Wed, Nov 04, 2015 page4

• Hostel owner shares joys of marriage with families

  • By Chen Feng-li and Jake Chung / Staff reporter, with staff writer
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  Over the past 11 years, a hostel in Nantou County’s Caotun Township (草屯) has hosted more than 450 different families attending their daughters’ weddings, allowing the establishment’s owner to vicariously share in the joys and melancholy of seeing one’s daughter married.

  The 63 year-old owner of the hostel, Hsu Yu-nu (徐玉女), said she has always lamented the fact that she did not have a daughter of her own and was envious of relatives who did, but added that her relatives always told her she was lucky not to have a daughter.

  “They said it saved me from shedding tears at having to see a daughter married off to another family,” Hsu said.

  However, there was always a small corner of her heart with a dim sense of regret at not being able to experience the paradoxical joy and reluctance to see a daughter married off, she added.

  After her mansion-like house built in the middle of a rice paddy passed inspections and became the first legal hostel in Caotun in 2004, things took a turn for the better.

  At the time, there were no large hotels in the area, and many relatives found the hostel to be “homely,” Hsu said.

  As luck would have it, a relative was getting married with someone from out of town and arranged for his future in-laws and bride to stay the night, who asked Hsu to prepare tou wei dan (頭尾擔), because she was a local and knew the traditional wedding customs better, Hsu said.

  The custom of tou wei dan originated from the preparation of daily necessities and other items of auspicious portent newlyweds would use when they moved into their new home.

  “Word apparently spread about my hostel and services, because over the years more and more families have chosen to stay at my hostel when marrying off their daughters,” Hsu said, adding that she hosted all nine brides of her relatives’ sons.

  Hsu said experience has taught her how to come up with auspicious phrases for almost any action or food, such as telling the groom that “Eating grapes rids your worries,” or “Kissing the tip of the nose brings good luck” when dealing with kissing games in more modern marriage ceremonies.

  Having played host to more than 450 brides at her hostel over the past 11 years, Hsu scoffed at the notion that she would not shed reluctant tears just because she did not have a daughter, adding that she often cries harder than most parents do.

  “I simply feel that all brides heading off to their weddings from my hostel are my own daughters,” Hsu said.

  While most brides come from normal families and have their parents to help them, some were the products of single-parent families, Hsu said, adding that when meeting such women she often cannot help but want to lend them a hand and be more meticulous when preparing their tou wei dan.

  Hsu said she also likes to play matchmaker, boasting that she has helped more than 100 couples meet and eventually marry. However, her son, who is now 30 years old, remains single.

  “To meet someone and want to marry them is all fate,” Hsu said, adding that she can only keep telling herself that her son just has not met his promised one yet.
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