Igbo (Nigeria) Wedding, Bronx, NY, 1990

After the nuptial rite in a Christian church, the bride Ezinaw, still wearing her western-style wedding dress and a flowery hat, throws her bouquet before she changes into traditional tribal attire for keeping Ibo customs at the reception. Her native attire will be a white polyester dress and a turban.

Katrina Thomas's notes: An Igbo couple in Nigeria are considered husband and wife when the bride's dowry is paid. Odera, a seven-year resident of the United States, now known as Ben, returned to Africa to find the high school student he had fallen in love with there and paid $200, her bride price. A year later he brought her to the States to be legally married in City Hall. Another year passes until the couple can afford a Presbyterian church wedding with bridesmaids wearing rose color satin and ushers in black tuxedos. It is followed immediately by a feast for friends, which includes pouring libations to their ancestors and a ritual of breaking kola nuts. Pieces of kola nut are passed to guests who eat them with hot peanut sauce.