2011- Oct-16, Joop and I got married in Korea.
We decided to have Korea Traditional Wedding and it was way more beautiful and meaningful than we expected.
We had blessing weather and about 450 people came to congratulate us!
Korean traditional wedding was…
1. Opening ceremony (Pungmul nori)
Since Wedding ceremony is very pleasant event, musical instruments takes place as pre-event in order to make the mood more festive and joyful.
2. Public announcement of the wedding ceremony –Daerye
Unlike western, In Korea marriage is not just about two individual getting married, rather emphasized as joining of the two families. Daerye means Great Ritual which means announcing tow individuals’ and families’ joining to heaven and earth, as well as wishing for good harmony between Ying and Yang (bride and groom)
3. Candle lighting
As beginning of the ceremony, bride’s and groom’s mothers would enter the wedding place and light candles. This candle flames represent the wish of the new couple’s bright future with passion.
This time, mothers would be super careful with light, since if the light goes off, it would be not so good luck. (haha don’t
worry too much Corrie! People will make sure light will go one until the ceremony ends)
4. Girukabi and Groom’s parade
Traditionally a wedding takes place at the house of the bride’s family and groom is traveling to the bride’s house with his attendants playing some musical instruments. Girukabi means person who leading the way to bride’s house holding
couple of wooden wild geese and usually groom asks one of his friend to do it. (Girugi means geese and Abi means man/father in Korean). The reason of using wild geese is because once they bound to each other they never meet another partner.
*This event would take in the wedding place not Suna’s parent’s house
5. Presentation of wild geese
When Girukabi enters wedding place, he gives wooden wild geese to the groom who then places it on the wedding table. Mother-in –law comes out to receive the geese and groom bows twice (This time groom need to put his hands up to his head for showing respect) to mother –in –law. Then mother-in –law takes Girugi in the house (her seat in this case)
6. Bride’s parade
Bride comes with beautifully decorated wagon and she does not show her face until entering the ceremony place. It is hard to believe, but in old days, lots of time, it was first time that the bride and groom see each other. (If groom is too curious, he would ask his friends to peek and see his bride beforehand)
7. Entering to the wedding table and washing hands
Groom walks to the east side of the wedding table and bride walks to the west
side. (Both of them have helper to assist, so no need to worry about figuring out which side is east or west) Then bride and groom face each other across the wedding table. The helpers wash the hands of the bride and groom which symbolizes cleaning both mind and body for the ceremony.
8. Bowing ceremony
The bride bows twice to the groom first then groom bows back once to the bride. The bride then bows two more times to the groom, who bows back once more. Bowing represents the promise of commitment to each other. After bowing, both kneel down and face each other.
9. Drinking and announcing the marriage to the heaven
Bride and Groom drink liquor in the gourd cups. (These cups are produces by splitting in half a whole gourd and symbolizes that the bride and groom each made up one half and only together could they be considered as whole) Both cups will be filled with liquor (by helpers) and both groom and bride drink only half (no one shot!!) then exchange the cups and drink all. Drinking signifies the destiny of the news husband and wife, and their harmony.
10. Weaving red and blue threads
The helpers weave red and blue threads into one and put it to the wedding table. (Represent Ying and Yang) The presenter of the wedding then performs a ritual ceremony to announce the binding of two people and families to the heaven, earth and all other places. He prays for prosperity of two families and asks to the heaven and earth to bring a bright future to new couple.
11. Receiving Girugi
Bride and Groom receive the Girugi (wooden wild geese) from bride’s mom. She would give one to groom and one to bride. This represents that the bride and groom will contribute to only to each other during their whole life.
12. Letter reading and bowing to the parents and guests
Bride and Groom may read a letter to the bride’s parents. (It is because in Korea, bride is consider leaving her family and entering new family –groom’s family, but I think in our case we can read letter to both family) Then they bow to both parents and guests for appreciating their support and joining.
