Entitled Family Members Asked for My Wedding Ring & The Aftermath [Part 1]
It happened while attending a village wedding
An Awkward Predicament
We were watching a performance just outside the village hospital that my husband’s aunt and uncle operate. For context, my husband’s uncle is a doctor. The lower floor is where their clinic and pharmacy are, the upper floor is where they reside. More than often, you’ll see their immediate family and distant relatives on the upper floors while their patients wait downstairs to get diagnosed or get their medication.
While we were watching the performance, my husband looked down at his phone and noticed that his younger cousin (let’s call him LM) had called him several times. Due to the volume of the cymbals and the drums, he didn’t notice until he checked his phone.
My husband went to the hospital courtyard to call LM back. When he returned, he had a look on his face. I asked him what the matter was; He told me that LM had asked us if we would be willing to lend our wedding rings. The soon-to-be-wed couple had left their own rings back at the bride’s home, and there apparently wasn’t enough time to retrieve them.
Consequently, they wanted to borrow our rings as placeholders for the ceremony. I immediately felt uneasy and honestly, a bit appalled.
A Clash of Culture
My husband and his brother had been asked to be groomsmen before we all travelled to the village. They both purchased a pair of pants and a new shirt just for the occasion. The night before the big day, I had even been asked by LM if I was interested in being a bridesmaid — which I agreed to.
However, after the pre-wedding dinner, said aunt discovered that the three of us had the same Chinese zodiac sign. She informed my husband’s mother that our zodiac signs were not auspicious for the new couple and told us to keep a distance from the new groom and bride at the ceremony (and to preferably not attend).
We laughed in disbelief and shrugged it off. If we weren’t the groomsmen or a bridesmaid, then you would think that we would be free from any wedding related responsibilities. That unfortunately was not the case. We were still asked to retrieve other wedding guests and to also drop them off to the bride’s home.
Then, to top it off, my husband and I were asked to hand over our rings to the groom and bride. In the West, we place a lot of significance in what our wedding rings symbolize.
In general, most people continue to wear their wedding rings after the wedding and only take them off before they shower or if they’re going to the gym. Alternative reasons for taking the wedding band off include divorce or when a spouse is about to cheat.
Meanwhile, in the East, from my own experience, I notice that most married couples store their wedding bands away after the wedding ceremony for safekeeping.
Needless to say, we were displeased. We had been disrespected and still expected to do their family’s bidding to ensure their son and his new wife had the perfect day.
The Fallout
I immediately refused. I had made many compromises before in the name of Chinese culture because when in Rome, do as the Romans do. However, this was one boundary that I wasn’t comfortable breaking. My husband agreed with me and called LM back to let him know.
My father-in-law and mother-in-law were standing nearby and also asked what was going on. When they learned that we weren’t willing to give up our rings, they were visibly upset. My father-in-law insisted that he would buy us new rings in the event that the new couple lost our rings.
While my mother-in-law chided us both as well, my father-in-law at one point started to yell. My mother-in-law warned us that if we didn’t help the new couple, other people would refuse to help us later on if we encountered any issues during our upcoming wedding.
My husband’s father just repeatedly insisted on buying us new rings and that it was a small matter that we should help the new couple with. I was dumbfounded. My husband’s aunt and uncle expected us to bend over backwards for their eldest son’s wedding, and so did my in-laws.
To my father-in-law, our rings were just objects. To my husband and I, these rings symbolized our commitment to each other and neither of us felt comfortable just casually lending our wedding bands to another couple.
It’s an understatement to say that it was awkward. My husband’s aunt refused to look me in the eye afterwards and I got the stink-eye from another relative. I was relieved when our car finally left, and we were on our way home.
I’m Actually Infamous…
In a village as small as that one, word travels fast. This was confirmed by my mother-in-law who lived in this same village for most of her life. There’s a high probability that I have been labelled as a selfish bitch and will get a recurring stink eye from everyone there if and when I visit again (so this is what infamy feels like?). My indignation stems from:
A) being told to not attend the ceremony because of my zodiac sign
B) being asked to lend my ring for the same ceremony that I told not to attend
C) being admonished by my in-laws publicly and having it turned into a scene
Also, to demonstrate how socially suave my husband’s aunt and uncle are, the entire team of wedding organizers (and even the MC) had planned to not show up on the day of the wedding. Why might you ask? The wedding organizers helped organize their eldest son’s wedding for free and said aunt and uncle did not once thank them for their services rendered.
Evidently, my father-in-law had to do some damage control and mend the broken relationships with the wedding planning team. He drank Chinese liquor with the wedding organizers and chatted them up. They happily returned back to work in overseeing the wedding, but this instance demonstrated to us that said aunt and uncle not only lacked self-awareness but also any EQ.
I don’t understand why their traditions supersede mine, or why I need to kowtow to their demands. They didn’t bother taking the time to understand our reasons for refusing, and instead perceived it as an affront.
While I don’t understand the logic or tradition behind why wedding guests’ zodiac signs affects the luck of a person’s marriage, and they likely don’t understand why my ring is important to me — the baseline is that our feelings and beliefs are just as valid as theirs.
Also, in relation to my in-laws, I was miffed. It bothered me that they turned on my husband and I and it blew up into a whole ordeal. In China, a parent’s word carries a lot of weight. Respect for elders is a deeply embedded value in Chinese culture, as is the concept of having face. Their attitude was WTF are you guys doing? Just hand over the damn rings.
Anyways, my husband returned to work the next day and he had a discussion with my mother-in-law during his lunch break. From what I was told, my mother-in-law was able to better understand the reason behind why we refused to lend our rings and empathize. She also pointed out that this won’t be the last cultural misunderstanding in the family — which is most likely true.
All in all, any future family gatherings in the village are definitely going to be unpleasant.
