The many colours of love

A newlywed couple lead the wedding procession through Phuket

A Chinese Lion Dance celebrates the Peranakan Wedding Ceremony in Phuket

Phuket celebrates its former Peranakan communities with a traditional wedding for the Baba and Yaya

Costumes in red, green, blue, pink, yellow and white dominated Phuket's social scene last weekend, as the Old Town celebrated love with the festive Peranakan Wedding Ceremony. The colourful nuptials, which are arranged every year by Peranakan descendants with help from the Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT), bring back the pride of Peranakan culture once so dominant on the island.

"Today, the Peranakan wedding ceremony is very rare if indeed it is held at all. The nuptials of the last couple to marry in traditional Peranakan style probably took place 40 years ago," says Jarin Neeranatwarodom, who has traced the Peranakan wedding to the early 20th Century, when there was a Peranakan community in Phuket. "We're delighted to be reinventing such a rare and colourful wedding ceremony."

Part of a tourism campaign designed to turn Phuket into a preferred honeymoon and wedding destination, the annual Peranakan Wedding Ceremony has been arranged for five consecutive years. Over the last four years, the traditional wedding has drawn many couples from around the world to marry in the Peranakan way. Four couples said "I do" during last weekend's colourful ceremony.

"You don't have to be a Peranakan descendant to marry in Peranakan style," says Chanchai Duangchit, a director of the TAT Phuket Office.

He's right: all you need is the person who wants to marry you and you can leave the rest to the City of Phuket.

Known as "Baba and Yaya" in Phuket, the Peranakan are the descendants of Chinese immigrants who settled around the Malay Peninsula from Malaysia to Singapore to Thailand's South in the late 15th and 16th-century. The Baba and Yaya were traditionally the offspring of Chinese men and local woman.

This intermarriage, however, makes the Peranakan unique in many ways. They're not exactly Chinese nor Malay but a bit of both. They speak Chinese in their houses and follow Confucianism, but dress and eat more like their Malay mothers. In Phuket, they traded with the Westerners, loved jazz and Western music and lived a luxurious life thank to fortunes made from the tin mines. The Sino-Portuguese-style shophouses and heritage mansions in Phuket's Old Town are living proof of the Peranakan's lavish life. And the best time to observe Peranakan culture is at a wedding ceremony.

"The Great Gatsby," commented Pranee Sakulpipatana, as she watched the couple's friends arriving at Hongsyok Mansion, a Sino-Portuguese house esepcially arranged to welcome the brides. Yaya, the Peranakan women, arrived at the luxury mansion wearing the vibrant-coloured batik sarongs known as Baju Panjang, and beaded slippers. The Baba or men showed up in Baju Lokchuan - long sleeved silk jackets with a Chinese collar.

But the centre of interest was of course the brides who, with tiaras perched their heads, prepared for the biggest day in their lives in the Peranakan bridal suite. The tiaras, with tiny flowers made of gold, serve somehow as a "sensor" to evaluate the bride's excitement, as she waits for her groom at her house.

"In the old days the Peranakan marriage was arranged by their families and the matchmaker" adds Jarin. "One can only imagine how the bride felt, as she had never met her groom. The tiara kept shaking, as her heart beat faster and faster."

Last weekend, the grooms arrive at the bride's house in a white stretch limousine to begin the wedding ceremony, which is largely based on Chinese traditions.

The finale was a celebration of colour and fanfare, with the four newly-wedded couples leading a procession through Phuket's Old Town.

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Article source: http://www.thethailandlinks.com/2013/06/30/the-many-colours-of-love/