Do you ever have that nightmare where your family, tired of worrying about your looming spinsterhood, secretly drugs you and puts you on an Air India flight bound for Delhi? You know, you regain consciousness somewhere over Africa and find you’re about to become the victim of the ultimate matrimonial crime – the drive-by wedding!
What’s that? You don’t have this nightmare? Right, then, it’s just me…
What is a drive-by wedding exactly? It’s a meticulously timed, perfectly orchestrated trip designed for single Indians around the world to return to the motherland for the sole purpose of getting married. In case any of you out there are considering it, or find yourself drugged into it, here’s how things would generally go:
Day 1: Fly to India, go to your family’s house and village. Jet-lagged, you will inevitably wake up at 3am with nothing to do but stare out the window. Soon, a gaunt man in a white tunic-pant outfit will come riding by on a bicycle with three crates of milk in glass bottles strapped to the back, heading to the market. You’ll see Bhoori, your family’s housemaid, walk out of the front door with two large buckets in hand. She’ll limp slowly through the dirt lane to the small water pump a few yards down in the village center. Disregarding her status as an untouchable and the implications of the denied casteism that still exists culturally, you’ll say to yourself, “This is what life is about. Milk in bottles, water from a well…such simplicity.” And suddenly you’ll think maybe this wasn’t such a bad idea, after all. Especially after you pop a few more of the pills your family gave you.
Day 2: Now begins the business part of your trip. While you were in America packing to come here, all the aunties and soothsayers of the village were meeting with your grandparents and pouring over biodatas (marriage resumes) of eligible bachelors. Astrological charts were consulted, teeth were inspected, and by the time your plane landed in Delhi twenty young men and their families had appointments to meet you. The first family arrives with their son, Hiresh, a handsome young engineering graduate from IIT. He is not much taller than you, but at least he is not sporting that bushy mustache all your fobby cousins do. (Yes, both the men and women.) After the families chit chat for about 45 minutes, during which time you and Hiresh both avoid any direct conversation but try repeatedly to steal glances at each other, one of the elders suggests that you two go for a walk. In that next 15 – 20 minutes, accompanied in part by a small gang of young village children who are following you and snickering, you get your equivalent of speed dating time with Hiresh.
Rinse, repeat. Do this 20 times.
Day 7: You’ve sat through all the “interviews” and met all the men. By now, the heat and the bugs will have hounded you into a baseline irritability, but the unbelievable food lessens the insult a little. It’s decision time. You get a few days, maybe a few second round meetings with some of the guys in the running, and then you pick one. The elders hold a meeting with his family, discuss mutual interest and dowry issues (it’s not about cows anymore – will the bride come with both gold and diamond jewelry?). You sit back and start thinking about wedding shopping while your 4’10” grandma, who never lets anyone get the better of her in bargaining, does all the negotiating.
Week 2: You are officially engaged, and now instead of the milkman’s bicycle bell you wake up everyday to the sounds of the workmen building your wedding mandap (a little stage for the ceremony) in the village square. There is a general buzz all around as the wedding venue, clothes, ornaments, and of course food are prepared. But, you don’t have much to worry about, and even get to take in an afternoon at the local hang-out spots with your other young female cousins where, of course, they mercilessly tease you about your upcoming wedding night.
Week 3: The wedding week itself! It’s basically a four-day long party in your honor. First is the arrival of the groom’s family; this occurs literally in a parade fashion with your betrothed at the helm. You’ll have one night entirely devoted to having mendhi, or henna, applied in intricate patterns on your hands and feet. The night after that is often the Garba night; hours upon hours of dancing and eating that lasts until dawn. But not for you; you are whisked away at some reasonable hour because the next day, your wedding day, starts very early with a milk and turmeric powder bath that the elder aunties give you in a ceremony intended to make your skin glow. Before long, will find yourself in the mandap, wearing your weight in red chiffon and gold, taking the seven steps around the marriage pyre which signify wedding vows in Hinduism. And poof! Within a matter of three weeks, and about two-dozen little white pills, you are a wife!
Week 4: Honeymoon, probably in some Himalayan Hill Station. Or, if you’re a more modern couple, maybe Goa. A few days as the dutiful daughter-in-law at your husband’s home and then you are back on a plane to the US. Husband to follow in six short weeks.
And there you have it – you’re a Drive-by Bride! Not only has your family procured you a husband, they’ve also given you a lifelong addiction to sedatives. What could be better?
Oh, in case this actually ever happens to me…can someone at least make sure I get an aisle seat? Thanks.
Half way...where? 