Culture: Chinese Wedding Preparation

Hello, I'm Gina. I have a very exciting great news in my family. My cousin just got engaged last week. Now they're working on the preparation of the wedding. Set the date and venue, find the dress, take some photos and so on. There is a lot of difference between an American wedding and Chinese wedding. So today, in this video, I will show you some traditional customs of preparation of a Chinese wedding. Number one, we love red. We mentioned it in a lot of our videos before. Chinese people love to use the color red in a lot of jubilant occasions. And of course, one of them is wedding. They decorate the house in red, they dress in red, even the gifts are wrapped in red. But today, a lot of people will use their favorite theme color other than red. But a red dress is always necessary. Number two, giving an acceptance of betrothal gifts. About two to three months before the actual wedding, the groom will go to the bride's home to present the betrothal gifts as a form of the groom's formal proposal to the bride's parents. In the sense of the traditional Chinese custom, the groom's gift symbolizes his wealthiness so that he can promise the bride's parents the bride will have a good life in the future. And finally, the bride's parents will give the return gifts, a gesture that says they want to maintain a good relationship with the groom's family. Number three, the hair combing ceremony. This ceremony is usually performed at the night before the wedding and take place in the bride's home. The mother of the bride will perform the ceremony or sometimes a relative may do so. They will comb the bride's hair for four times while these four lines are recited at the same time. May your marriage last a lifetime. May you be blessed with a happy marriage until old age. May you be blessed with an abundance of children and grandchildren. May you be blessed with longevity. So beautiful wishes from a mom, right? And those are some traditional custom of preparation of a Chinese wedding with a long history in China. And they are still very important in the modern weddings. And in the next video, I will share some custom on the Chinese wedding day. So stay tuned. Bye.