The Last Get-Away

This post has been in the works for a long time now. I apologize for the delay, but since people might be (hopefully) checking in on the blog a little more often these days (now that D-day has passed), I thought I'd better reward you.

What advice might you give to a couple who is expecting their first child? Well, one person's advice to us was a take a weekend away, and to enjoy the trip. What better opportunity than our friends' wedding in Chicago? We both arranged for the weekend off. It would be our first Indian wedding (quite exciting). We'd take the train (uber-fun). And we'd stay in the fancy hotel where the wedding was (Hilton, here we come!).



And then the rains came. This was our view from our train window. It had just started raining, fairly hard, when our train was about to arrive at the Dearborn Amtrak station. I was quite relieved, thinking how nice it would be to not have to drive in the heavy rains. I was also relieved, thinking to myself, that rain shouldn't really delay a train, so our trip would go ahead as planned... and then the announcement came: we should expect a delay in arrival of 2-3 hours. Since we were supposed to arrive at about 10pm or so, that was a little inconvenient, but oh well, right? C'est la vie! We got on the train, and as we headed out toward Ann Arbor, they broke the bad news.

Turns out 2-3 hours was a conservative estimate. Now they weren't giving actual estimates, but they were warning us that a flash-flood warning was in effect, at least until Kalamazoo geographically, and during flash flood warnings, Amtrak's policy is to go no faster than 10-15mph.

I'll give you a moment to digest that information. Fifteen miles per hour. From Dearborn to Kalamazoo. Google it if you want. One hundred and thirty-eight miles. That divided by 15 is 9.2. NINE HOURS for what is normally just over a two-hour drive. The entire train ride to Chicago was supposed to be five hours.

For those whose computers are faster than Amtrak trains, a clip is included at the bottom to demonstrate what 10-15mph on a train feels like. If only there were some kid outside riding his bike, you would notice that he were going faster than we were. To make a long story short, it got worse from there, and we never really did end up going full speed. We were supposed to arrive about 10pm or so on Friday night. Wedding festivities started at 1pm on Saturday. We didn't end up getting to Chicago until after noon on Saturday, and that was only because we got off the train a stop early and took a cab into the city. (We beat the train by a good 20-30 minutes.) So, we paid for a night in a fancy hotel, and instead got really uncomfortable seats on a really slow train that was ALWAYS either freezing or roasting because the A/C apparently was either all or nothing.

We rushed to the hotel and hurriedly grabbed quick showers (possibly the best showers of our lives, though, and made it downstairs just in time for a fancy buffet-style Indian lunch. Mmmmm... sooo gooodddd!!!

And so the festivities began. We met up with some good friends from school. Above is Anita... we hadn't seen her in about a year, so we were super excited to get to hang out with her.

After a really good buffet of Indian food for lunch (better than Indian food available in Ferndale, not as good as Ann Arbor, if you're wondering just HOW good), we spent the first part of the wedding festivities with the groom, of course, since he was our connection... He and his family had a small ceremony where they were blessed by the clergy. That was our first chance to see them all decked out in the super fancy wedding garb.

The happy groom

And what would logically follow a quiet, tranquil, peaceful religious ceremony like that? Well, how does a dance party in the streets of Chicago sound? (You're probably thinking, "I like the way you think!" Well, it wasn't my idea, but it was certainly fun.)

You didn't think I was kidding about dancing in the street, did you?

The entire groom's side boogied down

We did, too, but we paused for a photo op

Are you one of those people who's hard to impress? Think that getting a few hundred people to dance outside in the Chicago streets to Indian music blaring over loud speakers isn't too exciting? How about we kick it up a notch....

Maybe ushering in the groom on a white horse will make you warm and fuzzy inside

And not just that, but let's dress up the horse in fancy garb so that he looks super fancy, too...

(Are you thinking, where are all the pictures of that pregnant belly? That's not exactly the focus of this story, if you haven't noticed... sorry to disappoint. But at least look at the pretty pictures and oooh and ahhh a little.)

Neil's Dad breaking it down.

There's a pregnant belly

A ceremony in which each family presented the other with flowery stuff

The entrance of the bride, in the super fancy hotel

I mean, our wedding was ALMOST this fancy. (Ceremony was not exactly in English, so I can't tell you exactly how good it was... but it was impressive to watch)

Tying the clothes together... symbolic, eh?

This hall was huge and gorgeous...

Mmmm.... Indian food...

Impressive dessert buffet... and a sneaky shot of friend Alisha (a frequent star of such other blogs as EglesInCostaRica.blogspot.com and EglesInCentralAmerica.blogspot.com)

Are you drooling, too?

Last boogie down, shot

Fun trip... one last adventure... Next post may be about an even more exciting adventure....