Revised May 29 2002

"Come to the wedding"
or "How they get married in Wadi Mousa"

Page 3 of 3

In rural Jordan, there is no marriage ceremony as such: a woman is considered to be married when her menfolk hand her over ceremoniously to the bridegroom's womenfolk. The women go and collect her in all the transport they can find, and in as great a number as can be mustered. Obviously the future mother in law is the most important person in the procession. Once a girl is given into her care, then she is one of their family and becomes officially her son's wife. The marriage is later formally registered at the courthouse. It is also possible to marry in a "civil ceremony" at the courthouse, but nobody who had any alternative would consider this for a moment.

I found Sally and we took our places in one of the cars. The only men with us were the drivers of the cars and buses. When we reached the bride's house, they were ushered into one of the neighbours' houses where they would drink tea and await the women's pleasure. They always seem to think they wait for a long time!

The women all flocked into the room where the bride, dressed in white and with her hair uncovered was waiting. She was installed on the usual dais, sitting on a flashy red velvet throne and was surrounded by all her friends and female relatives. Those who had not been invited to lunch would have arrived an hour or so ago. Usually everybody gives the bride money on these occasions according to what they could afford, for many of the young girls half a dinar is all that they can manage. Serious money would be given presently . Incidentally a respectable woman appears before all the men with her hair uncovered only on her wedding day and for the engagement ceremony. I'm not quite sure of the logic behind this, but never mind. As usual she was heavily made up, and her hair was done in the usual arrangement. The village hairdresser seems to know only one style for a bride and certainly the make up is insisted on.

All of the younger girls from both families were dancing and singing accompanied by the drum that somebody was playing. The older women offered round bottles of soft drinks. This goes on for some time; finally when the men have enough of waiting, the father or eldest brother of the bride arrives and presents his daughter with a sum of money, which can be just about any amount. A reasonably prosperous man will offer her a gold necklace or sometimes even a collection of gold jewellery: a necklace or even two, a bracelet or several and probably ear rings and rings as well. All this she will put on, as well as the jewellery the bridegroom gave her at the betrothal ceremony. A popular girl from a reasonably well off family will go to her bridegroom fairly dripping with all the gold she owns. This is a mark of their status. She will almost certainly receive more from her new husband and his family. This gold and the money she receives are her personal property and it has been held a cause of divorce if a husband should take any of it without his wife's agreement. All of her brothers and male family members follow her father in strict order of precedence, each offering money in various amounts. An older lady is stationed alongside her to gather everything into a handbag to be sorted and counted later. (You will notice that with this system, money being pushed into the bride's hand and immediately passed to her companion, nobody will know for certain how much, or how little, each person has contributed).

Finally the ceremonial in the bride's house was finished and we headed towards the transport. The bride, escorted by her father, her elder brothers and her senior paternal uncle made her way towards the beribboned and beflowered car waiting for her. The two mothers took their traditional places, the bridegroom's mother in front, the bride's mother sitting beside her daughter in the back seat.

Everybody else rushed to climb into their transport. Most of the minibuses in the village are pressed into service on these occasions.

The procession moved off. We would ride round the village exchanging greetings with everybody we met before returning to the bridegroom's house and yet more singing and dancing.

Sally had taken a dozen photos and was impressed. "Is it always like that?"

"Often it is much more complicated!" I replied. "Imagine fifty cars going to Amman over 200 kilometers away to bring the bride. That's what happened when Abu Sultan's son was married. Abu Sultan is one of the village sheikhs and an important man around here; a lot of people came to the wedding. Fifty cars and about 80 coming back when the bride's relations were added to the convoy. Everybody was clapping their hands and driving six abreast on the main Desert Highway! Luckily the police either weren't around or preferred not to notice anything"

Sally obviously tried to imagine it.

"I remember another wedding when the bride was from Ma'an. That's much closer, only 30 kilometers. They set off at about three o'clock to bring her, and the bridegroom thought he had plenty of time to look in at his office before getting ready. So when the procession got to his house he wasn't there! A troop of his friends went off to find him, dragged him back, stood over him while he showered, shaved and dressed - and all the time the poor bride was waiting in the car outside the house".

"Oh boy!" she breathed.

"Mind you, the most memorable wedding I have ever attended was a Hassanat one! Instead of a car for the happy couple, they borrowed one of the carriages from Petra, and a dozen of the bridegroom's cousins supplied a mounted escort! It was wonderful," I said reminiscently. I hadn't known exactly what was being prepared. When all the guys started getting on their horses and the penny dropped, I sprinted to the front of the procession, where a Hassanat friend of mine had the video camera set up in his jeep, and asked if he had room for one more. He jerked a hospitable thumb and I swarmed up the side of the high mounted jeep (don't ask me how!) and climbed aboard.

