Thai Style Wedding [1]: Morning Part

I read about the Thai wedding ceremony today and I am going to try and summarize it here. My American boyfriend asked me a few times about Thai wedding and how Thais celebrate the wedding ceremony. I really had no idea about the ceremony until I read more about it because I have never been married before. Anyway, I will try to explain the ceremony and process here so that you can have some basic information about it if you are thinking of having a Thai style wedding.

Thai Weddings seem so different now than from in the past. Most of the couples getting married today do it in one day to save time and money. I have been to a few wedding ceremonies that were held in the morning, but more in the night.

If you decide to celebrate and have a wedding ceremony in just one day, the following explanation details some of the common Thai traditions and events when a wedding is held for just one day.

Morning Part:

Mostly morning part is held at the bride's house. The groom and his parents and other family members or relatives will come to the bride's house. Well, for the morning part, the number of guests is less than in the night ceremony. Mostly only family members and close relatives both from the bride's and the groom's sides are invited. First things in the morning, the bride and the groom will offer food for monks that they invited. The bride and the groom will hold the same pot and ladle and then ladle some rice to the monk's bowls together. The bride's hand that is holding the ladle will be on top of the groom's hand because it is believed that will make the groom always believe what the bride says.

After that the bride and their parents will get back in the house and wait for the groom to get in. On the groom side, once the groom decides to get married with the bride, he will have to invite a person that he respects and older than him to make the marriage proposal for him. That person is called "Thao Kae" or matchmaker in english. The groom side will make a procession near the bride's house with the matchmaker in the front following with the groom's parents, the groom and the others carrying the trays of gifts. Once the procession is ready, they will walk to the bride's house.

At the bride's house, there will be someone holding a silver or gold chains blocking the groom to get in and ask them what is the purpose of their coming. The matchmaker who is in the front of the procession will tell them they would like to make a proposal and then the matchmaker will give them one or more pink envelopes with money inside to them as a fee to get in and they will let you get in when they are pleased with what they get. We call that silver and golden gates. Mostly 2, the first the groom will have to get through is silver and the other is golden. There maybe more than 2 gates, so the groom will have to prepare the envelopes and make sure it will be enough.

Once the groom can get in they will see the bride's parents and the others waiting. The matchmaker will talk to the bride's parents while the other will receive the gift trays from the groom's side. The matchmaker will ask the bride's parents to have the bride for the groom. The bride parents will ask the bride if she would like that and then she will say "yes".

After that the matchmaker will bring the trays of bride-price, the money on the tray with some other things like gold necklaces to give to the bride's parents to have the bride from them, to the bride's parents. The bride's parent may count it and keep it or give it back to the bride and the groom later. After that the bride and the groom will change the wedding rings. The elders will bless them and then they will do blessed water ceremony by pouring consecrated water out from the conch shell on the bride's and the groom's hands.

After that all the guests will have lunch together and then wait till the night time to go the night wedding ceremony.