Knotted together for a wonderful beginning

Everything around you becomes beautiful when your soulmate is always beside to rejuvenate you. The wedding is a ceremony hosted by the elders of the family to share the happiness of bringing together the soulmates. India is known for its cultures & traditions, and celebrate weddings astoundingly. Every corner in India has separate tradition and customs to be followed. The holy rituals are given so much importance as they believe marriages are made in heaven.The banana trees tied in the form of an arch implying the occasion of celebrating the start of a new life together, an inviting aroma of food with polished banana leaves, with nadhaswaram music in the background, festoons of mango leaves above the head and mama-mammi’s noises are the perfect indicators of a brahmin wedding.

It all starts with nitchayathartham (engagement) where the groom puts over a ring to the bride promising that he will always be there for her and the bride puts a ring for the groom conveying the happiness of them starting a life together. The wedding is a showcase of the next phase of life like Snakatam is a Telugu brahmin ritual of wearing a silver band by the groom before heading for the muhurtam indicating that he is graduated and matured to pursue his higher education about life. He then leaves for Kasi yatra to become a sanyasi to gain his higher education, the bride’s father knowing about how great the groom is, stops the groom from the yatra and requests him to marry his daughter.

The groom agrees to his request, sits on the decorated swing to wait for his daughter. The Groom’s sister gives the bride a beautiful traditional koorai pattu, an authentic Tamil Nadu’s traditional saree weaved with silk yarns and gold jaris. The girl gets ready replicating goddess Andal, with a decorated bun hairdo towards her left side of her head. She then comes along with groom’s sister and sits on the swing with the groom.

And then they together go the Manai, where an Iyer recites mantras for their well-being and happy life. Then at the auspicious time, he ties the mangal sutra as an indication that he happily accepts her as his life partner. The first knot is tied by him following the next two knots by his sister to show that they are also happy to accept her a part of their family. They walk seven times around the Agni, implying the fire as the witness of their wedding and making prayers for their relationship to stay long. From now, the bride and the groom with all the blessings from God happily start a new life together supporting each other.

Then to test who is quick and smart, games are played as formal customs to enrich their intimacy. There Is a game in which a ring is put inside a silver pot of water and raw bananas. The bride and the groom should find the ring from the pot. Here the effort taken by them to help each other in finding the ring teaches them that happiness is found when fought together. Love becomes stronger when you start supporting and sacrificing for each other.

The next day, the groom takes the bride with him to his house to joyfully begin a wonderful life together. The bride is asked the light the lamp implying that she would create more happiness and love at the home eradicating the sadness away. A new life is born with promises to stay together at any point of time in life, to sacrifice and to start being selfless. The love that increases strengthen their bond, and they live happily ever after.
This post was written by Poorani for http://www.mukilganesanphotography.in.
Originally posted at — http://www.mukilganesanphotography.in/blog/weddings/south-indian-wedding/
