One wedding, a geek and an antique clock


I had the privelege of atteding a Norvegian/Italian wedding in Paris. Ofcourse, in the western world, you don't go to a wedding if you aren't invited. So, I was indeed invited :p :p :p. The Norvegian was a good friend of mine and we used to play squash every week.

In France, weddings are not "official" until they happen in the town hall. May sound wierd, but thats the way it is. People who marry in the church will have to marry "again" ( in a normal context, this would be the "same" two people again)in the town hall for the wedding to become legal.

So, my roomate and I head off to wedding. Since this was our first "western" wedding, we decided to be there on time. We are there at 10h30 . There is a group waiting outisde. One person did resemble the groom's brother. So, we started talking to him. 15 mins go by. Still no sign of the bride and groom.

Finally, the bride and the groom arrive with their 4 month old baby. They apologise for coming late. Then, we walk into the 'hall'. 20 mins and the wedding is over. We now leave the hall and there is "another" wedding group thats waiting outside for us to leave.

As we now walk out for the "vin d'honneur" to a nearby restaurant, one of the ex-insead folks starts talking to us. My roomate, sensing danger excuses himself and leaves. Being a "nice"person, I continue to engage him in conversation. In 15 mins, I realise that all he wants to talk about is hardware, microcontroller, c++, c# and so on. Now, do I want to talk about all this in a wedding ???????????

SOS - I look for my roomate. He is happily flirting with the girls.

Soon, we reach the restaurant. We start talking to the groom.

Me : So R***, is there a huge crowd from Norway?
R*** : Yes, indeed.
Me : How many ?
R*** : About 10, I think. But there is even a bigger delegation from Italy. Italians are so well "family-knit", so, we have about 30 from there. Such a "big" crowd was unexpected.
My roomate: R***, My sis' wedding in India had about 3000 people.
R*** - Astounded and speechless :-))

We then give him the gift. Its an "antique" clock.

R*** - Ah! Now I know why you are giving me this gift. Its just to remind me that I came late for my own wedding, ain't it? :-))

So, thats just a very "small" cultural difference betn Indian and western weddings, I suppose :-)