There are many differences between my home culture and my present culture, but one that is strikingly different to me in my relationships with women is marriage. The norm here is arranged marriage. For most this means that a girl's parents or elders, through the means of relatives and friends, find a suitable match for the girl in a boy who will hopefully be able to provide for her financially in the future. This looks different depending on caste and wealth, but for the most part the boy and girl barely know each other before they "say I do" (to use an American colloquialism". Typically the young couple goes to live with the groom's family where the bride learns from her mother-in-law how to take care of the house, and if she is lucky, it is an amiable agreement. A lot of the time the bride spends more time with her mom-in-law than with her husband. (Though many also live on their own as young couples as job, wealth...allow).
I often wonder about the intimate details of these marriages since they are so different from ours. I have read novels set in Eastern cultures that talk portray life for woman in an arranged marriage, but what is real? How is it different for Christians? I have often wondered in going into friends' one room homes in which everyone sleeps within the same four walls how there is enough privacy for intimacy...
So one day I was talking to Sangita and the subject came up to where I could ask her discreetly about these things. At first I tried to go about it using a commercial where a young woman talks about finding her "love day" with her arranged husband (the day she realized she loved him), but Sangita did not understand this. So I just asked her to tell me her story.
Sangita and her husband were distant relatives. He is nine years her senior and the son of a pastor and teacher of local dialect. He did not have a job. They were betrothed when Sangita was 16, but waited two years to be married. During that time they never talked. I can't imagine having never talked to my husband before my wedding day. After they were married they went to live with his parents in a very small house. They fought a lot due to their differing views on things and Sangita admits that she was often very angry. Very soon Sangita became pregnant with her first child, then her second, and then her third. Things got better in the family because Sangita made Jesus her Lord and she learned to serve her husband who is very impatient, drinks, and is very demanding. He got a job and things improved. They moved into a larger house- 3 rooms for 7-8 people...
There are a lot of gaps in the story.
Then I asked, "So you have been married for 20 years. Is your husband your friend?" She quickly shook her head and said no. She said that there was never any way for them to become friends because they never had any privacy. For a long time she has shared a bedroom with her son while her husband sleeps outside. She said that they have never been alone to just talk and get to know each other. They don't know each others' hopes and dreams or what makes them happy. She said that she wouldn't let that happen to her son and daughter-in-law. Before her 19 year old son gets married she is going to make sure that they have a room to call their own (this means either both sisters have to get married or the grandpa has to die before he can get married).
Despite the fact that there is no friendship, no romance, really no relationship with her husband, Sangita talks about how she serves him. She fixes all of his meals for him, takes care of him in sickness, goes to work to pay the bills since he is sick, carries water on her head so they can bathe, takes him to doctor appointments, raised three kids... She did not do this because she loved her husband or because she got love in return, but because it is her duty as a wife. What a different perspective. Americans are so filled with a sense of entitlement. I am so filled with a sense of entitlement that if I do not feel properly loved or romanced by my husband then I do not want to serve him. But this is definitely not what the Bible teaches. I am thankful that I have a husband who strives to love me like Christ loves the church, but even if he did not, I am still supposed to submit to him and be his help mate.
My neighbors work so hard in their homes all day long to serve their husbands (none of whom are Christians) because it is their duty. I am sure that some of them are actually friends with their husbands, but some are not. It just encourages me to be a better help mate and thank God that my marriage is based on more than duty.
I often wonder about the intimate details of these marriages since they are so different from ours. I have read novels set in Eastern cultures that talk portray life for woman in an arranged marriage, but what is real? How is it different for Christians? I have often wondered in going into friends' one room homes in which everyone sleeps within the same four walls how there is enough privacy for intimacy...
So one day I was talking to Sangita and the subject came up to where I could ask her discreetly about these things. At first I tried to go about it using a commercial where a young woman talks about finding her "love day" with her arranged husband (the day she realized she loved him), but Sangita did not understand this. So I just asked her to tell me her story.
Sangita and her husband were distant relatives. He is nine years her senior and the son of a pastor and teacher of local dialect. He did not have a job. They were betrothed when Sangita was 16, but waited two years to be married. During that time they never talked. I can't imagine having never talked to my husband before my wedding day. After they were married they went to live with his parents in a very small house. They fought a lot due to their differing views on things and Sangita admits that she was often very angry. Very soon Sangita became pregnant with her first child, then her second, and then her third. Things got better in the family because Sangita made Jesus her Lord and she learned to serve her husband who is very impatient, drinks, and is very demanding. He got a job and things improved. They moved into a larger house- 3 rooms for 7-8 people...
There are a lot of gaps in the story.
Then I asked, "So you have been married for 20 years. Is your husband your friend?" She quickly shook her head and said no. She said that there was never any way for them to become friends because they never had any privacy. For a long time she has shared a bedroom with her son while her husband sleeps outside. She said that they have never been alone to just talk and get to know each other. They don't know each others' hopes and dreams or what makes them happy. She said that she wouldn't let that happen to her son and daughter-in-law. Before her 19 year old son gets married she is going to make sure that they have a room to call their own (this means either both sisters have to get married or the grandpa has to die before he can get married).
Despite the fact that there is no friendship, no romance, really no relationship with her husband, Sangita talks about how she serves him. She fixes all of his meals for him, takes care of him in sickness, goes to work to pay the bills since he is sick, carries water on her head so they can bathe, takes him to doctor appointments, raised three kids... She did not do this because she loved her husband or because she got love in return, but because it is her duty as a wife. What a different perspective. Americans are so filled with a sense of entitlement. I am so filled with a sense of entitlement that if I do not feel properly loved or romanced by my husband then I do not want to serve him. But this is definitely not what the Bible teaches. I am thankful that I have a husband who strives to love me like Christ loves the church, but even if he did not, I am still supposed to submit to him and be his help mate.
My neighbors work so hard in their homes all day long to serve their husbands (none of whom are Christians) because it is their duty. I am sure that some of them are actually friends with their husbands, but some are not. It just encourages me to be a better help mate and thank God that my marriage is based on more than duty.
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