South Asian Weddings

Hi :)

Hi ladies! Ok, I gotta confess...I have been stalking this board forever and am happy to finally be posting!!! All of you seem to be so kind and helpful to one another, which is really encouraging to me and a lot of other brides-to-be. We are planning a celebration in India in April 2011, with a Catholic ceremony and reception to follow in May 2011. So, any tips for shopping in Delhi? FMIL will probably be making a trip in October to scout for ceremony sites/lehengas/sarees... Also, we will likely use a caterer from the Edison area for the May reception...any good/bad points you think I should know about?? So many questions from such a newbie...sorry!! Thanks a million!!

Re: Hi :)

  • katie978katie978 member
    100 Comments
    edited December 2011
    hey!  welcome!  I like your signature quote  :)  Glad you're chiming in! Check out the SA bio, a link to which comes up in some girls' signatures, for the shopping recommendations in Delhi & NJ.You're getting such a jump start on planning, I'm so impressed!
  • PamelaGtoBePamelaGtoBe member
    10 Comments
    edited December 2011
    hi katie :) i guess you can call it a jumpstart...i have been collecting ideas for what seems like forever.... and i figure the sooner the better on this whole planning thing...leaves time for work and school and all that other fun stuff that there is in life.
  • erin&andyerin&andy member
    10 Comments
    edited December 2011
    Congrats on getting engaged!  I love the girls here and they are the best - you will get so much great advice and ideas from these ladies!  While I don't have any answers/advice for your questions now, I do want to offer support and if you have any questions about a mixed wedding I can try to help!
  • edited December 2011
    Hello, welcome and congratulations! I don't live in NJ so I have no advice for you there but you will get a ton from the wonderful girls on this board.I bought all my outfits from CTC in Delhi and had a great experience with them.Happy planning
  • Meghana55Meghana55 member
    100 Comments
    edited December 2011
    Welcome to the board and congrats!!!  I'm a recent NJ bride so if you have any questions, feel free to ask!  Regarding caterers, I cannot recommend Chand Palace and Rasoi enough!  Our ceremony was at Rasoi and they catered our ceremony lunch.  They did south indian food which turned out fantastic, but they specialize in north indian.  I've had their north indian at events and it's sooo good! Chand Palace did our reception and they were amazing.  Everyone is still raving about the food.  I've been to a few events in the past few months that used Akbar, Tandoor, Moghul and Royal Alberts and I felt all left something to be desired.  Akbar - the food was just terrible - cold and no flavor and stale naan.Royal Alberts was ok, but nothing greatMoghul was good, but again nothing amazing.  They are over-hyped and because they have a rep for being good, they charge a lot more.  But honestly I wasn't totally impressed by their catering.  Tandoor - was ok, nothing to write home aboutI've heard good things about Palace of Asia, but I would highly highly recommend Chand Palace and Rasoi!
  • edited December 2011
    Hi and welcome.  I'm relatively new here too. Best of luck in your planning. :)
  • PamelaGtoBePamelaGtoBe member
    10 Comments
    edited December 2011
    erin...thank you so very much...it has been a looooong time coming, and now that the planning is taking its first steps we are realizing that there are a lot of things to take into consideration to respect both families' traditions/sentiments. splitting the ceremonies was the first step, and i'm really excited to be going to india :) puja...i will have DrGtoBe's mom check out CTC next time she is there...i think she might me more excited than i am right now :) thanks!! meg...i will check out those places!! i have eaten at rasoi once and really liked it...and i agree with you about moghul...their pani puri and bhel puri were reallllly good last time i was there, but their buffet was just eh, nothing special. do you know if anyone has gotten sweets from mithaas? it's that little snack shop just down from moghul/ming in that one plaza off oak tree road...it's always busy and their sweets are good but idk what they would be like to work with... thank you!!! mrs.khan...thank you and good luck to you also! it will be quite the adventure...
  • Meghana55Meghana55 member
    100 Comments
    edited December 2011
    I haven't worked with mithaas but their sweets are very good!   For DH's cousin's grad party we ordered like 5 trays of sweets from some other place in that Galaxy foodcourt place on Oak tree road.  Good price and the sweets were really good.  I'm not sure how they would be with wedding related purchases, but from my experience they were pretty good.
  • edited December 2011
    Welcome to the board. Glad you came out of lurking! I can't help with any of those places-but like Katie said the SA bio has a TON of great info.
    ExerciseMilestone
  • katie978katie978 member
    100 Comments
    edited December 2011
    here's the link to the shopping part of the bio in case you haven't found it yet:http://krishnaswami08.googlepages.com/shopping
  • edited December 2011
    Congrats and welcome!  Another Catholic-Hindu couple over here.  We did the Catholic ceremony on a Saturday and the Hindu ceremony on Sunday.  Whatever you do, make sure to talk to your Catholic priest to make sure everything's kosher.  I had a huge freakout two months before the wedding (like, the week we were sending out invitations) because our Catholic priest had never encountered a Hindu/Catholic couple before and he made a little bit of noise about problems with having two ceremonies.  Even though TONS of girls on here have done two ceremonies, I guess some parishes are more strict (i.e., it looks like you kind of don't take the Catholic ceremony seriously, so you're getting married twice).  Anyway, everything worked out fine for us; our Catholic priest seemed to just forget about everything -- very convenient for all parties involved!!
