The plaintive sounds of the muezzin calling the faithful to prayer at the local mosque drift into our room.  It is 6 am and time to get up.  Indians have dinner at 10pm and don’t go to sleep until after midnight, so the streets don’t come to life until about 11 am, when they start to rouse themselves out of bed.  That’s the  best time to wander, before the choking fumes of traffic and the mass of people make walking unpleasant.

Gerald is looking for great cow pictures and I monitor the changes in my favorite shrines.  Morning time is when incense is lit and flowers are offered to the gods.  It also presents a small window of opportunity to see/photograph the shrines while their little metal gate is open; otherwise it looks like the gods are imprisoned.  This morning I realize that in my haste I forgot my camera.

At the end of the road,after cursing myself numerous times for not having my camera, we hear drums.  Women are  pouring into a courtyard where a drummer is playing and a puja (blessing ceremony) is being done in front of a shrine. It is Sri Mata- a mother goddess, and this is a pre-wedding ritual. Durga, another female goddess is in the same compound  and the women pay homage to each goddess in turn.  The attendant at the shrine is a priestess. This group is from a simple village , but soon afterwards a wealthier group arrives and this time two drummers appear. First it is the bride’s family who take turns pouring offerings of milk and flowers, and there are now two drummers.  The groom’s family appears some minutes later, which presents a problem. They shouldn’t be there at the same time, but with IST (Indian Standard Time), the bride’s family was supposed to have been there much earlier.  Four generations of women dance with abandon to the drums, and I of course am invited to join them, which I willingly do.

“Gerald, I want to go to that wedding tonight, please go talk to the groom”. There will be more than two thousand guests, and it will be a gala affair. Indians are notoriously hospitable.  I am prepared with my best silk outfit and silver sandals for just such an occasion. Unfortunately this time we are not invited..  As we leave, people are arriving in cars, on foot, and rickshaw.  The wedding season has begun!

Dates for marriages are chosen with an astrologer, and this weekend is apparently an auspicious one.  Our friends and our guesthouse owner are all going to weddings with between 2000 and 4000 guests.  When I ask Mr. Singh (owner of our favorite restaurant ) if they are going to a wedding this weekend, he replies “We will be going to a big royal wedding in January.  All the Maharajas of each state will  be present and we have two chartered planes to take our group.” Now that’s a wedding I’d like to be invited to.

As we climb the six flights of stairs to our room the sounds of fire bombs exploding break the quiet. From our panoramic window we see the luxury hotel, on Jag Mandir, a private island,lit up like Las Vegas. Famous Lake Palace Hotel ( from the Bond movie “Octopussy’) is also ablaze with lights.

Our room is a bargain at $17 a night, with a painted stenciled ceiling and views of Lake Pichola on two sides,but the mattress is hard as a rock.  I am hoping for a good night’s sleep because I am pooped.  BOOM.BOOM.BOOM. There seems to be a wedding all over town tonight. Fireworks, drums, loudspeakers with disco music, people talking,laughing until the wee hours of the morning.  And if that isn’t enough, at 3 am the ever-present stray dogs go on a howling binge (maybe frightened by all the fireworks) and don’t let up until dawn.

The daily spectacle of processions, ceremonies, and incredible flashes of colors is what makes India “The Greatest Show on Earth”.