Attending the weddings

Attending the weddings

By now, you all know that engineering students are probably the busiest students you’ll ever observe.

But sometimes life allows to hang-out with their friends and family.

And I admit this, hanging out with your friends and family is fun!

It’s something every student needs after days of work.

Winters and Summers are usually considered the seasons of weddings in India.

And I think it is because people want their nephews, nieces, and students in their relation to attend their wedding.

I had a winter break and most of it was spent attending weddings of my relatives.

I’ve realized a lot of people are getting married this season!

There’s no surprise population in India is rising rapidly…

Weddings for Indians are more than just the reception. The Indian wedding includes the pre-wedding ritual (The ritual may vary in each state of India.), the actual ritual (The ritual carried out with the blessings of a priest.) and the reception (The feast organized in honor of the newlywed couple.).

If you are associated with the person who is getting married, you get a chance to attend at least two of these events.

You also get a chance of eating some oily yet tasty food. I love eating this type of food!

Almost 99.9 % weddings I attend are for the sake of pleasing my taste-buds… 

But as the Spiderman has already said, “Great powers come with great responsibilities.”

The wedding season also means meeting all the relatives that you usually don’t meet.

Now some of you might like meeting that aunt Usha, who last saw you when you were two years old and will probably exclaim after seeing how tall you’ve grown.

Please don’t get me wrong, I respect that. But socializing on a large scale is difficult for an introvert guy like me. But I had to this, anything for the food!

So whenever I attend a wedding, I make sure that I make clear of not being good at having a conversation by sitting in the last row of the chairs. That’s the spot where I find people like me!

I usually find them listening to the music, reading an e-book or checking notifications on their phone.

Most will find this quite ungrateful but it’s fair enough…

At least these people don’t act like they know me well just because they’ve seen me in a Mickey-Mouse underpants somewhere in the longest past!

I don’t understand what attracts my parents to the front rows…

I often see them talking to a person in the front.

Sometimes, they start pointing fingers towards me. They are introducing me to that person from a distance. If the person is eager to see me, my parents insist on coming to them. I can’t refuse it; I go there with a smile on my face.

On the day my cousin’s wedding; I met my aunt Usha for the first time in life. (Technically, she saw me first when I was a baby. I didn’t see her cause she dropped in my house when I was sleeping.)

And that aunt has a kid of my age. I’ve been hearing about his academic achievements ever since I was a kid.

He is intelligent, smart, extrovert and athletic. There’s always a person in your family with whom you are compared every time. I’ve never seen him in person just like I haven’t seen my aunt. But his tales of valiance have always been amongst the relatives.

I am kinda jealous of him.

I had to ask her something or the other so I ask her what does her son do during the vacations.

She said that he prefers going to the gym in the vacations. That hurt me so bad!

No sooner I thought I’d taken the blow than my mom exclaimed and told her that the only reasons for me to go out of the house are weddings and outings. I could see the grin on my aunts’ face.

Then I got a chance to escape the conversation and I took it. I headed towards the dining hall. The food counters had started and I quickly rushed toward them. I like to stay secluded when I eat something tasty. Some might feel that I’m lonely for the same reason, but I’m not!

I filled my plate with all the stuff that I could. I sat on a chair far away from the people and started enjoying the food. Mom introduced me to a lot of relatives in the meantime.

I had my lunch hurryingly. As soon as I was done with my lunch and re-entered the banquet hall, I sat on the same chair where I was away from people.

After some time, all of my relatives sat on the empty chairs around me. There was no way to escape. I tried to stay quiet, but my good old uncle Rakesh who knows me very well initiated the conversation. He asked me how I was doing with my engineering course. Many relatives of mine didn’t know that I was an engineering student. So I got mixed reactions from the people. Most relatives were really amazed after hearing that. They reacted like I doing something really great. The remaining people were not at all impressed; they felt like this field is quite overrated. This is true in many aspects.

As I started talking with ease, one of them started asking me questions. And I found that it was a generic set of questions I faced as a student. I’m sure that most of y’all must be well versed in these questions.

1. Do you remember me?

2. Look how tall you’ve grown! How tall are you exactly?

3. Beta, when will you graduate?

4. What are your plans for the future?

5. Did anyone tell you that you look like your father?

    (No uncle, you’re the first one to say this. Congratulations!)

…

…

…

allows them

I can keep on going.

Answering, dodging and asking questions, I spent some of the time (a big chunk of my time) with my relatives.

Well, that was tough for me. Everyone was lined near the stage to take a picture with the newlywed couple. I hate that part from my childhood. I was pretty much pissed on the fact that there were no pictures of me at my parent’s wedding. I was foolish, I admit it.

A relative had taken a picture of me when my braces reflected the flash from the camera and I looked like some badass gangster guy!

He posted that photo on the family group. I was really embarrassed even though no one seemed to notice that.

From that day on, I always smile without my teeth exposed.

The picture was taken. The newlywed bride and the groom introduced their relatives to each other. I was introduced to the groom by my cousin.

Then she introduced my aunt Usha. Aunt Usha was bragging about the taste of the chocolate flavored ice-cream.

What!!! There was an ice-cream counter as well?

Yes, there was… right opposite to the side I sat in the dining hall. My struggle of avoiding the crowd cost me the ice-cream.

Darn it! I couldn’t enjoy the ice-cream at my cousin’s wedding!

Now here’s a major take away from the above text.

The more closely the bride or groom related to you, the less space you’ll get for yourself.

This is my own experience of 19 years.

Believe it or not, it is true…