13. Photographing
Of course! Group photo is very important!!!
14. Paebaek (family event-Optional)
We skipped this part, since we are going to have wedding party in Holland. But usually this is also included.
After the wedding, the bride and groom immediately meet their new parents-in Law in an area of the main living room. The groom’s father sits in the east and mother in the west. The bride and groom bows to them. (This is to show their respect to groom’s family and ancestors and expressing their loyalty.) Then I believe, groom’s mother would throw some nuts to both bride and groom hoping for grand children. (Joop and I need to catch these nuts very well this time)
After groom’s family, bride’s family enters the room and does same things.
*Curious guest are allowed to observe
Special Thanks Eunah & Dominik, who provided English brochure so that I would have some Idea and less work.
24 responses so far ↓
1 SunaCho // Aug 10, 2010 at 11:28 pm
Korean traditional wedding
http://www.sunacho.com/2010/korean-traditional-wedding.html
2 rachat credit // Dec 21, 2010 at 12:16 am
J’ai appris des choses interessantes grace a vous, et vous m’avez aide a resoudre un probleme, merci.
- Daniel
3 Venice Blade // Jan 10, 2011 at 2:06 pm
Simply ancient and beautiful. God blessed you with graceful weather too. The bride & groom are regal and stoic. May the universe shower you with great fortune!!!
4 Mimi // Feb 2, 2011 at 9:26 pm
I found this website and I used it very well for my school project, thank you. But I have a question, what if one of the mother(the groom or the bride’s) die? Then does somebody else do the candle lighting? Please answer my question if you can.
I wish you a very good luck!
5 Suna // Feb 3, 2011 at 12:15 pm
Hi Mimi,
Good to hear that my blog was helpful for your school project
Well for your question, if mother already passed away, oldest sister or one of the aunt can be replaced as a mother’s role. or any one bride/groom consider as mother.
but probably do only candle light but not sit next to father.
Hope this answers your question.
Good luck!
Suna
6 Bryan // Feb 19, 2011 at 1:15 pm
Get page for helping me getting ready for my son to marry a Korean girl.
Wondering if you had any pointers to help me, as the grooms father as what to expect, and what to do, or more in the case of a tradition of korea when I get to meet with brides parents, and on the days too.
I like the fact that it includes ducks
7 Suna // Feb 19, 2011 at 2:08 pm
Hello Bryan,
Congratulation on your son’s wedding. So I guess they will have Korean traditional wedding?
Thing with international marriage is, since two different cultures are mixing, lots of communication is really required.
I think your daughter in law’s role is very important.
Usually Korean marriage, parents of groom would give some presents for bride and bride’s family. (for example jewelry set for bride and clothes for families)
In my case, we all omitted all the typical procedures, because we thought it is not so necessary. So you need to find out if your brides parents are conservative or expecting something from groom or you. Koreans rarely talks direct, so if you ask, they will probably say they do not need. So your daughter in law need to find out what’s her parent’s true expectation from groom’s family.
meeting the bride parents usually take places even before couple set for the wedding date. (usually on the first meeting they see if they like each other and decide for wedding date) However for international marriage it might not be possible, mainly financial reasons. In my case we met parents via Skype face chatting (I had to translate in the middle ) and met face to face 2 days before the wedding took place.
When you meet parents for the first time, it is nice to prepare some gift for opposite family. not too big but not too small. Plus have to consider price of the gift should be decided according to the age order. (order person gets better present)
Anyway every couple have different ways of doing it. So ask your son and future daughter in law what you really need to expect or prepare.
Hope it helped you and if you have any other question, you are more than welcome to contact me.
