<p>The recent marriage of the son of a friend of mine, which took place in another country, has me curious.</p>
<p>Over-simplified, US tradition is that the bulk of the wedding costs are the responsibility of the the bride’s family. (I am well aware that there are a variety of other approaches used these days.)</p>
<p>I understand that in China, a young man is supposed to have purchased a home prior to marriage. Thus, parents of boys often start saving for that purchase the day he is born. Not sure who pays for the wedding celebrations.</p>
<p>So: please share what you know about the traditions in other countries and cultures.</p>
<p>I don’t know what the rules are in other countries or cultures. I do know that for our wedding, each person who invited guests paid for their own guests (parents of bride, parents of groom, and bride & groom). Other friends I know have had the couple pay for the entire event, while others have different arrangements. My cousin had a potluck reception in a park & I believe she & her groom paid for their minimal expenses.</p>
<p>When my sibs got married, I think my folks paid for the guests they invited. I really didn’t inquire, as it was none of my business.</p>
<p>HImom, Interesting. I love that idea for our U.S. weddings. So, were all parties involved in planning the event or in budgeting the per-person cost?</p>
<p>My friend’s son married a Japanese woman in Japan, where all (I think) costs are, traditionally, born by the groom and his family.</p>
<p>Two of my five Ds are married. For one we paid for everything because the groom’s family was unable to contribute. For the other we paid for everything other than the rehearsal dinner. Both Ds, and their fiances, did the bulk of the planning in conjunction with a wedding planner. We were included when possible but the final decisions were theirs to make.</p>
<p>Wow, never heard of that before, and I am Chinese-American.</p>
<p>For my marriage in Los Angeles, since I married a Caucasian-American, my parents picked up the whole tab but H’s parents paid for the rehearsal dinner.
My brother married a girl whose family came from Hong Kong and my parents picked up the whole tab. So my parents bowed to two sets of cultural norm.</p>
<p>From my friends, it varies; some split with the girl’s families but mostly it’s the bride’s or her family’s responsibilities unless it’s a financial hardship.
This is going to be interesting as my D will probably have a wedding within a year or two.</p>
<p>I really only was heavily involved in planning my own wedding and helping as requested in the others. For our wedding, since my dad invited the bulk of the guests, he had the most say over where the event was held. He, mom, my in-laws, H & I and plus another four people went to the tasting dinner to pick out the menu. H & I paid for everything except the split for the food/catering divided by who invited the guests. It seemed the fairest to us, as my folks wanted to invite a ton of people, as did my in-laws. H & I also invited some people, so we sent out a whole lot of invitations & the reception was a HUGE 7-course Chinese dinner.</p>
<p>We did consider everyone’s suggestions in planning the event. It was held at a very nice hotel, where a lot of wedding receptions were held and everyone was informed about the price/person for each guest who attended. All the parties who invited guests were able to bear their costs without hardship, so that was a big plus.</p>
<p>It really never made sense to me that one family or the other should bear the entire cost of the event and we thought our solution was the fairest we could manage. We did NOT use a wedding planner as I had no problem organizing everything to my satisfaction and keeping within a budget I found manageable and affordable.</p>
<p>Several of my friends paid for everything themselves without accepting any money from either family (especially if the couple had been working for several years and could afford to pay). If the families insisted on giving any money, it was saved by the couple with all $$ wedding gifts toward a down payment on a place to live.</p>
<p>I went to a destination wedding where the parents of the couple paid different portions of the festivities. I was never clear on who paid for what–there was a luau the night before, the reception and then a Sunday brunch send-off for the happy couple. All in all, it cost a lot of $$$, but both families had tons of $$$. The couple is very wealthy now in their own right, as both are investment bankers.</p>
<p>Hi, cbreeze. My observation about expectations in China were based on recent conversation with young Chinese colleagues. They are all from Shanghai and Nanjing. Your response sent me to the Web, where this was the first thing I found.I’d be interested to know if your family’s understanding is different.</p>
<p>“A man is not a man if he doesn’t own a house,” said Chen Xiaomin, director of the Women’s Studies Center at the Shanghai University of Political Science and Law. “Marriage is becoming more and more materialistic. This is a huge change in Chinese society. No matter how confident a woman is, she will lose face if her boyfriend or husband doesn’t have a house.”
