Right after my parents left to travel back to the US last November, we turned around and packed for India. The reason for our trip was a wedding of Ryan’s coworker, and we jumped on the opportunity to travel to a new country! The bride’s family is Rajasthani and the groom’s is Bengali, so they planned multiple days of festivities for guests to enjoy. We were pumped. I already had one saree from my best friend’s previous wedding, and I got another custom one made in Little India here in Singapore before our trip in the most beautiful peach and gold colors!
We took a brutal red-eye flight to Kolkata, landing at 4:30 AM. Don’t ask me why we did this, I’m guessing it had to do with flight prices. At the time we booked I’m sure we thought “this is a problem for future Ryan and Bri,” and then we regretted it. Lucky for us, one of Ryan’s other coworkers is also from Kolkata and his wonderful mom was generous enough to have us come to her house to sleep for a few hours and eat breakfast. She was seriously a lifesaver for our delusional minds, and even took us to a delicious lunch at the best Bengali restaurant, 6 Ballygung Place before we left for our hotel that afternoon.
The hotel we stayed at for the entire trip was The Oberoi Grand, and it was gorgeous. It had such an air of luxury to it, in an otherwise semi-seedy area. We quickly found out that spending lots of time within the hotel wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. Don’t get me wrong, we did leave to explore the surrounding area the day after we landed, but that was the day with the most exploring. We generally received a lot of stares, and the constant honking everywhere we went eventually got to us.
On that second day though, we managed to visit the Indian Museum Kolkata down the street. Some of the galleries included insects, coins, birds, decorative art, and Egypt. It was truly an ecclectic museum, with more than one exhibit lacking explanations of what we were looking at, but generally a great way to kill a couple of hours. Photos were not allowed inside or I would share some of those with you! We then walked from the museum to the Victoria Memorial, which is stunning. It is a huge marble building, dedicated to Queen Victoria, the Empress of India, and now serves as a museum and popular tourist destination (and locals too!). The grounds were incredibly peaceful to walk around, with great views of the main building from all angles.
That night, we met up with the bride and groom and their friends at a local bar. It was great way to meet other young people that would be at the wedding events and get some quality conversations in with the engaged couple!
Monday morning started the official wedding events, beginning with the mehendi. This event was our first lesson in showing up on time. As in, don’t do it. If you’re invited to an Indian wedding in India, do not take any notice of what times events start. We were the first ones there besides the bride, groom, and the bride’s brothers. I’m sure to them it was comical that the Americans showed up on time, but if that was actually the case, they never showed it. Everyone was beyond hospitable and eager to talk to us, feed us food (so much food), and include us in all the activities. I have never felt so encouraged to take part in anything, and so at ease with strangers! It was truly a lovely experience.
The rest of that afternoon was spent lounging by the pool. We met up with a couple of new friends that night for Kusum Rolls, which Ryan had been told was the best Indian street food in Kolkata and we had to try it. It was a lot of food, but definitely didn’t disappoint!
The next day, we didn’t have anything for the wedding until later that evening, so we were lazy bums and laid around all day after eating a delicious breakfast of dosa and poha (my two absolute favorite Indian foods).
That night was the Rajasthani celebration, and it included more than 15 food stations, lots of chai tea, and pyrotechnics! The bride and groom were dressed like royalty, and the entire evening felt surprisingly casual. We danced with the groom and his family to enter the venue (after arriving early, again. And by early, I mean an hour late… which was still early.), witnessed the bride and groom kiss amongst fireworks, and then hung out eating and drinking while they did an official ceremony tying the knot. I got to wear my new, peach saree and truly believe no woman can possibly feel anything less than gorgeous in one. Sarees make every woman look like a celebrity, and I enjoyed every minute I got to wear one.
That night ended fairly late, so we crashed back at the hotel and woke up early for the next morning’s Bengali ceremony. You would think by now we learned from before about showing up on time. We showed up an hour and a half late and were still 2 hours early. Seriously, I feel like it was just a big joke by the third event. Of course the bride and groom’s families were there and it was refreshing to get to relax and chat with them while the ceremony setup was taking place. We were served delicious breakfast and enjoyed chatting with other guests while the ceremony took place.
The second half of the Bengali celebration was that night, complete with more incredible food, and a show of family and friends dancing and singing! Unfortunately for everyone there, Ryan and I were roped into participating in a dance (that we learned 4 hours prior at the morning gathering). I get very nervous performing in front of people, but true to the rest of the week, no one was perfect and no one really cared that some of the acts were less than polished. I basically forgot half the dance and just smiled the whole time.
We had such a blast attending our friend’s wedding and getting to experience India for the first time! The entire week was filled with generous friends and family, the best food, and the most stunning outfits. Instead of traveling more around India since we only had the remainder of the week off, we left the next morning for Nepal to round out our vacation. Stay tuned for that post!
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