Diamonds weren't on the menu, but that's what the waiter served Sindu Stephen on the night that Kandan Viswalingam proposed. Seated at Mimi's American Bistro in Washington, D.C., the couple heard music fill the restaurant. A singing waiter appeared with a 10-stone engagement ring. Taking the ring, Kandan slipped it onto Sindu's finger. Moments later, the joyful couple was engaged, earning a round of applause from restaurant patrons.
Sindu and Kandan had met five years earlier at medical school. Because both were interviewing for medical residencies at the time of their engagement, they relied on her parents, Babu and Gracy Stephen, as well as Prabha Bhambri, a wedding consultant and family friend, to "pull off the wedding of my lifetime," says Sindu.
For his part, Babu Stephen traveled around India to make his daughter's dream invitation -- a velvet scroll inside an ornamental -- a reality. A few days before the wedding, celebrity Mehndi artist Ash Kumar, whose clients have included Julia Roberts, flew in from London to create henna designs on Sindu's hands and legs.
For the ceremony at St. Ann's Catholic Church, Bhambri arranged for an archway of roses for the bridal aisle, and the altar swelled with over 5,000 flowers. The church had a "heavenly feeling of a peaceful place," Bhambri says. One bishop, two monsignors and four priests presided. As a Philadelphia choir seranded the 800 guests, three of the bride's cousins in sherwanis (robes) carried the rings, a Bible and Indian wedding adornments.