Weird wedding rituals from around the world
Will you try any of these strange customs on your big day?
Sweden
After the wedding, the groom's friends are allowed to kiss the bride if he is not in the room.
Romania
During the wedding, the bride gets stolen and taken to another place, usually a club or bar, by some of the couples' friends present at the wedding. The groom has to search for her and pay a ransom to get back his wife.
France
An old French tradition says that the newlyweds have to eat wedding leftovers from the toilet for the sake of virility on their wedding night.
South Korea
To make the groom stronger in his marriage and family life, his friends will remove his shoes and socks, tie his ankles with a rope and beat the soles of his feet with dried yellow corvina fish.
Scotland
In order to keep evil spirits away from the new formed family, brides and grooms are covered in treacle, soot and flour.
Kenya
All for his daughter's luck sake, the father of the bride spits on her breasts and face.
Sudan
If a woman can't have children, she will be married as 'husband' to another woman in some parts of Sudan. The 'wife' will be impregnated by a 'secret boyfriend' and the 'husband' will be recognized as the legitimate father of the respective child.
India
'Manglik' women (an astrological combination when Mars and Saturn are both under the 7th house) from India are required to marry a banana tree in a ceremony known as "kumbh vivah". After the ceremony, the tree is destroyed in order to break any potential curse over the bride and groom.
China
In some parts of China, brides to be have to cry for fourteen days before they get married. After ten days, her mother joins her, followed by the grandmother.
Borneo
Three days before the wedding, members of the Tidong tribe in Malaysia are forbidden to go to the toilet or leave the house - otherwise terrible bad luck will befall the couple.