A Tuareg wedding - the transfer

After the food we went back across the street to spend more time with the Bride. We got some fun shots with some more of the girls outside her little hideaway house too!

    

Then we went inside. It was around 4pm i think. We sat and showed Aminata a bunch of our photos. She could at least enjoy her own party vicariously through the photos! She really loved seeing them.

Eventually one by one all of her other friends dropped away until it was just us three white girls sitting in the hot cement room with the bride. We knew it was another few hours until they expected the groom’s party to come for her and it was sad to see that if we weren't there she would have been alone. Or maybe it was because we were there that her other friends felt it would be ok to leave her? At any rate, the night got dark and we told stories and made jokes about sneaking her out for a slurpee run.

I know this picture is awful. I didn’t try anything fancy on it because it shows exactly how we were! We were sitting in the dark for over an hour. The sun had set, the room had no lights and we continued to sit with the bride, quietly talking while we waited to see what would happen next. Again, it just really blew away out preconceived notions of what a wedding would be like.

Suddenly there was a flurry of activity. Many of her friends returned at once and whisked her away to a neighbours house that had lights in one room. They all had changed into their fancy shiny outfits made out of bazain material (pronounced bah-zen) Aminata showered (good thing- she was sweaty all day!) and changed into a traditional Tuareg wedding outfit. Women all crammed into the room and it was a loud jumble of laughter, noise, etc. Everyone shared their makeup and applied way too much scented body spray, eyeliner, and ghoulish thick dark lipstick.  Thankfully someone had let me know they changed into their fancy outfits and I had brought my one along! And looks like I fit right in with the purple color many seemed to love. We didn’t even plan that!

They carefully applied makeup to Aminata and this was the first time she really started to look happy and excited. We could finally see her hair and face too! She was so lovely. It was hard to get true portraits with everyone all over the place and she was still shy.

 

After she was all ready to go and our whole wedding party smelled like a perfume factory gone bad, we all went outside and across the street to her house. She went inside the hut to wait and we all sat outside. They served us leftover Moxfe and as Katherine would say “Lucky us”.    We chatted and waited for a delegation of the husband’s friends to arrive.

And finally around 8:30pm they did! The main guy went straight to the hut and tried to get open the door. The women slammed it in his face and held it shut and wouldn’t let him get to the bride. It appears he had to pay a small fee to the friends in order to let the bride go! Some women took him to a corner and after they were pleased with the amount of money that changed hands, they led him to the hut.

The bride was led out of the hut and into waiting vehicles. She was completely draped in a white veil with a darker layer underneath and she couldn’t see a thing. They had to lead her around like a blind woman! Many people piled into many vehicles. (Mine included- some even wanted to hang on to the roof to ensure they got a ride!)

When we got to the Bride’s new house (A tiny cement two bedroom house that had electricity!) we were in for another surprise. The Groom was nowhere to be found! Some of the Tuareg women explained this was not at all the norm and that he should be there. An hour or more of hilarous/confusing/angry shouting ensued. Some of it seemed in good jest, but yet they kept refusing the let the groom come. They didn’t want money or a traditional bribe or anything either. The poor bride sat there on the bed (middle left in the picture) and sweated some more and waited. At one point us women threatened to stage a sit in. We weren’t leaving her alone until her husband came to claim her! I even got a rousing chant of “On est la! On est la!” (we are here!) started that had everyone laughing. In the end, some of the women gave in and decided some of us should leave. Maybe the groom was shy? They said he didn’t want to show up with so many people there. Apparently he did eventually come…

So at 10:30 pm we left with a group of women. Feeling wholly unsatisfied that she was there and we hadn’t actually delivered her to her husband.

With so many language and voices flying we couldn't keep track of what was all going on. One of my favorite pictures of the night part? Rebecca and Katherine- all sweaty and hot and tired with no clue what was going on. Total confusion. I’m with ya girls!

A Tuareg Wedding – No party is complete without food!

Every party here to some extent revolves around food. Huge pots of rice and sauce are most common. You can come to an all day affair and be there for many hours and leave just 10 minutes before the food and they are bothered by that. However if you show up only 10 minutes before the food, eat the food, and leave shortly after- you are ok.

Interestingly enough, this very poor Tuareg family had hired out help for the day from three Zarma women who came and did all the cooking! The one Zarma woman kept coming over to me to ask for “cadeau cadeau” (money present).

  

There were 4 huge cauldrons of food. Two of them had rice in them. Here are the other two. One has tomatoes and oil and veggies and pieces of meat in it.

The other had a traditional Tuareg dish called Moxfe. It is made up of ground millet, oil, milk and a few other things. It is cooked until it is the consistency of lumpy porridge. It tastes strangely a little fishy too. Can’t say this is a personal favorite, but we eat what we are served!

 

When the food was all ready, many women got up to help pile it onto 20 or more platters to be passed around. Every plate was piled high and distributed to small little groups gathered in a circle to eat together.

There was very little waste. Most platters were wiped completely clean with a multitude of fingers dipping, smearing and grabbing the food.

What little was left on a platter was put into a covered container and served later in the evening as a snack while we waited for the groom’s entourage to appear. Yummy! I have mostly mastered eating with my hands, but I admit I still like a spoon when offered! The main reason being- it is hot! The steaming rice and boiling sauce they mush in their hands like it is easy, but it burns my hands! And then they all laugh at the wimpy hands the white girls have. haha!

I mentioned the groom’s entourage right? Well that part of the story is coming next!

 

Also- I forgot to add in the last blog a picture of the dancing! It traditional Tuareg party style, the young people gather in a music tent and get up in small groups to shuffle back in forth. Not very lively- but they are fairly reserved about those kinds of things. They even made Rebecca get up there!

A Tuareg wedding- the party outside

The wedding day festivities actually took place is 4 distinct locations. I can’t show you how the groom and his friends celebrated since I never saw them. In the previous post I told you about how the bride was spending the day, so let’s look at how the other party goers passed their time!

This is the yard where Aminata’s family lives. We visit here every week. All of the women gathered in this place. It was a hot day (mid 40s Celsius) and every patch of shade was taken up. You can’t see them all in this photo, but there was close to 40 women crammed together under this wooden and straw structure we call a “hangar” here.

 

A bunch of us in the official two shades of “wedding fabric”.

The hut they lived in also had people in it. There were women everywhere!

While all the women sat and visited, there was another party going on just 30 feet away. This was the real party place, where all the young people gathered. Our friends had taken a power line from a neighbours house and run it into this rented tent, with rented plastic chairs, and set up a boom box, precariously balanced on a chair. 

 

This kid kept making me laugh. He thought he was so cool!

 

Of course the little kids gravitated to the music spot and were busting a move just outside the tent cover. They didn’t care it was 40 degrees!

  

Bennett wasn’t as excited by the dancing as the other kids, but he was still having fun. He found a tire and was rolling it all over the place for a while.

So all afternoon the women visited, the teens and 20s danced, and the kids goofed around as normal. Until it came time to eat…. But I think the food will be a post for next time!