Weddings are an exciting time for couples and their families. Parents, aunts and uncles come together to commune around the love of their bride and groom; a love which provides light and warmth for everyone. Although the statement is true for many, this is not always the reality. Sometimes our loved ones, acting out of love, hurt us without realising. This week, we talk about conflict around the wedding day.
The truth is, regardless of how tight we try to hold it together, all things fall apart. But, what life looks like after the crumbling has stopped, that depends on us. Rice & Roses host sits down with her mother-in-law as well as Nyaki Tshabangu to talk about difficult situations that they had to face during their wedding period.
For our Q&A coming up soon, please send your questions on love, weddings, culture, and anything else to mrs@tsoseletso.com.
This is a PSD original series. Research and writing by Lungiswa and Reatile Mosoeu, music - sourced from Artlist.io. This is Rice and Roses, produced and brought to you by PieSlovakiaDance.
Episode #5: Out of Love
{Introduction}
* Audio clip: Truck delivering a cow
* Audio clip: Mom + cows moo in the background
* Audio clip: Commotion + thump
{Narrator: Cow story}
*Music: sad music
*Audio clip: mom on cow story
This is a story about the influence that unexpected events, history and unmoving points of view have on the outcomes of our dreams. We may plan, prepare and feel ready, but there are elements involved in our experience that can only be summarised as a roll of the dice.
In this clip, I sit down with my mother-in-law to talk about a difficult situation that she had to face during her wedding period.
*Audio clip: mom on uncle
My name is Lungiswa Ngwaziyamiyaya Mosoeu, I am a wedding dress blogger and newlywed. I decided to find everyday women, like me, to share their stories of how they got their dress and how the traditions they grew up in informed their wedding day decisions. This is Rice & Roses.
*Music - fade out
{Narration: opening}
In this episode, we go together to meet with a family-friend and colleague, Nyakallo Tshabangu. Her and her husband, Onnalenna, have been married for seven years now. The Tshabangu’s are a young duo who speak, move and think in a style uniquely their own. Very little about them looks like it may have come from someplace else. They are one of the most sincere, loving, and accommodating couples I have met, so when I heard that Nyaki’s husband and his mother had had a falling out around the time of their wedding, I wanted to know how Nyaki had handled it and where that story had ended, if it had ended at all. But, first Nyaki’s wedding dress.
* Music fade in
{Narration: the Wedding dress}
* Audio clip: Nyaki’s wedding dress
We open on this part of the conversation with Nyaki to get insight into the kind human being she is. Her main driver for deciding on a course of action comes down to purpose. For her, the goal of the wedding exercise was to get married. All other things moved from centre stage to her peripheral view, including the idea of walking the aisle in the “perfect” dress.
* Audio clip: Nyaki continued
Before 2020 was interrupted, there were 115,000 weddings happening daily around the world. That is just under 42 million weddings a year. Take any reasonable minimum average and apply it to the number of wedding dresses, rings, shoes and accessories being sold each year. Then take into account the venues for hosting, the amount of food, wedding gifts and other related purchases, and what you have is a $72 billion dollar global wedding industry. Hmm.
* Music - fade out
{Narrator: Nyaki & Mother relationship}
Weddings are an exciting time for couples and their families. Parents, aunts and uncles come together to commune around the love of their bride and groom; a love which provides light and warmth for everyone. Although the statement is true for many, this is not always the reality.
In our introductory episode, we heard about the pleasure Wandy gained from having both her mother and husband’s mother bond with her as they went wedding dress shopping. But, in Nyaki’s case, her soon-to-be mother-in-law had some reservations about her son’s big day; reservations that would put a strain on her relationship with her son, his fiance and his incoming extended family.
I asked Nyaki what her relationship with her husband’s mother was like before she and Onalenna got engaged.
* Audio clip: Relationship before the fall
*Music - fade in
{Narrator: Fallout}
I followed that up by asking why their relationship had fallen apart, and why her mother-in-law did not attend their wedding.
* Audio clip: The Fallout
{Narrator: Resolution}
The stories of both Nyaki and my mother found meaningful endings. On both occasions, the rift between family members was mended, with peace and respect restored. In the case of my mother, although her uncle did not attend her wedding, he reconnected with the family, mending his relationship with his sister a short while after. With the Tshabangu’s, Onalenna ended the divide by bringing the two most important people in his life together.
* Audio clip: Nyaki on reconciliation
{Narrator: Closing}
Our family members and the people closest to us can, oftentimes, hurt us the most. But, what I learn from Mrs Nyaki Tshabangu and my mother, Mrs Mosoeu snr, is that the very category of people who surround us are, exactly that - people; human beings with history, differing beliefs and world views; humans with hopes and dreams, carrying wounds and flaws of their own. If we celebrate with and enjoy them in the good times, the onus is greater on us that we forgive and love them in the bad.
The truth is, regardless of how tight we try to hold it together, all things fall apart. But, what life looks like after the crumbling has stopped, that depends on us.
* Music - fadeout
{Narrator: Credits}
* Music - Theme
For our Q&A coming up soon, please send your questions on love, weddings, culture, and anything else to mrs@tsoseletso.com.
This is a PSD original series. Research and writing by Lungiswa and Reatile Mosoeu, music - sourced from Artlist.io.
This is Rice and Roses, produced and brought to you by PieSlovakiaDance.
*PSD call out