Mad World I : The Wedding

Hello readers!

Every once in a while you go through an experience that may only last a couple of hours but completely embodies the culture of an entire nation. In our case it is quite obviously a culture of confusion; political, social, religious, and even musical confusion. My experience is that of an Egyptian wedding. Once again, my adventure begins with Frank.

It was Thursday afternoon, so naturally I was re-organizing my vast record collection in my mother’s swimsuit. Ever since his arrival with me, Fluffy has been giving a hand with the musical selections while I polish my vinyl to a gleam every Thursday. I point at a record and if he barks once, then he wants me to play it, but if he says “no, I don’t really feel like Queen right now” in his heavy French accent then he’s obviously against it. So just as we were arguing over the next song, Frank lands on the windowsill and flutters his white wings to get my attention. I scurry hastily to him and take the note attached to his right leg, which turns out to be an invitation to attend the wedding of a school friend. I give Frank a kiss on his little head and bid him farewell as he majestically takes to the sky.

“Oh boy” I thought, “time to get all dressed up and look fabulous!” You have to understand, I don’t really leave the house much, I guess that’s due to the fact that I don’t really have many friends, well, apart from Fluffy and Frank. All my old friends seemed to mysteriously disappear after I had my nervous breakdown. But this friend who was getting married I hadn’t talk to in years, it seemed that he still had my address and remembered me. I blushed at the thought and immediately put on ‘We are gonna be friends’ by The White Stripes, to truly linger in this emotional moment, but made sure not to get any tears of joy on the French cut swimsuit.

The wedding was that night, so I thought I better start getting ready right away because it started only a few hours later. I showered, shaved, and put on my black evening suit. Just as I was flipping the second fold of my tie while standing in front of the mirror, it suddenly occurred to me how stupid ties really are. I mean, why on earth do we wear a piece of cloth around our necks in this kind of heat? If it covered some vital genital region I can understand, but this, it’s pointless! We might as well wear them around our heads like Rambo. So I thought I’d make a statement, after all, things change with the act of only one person. So I tightened the red tie around my head, fed fluffy and went to get a taxi.

We arrived exactly on time, but the security guards at the gate evidently had a big problem with my new fashion statement, so I was forced to remove it and wear my tie properly. I walked into the hotel, which is owned by the army, and was told that no one had showed up yet so I decided to wander around for a while. I was amazed at how incredibly luxurious army hotels were; floor to ceiling windows, crystal ashtrays and shiny marble floors. “So this is where the money’s going”, I realized. For a second I thought about sneaking out some of the obviously expensive ashtrays and giving them to some street children outside, but quickly decide against it. No, my attack on this corrupt system must be more planned and powerful than that. I need to find a way to take one of the big mirrors, but later. Later…

After circling the hotel a good dozen times, I hear the sound of the ‘Zaffa’ and head towards the lobby again. A smile comes to my face as I see my old friend, all grown up, coming down the stairs with a beautiful woman by his side. I wipe a tear away and clap with the rest of the people to the music of the loud zaffa band. They sing old folk songs about marriage and how beautiful the bride is, but then I get startled to hear them chant “the bride is white, oh yes, the bride is so white!” My jaw drops and I freeze mid-clap. How racist!?? What if she wasn’t white, would they simply edit it and sing “the bride is black, oh yes, black as the night!” or would they leave it out altogether?? Still, it seemed like I was the only one disturbed by this racism as everyone else clapped and sang along about the bride’s fair complexion, which I must say, was due to 6 coats of makeup.

So we follow them like smiling, clapping sheep into the main ballroom and proceed to watch the katb el ketaab commence. The mazoon starts reciting verses from the Koran, and everyone in the room diligently echoes the prayers. Then I get another shock once again when the groom follows the ‘procedure’ by asking the father in Arabic “I want to marry your young virgin daughter” and the father answers “Ok, I am now giving you my young virgin daughter.” Hmm, they really are anal about the whole virgin (‘bikr’) thing. But what if she wasn’t a virgin? Would they exchange it with “I want to marry your young sexually-enlightened-but-overall-more-experienced daughter”? Or would they just leave the whole sex thing out and put in another adjective to sound length-wise, like “I want to marry your young brunette daughter”? I snicker at the idea, but stop myself violently when I notice people giving me murderous looks, obviously misunderstanding my laughter for doubting the bride’s virginity. I get a vision of myself being hung from the ballroom chandelier and set on fire by the crowd.

Once the solemn religious phase ends, everyone gets up and the evening moves to the dance floor. This is signalled by the DJ putting on a trance song with an Arabic vibe that is often played at weddings, little does anyone know that it’s called ‘Good Morning Israel’ and is by Eyal Barkan, an Israeli. So everybody in the army hotel ballroom starts dancing and clapping to ‘Good Morning Israel’, kind of like an Israeli wedding dancing to Ana Bakrah Israel (‘I hate Israel’). Hmm…

This was the first time I actually look around at the people involved, especially the women. They are either veiled and clinging like weed to their fiancée\husband or they’re single and wearing what pretty much amounts to lingerie. The single ones frantically scan the room with hungry eyes in search of a potential suitor. I decide I can’t be the only one sitting so I join the pack on the small dance floor and clap along. The mood shifts to balady music and everyone goes crazy, jumping and singing along. I suddenly feel incredibly out of place, it’s almost as if I was still wearing my Rambo head tie. The DJ plays songs about 3antar (a tribute to guys who can fuck well) and el 3enab (a tribute to nipples) between constant chants of “aywa ma3ayaaaa” and “feen el zaghrootchaaa?” as veiled and non-veiled girls shake what the lord gave them and the men take in eyefuls. Yes, these were the same people reciting Koran a second ago.

I don’t like to judge people, let alone an entire culture. But in the span of 5 hours, I’ve seen people singing praises about how white the makeup of the naturally dark bride is, an army hotel that probably took half the country’s education budget to build, Koran reciters singing about nipples, a wedding speech that sounds like a bargain for a goat and confessed Israel-haters dancing to ‘Good Morning Israel’.

With that said, I really don’t understand why they wouldn’t let me in with the tie around my head. Good night, my little sheep.