Exotic Costumes

This weekend was a busy one. Earlier last week I had spent quite some time calling around Indian saree stores and not having much luck getting through. A couple didn't offer tailoring services; at one shop the phone just rang, and rang, and rang. One home-located business had had their phone disconnected, and the forwarding phone number wasn't working either.

Finally, I got lucky when I called Chaubara. The gentleman was very helpful and we set up an appointment Saturday. His wife is in India right now, on a shopping trip, I think, but he was able to get his mother to be there. She showed me how to put on a sari. This really helped a lot in getting the concept of how it all works. I do have a video but it's rather choppy. And then, later in the day we went over to the tailor who does ladies' garments. We told him what was needed, stressed that we needed one of the cholis and petticoats ready in a week so that I could have some time to practice putting these on for the wedding on July 2nd.

Raj at Chaubara advised that it would probably be a good idea to get some jewelry as it's usual for women to dress up to the finest for special events. There were some really lovely jewelry, and I finally settled on a black jet necklace and earrings. I liked some of the more fancy jewely, but it wouldn't be polite to “outshine” the bride even though in Indian weddings you'll see jewely everywhere. Black jewelry goes with anything, and for me, the colorfulness of the sari will be enough.

Yesterday, we went to India Saree Palace to see if we could find a nice outfit for Bruce. Unfortunately, they didn't have any in his size, but the gentleman said he would check with the other stores to see if they had one for him. And I got some bangles.

Yes, I have pictures of the necklace and earrings. However, the cable that I use to download picture seems to have gone missing. It's gotta be somewhere in my room and I'll have to do some good cleaning to see if it shows up.

Sometime later this week I'm going to see if I can find a decent sandal. I was hoping to find a pair of Indian shoes at the shops we visited in Langley Park, but no such luck. And with time being of essence, I don't think I'm going to be ordering one online, but will likely do so sometime in the near future.