weddings<\/mark><\/a> have a way of making your relationship status feel like your identity. Before anyone asks what you do or what you\u2019ve been up to lately, the conversation somehow lands on your love life. \u201cAww, you\u2019re still single?\u201d comes with a sympathetic tilt of the head. \u201cYou’re next,\u201d someone cheerfully declares. Then come the classics. \u201cDo you even want to get married?\u201d \u201cAre you too fussy?\u201d \u201cYour parents must be worried.\u201d Every South Asian woman who has crossed a certain age has heard some version of these questions. Years ago, they would have made me uncomfortable. Today, they mostly make me laugh.<\/p>\n\n\n\nThe only real inconvenience I have discovered about attending weddings solo has nothing to do with loneliness. It is removing a dozen strategically placed safety pins from my sari at midnight with nobody around to help. Or trying to unhook my blouse after a long evening of dancing. That, I would argue, is the true single-girl struggle at an Indian wedding. Almost everything else has been surprisingly liberating.\u00a0 <\/p>\n\n\n\n
You Are Never Really Alone <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Destination weddings, especially, have completely changed my perspective. There was a time when checking into a hotel room alone would have made me feel self-conscious. Today, it seems like the start of an adventure. At a recent wedding in Jodhpur, I spent time with wedding photographer Kartik Bhagat behind Dream Diaries, whom I had only known professionally until then. It was refreshing to see him in his element, documenting the celebrations while sharing plenty of laughs in between. I also bumped into Anil Singhvi ji, a longtime professional acquaintance of my father, and unexpectedly found myself chatting about stock markets and investments over cocktails instead of discussing wedding gossip. By the evening, I was swaying to an immersive Sufi performance and dancing through the artist line-up as though I were at a music festival rather than a wedding. Somewhere between breakfast conversations, dance floors and late-night chai, you stop being \u201cthe single guest\u201d and simply become another person celebrating people you love. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Your Relationship Status Isn\u2019t Your Identity <\/p>\n\n\n\n