Weekday wedding events

Lifestyle Wedding, Fashion & Beauty
1

Have you guys gone to weekday wedding events?
Specifically a mehndi that was on wed/Thursday?
I know goray people do that sometimes with their weddings and the turnout isn’t great but I was curious how it goes with desis.

Thursday mehndi, Friday shadi.

It’s not ideal but we’re having to move cross-country for rotations/work that following Monday so I’d rather have a day buffer since we’ll be tired. We couldn’t do that if we went with our parents’ suggestion of a Friday mehndi/nikkah and Saturday shadi.
We’d have to catch a 6am flight out immediately after the wedding…
But if a Thursday mehndi seems preposterous then we’ll have to go with that option.

So far the pros are:

  • extra day to unpack/travel before rotations
  • most venues are available for Thursday from when I called around
  • wayyyyyyyyyyyy cheaper

The cons:
-we’re worried our friends that aren’t immediately in the town won’t attend the mehndi. Considering mehndi rely mostly on the people there for the hungama, it’ll suck if my friends don’t show up. They’ll have to take off work for 1-2 days if they’re out of town.

  • if people DO come, they’ll leave very early

Pros for fri/sat mehndi/wedding:

  • more people can come
  • less of a problem for out of town guests
  • people can stay later for the functions

Cons:

  • wedding would end around 11-11:30pm on Saturday night. We’d have to change, try to get some sleep, and be at the Airport for the earliest flight, pray nothing gets delayed, and be ready to start 1st day of rotations at 8am the next morning. I’m gonna be exhausted.

  • those out of town guests may not come anyways

  • there is a HUGE difference in money when I was looking at prices. I wouldn’t be able to afford the venues I want for the wedding so I’d have to find alternate options.

I don’t have too many friends from out of town but I’m worried about work obligations for people. We could start the mehndi at 7:30-8 and have it end by 11pm but I don’t know if that’s too short of a time. My in-laws are out of state but the only people coming from their side are family and they’ll take off regardless so BF told me not to worry about that.

Somegroovychick offered some advice (totally appreciated btw) but I wanted to see if other ppl had done weekday mehndis.

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Re: Weekday wedding events

i have been to a monday tuesday wednesday wedding. it was the best wedding i have ever attented.

many guest could not make it, i had less time to get ready as i had a full day of work prior to each events...but the ambiance was at it's best.Everyone enjoyed so much!

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Re: Weekday wedding events

Was it because there were fewer people there? What made the ambiance so great?
Share share.

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Re: Weekday wedding events

The only Mehndis I've been to are usually on a Wed or Thurs night. Wed if the Shaadi is on Fri and Thurs if the Shaadi is on Saturday. I've never heard ppl complain about this in our circle and has never effected the amount of turnt upness at a wedding. Hehe. Anywho I think you should be fine - I expect mehndis to be during the week and usually close friends will take those days off anyway.

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Re: Weekday wedding events

Would you consider a daytime/lunch reception for your Saturday wedding? The photos come out way nicer during the day hours and venue rentals are cheaper for morning weddings. You usually have to be done by 4, I think, so they can set up for evening affairs so it would be 12-4 roughly and you'd have the rest of the day "off".

otherwise if his family is flying in regardless and your local friends are, well, local, then I think a Thursday mehendi would be fantastic and wouldn't require people to take time off work. I think you should go for it then! 7-11 is a perfect time for a mehendi. If people want to, they can always stay later and party with you guys.

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Re: Weekday wedding events

Yes. I've attended lots of Thursday mehndis. It's not great, but manageable. People who are close to you and people who have come from out of town will take Friday off, and maybe even Thursday. So they won't really be affected.

But you will lose or inconvenience the local guests who cannot take off because of the nature of their jobs and people with small children (but desi weddings are not ideal for those anyway -- not much you can do about that unless you have daytime events).

When you're timing a Thursday mehndi, just know that local people in particular will have a hard time getting to your event before 8. So just time things accordingly. Leave a good buffer for late arrivals with the cocktail hour. If you're relying on these people also to be part of rasams and performances, you need to check in with them to see what's doable.

