There were several events in October in California, with the wedding ceremony on Friday, Oct. 21, at the Shiva Vishnu Hindu temple in Livermore. It was a traditional brahmin ceremony, with a handful of festivities — traditional and otherwise — that took place before and after.
Photographs by James Thomas Long
The traditional South Indian wedding isn’t short. Ours lasted about five hours, and included a variety of small ceremonies ranging from reverent (a ritual honoring our elders) to playful (Ashwin riding in an elephant-shaped bicycle). At one point, we were hoisted on the shoulders of our uncles so we could drape flower garlands over each other.
The ceremony comes from Hindu scriptures and traditions that go back centuries. It’s performed in Sanskrit, one of the oldest languages in the world.
Each part of India has its own wedding traditions that evoke the region’s heritage in some way. Our ceremony reflected the part of South India where Ashwin’s family is from.
Among the highlights were:
- A puja in the beginning in honor of Ganesha, the Hindu god that is known as the remover of obstacles, to pray for everything to go well.
- A small fire ceremony that serves as a rite of purification.
- A procession of seven steps, and with each step, Ashwin and Leslie reciting prayers to live long, healthy and charitable lives.
The night before the wedding, we had a sangeetham, one of the more cultural components of a traditional Indian wedding. It’s typically an evening filled with maruathaani — where people have intricate designs drawn on their hands and wrists with henna paste — music and dance.
We marked the end of the festivities with a bit of style in wine country.
The day after the wedding, we hosted a reception at SHED, two hours north of San Francisco. It was a more intimate affair, an evening spent with family and a few of Ashwin and Leslie’s close friends.
