Reception Dinner

There are rushes, there are stampedes, and then there are wedding reception dinners.

It all begins with guests piling up at the garden, slowly but surely building into an army that can’t wait to unleash its wrath. Everyone’s around for 2 purposes: taking a photo with the couple on stage and then going nuts at the buffet counter. Actually, it’s just the second one. The photo is nothing but a needless obligation. Neither are people particularly excited about it nor do the couple want pictures with four hundred people whose existence wasn’t part of their sphere of knowledge until a second ago. People just see those lines as the time cost of accessing the endless plates of food they’ve been getting wet dreams about since Monday morning. 

Waiters have been roaming around with starters for a while but most people feel criminally neglected. Every time a waiter comes close and then turns away the exact moment those people stretch their hairy arms to grab a dozen cheese corn balls. It’s a tragedy. Kids running around the garden occasionally bring the waiters down with a flying tackle, further reducing the supply of starters and increasing its scarcity and perceived value, almost like Bitcoin. Clearly, the starters aren’t going to pacify the crowd and matters start heating up. 

At this point, everyone has to make a trade-off. Stand in the line and wait for the eternally delayed couple to arrive and begin the shitty photo ceremony? Or rather invest the time by quietly walking around the buffet counter like a vulture and waiting for the first signs of opening? It’s a neuron-blasting dilemma and brings out everyone’s sophisticated game theory skills into action. Some hedge their bets- standing near the stage while asking their kids to ensure Russia-grade surveillance around the dining area. 

Suddenly, the chat counter opens out of nowhere. Some insiders, presumably cousins of the groom, knew exactly when that’d happen and manage to strategically position themselves to rake in the Pani Puri. But the entire dinner section is still not open, so most uncles hold their horses and don’t rush for the snacks, lest they be perceived as greedy assholes. At the same time, the cousins continue to binge on their 7th plate of Tikki and teeter dangerously on the brink of violent dysentery. 

Meanwhile, the couple continues to delay endlessly and the waiting guests soon get frustrated. Their hunger is reaching dangerous levels already, and the tantalizing menu items threaten to turn their mild salivation into a veritable flood. 

Some free-thinking revolutionaries decide to skip the line at the stage and start queuing up for the plates. “Enough of this waiting crap, I want my Navratan Korma” their hunter-gatherer mind tells them. And all it takes is for a few desperados to start queuing up. It’s enough of a precedent to bring a barrage of people behind them as the queue turns into a serpentine line stretching a few kilometers. 

An ever-growing queue pulls in even more people, reminiscent of a multi-level marketing scheme. At one point, even the couple’s parents leave the photo ceremony to start lining up. Screw these pictures, logic dictates that they can’t risk missing out on the Paneer Makhani, a crowd favorite on such debauched occasions. 

After endless moments of waiting and the queue getting longer than the Western Express Highway, the caterers finally get the go-ahead. The floodgates open, and what ensues is a level of barbaric looting that makes Genghis Khan look like the paragon of sainthood. 

Plates clank, gravies fly around and people ransack the last vestiges of the Hakka noodles in a bid to ensure that nobody in the family walks out without gaining a few kilos. World peace seems like a myth as war rages at the live pasta counter, with separate skirmishes going all over the ground to secure a seat at the limited number of tables. 

Some people put every living cell in their body on notice and go berzerk at the dessert counter. Paramedics are rushed in to contain the sudden surge in heart problems as health insurance premiums in the neighborhood start hitting all-time highs. 

In the end, the army has to intervene to bring in a measure of peace. Amidst all the scenes of gastric warfare, the couple suddenly realizes that nobody has taken photos with them. Forget that, even the cameraman and his crew left and are now seen destroying the non-veg section.  

Realizing the perverse logic of the event, even the couple rush into the gardens, as FOMO reigns supreme and the entire reception turns into a giant orgy of endless hogging and looting. News anchors are already at the site, surveying the catastrophic situation and already calling for donations to rescue the victims of war: poor folks who couldn’t land even a single piece of the delectable Manchurian. 

The warring continues until the wee hours of the morning, after which the caterers threaten to raise the per plate cost (including the charges for smashed cutlery), and concerns of a further dent to their retirement corpus forces the parents to broker peace and end the hunger games. 

All this goes on to demonstrate a constant quirk of human nature that wedding planners continue to overlook. It doesn’t take a Ph.D. in crowd management to see this, yet we continue to create conditions ripe for full-scale warfare every December. 

To put an end to all future bloodbaths, we must admit it. Each person has a dark side. The easiest way to bring it out is to make them wait for the reception dinner.