I heard sometime ago that there's no such thing as a perfect wedding - especially a Malay one!
Last nite I attended one akad nikah. . .this being the 2nd for the month. This is the time of the year when, every weekend, you need not worry what to cook, cos you get wedding invitations siang dan malam. And mine goes right up till the first week of July! Perhaps its about time we come up with different menus for a kenduri, right? There was a time when I attended three kenduris, same day, same caterer, same menu and more often than not the same crowd.
So back to this akad nikah. . .As I was getting ready for it, something came to my mind. . . . cos I had the same baju on, the one that i had when i attended the 1st akad nikah, 3 weeks ago. Not that I mind wearing the same baju, but what if someone recognized me from the same akad nikah that I attended much earlier in Melaka! I'll tell you why . . .
This kenduri in Melaka, mind you, is more of a get-together for me and my friends - and friends, are a bunch of us, five in all that have been together for the past thirty odd years! We started from secondary school and made our vows that we'll remain friends and meet up as often as we could just to keep up and liven up the good old days. You can't imagine how much fun it is when we're together. . .we joke and laugh, and that's when we let our hair down, and forget just about everything and enjoy every minute that we can and behave juuust like we were when we were in our teens- our antics would even amaze and probably embarass our kids and cucus. So when the son of one of our friends decided to get married we all decided to get together (minus husbands). And this is when everything begins, mind you, nothing beats this, and like my husband said, this only happens when we are together!
We checked into the apartment. . . got dressed for the akad and headed to a mosque closeby. . . the program was to meet and gather at a mosque and leave for the bride's house sometime after isya'. So off we went. We were the only ones from KL- the rest were the locals.
A good half hour of waiting and finally someone came from the bride's side and the procession began.
Adat orang Melaka, meriah sekali. . . .sampai2 saja disambut dengan kompang and every few steps that we made, bunga api pun dipasang, berapi2.
They actually closed the main road for this event. For the five of us, it was really meriah, bayangkan, bunga api and kompang bertalu2 and this went on sampailah kepintu pagar rumah pengantin. So we got invited in. . .someone noticed my slinged arm, so I got the VIP treatment, dibawa masuk, duduk berhadap tak jauh dari tok imam, all ready to officiate the ceremony. Five minutes passed, half of the hantaran laid gracefully down on the permaidani, then I hear this hush hush, . . . . . " salah rumah la, salah rumah la. . . . ." I could not believe what I heard, thinking that it was just another joke played on us, cos earlier, like all Melakaans, they were joking away, bayar tol lah, perli-perli pengantinlah what-have -you sebelum masuk. . . so I thought this was just another trick. Believe me. . . . it wasn't a joke at all. . . . . someone came and whispered to me that we'd better get our buts out the hell of here, cos we got the wrong house!
Ya Allah Ya Tuhanku, betul ke. . . .macam mana boleh jadi macam ni. . . .malu nya tak tau mana nak letak muka ni. So there we were yang mula-mulanya begitu happy dapat duduk beradap tok imam, begitu strategik sekali, sekarang kena angkat punggung and bawak balik hantaran!
I did not say a word, just walked out, pandang ke bawah and wish and wished and wished I could fly away out from there. And finally, when we got back into the car, tiba lah pengantin yang sepatutnya diraikan, only now, minus all the bunga api and the kompang, jadi kelamkabut. . .mereka pun agaknya terpinga-pinga - kenapa ada rombongan pengantin lain kat situ. . . Tak apalah, pengantin perempuan masih ada, tak sempat di kebas orang lagi!
Nak ketawa ada, nak marah pun ada. . . .rasa-rasa nak sepak punggung, punggung siapa? But here, whose fault was it. . . .the guy who came and picked us up at the mosque? Or, takkan lah pengantin lelaki and my friend tak ingat langsung rumah bakal isteri. . . .Adoooiii malunya.
So that night we hardly slept!!
