Valaikappu(Indian bangle wearing ceromony)

My wife's Valaikappu was held yesterday on 9th Dec 2012. The day actually fall on our 2nd year of our wedding anniversary, My wife was 30 weeks pregnant at that time.Vallaikappu is a combination of two words - vallai - meaning round (as in bangle) and kappu - meaning protection. This ceremony is performed during the odd months of pregnancy mostly during the seventh month for the expectant mother and celebrates the joy of the upcoming motherhood and ensures the welfare of both the mother and the baby inside her womb. Mostly women are invited for this function. The expectant mother is made to wear a lot of bangles mostly glass ones of red and green colors and the sound of these bangles are supposed to reach the womb.

We do some cooking our self and especially my wife she do mee-goreng by herself - and we brought some kuih-Muihs and cakes. So, it was a wonderful occasion with some of the relatives helping to bring their own home-made dishes to the ceremony.We started the ceremony at about 5 p.m.The ceremony starts by both of us offer prayers keep 5 green bangles and 5 red bangles in front of the God for the Kula Deivam and get blessed from our parents

Next is the bangles ceremony started with our parents done the Neam leaf followed by silver bangle put to my wife's hand. 13 married ladies blessed my wife by adorning the bangles on her and prayed for a safe delivery and a healthy baby.

Next, my wife asked to pick one of the three bundles of rice tied in a white vesti. The three bundles being ponggal (sweet) rice, pulli (tamarind) rice, and tairu (yogurt) rice. Its is olden days saying that if you pick the tamarind or the yogurt rice (both of which are sour), you will be having a baby boy and if you pick the sweet rice, it's predicted that it's a baby girl. Back in those days without the modern-state-of-the-art ultrasound device, they relied on this method to guess the baby's gender. It was fun for us as well since all the attendee don't know our baby's gender - we are leaving it as a surprise until the big day arrives.

Finally the moment arrive and my wife picked the Tairu rice - so everyone reaction was hmmm huuum hmm ...its baby boy :) Let's wait and see!