Muar, Malaysia 10

Wedding Day
Up at 6am, we all met on the ground floor of the hotel at 7:30. There were 3 cars worth of us. We drove directly to the rented bungalow, which is ostensibly the grooms house, since his family isn’t from this region. We were only there long enough to photograph the bridal car, a brand new black Toyota Camry covered in pink ribbons.
At this point, the groom & his attendants were to go to the brides house alone, but at the last minute a few of us women jumped in the car with Richard, Ric's dad, so that we could experience it as well.
We arrived at the bride's parents house, where we dined yesterday, and saw the bridesmaids & family waiting at the front door. At this point, the groom and his men are meant to convince the girls to let him in to claim his bride, currently hiding out of sight in the house.
The groom is meant to perform any tasks asked of him. He had to wear a belt of string & dangling bananas and oranges around his neck. He was obliged to sign a contract written exactly as below (spelling errors included)
Memorandum of Love
L. Ricardo Wang. Passport No.
Would like all of you to witness my Memorandum of Love to my precious women Christian Chua,
1, All my love are devoted to her, and only her
2, I shall respect ALL her advises, and ALL her decisions
3, I shall be more creative to spice her up everyday
4, I shall give her all my money
5, I shall have a lot of babies with her
6, I shall change diapers and milk all of our babies in the middle of the night
7, I shall listen to her when she said “NO”8, I shall always remember: Christine will never be wrongThis memorandum valid till 9999/12/31

He finally made his way amongst the gaggle of sentry girls to her bedroom door, where he was forced to pay an entry fee to get in. But it was all worth it when the door was opened and the group beheld the radiant beauty of ... The brides brother...in bed...naked. It was the wrong room.
As such, the men set their sights on the opposite door . As the groom was reaching deeper into his pocket to find more money to get that door open, he had the horrific realization that he had forgotten the ring. Henry raced out of the house and quickly drove to get it, however Christine, absolutely stunning with a strapless white wedding gown & veil and pearl tiara, came out anyway.
I was outside with the other girls
from the grooms side who technically had no business being there. We had watched the spectical through the windows & front door. I sat with the grooms male relatives & cousins outside and ate tofu soup while the photographs continued indoors. Christian than called me into the house. The groom had to perform one more feat before they were married. The girls demanded he get his leg waxed. He wasn’t about to do that, so Christian, as one of his men, was able to take his place. He sat down and lifted his pantleg. He never flinched.
After the newly married couple visited the Respect Receptical, the grooms people all piled back in the car, with bride, and headed over to the grooms house once more. We all got there before the bride and groom, and a large string of fireworks was setup by the front door. When the bride and groom arrived, Christian barely had enough time to say "You will not believe how loud this is going to be" before they were set off and I was literally floored by the din. They are meant to frighten evil spirits away and I cannot comprehend how they could ever fail.
There, we witnessed the tea ceremony, where the bride and groom served cups of tea to the honored members of the family in exchange for red envelopes containing money. After we took tons of photos, the couple went into one of the bedrooms. Now, tradition states that at this point the couple undress and then spend 3 days in the grooms house. As we had only that day, Ric symbolically just removed Christine's veil, she his jacket, then we all got back into the cars. Back to the brides house again, where we ate Pancake with a peanut buttery texture, heated soy milk, cake with pink & white frosting, and white dumplings with fried mushrooms, oranges. This trip was to signify the third day, when the bride returns to her parents home to advise them that she is happy in her marriage. Then back once again to the grooms house,where we were finally taken back to the hotel at midday. We had done a lot of back and forthing due to the fact that we had to fit 3 days worth of festivities in about 3 hours, and the heat was crippling.
We were given 15 minutes to change then all drove about 1000 feet to an open air eatery down the street. The meal consisted of a bowl of rice and various kinds of pork dishes, including two separate kinds of pig intestine. As such, Kelly ate her rice very very slowly so it wasn’t too obvious that she wouldn’t touch anything else. It was enough. That much pork rendered me with little appetite.
Afterwards the family wanted to go shopping. Christian, Raymond and I preferred to go back to the hotel to have some respite from the heat, so we elected to walk back. We actually fell asleep for hours till we were to prepare for tonights dinner.
Not knowing quite how to dress, I wore a blue dress I had bought in London the day we departed, and Christian wore a shirt and proper trousers. We arrived at the reception hall and were led upstairs to an enormous banquet hall with more than 200 people. We sat amongst the family from Hong Kong at a table nearest the front. The evening was surreal. The dishes came out one after another. A seafood platter, followed by sharks fin soup. Raymond had warned us it was coming, and we ate it even though we felt so strongly about what it was. It was pleasant, but Tom yum soup would have been just as nice and no sharks had to be harmed.
Much to our amusement, someone wandered around selling newspapers and another guy was selling scratch cards. We were later advised that it is very important to show oneself at social functions, but they like to read to help pass the time.
The MC spoke only in Mandarin, which was incredibly amusing since our table was full of Cantonese speakers, so they were as lost as we were. After the MC sang his bit, there was a professional singer who did a few songs until the karaoke started. The whole evening was filled with middle aged accountants getting up on the stage and surprising us with pretty good renditions of their favorite songs; none of which we ever heard of.
The evening was magical; with each dish that was served we chatted with the family members at our table, who often explained what several dishes were for us.
When Christine and Ric finally came out, the bride was wearing the white wedding dress we had seen her in earlier. During the course of the night, she would disappear for a short while for several dress changes. The second was a spectacular pink ball gown with matching pink bling in her hair; the last a stunningly beautiful aqua blue evening gown, again with matching bling. I nearly hit myself for not thinking about doing the same thing at my wedding.
When the evening was over, it was over in a flash. We were chatting and generally having a wonderful time, when all of a sudden the florescent lights came on overhead. We turned around, and realized the majority of the guests had left, and they were sweeping the floors and putting chairs up on the tables. We remained long enough to take family photos of ALL the family, both sides, then headed back to our hotel.