Aleema + Jamil
Calgary Ismaili Wedding
I don’t know how to start this. Whether I need to tell you that this is a couple who are going to save the world. Or that this post begins with the groom greeting the bride’s family with chocolate. Or maybe the world needs to be saved by people arriving at each other’s homes with chocolate. But this is more than a wedding story because these subjects are people I am fortunate to call friends and this is more a story for them than it is for others.
Aleema and I first met in high school, both perhaps in more academic social groups than the popular ones. We muddled our first Grade 10 science experiment together with the teacher that struck fear into the hearts of all students. I recall his booming voice pass by our bench saying ‘that’s bad science girls’ – seeing our university prospects shatter. For three years we’d share classes and lunch, pass each other in the halls in our matching green uniforms. Of a hike or two with Aleema and her father, most of which was spent with him far ahead looking back at us probably contemplating why we were so slow. Then it was off to university. Aleema, achieving as only Aleema does, went to Stanford and finished her undergrad and master’s in the time the rest of us did our bachelor’s.
Our paths crossed when she would return to Calgary to visit her family (one time just for an hour as I drove her from a meeting with the mayor at city hall back to her parent’s place and dropped her off), or when I had work in Toronto when she lived there, or in Austin when I was visiting my then-boyfriend (now husband) and she flew in with friends to run a marathon. It was no surprise that on one of those visits she casually mentioned she would be attending Harvard Law, with the intention of using the knowledge from there for greater purposes.
Naturally, her giving heart met another as selfless as hers, and that was Jamil, who was finishing his psychiatry residency in Edmonton. Both aspiring to give back to their communities, with closeness to family, and shared faith, it was obvious why they connected with each other. Most of their relationship was spent apart, Aleema in Toronto, Jamil in Edmonton, their wedding marking when they could finally call the same city home.
So under apocalyptic skies, in the smokiest week in memory from forest fires in Washington, they got married in Calgary. A three-day event, where they aspired to honour their families, and to show their school friends a traditional Ismaili wedding. The first was the mehndi party in Aleema’s parents house. Where Jamil arrived, presenting chocolate bars to the household. An evening of recounting their story, and friendly competition to know who knew them best.
The second day, the pithi ceremony which Jamil took part in solely because he may be slightly renowned amongst his friends for being an enthusiastic participant in their’s, therefore requiring the need for retribution. An evening of food debauchery and laughter in anticipatory celebration for the following day.
Then finally the wedding day. An intimate day, where guests were greeted at the ceremony with handwritten notes from the couple. Where the reception was held in her childhood home’s backyard under a tent and aglow from cafe lights. Of lawn games, and speeches attesting to their character.
Congratulations you two. The sweetest couple, with the biggest hearts, who deserve each other in every way.
You may also be interested in seeing Faaria and Omar’s Banff Springs wedding.
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