I'm impressed

Indeed, I'm impressed with the way my niece's wedding went off in the deep south of Kerala, India. Last week Sudha, Ammu and I traveled to Trivandrum to attend Veena's wedding - Sudha and Ammu headed there a couple of days before I did so as to be able to help in the final stretch of the preparations for Veena's wedding.

Veena's mother Usha (my first cousin) had a houseful of folks from her husband's side as well as from her own Mom's side - every one of those folks had traveled from afar to be there to put their shoulder to the wheel. The youngster males were ever ready to drive to the airport or railway station to pick up arriving guests, while others set about cleaning the house, the women helped put together the food for all those in the house. It was work, work, work for everybody and come mid-night people slept wherever there was some space to rest their tired bodies and were up early the next day bright-eyed and bushy-tailed to do whatever it took to make the wedding a fun event for all to enjoy. The day before the big day was special because more people had come in from all over the world and the house was choc-a-bloc! There was this American guy Enrique Batayas, all of 27, who was there with his German girl friend Manon who he met in Australia. The two of them got swept into the marriage preparations and were simply amazed at how the family all pull together - it was the Yankee who commented how awesome it was to see four generations of people all get together for the wedding! Back in the US he says its just 'me, my Mom and maybe my dog'!!

The wedding itself happens so fast that there is not really too much to see and because it is not over seen by a priest there is always plenty of confusion on the stage with multiple elders reeling out contradictory instructions!! Enrique put it beautifully when asked what he thought of the wedding per se - he said 'it was confusion confounded once the bride and groom got on the stage and then the paparazzi moved in and there was little to see'!! How true - most of us actually only got to see the butts of photographers and videographers!!

In the end it was a lovely simple wedding like most Nair weddings and Brijesh and Veena looked the perfect pair. I wish them all the very best in life.