A Passage to India: 2008

Tuesday, July 15, 2008

Don't give up on me yet!

For those of you who are still reading my blog, don't stop reading it yet. I will finish up with the rest of my entries from a pilgrimage I went on to Char Dham when I was still in India, and since I am now back in my home town a few of my reflections on the whole experience. Also I have done a little other traveling on the side recently to Europe for a couple weeks, and to Maui, HI in the states.

Saturday, May 3, 2008

during the marriage

The fire that you can see in the picture needs to be walked around several times before they are officially married. During this time flowers are thrown at the two of them and everyone teases them.

Me in a rickshaw in Bhavnagar where my host grandparents live.

The Marriage day

The sister of the bride carries the pot like thing on her head when the groom comes to welcome him. Before the groom comes there is some welcoming among the families where the sister of the bride feeds the groom sweets and tries to pinch his nose to tease him. This is to show the teasing he will recieve from her throughout his marriage.

Some of the grooms friends are teasing him by preventing him from seeing his incoming bride through the crowd.

Bride and groom meeting for the first time in several days to put flowers on each other and do some welcoming with the family.

here comes the bride carried by her family to the wedding tent.

Procession of the Uncles

Another one of the traditions of this family is for the uncle to give gifts to the bride and her family and also buy the wedding sari for her. To bring the gifts there is a huge procession down the road with music and dancing to bring the gifts. The plan was to dance all down the road, but due to the heat they got lazy and just danced in the driveway of her house.

Everyone holding the gifts to hand out.

dancing in the street

Family functions for marriage

almost every day we were eating at a marriage grounds for buffet style meals, and this is the typical place where the food is prepared.

The bride Sweetie getting her bridal mehndi applied. She needs to sit like this for four to six hours, and then wait for it to dry afterwards.

The gossip group of women as their mehndi is applied. They can't really use their hands properly so each time water was brought up someone needed to hold the cup for them while they drank.

Before the marriage the bride in this family held a before wedding dinner for all the community members they knew in the town. They claimed that around 3,000 people were there, and the food counters and chairs took up a football field so I am sure around 3,000 people showed up.

Marriage

Indians, especially Gujaratis are obsessed with sweets, and they always have a box in their house to eat at dinner and share with guests. Lots of the sweets are made with cashew nuts, kesar flavoring, coconut, pistacios, and figs. I am not a big fan of them, but it is necessary to eat them almost every day.

This is a group of women doing Puja before a marriage to their caste god of vishnu.

One of the traditions of this particular family is for the parents to buy the bride all new clothes, jewelery, bedding, and other items to take with her to her new family.

Mehndi with my first host mother Rima

More Goa

A typical temple in goa complete with the pond area next door.

Another ferry boat that has a concert and DJ on board and everyone dances and enjoys until sunset.

Goa

This is the tomb of some saint in a church in Goa.

Cochin

Like every other day we had a storm after we arrived to Chochin, and enjoyed the cooling effect of the rain.

the katakhali dancers

one of the exchangers helping to pull in the chinese fishing nets that line the inlets of kochi. In the off season the fisherman lure in tourists to help them for fun, and then ask for money. Of course all of us were reeled in to this trap and ended up paying some even if we asked if it cost us anything beforehand. They still guilt tripped us into paying a few rupees apiece. Everyone needs to survive somehow or another even during the off season.

munnar 3

The entire day we were driving around it was drizzling on and off, and going around all the tight turns on the road that could hardly hold one car, everyone was a little worried about crashing into something.

In this place we weren't supposed to enter the area, but we found a little trail on the side and some people decided to hike up it while the others waited in the bus. On this little hike two of the boys aquired leeches to be discovered later on!