Earlier this week I mentioned that one of my cousins has annoyingly set the date for their wedding 12 days before ours after not only having been engaged for slightly longer than Mr Ng and me (we got engaged February of last year) but also after knowing for the past 1.5 years the date and location of ours. My annoyance was actually starting to subside until one of my Aunties informed my mum of a Chinese superstition which basically states that if a couple's wedding falls within less than 30 days of the wedding day of one of their close relatives (cousins included), then the couples cannot attend each another's wedding or there may be a 'collision' of good fortune. A few quick calls by Mr Ng to HK confirmed that the superstition does indeed exist and that the direct translation from Chinese was 'double clash'.
So being a big believer, my mum has informed me that she will be the one to break the news to my cousin that both he and his new wife will not be allowed to attend our wedding even though they already RSVP'd their attendance. And luckily Mr Ng and I will already be in Hong Kong by early January so we wouldn't have been able to go to theirs anyway. We are still waiting on confirmation from relatives on whether or not the rest of my family will be able to attend their wedding (and vice versa) and I have a feeling that things could potentially turn very ugly for them if that is the case (the rest of my cousin's family made their plans very far in advance to come to HK for our wedding). And all this because they stupidly went ahead and set their date without consulting ANY of their family members!
I am going to be a bitch and say that I really couldn't care less what the consequences are going to be for them because Mr Ng and I set our date and informed everybody of it so long ago. And even if they weren't aware of this superstition they should NOT have set their date so close to ours knowing full well that many of our relatives were travelling to HK around that time.
Anyway, that's the end of my rant for now. I'm just hoping that this will not affect our day in any major way.
But while I am on the topic of Chinese wedding superstitions, I thought it would be interesting to see what some of the others are. And this is what I've managed to find so far:
Gift money for weddings should always be an even number, symbolising that everything is in a couple
Couples with the same surname cannot marry; even if they are not related they still belong to the same ancestry
A Chinese man is advised not to marry a girl without pubic hair (there goes the Brazilian waxing industry lol); the reason is that she may not be fertile and thus produce no offspring
Wedding clothes should be red, yellow and/or white and wearing black, blue or gray will bring bad luck to the marriage
A boy, preferably a dragon, must roll over the newleywed's matrimonial bed to ensure good luck and a baby boy
Brides shouldn't try on their wedding dress before the wedding day or the wedding will not push through
Breaking something during the reception brings good luck to the newlyweds
A bride who wears pearls on her wedding day will be an unhappy wife experiencing many heartaches and tears
It is recommended that no one sleeps or sits on the bridal bed after its installation and blessing for fertility; if however, the groom needs to sleep on it before the wedding he should be accompanied by a young boy preferably born in the year of the dragon
If the bride meets another bride on the wedding day their luck may clash; the matchmakers or the best men from the two bridal parties will exchange red packets on the couple's behalf to neutralise the effects of the clash
For the bride to be obedient to the groom, the groom has to kick the door/wheel of the vehicle before he fetches the bride from the wedding vehicle
Pregnant women are encouraged not to attend weddings to avoid clash of luck
Persons in mourning are not to attend any wedding celebrations within 100 days of the death as a form of respect for the dead
If a roast pig is included as part of the bride's home visit gifts, care must be taken not to break the ears or tails accidentally; an imperfect pig implies that the bride is not a virgin
The groom must arrive before the bride to the ceremony to avoid bad luck
And it goes on! I think I should stop reading up on this anymore before my head explodes.
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