The waiting is over the day arrives, 28th of May, Guruvayur temple in Kerala. We are all there to be with Nirmal and Sindu, to share their joy, and to bless the couple.
This is a crowd of devotees who come to the temple from far and wide, Guruvayur is one of the most popular temple destinations of India. There are some rules to be followed like removing the shirt before entering the temple.
You can see some people have already removed their shirts, thankfully only men have to do it, ladies can walk in with casuals or designer clothes, no problems there.
It has been a tradition to conduct weddings in the temple for the well being, health and prosperity of the couple. Now most weddings are conducted in wedding halls for the sake of convenience.
Over 300 weddings are performed per day and they have to be performed within one hour of the auspecious time. There is crowd there is chaos, there is confusion, its all a part of the wedding fun. No chaos confusion there is no wedding fun.
One thing great about temple weddings is that there is no difference between rich and the poor, all are treated alike.
Now it is difficult to locate your own people, but all are assembled there, The bride Sindu's brother Ranjith and cousin Unni in the foreground in the picture below.
No hurry, you have to wait, first come first serve. No preferences or recommendations, the bride and the groom's name would be called, it has already been registered, tokes are issued, Our couple is third in the waiting line.
The bride arrives, escorted by Seema, and Mahua. gorgeous she looks.
No make up, simple silk sari, very little jewelry. gorgeous she looks.
Ah! lovely Sindu giving me a smile,
I am here I am here don't worry Sindu.
Believe me I was worried how to reach the wedding Mandap. I am not strong and well built. Here she is escorted by elders to reach the mandap, No worries about the groom, he needs no escort, after all he has been waiting for so long to find a right girl and God is rewarding him with a beautiful lovely caring loving wife, he will wade his way through the crowd no problems.
the ceremony. involves simple wedding rituals, tying of knot, sometimes exchange of rings. the bride and the groom garland each other and go around the deepam 3 times.
Please don't ask me how I reached and where i am standing, perhaps my foot was on some poor guy's shoulder, no one protests, they all know the problems, Some one from behind was supporting me. I couldn't even turn to thank him.
The ceremony is very short , receiving blessings from the priests. All done very fast as more than 200 couples to come. the ceremony is over. Sindu and Nirmal are husband and wife now.
EEEEEEEEEEYAAAAAA !!
I got my girl, I got my girl, his heart is jumping, Nirmal holding Sindu's hands escorting her, now it is his responsibility. Ah! happy couple smiling for me. Now all the relatives will come to congradulate the happy couple.
Groom holding an umbrella, It is his responsibility to protect his wife, here from the rain, luckily it stopped raining for some time.
Members of the family congradulating the couple.
Seema, Mahua, Priya, Chikkoo, The happy couple, Vijay, Ravi. Rest of them are somewhere in the crowd. they all will assemble in the wedding hall close by.
In the wedding hall, the ritual is repeated, for the relatives. After this they all come and bless the couple. no priests, elders perform the ceremony.
Here the Bride's mother is blessing the couple. Lot of people, they all came and individually blessed the couple, only the elders, me too went up to bless them.
the family group picture.
now the most important, there was a long wait and I was hungry, i sat down with my friends Shankar and Asokan.
Rice Sambaar, three kinds of side dishes and two payasams (sweet) I had a second helping of the payasams both were terrific. I had a full tumber of rasam, drank it, don't like eating with rice. I love rasam. After this I went to the hotel room and slept well.
Took some pictures of other brides who got married that day. this is little out of ordinary, she is a walking fort knox. the brides usually hate wearing so much of gold causing discomfort. it is the parents and relatives who insist on the bride wearing this much of gold. Not very safe. She wouldn't know if one piece of jewelry snaps and falls.
Blunt Knife
Travel and photography blog
Awesome pics Rauf. Never been to a traditional south indian wedding, but now i know what to expect :-) I had tried payasam once, its yummm... I was told that some weddings take 3-4 days for all the rituals to complete, this one finished in a day i guess? How many days were you there in Kerala for? So much bling bling, wonder if the groom provides security too :-)