The one with all the weddings

It's officially wedding season in Rajasthan.

Weddings here are the most important event in a person's life - they are in many cases the ultimate way to show off one's status in society, and often sink a family into life-long debt due to the extravagance and expense of the ceremony and party. I've heard people at the organisation here talk despairingly about how weddings still undermine much of the financial development work that NGOs' attempt to instill in villages - regardless of teachings on saving money, taking loans responsibly, etc., many people still feel the pressure to take loans of thousands of dollars to spend everything on one wedding ceremony.

But I don't just mean any ceremony. The weddings here usually last for about a week, and involved hundreds to thousands of guests. Each wedding party seems to vie for the title of "Loudest Party", leaving chaos and a ringing in your ears in its wake. There are nights when I pray to never see or hear one again.

My dorm is, rather unfortunately, located in an area where a number of wedding party venues are set up. At around 5 or 6 in the evening, or as dusk falls, the groom parades come out on the streets. These involve an official looking band - it's actually very American style looking, with the uniforms and the brass instruments, which, incidentally, are only there for show and are not played - with the groom's friends behind them dancing to the beat of drums which are more often than not at odds with the blaring Hindi music. Finally, behind the frenetic dancers comes the groom, elaborately dressed, sitting on an even more elaborately dressed horse. These horses often do a number of wedding parades a day/night, and seem unperturbed by the noises and chaos. More often than not, the groom appears uncomfortable, ill at ease, and sometimes terrified. As the procession advances, carrying the groom to the family of his bride-to-be, they stop in the streets and beat the drums louder and dance with greater energy, usually causing massive traffic jams as they pass. Not that this seems to bother anyone.

Perhaps the best part is the explosives. And by explosives, I mean the cases of fireworks and firecrackers set off every 5 meters or so down the street. As I'm still more or less a newbie to the whole situation, I still jump everytime a firecracker explodes 3 meters behind me, which never fails to make the shopkeepers around me chuckle with amusement. Ah, to be a foreigner.
But there are quite literally dozens of firecrackers and fireworks being lit every which way, along the main road, often only 2 or 3 meters from walkways or stores. It's one of the most ridiculously hazardous things I've ever seen - when walking down a street, I have learned to gauge the approximate amount of seconds I have to run past the firecracker between the time that it has been lit and that it will explode.

Later at night the real party begins. Everyone arrives at the wedding venue in beautiful outfits (I've seen them on their way!) and gets ready to party all night long. The fireworks begin in earnest around 9-10 pm, and are sometimes so close and so loud that I can feel the vibrations my bed mattress as they explode. The music blares until 2 or 3 in the morning. And every night, without fail, the same pattern starts again. This is the best time for weddings because it is still cooler than the rest of the year, and it also means that many shops close early as people are invited to dozens of weddings. I'm still holding out hope for an invitation of my own... :)
So beyond the lack of sleep, I at least get personal fireworks from my rooftop every night - that is, if I willing to brave the possibility of getting hit by one myself!