It’s wedding season and it’s madness. Despite the sweltering heat, many choose to get married around this time because many couples want to ring in the near year as a newlywed couple. I was extremely lucky to be invited into my coworker’s wedding. He joked that it was a small wedding, but weddings are by no means ever small in Cambodian standards. Me and some of my coworkers decided to go all out, Cambodian style.
Attending a Cambodian wedding is like
prom. Girls rent flashy blinged out dresses, get their hairs coiffed Marie Antoinette
style, and add on so many layers of fake eyelashes that you can barely blink.
Well, we weren’t ready to go that far. But we did go to a dress rental shop.
With my broker Cambodian and their broken English, we got four dresses. Not so
bad for $15 a dress including 2 fittings?
The wedding was located about 15km out of town from Siem Reap at a beautiful temple setting. The tents were already set up as ceremonies have been going on since early that morning. In fact, the entire wedding ritual has been going on since the day before. Yes, a wedding here is typically a two or
three day affair. The Buddhist ceremonies and family traditional ceremonies are
held on the first day and then continues on until early morning the next day.
The second day is the banquet in which we attended.
The traditions differ vastly from
American traditions. For one thing, there’s no speech from the bridesmaid/best
man or from anyone in fact. That’s because the whole venue is surrounded by
speakers and Khmer music is blasted throughout. Make sure to bring ear plugs or
be prepared to be deaf for the rest of the day.
As soon as you enter the venue, cheerful bridesmaids and groomsmen will greet you with a happy smile. Hats off to them as they've been helping out the newly weds throughout the two day affair. As in many Asian style weddings, there are always good luck charms and motifs ornamented throughout the venue: notice the coconut and bananas spray painted in gold and silver? Also the lucky wedding color pink, is everywhere.
The servers will take you to your seats. Each table has 10 seats. As soon as the
table is filled, the waiters bring in the food. It’s usually a 6-7 course with
a starter, appetizer, 2 mains dishes, rice, and dessert. There’s a never-ending
flow of beer and other soft drinks as well so expect never-ending rounds of
cheers (or as in Cambodian “jewel mohyi). The bride and groom are busy greeting
guests and changing outfits (they had 5 outfits for the one I attended) so don’t
go over and bother them. They will come around at one point to say hi to you
and all of the guests.
Once the meal is over, the waiters will
bring envelopes and pens. For those familiar with Asian weddings, it’s the
traditional “wedding offering gift”. This may seem weird to those that are used
to attending weddings for free, it’s typical in almost every Asian tradition to
give money to the newlyweds. I remember my British boss in Tokyo being so
disturbed by it. He would ask “Why do I have to pay to attend someone else’s
wedding.” Fair enough because in Japan, you typically have to pay about $300
per person per wedding (more if you are their superior or relative). But in
Asian tradition, it’s customary for every attendee to help finance the couple’s
wedding ceremony as well as for part of their newlywed expenses. In Cambodia,
the standard amount seems to be around $15~$20.
Where is the bride and groom you may ask? Most of the time they're busy either greeting the guests or even more important, changing outfits. There's at least 5~10 costume changes during the entire wedding. For this wedding there were at least five but I lost count. Just fyi, the bridemaids and groomsmen also change as well!
Drinks keep on coming after the food is
over, but the music keeps on going and you know what happens next…the dance.
This is my favorite part. I love it because everyone gets into a circle and
dances which makes it almost mandatory participation for everyone.
And for some other happy shots from the wedding.
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