Suna Cho
8 Shalyn // Mar 21, 2011 at 2:59 pm
Hello, I was so enlighten by your wedding! Well you see… My mother came from seoul korea, she was adopted at a very young age; he name sook young ha. I have always dreamed of have a Korean wedding, I’ve have been researching for months, finding more wonderful traditions! Right now I’m trying to learn Korean, if you have anymore info for me, about anything please email me at shalynvaught@gmail.com
9 Irene Bogert // May 16, 2011 at 10:24 am
Hi, my son is marrying a Korean girl, my husband is going to make a speech at the wedding (the wedding will be a mixture of Korean and australian style), we are wondering if there are any special traditional words my husband should make in his speech other than welcoming our new daughter-in-law into the family. We thought it would be nice if he could say something traditionally Korean.
Thanks, Irene
10 Rob & Jihyun // Dec 21, 2011 at 6:35 pm
Thank you for this web site it has help us alot with our wedding
11 Al-amen Amer // Feb 7, 2012 at 12:11 pm
so nice. i would like to present this to my classmates as an assignment. can i? thanks.
12 Suna // Feb 12, 2012 at 3:52 pm
sure! Hope your assignment went well
13 Rachael // Apr 16, 2012 at 8:46 am
thanks for this great blog! i’m actually using it for my research paper if you don’t mind. i choose the topic because my brother may actually be doing the same thing as you not too far down the line.
thanks for your great input and memories!
14 Daniel // Apr 23, 2012 at 9:43 am
Thank you for explaining this. It will help my family understand what is happening during our wedding ceremony. It has been nearly impossible to find this information in English and many people don’t know the reasons for the rituals when I ask them.
15 Daniel // Apr 29, 2012 at 4:01 pm
Hello,
I wrote a comment earlier. I wanted to ask if I could your explanation to explain to my friends and family. I would of course link and credit the work to you? Would that be ok?
16 Suna // May 1, 2012 at 9:03 am
Daniel! Sure go ahead!!! Congratulation on your wedding
17 Celia // May 18, 2012 at 10:00 am
Our son (6’3″ red head) is marrying Chaeyoung in Busan next Saturday and we will be there for the wedding.
As parents of the groom are there any things that we need to know?
Do we bring gifts to the bride’s parents? Do we help pay for anything concerning the wedding?
The Bride’s parents bought the groom a new suit, is there something we should be getting or doing for the bride?
18 Suna // May 19, 2012 at 1:07 am
Usually Groom’s parents buy some jewel for the bride in Korea. However your family is not from Korea so they might expect from anything from your side.
If you want to impress, you can buy good present for all the family even it’s very small thing. if there is grand parents then their present should be the biggest.
for the wedding payment..that you need to discuss with bride’s family. For our case my side (korea) paid for Korea wedding and my husband side paid dutch wedding.
hope it helped.
19 Kathy // May 25, 2012 at 10:32 pm
My husband and I would like to know some ideas of blessings (parents of the bride, grandmother of the bride) to give during the paeback ceremony. We are unfamiliar with the ceremony and would like to make sure we say appropriate blessings. Thanks
20 jessica // May 29, 2012 at 1:39 pm
thanks so much, it was great help for my assignment! it was nearly impossible to find this good thing in English!!
21 Suna // May 29, 2012 at 1:41 pm
Glad it was helpful for you
22 Suna // May 29, 2012 at 2:55 pm
well my husband and I skipped Paeback ceremony. The reason of this creremony is for bride to greet to groom’s side whole family. And groom’s side of family will throw some jujube or chestnuts (and you and groom would need to catch it). it means they hope for you to have many offsprings. Before Bride’s family were not allow to get into this room but nowdays i don’t think it really matters.
During the ceremony all the family memeber will say something to both of you. and i think best to say is thank you and we will live well. (감사합니다. 예쁘게 잘 살겠습니다.)
I hope this helps you
Congratulation on your marrige!!
23 Emily // Oct 22, 2012 at 1:10 am
Where did you get married? 서울시에? 그럼 성균관대학교에 입니까?
24 Suna // Nov 17, 2012 at 11:18 pm
아니요. 대전이에요.
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