Thursday, July 06, 2006

Filipino Weddings...Part 1

 I learned a little more about Filipino culture today as a brother shared with my his story of getting married. He had met his wife to be in the city, but she was from the mountains. When the romance escalated to the place where they wanted to get married, he made the trip to the mountain to see her parents and ask permission to marry her. He took 10,000 pesos with him. This is a huge sum for those who are working for 3,000 pesos a month. When he arrived at her island, he immediately gave 5,000 to her brother to go the barrio and buy the pig and a cavan (50kg/110 lbs) of rice. They had it cooked and partially eaten by the time he got there. As the father began to lay out the details, he would have to buy 7 pigs, and 5 sacks of rice for the family, he looked around and wondered when all of these folks were going to go home. They didn't. The people had gathered when they knew a pig was going to be killed the night before. They stayed for breakfast, and for lunch, and for dinner. When the pig and the rice were gone, so were they! More later.....

No comments: