This last weekend I got to experience an awesome part of culture, a wedding. Traditionally weddings in China are very different from our Western ones. The bride wears red, not white. It is not custom for guests to dress up, only groom, bride, and maybe two close friends. In village weddings part of tradition states that the groom and the bride have to fight to get to each other. I've heard of stories of the guests tearing at them, until they can reach one another. I think this custom is dieing out, but still practiced in some villages. Although nowadays the western wedding is becoming more and more popular. I've heard of people having two weddings, a traditional style and a western style. Either way, there are usually two sets of photos. In the wedding I attended, it was mixed, but I could obviously pick out what parts were not western.

Early in the morning the family and close friends of the groom went to his house (of which group I was part of) and the family and close friends of the bride went to her house. They each spent time in the morning preparing, the bride does her make-up and gets dressed, the groom does what he does. Then after a time about 5 dishes come out, some meat, some vegetable and they basically signify a love filled marriage, blessed with children (or child because of the law) that lasts till death. The groom and his parents say something, then the groom drives off in a car. The car is usually decked out in flowers and other decorations. The groom drives to the bride's house, plays some games there, greets her family and all of that, then comes back. 

 Me and my friend waited at his house, he probably spent about two hours. When they come back everyone goes outside to greet him and the bride. There are fireworks, pictures, cheering and so on. I guess custom says the groom is to carry the bride to his house, but his house is up 4 flights of stairs so I can understand why they skipped that part.

At the grooms house everyone takes pictures of them, with them and so on, then everyone left and went to a restaurant. At the restaurant is where I saw more western things come into play. Everyone goes in and sits at tables (there were probably about 12). There was a stage set up at the front and once everyone was settled the groom and MC went up there. The MC asks him some questions, like “What do you like about your future wife?” “Why do you want to marry her?” I really don't know much cuz it was all in Chinese and my friend just explained briefly. Then the bride comes through from the side and the groom ran to meet her. He got on his knees and gave her some flowers. They walked up the path together to the front stage. At the stage the MC asked them “normal” questions, like “Do you promise to love her/him until you die?” etc. After this we eat. 

When the meal is finishing up the bride and groom goes to each table to give a toast. They use this strong alcohol that is translated into “White wine”, but its a lot stronger than that. Towards the end the bride might use water or just stand and smile, but by the sound of it, most times the groom gets pretty drunk. After the bride and groom go through, the groom's father goes to each table and gives a toast, so he gets pretty drunk too. It was nice cuz both times, when they came to my table they toasted me and said, “To our foreign friend”.

After the eating and toasting everyone can pretty much go home. The groom and bride greet people as they were leaving. When me and my friend went to say thanks and good bye an old man came up and spoke to the groom, after he walked away the groom turned to his new wife and said, “I forget, is that your mother-in-law or my mother-in-law?” Haha. Like I said pretty drunk.

I guess that night, the two families dine together. I don't think honeymoons are custom, but they are becoming more popular.

All together it was an awesome experience!