Hindu woman wants a vegetarian wedding Christian fiancé says they'll look 'cheap.'

Cross-culture weddings are complicated. What type of religious ceremony, what traditions will be honored, and what food will be served are all questions that can cause a fight. Then comes the worry about your guests judging you for skipping something they deem imperative to a good wedding.

On a popular Reddit thread in the Am I the A**hole Subreddit, a woman in an interracial relationship is having trouble convincing her fiance to agree to her culture's wedding norms.

She writes:

My fiancé (24M) and I (22F) will marry later this year. We come from different cultural backgrounds. He is a white American Christian, and I am South Indian Hindu. We combine aspects of our cultures for the wedding and have two ceremonies on the same day with a reception dinner.

My fiancé loves meat, and to be honest, I do too, but South Indian Hindu weddings need to fall on auspicious days, and meat is a big no-no. My fiancé thinks our non-Indian guests, unfamiliar with the culture, will believe we are being cheap by eating vegetarian food and not having alcohol (he’s okay with no alcohol, though). I'm afraid I have to disagree since our food will be very nice (traditional South Indian wedding meals have a vast array of dishes served endlessly on a banana leaf plate). We will have Western desserts following the dinner.

My fiancé and his parents/brother enjoy vegetarian Indian food so I’m not sure what the problem is. My fiancé thinks we should include non-vegetarian Indian food, which would offend my entire family and be sacrilegious. My family eats meat, but like Catholics on Lent Friday, we don’t eat meat on auspicious days like weddings. Am I the a**hole for insisting on vegetarian food?

The internet can make an interracial marriage work:

makisgenius says:

I would just have two buffets one with traditional American fare. Have both the buffets on opposite sides and let people decide. When there are auspicious days, South Indians don’t stop others from eating meat. Like in the workplace, they just don’t do it themselves. It is that simple.

Rob_using_Reddit says:

YTA (You're the A**hole) it’s not combining cultures if one culture supersedes the other.

MaybeAWalrus says:

YTA. Your family doesn't have to eat the 'sacrilegious food' if they don't want to. This wedding is between two people, you and your fiancé not you and your family. What he wants is more important than what your family wants. You need to find a compromise.

OP added an update:

I spoke with my fiancé and his parents, and we decided that it would be best to have American vegetarian options in addition to Indian food. And I mentioned this in the comments already, but his family asked for no alcohol first. His parents convinced him that not having meat won’t make us look cheap, especially since we were going all out with flowers and desserts and entertainment.

And another update:

I am currently speaking with the owner of our venue and seeing if we can have the venue for two days instead of just one. He’s a family friend and will prioritize making us a reservation if possible. If we can have two days, then none of this stuff will be an issue, and we can have meat (not beef, though), and my family would be fine paying for it on the Christian ceremony day.

Wishing you all the best with your marriage, OP! If Hindus and Muslims can make a marriage work (see Hasan Mihnaj) then Hindus and Christians should too!