From ‘will you?’ to ‘I do,’ cultural rules vary
■ University students offer
a glimpse at their cultures’
courtship and wedding rituals
By Dominique Beaumonte
for the Emerald
Don’t think about proposing to
Ada Hakobyan, Haben Woldy or
Rashree Parsad before speaking to
their parents.
From the way people propose to
the location of the wedding, mar
riage in other countries means an
entirely different set of rituals than
the diamonds, white gowns and
flowers that often appear in Amer
ican weddings.
Ada Hakobyan, a junior from
Armenia, said it is traditional for
parents of the groom-to-be to ac
company him to the home of the
s bride-to-be’s parents for the en
gagement announcement. Upon
the approval of the woman’s par
ents, a wedding date will be set.
“Ethiopians do it a little differ
ent,” said sophomore biology ma
jor Haben Woldu. “My future hus
band will express his love for me
to the elders of his family, and
they will go to my parents, with
out him, to tell them why he’s a
good man.”
Woldu said the groom-to-be
must wait patiently until her fam
ily has come to a decision on
whether he is worthy of their
daughter’s hand in marriage.
In Mexico, it is honorable for the
bride to wear her mother’s gown
for the wedding, Brendalee Si
fuentez said. During the ceremony,
the groom gives gold coins to the
bride, which is the first money a
husband gives his wife, she said.
Parsad, a Fijian Hindustani sen
ior, said Indian weddings are
solemn occasions.
“Hindustanis are superstitiously
romantic,” she said.
Women have the major role in
the weddings; the mother and sis
ter of the bride are solely responsi
ble for making preparations,
Parsad said. The wedding process
lasts anywhere from 3-10 days.
During this time, the bride and
groom fast and abstain from alco
hol, smoking, sex and meats as an
act of purity, she said.
“Ethiopians do it a little
different.”
Haben Woldu
sophomore biology major
Because of certain traditions
within the Hindustani religion,
finding a place for the ceremony
can be a more complicated affair.
“In my culture, the temple is sa
cred and often too small for wed
dings,” Parsad said. “Besides,
there are some traditions that call
for a more open space, like a hall.”
She said the bride and groom
do very little talking during the
ceremony except for the exchang
ing of vows.
“There are seven vows that the
bride and groom make while cir
cling a fire, which signifies eterni
ty. The bride and groom are
linked by a gold cord, and each
take turns leading one another,”
Parsad said.
Parsad, Woldu, and Hakobyan
all agreed that weddings in their
individual cultures are more than
a union of two souls — they are
also parties that may last for
weeks. Woldu said that although
the wedding is a sacred event, the
four-day celebration is also filled
with food, fun and games.
But it isn’t just culture, ethnic
identity or nationality that influ
ence a person’s wedding; religion
also plays a role.
“It’s really important that I mar
ry a man who is Christian,” said
ASUO Vice President Joy Nair,
who is also of Indian descent.
Nair is a Christian, so her wed
ding will more closely resemble a
typical American wedding.
“I can choose whether I want to
wear cultural garments or a white
gown,” she said, and it is natural for
her to have her wedding in a church.
Though Americans may joke
about the annual gift of fruitcake
during the holiday season, the
dessert will play a different role
at sociology major Cordelia
Green’s wedding.
“American people may take
fruitcake for a granted,” Green
said, “but in Jamaica it is common
and tradition for there to be a tasty
fruitcake laced with rum at the re
ception, and all the cake left over
is sent to friends and family that
couldn’t come to the wedding.”
Dominique Beaumonte is a freelance reporter
for the Emerald.
Wedding day mishaps blamed on children, animals, music
■ For wedding plans that go off
without a hitch, planners advise
having a ‘Plan B for everything’
By Pat Berman
Knight Ridder Newspapers
COLUMBIA, S.C. (KRT) —
When asked whether he would
perform the service at an all-nude
wedding, Harold L. Swafford of
Columbia, S.C., replied, “It won’t
be a problem for me.” He waited a
beat before adding: Because I
won’t be there.”
