The only blonde at the wedding

So you know those cringe moments where you’re in a totally different country, it’s your first time at a non-British wedding, you only know the father of the groom, and you’re the only white couple in a room of about 200 people…and you totally balls up everything. Yeah that.

Bro and I were invited to accompany Martin and Janet to the Executive Manager of KOPEL’s son’s wedding in the neighbouring village. It was the first Muslim wedding we’d been to, so we were a little excited and a little nervous. We arrived at the village hall to much hustle and bustle…everyone clamouring to see the bride and groom. They’d already been married the night before, so this part of the ceremony involves them sitting on the top of the stage on thrones, dressed in their finery, so that the congregation can bless them and observe them. They looked incredible.

Our first blunder was that all 4 of us went straight up on stage to wish them well, but it turns out the family and friend procession of blessings hadn’t even begun yet. We were late so assumed we were the last to do this...turns out it hadn’t started yet!! The custom is that you offer the groom an envelope containing a monetary gift, but this is supposed to be done subtly in a secret handshake between the men. Bro forgot so then kind of doubled back and just handed it to him in front of everyone. Cringe. This was perhaps made more cringy by the fact that I was wearing my borrowed customary dress again, and it happened to exactly match the colour scheme chosen for the wedding (which everyone kindly pointed out!) so I’ve rocked up looking like a try-hard bridesmaid. Great.

Then later on, when it finally was our turn to properly go up and bless them, we actually didn’t have a clue what to do, so while in line, we both tried to see what everyone else was doing so we could copy them. It seemed to involve sprinkling chopped parsley and rice into each of their upturned hands, then sprinkling them with water from this little jug. When it came to my turn, no water came out so after an embarrassed fumble, I just mimed, however, when it came to Bro’s turn, he tipped practically the whole jug all over the groom’s hand. The poor guy didn’t know what to do with it, even less so when Bro then proffered his hand for a shake….

So all in all, I can’t say we excelled at slotting into our new cultural experience, but I did enjoy it for the novelty of experiencing something new and so different from the weddings we’re used to. We ate a LOT of food, and too many scrumptious little cakes and enjoyed watching the Malaysian Kareoke that was going on at the foot of the stage throughout the ceremony by various uncles and aunts. It was swelteringly hot (Bro took a video of me from behind up on stage and I have a sweat patch the size of Asia!…Sexy!), and I did feel for the poor couple who were roasting on the stage, but it was a happy event, and we felt honoured to have been invited.