When the Wine is Spilled

I went to my first mainland Chinese wedding this evening. The first thing to realize about a wedding here is that it's all about the banquet and the food - and, there's also something about two people getting married or something. To gain access to the banquet one must present lots of cash (about US$70) in a red envelope at the door. The amount is immediately counted and tallied next to your name. Then your picture is taken standing with the bride and groom and you are allowed to set at your assigned table.

For the next three hours people eat. The bride and groom are trotted out between courses to be humiliated by a professional wedding handler/master of ceremonies who substitutes for the holy man. The groom is lampooned for the way he kisses the bride and they both are made to drink bad wine poured down their throats. They go from table to table (there were 50 tables in this case) to toast and be toasted. Their bosses speak to the crowd about their good character. There's a contest to see who can guess the color of the traditional dress (qipao) the bride will wear at the end of the evening. The bride throws the flowers into a crowd. Children run up and down the aisles. The groom says a few words thanking the bride for marrying him. Fruit is served and everyone goes home. The bride and groom go back to work the next day.

I asked a friend how do we know at what point they are married? "When the drunks in the crowd start spilling wine" he said.