Written by Master Rayden | 10 March 2010

Have you seen your parents or grandparents’ wedding photos and have you heard them telling you about their good of days of preparing for Customary Weddings? Well, as far as our generation is concerned, we have lost much of the Traditional ways of preparing for our Grand Customary Wedding.

In the olden days, marriages are commonly prearranged between families or even decided before the families had children. Meaning that the two families have decided that the children, if one family has a boy and the other family has a girl, they will be married once they reached the age of 16. if both families have boys, then they will become sworn brothers. Can you just imagine what would be like if we have these kind of marriage arrangement now? Do not be surprised, there is still such arrangements ongoing till to date.

Traditions, Beliefs and Customs of our Chinese culture have evolved through time. Most of the traditions were lost through the generations because of the tedious efforts needed to prepare for marriage and also the places that we stay in. Many of the customs applicable during the days where we stayed in kampongs are no longer applicable in HDB flats now.

As time goes by and our younger generation grows up and reached the age of marriage, the older generation has learnt to adapt and make necessary improvements to suit the modern culture.

Nowadays, for the younger generations, the word "Grand" means beautiful wedding gowns and photos, Diamond Rings, Ballroom Dinner and the showing of powerful presentations before the commencement of our wedding dinner and last but not least, the amusing games played on the couples after the pouring of champagne.

However, we are glad to see that certain important rituals and practices of the customs were still applicable in the modern society. I hope that by writing this article, it would serve to preserve some of our wonderful and colourful traditions for our next generation to follow as much as possible.

These traditional etiquettes include initial proposal (match making), birth date matching, presenting betrothal and wedding gifts, selection of auspicious dates for arranging pre-wedding rituals and the wedding ceremony. Some of us do take the Registry Of Marriage date as an important date too.

Initial Wedding Proposals

In the ancient days (as seen in some Chinese Documentary Films) and for some traditional Chinese today. There will be sending of three different kinds of official letters during the betrothal and wedding process.

The first letter sent by the groom's family to the bride's family to request for a formal meeting to arrange for marriage is known as a Request Letter. This letter usually accompanies the first gifts for the bride's family.

It is usually done by a Mei Ren Puo or the Match Making Lady who also double up as the Mid Wife to guide the women to bring their babies to the world. This Mei Ren will act as an Agent between the two families to negotiate the Terms and Conditions stated down by the families.

This process is often accompanied by the Ba Zi (Date, Time and Year of Birth) of both the potential bride and groom, for the purpose of checking whether their birth year, date and time clashes with one another or not.

Some families of the groom’s side might even place the Ba Zi of both couple on their ancestor’s altar table to ask for guidance from their ancestors. If there are bad events that happened within the three to five days of placement of the Ba Zi, means that the ancestors may not approve the marriage or their Ba Zi is not compatible.

The groom’s family would proceed to see a Feng Shui Master, Fortune Teller or Deity through a "Medium" to ask for their expert advices before deciding whether the marriage were to proceed. The fate of the couple will depend greatly on this divination, if it is a good one, then they will continue to be married, if it is not good, then it will be one of those sad endings that you will see in the movies.

The general compatibility horoscope is attached below for your reference. Normally, the older generation will do a thorough check during the first assessment to determine whether there are any clash of horoscopes between the couple and their parents. It will be not very likely for the relationship to be developed to the stage of marriage if the couple’s Horoscope clash severely.

This is very subjective and many modern families will actually overlook this part just to give in to their children. However, do note that they will still warn their children on the consequences of the mismatched horoscope combinations or Ba Zi compatibilities.

