Wedding coordinator manager

It was a few years ago. My elder sister was getting married. The Haldi ceremony was to be held in the morning. We had arranged the morning Haldi ceremony on the rooftop of our apartment building. Part of the rooftop was covered with a colorful 'Shamiana' (a decorated canopy). It was essentially a women's function. My female cousins, sisters-in-law (bhabhis), aunts, my sister's friends, and most of the ladies from our apartment were gathered there. What a commotion they were making! The music, the laughter, and the joking... everything was loud. They had one round of dancing to Bollywood songs and now the Haldi ceremony was taking place. They planned to have another round of dancing after applying haldi to the bride, my sister, and to themselves.

I am Salman, and I was 28 at the time. I had gone to supervise that everything was going well with the ceremony. In fact, I was in charge of the entire wedding ceremony. It's a long three- to four-day event.

All the arrangements had been planned and organized by me beforehand. The morning Haldi ceremony was not that big of an event. The main wedding ceremony was in the evening, which was much larger. But we were holding it at a banquet hall near our house. The decorations, lighting, flowers, and catering were all finalized. Now I just had to supervise and coordinate everything with complete care.

I was passing through the section where the ladies and girls were applying haldi to each other, some of my sisters-in-law and cousins caught me. They were determined to cover my entire face and body with haldi. Some of my sisters-in-law were especially insistent on applying haldi to me. I pleaded that I was extremely busy today. I had to run around and manage everything. They said, "No... you are next... after your sister's wedding, we will get you married too. We will find you a beautiful bride within six months. So today we must apply haldi to you."