What does your wedding say about you

There was a piece in the Hindu monday entitled "Forget-me-Knots" describing "second generation Indian-American weddings".

When I read blogs of other western women married to Indian men, most of the time there are colourful descriptions of the wedding and beautiful pictures of the bride looking gorgeous in a sari and the groom in an embroidered suit.

When we decided to live together, hubby was living in India and I was in Europe. My main preoccupation was figuring out if I could relocate to India or not. With two teenage kids from a previous marriage, it was going to be difficult. Everybody around me was insisting on negative issues, especially people who'd never set foot in India. I discovered unknown aspects of family, colleagues and friends. People I had always seen as open minded and sophisticated blurted out xenophobic comments. In the end it was my gynecologist who convinced me, saying "don't fling it all and traumatize your kids for a sexual pulsion". That was not exactly romantic, but I figured she knew what she was talking about.

So the next step was taking hubby to Europe. I started researching immigration rules, and found out it was going to be a tough journey. I read many stories of people getting married abroad and then the wedding transcription in French law taking months, preventing the spouse to ask for a visa. That's why we decided to get married in France. Our goal was to live together, not to get married.

We ended up having a simple registrar wedding at the town council, the white bride in a simple beige wollen dress and the black groom in a chocolate cotton suit. We exchanged gold rings and a kiss in front of a dozen people, and went on to a nextdoor bar for champagne and light snacks. Hubby was slightly upset, as I'd tried to choose an auspicious Hindu day, but it was a Friday, he is vegetarian on Fridays, and he believes everything you start on that day you will do again. Then we left for a honeymoon in the country where the hills are alive with the sound of music, and hubby was jealous of SRK - but that's another story. (I managed to book a Yash Raj enchanted journey honeymoon trip, on famous film locations !)

Sometimes I wish we had done a traditional wedding in India, but I don't think I could have coped. This was the wedding of a secular, shy and austere couple.