Curiosities of the marriage of the Aini

The Aini are a people that lives in the forest Xishuangbanna prefecture, to the south of the Yunnan province. In the middle of soft covered forest mountains are the villages of the Aini. At present they are considered to be a branch of the Hani, called also Akha out of China, although his language is different from that of other Hani.

His marriage has some special characteristics. First of all, between the Aini they are not the girls, as in other nearby peoples, which, on having come to the puberty, are going to live to a special house, if not the boys, for whom his parents construct in the proximities of his house a small hut, called the "Quarter of the Flowers", which turns into the nest of love, where the boy takes to term his first affectionate conquests. The "Quarter of the Flowers" will be used after the marriage, since the first year, the new couple will live in him, up to moving to the house of the parents or constructing a new house for themselves.

The ceremony of the wedding has some resemblances with those of Occident since there takes control a priest who joins formally the fiancés in marriage, only that between the Aini, the guests remain out of the room, the wedding being celebrated in the intimacy of the fiancés and the priest.

East is usually dressed in a red layer, since the red one, symbol of the life, it is sacred for the Aini. Between the Chinese the one that is dressed of red is the fiancée. Before him priest places a wineglass of rice and a tea cup. Opposite to him the fiancés. The priest takes first a hard-boiled egg, and one spends it to the fiancé, this one one spends it to the fiancée. He returns it to himself, then the fiancé peels it, and divides it between the three. The priest will sing some singings auspiciosos, then it wets the egg in wine and in tea, and one eats it. Next it delivers to the fiancée a cooked paw of chicken, which eats a little and one spends it to the fiancé. East eats it up to finishing with her.

Then the priest proclaims that his marriage has been bendecido for the gods, and they go out on the outside to receive the congratulations of the relatives and friends.

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