At this time of the year, if the pile of wedding cards is astounding, what’s worse is what it entails. Not for the hosts who have probably relaxed after signing up a wedding planner, and will probably arrive freshly groomed from a spa. It’s you and I who must bear the burden it places on our wardrobes, diets, and social etiquette about which of the half-dozen functions of each wedding to attend, or skip.
Besides the manipulation it requires — “we’ll attend the Sharmas’ son’s engagement and wedding reception, and the Jains’ daughter’s sangeet,” my wife tells me; “then we might be able to make the Singhs’ son’s pheras, and squeeze in the Mehra-Menon joint reception,” I suggest, but she wants a little more play because there’s a post-honeymoon party the Sainis are hosting, and the divorce party the Chopras are throwing themselves barely a year after we’d given their nuptials a miss. No one expects you to attend all of the functions – that would be so gauche – but you still need a valid excuse for staying away. You can’t lie about “attending a conference in Bangkok” to the Sharmas if you intend to be at the Jains’ a day later, where they’re also expected, or feign sickness to get out of the Chopra reception only to run into them at the Chatwal baby-shower.
If attendance is an issue, managing wedding fashion is more so. Did you wear your only Rohit Bal to the Sainis or the Mehras? Is it safe to repeat the Raghuvendra Rathore bandgala at the Sharmas when the Singhs and the Jains might well be there? Can the missus sneak in the new polki set to both the Menons and the Chopras?
Some of us are lucky about not having to concern ourselves with issues only the seriously rich have — the topless Porsche would be seriously cool to drive to the sangeet in, but what will it do to your partner’s salon-set hair? Will the valet at the Singhs know whether you’d attended the Jacob reception in a Beemer or a Merc? Will anyone care that you aren’t wearing your Hugo Boss shoes because dew and grass had ruined them at their last outing at the Sahais’ farm? Will it matter if the watch, that no one can spot under the cuff anyway, is a Titan, not a Piaget?
All it takes the Murlis to line up a bar of single malts and the Patels to ensure there are a dozen-odd world cuisines and at least twice as many desserts on the live buffet counters, is to dip into their coffers. But when was the last time you actually ate at a wedding? My wife’s diet, for instance, dictates she can only have a bowl of dal and a plain roti this evening, a change from when we attended the Rai and Mehta functions when flunkeys had to be dispatched to ensure that the expensive cheeses in the salad were washed out with Avian water so she could have her “plain tomatoes and cucumber only tonight”.
In any case, the last time I checked, an “8 p m onwards” invitation means it’s safe to arrive only by 11 p m, giving most of us time to grab a paratha, or some egg and toast, at home. And which is why we tend to look at, rather than eat what our hosts have so expensively laid out for us …even if it means that by the time we get home, we might just be ready for another snack of whatever’s left over in the fridge — while still dressed in our couture best!