 

Horoscope for Marriage and Partnership Compatibility

Rat – 子

Born in 1924, 1936, 1948, 1960, 1972, 1984 and 1996

Best Compatible Animal Signs – Cow

Compatible Animal Signs – Rat, Dragon and Monkey

Conflict Animal Sign – Horse

Cow – 丑

Born in 1925, 1937, 1949, 1961, 1973, 1985 and 1997

Best Compatible Animal Signs – Rat

Compatible Animal Signs – Cow, Rooster and Snake

Conflict Animal Sign – Goat

Tiger – 寅

Born in 1926, 1938, 1950, 1962, 1974, 1986 and 1998

Best Compatible Animal Signs – Pig

Compatible Animal Signs – Tiger, Dog and Horse

Conflict Animal Sign – Monkey

Rabbit – 卵

Born in 1927, 1939, 1951, 1963, 1975, 1987 and 1999

Best Compatible Animal Signs – Dog

Compatible Animal Signs – Rabbit, Pig and Goat

Conflict Animal Sign – Rooster

Dragon – 辰

Born in 1928, 1940, 1952, 1964, 1976, 1988 and 2000

Best Compatible Animal Signs – Rooster

Compatible Animal Signs – Dragon, Rat and Monkey

Conflict Animal Sign – Dog

Snake – 巳

Born in 1929 1941, 1953, 1965, 1977, 1989 and 2001

Best Compatible Animal Signs – Monkey

Compatible Animal Signs – Snake, Rooster and Cow

Conflict Animal Sign – Pig

Horse – 午

Born in 1930 1942, 1954, 1966, 1978, 1990 and 2002

Best Compatible Animal Signs – Goat

Compatible Animal Signs – Horse, Dog and Tiger

Conflict Animal Sign – Rat

Goat – 未

Born in 1931 1943, 1955, 1967, 1979, 1991 and 2003

Best Compatible Animal Signs – Horse

Compatible Animal Signs – Goat, Rabbit and Pig

Conflict Animal Sign – Cow

Monkey – 申

Born in 1932 1944, 1956, 1968, 1980, 1992 and 2004

Best Compatible Animal Signs – Snake

Compatible Animal Signs – Monkey, Dragon and Rat

Conflict Animal Sign – Tiger

Rooster – 酉

Born in 1933 1945, 1957, 1969, 1981, 1993 and 2005

Best Compatible Animal Signs – Dragon

Compatible Animal Signs – Rooster, Cow and Snake

Conflict Animal Sign – Rabbit

Dog – 戍

Born in 1934 1946, 1958, 1970, 1982, 1994 and 2006

Best Compatible Animal Signs – Rabbit

Compatible Animal Signs – Dog, Horse and Tiger

Conflict Animal Sign – Dragon

Pig – 亥

Born in 1935, 1947, 1959, 1971, 1983 and 1995

Best Compatible Animal Signs – Tiger

Compatible Animal Signs – Pig, Goat and Rabbit

Conflict Animal Sign – Snake

Upon clearing the first stage, meaning that all the compatibility status, the families will meet up to discuss on the dowry, wedding gifts as well as how many tables to be given to the bride’s family during the wedding dinner and any other stuffs required by both families.

It may be a tedious discussion especially if both family are from different dialect groups and will try to ask their elders for directions. Some families fall out on one another because of their requests which may be difficult for the other family to fulfill. Ultimately, this will affect the young couple’s relationship as they try their best to cope with both parents in order to satisfy them. At this point, it would be good to advise your own parents to be flexible with the requests and work towards a Win Win Situation for both parties.

Some of the gifts or requests are being replaced with Red Packets aka Ang Pow (Money placed into Red paper envelops) either because the process is not very applicable in the modern days or troublesome to get or prepare. I will elaborate more on the Betrothal Gifts in my next chapter.

Once all these discussions had been settled and confirmed. The groom’s family will then instruct the Mei Ren to proceed with the second letter, which is a gift registry which records and describes the value of the gifts as discussed by the two families during their first meeting of. This is known as the Gift Letter which will usually be accompanied by some formal gifts to the bride's family. This will include the betrothal process in which an auspicious date must be selected to send the gifts that were agreed between both families.

The third and final letter is known as the Wedding Letter and it is presented to the bride's family to officiate the wedding and bringing the bride into the groom's family on the actual wedding day.

Well, I do hope that you have a wonderful time reading this article and have gained an insight on the wonderful traditions of preparing for the Chinese Customary Wedding. I will be going into the second phase which will include the Betrothal Gifts and preparations to be done before the actual wedding day.

 

Best regards,

Rayden Sim