After many months of planning, Russell and Precious's Wedding weekend extravaganza was finally upon us!
Final frantic preparations were taking place on Thursday, even at our house, the 'church' for the White Wedding part. Some of the young men from Russell's were dispatched to help make the garden lovely and they worked hard alongside Steve and Mike to clear and burn all the garden debris. Friday was just as chaotic with any spare vehicle being sent left right and centre to move marquees, chairs, wedding clothes and the like. In the midst of all of this one of Precious's brothers had his car stolen in central Durban, so that added to the stress!
The fun was officially timetabled to start at 3pm on Friday when the first cow was to be slaughtered. However, the poor thing didn't meet its end until gone 9pm! Even for Zulu timing that is late!! Before that, at Precious's mum's house they had to slaughter a goat and then inform Russell's house that it had been done, this gave the go-ahead for the cow. I missed the goat slaughter but the rondavel in which Precious was hauled up absolutely stank of dead goat by the time I got there! Poor Precious and her ladies had to sit in there all night. I was glad I could travel, as photographer I had to go between the 2 sites. They offered me some freshly boiled goat, but I politely declined!
One of the main events on Friday was the moving of the 'Wedding Chest'. This is a huge polished cabinet with a lovely elephant decoration on the front. It was moved from Precious's house to Russell's on Friday night accompanied by a lot of ululating Gogos. It featured in Sunday's traditional rituals.
Also, at midnight, Precious had to smuggle herself somehow into Russell's house. If she managed to do so then all the men there had to give her money. Sadly for her she was spotted. I missed this as I had to get home for some sleep. Steve and Mike, who stayed in the valley the whole weekend, also appear to have missed it - I think the excitement caught up with them and they were asleep. The rest of the wedding party however stayed up all night.
The problem with staying up all night is that you are quite tired the next day. So when I turned up on Saturday at 7am ready to party, everyone else was already a little worse for wear! Thankfully it was a beautifully sunny day (unlike the forecast - ah the power of prayer!). Once everyone was ready, the main bridal party - couple, 4 bridesmaids, 4 best men (including Steve and Mike), and the flowergirls and pageboys - all set off for Durban for photos on the beach.
We were only running 2 hours late for the service at our house. By the time we got to our house it was quite crowded. Officially only about 20 people had been invited to the White Wedding service in our garden. Unofficially, another 100 Zulus had turned up. They were hot, hungry and desperate for a glimpse of the happy couple. Apart from the rude women who helped themselves to food out of our fridge, everything went smoothly. (thankfully for them, they only stole juice, fruit and bread, if they'd started on my chocolate, it would have been a different story...!!!)
The procession then travelled from here back to Russell's in the valley, with cars beeping their horns and veering all over the road. Everyone they passed waved and cheered. At several points they stopped the vehicles and various people got out for a bit of a dance. None of this dancing compared to the first dance (video on facebook) which far surpassed all other dancing of the day. The entire bridal party danced into the reception tent. I can't really describe it, it has to be seen to be believed...
With the White Wedding over and done with, Sunday morning arrived with cloudy skies and the traditional outfits for Umabo. Having been to several weddings now, I'm noticing a change in atmosphere on the Umabo days, it's much more relaxed than the white wedding. I think the Zulus just do their thing on these days and enjoy it.
I'd hoped to miss the second cow slaughter, scheduled for 6am, but no, it happened at 11.30am, just after I arrived.
Oh joy. Yet more brutality and blood.
It's totally gross and then strangely fascinating. Once the animal is dead it just looks like a huge piece of meat and the butchering is rather interesting.
The photos are still gross though!
Mike and Steve were in traditional Zulu Skins (see above pic) and I wore a Zulu outfit too, slightly warmer than theirs. The Zulus were delighted to see us dressed like this and lots of people wanted photos with us. The traditional cermony comprised a lot of dancing, singing and parading round with sticks and shields for the men. The boys joined in and blended in very well. After all the backward and forwarding, they were officially married the moment Precious did a runner from the field and Russell headed off after her. Then suddenly it was all over.
The heavens opened shortly after this and I decided to make a move, given that all the houses were now full of hungry Zulus awaiting their beef curry. Mike and Steve stayed on and reappeared only yesterday, so their wedding experience lasted a lot longer than mine, although I still reckon I'll remember more than they will ;-)
A great weekend, all in all, crazy, chaotic but full of fun times and good memories.
Now there's just the small matter of about 1000 photos to edit...
