93.Interesting Chinese Culture——Why are Chinese weddings so elaborate?

Every year around February, during the Chinese New Year season, city hotels are almost fully booked, wedding planners work until after midnight, ancestral halls in the countryside are decorated with lanterns and red banners, and social media fills with one red wedding invitation after another. Why do so many people choose to get married right before or after the Spring Festival? And why are Chinese weddings often so elaborate, with dozens of banquet tables, a complicated set of rituals, heavy gift money exchanges, and almost the entire extended family showing up?