MADE IN INDIA: MY BIG FAT INDIAN WEDDING

Things may get a little bridal on this blog as I'm getting married in July (squeal!). Don't worry, I don't have the bridezilla gene. If I have any virtues, it's that even in extreme pressure, my heart rate rarely goes over 65 (which came in handy when I was a news editor). The other thing is that I can't bring myself to fret over flowers or invitations, or worry about which guests need to be seated far away from another. If grown adults want to act like gimps at family reunions, that's their business as far as I'm concerned. Luckily as it's a small affair of about 100 people (ok, so the title of this post was slightly deceiving, but hey, you need a good headline to hook people in dont'cha?) everyone pretty much knows and loves everyone else.

As I write this, I'm slightly mopey about the fact that just a couple of days ago, I was in Bombay with my sister at the tail end of a chaotic holiday to shop for my wedding dress, and go to a cousin's wedding in Bangalore. A week later, and I've got my dress and matching jewellery tucked up at home. What's more, I snagged a boatload of jaw-droppingly gorgeous silk fabric from Crawford Market in South Mumbai to decorate my venue with. A word on Crawford Market - don't even dream about setting foot near it unless you have the stamina of an ox, and enough patience to withstand people waving all manner of crap in your face in the hope that you'll buy the towels/calendars/underwear/rattles/guitars they are selling. Once you've made it through, and trust me, you'll feel like you've broken into Mordor, there are endless stalls selling fabric so pretty and so ridiculously cheap (about $3 a metre), you'll go nuts. Well we did, anyway, and it took several vodka cocktails to recover. My cousin's wedding in Bangalore, on the other hand, really WAS a big fat Indian wedding, and I'll write about that asap as my brain is still processing the five day shindig with 5000 guests.

I'll post pics of all these goodies very soon, but for now, they're still sitting in Bangalore waiting for my Dad to cart them back for me. In the meantime, feast your eyeballs on the stuff by a sweet little online company called Zarbaft sold only through their Facebook site. It's got a lovely vintage 1970s vibe, very Zeenat Aman, and pretty reasonably priced too.