Hindu wedding

About three or four years ago, when Leo was working as a programmer, one of his coworkers was a sweet young Indian woman. We were lucky enough to be invited to her wedding this weekend, a traditional ceremony in a Hindu temple. It was about a three-hour drive from here, so we decided to stay overnight in a hotel to make it easier on the kids.

Yesterday I was packed and ready to go by about 10:30. I cleaned and trimmed both girls fingernails, but decided in the interest of time to skip Audrey's toenails, though they were a tad grimy from outside play, since she'd have shoes and socks on over them. The wedding was at three. We still needed to stop by JC Penney's, where they were registered, to pick up a gift card, and I also had realized both girls had outgrown their good Sunday shoes. They had no other shoes to match the dresses I had picked out for them to wear to the wedding, so while we were at the mall getting the gift card, we also quickly fitted both with a pair of black Mary Janes, Aislinn's in particular costing a bit more than I usually like to pay (Walmart is my first stop for most of our shoes). But at least they had shoes. Couldn't possibly go to a wedding without appropriate shoes, you know?

We ate at the mall food court, and then I changed them both into their outfits in the van before we left. I waited to change them because I KNEW, if I dressed them in their good dresses BEFORE lunch? Someone, if not both, would have ended up with food on her dress. So dresses on, good socks on, but did not put the shoes on, because I also knew that on a three-hour trip, they'd want their shoes off eventually.

The drive was fairly uneventful, though it was starting to sprinkle a bit by the time we pulled into the parking lot of the small Hindu temple in Beavercreek, Ohio. We made sure both girls had both shoes and socks on before getting out of the van. Our friend's mother was outside the temple, and asked us to enter through the basement entrance and remove our shoes before going up to the main part of the temple.

So my worry about shoes? No big deal. I did, however, panic a bit as we were walking in. What else did I not know about Hindu temple etiquette? Was my sleeveless dress going to be an insult to their modesty? (I later noticed a couple of other women in *strapless* dresses, and figured if it was an issue, there probably would have been shawls offered to us to cover our arms. And I googled Hindu temple etiquette as soon as we got home. Sleeveless dresses: not really a problem, though traditional Indian dress is recommended.)

The ceremony was LONG, maybe around two and a half hours. I later learned this is actually short, as most traditional Hindu ceremonies last days. In any case, my six-year-old was bored stiff and had to reminded countless times to sit properly on her chair, and allowances had to be made for the toddler. Aislinn and I ended up on one side of the room, on the floor, playing with a gorgeous 10-month-old half-Indian baby, whose modernly-dressed Indian mother graciously shared his toys with Aislinn. She was still a bit disruptive, especially when the little boy's American dad kept teasing her. She would scream with glee as he put a cloth book on her head, I would shush her, and the Indian mom would raise her eyebrows at her husband. No one glared at us, though, and my only regret was that it was hard enough to follow the ceremony, which was mostly in Sanskrit or Hindi (not that I can tell the difference) without trying to keep tabs on both a bored 6-year-old and an antsy toddler. I finally knew we were near the end when the bride and groom took their seven steps around the fire in the middle of the canopy, because this was listed near the end of the ceremony in the program we were given.

Because the groom was American, the reception was more traditional American, with drinks and hors-d'oeuvres first, followed by a yummy buffet featuring prime rib and a champagne toast (I had just one sip for the toast, and decided we need to get some champagne to have on hand after this baby's arrival), and cake and dancing at the end. Audrey made friends with the flower girl, the other nod to the American groom (she was his niece, and the ring-bearer his nephew, her brother). She was the same age as Audrey, in the same grade, and talked and giggled JUST. LIKE. HER. I mean, same mannerisms and intonations. Uncanny and quite funny to watch them together. All the little kids danced along with the adults, though we did not stay very long. By this time it was 8:30, an hour past Aislinn's bedtime, so we were expecting a meltdown at any time.

I was exhausted myself, and though I did stay up with Leo watching some TV after we got the girls asleep (somehow we scored a two-room suite, although both beds were in the same room), I turned in before 10:30, which is less and less unusual for me these days. Must be pregnancy. Anyway, we hoped that because the kids got in bed so late, they would let us sleep in this morning for a little while. No dice. Leo was in one bed with Aislinn (we're trying to keep the night-weaning permanent), and I was in the other with Audrey, and by 6:30, Aislinn was calling out each of our names, and then reciting every word that she knows how to say.

"Aud'ey?"
"Mama!"
"Baba...baba!" (daddy)
"Eat!"
"Nigh'-nigh'!" (realizing we were all still sleeping...sort of)
"Eve'y day!" (a word from one of her favorite board books)
"Wash?"
"Aud'ey?!"
"Puppy..."
"Meow..."
"Home?"
"Aud'ey!"
"MAMA!!!!"

On and on it went, until I got up to turn the TV in the other room for the girls to watch cartoons, and then crawled back in bed with Leo to snuggle and doze for another hour, before we went down to our continental breakfast of bagels and orange "juice" (as if).