KARACHI: Gone are the days when a big fat wedding comprising every distant member of the entire clan had to come and pass comments on the bride’s makeup, the food being served, and the decorations. Thankfully, intimate weddings are the new norm. Recently, Saboor Aly and Ali Ansari shared their baat pakki highlights on Instagram. The event looks easy to be at. It feels comfortable, cozy, and happy.
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Looking at the pictures, you can tell the bride and the groom do not feel out of place. While sure, the event is overwhelming for the life-changing prospects it lines up ahead, but people who truly want to share that overwhelm and joy are by your side. There is somehow more surety to that thought with lesser people. Saboor Aly and Ali Ansari seem to be surrounded by the people they care about the most and honestly, why should anything else matter?
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Today, due to the ongoing pandemic, only the closest people to the bride and groom get to do that, effectively minimizing judgment to a minuscule level. However, that is not the only reason why intimate weddings are better.
Cost-effectiveness
What is the point of having scores and scores of people for a right of passage such as marriage? With so many people invited, there are more people you are looking to impress. The more you want to impress, the more you spend at the event. Spend that money on the decor, the dance floor, the photography, the clothes, or even your honeymoon later on! Instead of spending, say 5000 bucks on 500 people, you could spend the very same amount on 50 people. That would ensure a much better quality of things for those very close fifty people, instead of having 500 unimpressed guests.
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It should be about you
In hosting hundreds of people, you make the event less personal. It becomes less about you and more about your guests. Instead of attending you on your big day, your family has to attend them. And boy is it anything but easy to attend to desi relatives who can throw a tantrum or call their parosan (neighbour) the very next day to discuss how bad the food was, how ugly the bride looked and how they were never invited onstage for their family photo to be taken.
It is your day to be a bride/groomzilla and stay in touch with your emotions, however overwhelming and tantrum causing. Not Rakshanda auntie’s!
You and your family can truly be yourselves
In most desi families, one thing that is highly rampant is disapproval of things that are quite harmless. Girls on the floor dancing? Disapproval. Did the bride laugh showing all her teeth? Disapproval. Did the bride not cry? Disapproval? Did the groom hug his bride post nikkah? Haw haye (the final and most lethal stage of disapproval). With lesser judgment, you get to really be in your element. You’ll only get married once (I’m assuming), why not throw your guard down and enjoy your events?
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It reflects on how your marriage could look like
Here is to hoping we make marriage simpler by making it about the two who tie the knot. In trying to seek approval from the entire clan, not only does the wedding become difficult, but so does marriage. A bigger wedding seeks involvement from more people than an intimate one.
Things will however not look better until we move past the entire notion of Log Kya Kahengey that we keep some of the best things in life from getting spoiled. Happy intimate weddings (and hopefully marriages), everyone!