  • edited December 2011
    Welcome! I did most of my shopping in Delhi -- I would steer clear of Chandni Chowk which everyone said was a great place to go but I didn't find anything there. Karol Bagh is great for lehngas/saris/jewelry. I love love love the Ritu Kumar boutique in GK1 -- I believe they have one in CTC as well but we didn't go. I got my bridal lehnga there. Also, we got FI's stuff at Diwan Sahib and it looks great. Welcome again and let us know if you have any more specific questions! October is a good time to go to India for shopping -- they bring out all the new bridal wear for the year I believe so you'll get a good selection!
  • edited December 2011
    Welcome Pamela! We are another Hindu/Catholic couple and we are also doing our Hindu Ceremony first (December 9th- as it is our auspicious day) and Catholic Ceremony followed by a small Hindu pooja and reception on January 16th. When we sat to speak with the Father from the Catholic Church he knew our plans to marry before hand in the Hindu religion and he had no issues with it and did not request convalidation or anything from us. He will however be the one signing the marriage certificate and our legally married date will be January 16th. I think different churches operate differently and it is also at the preference of the priest performing the ceremony. Once you sit and talk with him- you'll get many of the answers you're seeking. I hope that helps!
  • edited December 2011
    Pam- that was to answer the question you had from another post. Oops! :)
  • PamelaGtoBePamelaGtoBe member
    10 Comments
    edited December 2011
    meg...thanks for the galaxy recommendation. i love love love sweets, so there will be lots of them there...DrGtoBe just doesn't want me to love them too much, haha. have to promise to work out to eat sweets ;) thank you masti!! and it feels good not to lurk now... thank you katie...bookmarked! dublin...yes, i have to admit i am having a little freak out about the hindu/catholic when do to what and what will the priest say idea...the priest who will marry us is actually a close family friend, and has known about our relationship for years and been cool with it...he has given us blessings a few times and does not seem to be super-strict; however he does know all the rules and regulations of things. i am hoping that if i explain to him that DrGtoBe and I will recognize ourselves as being 'officially' married once the Catholic ceremony is completed, that he will be understanding and know that we are taking the whole process very seriously. i am kind of sad that we won't be able to have hindu ceremony here also, because most people have not had that experience. but we are looking to incorporate some things, ie garlanding, readings from the gita/upanishads, etc. any wisdom you have to share about making it work will be SOOO HELPFUL!!! meghaks...thanks!! will have fmil check those places out...hopefully i can make one trip before it all happens also... esj...THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU!!! i am so glad to see another bride with the same situation/timeline...i posted on the Catholic board and they made me freak out a little...but i think that you are right that it is highly priest dependent. i think it also may help that we are planning to marry at Lehigh University...it is not considered a parish per se, as it holds both Catholic and Protestant services. you girls are so wonderful! thanks!
  • edited December 2011
    Oh it sounds like you are totally fine, then!  Your priest sounds great.  I think what threw off my priest was the fact that our Hindu ceremony seemed to come out of nowhere.  I told him exactly what you said, though: that we were treating the Catholic ceremony as our "real" wedding (my husband is not religious at all and neither is his family, either; we were pretty much doing the Hindu ceremony for cultural reasons, god forgive us!). Prior to the little chat with my priest about the Hindu ceremony, he said that because we weren't having a full mass, we were free to include non-Catholic readings in the ceremony.  He suggested Hindu readings, poems, anything (in addition to Christian readings, of course).  I was really pleasantly surprised by that option but didn't take him up on it because I knew we were doing the Hindu ceremony. 
  • edited December 2011
    I think FI's sister bought the sari I'll wear for our Hindu ceremony in Delhi. I'm not sure that it came specifically from a bridal boutique, but it's very pretty and has a lot of beautiful work on it. I can find out where she got it if you want.
  • neha1683neha1683 member
    10 Comments
    edited December 2011
    I may be a little late, but some Delhi shopping tips....Ritu Kumar is always classic, but the best one is the store in GK.  Overall, I'd say stay clear of Chandni Chawk as well, but there's one store there that's awesome - Anarkali (i've bought many lenghas there in the past).  They also have a branch in Karol Bagh.  It's a little bit more budget friendly as well.  CTC is good too.  Also, check out Kimaya and Ogaan (Emporio Mall in DLF).  And my absolutely favorite is Tarun Talahani - I almost bought a Sangeet lengha from there - absolutely gorgeous unique clothes!Oh, and for fun accessories check out BG's in South Ex (costume jewellery).HTHHTH
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