These Boots are made for Hiking: My First Toy

The Happy Couple Notice the color of the brides dress

Most volunteers like myself who has been here one year (can you believe that.. I have been here one year wow..wow) has been invited to 10, 15, 20 weddings by now but I had not been so lucky (?) (or maybe I had!!). So this was my first "official" invitation. My co teacher and friend from Aliabad village had invited me to her cousin wedding on Monday evening. This was a girl wedding (test - from by my wedding blog... How do you know if it is a girl or boy wedding?). The girl wedding is where the bride's dress is any color and it is usually the bride family that comes to this wedding. At the boy's wedding the bride's dress is white and it is his family and friends that are there. Most of the time the two weddings are on consecutive days (it must be draining for them as well as their pocket book!!). I took a marshurutka to my co teachers house Aygun and watched everyone get ready, most people go all out. Aygun's sisters go to the hair salon and get their hair done and lots and lots of makeup. The dresses for the younger and not so young females are extremely dressy. I find that (especially the village), the food is the same potato salad, beet and potato salad with lots of mayonnaise that is sitting on the table for hours, tomatoes and cucumbers and lots and lots of boiled meat. At the end of the celebration a small plate of meat kabob is served. So needless to say (since I don't eat meat here), I ate tomatoes and cucumbers with bread!! At our table there was room for 8 people comfortably but then they added 7 more chairs so we sat shoulder to shoulder on these awful plastic chairs!! There were 500 guests at this party and not enough room at the tables for the children to sit. Hey, but a party is a party!! Everyone was up dancing as soon as the very loud music started. It was very interesting to watch, the men and boys dancing together and the women and girls dancing together. This is also true of seating arrangements, the men sat at difference tables then the women (I believe it is because of the alcohol), there is NONE served on the woman's tables. Aygun asked me to dance and of course I did. The announcer noticed that I wasn't a "villager" and asked Aygun who I was. At weddings everyone goes up to congratulate the couple, so he asked if I would... Oh crap... I looked at Aygun and said "I will do it IF you translate for me". She said yes, so I did and thank the couple for inviting me and wished them happiness bah, bah.. Aygun translated and everything went fine, so I started to sit down. Aygun grabbed my arm and said "Oh, they are going to play American music and you MUST dance an American dance for us (side note - no alcohol was involved....darn!!). So I started dancing (they did the disco thing, lights, ball etc), everyone joined in and they film it, so if you see a crazy American rocking out on YouTube... it isn't me!!! After that I figured I better get out of Dodge, so another of Aygun's cousin took me home (no marshurutka's ran after 6 PM) and I had school the next day. Well, my first toy was a success (I think)!!!