A Traditional Wedding Ceremony

Wedding Ceremonies is very common with everyone depending on your tribe and country. It is a day you get to share boundless joy with you and your husband to be. Though I'm not married yet, but I know it's one of the most happiest day for both the Bride and the groom.

My cousin on her wedding day 4 years ago

Here in Nigeria, different tribes have different ways in which they perform their wedding rituals. I will be telling you how my home town wedding ceremony is being carried out. Like you all know, I'm From the Igbo speaking tribe and one thing is for sure, I love my tribe and my people.

It is obvious that even if you're from the Igbo tribe, they still have different ways of performing their wedding Ceremonies but they're almost similar to each other.

When a man and a woman agrees to settle down (marry each other), they must first inform their parents. The man is then expected to come along with his father and some elders to the the girls house. According to traditions, you can't visit an elder without a kola. Depending on what the man's family want to use as kola, they may decide to by a goat or drink, but it's most adviceable to buy a drink, not just a drink but a strong one at that.

The man will have to make his intentions known to the girl's father and before any decisions will be taken, they have to call the girl to confirm if she knows the man sitting down and if she wants to get married to him. Once she agrees, they have to take the next step.

The man will be given a list from the girls family on what to buy. Some of the things he's expected to buy include;

• one box of wrapper (clothes) for the girl's mother and a minimum of 200 thousand naira. The 200 thousand naira will be used by the girls mother to prepare food few weeks before the wedding for the community, telling them that her daughter wants to marry, it is a means to invite people to her daughter's wedding.

• some tubers of yam

• gallons of palm win

• cartons of drinks depending on the type of drink they want and some other things added to it.

On the day of the ceremony, everyone would have arrived at the event center looking gorgeous in their different attires. The groom will be sitting down in a different canopy and there will be a special canopy for the groom's family.

The wife to be is expected to come out on her white tied wrapper with her girls around her to greet the elders before they start the ceremony properly.

After greeting the elders, she's expected to go back to the room and change into her wedding dress special for she and her husband to be. The elders on the other hand, will have to carry-on with the ceremony by breaking the kola and saying some words of prayers.

Later the Bride will be called out by her father and she has to dance to where her father is. Getting there, she will kneel down while her father will hand over a drink in a cup to her telling her to look for her husband and give him the drink.

At this period, I call it hide and seek because the bride does not know where her husband is sitting, so she has to dance round the canopies, looking for her husband. When she sees him, she will have to kneel before him, offering the drink to him. Immediately the husband is done drinking, he will have to put a little cash in the cup then dance with his wife back to his in-laws.

Both of them will have to kneel before the girls father and he will pray for them. Afterwards, they will dance and dance before cutting the cake, while they're dancing, the waiters will be sharing the food and drinks.

At the end, there will be presentation of gifts. Of course when attending a wedding ceremony, you don't have to go empty handed, you need to package gifts for the new couples.

Wedding Ceremony is so special in my home town, even when Most people are not invited, they still attend, showing love to both families.

I was given the permission to use those pictures and they're screenshot from my Facebook page.

Also written here

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