The Wedding
Traditional Chinese Wedding is nothing like a Christian Wedding here in Australia. In Australia all wedding photos are taken on the day of the wedding but not in China, where Wedding photos are taken about 2 months BEFORE the wedding, these are a variety of traditional dress and or different western wedding dress photos. These photos are used to invite people to the Wedding-Banquet.
At about 8;00 in the morning of the wedding day the Bride will get ready at her home or in this case her hotel room here her parents, family and maybe some close friends will join her along with what we know here as her Bridesmaids.
The preparations consist of having her hair and make up professionally done and then dressing in her traditional Red and Gold wedding dress, then having her dowry (Gold Jewellery) placed in and on her hair, neck and arms, this is all completed before the Groom arrives.
Meanwhile the bridesmaids are busy planning tasks that the groom (or his nominee) must perform (to the brides satisfaction) before he is allowed to enter the room.
Just before the Groom arrives with a Red Umbrella and some household goods, all the bridesmaids except the Number One Bridesmaid will wait outside the door and bar the way, so the Groom and his party can not enter the room until the Bride is satisfied, but his problems are not over yet.
The Bride by tradition can not stand up unless she is wearing her red shoes, but where are they? You see they have been hidden by someone (often the Brides sister) but who and how well. Now the Groom has two choices, look for them himself (the cheap but slow option) or bribe someone to tell him where they are with some “Lucky Money”(money placed in red envelopes), (the quick but expensive option)
Once she has her red shoes she is allowed to stand up, then the Bride and Groom give the Bride’s parents some Sweet drink as a symbol of a Sweet Life and the Brides parents pay the Groom some Lucky Money then they leave to start their new life, here is where the number one Bridesmaid has another job to do, when the bride goes outside she is to be under the red umbrella the groom has provided and it is the job of the Bridesmaid to ensure that she is so covered.
Once they have left they will go to lunch with their families and selected guests (this is only a small group) after which we all go on our own ways till later that day when we again regather for the Wedding Banquet. We arrive hours before the Banquet but after the Bride has changed outfits, now in a modern western wedding dress, in time for a “rehearsal” for a “Faux Christian Wedding”.
At about 7:30 pm the Wedding Party line up outside the banquet hall to greet their guests, have photos taken with them and collect “Lucky Money” (No gifts are given) the person who has paid for the banquet also waits for his guests to give him his “Lucky Money”(he usually has guests that the Bride and Groom do not know and if he is knowledgeable he can make money)
It is now 8:00pm and everyone is settled at their tables in the banquet hall, when the Groom struts in to take his place at the place where the wedding takes place then just like a real Christian wedding the Bride, her Father and the Bridesmaid enter the hall, and the Faux Wedding takes place followed by speeches then the thing most people are waiting for, the food is served, in this case quite a lot of food.
That is the current tradition and it went this way, Just after breakfast I was asked to bring my Camera and meet Suzy’s family in the foyer to be taken to where Suzy was.
When we arrived in Suzy’s room Suzy was already in an outfit that is worn under the traditional wedding dress, we chatted for a short while with Suzy acting as translator as Suzy and I were the only ones who spoke English, this would change when the bridesmaids arrived as they were mostly friends from her Chinese University days, mostly but not all there was a surprise for me and she arrived a little later, she was my friend Jennifer from HuaDu, through whom Suzy met me.
Shortly there after the Hair and Makeup person arrived she too would have a long day staying with Suzy till after the banquet.
It took time for Suzy to be made ready with all the traditional wear but it slowly came together and by the time James arrived outside all was ready with all the bridesmaids but Jennifer waiting to slow James’ progress I too went out to witness this, the rest followed the traditional script so I will let the photos do the talking.
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Welcome to Herman and Carolann’s Travels to Asia
China 2016