Village Weddings

There was just a wedding in my village. Yesterday actually. It wa not my first wedding. I have been to a handful. Also baptisms and funerals. But I feel I should write a bit about Senegalese weddings. Well, from my outside, naive, ignorant perspective.

I do not like Senegalese weddings. Well, let me rephrase- I do not like wedding when they go on next door to my hut and I would rather be doing other things. But i digress. Weddings are characterized by a few things: like every party or celebration, the day seems to center around lunch, at least that is what many of the women spend the most time on, people arrive and wait for and leave after. This is you usual greesy rice, a few veggies and a chunk or two of meat. A wedding does have other fun things though too, lets see...

At this one, as the wedding was on a sunday, random people started arriving saturday, mostly (as far as i can tell) to get ready for the food making and whatnot. A tent is erected and chairs appear from mysterious sources, and then... my personal favorite (not), the griots arrive. Kids start singing around dinner time. As my neighbor is getting married and a large open space sits between our compounds, a natural place for folks to gather and dance is there, about thriry yards from my hut. A generator cranks on soon there after, promising longer and louder entertainment to come. At an earlier time (before this all begain to bore me), I would be interested in watching the fun. Now... not so much (ok, i am a grinch, sorry). At first the generators power up some lights and the drums get going. The drums are punctuated by dancing and clapping and laughing, general endless merriment. A little before midnight a guitar is plugged into an amplifier and then a microphone is plugged in too. Singing as a high pitched yell is not my personal favorite style, especially when i am trying to sleep. This goes until a little after four in the morning. Then the generator is turned off, i suppose to save gas for the comming day. But the druming continues, the singing and clapping continues until, and this will always amaze me, until a little after seven, well after sunrise.

Needless to say, I do not greet the morning bright eyed and cheery.

Then there comes the folks gathering, sitting, greeting, talking. Folks tend to sit in groups and make tea too. I try to sit with some of the old guys in the village that I know best and ask random questions or get vocab. I usually give a couple dollars into the comunity gift to the family to pay for the wedding. There certainly is not a lack of things to pay for: food and meat, the music, entertainment and griots, the rented tent, rented chairs, rented cooking pots, the bridal makeup and hair, transport, perhaps firewood, other random wedding presents and things too. This money is collected in a variety of different places and forms, some more formally, some with a griot anouncing your name and father and how much you have given and sentiments, some more anonymous. Personally I like to go more on the un-noticed side.

There are also gifts given that have to be shown off. In adition to money, people often give fabric for whatever purpose you want to make with it. Also piles of bowls and buckets, brooms and rice, cookware and even some furnature must be displayed and talked about. People gater in a large circle around the tent while a griot anounces all, drums punctuating and people shouting encouragements.

In the early afternoon the bride arrives (at least this is how it goes in the weddings i have seen here) The groom is generaly unseen for the day. Usually I am told he is away, maybe in some house across the way, maybe off praying. The wedding does not really seem to be about the two people involved. They have very little to do in the way of public ceremony. But then perhaps they are very busy doing something else somewhere else and I just dont knoz it. I do know that they are not together for nearly the entire day as far as i can tell. The bride arrives in a station wagon with a group of other women, people hanging off the back and roof of the car, everyone having the grandest time. People swarm the car, the drummers push themselves throgh the throng, the doors open and everyone gets out, everyone except the bride. Then there is a little dancing, drumming, traditional something that is lost on me until finally the bride gets out too. Now, everyone appears to be having the grandest time except, always, not the bride. She gennerally looks like she is at her own excecution. Eyes do not leave own feet or else are closed, no smile, no talking, not moving more than a shuffle. Its odd when everyone inches away is dancing singing , drumming fast and loud and laughing giddy, the bride looks almost ill to be present. It doesnt help that the makeup and hair make her look like an exagerated drag queen, pale and vibrant at the same time. SHe makes a shuffle around the crowd, doing one of a few slow circuts of the whole gathering. Then eventually she disapears into a room somwhere, perhaps to be seen again, perhaps not. I usually dont.

And then peole go back to sitting down, talking, drinking tea, collecting money. Durring this whole time, well durring the whole day of everything, the genreator has been moved out to the middle of the village and music blares from the large speakers out there, far enough away to allow all but quiet conversation thankfully. Lunch comes near four. Men eat first and then the women and kids. Greesy greesy rice... oh greesy rice. Then the rest of the afternoon is spent lazying about meditatively, generally digesting, drinking more tea, maybe some other warm drink unless somone has saved some ice from the nearest town. I debate how much i should care about going to pull water for a bath and watering my plants- i am not that dirty sitting in one place all day, and my plants can go one afternoon without a ton of water.

And thats the end of that. That would be a wedding from my perspective at least. Folks begin to disperse as the sun sets but the music out in the vilage center continues. My family has no usual organized supper. I eat a bowl of leftover cold rice by myself and then sit up for a while seeing people off. The music only lasts until about nine, or maybe the gas ran out. The drummers go home and I guess the kids are exhauseted or else know they have school tomorrow. Blessedly that night was near its usual quiet, only a few noisy ones singing drumming and dancing out away from my compound. I sleep easily.