Hello Hive! It’s been years away and I’m super excited to be back on here.I missed hive a lot. I’m grateful to my wonderful friend @samostically who encouraged and convinced me during a conversation to be back on here and resume all my great content. I’m happy to say I’m finally back and I’ll do better. I’m very excited to reignite my old friendships, explore my favorite communities, engage and interact with new people here.
I’ll be sharing some fun activities I’ve been up to. Recently I attended a wedding ceremony. It was my cousin’s wedding and it was a beautiful occasion.
TRADITIONAL CEREMONY
The traditional wedding ceremony is the groom asking for the bride’s hand in marriage traditionally. This involves a lot of cultural rites, traditional performances and gifts giving. In my own culture which are the Igala’s from the middle belt part of Nigeria, little to no bride price is being collected because they believe their daughters aren’t supposed to be sold out. They practice the exchange of kola-nuts between both families to signify oneness.
It was a small ceremony and it’s usually done at the bride’s family house. The ceremony started with the bride coming out in her first beautiful traditional outfit, dancing round the tables of the elders with her siblings and friends greeting them and receiving their blessing.
After the first appearance , it’s the duty of her fiancé’s family to woo her with money so she comes out finally in her second outfit to complete the marriage rites. In a case were she’s not satisfied with the money dropped, she’ll remain in her father’s house until the needful is done. This is a test from the bride’s family to know if the new family she’s marrying into is capable of caring for their daughter and know she’ll never go hungry.
Her fiancé’s family proceeded to drop money notes begging her to come out to accept their son. After a while ,she was satisfied with the money her in-law’s presented and then she danced out happily in her second outfit for the exchange of kola-nuts and the final marriage rites and blessing.
I was too excited being present and anyone could tell. I kept cheesing from ear to ear as I watched my young cousin being handed over to her fiancé’s family and become a wife finally. My least favorite part about the ceremony was that I had to kneel and properly greet anyone who my mom introduced me to that was elderly. Knowing how annoying African parents can be, it was exhausting for me at some point. The ceremony ended with a lot of dancing and celebration and even an after party that lasted till midnight. It was a beautiful event and I’d do it all over again.
THE RECEPTION CEREMONY
In a typical Nigerian Christian wedding, the white wedding and marital vows exchange is done in the church followed by a reception ceremony after the pastor’s blessing.
I didn’t meet up the church wedding so I proceeded to the reception ceremony with my mom which was held at an event center.
My favorite part about the reception was the hall decoration, it was simple yet elegant. The great live band singers had people on their toes dancing for hours.
The couple were ushered in by the MC accompanied by their bridal party and grooms men.
The reception wasn’t a long one but it was fun filled with lots of paparazzi, food and drinks and bridal party games. Well wishers also gave words of advice, gifts and their prayers.
The reception ceremony came to an end with a toast to the couple and celebration after. Overall I’ll rate my experience a solid 10. Attending a Nigerian wedding is always a good idea and I’m happy to have properly experienced both ceremonies. I definitely cannot wait for my next one and even more to come.