[China’s</a> housing boom spells trouble for boyfriends (Many women won’t marry men who don’t own a home)](<a href=“404 Not Found”>China's housing boom spells trouble for boyfriends (Many women won't marry men who don't own a home))</p>
<p>I’ve never heard of that expectation either and don’t know many Chinese in Hawaii who have houses before they get married (& a goodly number after they get married either). In HI, the most that happens is that the girl gives the boy some gifts (mostly clothing) and the boy gives her family some food (roast pork, cakes, and other foods). The girl also pours tea with candied fruit in a ceremony following the wedding & gets money & jewelry from the close relatives who are present.</p>
<p>I like the idea of each person/side paying for his/her invited guests, however, that might still cause problems if the “planner” makes choices that are very expensive. That may be why the US has the tradition that it has…the bride’s family pays so that it can make the choices…</p>
<p>I don’t know what to make of this. I have never heard that a man is supposed to provide a house before marriage. And I have never heard it brought up as a prerequisite among my family and Chinese friends. Real estate is expensive in Asia and I wonder how many could actually achieve this.</p>
<p>Perhaps this is a recent phenomenon because no one was supposed to own anything(landlords were banished and persecuted) in Communist China.</p>
<p>HImom, is the tea ceremony still common in Hawaii?</p>
<p>cbreeze, you could be right. It seems to be a big concern for the educated young adult men I know. In a turnabout from previous cultural pressures, I recently heard from a young mother of a newborn daughter who was relieved that she had had a daughter so she and her husband did not have to start saving for real estate for their off spring.</p>
<p>In an upcoming wedding, the bride originally is from HI & groom from UK. I believe each family is hosting a reception for the couple. I guess a lot depends on the economics and what all the parties involved want and can afford. I admit I didn’t give it a great deal of thought when we were engaged & got married. Everyone seemed OK with how we worked everything out, so that was good enough for us.</p>
<p>It really doesn’t seem right to me that one family or the other should bear the ENTIRE cost of the event–compromise seems to be a better way to start off, but that’s just me, I guess. I tried my best to consider and incorporate nearly everyone’s ideas and everyone seemed quite content.</p>
<p>Gee, if Chinese men are supposed to have real estate, should we all have our kids start looking to partner with them, so they’ll have a place to live?</p>
<p>Actually, I think all are best served if they save money, for themselves and their offspring, so they can have choices, for education, weddings/marriage, where and how to live, and retirement. It doesn’t necessarily need to be committed at the time they save, but if the money or resources aren’t there, many fewer options exist.</p>
I’ve gone to a lot of weddings where if many of the guests are from out of town, that the wedding festivities are a 3 day affair. Every OOT guest is invited to the rehearsal dinner, wedding reception and a brunch the next day.
I am shuddering just thinking of the cost of my D’s future wedding.</p>
<p>In our family (I’m Asian American), my parents paid for our wedding. In the old country, the groom’s family would have paid. My sister was older when she married and she and her fiance insisted on paying for the whole thing.</p>
<p>Yea, we thought it was a bit much to have these very expensive events at a ritzy resort hotel, but since the guests and families were all quite well-heeled, none of them seemed to have thought anything of it.</p>
<p>Another friend had a wedding at a country estate. Since many of her & groom’s friends & his family were from out of town, I think she did entertain them as well, but since we’re not that close to them, we weren’t included in all of those festivities.</p>
<p>Weddings can be crazy expensive or more modest affairs. It really is up to the parties involved to figure out what makes sense under the circumstances, at least a major consideration should be given to expenses and ability to comfortably pay by those involved.</p>
<p>People with daughters sometimes comment how lucky we are to have a son when it comes to weddings but our son is gay, so who knows how that will work out? </p>
<p>Well, I guess I do know how it will work out on our end of things. We’ll write a check for an amount we are comfortable for and that will be that. If they want to spend more money, it will have to be their money or from the other grooms family. Frankly, the older our son is when he marries, the less money we will give towards the wedding. I think at a certain point, it becomes a bit silly for the parents to be expected to pay.</p>
<p>I have a very good friend in mainland China that married about 5-6 years ago and he did not have to already have a home to get married. They purchased a home together before they were married. Then they went to her hometown for a celebration and then his. The whole thing is done so differently in China, because of all the governmental approvals needed, it’s hard to compare traditions.</p>
<p>I should add that he is/was considered a good catch, being a college educated engineer with a Master’s degree.</p>
<p>I am Southern and Jewish and geneally out of town guests are fed from the moment they get off the plane or arrive in town to the moment they leave. For us, that meant a small dinner for out of towners on Thursday night, lunch served in hospitality suite on Friday, dinner Friday night, lunch on Saturday, rehearsal dinner (given by groom’s family) on Saturday night, brunch on Sunday, wedding Sunday night and breakfast in hospitality suite again. Lunch on Saturday included sightseeing and brunch on Sunday was grab and go so people could do what they wanted. </p>
<p>Man – when you write it all down it sounds exhausting.</p>
<p>Like many other communities, where I grew up, everyone entertains for each other. So my parents essentially only gave the wedding, their friends and extended family did everything else (except the rehersal dinner.)</p>
<p>In the cases where my family members (all Southerners) have married people for whom traditions are different (ie they don’t invite all the out of towners to the rehearsal dinner) other family members have stepped in to entertain. </p>
<p>While my friends and I don’t have children marrying yet, we do entertain for each other at Bar and Bat Mitzvahs, though the meals generally don’t start until Friday night. (It did about kill my mom that I wasn’t feeding the small handful of people that arrived on Thursday.)</p>