The glamour and glitz that resonate on her special day cannot be compared to any other, but Shylocks are all round and about her , waiting for their debtor.
Wedding in Nigeria
Question: What determines a long lasting marriage?
We all know that we don’t like anything small or average in Nigeria; we love it big, noisy, flashy, on the covers of famous online and paperback magazines, we certainly would go to any extent to make it go viral on social media, make it sassy, stay on top, shake some tables, break some legs, you name it. Nigeria is of course the giant of Africa, and things don’t come small, but extra size or extra large –even if the shoes don’t fit; in Nigeria, shoe get size.
What is wedding ceremony without the ceremony of a stunning pre-wedding photo, colourful bridal shower, a flamboyant engagement ceremony which ushers in the main wedding ceremony that would certainly leave people’s mouths hanging open or their eyes and tongues glued to their social media handles for months if not for years, and stay on the top listing as the most stunning or star studded wedding, ever.
We love attention in Nigeria, so far as we can force it or buy it. A wedding without a long line of expensive ashebi and bridal train, is that one wedding? It can’t ever be Nigeria.
Read Also: Roadside begging: the new form of stomach infrastructure in Nigeria
Preparing for the Wedding of a lifetime in Nigeria.
One must agree that at least, 50% of couples who make it to the aisle walk down broke, this is as a result of nothing too serious, not because they envisioned it, but they saw it far too late, after they must have been swept off their feet by the contagious mind-set of planning that ideal wedding of a lifetime in a society such as ours. It is unfortunate that some couples are pushed beyond their limits to engage in some things that ordinary they won’t find themselves doing, that on that day, you rarely find men (bridegroom) smiling, because they know the amount of debt they have incurred due to their wives’ incessant appetite to please some certain class of people or just to slay.
Most couples are driven to become debtors by borrowing, turn their wedding into a profit making venture, they force friends and foe to buy their so called ashebi at ridiculous amount –not minding where and how those that would wear it would get the money—that they would make turnover, force these uniforms on people or even beg people to wear it, follow and unfollow friends on different social media handles, and make unimaginable requests of what to wear and what not to wear –after all , it’s their day, and you owe them one thing: to honour their invitation.
Read Also: My Bossy Boss.
The Ideal Thought.
It is a pity that all the stress, headache, heartache, preparations to slay and go viral on internet is just for few hours; not much has been planned for years to come after everyone has shown off and dispersed, leaving the couple to themselves. Most families lie in ruins, not because they never had the best of weddings, or planned for that slay-die day, but because they only planned to fail: they got their heads too crowded with the unnecessary while the necessary waited to hit them hard when they least expected.
Nigeria is one of the countries where the most glamorous weddings take place, where people live for the internet –the yeah sayers-- but the stench that comes from behind closed doors in marriages can cause an epidemic. On the other hand, the number of divorce cases are also on the increase. Obviously, something is wrong somewhere: either we are not getting somethings right or we need to work harder in getting the right things done. It is high time we went back to the basis of building and planning a union of a life time and not that wedding that would break the internet.
Written by Oluoma Udemezue.