Have you read the post that I published on 22nd January 2009 called ‘My wedding day. Why there were less than 15 guests in total’. If not, have a read. It’ll give you a bit of background about my wedding day.
So in the end Suraj and I agreed to have 5 people attend on each side. Thus with us 2, there would be 12 people in total.
What happened?
We got to the registry office and my cousin brother Anand walked me in. The ceremony began and everything went well until it was time to put our rings on. Suraj couldn’t get mine on and of course he was trying to be gentle and not hurt me! I have largish knuckles so the ring needed a bit of a push. Anyway he managed it. Then it was my turn! Same thing! I tried and tried but no luck. Suraj then indicated that I should just push hard and go for it. I did and my whole body went forward with the effort needed to push the ring on! It fits fine. Really. LOL. 🙂
So we were then legally married. There were no marriages after ours so the registrars suggested that we spend longer in the hall taking photos if we wanted to.
We then took photos outside. The grounds are lovely even in the winter. Less growth, less colours, simple BUT beautiful.
After that I got changed and we went to lunch at Celebrity in Kingsbury. It was so nice and chilled.
Before we got there, it was sprung on me that it was a Jain Tirthankar’s birthday on the very same day! Thus a very knowledgeable man from the Jain derasar (place of worship) in Leicester had sent us a deity and a letter. My family wanted to read it out at Suraj’s dad’s home after lunch. I think I would have been OK about it if it wasn’t sprung on me but the short notice frazzled me!
Even though it was ‘just’ a registry there was still quite a lot to organise. Lots to think about and last minute changes…well…
Anyway we went to Suraj’s dad’s after lunch and were welcomed by his family with a short ceremony. Suraj’s aunt and sister in law to be then put a sari on me. This sari is called a gad cholu. It’s symbolic of a man and woman being married. Kind of like a wedding band. Under the mandap, the groom’s side put this sari on the bride, on top of the sari she has on already. This symbolises that she is married and accepted in the family. After this my cousin, Anand, played some music to us. He is a skilled violinist! 🙂 Mum then read out the letter and presented he deity to us. After this we all had a drink and my family left.
Suraj and I returned after taking his cousin home and we chilled out with his dad, brother and sister in law to be. We watched the recordings of the day and looked at some of the photos we had too. It was nice. Calm and relaxed.
Mind you, something did go wrong! I have 2 cameras. Both were charged. There were 6/8 spare batteries for one of them. But guess what? Both cameras were flat before we finished the family photos. It was lucky that Anand brought his parent’s camera and we had camcorders to records some gems.
So did it all go well? I think so. What do you think?
After that Suraj and I moved in together and we went on our honeymoon a few days later. Watch out for a future post about our honeymoon. Surprise location! Was it a good surprise or a bad one?
3 Comments
Urvashi · February 11, 2009 at 10:22 pm
I loved the article on why you only had 15 people at your wedding and all the related articles to it
Some very true points in them
I had to fwd them to my mum in the hope that she’s start seeing wedding stuff in the same light as me!!
Preethi · June 8, 2011 at 8:44 am
Heena,
A common friend Manish, shared this post on his facebook page, and so I got to read it as well. This is a truly inspiring post – congrats to you 2.
Heena Modi · June 8, 2011 at 12:58 pm
Thanks Preethi 🙂
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