Missing Bangladesh and the Festivities

Bangladesh may not be the best country to live in nor a place to tour, but it has its own charm, if only you open your eyes and mind, you will be enchanted by this small and young country too. What I miss most of Bangladesh aside from the friends and family I left there, is the winter season from late November to early March. It's a very pleasant weather. In the city, the temperature gets cold like Baguio City during the 80's, while in the hilly parts, it gets too cold that people die because of the cold temperature.

Early morning winter, it's getting denser.

And since it's winter there, it's also considered the "Wedding Month". One of H's cousin is set to get married this month. They already held their "holud" last wednesday and the wedding is today.

The engaged couple wears yellow or orange for the Holud 

Holud is one of the many festivities in connection of a wedding celebration. It's commonly practice in Muslim religion and Hindu religion, and it became a Bengali Tradition. Some Christians/Catholics adapts this celebration also, but I have yet to attend a Holud for a Christian or catholic couple.

Holud is a bangla word for turmeric and it's also the bangla word for color yellow. Traditionally, holud for the groom and for the bride is celebrated separately, but nowadays, people celebrate it together. It's similar to a bridal shower or to a stag party without the "hanky-panky" or "kinky games" or "naughty games". In Holud, the couple are usually dress in color yellow or orange traditional bengali clothes, and the family members’ clothes are also color coded, and the guests are expected to wear something yellow or orange too. The couple are seated on the stage where guests will have to scrub them with turmeric paste or spread the turmeric paste in any expose skin of the couple, and feed them with sweets afterwards. This practice is the “cleansing of the couple” before they enter the married life. If we look at it, it’s similar to the confession we do prior to the wedding celebration. We have to be clean before we face the Lord and the church community and accepts the Sacrament of matrimony.

Sometimes, they also prepare a program of dancing and singing.

Dance presentation during gaye holud of another cousin

In H's family, they don't practice this tradition, that's why we didn't have a Holud party, but if given a choice and chance, I want to experience the Bengali traditions also, but definitely, I will have a "Boubhat party".

My second time to wear a saree at my staff's holud party. (2008)

Tradition is a guide and not a jailer. - W. Somerset Maugham

Another thing that I will miss this winter season is the "mustard field" in bloom.

He don't bring me flowers anymore, but he made sure to give me a field of flowers.

Last winter, H and his family planned a trip to the village so that I can see and have a picture in the mustard field. This one was just a small patch of mustard field, but nevertheless, it was awesome. They say dark spirits lurk around the mustard field that's why they find it weird that I want to go and see and have a picture in the mustard field. 

Pre-Cana Seminar

Pre-Cana or Preparation for Marriage Counselling is a requirement in a Church wedding. Since H and I are based overseas, we requested from the Chancery of Cubao to allow us to have our pre-cana abroad.

Bibaho Prostuti Shohaika (Marriage Preparation Help)

Our pre-cana was administered by a seminarian. And there were times that the discussion was awkward since there were topics that are “taboo” in BD like the sexuality and family planning. We had a one hour session every night from 730pm to 830pm for 5 consecutive nights. It’s a good thing that it was Ramadan during that time, the roads going to the church were traffic free all the time, that it took us 30minutes from the house to the church, and 45minutes from the church to the house which usually takes 1 hour and more during regular days. We consider it our “date” too because we go out for coffee or snacks after the session before going home.

During the seminar, I’m so proud with H because he shared lots of things. He is a man of few words and he doesn’t talk about his emotions but during the seminar, he opened up and shared in the topic too. I want to share what we had discussed in the 5 nights seminar.

1^st session: the seminarian, Brother Ronald Costa, discussed what Marriage is. He asked H and me why we decided to get married and why we want to marry each other. Marriage is a covenant as God is present in it, and it is the first vocation. I can’t recall anymore our answers but H mentioned that he decided to marry me because he wants to spend the rest of his life with me already, he doesn’t want to wait for the weekend for us to see each other but he wants to see me before going to sleep and as soon as he wakes up.

We talked about the 7 Sacraments too and of course I memorized the 7 sacraments that’s why when I can’t complete the 7 sacraments, I made sure to Google it once I reach home. And of course, I’m correct, I already did mentioned the 7 sacraments but Brother Ronald made a mistake by telling me that Matrimony and Holy Orders are one.

Before we ended the 1^st session, he gave us an assignment. We have to write 5 Good Qualities and 5 Bad Qualities of each other and we will discuss it next session.

2^nd Session: We discussed first the 5 qualities. I was surprised I wasn’t able to write 5 bad qualities of H. He isn’t perfect but I can’t seem to find any bad qualities except the obvious hehe. And I was worried that he will be able to write 5 bad qualities of me. We didn’t discuss further with our good qualities, Brother Ronald just reminded us to continue with our good qualities. On the other hand, we discussed the bad qualities and what are the possible causes of it and if we can fix our bad qualities. And well, our bad qualities are fixable.

Brother Ronald shared to us the ingredients to a Happy Conjugal Life: faithfulness, respect to each other, full consent both intellect and will, accepting each other, belief in God and to each other, praising/appreciation of each other, open and constant communication, living according to our means (family budget), healthy sexual life, quality time for each other and forgiveness.

The 3^rd session was awkward since the discussion is about the reproductive system and sex. H didn’t share much during the discussion because he is uncomfortable with the topic. While me, I find it uncomfortable because I’m talking to a Bangladeshi. Yes, they are also advocates of Natural Planning and Brother Ronald reiterated that many times during the session. At the same time, he mentioned to us to be responsible parents and to cultivate a loving relationship with our spouse.

The 4^th session, we talked about family spiritual life. It’s not only the physical body that needs nourishment; our spirit/soul needs nourishment too. We need to pray, attend the mass regularly and do good. We have to balance our time, time for self, time for spouse, time for kids and time for others. We have to be the role model to our children and nourish them according to the teaching s of the Church.

The 5^th session was just a review of the whole session and giving of certificates.

The pre-cana class may not be the best session but nevertheless, it enlightened us about married life, our responsibilities to each other and to our family. H is now much aware that he really needs to be more supportive of me especially that I don’t have my family and friends in BD. He is my support and my beacon.

"I take you to be my Best Friend, my faithful Partner, and my one True Love. I promise to encourage you and inspire you and to love you truly through good times and bad. I will forever be there to laugh with you, to lift you up when you are down and to love you unconditionally through all of our adventures in life together."