Mona's Wedding Part 1

So this is a brief overview of an Indian wedding as seen through my sister's wedding. Festivities begin long before the actual ceremony. The Engagement Ceremony, which took a full day broken into two main parts, was done three months prior. During the next three months there was a lot of prep. Me and my cousin, Anjali, were responsible for providing music for multiple events, choreographing a family dance at the reception, and organzing her procession music. The Aunts were repsonsible for the the sweets and food at every event starting a week prior to the wedding. Half the aunts would cook for the wedding, the others would cook to feed everyone working during the day.


The first major ceremony is the Henna Night. This is where all the women get henna on their hands to celebrate the wedding. The decorative henna is done in intriquite designs. This is also to show who is a part of the bride and groom's immediate family (immediate family in the indian sense is all immediate family, all close cousins, aunts, uncles, close friends, and anyone else that needs to be invited through obligation). Mona's immediate family is 120 people.


Then there is of course meal time at which time there is sporadic dancing to celebrate the event. Everyone tends to join in. the older generation pull out their old moves and the younger generation struggles to keep up. I even did a little bit of dancing. I have the grass stains on my pants to prove it!



Then at this wedding in particular had a unique twist, as the groom's side is not from our part of India. They are from an area closeby but still have their own customs. One custom is coming to the bride's home and bringing her gifts. . . tons and tons of jewelry. I'm talking gold and jewels piled into four large gift baskets. I need to marry into this family.

With jewels in hand and a fresh coat of henna set to dry overnight, Mona went to bed to get ready for the next day's ceremony which will turn out to be an ALL DAY thing. I'm talking 10 hours of ceremonies. More to come. I'll keep you posted.

Post Wedding Relaxtation

So for those of you who didn't know, a week and a half ago my cousin got married! Now it was a lovely wedding. It was the full indian wedding. Five full days with ceremonies lasting as long as 4 hours long. I know what you are thinking: "I'm exhausted just thinking about it." Now imagine if you were a family member of the bride, the videographer, one of the dancers in the performance at the reception AND someone who is still working for his company via phone.

Well i'm back and i'm currently working on creating the wedding DVD. The groom like Rock music. U2, Aerosmith and the like. Anyone know any good songs that might be either comedic or romantic for this wedding video?

I'll post pictures and stuff from the wedding in the near future, but for now fully understand that i'm severly exhausted.

कुएस्शन मार्क्स

Does anyone else see question marks when they type out the title for their post?

Couples Suck!

I'm sure i'll change my mind if i ever become part of one. But for now my entry title says it all.

The Way I Are

So i just spent three days reading a book that was quite entertaining. However, the entire time I was reading this book, I kept thinking to myself: "I've read this before." So I continued to read and fought away my pangs of deja vu. And then as i turn to the last page i realize that I read this book years earlier. The way i knew was that one of the characters gets a colonoscopy on the last page and I remember reading that thinking. . . "What a way to end a book." So there goes three days of lounging around with hopes of getting yet another gay romance novel under my belt. Oh well, at least it was entertaining.

In the office. . . Scott Caan

This guy came into the office today. He's short. Like two-three inches shorter than me and let me tell you, I am no NBA player. While he was wearing clothes that weren't too revleaing, it most definitely offered a nice guess as to what could be expected if by chance a large gust of wind were to have blown his clothes completely off. And let's just say, I wouldn't mind all that much if something like that happened. He wasn't the sharpest tool in the shed but he had great taste in films and was definitely passionate about his stuff. Okay that's my celeb encounter for the day! Next is Nick Cannon.

Just ask for the spelling

So I do not have a typical name whatsoever. In Indian society, my name should be spelled Amit, but because my mother felt that Americans will constantly be saying my name incorrectly she changed it up and spelled it Ameet. Now, i know many of you are thinking that my mother must be a genius to have the forethought of spelling my name in such a way as to prevent the mispronunciation of my name. While Mom is a genius in many ways, this was not one of them.

Dear Mother you forgot one key bit of information. . . If your name is not John, Paul, Matthew or Michael, most people will not pronounce and/or spell your name correctly. Now I'm not an idiot. The entire world is not educated with Indian culture and/or the Hindi/Gujarati alphabet and I don't expect it to be. And I'm not at all upset when people asked the proper pronunciation or the proper spelling. In fact, I'm often the first to offer this information. Its when the people i am talking to have to add a comment after i give them his information that bothers me the most. Let me give you an example:

Me: "Hi this is Ameet from Stacey's office, calling for John"

The people I am angry with: "I'm sorry what was your name again?"

Me: "Ameet. Its spelled A-M-E-E-T"

The people I am angry with: "Oh, that's such a unique name!"
Other People I am angry with: "Wow. Let me guess, are you Iranian?"
Even more people I am angry with: "That's such a pretty name!"

Now, in my mind I'm thinking: "Thank you for pointing out that my name is not Michael, Matthew, Paul or John. Now can you connect me with John so I can get my work done." Or I'm thinking: "I'm glad my name is like a game for you. It is not Iranian, it's Indian, I'm sorry you don't win the giant stuffed pink elephant, but you can purchase three more guesses for just one dollar. Now connect me to John so he can have a go." Or I am thinking: "My name is not pretty, stop bullshitting. It means 'Unfriendly'. What's pretty about that? Now will someone connect me to John so I can confirm this fucking meeting."

Begin Rant now: Just ask for the spelling! Its not hard. ask for the spelling, write it down and move on. I don't expect you to know how to write my name properly. If I wasn't born here, i wouldn't know how to spell John and would have to ask you how to spell it. But the only difference is I would not respond with some bullshit comment like *with an Indian accent* "Oh wow, Vat a cooool name!" I'd respond with "Nice to be meeting you John." and move on!

Okay my boss is about to come back, gotta go!

Confessions of an Ugly Gay Man

Let's face it, compared to the bronzed and built bodies that fill West Hollywood, Castro, and Hillcrest, I'm not much. Amongst the chiseled faces, rock hard abs, and tall frames, you can find a pudgy, colored boy with glasses and an awkward smile. Compared to that image of the Adonis flooding the media and our senses, I am ugly.

If you think about it, ugly is such an ugly word. It doesn't look all that impressive and alongside to words like "beautiful", "gorgeous", and "glamorous" it hardly compares. "Ugly" must feel highly inadequate in the vocabulary word. It doesn't have the fanciness of its multiple syllable counterparts, and it is rarely, if ever used in a positive context. So of course "ugly" must feel ugly.

On the other hand, "Ugly" has a power that many other words do not. In just four short letters, a word is formed that can make prom queens cry, send people running to plastic surgeons, and can make the most stunning man feel humble for the slightest moment. While words such as "beautiful", "gorgeous", and "glamorous" have a momentary rush of exhilaration and flattery, the use of those words often lead to strong feelings of doubt and distrust. Where as "ugly" has the potency to never be doubted. In a way, "ugly" in all its simplicity and small size lives among the vocabulary giants as the underdog with the ability and strength to one day prevail.

When I look at the word in that context, I guess being ugly doesn't seem so bad after all. Sure I don't have the bronzed ivory skin or the six-pack abs or the physical features that most people find appealing, but in my simplicity, normalcy and inadequacy lies the underdog that reaches to be amongst giants.