Ros (Anointing)

The Day before Yesterday (6th Jan) I went to attend my friends Ros Ceremony. Ros is one of the traditional ceremonies of the Goan Catholics conducted one or two days before the wedding wherein the bride and the groom are anointed with a mixture of coconut water and milk by the parents, relatives and close friends as a sign of their blessings to the couple.

I missed the Ros of the Groom as it was on the 5th and i was in the train at that time, but i ensured i attended that of the bride.

My friends and i reached the house of the bride at around 20:00 hrs and found that the house was glittering with lights and a few close relatives were all gathered and having a good time. I guess they were waiting for all the guests to assemble so that the Ceremony could begin.

At 20:30 after the snaks and the soft drinks, everybody were all geared up for the ceremony to begin. Us friends has decided we would be emptying not one but two buckets of the mixture onto the bride. Suddenly a couple of the brides cousins rushed up to us and requested us to keep the bucket for the last as they had their own surprise all planned. We promptly agreed as we judged by the devilish grins on the faces of those girls (who in normal circumstances would appear to be two innocent angels), that the bride would need the bucket of water after the they were through with their surprise... :-)

Anyways, the long wait ended the ceremony had begun... The parents and elederly relatives started off by pouring and rubbing a handfull of the mixture and giving their blessings. Then came the cousins... we noticed that all of them were holding eggs in their hands.. soon the eggs were broken and rubbed off on the bride.. Well what can I say.. I was kind of dissapointed.. was that the surprise we were looking forward to??? because that was kind of predictable.. Well the answer is 'NO' suddenly one of the cousins came out with a paste.. a slimy looking paste it was.. It was dirty grren in color like that off the moss that forms on the walls during the monsoons.. Texture not too pleasing... That kicked off the screaming of the girls around esspecially that of the younger sister of the bride, who started yelling at the cousins.. but the cousins were pretty determined to achieve what they had planned and in the end did achieve it.. luckily though they did not put it all and they targeted only the hands and some of it on the Clothes..

Well next it was us.. Me being a veg i was not very comfortable with all the broken eggs around and the their smell in the air... but hey it was a ceremony and we had a plan.. so we stuck to it... Two buckets filled with the mixture were emptied on the bride... And i think she would have enjoyed it... considering wat had happended a couple of minutes back... :-)

Well the ceremony had come to an end.. it was time for dinner.. unfortunately a couple of my frineds and myself had to leave early.. So after a couple of snaps with the bride and the groom we were all set to leave... But before going curiosity got the better of us and we went to the cousins to enquire the contents of that greasy, slimy stuff that was applied.... Turned out to be...

Bananas, Tomatoes, Eggs and Food Colour...