Discuss if marriage and wedding customs in Ukraine and English speaking countries are the same

Я немного повыкидывала информации с текстов юнитов, но сильно не сокращала, лучше прочитать больше, ведь хорошо, хоть не сложные, думаю больше отложиться))

Getting married is an important decision for everyone in life. Naturally, everyone wants their wedding to be something special, something that they will remember for the rest of their lives.

English speaking countries

Weddings

A wedding is the occasion when people get married. Many people in Britain and the US now live together without getting married. This was once called 'living in sin' and was not socially

Planning to get married

Before getting married a couple get engaged. It is traditional for the man to propose (ask his girlfriend to marry him) and, if she accepts, to give his new fiancée an engagement ring. Today many couples decide together to get married.

Traditionally, the family of the bride (the woman who is to be married) paid for the wedding, but today the couple usually pay part of the cost. A traditional wedding with a hundred or more guests is expensive. Before the wedding, the couple send out printed invitations and guests buy a gift for them, usually something for their home. In the US couples register at a store by leaving there a list of presents they would like. Guests go to the store to look at the list and buy a present. In Britain couples send a wedding list to guests or, as in America, open a bride's book in a large store.

The night before the wedding the bride and bridegroom or groom (her future husband) often go to separate parties given for them by friends. At the groom's stag party guests drink alcohol, joke about how the groom is going to lose his freedom, and may watch a stripper (a woman who takes her clothes off). The hen party for the bride, called in the US a bachelorette party, is usually quieter.

The wedding

Some people play a special role as part of the wedding party. The groom's closest male friend acts as the best man and stands next to him during the ceremony. Other friends act as ushers and show guests where to sit. The bride's closest woman friend is chief bridesmaid

Many women choose to have a white wedding, so called because the bride wears a long white wedding dress, with a veil (a piece of thin white material) covering her face. Her wedding clothes should include 'something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue', to bring luck. On the wedding day the bride traditionally arrives at the church a few minutes late and enters with her father who will give her away to her husband. Some brides today find this offensive. The groom places a wedding ring on the third finger of the bride's left hand, and sometimes the bride gives him a ring too.

The 'happy couple' and their guests then go to the bride's home or a hotel for the wedding reception. This may be a formal meal or a party. The bride and groom and their parents greet the guests, who, in the US, say 'congratulations' to the groom and 'felicitations' to the bride. There are often speeches by the best man, the bride's father and the bridegroom. The bride and groom together cut a wedding cake, which usually has several tiers (layers), each covered with white icing (AmE frosting), with figures of a bride and groom on the top one. Before the newly-weds leave for their honeymoon (a holiday to celebrate their marriage) the bride throws her bouquet in the air: there is a belief that the woman who catches it will soon be married herself. The car the couple leave in has usually been decorated by their friends with the words 'just married' and with old tin cans or shoes tied to the back.

Ukraine

Today, there are two categories of people when it comes to weddings: those who want to have big parties with all the traditions and those who have small parties in order to spend money on their honeymoon or on some material things they need in life.

In Ukraine, traditions of celebrating weddings are rich and go way back. Here you can also divide weddings into several categories. There is a fine line between urban weddings and those thrown in the village. If your fiancée’s family and relatives live in the village, they will want to have a traditional wedding with lots of guests. In the village, the celebration usually goes on for at least a couple of days. Earlier, some used to celebrate for a week and each day had its meaning – the first day was the actual wedding, the second is parents’ day, and the third is the ‘day of varenyky’, and so on.

In the western part of Ukraine, the bride and groom traditionally dress in the national embroidered costumes. As the day goes on, there are certain dances that must be performed. In particular, the groom has to dance with his mother-in-law, or the mother-in-law with the newly married couple.

A wedding in the city is a totally different thing altogether. It usually takes place in a restaurant that can be rented, with or without catering. The cost of such a wedding will start at around US $20 per person and more. In the city, weddings today are much smaller. Many young people do not marry at the early age they used to before and typically have small ceremonies for their closest friends and relatives. In the cities, the weddings usually last only for a day and there are no second or third day parties. One of the reasons is that, no matter how much less money people in the village make, they all have their own little farms and many of them work in former collective farms. This means they can save a lot of money by having their own supply of meat, flour and vegetables, and other main products needed for the wedding. Many of them even make homemade vodka – or samohon- themselves.

The presents at the city weddings are given when all the guests enter the restaurant. The young couple stands in the hall and receives congratulations and presents. It is highly recommended that you sign and attach a card to your gift, because there are cases where the married couple does not know who gave them this or that present. Another tradition is holding different contests to find out whether the first child of the newlyweds will be a girl or a boy and who is going to be the leader in the family. The outcome does not have significant meaning, as they are mostly done for fun.

As to the wedding itself, now it has become quite popular to get married in churches, a tradition that was forbidden on the times of the Soviet Union. Nowadays, couples register at the citizen status registry or ZAGS and then they go to church to hold another ceremony.