Marriage Differences between Countries (Jumah Sultan, 6C)

Every single person likes to marry someone whom he is in love with. Therefore, couples choose each other, hoping to create a happy family and to spend the rest of their lives together. Recently I had a very interesting conversation with one of my Chinese friends about this happiest moment in the lives of young people, which is marriage. We learned more about each other’s marriage customs, and we found that the customs in Libya are different from those in China in many ways.
First, in Libya, the groom has to pay for everything from the beginning of the wedding ceremony until its end. In Libya, the groom should be financially well-prepared if he wants to get married. Before the marriage, when the groom proposes to his future wife, he has to pay a specific amount of money called “dowry” to the bride’s family. This dowry is determined by the bride’s sponsor, who is her father in most cases. Furthermore, the groom has to have his own house and car. Actually the car is optional, but the house is mandatory. Moreover, the groom has to cover all the marriage expenses, including the food for the guests and the payment for the musical bands, whereas in China, the groom and the bride share the marriage expenses somehow. For example, if the groom buys the house, the bride would buy the furniture. Also, the dowry payment is optional and depends on the family.
Second, the time set for weddings in the two countries is different. In Libya, the wedding starts on Monday and finishes on Friday. So, the celebration lasts for five days. In those five days, the groom will receive and entertain his friends, relatives, and neighbors. Everyone will wear his or her traditional costume to join the groom and his family to celebrate the wedding. They all become like a family and share the activities such as cooking for the guests three meals a day, or singing and reciting poems till early in the next morning. In China, my Chinese friend told me, it is just a one-day celebration, and after that the couple starts their honeymoon somewhere. In China, the groom also invites all of his friends and relatives to gather at a specific time and at a specific place where they can celebrate the wedding ceremony together in the presence of the bride and the groom.
To conclude, though the marriage everywhere aims at the same objective, which is to create a happy, lovely, and strong family, different countries have different cultures and customs and the inhabitants of those countries celebrate this occasion in different ways.