OUR YORUBA TRADITIONAL WEDDING PHOTOS + VIDEO – SISI & BOBO

YAY! I think I’m conquering procrastination! I said I was going to upload the wedding photos since but I never got around to doing it. Today I have overcome! LOL. In case you missed the parry, the traditional wedding was on the 17th of July…wow! I can’t believe we’ve been married almost 3 months! Time is flying by….before you know now we will be doing 50 years anniversary ehn by God’s grace. Instead of just showing you pictures I will explain a bit of how it went in case you’re not familiar with Yoruba weddings. (Ps. The video is at the bottom of the post!) So you don’t miss any of my videos click HERE to SUBSCRIBE (It’s free!) You can also follow me on Instagram 😀

The event is usually flamboyant, Yoruba people like to party. If you’ve been to any yoruba wedding ceremony you know its the same process everywhere. There’s usually two Alaga’s who I will liken to MC’s, 1 to represent each family. One is Alaga Iduro (grooms family), and the other is Alaga Ijoko (brides family). These Alaga’s negotiate and make sure the evnt flows seamlessly. They can sing, and dance very well…the funnier and well experienced an alaga is, the better. You dont want a dry wedding. Another thing…these alaga’s know how to collect money trust me. They will collect almost every 5 minutes.

GETTING READY

To be honest the night before the traditional wedding I ccouldn’tsleep because I was anxious, nervous, excited everything at once, before I slept it was almost morning. I would advice you to get some sleep, even drug yourself to sleep, I should have because I looked tired in a lot of the photos. I felt I had so many things undone! By morning, my moms friends from Warri came to my room and some were singing, dancing…excitement! The first thing I did was to look for food to eat, hungry bride-angry bride.

I love these shoes + it was on SALE!

This was for the second outfit…read to end to see what happened

My baby Tutusco

Banke Meshida showed
up, the photographers/videographers showed up and then work start. I ran in to
take my bath the bride began to get ready. I never did a trial with Banke so I didn’t know
what my face was going to look like, I was pleasantly surprised when I looked
in the mirror! It was her assistant that did the first makeup I had in the
itsekiri outfit. While BM handled the main one 😀

Now to that outfit, I’ve been asked are you itsekiri oh…I’m not but I could be. LOL. The language is similar to Yoruba and I love it. A lot of my mom’s friends are Itsekiri and I don talk say I go wear that wrapper whether I marry itsekiri or not. The lady that dressed me up was from warri…I felt like a princexx! LOL

These women are wonderful and brought life to the party!

Bobo’s parents

Bobo’s siblings

Ayo, Ola, Yomi, Tola …my new family

Big lovely sis T

L-R My bro-in-Law Ola and my nicest cousin Toyin 😀

My grandma and I

My younger sis Funmi and her babies, Tutusco and Riwostic

My younger sister, Shade

I love this babe

Me and my yotan and her sister

That morning was so disorganized…I honestly thought we were going to have time to take proper family portraits BUT noooo. Everyone was running helter skelter, it was raining (sobs) and we were late to the venue. How do other families do it? Chai…people were all over. No space. Noise. I’ll be better prepared for my daughters wedding…if that’s any consolation.

THE RECEPTION DECOR!

I have to give credit to the company (Tsoule) that decorated the hall. Wed Expo covered the décor, and Bobo and I’s Aso Oke + my teal jewelry. The hall looked very contemporary traditional and I was so happy with it! I also give a big shout out to Molbaks Aso Oke…I saw what I was wearing the day before ,even though there was skeptism it all look fab ! My jewelery was made by the lovely Oma, I saw it that day and I loved it. Everything blended. The cake was made by Cakesiena, I called him only a few days to the wedding and he managed to deliver, even though that weekend was his dad’s funeral. Thank you!

The lovely cake

Eru Iyawo section

Proposal letter

My family on the left, his on the right

BOBO’S ARRIVAL

In a Yoruba traditional wedding, the bride is the last person to arrive , the first part of the whole marriage ceremony is to meet the families and pay bride price. I don’t know how much they paid exactly but the money was given back to Bobo and I…I think that’s part of what I spent in Dubai. Chai…I chopped my bride price.

