Engagement Ceremony

In Taiwan, there is a tradition to hold an engagement ceremony, which is more or less as important as a real wedding. Engagement ceremonies are held at bride's house. In the morning, a groom and his family visit bride's home with gifts for the ceremony. The beginning of the ceremony is a tea ceremony, in which the bride serves tea to groom's family one by one and each person returns a red envelop, which is a traditional envelope with money in it, in the cup. Then, they exchange rings, like in a western wedding, gloom's family puts a necklace on the bride, and so on.


Today, we had one, but we had it in our own way, a mixture of Taiwanese tradition and western tradition. In the morning, my fiancee got professional makeup and dressed up with the dress we rented from a bridal shop. We went to the cultural center to take pictures. Since I was staying at my fiancee's family place, my fiancee's brother in law took me out to drive around the block before visiting my fiancee's place, pretending that I was from home. We had a ceremony at my fiancee's place. We kept the ring exchange for the wedding, so instead of exchange, I put back the engagement ring, which my fiancee took out before the ceremony, to her finger. Following the ceremony, we had a reception in a restaurant.