WEDDING BLUES (ARGENTINA WON)

As I have repeatedly said I do not like to attend weddings or anything related. It is too pretty, too much of dressing up and way too flashy with all jewellery, glittery smiles and disco strobes. During daytime it is too much of visible makeup. Sometimes the food is fantastic, sometimes worse than ordinary. But food is one of the major reasons for attending any such mammoth effort to get strangers together and then feed them.

After having attended two specific functions of two weddings in Hyderabad I was congratulating myself on my ability to smile through both the occasions. I travelled with M to Bangalore to attend his friend's daughter's wedding. Shruti wed Felix in an Arya Samaj wedding, with a few Tamilian functions like 'unjal' and such. This is a function where the groom is brought back to the mandap from his sulk to move to Kashi, after promising him his bride. The two are then made to sit on a bedecked swing, while lovely rhythmic songs are sung by the 'singers' in the family. The evil eye is removed by all the senior ladies, even as the bride and groom are fed with enriching banana steeped in milk.

God save those well dressed women, when the senior ladies of the family chuck those rice balls dipped in red kumkum all over the place. We just sashayed in, so I did not see the whole event though the nadaswaram team really poured out their heart into playing some lovely songs.

Sitaram was with M in both IIT Madras and then IIM Ahmedabad and we have known him and Lakshmi for some time now. Elegant wedding but the best times were had by me because caught up with the old boys, so to speak. And a girl, Swapna Kishore.

Most of the attendees were IIM batchmates. Some of them are doing sterling work with their NGOs, some still sport corporate looks though retired and many of the spouses continue to work in their jobs as doctors, teachers and so on. And not to forget the one as a journalist.

Sizes have changed drastically, but the faces have retained a familiarity and when they got animatedvwith memories and fondness, they actually began to look good.

While I might not have remembered a name or two, there definitely was great bonhomie and a genuine fondness among the guys. Discovery of the day, M had been nicknamed as 'pain' in IIM. Somebody did that christening way ahead of me.

Another discovery is that M is good at networking, including remembering the names of spouses and what the kids were doing. Chatting, laughing, catching up and somewhere finding a certain comfort zone, it definitely felt like one cohesive group.

I felt very comfortable and with some good food, the day went on swimmingly. The evening, after a small nap, was devoted to the finals of the World Cup. Glad Argentina won, but then France never really showed their best. Strictly my opinion.

While I have cousins and good friends here, Bangalore is not anymore that little place, where you could decide to meet three persons and barely manage enough time to meet even one. The gloomy gus weather of Bangalore, where you want to wrap yourself in a shawl and burrow yourself deep into the bed has given way to some sunny weather.

And now to make those apology calls....