Although the courtship rituals of the Thai ethnic minority have changed over time, the family of a potential groom must still have a full larder if their son is to marry. In the central coastal province of Nghe An, it is the groom’s family who must provide a bountiful dowry.
Traditionally, Thai weddings followed the custom of "sitting where her parents have placed her". In other words, a daughter’s marriage was arranged by her parents. However, this practice has died out and now young ethnic Thais are free to fall in love and marry of their own volition. Although their extended families may have their say on the appearance, behaviour and social position of the potential bride and groom, the young couple themselves have the final word. The young couple can marry as long as they honour the traditional wedding customs of their ethnic group, and these customs comprise five steps.
First, the girl must give the boy an object as proof of her love, then the object must be shown to the girl’s family, the two families must meet, there must be a engagement party, and finally the wedding itself. When a girl has learned to weave and a boy is able to make nets, they are considered old enough to be married.

If their love for each other is so strong they "miss each other while eating and while lying on the bed until the small hours of the day," the girl may give the boy an object as the proof of her love. This object could be a blanket or a favourite blouse he can keep to remind himself of the girl. As soon as the girl grants this object to the boy, he rushes to his parents to show them the proof of her love. The young man’s family must have prior warning of the love developing between the young couple, because they must be very generous when they visit the girl’s family to show them her present.
They must take four bottles of rice wine, 20 areca nuts and a matching number of betel leaves, and several kinds of fruit from their family’s orchard. All of these things must be in pairs, to symbolise that the loving couple are to become husband and wife. If the bride’s family does not approve of the marriage, the young man must return the object and the wedding will not go ahead - although this rarely happens.
Once the bride’s family agrees, a third party is appointed to act as an intermediary and arrange the wedding. The intermediary can be a man or a woman, but they must have an intimate knowledge of the Thai ethnic minority’s wedding customs. They must also be a person of high standing in the community and from a good family themselves, as well as having a knack for public speaking. In the wake of this meeting, both the boy and the girl are regarded as members of the two families.
On the day of the full moon, or the 15th day of the lunar month, representatives of the groom’s family visit the bride’s family to pay their respects to the girl and her family. They must take with them two or four rations of Com Lam (bamboo-tube rice), two bottles of rice wine and scores of areca nuts and betel leaves. These visits can be repeated each full moon for five or six months, depending on when the engagement party will be held.
On the last of these visits, the intermediary will consult a fortune-teller to choose an appropriate day for the engagement party. On the day chosen by the fortune-teller, the groom’s family sends a delegation loaded up with more gifts to the bride’s family. The delegation comprises the groom’s two grandfathers and grandmothers, three young men, two young women and the groom himself, and they must take with them a jar of ruou can (the rice wine drunk communally through bamboo straws), a 30 or 40kg pig, about 30 or 40kg of glutinous rice, 10 trays of areca nuts and 10 trays of betel leaves.
The provisions are for a party celebrated by the groom’s family delegation and members of the bride’s extended family. As the banquet is prepared, representatives of both families discuss the amount of gold, silver or money the groom’s family will pay to the bride’s. This money is to compensate the bride’s family for raising their daughter. Formerly, many young men would have to break off the wedding because the their family was unable to pay this dowry. Now the attitude towards the dowry has changed, and the sum is purely symbolic: somewhere between VND550.000 and VND1 million is standard these days.
When the dowry is agreed upon, the guests and their hosts begin the party, wish each other good health and prosperity and consider setting the date for the wedding. In the period leading up to the wedding date, both families are busy with preparations.
The groom’s family must give the bride’s family a pig twice as big as the last, 20kg of glutinous rice, 20 pairs of glutinous rice cakes, a dozen bottles of rice wine and an enormous quantity of areca nuts and betel leaves.
The future bride must also make, with her own hands, eight mattresses, 20 pillows, six blankets and other minor offerings to give the mother and sisters of her future husband. Immediately before the wedding, there is a ceremony to welcome the bride into the groom’s family, and the hour for this ceremony is picked very carefully. The groom will proceed to the altar of the bride’s family, honour the ancestors of the bride’s family and lead his bride and her entourage to his home.

Usually, the bride will reach her groom’s house at about 3am or 4am, when the members of both families will greet each other. When she reaches the stairs of his house, the groom’s aunts welcome her and wash her feet. She is then offered silver gifts to prove the sincerity of the groom’s family’s feelings for her and to wish her luck and happiness. The bride can then be led into the wedding room, and the ceremony of offering silver bracelets to each other takes place. From this point, the bride is officially accepted into the groom’s family and is a married woman.
The newly wed couple enjoy their first meal, signalling the beginning of the wedding banquet. Members of both families enjoy the party and dance, sing and wish the couple everlasting happiness to the sounds of gongs and drums.