Wedding Bells!

With only a few days away from Suzie’s wedding in Cornwall, England, I could hardly hold my excitement of what it is going to be like, when she is all dressed up and ready to make her commitment to Mark. Would it be a Church Wedding or would the Priest come over to a beach party to pronounce them man and wife? Would she wear a wedding gown or would the Sporty couple wear their swimsuits and surf the sea as their unique wedding Do? Would they seal their “I do” with a kiss or just fall into a hug? Or would they fall with a big splash into the sea and kiss underwater?

Questions! Questions! Questions! I thought it best to quell the query with a visit to a shop in Delhi that caters to western wedding needs which is what Christians in India wear at weddings.

I was in for a big shock!

No, Christians in India wear saris at their weddings and the much adorable gown was worn at Parties and sometimes at weddings. This explains why, in Delhi, where you have a sizable population of people from the northeast, who are mainly Christians, not to speak of converts from the hills and the surroundings of Delhi, whose great grand fathers took to Christianity, a century or two ago, while the British were here, there were no Christian Wedding Shops in Delhi except one or two.

This took me on a trail finding one, through Google search.

Tucked away behind the Afghani Market, also known as Kabul India Restaurant Market at Lajpat Nagar II, near Dr Lal Path Lab, you will find a little door on the right side of the road, if you are coming in from where they make those lovely yummy Afghani naan (bread).

Don’t judge the inside by the door outside! The little basement design-cum-tailoring Shop is a veritable joy to enter. It was like entering a fairy tale shop and getting lost in what they had to offer there. I was enthralled and just could not stop clicking pictures for memory.

Glady Vaiphei Hunjan, who owns the shop, came to Delhi from Manipur, which is in northeast India, to study and stayed on. She says,

“Yes, the gown is coming back after a spell of about ten years when it wasn’t seen much at weddings. It is now being worn for parties and people prefer the less cumbersome and by now, a multi-purpose gown at the wedding than a sari.”

It takes almost a month to tailor a wedding gown, she told me.

“There are many levels of work to be done to make a wedding gown, starting with the choice of the fabric, the design, the embroidery and the lace etc. It takes time…”

And how much does a wedding gown cost? Naturally, it all depends on the design!

I went back to think of Suzie. Will she buy her gown ready-made or will she have it tailored, will it be white or will it be any other colour?

Times were changing and what I saw Cindrella wear, in the book, was not the only colour gowns are worn today. Indeed, fancy wearing a yellow gown for your wedding day!

If it could be tailored at Glady Vaiphei Hunjan’s ‘Sincerely Bridal’ I am sure there were people who would like to wear other coloured gowns.

I, for one would love to wear a rainbow gown!

Here take a look inside Sincerely Bridal

https://plus.google.com/u/0/photos/118112130944380341626/albums/6039968525704457905

The English Papers III

www.cookingwithegg.com

Ingredients:

Raw green vegetables, red pumpkin, all sliced and cut to fine pieces, preferably of the same size. Starchy vegetables like potatoes, sweet or otherwise, may be cut and cooked separately.

Method: Place a thick pan on the fire. Add a spoonful of butter or oil. Allow to heat. Add half a teaspoon of cumin seeds into the butter and allow it to fry till it lets out a flavour. Gently pour in the vegetables and turn down the fire to extreme low. Turn the vegetables in the pan upside down for a bit. Add, salt to taste, a little turmeric powder, a spoonful of garam masala and place a lid over the pan and allow the vegetables to cook in their own juices on a slow fire. Do not add water at this stage. Keep an eye on the pan by occasionally turning the vegetables, this way and that. Once, it is partially cooked, put off the gas and allow the vegetables to cook in the steam, inside the pan. The flavours will marry gently and leave a lasting, effect on your palate, long after the meal is over.

When you are ready to eat, add a little coconut milk to the mixture or cream, in your bowl. Or just plain, warm or boiling water, so you have the liquid effect, just in case you like it that way. Or just eat it, without the additions.

This is a no garlic, no onion vegetable curry, delicate on the taste buds and smooth for your stomach. But if you are one of those, who like it a little strong, then, avoid the cumin seeds seasoning in the pan and replace with crushed garlic and finely chopped onions, fried until brown, before you let the vegetables in, into the pan.

NOT all marriages are as delicate and smooth like the vegetable curry the recipe of which is given above. Clearly, if one starts with a lot of raw and rough smelly flavours, the marriage may be indigestible.

“Indian marriages last forever. They are stable and strong. You certainly do not have that many divorces.”

“This is news to me,” I said, a trifle doubtful about the BIG FAT Indian marriages, ‘at least in Kolkata, I know, divorces have become an epidemic!’

The stability of the old, traditional marriages has given way to adventure. Besides, when both partners are economically independent, there is no need to carry on with a long dead marriage, and be adventurous and embrace the new, which promises a volatile, hot and simmering love, flavoured with passion and non-lasting promises.

When I looked at a generation, in England, which is 65 and above, I saw stability and happiness for having stood their ground and stayed in a marriage, no matter what. But when I looked at the generation which is 25 – 30 years younger, I saw people have been more adventurous with their lives and have been able to weather many changes and have taken risks in their lives for which they have no regrets.

I am not sure whether it is the security of living in a country, where, to love and procreate, without having to marry, gives a person, a freedom, dear to the soul, or is it just that marriage is still an important institution, but one does not have to marry to have children.

I am not sure that our society in India will ever change to accommodate the freedom of the soul, to love, without questioning, gender, caste, creed, education, profession and mother’s family line details before we hope to tie the knot.