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Re: Weekday wedding events

i guess less people..more intimate..guest actually talked to each others...sitting at differents people table to mingle..the grom bride danced in all three functions and made every single guest dance...the food was yummy..and it was the same hall three days in a rows whihc made the venue seem like a familar place for a big get together

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Re: Weekday wedding events

You guys are making me feel so much better! I had checked some other forums online and most everyone was complaining about weekday weddings, but then I realized that it was because non-desi weddings usually are during the day so that could be a problem.

Day time receptions wouldn't make a huge difference in terms of convenience since we'd have to fly out on Sunday even if that was the case. There's very few flights that leave from here to where we have to go for rotations so we'd have to keep saturday completely free to fly out at like 6am.

Thanks girls!

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Re: Weekday wedding events

The level of "turntupness" was most of my concern. LOL. I didn't want it to be super lame and over by 9pm since everyone had to go to work the next day/people were exhausted because they were arriving from work. But I guess the closest people to me will still be there and rasams will be earlier so the aunties can go home for their bed time if they need to.

Yeah I wasn't planning on doing rasams till 8:30-9pm anyways. We're a fairly conservative group in general, so there won't be very MUCH dancing in any case. I know mehndis run late for some of the people here because there's like 4 hours of dancing but that won't be the case for mine since most of my friends don't dance very much/won't dance in front of men. It'll mostly be rasams and then 1-2 dances that my friends choreograph and food.

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Re: Weekday wedding events

I've been to lots of Friday weddings, that's counted as the weekend so people still come. Been to a few week day weddings, last one I went to was on a Wednesday and most people still turned up.
With mehndis, it's 50-50, depends on how big it is. If people want to be there, they will come regardless of the days.

Having said that, these days mehndis tend to be a week apart from the wedding for convenience, rather than do back to back. So a mehndi will be on a friday or saturday, and the wedding will be the following weekend.

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Re: Weekday wedding events

I brought up the idea of doing it a week apart but it'll be really hard for my BF's family and friends to take THAT much time off from work. Which is understandable. That's definitely what the trend has been in our community as well, though. Keep the events separated by a week.

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Re: Weekday wedding events

Ive been to loads of weekday weddings and its not even just a desi thing anymore, in fact Ive had 3 english wedding invites this year all for a Friday and all during the day.

With Desis its so common now too, in august I even have a wedding on a monday and another on a wednesday. The assumption is if youre close enough and care enough you will make the effort. Personally as a guest Im just honoured to be invited and not bothered at all about the slight inconvenience. Yes its not ideal for me but the weddings not about me is it? :)

Actually even my nikkah was on a Tuesday and reception on a Friday (at least my mehndi was on a sat ;0) my parents were particular about it being on certain auspicious dates so they didn't care as long as that was adhered to; we also stuck with it as I had a lot of people flying in so to make it easier for them its best to have events as close as possible. Personally I see no problem with it; its your wedding and I imagine your nearest and dearest will make the effort. I do appreciate we don't want to force people to take time off work so just keep a margin and make sure there are canapes etc for those rushing straight from work in the evening to keep them sweet until events begin :)

Just make sure you leave at least a day in between events to allow for recovery time!!

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Re: Weekday wedding events

My mehndi is on a Fri and fam made me put shadi on Sunday (Sat off) so that I wouldn't be dead tired on wedding day ha ha. So that makes my Vaima on a Monday (which has already been a problem for some people. But since Valima is a short function, ends early, I can justify it being on weekday.

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Re: Weekday wedding events

I hope all my guests have the attitude you do!

Yeah, I think Monday valimas are getting popular because i've heard of quite a few. I was mostly worried about the mehndi since that's when the hulla-gulla is and I didn't want it to be over so soon because it's on a weekday

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Re: Weekday wedding events

You sound like you want a nice ronak wali mehndi. Try and do it on a friday if possible. I like the idea of the daytime wedding too :). It's very popular in PK nowdays and you could maybe get a beautiful venue that has a sunroom etc.

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Re: Weekday wedding events

yeah we're still trying to mess around with the dates, we MIGHT MIGHT be able to squeeze it in 2 days after my boards/a week before ramadan starts. That way I can do a Mayoun on Friday, mehndi on saturday, and wedding on sunday. So far, everyone's saying that that's doable for them. And lets us do a honeymoon, walima, and comfortably move in/settle into married life before rotations.

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Re: Weekday wedding events

thanks ladies, you're all the best! :)