I heard stories of when Bobo entered and I recently saw the video when he was giving moves… everyone just open mouth dey look. See the excitement on my grandma’s face? E be like say na she happy pass that day.

Bobo dancing and my grandma so excited! LOL

Bobo’s mom…I’m sure she’s like, “Ah, this boy…”

It is customary for the groom to arrive with his friends and prostrate before the father inlaw 3 times, receive acceptance and prayers from them, then go to his parents and prostrate to receive their own prayers. If you never exercise, don’t dare join the grooms parade because those alaga’s go take your eyes do ween! Some will ask the groom to raise hands, stand at attention and start marching. I love Yoruba weddings. You can see Bobo prostrating…oh yes, he begged to marry this bride. No shakara.

In the name of the father…

In the name of the Son…

In the name of the holy spirit!

Thereafter, the grooms family presents a proposal letter, that’s what Bobo’s mom is carrying below, well the girls are carrying it and she’s dancing behind them. This proposal letter is presented to the brides family.

My mom receives it then shows it to the rest of the family, and then she kneels in front of her husband to collect money from him. She then brings out an acceptance letter which you can see her carrying and dancing, people come out to spray money again and then she hands it over to the inlaws.

The proposal letter (which is in a frame) is hung on the wall in our house)…imagine if you have 8 daughters…you’ll just display a long line of proposal letters. LOL

One of the Alaga’s

Bobo’s parents dancing

Bobo’s mom bring the proposal letter

My mom receiving it

They accepted oh! We have wife now!!!

Waiting for me….:D

SISI’S ARRIVAL

Now that things have exchanged hands it’s time for me to come out. Na from here I sabi wetin happen. See ehn, Molbaks designed a very pretty veil with flowers to go with my aso oke, but errr…my sister forgot it at home. So when it was time for me to come in we started panicking because we need a transparent veil! The venue is too far from home to go and pick it up…miraculously we found something transparent… a piece of net used for decoration. LOL.

Can you tell that’s not what I was supposed to use originally?

When I danced in I was sprayed some money and then I had to go first to my parents, they prayed for me, I sat on their laps and kissed them each then I was escourted to my inlaw’s seat. I knelt down there, they prayed for me, opened the veil, I sat with them and dash them kiss too. Then I proceeded to go behind them to greet my inlaws family as you can see.

With my parents

with Bobo’s parents

Greeting my new inlaws

Greeting ohhh

I was later asked to go to the Eru Iyawo section, which is a small place set aside and decoragted with our photos, the items brought to pay the bride price i. e yams, fruits, drinks, jewelry etc and I was asked to pick what I like there. Traditionally the only thing you should pick there is a bible which is what I did, I danced with the bible to where Bobo was,

I had to place his cap properly on his head as part of the traditional wedding, I swing the cap on my finger to show everybody before placing it on him. I knelt down, he prayed for his new bride and I asked him for garri money…he had to bring money from his pocket to give to me

Yomi, this is not the cap!!!

Asking for garri money

Collecting my garri money

These Alaga’s can be very mischievoious…he was told to kiss my ring, forehead, my nose, my chin, then my chest….Bobo said “ahhhh…..noooooo” he said he was satisfied with kissing the neck. LOL. If the bride is pregnant the groom will have to kiss the bump as well. Oya kiss!

Kiss the ring

Kiss the nose

Kiss the chin

Kiss the chest??? LOL Lets not do this here.

His cap finally arrived and I had to place it on

I don’t think cutting cake is part of the original tradition oh but we had a cake and we had to cut it ! It was yummy! After that my dad gave me and bobo the dowry (as is tradition, to imply that I am not being sold!) We prayed and it was dance dance dance…

returning the owo ori

Bobo and my brother dancing

Daddy spraying the money

Can you see my excited grandma? Na she happy pass

Typically I would change into another outfit but guess what again? We forgot the gele and jewelry of that outfit at home. Ha ha ha. When I told you we were disorganized you think say I dey lie? Thats the job of the CBM but when the CBM is moy younger sister and the mother of two kids, you go sempe! LOL We didn’t change anymore and the world didn’t end….