Betrothal Process 纳彩, 下娉 or 过大礼

Written by Master Rayden | 10 March 2010

In the first chapter, we touched on the initial proposal for marriage and once the outcome of the proposal is agreeable between both families were favorable they would proceed to prepare the betrothal gifts.

For the older generations, some the potential bride and groom do not even have the chance to meet one another during the initial proposal stage. Upon agreement of the proposal, the two families will then arrange for a face-to-face meeting to evaluate both the potential bride and groom in terms of their compatibilities such as appearance, education, character, and social position. If both were pleased with the outcome of the meeting, the Betrothal process will take place.

Nowadays, most of the younger generations do not practice this match making or blind date marriages. Thus the brides and grooms would have safely met up with their potential parents in laws way before they reached the stage of marriage proposals. This has its good points as people has the rights to choose who they want to marry. However, the Betrothal process still applies. Having known the future parent in laws may not make this process any easier because it is all dependent on their upbringing and customary beliefs according to their dialect group too.

The formal Betrothal process actually starts when the parents of both sides start to go into serious discussions to determine the required Betrothal gifts 娉礼, the amount for the Bride’s Dowry 娉金, how many dinner tables to be given and what is needed for the Return of Gifts 回礼. Finally, they would ask for the Fortune Teller or Feng Shui Masters to select auspicious dates for Betrothal and Wedding ceremony.

The Betrothal process can be very simple or very complicated, especially when the families have some elderly people who has their strict customary and cultural beliefs to follow through. Some parents may also follow as much as they can, although they belong to the younger generation as compared to their parents. This is because they want to uphold the family traditions as well as to do good for the new couple to live happily ever after and have loads of children too.

No matter how much the parents may want to follow in terms of tradition, they are mostly aware that certain traditions are not as practical to follow through the evolution of time. Thus, some of the traditions are being replaced with the Ang Pow to represent the particular item needed in order to fulfill the customary wedding process.

Some of the items that are being replaced with Ang Pows include:

A pair of Sugar Canes

A pair of Chicken – One Rooster and One hen

A pair of Pork Trotters – Front leg

Most common Betrothal Gifts still applicable nowadays and according to different Dialect Groups include:

Applicable to most Dialect Groups:

• Cakes with Cream Toppings come in small square pieces and mostly eight to ten pieces in a box (depending on how many boxes are being requested by the bride’s family)

• Two bottles of hard liquor

• Oranges – in even numbers

• Canned pork legs – in even numbers

• Two pairs of dragon and phoenix candles 龙凤烛,

• Bride’s Dowry 娉金 wrapped in Red Cloth or slotted into Red Packet

Hokkien

• Chinese baked Cakes (Big Biscuit)

• Packets of Rice Candies

These entire Betrothal gift item will be packed into a big and round multi-tiered bamboo made basket that is used for wedding. Normally, most cake shops selling traditional wedding cakes will have this type of basket and they will loan it to you when you purchase their cakes. However, do note to collect the basket few days or weeks before the Betrothal date, this is because they may not have many to loan. The worst case scenario is that the person who borrowed it before you has not returned it on time, or they might have loaned to others first. You do not want to be caught in this situation as it will affect your Betrothal process.

In the olden days, this Betrothal process might be done months or years before the actual wedding date. However, in our modern days, this practice is to be completed about 2 weeks to 1 month before the actual wedding date. This is to facilitate the customary practice of the bride’s family sending of the cakes together with the wedding dinner invitation card to their relatives to inform them officially of this joyous occasion.

Following strict rules of tradition, the number of cakes in the box is dependent on the seniority and the level of the relationship with the recipient. If we were to follow the rules, the recipients of wedding cakes, were expected to present congratulatory gifts to the bride's parents. However, this may not be practiced by some and it will be given for the wedding dinner or Tea Ceremony Ang Pow.

Please note that for the elder generation, this is an important process because when the younger generation gets married, it is considered giving the elderly the due respect by sending the invitation cards to them personally and asking them to grace the occasion. Some elderly will not attend your wedding invitation if the bride’s family does not go up personally to invite them.

Luckily, this aspect is only applicable to the elder generation closer to the family, so it is much easier to send invitations cards to friends and other distant relatives, thus the bride’s family has to go to fewer places to send the cakes and invitation cards personally. It is a very tiring process and could take up a whole day with proper planning of the route taken to so many places and ensuring that they are waiting at home for you. Thus it is advisable to get all the addresses and telephone numbers ready in advance and contact them few days prior to the Betrothal date. This will save you a lot of time and effort, most importantly, lesser frustration and more petrol saved.

We will look into the Return of Gifts 回礼and Bride’s Gifts 嫁妆 in the next chapter, this is the part when the bride’s family accepts the Betrothal Gifts and returns certain items to the Groom’s family.

Hope that you have enjoyed this chapter as much as I had while writing it. I am not the subject matter expert. This is my little effort to put our traditional wedding culture in writings and spread it to as many of the younger generations as possible. If any of you have more valuable information to be included into any of the articles, you are most welcomed to email it to me and I will add them in accordingly.

Knowledge is nothing, unless we share it with others.

Best regards,

Rayden Sim

Tian Lu Feng Shui