“Do you know there were only 80 guests at the wedding?” A friend who had attended a marriage in the United Kingdom was describing the experience. He was full of praise for the function, but appeared a little bewildered too. “Only 80, can you beat it, and that included the families of the bride and groom. Eight tables in all with every guest allotted a particular seat.” After attending marriages here where half the population is invited and the other half gatecrashes, he had every right to sound astonished.
“Can you change seats?,” I asked, intrigued. This sounded like booking tickets for a movie. “No way,” he replied. “I can’t imagine something like this happening in our part of the world.”
I can’t, either. Kerala weddings have always been known for their brevity, but the austerity that used to be associated with them is gone. Everyone’s invited to witness the extravaganza. The hall is huge, the decorations unique – event management has seen to that – the bride is covered with gold, silk and flowers, in the order of visibility, while the groom looks self conscious and uncomfortable in an ‘Indian’ costume. He need not be, for the guests have come with their priorities firmly in place. The bride, the groom and the ceremony are mere trappings; the feast is the thing.
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The beating of the drums and the ‘nadaswaram’ rising to a crescendo signals the tying of the ‘thali’ around the bride’s neck. It signals something else for the guests – it’s the welcome meal bell that indicates it’s time to make a dash for the dining hall.
The most coveted seats in the wedding auditorium are those nearest the doors to the gastronomical heaven and many canny guests have taken strategic positions there, already half out of their seats in their eagerness to sprint at the right moment.
Before you know what’s happening, almost all the guests rush out as if the fire alarm has been sounded. And then begins the jostling, the pushing and the shoving. The wedding feast is a great leveller. Class, caste and gender distinctions are ignored while good manners are thrown to the winds in this mad rush to sit reverentially before the banana leaf. The well heeled rub eager silk covered shoulders with the down at heel, men ungallantly push women aside while women, not to be out done, return the compliment – sexual harassment is not an issue here. Children cheerfully bring down old grandmothers, students think nothing of aiming well directed elbows into whomever stands in their way and all seems to be fair in the love for food and the war to reach it.
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Those with the swiftest feet and the quickest reflexes manage to gain entry and the doors close leaving high, dry and hungry, a huge group that is left ruing its lack of initiative. These days it’s not just feasting that is important but telling the whole world you have feasted.
The other day I noticed a young chap taking a picture on his phone of the leaf after food was served. “Whatever for?,” I asked my husband. “To put up on Facebook, what else?,” he replied. One can imagine the likes that would appear and the comments: “Wow, three rows of curries! You lucky dude!”, “I'm hungry!”, “Oh for the taste of Kerala. Homesick!”, “What’s that interesting looking item, middle row, third from right?”...
The hungry ones, watching hawk eyed from the glass doors and windows, perk up the moment they see the buttermilk being served. “Over!”, they announce to their ravenous companions. Before the first group can exit, they rush in, causing a stampede of sorts, while the catering manager and the long suffering uncle of the bride seek vainly to bring some order into the proceedings.
“Allow us to clear the tables first”, they plead, trying to close the doors but in vain. “So what if the used leaves are just being cleared? We aren't finicky or squeamish, are we?,” the self appointed spokesperson of the group asks rhetorically, as all scramble for seats and watch with satisfaction the leaves being taken away, fresh ones being placed and curries being served.
If you chance to glance at the stage as you leave with a burp, you might find two people in a corner with lost expressions on their faces, waiting resignedly to be taken for lunch. They are the bride and the groom.
[khyrubutter@yahoo.com]
(A fortnightly column by the city-based writer, academic and author of the Butterfingers series)