Today we went to our first wedding. A young lady from our church got married to an Anglican man from the Uganda/DR Congo border. It wasn't until yesterday that it was confirmed that it would take place - there had been some issues over the dowry: 12 goats, a blanket and a hoe is the standard bride-price that the Groom's family pays to the Bride's family (the opposite way round from Indian dowries). This morning we headed off with the maximum of 8 people in our car (we have 8 seat-belts)- all dressed in our finest. The wedding was supposed to start at 11am, but some confusion over who was actually going, and which of them was going in our car meant that we didn't arrive until 1130, which was fine because the wedding started at 12. The service was concise at a mere hour and a half and featured some great singing with the wedding party dancing down the aisle, rather than processing. For some reason, the clapping in between each section of the vows was accompanied by random sound-effects from the keyboard - amplified through a massive sound-system. The bridal party didn't smile though, as apparently if the bride smiles it will offend her family who she is now leaving to go and live with her new husband's family.
While we were in the service someone decorated all the cars all over with white and orange ribbons and we were instructed that we were to be the penultimate vehicle in a wedding convoy of four vehicles to drive to the reception in the Groom's village. We ended up with a different 8 people from the ones we'd started with, and the other cars seemed to be carrying even more. We then proceeded to the reception venue at a snail's pace with hazard lights flashing, horns blaring and following a weave along the road like warships in a zig-zag pattern to dodge torpedoes (sorry, old metaphors die hard!). Our procession was joined by some motorbikes who decided to weave amongst the cars, so it was all starting to get a bit silly as we approached a barrier with police/soldiers blocking the road - which turned out to be the first stage of crossing from peaceful western Uganda into the chaotic DR Congo. Fortunately we swung right onto a dirt-track just before the barrier and stayed in Uganda, but then stopped soon after as the front car carrying the bridesmaids (all 7 of them I think) ran out of petrol. They were two trucks full of bricks and builders coming the other way so this caused a bit of roadblock - and not a subtle one with all the ribbons, lights and horns! - Eventually the bridesmaids were pushed up the road and we arrived at a primary school bedecked in tarpaulin and more white and orange fabrics and kitted out with a stupendous sound-system, the ubiqituous plastic chairs, and hoards of raggedly-dressed local children who the "event oragnisers" kept trying to shoo out of the photographs.
The wedding party danced their way in and there were several speeches before we all tucked into a feast of carbohydrates: - a mountain of rice, a hillock of steamed matoke (plantain), boiled potatoes, dry-roast potatoes, beans and some chewy meat, slopped with "soup" (meat-gravy) all eaten with fingers (which saves a lot of expense and washing up when hundreds of people are being fed!) At an African wedding everyone gets fed, there's no guest list or seating plan, just a massive communal feast.
After this the bride and groom fed each other wedding cake and and then we were invited to present our gifts to the happy couple. By this point young Sam was exhausted, so we headed home (somehow with a different car-load again?!).
Every culture celebrates weddings in different ways, and we enjoyed celebrating one in Ugandan style.
No comments:
Post a Comment