Chkai and Khmer Weddings
This past week has been quite eventful. There was a public holiday on Tuesday 7th, which meant that we had to get our own food. So, Alana and I headed to the Russian market to grab some $1 noodles for lunch. After filling our bellies with goodness we went for a wander and upon departing the market we saw a tiny little kitten. There was a British lady trying to give him water and she told us that the Khmer children were playing with him. Long story short, we ended up bringing a kitten home. We’ve named him ‘Chkai’ which means dog in Khmer. Alana took Chkai to the vet and it was said that he was all dandy except right now he has a dead worm hanging out of his bottom.
On to the wedding, it started with a precession where we all walked through the entrance two by two carrying partnered gifts of fruits, which were bought by the groom and given to the bride’s parents. We placed all the fruit into the bride’s parents’ house. The fruit is given as a formal offer, and it is then counted during a song/dance. The fruit is given to the family in a belief that the fruit will get rid of any bad energy and future anger between the families.
The next part of the wedding was called the cleansing ceremony. This part is to prepare the bride and groom for their life as a married couple; their hair is symbolically cut, representing a fresh start to their new relationship together as husband and wife. The master of ceremony performs the first symbolic haircut and wishes the couple happiness, prosperity, and longevity. The bride and groom's parents, relatives, and friends then take turns to symbolically cut the bride and groom's hair and give them blessings and well-wishes. (In the old days, the bride and groom's hair were really cut during this ceremony, but in modern times it is only done symbolically.)
Moving on to the tying of the red string ritual - this is the final and most memorable stage of the wedding in which family members and friends tie the bride and groom's left and right wrists with blessing strings. The praises and well-wishes of happiness, good health, success, prosperity, and long-lasting love are acknowledged and witnessed by the loud sound of the gong and joyful cheer. The ceremony concludes with a shower of palm flowers thrown over the new couple.
Next the groom and the bride stand up and the groom holds the bride's scarf with one hand and the sword in the other. The bride holds a container with rice and both walk inside the bedroom. This part of the ritual is based on a story where the Price Thaong was married to Princess Tevty, a daughter the sea dragon king. After setting the date already, Tevtey had to bring him to her father in the dragon world, so the sea dragon’s daughter asked the prince to hold her scarf in order to dive into the dragon world. In the meanwhile, the dragon king commanded his men the kill the prince at the gate in order to test the prince’s ability. But the daughter had known this; hence, she disguised herself as the prince by changing her skirt and it was put on the prince instead so that the killer was not able to kill the prince. This ends the official wedding ceremony and they are officially married.
At this point in the ceremony it was about 3pm and we all had a nap on the floor of the house next door and then prepared for the evening party. At the party there was another ritual that the newlyweds did and it was to have their first dance around a round table of fruit. They also had their first married kisses, which is not like in Western culture where we think kissing on the lips is what people do. Here, kissing on the lips isn’t a loving or passionate thing; they kiss on the cheeks and forehead.
Heaps of Peace,
Jay
