CHINESE MARRIAGE CUSTOMS

A long, long time ago in China, a man could have as many wives (concubines) as he wished after marrying the first wife. Yeah! You could find a seventy year old man with a sixteen year old concubine (eich - the poor girl!). This was so because poor families sold their young daughters to the rich in order to get some money from them and also get rid of a useless female (their perception of the usefulness of girls) in the family.
In modern modern times, this is not a common thing any more but there are still cases of old fellas with wives young enough to be their daughters or even grand-daughters. Nowadays, couples have the freedom to choose who they wish to be with. However, they still need to show their respect to their parents and a formal agreement has still to be obtained before any proper marriage procedure can be carried out.

Before getting married
Before the marriage is agreed upon, the couple have to pay a formal visit to each other's parent or guardians. When visiting the girl's parents, the boy has to bring with him the betrothal gifts in order to show sincerity. When the gifts are received, then both the boy and the girl are formally engaged. When the girl visits the boy's parents, the parents have to prepare a formal gift for their future daughter-in-law.
One of the wedding procedure is that the bride has to prepare a dowry to be brought to the bridegroom's family on the wedding day. A dowry is things bought by the bride's family, which include blanket, clothes, accessories, daily necessities and so on.
What comes next is the selection of an auspicious day to hold the wedding. It is very important in the Chinese culture. A wedding is deemed as an important day in a person's life and thus everything is chosen with care so as to symbolize goodness, harmony, abundance and auspiciousness. People will choose the best day based on the Chinese Lunar calendar by referring to the Chinese Almanac or T'ung Shu.

The wedding ceremony
Formal Chinese wedding custom requires the bridegroom to fetch his bride at her parents' home after paying the necessary respect to the parents-in-law. The couple will then go to the bridegroom's home, where the bride will greet her parents-in-law. At the groom's home, the young couple will have to greet the parents-in-law with a cup of tea each and the parents will return the daughter-in-law to be with a red packet of money inside. This tea ceremony also includes the relatives of the groom. Similar to the western culture, the bride and bridegroom will be accompanied by bridesmaids and best men and they are usually single.
Then there is the banquet. All relatives and friends will be invited and they will wish the new couple with auspicious wishes. At the banquet, the newly wed has to drink a half glass of wine from a pair of glasses linked by a ribbon. After that the newlyweds have to cross-hands and drink the other half of the wine. It is believed that after this ceremony the newlyweds will love each other dearly. After the banquet, friends of the newlyweds will usually continue the night by going all out to disturb the new couple with a few games. As a norm the newlyweds would have to play these games till very late in the night!
However in modern times, many young people forgo many of the rituals or ceremonies. They do that either because they think that new generations should not be confined by old traditions, or some do so due to economical reasons to try not to overspend.

MARRIAGE SUPERSTITIONS

• Wedding clothes should be red, yellow and/or white.
• Wearing black, blue or gray will bring bad luck to the marriage.
• Couples with the same surname cannot marry; even if they are not related as they still belong to the same ancestry.
• A boy, preferably born a Dragon (unless the bride's or groom's animal sign clashes with the Dragon), must roll over the newlywed's matrimonial bed to ensure good luck and begetting a baby boy.
• Never marry someone who is older or younger by 3 or 6 years.