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Apparently changing traditions pisses people off. The intelligent part of me reads this and thinks, “duh, stupid. That’s why they call it a tradition. It’s tried and true.” And my ego butts in and says, “Traditions are meant to be personalized.” So, who wins? I feel like it’s the difference between being the “good bride” and the “bad bride”. How the heck could life and wedding planning come down to such simplistic dichotomies: good vs. bad?
The easy answer here is that it’s rarely ever so simple. That’s about as easy as it gets though. Back many posts ago, I talked about how I wanted to modernize and personalize the Vietnamese tea ceremony. Everyone seemed to be on board. I made my case to all the parents and there was really no resistance. As the wedding gets closer, some people (perhaps of Vietnamese persuasion) have decided that going against tradition is unacceptable.
Why, you ask?
“Because it just is. No one does it that way. Look at your cousin’s wedding. She did it that way, why can’t you?”
It may sound crazy, but I have this vision that I feel will be more personal… more us. I swear it will come together. I feel like people aren’t trusting my vision. In short, I feel like I know what is best for this wedding. Is that wrong to say? Is it even fair? I’m following the traditions as I know them and modernizing them in ways that suit my beliefs.
For example, I don’t want Mr. Hot Wings’ family to gift my family with a dowry. I prefer to think of it as his family sharing their traditions and cultural symbols with my family. I don’t want to be taken from my parents’ home and brought back to my husband’s family home which is supposed to be my new home. I prefer it to be the families coming together and joining. I’m not rejecting my own family to move to my new family. I’m adding this new in-law family to my current circle. I don’t want the tea that we present to our parents to be the only way that we show thanks. I want to actually hold their hands, look them in the eyes, and tell them how much they mean to me and thank them for all they’ve done for me.
And lastly, I don’t want to be compared to other Vietnamese brides. I don’t want my family from Vietnam to tell my mom that I did it wrong. So I’m doing it a completely mixed way so that the tea ceremony can stand on its own 2 feet—a ceremony unto itself. I’m asking for too much, aren’t I? People will compare, and that’s out of my control. I shouldn’t obsess over things that are out of my control, right?
For most of our wedding planning, Mr. Hot Wings and I have tried to please our parents wherever we could. Some things are better to give up than to hear about for the rest of our lives. Other things are worthy of standing up for. It’s immensely important to me that I not do things I am opposed to. I do not want to feel like I’m being bought. I don’t want to feel like a child. I want an actual voice in thanking my parents. I think my parents will understand my vision after it happens and appreciate my unique take on the tea ceremony. I wish they would just trust me. But what if I’m wrong? What if they can’t get past it and only take it as disrespect? I know it’s our wedding and we should do what’s best for us, but I really care about them and what they think. Oh, the dilemmas just never end do they?
Do you ever feel like you know what’s best for everyone else? How do you deal with the traditionalist who insists that you’re doing it horribly wrong if you don’t do it the way everyone else does it?
First of all I just want to say that wedding picture kind of looks awesome - love the giant lollipops!!
Miss Hot Wings - I know how you feel. My FI is Jewish and we are not getting married by a Rabbi. At first the FILs were very upset by this and felt offended. But neither of us are religious in any way and we felt that it was going against something we believed in to be married by a Rabbi. Once we calmly and logically explained ourselves to his parents they were more understanding. We are also incorporating other Jewish elements into our wedding so they will still feel like the culture is being incorporated and represented well.
I think in the end your families will be happy for you no matter what you do. The leading up to the wedding seems to be the part where everyone voices their opinions and concerns but I think once the time comes they will respect your wishes and see that what you have planned is still incredibly beautiful and meaningful. I think they will just be happy that they are there celebrating with you!
Good luck with everything!
Go for what you want. It sounds as if you want to honor your parents, so you are not showing any disrespect. Maybe after you change your tea ceremony, others will start doing it your way, and form a new tradition. This is your day and you have every right to be sure that it is everything that you want it to be. Good luck.
i say keep the your personalized tea. most people once they see it will think it’s lovely. sometimes it’s hard for people to visualize a tradition being done in a different way but once you show them, they’re on board.
besides the people that complain will most likely have complained anyways. maybe not the most positive statement but unfortunately true.
