Sikh wedding rituals

Punjabi Wedding Traditions are very interesting. Punjabi wedding include many rituals. All the rituals are fun filled. In Punjabi Traditions First the people do “Roka” means to stop. Roka is to stop the search partner as the perfect match has been found. The next ritual is Taka means “set the date”  after the roka ceremony conceded at bride place to set wedding date and preparations are made for engagement. Then they do Kurmai means which is formal engagement. Engagement ceremony started with a short prayer by granthi (sikh priest). And then they set date of marriage. So they rituals begin 30 days before the marriage. Then in Punjabi tradition people do chunni ceremony after the engagement and this is performed by mother of a groom who cover the bride’s head with chunni (red scarf) which represents that from now she is responsible for upholding the honor and pride of her family. And there is ceremony called mehandi . The bride and groom both applied henna hand and feet. Choora ceremony is performed at bride home by her uncle giving her 21 bangles with red and cream color which is bath by yoghurt milk and rosewater. On the wedding day's first they do Sehra bandi it performed at groom's home. Sehra means a heavy embroidery veil is fixed onto the groom's head which is then tied on turban. Then the Anand karaj means “ceremony of bliss” which starts with kirtan- traditional singing of hymns. last doli which the bride sits in car and push the car by four people. This is very emotional moment for her parents as their daughter is leaving from her house to start new life.

   

Sikhism Beliefs

I belong to sikh culture. I love my culture and its traditional values. In this blog I will tell you the facts about what sikh believe. Sikh believe that everyone (men and women) are equal and have equal status before God, who created the whole universe. The name of the sikh holy book is Shri Guru Granth Sahib Ji. We worship 10 Gurus. Sikh people wore a steel bracelet called "kara". The place where sikh people worship is known as Gurudwara and it is where the sikh holy book "shri Guru Granth Sahib Ji" is kept. In gurudwara all sikh people remove their shoes and all of us cover our heads as a sign of respect. "Golden Temple" is the central Sikh shrine which is in amritsar, India. In gurudwara there is a langar hall in which sikh participate, it's a communal meal, of Punjabi food which is cooked and served by volunteers. The traditional dress of sikh culture is salwar suit in women and kurta pajama in men. Punjabi folk dance is bhangra (performed by men) and giddha (performed by women). Sikh wedding includes various rituals. Engagement ceremony is called “Kurmai” which is performed a week before the wedding. This ceremony is performed in gurudwara (sikh Temple) or can be performed at bride/groom house. This ceremony involves ardas, kirtan and langar- which is a common meal. In the marriage we wear traditional dresses and it’s lots of fun. All of the family members and relatives together enjoyed a lot. So there are lot of more good things about this culture which I enjoy the most.

                             

The importance of festivals

                 I am from India and I love the Indian traditions and festivals which we celebrate in our culture. Every festival we celebrate has its own uniqueness and specialty. There is something which makes every festival unique. My family starts off each day with a prayer to thank God for what he gives us and what we are. Also, Holidays mean a lot to my family because in that day we can spend time together, share our thoughts to each other, play some games or watch a movie.

                  Some important holidays/festivals in our culture are Gurpurab, Diwali and Dussehra. Each festival has its own meaning and importance. People celebrate them with traditions which makes people to enjoy more. After celebrating a festival together than all of the  family members and relatives sit together and eat dinner. The dinner time conversations valued in my family because we share our thoughts to each other or plan to make some plan on holidays and everyone give their opinion.

             My favorite festival is Diwali. On that day, my family do lot of things. We go to shopping, clean our house, make lot of Punjabi traditional food. My family plan to give something to our relatives. We do lot of fun on that day because on that day my cousins came to our house and celebrate together. We plan to do something to make our Diwali special. We decorate our house with colorful candles. At evening time, we do huge fireworks and mom makes different kind of sweets. In our culture, we wear colorful traditional dresses on festivals like Diwali, dussehra and everyone want to look beautiful on that day. So, every festival brings enjoyment, happiness to our houses. I wish that the new generation will also give importance to these festivals and continue celebrating these festivals by learning its importance in our life.

