The food had to be blessed and offered to the ancestors first of course. This has to be done outside and was primarily for grandma and granddad who are no longer with us. I’m sure that they would have enjoyed the feast it’s a shame they never got a chance to meet Alison in person.
Alison and her folks were supposed to meet me up the road so that we could come down together but the traffic from Toowoomba must have been a little better than expected. As things weren’t quite ready yet we decided to head out for a quick drink at McDonalds before making our entrance. Our outfits probably raised a few eyebrows at this point.
Traditionally the groom is supposed to travel to the Bride’s house to escort her to his home, normally a fair distance away. On approaching the groom’s house the party is supposed to make as much noise as possible to signal their arrival which should then be answered with fireworks and crackers. As with most Chinese customs this is supposed to drive the evil spirits away from the area. In our case this was represented by a Mazda car horn and firecrackers of the electronic variety. Not exactly authentic but certainly enough to scare away spirits and annoy a few neighbours.
A brother of the groom is then supposed to approach the car and open the door for the Bride to emerge, but only if the Bride offers an adequate bribe. My cousin Paul must have been happy with his Ang Pow, a red packet containing money, as we were soon allowed to descend and enter the house.
We were then greeted by the family and brought over to pray to the deities and ancestors. This symbolized an announcement of our intent to marry each other and to introduce Alison all the Chua ancestors so that she could be acknowledged as one of the family.
After the ancestors had been informed of a new family member we then prepared to offer tea to our parents and relatives so that they too would accept Alison and me into the family as husband and wife. This involved serving a sweet tea brewed from dried red dates and longan in a special tea set to each family member in turn.
The relatives would then drink the tea to display their approval of the match and express their happiness by presenting us with Ang Pow or gifts of gold. Alison received a wonderful array of rings, pendants and earrings that day from my mum and aunts while I got a beautiful gold and onyx ring with a hammer-set solitaire.
I also served tea to John and Sheena and it was wonderful that they could come to take part of this special day with us. Everyone had a great time and it was a really nice bit of tradition to follow.
After all that the ceremony was over and we had taken our first step towards becoming man and wife. Oh and the feeding frenzy could start of course. :)
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