Swafford, a lawyer and notary
public who has officiated at mar
riages since 1976, does not do nude
weddings. He also avoids weddings
that involve swimming or hot air
balloons, although he has been
asked to perform those types of cere
monies, too. He prefers ceremonies
where everyone stays dry, dressed
*■ and with both feet on the ground.
Those caveats aside, two things
Swafford always makes time for
are weddings and adoptions.
“I’ll stop whatever I’m doing,”
he said.
Whether weddings are deliber
ately offbeat or meticulously
planned, things sometimes
go awry.
With no pun intended, owner
Minnie Young said of weddings
performed at The Magnolias of Co
lumbia, “Seventy-five percent go
without a hitch.”
But those mistakes tend to be
memorable.
“When there’s a little boo-boo,
people relax more and have more
fun. You can laugh instead of cry,”
Young said.
Of course, what constitutes a little
boo-boo or a big blunder may be in
the eye of the beholder. Or the bride.
Or the groom.
“There should be a Plan B for
everything,” said Linda Ingle of Jo
Lin’s Bridal & Formal Wear.
Aside from fainting grooms, some
wedding planners most often cited
children and animals as culprits for
deviations from the script. Music —
too much or too dreadful — also
earned some mentions.
An outdoor wedding on a hot
July day caused one groom to faint,
Swafford said. But such was not
the case with a groom who fainted
twice during a wedding at Corley
Mill House & Garden, a popular
wedding spot in Lexington, S.C.
He would have gone down a third
“When there’s a little
boo-boo, people relax more
and have more fun. You can
laugh instead of cry.”
Minnie Young
wedding chapel owner
time, too, Corley Mill owner Sheila
Hall said, but someone brought out
chairs to seat the couple for the rest
of the ceremony.
Hall also remembered a flower
girl who thought she was sup
posed to throw her petals in peo
ples’ faces. As the guests caught
on, they covered up when the
petal-pelting flower girl advanced
down the aisle.
Phyllis James of Mitchell House &
Gardens in Columbia recalled a
flower girl who had been trained to
dutifully pick up after herself. The
first trip down the aisle, she tossed her
petals. For the trip on the way out, she
began picking them up, one by one.
James also had an animal inci
dent at a wedding. As the bride and
groom stood in front of the minister,
her cat Stormin’ Norman strolled in
and plopped down on the bride’s
train for a cat nap. To the amuse
ment of guests, he punctuated the
minister’s long-winded sermon
with occasional yawns. Norman has
since been relocated to a new home.
A gobbling turkey might top a
snoozing kitty. Chris Harris was a
guest at an outdoor cowboy wed
ding in South Carolina. The
guests sat on logs lined up like
church pews, and a big turkey ca
sually strutted among the assem
bled multitude.
When the preacher got to “speak
now or forever hold your peace,”
the turkey loudly gobbled, gobbled,
gobbled, Harris said.
Then there was the bride and
groom who wanted to ride off on
horseback at the end of their wed
ding at Magnolia’s in Columbia.
The groom climbed aboard his
horse with no trouble, but the
bride’s gown slowed her down.
Her horse got nervous, and the
bride’s long white train was not
white anymore.
Even if party poopers, ani
mals and children were ban
ished from weddings, an ele
ment of unpredictablity always
is afoot.
And remember that what’s
done is not so easily undone.
Swafford joked that he would
marry a couple for $25, but it
would cost $2,500 if they came
back for a divorce.
“I had an elderly couple I married
on a late Friday afternoon, and I got
a call from the groom about 8 or 9
that night asking me to hold on to
the paperwork over the weekend
because things weren’t working
out,” Swafford said.
“I told him it was too late. They
were married.”
Distributed by Knight Bidder/Tribune
Information Services.
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