Wednesday, September 18, 2013

Seah Wah-Cheong and Kway Thoo-Yong, Marriage October 1907, Singapore

A CHINESE WEDDING.
INTERESTING CELEBRATIONS

The celebrations in honour of the wedding of the daughter of Mr. Seah Leang Seah and Mr. Kway Thoo Yeng last evening were very interesting and upon a scale in keeping with the high positions occupied by the bridgegroom and the bride's family in Singapore.

H.E. the Governor, Sir John Anderson, was among the many European guests invited, and accompanied by Mr. Seah Leang Seah visited the bride. The back part of the ground floor of Bendemeer was reserved for Chinese ladies. On the lawn the band of the West Kents was stationed and played a charming selection of music as the undermentioned programme shows:

1. Grand March "Pomp and Circumstance" - Elgar.
2. Overture to "The Barber of Seville" - Rossini.
3. Selection from "La Traviata" - Verdi.
4. Vaise 'Lustige Bruder' - Vollstedt.
5. Three Dances from "Nell Gwyn" - German.
6. Selection from "The Gondoliers" - Sullivan.
7. Menuet "No 1" - Paderewski.
8. Two Step "Laughing Water" - Hager.

The bride had to undergo a prolonged ordeal in sitting to receive the congratulations of her friends. She was most gorgeously bedecked, her ornaments representing in diamonds alone an untold wealth. The weight of the gold pins and other ornaments that formed that formed the bride's coiffure could not be estimated. Many of these priceless jewels were family heirlooms and represented the wealth of the family. The trial of sitting must have been no small physical endurance, even although two young aides-de-camp were told off to fan the bride.

The young bride is Miss Seah Wah Cheong, daughter of Mr. Seah Leang Seah and the bridegroom who in accordance with Chinese etiquette has never seen his bride, is Mr. Kway Thoo Yong, a name well known in mercantile Singapore.

A very large gathering of Singapore Society assembled to do honour to the occasion and the beautiful lawns and green swards of Bendemeer afforded complete scope for one of the most attractive social gatherings seen here for a long time.

(The Singapore Free Press and Mercantile Advertiser (1884-1942), 9 October 1907, Page 6)