moving along

Having a slight fever, feeling restless in bed, waiting on the paracetamol to do its thing. No better time to update this blog!

Aunt helped with the possible itinerary for The Day. She had plenty of facepalm moments as I displayed my utter ignorance towards the social obligations which come with lawfully unifying a Hainanese with a Hokkien. In my defense, dad appeared similarly clueless hurhurhur.

I found it all quite amusing. Her multiple expressions of exasperation tempted me to feign some ignorance, but she was doing me a huge favour and a traditional wedding is, in her words -and translated from mandarin- , "No Laughing Matter!"

Since the house is too small and messy to present to the world, further complicated by my mother's. ..shall we say, unpredictable behaviour,  it was heavily suggested that the tea ceremony for the bride's family- and the bride be "brought over" to the groom's - from a hotel room. It is a delicate matter, this,  and would add to the cost which I am keen on keeping as low as possible :( but no sense harping on the dismal situation, easier and faster to work on a solution.

The initial plan was to hold the traditional wedding banquet at a restaurant, but keeping in mind having to shuttle quite a number of senior citizens around, the hotel restaurant seems like a better option :( and if that is to be the case, it would be prudent of us to book the restaurant now, as The Day would be a little under a year from today! Augh!

Our fams will be meeting next weekend as a formality to suss out the number of tables to book. 8 tables on my side....Grandma and mom come from large families, and dad has 12 lifelong friends who cannot be omitted.  Rightly so, I feel.

Now, I had no idea that it is customary to have the groom's family extend an offer of total tables for the bride's side, and the bride's side offer to pay for the remainder. I suppose this varies between the dialect groups, but it sort of makes sense as haggling seems to be an acceptable "polite" way of settling deals amidst the Chinese.

Also, in keeping up appearances, one can't just give away a daughter as if she were of little to no value?!?!?

Dowry wise, dad came up with a token number after a little persuasion from me, my persuasion stems from the fiancé stating it is necessary and important that my dad ask for a dowry, re: previous paragraph. Fiancé scoffed at the amount, and I was a little too feverish to ask if it were too high or low! Will check later. Hurrumph.

I'm sure some (if any) people reading this might view the whole process as rather gauche, even I am not comfortable with it. But in line with a generation who takes these customs seriously (grandma) and parents who are old enough to have performed these rituals, yet find no necessity to adhere strictly to them, it is a difficult necessity to find a balance to please our elders.

I am, after all, the oldest and only daughter, him being the oldest and only son, and last male descendant with his surname (as he often reminds me when I get overly whiny about all the fuss).

Well. There's a lot more to add, but this entry is getting too lengthy.  Next update will probably be after The Negotiation.