Immediately after the horses came the decorated "bridal carriage" with the horse pulling it adorned with even more ribbons and flowers, and then about a hundred cars and vehicles, including the lorry owned by the bridegroom's brother, also stuffed with people. We stopped all the traffic between the village and the valley - right at the time that everybody was coming home from Petra in the evening. Nothing could move, so everybody got out of their cars to cheer us on, and all the tourists were out of their buses, filming and photographing like mad! They weren't quite sure if it was for real or if it was for a film, seeing the video camera working away. The bridegroom was dressed up in a sheikh's ceremonial black and gold robes (to which he had no right but who cares !).

Khalid Hassanat, one of the bridegroom's closest friends, led off the escort, dressed in a flowing white desert cloak and red headdress, waving the three foot long silver sword he uses for dancing (Khalid must be over 6'6" or close to 1m90). For me the crowning moment was when he decided that the jeep wasn't going fast enough and started threatening it with the sword, shouting "Imshi, imshi!" (which in this case meant something like "get a move on"). Anyone would have thought the jeep was a horse! It really was wonderful! Trust the Hassanat to go one better! I heard later that half the village was up on the roofs watching and they talked about the wedding for nearly a week - which must be a record. Certainly the road was lined with far more people than usual. Ali and Fatima's daughter announced that she wanted a wedding like that when she got married (she is about fifteen).

After describing all this to Sally, it seemed something of an anticlimax when we got back to the house with the cars. All the men were waiting and the bride was escorted into her new home. A number of packages were unloaded from her family's cars: the linen, blankets and cushions and so forth, which she was contributing. More singing, more dancing, more contributions of money - to the bridegroom this time (I produced 20 dinars or around 30USD, which is pretty average for a family member not from the immediate family) and gradually people started to drift away. I hoped that the bride and the groom were less exhausted than the rest of us. I fully intended to sleep for at least twelve hours, and I imagined that the bridegroom's family would do the same.

During the next few days the newly-weds receive congratulatory visits from most of their families, and this is when more traditional wedding presents are offered : tea sets and plates, glasses, clocks and ornaments, and just about anything else you can imagine. After four or five days at home, allowing them time to adjust and the bride to organise the house to her taste, they usually leave on a honeymoon to whatever destination the bridegroom's budget allows.

The sun was dipping lower in the sky, it seemed incredible that the afternoon had nearly ended. This is a marvellous moment in Wadi Mousa, as the sun sets over the mountains. The sky to the south west turns into a great golden curtain, streaking progressively with orange and red until it all fades away into the grey of the evening.

I asked Sally if she was doing anything that evening - should I invite her for supper? "Marwan said he would get a few people together and we would go and have a cook-out in the desert somewhere" she explained.

I suppressed a pang of envy. I always enjoy these cookouts, and the desert right now sounded very attractive. While I thoroughly enjoy joining in the festivities, I had been in the middle of a lot of people for the last couple of days, and I realised suddenly that the silence and the stars of the desert were just what I most wanted. Never mind, I could always call somebody and suggest a private party, in fact that was rather a good idea. I put it aside for further consideration and action.

Marwan arrived and collected Sally; I refused a not very pressing invitation to join them and turned to Fatima who was heading towards me purposefully, looking full of news.

"You'll never guess!" she said. "Karim has just called. He will be on the ferry from Egypt tomorrow! And" she continued "he asked about Zein! Just casually, but he wanted to know if she had any "suitors" yet!"

We looked at each other. "Should we tell her?" I wondered.

"Let's not" she decided. "We'll see what happens when he gets here. In any case I've just coped with one wedding, there's no question of organising another one any time soon. Although mind you, an engagement would be all right - of course if that is what he is thinking about. It would keep him at home anyway!" she said practically.

We were undoubtedly speculating ahead of the situation, but never mind. I went off to make my phone call. It was being rather a good day.

The next afternoon having caught up with my sleep, even if a bit later than I had originally planned, I was heading for the steps leading to the bridal couple's house when I was stopped by Fatima who wanted to know what was in the gift-wrapped parcel I was carrying (and how much I had paid for it!). We noticed Nadia and Zein approaching down the lane leading to the road, also carrying gift-wrapped parcels. "What do we tell them?" I asked.

The question was immediately proved moot. A taxi followed them into the big yard and Karim in person got out. He very properly greeted Fatima and me first of all, as the oldest women present, then exchanged cheek kisses with Nadia. Finally he turned to Zein who was hanging back.

"I've missed you!" he said. She blushed.

Nadia and I watched them with interest. Although a decorous distance apart, the two were undoubtedly leaning slightly towards each other. Simultaneously we both sighed sentimentally.

Fatima also sighed, but with resignation. "I'd better go and find Ali" she said.

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©Ruth Caswell 2002