Chinese
Wedding Customs by
Karen Grace Pascual of Tsinoy.com
The
celebration of love and unity is performed in different
cultures with different traditions and customs. The
Chinese having a rich culture has an elaborate and festive
way of tying the knot.
Here
are some of the traditions that make up a Chinese wedding.
See if you can fit some or all the traditions in the
modern day setting. Customs may vary from different
clans, regions and localities. Some of my sources did
not include the exact region of these customs.
Bethrothal
The parents of the bride and the groom formally
meet today. The female's family picks an auspicious
date from the suggested dates of the male's
family. Auspicious days a re
subject to interpretation by fortunetellers
that perform the analysis based on one's birth
date (day and hour) after consultation with
the Chinese almanac. The 15 day period from
the middle to the end of the seventh lunar month
is considered inauspicious because that is time
of the Hungry Ghost Festival when the gates
of Hell are opened and the lost spirits are
allowed to wonder the earth. Usually the whole
seventh lunar month is considered inauspicious.
The
15 day period from the middle to the end
of the seventh lunar month is considered
inauspicious because that is time of the
Hungry Ghost Festival when the gates of
Hell are opened and the lost spirits are
allowed to wonder the earth.
Dragon
and Phoenix Cakes
The
male's family will present the betrothal gifts
which includes tea, dragon and phoenix bridal
cakes, wine, pairs of male and female poultry,
sweetmeats and sugar. In extremely rich families,
they even send out jewelry. Tea is a primary part
of these gifts
Pre-Wedding
Giving
out invitations is a must for every wedding. But
the Chinese really does it with style. They send
out Double Happiness cakes to the close friends
and relatives to announce their wedding. Along
with these cakes comes an invitation printed on
red paper. Those who received it must give them
a congratulatory gift on the wedding day.
Another
pre-wedding ritual is installing the bridal bed
probably for the couples first tonight together.
A respected relative considered a good luck man
or good luck woman, one man or women with many
children and living mates will install the bed.
Installing the bed means moving the bed slightly
or putting the bed cover and the pillows. Once
the bed is installed, children (as many as you
want) are asked to play on the bed. Later on they
will scatter red dates, pomegranates and other
fruits.
Double
Hapiness
Wedding Invitation
The female has to bathe
in water infused with pomelo skin or peelings
or leaves, to clense her of the bad things.
Wedding
Day
Wedding
day for a Chinese custom, is equally tiring as
of a western culture. The female has to bath in
water infused with pomelo skin or peelings or
leaves, to cleanse her of the bad things. Then
a good luck woman will come to help dressing up
the bride's hair. The woman should also speak
auspicious words while tying up her hair in a
bun, a style of married woman.
The
female's face will be covered with either a red silk
veil or a 'curtain' of tassels or beads that hung from
the bridal Phoenix crown. For the males, a capping ritual
is done. The male will kneel at the family altar while
his father placed a cap decorated with cypress leaves
on his head. They will set up the bridal sedan chair
to pick up the bride along with the relatives and friends.
In
some cases, the groom would take dinner with the
bride's family, and receive a pair of chopsticks
and two wine goblets wrapped in red paper, symbolic
of his receiving the joy of the family in the
person of their daughter. In some regions, he
would be offered sweet longan tea, two hard-boiled
eggs in syrup and transparent noodles. Another
variation was the groom's partaking of soup with
a soft-boiled egg, the yolk of which he was expected
to break, arguably symbolic of breaking the bride's
ties with her family.
Another variation was the groom's
partaking of soup with a soft-boiled egg,
the yolk of which he was expected to break,
arguably symbolic of breaking the bride's
ties with her family.
The
festive procession of picking up the bride includes
firecrackers and loud gongs. The groom led the procession
accompanied by a child as an omen of his future sons,
and attendants with lanterns and banners, musicians,
and a 'dancing' lion or unicorn followed the bridal
sedan chair.
Did
you know?
The
door game originated from ancient
time that shows that the bride's family
and friends do not want to marry her
away.
The
'good luck woman' carried the bride on her back
to the sedan chair. Another attendant might shield
the bride with a parasol while a third tossed
rice at the sedan chair. Shocking as it may sound,
it is written that the bride cannot touch the
bare earth. Great care was taken to ensure that
no inauspicious influence would affect the marriage.
The
female attendants were chosen with particular
care that the horoscope animals of their birth
years were compatible with that of the bridegroom.
The sedan chair was heavily curtained so that
the bride may avoid seeing unlucky things.
The
wedding ceremony only takes about a few minutes
with the bride and the groom going to the family
altar. They pay homage to the Heaven and Earth,
the family ancestors and then to their parents.
The groom's parents are offered with tea with
two lotus seeds or dates in the cup. After they
bowed, the ceremony is over. In some other rituals,
where both also drank wine from the same goblet,
ate sugar molded in the form of a rooster, and
partook of the wedding dinner together.
Chinese
Wedding Banquet
Wedding
Banquet
Of course, food is one thing present in all occasions.
The Chinese wedding banquet usually consists of
fish, roast suckling pig, pigeon, chicken cooked
in red oil, lobster and desert bun with lotus
seeds stuffed inside. Each dish represents a significant
wish for the young couple. The fish sounds like
'yu' which means abundance. The roast suckling
pig symbolizes bride's purity. Pigeon implies
peaceful future while the chicken which also means
'phoenix' cooked in red oil symbolizes a wish
for a good life. The lobster is literally called
'dragon shrimp ' in Chinese. The lobster and chicken
is a yin yang and represents a balance that must
be met like the marriage of man and woman.
Getting married was never easy in every culture.
All preparations and cooperation from both sides
are needed. There is chaos, miscommunication,
panic, almost everything can happen between the
preparations and the wedding day itself. But amidst
of this all, a wedding, whether Chinese or Filipino,
American or African, is a symbol of unity and
harmony that man and a woman is bound to. It is,
as cliché as it may sound, a celebration
of love that will last forever.
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