Tuesday, November 29, 2005

A Chinese Christian Indonesian Engagement

I have no idea if Tjan is Catholic or Christian. But all 9 of us were very well looked after on the entire trip to JKT. Everywhere you go, people do not understand you. They understand extremely little English if you're lucky. You feel like an 1d1ot when you try to communicate. Everywhere you go, people spoke Bahasa Indonesia, including the wedding. The emcee spoke bahasa (no translation), so were the solemization and prayers of thanksgiving.

It is still pretty much a Chinese Wedding. The day started at something like 6 am when I was still sound asleep. Bride woke up at 430 am. The usual customary stuff took place but it was more elaborate. It seems that this was a pretty traditional one with more things the groom had to get for the bride. They don't have the stuff like the brothers or sisters like we usually do.
There were 4 wedding planners. They took care of all the logistics stuff, ensuring things happen when they should. But like any event, Murphy's laws still apply. There were some 500+ people. This is round 1, the engagement. Round 2 would be the wedding, another 500 odd people. Thats 1000 people! I would never imagine a thousand people wedding party in Singapore.

The march-in was a little different. They took the time to introduce the couple, making it look a little more grand than it actually is. Eveyone waited in anticipation. The entourage was led by some 6 'candle girls', followed by the parents of the bride and the groom. Then finally the bride and the groom.

The decoration, the ambience was very nicely done, though a little dark with red lanterns and dark grey curtains and red roses. There was a live band singing. And you feel that "love was in the air" feeling or that 'true love' and 'the one' really exists. It made you feel like falling in love again. (Which is why I say too watching too much romance movies and listening to too many love songs ain't necessary a good thing) This was something you don't really feel when attending local weddings back in SG. So was it the work of the wedding planners? I know not.

There was no yum seng, only a toast to the couple, I think? T2 made his virgin CNN broadcast on behalf of the GSocks, talking through the mic facing the camera man.

The wedding favour was a grandma and grandpa keychain. It was a sweet little thing. It was a horrible thing the waiters started to clear the tables when the wedding hadn't ended. They cleared our wedding favours! #$^&!*( Aii. We were all too excited when our names were announced only to be back, disappointed.

The food was good. There was no shark's fin! Good. I never liked it anyway. It's an expensive and cruel 'delicacy' with no nutritional value. My wedding (if I ever hold one) will have no shark's fin. In place was minced pigeon soup in bamboo 'tubes'. It was very good and tasty indeed.

The whole environment was very noisy actually. As though you were in a pub, not being able to hear clearly what the next person was trying to say to you. You couldn't hear the person 2 seats next to yours. There was this huge flower vase on the table, which for some reason they couldn't remove, obscuring your view of the person across.

I guess, its gonna be a long time before we see Tjan again.

The only thing I didn't understand was, an engagement done with the tea ceremony?

Posted by LiTTle-FooT at 12:06 AM with 0 comments