Insight: An Indian Wedding
I am sure it’s pretty clear that I am by nature, a cynic. I hate almost everything that is around and I make sure everybody knows about it. My hate for Indian Weddings is way more than my hate for flying or Indian startups or those VC’s who invest in those startups or well, Audi.
I. Hate. Audi.
Pre-Pre-Wedding
The whole story usually begins with you getting invited to one, the people who invite you usually decide to randomly drop by your place without informing you and the door is opened to them while you’re sitting in your boxers and trying to plan a heist in GTA V. I know, worst. timing. ever. but you can’t really do anything about it except make snarky comments at random intervals about how things have changed and people shouldn’t just drop by without informing you. They hand you the wedding card usually with 500 grams of almonds. (The rich have custom designed chocolates wrapped in fancy boxes but they always taste like shit.) They smile and talk about general things, eat some snacks and probably drink a cup of tea before they leave because they probably need to get to ten other people and drop by their houses randomly before informing for the lulz. You know, the usual stuff.
Pre-Wedding
Sadly it doesn’t end there, after you receive the card, there is a family debate on who should be going and which functions are important. For example: If it’s a business associate, do we really have to go for their engagement party? Yes?! WHY? Oh because they came to the cousin’s engagement party? Why would they come for that? They don’t even know the cousin. Shouldn’t we all go? What’s the food like at Hyatt? Do we eat dinner there? What should we buy them? A TV? Like an LED or one of those 3D one’s? TV’s are too cheap? No screw it, we’ll just go the reception. What color suit? Man, I really don’t wanna go. Do we have to give the driver overtime? What time is the wedding? 8? So like we go at 11? Isn’t the next day Monday? Vegetarian food sucks at Marriott!
Note: That, was just an example and no, it wasn’t over-exaggerated.
The Family Wedding
However, the main problem isn’t a business associates wedding, it’s the family weddings which suck the most, there is no option there, you have to be there at all of the million functions around all those million aunties who get drunk and start dancing like Dev Anand and when they find you lurking around in a corner trying to hit on that cute second-cousin’s friend, they decide that there would be no better moment to pull your cheeks and say “You have grown up!” even though they just saw you two months back and you haven’t grown up for shit, at that moment you just want to show her your Spongebob boxers but you can’t because that would be a bit too provocative and probably because somewhere in your mind you know that it won’t end well.
So you get your cheeks pulled while the aunty tries balancing herself and the uncle comes around trying to hold her and asks you mundane questions like “Are you still studying? No? So you’re working? Yes? Where? Ohh, you joined family business! So proud of you son, you should teach my kid something, he wants to work for those idiots at IBM! What degree? BBA? What is that like a doctorate? No? Haha, so many degrees so many quotas, government sux, education system sux, potholes at Malabar Hill, no Black Label at this wedding! Why are we here? We should meet sometimes! Juhu is too far! I like farting but I just look around when I do that so people don’t think it’s me even though I am the only one old enough to collapse at any momen….” AMBULANCE.
The Photographer, The Bride & (Sometimes) The Groom
There is a photographer who is forced to take pictures by the bride’s mother of her friends’ but all of them look like Shrek, so it’s kinda hard to get a good picture. I always feel bad for the photographers. They have to make you look good and admittedly, most of us don’t look good.
Thus, the photographer is also known as the most important person at the wedding. People come to weddings to show how awesome they can look and NOT to wish the bride and the groom. DUH.
The bride has decided to enter with the groom at about 10 PM even though the function was supposedly to start at 8, fashionably late has a new meaning. After the grand entrance there is a wannabe-seductive item number usually performed by the friends’ of the bride or the groom or both (Which to be honest is rather unappealing because the hot one’s never participate in this stupid stuff.) After applauding like a complete whack-job and tearing up as if she is dying the bride decides she wants to click about 999 photographs because apparently it’s her day.
In all of this, it really never looks like the groom plays an important part. I mean, the photographer is way more important, who cares about the groom? He is just a guy who…got married today. That’s all, right?
The Food & The Drinks
The pushy relatives trying to call the dude who’s serving starters when they are “socializing” with you and then saying “Mast hai, mast hai” while they take nearly the whole thing in their hands and pour chutney all over it and you just end up looking at their faces with a are-you-fucking-kidding-me reaction but obviously they completely ignore that. The food issue is the biggest issue at weddings, even the 95 year old uncle who keeps coughing every 3 seconds becomes a foodie.
Usual Indian weddings have a buffet system, where you take your food in a plate, the concept of this never sits well with us; Indians, mainly because we want everything available at that wedding. So we obviously end up with a plate and put everything on top of each other because obviously we don’t want to stand in line for food again, who would, right? So there’s the rice with the gravy with another gravy with the naan with the other rice with noodles and something related to yoghurt on top of each other. Totally appealing.
While uncle’s hustle around to get their Black Label peg before anybody else because who the hell wouldn’t wanna drink for free and order three drinks at the same time so they don’t have to wait at the bar again?
Pro-Tip: Never sit with old people at Indian weddings. They are all too drunk. (Also the #1 reason why people show up early at weddings: Open Bars)
Why Are We Even Here?
One of the most important questions asked at any point during a wedding is, “Why are we even here?” It’s asked usually by people like me, to the people we came with, to the wedding. It’s also code for: Let’s leave without getting noticed because if somebody sees us they’ll ask us another set of questions including things like: Why are you leaving so early? The party has just begun! Monday hai toh kya hua?Aap vegetarian ho? How was the decoration? Did you eat? I didn’t see you eat! Do you want my car to drop you? I just bought an Accord! It’s awesomemax! Even though I’ll never meet you again for a year I just want to tell you how awesome it is that you came for my son’s wedding! Oh, btw, sweet dish liya?
Honda Roxy
The worst part about the whole thing is when people try to show-off at weddings, trying so hard to make other people think they’re richer is absolutely the worst thing to do specially when they can’t even pronounce Burberry or Louis Vuitton and they end up calling it BB and LV for that reason. I remember going to a wedding, all of my family was already there and I was pretending to be running late when I was actually at home sleeping. I self-drove there in my small hatchback and got out of the car to hand over the keys to the valet, the groom’s father was standing outside to welcome the guests and he looked at my face and we had the following conversation:
Groom’s Father: Beta yeh kaunsi gaadi hai?
Me: Nissan.
Groom’s Father: Beta HUNDAH kahan hai?
Me: HUNDAH dad ke paas hai.
Groom’s Father: Aapko bhi HUNDAH lena chayie tha. No point in buying car which is not HUNDAH. HUNDAH makes small cars also. You know, HUNDAH BRIO, I buy my son that, he likes it..
Me: That car looks like a truck crashed into it.
Groom’s Father: Shape pe mat jao. Brand pe jao.
Although, admittedly, this would happen only at a Sindhi wedding.
Conclusion
Don’t attend one, don’t be a part of one, go take a flight rather than sitting through this bullshit specially the one function where women decide it’s a good idea to put green colored poop on their hands which later turns brown.
Just. Don’t. Do. It.