Wow! Well, I don’t know your culture, so I have no ideas on what you should do so as not to offend anyone. I would say do what you want, but don’t feel like that’s a good enough answer. I’ll twiddle my thumbs and hope someone else has a better answer.
My family has some concerns about my wedding. Actually, just my Granddad, who ran away with my Grandma to get married, and my Nanny (Mom’s Mom), who also ran away to get married. G’dad is mad because we’re not getting married in a church (I’m not even Baptized) and Nanny is mad because we’re not getting married in my hometown (she doesn’t want to travel 2.5 hours). It’s all just crazy.
@airythia: “the people that complain will most likely have complained anyways” You are soooo right! I’ve never thought of it that way. Thanks for that.
I have no answers, but I just wanted to say I feel your pain! Balancing everyone’s expectations while still planning a wedding that you and your groom are happy with is definitely challenging.
I totally know what you mean but on a much smaller scale… there were certain parts of our wedding I really wanted to be “different” some people (most my mom) had a hard time seeing them because that wasn’t how ’so in so’ did it. In the end the things she fought me the most on she ended up really liking what we or I’d done 
I’m going through this right now. All we want is to have a ceremony and reception that reflects us as a couple. Which is not fancy schmancy dinner with ballroom dancing and pretty stuff on the tables.
In the midwest in smaller towns if you don’t do it just like your cousin/sister/next door neighbor you are bringing down all that is good and holy and right with the world. Or so says everyone in mid-minnesota. Blah.
A bride having a dress that isn’t white would be the talk of the town for a week! No KIDDING. grrrr….
In fact I started writing a blog post about all this.
We put this on our wedding website:
Be who you are and say what you feel for those who mind don’t matter and those who matter don’t mind. ~Dr. Seuss
We just keep telling ourselves that.
Ya, i must agree, some people will just never be satisfied.
Traditions were often born out of a certain feeling or necessity. Your tea ceremony (which i know nothing about, but it sounds pretty interesting!) can reflect the same intentions that it was created for, perhaps even more so, with your own personal additions. Am i wrong?
Italians have a lot (no seriously, a lot!) of traditions, some practical, some ridiculous, that we are having to wade through and explain along the way why we are not including them… all i can say is good luck and i hope it turns out well!
Some things just aren’t going to be trusted until they are seen. My mom and I are both very visual people and she obviously can’t see the vision inside my head and I’m not as elequent at describing things as I could be.
So, her gut response to some of my ideas is distrust because she can’t see what I see. When I can provide her both a visual reassurance of what it will look like, and back that up with good solid reasons why we want to do something the way we want to do it, it seems to smooth things over better.
Share the vision, find a tactile way to help visual people “see” what you see and emphasize your reasons (you’ve done so very well above).
You’re not planning to walk up and slap each relative across the face, you’re trying to utilize the heart of the traditions in a way that respects everyone, including yourself.
Ugh, I think we’re in the same boat. As a fellow Vietnamese bride (marrying a non-Vietnamese groom, my FH is Filipino) I’m struggling with similar issues. We’ve been engaged for 1 year and 7 months with our wedding 3 months away (so 1yr 10months total). Our families were totally hands off “we’ll support you, do your wedding your way” until now… THREE months left and his parents insist we choose “sponsors” have a “cord & veil ceremony” and my parents want to do the whole groom comes to pick up the bride tea ceremony with a big roasted pig deal, despite the fact that my parents live and hour away from our wedding location and we have no where to physically do this (and we’re having an actual Catholic Church Ceremony - both families are Catholic)… Oh and did I mention that they told me this weekend that since my grandparents and great grandmother are still alive (Thank God because I love them dearly, of course) their names MUST be on our invites… Umm, say what?! The invites have been designed for months now and already being printed and they tell me this NOW? 3 months from the wedding and after the fact that we ordered them?? Omg.
@Beth: That’s really solid advice. I had done that with all of the other elements, the tea ceremony has proven difficult. We’re going to do a rehearsal for the tea ceremony. Hopefully that’ll ease the tension.
@shoeGal: Omg, I feel you! My mom started “editing” the invitation before mailing! They were printed, stuffed, and addressed!!! What more was there to edit. No changes could be made. Hang in there… Only a couple more months left. I’m at 1.5 months.. ek!