Looking back, I am reluctant to make a judgement, as to whether, we are moving fast forward, or rewinding backward.

I have a taste for a delicately flavoured Indian curry, which lingers in my taste buds and does not bring up a strong smelling garlic onion burp that can shatter a good night’s sleep.

I think Jill will agree with me totally. We always finished a night’s meal with the Indian curry and packaged ready to eat, steamed fish or chicken, topped with a cuppa and dark chocolate.

Splendid! I say, splendid!

                                       Watch video: What is the Big Fat Indian Wedding, today.

Stay away, you prick!

I am quite sure you are aware of the story that is going around on the internet these days?

No?

Oh!

Well, it is an age old discussion: how do you tell men that women count. That women have desires that need to be addressed, and men can’t just turn their face the other way pretending that because they, gendered male, made sex with a woman, she is over the hill with joy!

The First Online Tamil Lifestyle Magazine called Tamil Culture ( See link below) has done it going way out to bring sense to the male (It’s just about the penis) mind, to consider women’s desires too, before they go the whole hog to say, that only men count.

The nicely done article by Niveda Anandan hits hard on men. “But we Tamil women get horny too. Contrary to popular belief, we have sexual urges as well. Just as you experience complete sexual liberation, we wish to have the same without being judged and ridiculed as “not marriage material”. We are not objects to be judged as “easy” or “used” and are disgusted that you would even use these terms to describe us.” Atta girl!

Now, what is marriageable, material you may ask?

Please note: virgins, women who have never touched a man or not been touched by one either, who have kept their bodies covered and not exposed it to public, who have not hungered for sex, in mind and body, these are your, yours truly virgins; woman who have not had sex, before marriage, in other words. The impossible, is hardly possible in these times!

In a culture that is schizophrenic, caught between the extreme conservative and traditional while at the same time modern, Indian society stands as a classic clash between the past and the present. Really there are no women out there who fear being ‘deflowered’ before marriage. They simply follow what they have been taught from childhood – virginity is paramount and must be a treasure to be offered only on the night of marital conjugation, that too with a man, of course. Many are bolder and don’t waste their youth on such rules. Behind the curtain, sab chalta hai, everything goes!  They simply hoodwink the parents/guardians and go ahead to take a “full body dip, in the well of passion”. Refreshing change!

I ask why is it important for a woman to be a virgin to be marriageable. And the answer is: it boils down to that absurd practice remember, patriarchy thy name is foul. Primitive, regressive and downright demeaning, patriarchy is about possession – the body of a woman, land, house, wealth, jewels, all and everything that must go to the child who is the ‘real’ inheritor of the wealth, which is the legitimate child of an unpolluted (read virgin) woman, who belongs to one man.  

There are other questions that come to mind. Why has the article not addressed the growing numbers of women who love woman? In a state where the Chief Minister herself has been living with a woman for decades, why has the author not addressed these desires as well and told the men off!

If desire for love and sex is not to be dominated by the penis, then, it certainly breaks the patriarchal norms, and finds its own shore in some other bed. And that discussion has been left out, sadly. So, really, while fighting the battle against capital ‘P’ – prick and/or patriarchy, has the author, sidelined same sex partnership as a valid and bold route to overthrow the ‘P’-factor that ails our society?

Tamil Culture Online Magazine:

http://tamilculture.ca/an-open-letter-to-young-tamil-men/?fb_action_ids=554131964642752&fb_action_types=og.likes&fb_source=other_multiline&action_object_map=%7B%22554131964642752%22%3A457936860986712%7D&action_type_map=%7B%22554131964642752%22%3A%22og.likes%22%7D&action_ref_map

Deepu Weds Kavita

Deepu with his mother, Nidra

I am not sure if one can call oneself fortunate or fastly aging if one gets to see the birth of a child and then be present at the wedding of that child as well.
A young girl came to our house in Bombay in the final years of my school days and continued to stay with us till she was nineteen or so. Then she returned to her village, in Nadia district about an hour’s journey from Sealdah in Kolkata. Her name is Nidra. During the years she lived with us in Bombay, she virtually became like my younger sister.

A couple of years after she returned to her village, we heard she had got married. Shortly we heard she had given birth to a son as well. But alas! No sooner had her husband heard that she was pregnant, he fled, leaving her to fend for herself and the baby. The baby was called Dipankar Mondol.

Not an uncommon thing here in the villages of Bengal but for us it was heart breaking. Naturally, we brought the mother and son back to our home in Bombay. For many years they lived with us, both in Bombay and Pune until, when he was around 15 years, both mother and son returned to their native village, to visit us during his holidays from school.

On February 10, 2009, Dipankar married Kavita, a girl living nearby in his village.

Kavita, in her bridal form

Sindur ceremony

Saat phera

“Mashi,” he had called me, “ ami beye korchi”. – Mashi, I am getting married.Naturally, I joined the elite borjatrik(people from the boy’s family) and introduced myself to the girl and her family as – “ Ami Deepur Mashi” – I am Deepu’s maternal aunt.

The wedding started at around 9pm and went on till after 2am the following day. The next morning, after a sleepless night, we arrived back to the boy’s house, since as a rule, marriages happen at the girl’s. I left for Kolkata after plates full of mishti and a sumptuous meal of maach bhaat complete with mishti paan.

Bringing the bride home......

.....even as the tuition classes go on.....

.......and others look on!

Pssst! …….and already the Tu Tu; Main main have begun as Nidra, whispered in my ear – “Dhoor! Ekdom bhalo lage na. Meyer data uchu….” – I don’t like it at all. The girl has buck teeth!

Oh Gawd! Not again!!