Dinka wedding

One of my co-workers was getting married and invited myself and a few others to his wedding in Yei (pronounced yeah!).  So we headed off on a 4 hour journey to go 100km to a traditional tribal wedding.

The wedding was an arranged marriage that the families negotiated, and the price being cows.  In the Dinka tribe the man pays the woman’s family and she gets a higher price based on 3 things 1) height (the taller the better), 2) family lineage and 3) education (jury is still out on if this affects the price positively or negatively).  A cow goes for about 1000 pounds (or $350).  My co-worker paid 85 cows for his wife to be, approx 85,000 pounds or over $24,000.  Considering that 90% of the population makes less than $1 a day, this is quite a lot of money.

Anyway after traveling with an armed police escort we arrive in Yei and quickly dress for the wedding.  But the wedding is held up because they are still negotiating…one of the sticking points being the large bull that needs to be sacrificed at the wedding.  SO after another 2500 pounds and the process of finding the right bull, the wedding is able to finally commence. 

It was a pretty amazing experience, there was tons of chanting and a procession, we were ushered into a large tent that was covered in embroidered flowers where women (which took the bride and her friends one month to make) wiped our faces with clothes and then our feet.  Outside the tent they sacrificed the bull to the sounds of chanting and drumming.  
 

First they carefully skinned the bull then slowly removed each organ whole, they even cut a small incision in one of the 3 or 4 stomachs and then pulled out all the grass.  

The bride eventually came with 50 women in attendance and wearing a surprisingly traditional white wedding gown (with sleeves) and a veil.  Her hands and feet had dark henna and she and her maids had sparkles on their faces.  The mood became serious and she looked quite somber.  The two hadn’t really seen each other much and they definitely both seemed nervous.  In addition she is quite young and will have to leave her family.

The wedding went on for 3 hours with lots of speeches, chanting and singing. The men sat on one side, the women on the other.  Eventually they asked the kawajas (foreigners) to stand up and speak.  We took turns said a few words and then everyone sang a song about ‘welcoming people from the land where people speak Hallo!’.   It was late into the night and eventually the ceremony was over. 

Everyone trickled back to their tukuls, the men went to their homes including the grooms and the bride to hers where people stay up all night but don’t eat.

Early the next morning we were brought to the grooms family where we met all the elders (the senior negotiating team for the bride price) who turned out to be mostly women as the men had died in the war.  There we hung out with the bride and her cousins talking about marriage and traditions.  They asked me many questions about marriage, the U.S. whether we have vegetables and meat, had I gone to school, and they all assumed because I was not yet ‘grown’ (read tall) therefor I must be 15.  When I explained I wasn’t married because I hadn’t found anyone, I got many offers of 19 yr old sons and brothers, even an offer to be the 2^nd wife of a girl's father.  

Eventually another cow was slaughtered and then the women drummed and danced, which I was asked to take part in.  

We ended up eating a meal of millet porridge with warm milk and then made the long trek back to Juba.