I hear you. As you can imagine, we had similar problems/challenges with our wedding. I think what ultimately ended up getting everyone on board with our “personalization”/modernization of the Jewish and Chinese ceremonies is that we put together a very detailed program for each ceremony (translated into Chinese for my side of the family) that explained why and how we chose to do things the way we did. My Chinese side of the family got to understand the meaning behind certain Jewish customs and how we took care to incorporate certain Chinese elements (sipping wine from a tea cup, for ex.) into our Jewish ceremony. And our Jewish side of the family were able to figure out the meaning and procedure behind the tea ceremony, and as a result, were comfortable and excited to participate.
At the end of the day, even with all of this, there were still decisions that I’m sure my family wasn’t psyched about. (You should have seen my grandfather’s face when he saw that our invitations were purple instead of red.) But at least we were able to show them our vision and how hard we were working to combine our families. I think they appreciated that (even if they never actually said so)!
@Mrs. Hot Cocoa - my grandmother was livid when she heard our colors were purple… She couldn’t understand why we’d choose such a “morbid ugly color” *sigh* … I had no idea purple was a bad “Vietnamese” or Asian wedding color 
This is the 21st century, and people should respect you for your choices to slightly alter the ceremony. They should realize you are keeping the core and the main elements of the ceremony and that is what counts.
Being someone who strives often to make sure my mother knows I am an independent person with my own thoughts and opinions, I am not afraid to go against the grain. So I apologize if I’m a little off to one end of the scale 
I can definitely relate. We’re doing a Thai water ceremony and my mom keeps insisting that all these inane things are “tradition.” (Even though I’ve never seen them done, but whatever, I feel like I don’t know enough to argue.) But if I even suggest that we don’t *have” to exactly follow tradition, she snaps back with “If we don’t do it right, then it’s not worth doing.” Argh.
People get too caught up with motions of tradition sometimes. The reason things become tradition is because they had some kind of meaning. If that meaning doesn’t resonate with you, then there’s no need to do it. If your tea ceremony is meaningful to you, maybe you’ll end up starting your own traditions.
I’m a traditioanlist, but only for things that mean something to me, if I dont like a tradition, I’ll either skip it or adapt it to make it personal. I’m glad you are sticking up for what is right for you!
I say do what you want, it’s YOUR wedding, and not your parent’s wedding. I tried in my planning process to not offend anyone, or do anything too crazy, but even if someone disagreed with our choices, I stuck to my guns, it was OUR choice to make, not theirs!
It sounds like you’re still including the real meat-and-potatoes of the ceremony, showing respect to one’s elders. In fact, it sounds to me like you’re showing extra-double respect: rather than saying “I am giving you tea because I’m supposed to give you tea because it’s tradition,” you want to genuinely, honestly, interact with them with thanks, respect, and yes, tea. Isn’t that better?!?
I kind of want to say “Mom, Dad, in this day and age, respect is a two-way street, so while I’m showing respect to you and our heritage by including this ceremony, I’d appreciate it if you show me respect by trusting me to handle it properly, and also acknowledging that some aspects of it (ie, a dowry) disrespect me.” But I’ll tell you right now, I’d never have the guts to say that!
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Mrs. Hot Wings, Chicago/San Diego Age and Occupation: 28, Professor Fiance's Age and Occupation: 32, Instructor Engagement Date: December 20, 2008 Wedding Date: August 2010 Venue: Ocean View Villas/Jasmine Seafood Restaurant About Me: I am a psychology grad student living in Chicago and planning my wedding to a fellow psych grad student. I am a Sunny So-Cal bred gal who trudged across the country to follow her love of psychology and ended up finding a partner in the process. I am overly passionate about anything I involve myself with. I am an activist, a foodie, a reality TV watching junkie, an over-analyzer, a photography obsesser, and am utterly cheesy to the core. This is a story of what happens when a boy and a girl meet, fall in love over academic dorkiness, and a shared love for life. We (mostly I) are planning our semi-destination wedding in my hometown of San Diego. We are excited to bring our families and friends together from across our lifespans to celebrate our future in a grand 400+ person culturally blended affair!
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