some traditional practices related to a chinese marriage are still retained but others have been changed and modified over the years. i have just started reading a book titled 'mao's last dancer' by li cunxin and the wedding ritual described in the first chapter of the book, which took place in 1946, was most archaic. no, i am not going to go so far back; what i am going to compare are the practices during my time and my daughter's.
prior to the day of the actual wedding, the groom's side would have a representative to deliver some gifts and angpows to the bride's parents. my time, i remember one of the required items was the roast pig. ivy was clamouring for this delectable item but we told her this was no longer in fashion, what with swine flu and malaysian pork not being allowed into s'pore. in place of a roast pig, we received two packets of bee chun hiang roast minced pork.
these food items came together with four red packets (angpows). the usual practice is three red packets but ian's grandmother, being more traditional, insisted on including a fourth one. apart from the bak kwa, there were oranges, two bottles of liquor, one packet of dried red dates and one packet of dried logan.
there is quite a bit of diplomacy involved when it comes to dealing with the angpows. the biggest anypow, also known as the 'thor lui' (table money) is meant for the wedding dinner. the amount is just a portion of the total cost of the dinner. however, the bride's parents do not pocket all the money. a token sum is kept and the rest returned to the groom's side. i heard of a case in which the amount was too meagre and receiver felt so slighted that he/she pocketed the full amount. this, in turn, caused the giver to be upset.
another angpow in which a token sum is kept by the bride's parents is the 'peng kim' or the dowry money.
the other two angpows are meant for the sustenance of the bride when she was a baby (nee boo) and another for cleaning up after the baby (chit sai juoe). the bride's side will normally accept the full amount contained in these smaller angpows.
on the bride's side, we had to purchase the tea-set for the traditional tea ceremony. this same set would be used for serving tea to the relatives on the groom's side. so, the set was packed carefully and taken over to kuching. it returned with us to singapore for us to hold the tea cermony on 21 september.
as with all chinese practices, you cannot just take and take; you have to take and give or give and take. the receptacle that held the oranges, brandy, whisky, packets of dates and logans, was not returned empty. besides returning a portion of the ang pow money, the bride's side also presented the other party with oranges, some dried food and candies (kong trng) wrapped in red papers and two bottles of (fraser and neave) oranges crush. we were supposed to return some of the bak kwa which we inadvertently forgot.
the dowry money (peng kim) in the past was used to purchase jewellery, usually gold ornaments, for the bride to take to her new home. however, in this new age, the practice is to select a number of pieces which the bride has acquired over the years and place these items in a display box.
what i have described is the hokkien custom. i am sure there are differences among the ways practised by the different chinese dialect groups.
