My Best friend's wedding

We knew that this would be one event which each one of us would love to be there, but most of us knew we could never make it. Thankfully fate intervened in my case and bang I was there desperate to get tickets in the last few days.

I was going to my native land for the very first time, nothing could beat this feeling and I was gonna witness my best friend's wedding. But the night before we could board the train one of the guys backed off for myriad reasons, this was too big a event that one guy could mess up our trip. His excuse was that he had a gut feeling that something bad may happen say a landslide happens in Konkan as our train passes through the region. Probably he should not have told us this thought he had in mind. Surprisingly me and Narkar were pretty determined to go ahead come what may, looking back I realise we have been quite brave.

As soon as we settled down fellow mallus were busy exchanging names, their respective places, occupation etc. Our coach had some enthusiastic kids who ensured that none of us got bored during the trip except for Narkar who could not understand what the hell was going on. On his part he tried explaining Govinda movies to my fellow mallus, thankfully those descriptions were interrupted by the chirpy kids around. At 8'o clock in the evening people were through with their meals and ready for bed. As it got darker we were thinking about the reason why our friend had backed off at the last moment and the fact that we would be covering the konkan region in the night didnt help as well. When we looked around all the passengers were sleeping peacefully , having covered themselves in the white cloth, and God forbid if something bad happened then most of us would be covered in white cloth. I shared this thought immediately with Narkar who could not sleep well that night, probably hoping that we get off the Konkan belt as soon as possible.

When the train landed at Shornur we were glad to see Sanju around, it seemed as if he was around for somebody else's wedding and not his own. He seemed nonchalant, unperturbed by the enormity of the impact it would have on his life. As for me I was just happy to be there at that moment, a time when you get to enjoy the present without no qualms about the past or the future. When we reached his palatial house I realised this is why mallus pile up money to build a house in their hometowns.

Sanju's different set of friends were being treated like VIPS by the resident family members, one group was planning to go Gurvayoor, another was planning for a swim, and Narkar wanted to doze off. I was just too excited to be a part of everything. Sanju's cousin Kuttan came up to me and offered me a ride to Thrissur town to pick up flowers for the marriage. Within 2 hours of reaching Thrisur I was on a bike, seeing 3 different temples as we rode deep into the country side Thrisur. I met Sanju's great grandmother in their traditional family house(kudumbam) and then Kutan's house and then a couple of other houses. Every house I went I got a warm welcome and I rued on missing such traditional roots as part of one's upbringing. I covered a whole lot of Thrisur and the famous temple Uthralikaav temple(this is promoted in Kerala tourism!!). The night before marriage after we had our share of payasam and the traditional meal,we were still wasting away at Sanju's place we could not believe this chap is getting married.

I could have stayed up the entire night but wisdom prevailed and we headed off to our lodge. Lodge was no less than a seven star hotel, I havent got the time to thank Sanju for the excellent service we got. We had a guy on call for 24 hours for anything we could ask for. As me and Narkar settled down on our luxury water beds we knew we had to be up early for the next day.
In the middle of the night I'd asked Narkar to get up and keep the vehicle ready, this is what Narkar claims that I was talking in my sleep.When the alarm rang at 6 I got up instantly and Narkar got terrified again seeing the way I got up. Both of us were dying to get out of the hotel.

The D-Day was very special and the whole thing got wrapped up in a couple of hours. When we reached the hall it looked grand with a seating arrangement for 2000 guests. The stage was decorated with flowers and lamps straight out of a mallu movie set. To spice up things we guys were appreciating the sari clad beautiful girls when we realised the real thing was just about to begin.The groom comes in first, followed by the bride , sit on the floor for some time , then the sat phere happen followed by the exchange of garlands. Thats it, man and woman have become one in holy matrimony.

This is when we realised since we were born lazy we are justified not to get a gift since we had made all the effort to travel way down to mallu land. By the time our conscience woke it was too late we didnt have an envelope. Finally I went out and bought an envelope, and wanted to tell our man that please spare us the effort of buying a gift which would turn out to be worse than what he could get himself.

Now the best part of the marriage, the traditional meal served in a banana leaf. As we walked towards the hall where food was being served I noticed a strange phenomena although pretty cliched in our native land. The hall was closed till the time one set of people finish the food, while others queue around the door waiting to barge in. So we decided not to break this tradition, we were not so close to the door but we barged in when the doors opened. After all the local train experience helped us in getting a seat!

The food was simply amazing , all possible mallu vegetarian dishes prepared in coconut oil along with 4 different varieties of payasams , probably the best I've seen so far. As the guys who were serving food were busy chirping payasam payasam our fellow marathi manus heard python and still went on to ask for more. I'd to explain to other guys 4 different varieties were being served so they should not miss on any of them.

The only regret was that this whole thing got over too quickly and the fact that we'd sit in a train for the next 24 hours did dampen our enthusiasm for a while. As we were idling away in the hall Sanju comes and thanks us for attending the marriage. I was hoping he would be busy but this guy was just not ready to be where he should have been. Finally when his Dad comes up and reminds him everybody is waiting for him, he dares to ask why not once but twice. Thats when me and Narkar decided it was time to say Adios and we thanked God to be lucky enough to grace this occasion which we would cherish for years to come.