               

Small happy family

Family is something which plays an important role in our life. I believe that a person without family is not complete in this world because family is a very important part of our life. Every member of the family emotionally attaches to their family members in their happiness as well as sadness. When you live in happy family than you feel secure and help each other in their bad time. I live in small and happy family, where we live for each other’s. When I get home after my school and my younger brother is not at home than I feel like something is missing because even though we fight a lot but still we care for each other. My Mom is the world best mom. She is very nice, pure hearted and always help people. I want to thank god for giving me such a nice mother. She makes me fresh and my favorite food when I get home and she always make sure that I eat healthy. My dad has always given me whatever I want from him. They guide me to the right direction if I ever need their help.  So, my parents are the best. My grandmother is my angel. She is India right now but I think I am very lucky to have a grandmother like her because she always supports me and always ready if I need her help. This is my small and happy family and my family members are everything for me.

              

Family values

Family values are the values that are passed from generation to generation within families. The more significant values are family unity, honesty, education etc. These are some of the values which I have learnt from my parents. Many years ago, the trend used to be like that dad go outside and work. Mother stayed at home doing household chores and take care of their children, help them to get their homework done before they could go outside and play. Every Sunday the family would go to church and in my case, we go to Sikh temple. And the mother at home teach childrens moral values such as respect. So, parents taught their childrens to respect their elders.

But now a day’s teens lack these moral values. They are more interested in learning how to use the internet, play violent video games and doing other stuff that they want to but not interested in learning the values that can make them a better person. The reality is that teens have lost their sense of the direction. Earlier childrens used to sit with their parents and talk to them about their whole day and more likely to spent most of their time with their family. But now childrens want to spent their time with their friends rather than family. They don’t like to share their thoughts with their parents. So, they lack the values which is very important for them. I believe that family values play a very important role in the growth of the children.

      

My Mom's healthy food

Eating food made at home is not only important for your diet, but it is also important as a part of your personal well-being. We all know that homemade food is healthier than processed food but still we prefer to eat junk food. Every day after school my mom would have made my favorite dishes because she doesn’t like me and my brother to go outside and eat food which will make us sick. It’s not like we never ate food from outside but we usually eat food at home made by my mom. We are only out once a week with all of my family members and free to eat whatever we want to. My mom always cook food using fresh vegetables and she always make sure that she makes something which me and my brother love to eat, so that we’ll not go outside to eat street food. I think the increase of the advertisement make childrens eat more junk food. This is the reason why they like to eat food from stores not at home. They like processed food more than the homemade food because of the flavoring and then they get obese. I believe parents should take care whether his/her child is eating healthy food because if they will make their child favorite dishes at home than maybe he/she will prefer more likely to eat at home and there is one more good thing of eating at home, eating at home gives entire family time to talk about their day. My mom always makes sure that we eat healthy that is why she is my angel because she takes care of everything.

   

Key to success

I believe that a key to success is to respect other people. I think that if you can bring smile to someone face than that smile will make your rest of the day better. If you really want to be happy than learn to respect other people and their feelings. If you always respect your parents and can do anything to make them happy that you should be really proud of yourself. I believe to be a successful person always remember how to deal with other people and be respectful. If you will give respect to them then automatically they will respect you also. If you will not help others when they need your help than how can you expect them to help you. If you really want people to respect you than learn to respect them.

So always give respect to others and talk to them nicely, don’t show your attitude or disrespect them because you have power and they don’t. The lack of respect often leads to conflict. If you want to build a strong relationship than the first key step is to learn how to give respect. If you are a person who always give importance to respect people than it may create more opportunities for you. I believe to give respect in order to get it. Always show positive attitude. If you are respectful than people will like you, talk about you and give respect to you but if you are person who always disrespect others than people will also disrespect you.