Here’s a question: what takes up the most space at a wedding function? It’s not your fufaji. No, it’s not even fragile egos. It’s cancan. Yes, that net thingy that you wear under your dresses, because Disney ruined us all. I have been to weddings with itchy clothes. I have been to weddings with a turtleneck under my lehenga. But nothing beats the cancan (in being terrible, of course). Apparently, there’s an unsaid rule which states, that the heavier the cancan, the closer you are to the wedding. So if it is your brother’s wedding, the amount of cancan needs to be less than the bride, but more than the rest of the guests. I abided.
This is for those who haven’t experienced cancan. It’s like carrying another body (don’t ask me how I know this), but in this case you also have to look nice while doing it. You also need to have the rest of the outfit in place. Now, if you are a baraati, and if you happen to be the groom’s sister – there are expectations involved. You gotta dance, if you’re also a punjabi, you gotta bhangra like no one’s watching, when people are actually watching you.
So you do all of that, wearing what feels like a sack of potato. It’s like the Vikram Vetal scenario. Cancan is to clothes what karela is to body. It’s good and important, but you do not like it. You know it’s good and important, but you still despise it. My cancan experience started with people stepping on my dress, because it was that wide. It ended in me not being able to feel my lower body. As much as I hated THAT, I left the experience a better football player, because I had to do so much kicking.
After the function ended, my father sort through the clothes, because well, someone had to pack. When he picked up the lehenga, he had a newfound respect for me, for going through that. It’s like he finally understood that women have it harder. So maybe that’s a good experiment to get men to understand our lives. Cancan may just be a tool to teach men some empathy. Of course, there are some good parts to this overall heavy experience.
However, for those who have not worn a cancan dress, here’s why you should not even consider it. You will hardly move, because the feeling is very close to sitting on a weird chair that is deeply uncomfortable. When you do move, you cannot have people around you. It could’ve worked wonders during the pandemic, because social distancing comes automatically. Of course, there are people who do not respect that. So you’ll constantly have baraatis stepping on your dress, and you can either yell or wait for them to move, if you wish to move as well. Both are bad ideas.
Finally, wearing it is like talking to your ex when you feel lonely. It’s a lot of effort, it’s uncomfortable, it’s VERY heavy and you come out feeling worse. Cancan is the fashion equivalent of all uncomfortable human experiences. But hey, you know you’re still going to wear it, I know I am still going to wear it. It is, what it is.
