"I don't worry about terrorism. I was married for two
years."
Sam Kinison

Its that time of the year again, when the daily mail consists mainly beefy envelopes of wedding invitations. When “festivity” seems to be in the air and everyone even remotely related is partaking in the this magnificent event known as an “Indian Wedding”.

Don’t get me wrong here, people get married all over the world. But no where do they do it like we do it in India. The search for a suitable partner, followed by match-making, the billion pre-marriage rituals and customs that follow (ohk…maybe not a billion :P), which ultimately culminate in the probably the grandest spectacle on earth, the actual marriage ceremony!

I attended two such marriages last weekend back to back and it made me realize that if one cares to look beneath the surface of this meticulous and back-breaking exercise, it’s actually darn funny. I mean in a world where the need for marriage is itself a matter of debate, no one gives two hoots about it here. For us its the ONLY logical end of adult life which everyone must reach if they have to be accepted as an “honourable” member of the society and the seriousness with they are conducted bears a testament to this fact.

If anyone has any doubts if the recent global economic meltdown will have any effect in India they should just attend a wedding in India. The world maybe going ballistic with a new multi-billion dollar MNC going bankrupt everyday but that doesn’t seem to have upset our jolly good revelry in any way . In fact if anyone could be forgiven for mistaking us to be the most prosperous nation the world after seeing this vulgar and utterly useless display of wealth.

What's also interesting to note are the wide variety of bemusing characters one meets at a wedding. From the distant uncle who seems to have it all figured out and just can stop pointing out all he thinks you are doing are wrong with your life to the aunt who’ll just keep reminding how tall you’ve grown since she last saw you/ you maybe the next one on the altar/ how much her son earns blah blah (you get the drift, don’t you? ). Its bemusing to the point of being hilarious because at the end you realize that they were giving that free advice in all seriousness!

But at the end you can’t help but wonder does this tamasha really necessary? I mean marriage has just been reduced to a lousy form of social sanction nowadays. So why spend all that money, time and energy is a such a tedious procedure that has basically become redundant? I guess its up to individual discretion at the end. But then I can’t call them completely useless because it did give me something to write about!