A Bollywood wedding party!

It was our very good fortune to be invited the other night to a wedding 'sangeet'. A sangeet is part of the traditional Indian wedding process. It's a pre-wedding party, where traditionally all the relatives from both families get together to party and get to know each other. They used to last for days, but tend to be just one evening these days.

The bride was the daughter of an old friend and fellow bushwalker who's originally from Bangladesh. The dress code was strictly 'Indian', and we were happy to oblige.

Indian weddings have always been grand affairs. It seems that they've become even grander these days, and the Bollywood theme is all the rage.

This do was held in Sydney's Paddington Town Hall. No expense was spared. There were two or three hundred guests, and an awful lot of them seemed to have been attending Bollywood dancing classes!

The bride arrived in style.

Between delicious meal breaks we were treated to dance performances from aunties and uncles, mates of the groom, nieces and nephews, and from the bride and groom themselves. The bride in particular, was an enthusiastic and accomplished dancer!


When not performing, they were holding court on their regal couch, either by themselves, or with their families.

















Towards the end everyone with any dancing genes in their body (so not me) was out there dancing. There was even a rather strange robocop character on stilts. Don't know what he was about!


All in all, a unique and rather wonderful experience for us!

Here are a couple of short videos:

Parramasala - and Parra gets moving!

This weekend was the Parramasala Festival weekend in Parramatta. It's the annual 'spicy celebration of cultures' - primarily Indian cultures, that is. And it's colourful, tasty, and loud!

Most of the events are in Prince Alfred Park and Harris Park. I checked out Prince Alfred Park on Saturday afternoon, and watched a Rajasthani folk group, a fashion show featuring Western Sydney designers, and a terrific troupe of Bollywood dancers, from the Natraj Dance Studio.

Oh dear, the dancers have come down into the audience, and they're wanting us all to join in!


Yours truly doesn't have a dancing bone in his body, but most of the crowd find theirs, and don't they get into it just!