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By the way ... My million cousins' wedding
I have discovered that I have 1 million cousins
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I
have discovered that I have 1 million cousins. Well, you could delete a few zeros, but it is still a lot of people and their families to fit into one venue.
We're getting ready for my daughter's wedding, and trying to emulate the wise Prophet Solomon and avoid offending too many relatives, colleagues, bosses, friends and neighbors.
Only this isn't about the prophet threatening to split one baby in half to give to two claiming mothers.
It's about at least four branches of the families of the bride and groom's parents that must be
balanced on the swelling invitation list, while also including their respective acquaintances.
'My own friends reach 100!' wails Dear Daughter.
The first elder cousin we consult pulls out her neat stack of family records, updated each year. 'Look dear, the Tasik family [of Tasikmalaya, West Java] alone reaches 100 people.'
She doesn't notice my hair almost standing up in all directions and I scribble furiously, avoiding the expression of my daughter, who has never met this aunt from her dad's father's side.
The younger cousin we consult next is from my husband's mother's side, whose relatives are mine too, as we are distant cousins. I still wonder how the fact that we're related has not seemed to shorten the invitation list.
Our cousin's list sounds unbelievably short with only six invitations needed, each for one family (meaning two to 20 guests each). 'But then you'll need separate invitations for this uncle's sons as they don't get along that well.'
Well this is one tip we'll gently dismiss as we have not quite updated the records of whose families are loving like the one in The Little House on the Prairie, the old TV series, and whose are ready to rip each other's throats out, errr, a bit like our own.
It's pretty amazing how the intention to include all relatives in the big family function gives the impression of really tight, tentacle-like clans (at a fat expense), while in daily life the hilarious, tragic and sordid stories of each would be great script material for a high-rating TV series, much more dramatic than the average sinetron soap operas.
And so the list swells ' to be pared down later due to financial considerations and Daughter's raised eyebrows ' as one forgotten relative emerges after another.
The close family friend is closer than all those bickering relatives, of course, especially if she turns out to be ' ooh! Another relative!
'Of course I am!' says one newfound, indignant aunt. 'My mom's the youngest sister of your dad's mother.' She was responding to my sister's loud affirmation that she wasn't a real aunt, while I kept my mouth shut instead of gaping at the new fact.
Yet, such basic facts are not commonly known in the family because not many know where the family stops. I might be brave enough next time to ask which of dad's moms she was referring to.
We're always scratching our heads over whether and how we're related to this aunt and uncle. The main puzzle is how many grandparents we actually have ' and who they were.
My grandpa had a couple of wives, a few divorced, a few in a polygamous marriage. Maybe like many other men here, including first president Sukarno, he probably wasn't sure which ones he was officially married to.
One or two of the wives had earlier marriages, so God knows how many half aunts, uncles and grandparents we have.
But as their brethren have different degrees of closeness to us, even whittling down the invitation list to 'just close relatives' isn't that easy. And that's just my grandpa.
The task also falls on the eldest sons and daughters (coincidentally both my husband and I) to resume neglected family ties at least by ensuring the first family wedding is inclusive of the 'family'.
But we also want to ensure that daughter has a much bigger share of the invitations, as the wedding should be the bride and groom's party, not just that of the parents' and the zillion cousins.
At the end of the day, Solomon's famed wisdom might be thrown out the window. With some 60 to 100 wives, I bet he didn't even bother with invitation lists that included his countless kids.
' Rita Hadi
