The worst thing about the wedding season is, well, the wedding. Invitations land up on your table, and you hope that they land gently because some of them are really heavy. Many of them have sleeves in them, and the more you know the family, the greater the number of the cards in the sleeve, one for the sangeet, one for the wedding, one for the pre-wedding dinner, one for the pre-wedding engagement ceremony and dinner…and finally the one for the reception, which goes to everyone in the city.

“You know this Anil Dharker?” the mother of the bride will say to the father as they do the invitee list. “Yes, yes,” the father will say. “You know our friend Chetan. Well, his friend Ashok once introduced me to Anil in the loo of the Bombay Gym. Of course, we couldn’t actually shake hands because our hands were otherwise engaged, haha, but if we had met two minutes earlier or later, we would surely have done so and exchanged visiting cards.”

“In that case,” the mother of the bride will say, “There’s no question about it. We have to call him.”

So you get called, along with hundred of other loo acquaintances to the big fat Indian wedding, whose presence is announced by the massive traffic jam on Marine Drive and the million-watt bulbs that light up the plaster of paris Gateways of India or Taj Mahals.

Over the years I have made a simple rule that tells me whether I should attend or not. I attend the wedding if:

a. I know the young man or woman getting married.

b. I know the parents well enough to know the existence of said young man or woman.

c. If the parents go beyond sending an invitation and actually bother to meet me or call me, indicating that their card goes beyond the routine.

Last week there came a wedding which fitted into slot c. In fact, the father of the bride sent a personal sms and an e-mail too, so how could I not go?

I was thwarted by the bigger fatter Indian wedding. My friend’s wedding was at the Mahalaxmi Racecourse Enclosure 2, which is of modest proportions compared with Racecourse Enclosure 1, which can hold thousands.

On that day it did, because that’s the day the daughter of one of India’s leading industrialists got married.

Well-known politicians attended, which meant lot of police and big time film stars attended, which meant lot of fans. We crawled and crawled through stop-go traffic along the approach road to the Racecourse, and once inside its grounds, crawled some more. It took me one hour and 10 minutes to cover a distance of half a kilometre at the end of which I found that there was no parking space anywhere for love or money. The option was to abandon the car or drive on. I drove on and hoped my friend would understand.

After this madness, it was a relief to sit in the comfort of the Jamshed Bhabha theatre and listen to the Symphony Orchestra of India’s celebrity concerts. You go for the music of course, but the sense of anticipation means as much: you sit and chatter and watch the auditorium fill up, then the sudden silence as the orchestra troops into our applause. Then the frenzied cacophony of sound as each instrument clears its musical throat. Then the tuning as the leader of the orchestra stands up, followed by the oboe’s pure clear sound giving the pitch. Finally, the complete silence as everyone waits for the stage door to open, and for the conductor to walk in. Then the music begins…