got them back. It required a little bit of tackling from me and some other people on the bride’s side of the family, but it was all in good fun =). Here are the rest of the photos from the wedding:













My sister, Praneeth, Divya, and me.





The after dinner. There were people all around getting us food constantly.





My little cousin again, isn’t she adorable!?







She’s on the wedding chairs!!





In the beginning of the cermony you’re not supposed to see each other.





Walking around the altar.





Step 12. Practice for the Team Rich dance which we did at the reception the day after the wedding. If I can get the video I’ll put it up. It was awesome =). The photo below is of the initial pose.



Overall, it was a lot of work, and I was really tired but it was the most fun wedding I’ve been to so far.

Finally,





Rest.




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