the Wedding House

“The Wedding House”

It is 6:30 pm Friday night. Hindu drummers accompany a processional to the Hindu Temple and then to the house. The participants dance around to these drum solos for about 3 hours. Its 9:30—gotta get a good night of sleep for what is to come.
Now Saturday morning has arrived—a good night’s sleep. There is a beach ball on a 15 foot tall bamboo pole symbolizing their Hindu wedding that was put up last night. They will leave it up for years. Recently today several ladies donned saris and daubed mud on themselves for some reason—beauty perhaps—nay.

You know, we do things so differently in the States. Here the female members of the extended family come over days earlier to “pick rice”. That is where you buy cheaper rice that might have pieces that are not editable and then they sit around a table and pick out the bad pieces while they talk—sort of like a quilting bee. Then today there is more food preparation time under the carport by 15 or so ladies and guys as they cook the food over outside pots with a wood fire. They use something like a large wok about 2 feet in diameter—very labor intensive. Seven Curry is the favorite for “wedding houses.”

This is their solution to catering. Some people here do cater events but it usually consists of a Styrofoam box with vegetable fried rice (chicken or beef too, if they are not Hindu), some roti perhaps and a small paper sack of sweet bread with the consistency of dough—called sweet meat.