Winter chill, a wedding and no electricity

Traditional Manipuri wear. Young women can wear colour

December 10th I managed to shock my mother by telling her that I would be attending a wedding ceremony. The 'shock' bit was because I am loathe to dress up in formal traditional wear and jewellery. The Manipuri formal traditional get up is uncomfortable for me since the upper wrap calls for some elegant manoeuvres that are er...well beyond me. The other bit of course is that the dress is not the bit weather friendly. The upper wrap called 'innaphi' or 'phi' for short is a flimsy, gauzy cloth so made so women can show off the jewellery they are wearing underneath and is not the best thing to wear in dropping mercury levels.

white for groom's side

Imphal was seeing a 5 to 9 degrees of temperature levels and my announcement that I was off to a wedding made my mother happy that her daughter was at last turning into a social animal! I saw the range of questions going on in her head over why I was making a break of my 'no wedding going, no wearing all the get up' stand, given that my cousin had just got married and I had stayed put firmly wearing jeans and taking pictures. I told her that I would have to go since the wedding in question was of someone who just would not take my "please understand, I can't come" line. It being wedding season in Manipur, my mother had another wedding to attend too and I thought she would ask me to stay at home and continue being a non attendee at marriages as is my wont but it was my turn to be surprised when she said, 'good then, you can be dropped to the bride's place after my vehicle drops me off'. Truth be told, I had expected her to say, 'There will be no one at home to look after your son, so stay at home" but no, she coolly went on with "Adi (my 7 year old son) can stay with your aunt till I come back home". That sealed it for me! That statement meant that my mother was ok with me staying on at the wedding till the time, the bride would reach the groom's house.

Knowing I had no solid reasons not to attend the wedding, I went about getting ready and realized just how of touch I was with the art of getting ready and decked up. There was no 'bindi' in the house, I did not have a brooch to fix the 'phi' in place and my son screwed up his nose (he said, he would give his verdict on how I looked!) seeing I had no nail polish on. Also, I had to stop my mother just as she was getting out of the house to put 'chandon' on my nose. My son gave me a once over and said, "Mama, you look different. I thought you would go in jeans" but the dog we have, did looked startled! At the wedding venue, friends who had never seen me in the formal traditional and make up and jewellery get up arched their eye brows and pulled my legs but that was expected in any case.

The Jatra lies in wait

The ceremony got over by 6 pm and I decided to go along with E, one journalist friend (a non manipuri) who had a car. But given that she was not too familiar with the roads of Imphal and given the darkness thanks to Manipur's electricity load-shedding exercise, two friends of the bride (known to myself and E) offered to go along with us. We had hardly started the snail paced drive that is characteristic of wedding processions at starting point when someone tapped on our window and told us that we had a near flat tyre. Considering the darkness and the distance till the groom's hose at Mayang Imphal from the bride's place at Singjamei, we had to get down and look for other vehicles. We found that all small vehicles had moved ahead and that the only available vehicle was a bus that was carrying senior people. We hopped on and waiting for the vehicle carrying the bride and another that was to carry the ceremonial offerings (called 'jatra' the offerings are first brought from the groom's house and placed before the clan deity of the bride and once the ceremony is over, it gets handed to the bride's side and then has to accompany her till the groom's house and then placed before their clan deity). 2 metres ahead and the wedding convoy stopped again because the wedding band party could not find their vehicle!

20 minutes later, we were on our way and found naturally that most parts of Imphal we were passing through were covered by total darkness. Sitting inside the bus, we saw what we thought was dust cover around our vehicles and then at Wangoi Bazaar, we found that all other vehicles in the convoy had gone ahead leaving just two vehicles on the road. One was carrying the bride and a few of her friends while the other was carrying relatives: they had just realized with only a quarter of the journey to the groom's house that the 'jatra' had been left behind at the bride's house! The bride would not be able to enter the groom's house without it!

only women bearing sons as their first child can carry the jatra

The older people in the bus said they were cold and did not want to wait along and so we moved on to the groom's house. It was when we alighted from the bus that we realized that the 'dark cover' that we thought was dust was actually a thick cover of fog, something that had never happened in Manipur. One of the boys actually pointed out that since we were at an area near to the Loktak lake, it must be the water precipitation. 4 of us (me, E and the two boys) now went to meet the groom and were served hot food that warmed us while the poor bride and the set of relatives who would have to carry in the jatra had to stay 1 meter away from entering the groom's gate as they waited for the jatra to be picked up from the bride's house stayed put in their vehicles. Finally at 8.50 p.m, we heard the band strike their notes and we knew the bride was home!
It was 9.07 pm when we set off for home. On the road, we realized that the fog cover was getting worse and that the total absence of electricity was making things worse. The vehicles just could not move despite fog lights being put on. Those who were driving had to turn down their windows and stick out their necks to try and get a sense of just where to drive! At one point, all vehicles ended up on a wrong turning and we had to turn back. At another point, police flagged us with their torch lights and asked where we were going. For a change, the police were not trying to act all high and mighty as they are won't to in Manipur in the name of security checks on the roads. They were asking every vehicle where they were heading so that they could let the folks know whether they were in the right direction, taking the right roads etc. It was 10 p.m. when I reached home. The next morning, my mother said, "What co-incidence that the fog happened on the day you decided to attend a wedding ceremony!" Now I know just what to say the next time, someone really insists that I attend their weddings...