Wedding

Yeah, yeah. We’ve been promising to blog about the wedding for weeks. Now, of course, the memories are less clear, but we’ll do our best. The wedding was down in the valley from where we live. There is no electricity in the valley (only three families have generators) and people have to haul water from taps, but it’s absolutely beautiful. The wedding was at the home of the induna (headman). He works as a groundskeeper at the hospital, so we know him, but we had not met the bride and groom.

The wedding was supposed to begin at 10, but everything here runs on African time. We showed up at 1:30, and it was actually perfect timing. Ten minutes after we arrived, some of the older women began a traditional song and dance. The first hour or so at the wedding was awkward, as per usual. Many of the people attending the wedding had seen us around, but the bride’s family was from a different village so we still received quite a few stares upon arrival. We had a few people ask to take pictures with us as well. Soon though, the bride and groom arrived and the wedding party moved into the tent.
There was not enough room for everyone in the tent, so we were content to watch outside with the majority of the other guests. This was not to be. We were ushered through the crowd right to the front of the tent. There were not enough chairs, so extra chairs were brought out from the house for us. Matt ended up sitting directly behind the bride and groom. In fact, he was so close that when the best man dropped the ring, Matt picked it up. It was definitely awkward to be given such special treatment, but it is fairly common. I don’t think we’ll ever get used to being treated like celebrities.
The ceremony inside the tent was a fairly traditional Christian ceremony. It was in isiZulu, so we didn’t understand much though. After the ceremony we were fed. At the head table. Celebrity treatment again. After the food, however, the fun started. All of the wedding guests went outside for a traditional Zulu wedding.

The Zulu wedding consisted largely of singing and dance-off’s between the two families. The signature Zulu dance move is a high leg kick. Some of the younger men and women repeatedly kick their legs up to their heads and then stomp their foot on the ground in time with the music. It’s pretty awesome. Most family members were dressed in traditional Zulu attire: the women wore skirts and beads (traditionally women didn’t wear shirts, but everyone over 18 wore a bra) and the men carried shields and sticks. The two families (extended families with about 30-40 people) would always face each other. One family would sit down and watch while the other family sang and danced, and then they would trade places. Meanwhile, about 100 of us non-family members stood around and watched. The Zulu wedding lasted about 3 hours. We are not nearly good enough writers to capture the energy of the Zulu wedding, but suffice it to say that we had an amazing time and we are looking forward to the next one.