Michelle Angela M. Nazar Luistro Anthropology 10

Miss Abby

August 26, 2011

These articles had really strucked me, yet it also amazed and amused me at the same time. While I was reading these two, I had a gut feeling that I still do not know about the societies of those others who are also parts of the globe, especially the countries that had been featured, Japan and India. Who needs love! in Japan, many couples don't. This title seems to explain everything about the article, well if not everything, at least a glimpse of what the readers are about to read. Mrs. Yuri Uemura then started talkingabout their family. She said that there was never a love that had existed between her and the husband yet they had survived their 40-year of marriage. It was kind of a strange thing that such scenario could be possible, and here is a real life example, a perfect example. I then thought that maybe that they had at least been good friends in the entire marriage period, but I was so surprised to know that they are not friends at all. He even hit her, summoned her, and did a lot of bad things to her. After knowing the tragic story of Mrs. Uemura, I was not surprised at all to the other families that were featured in the article. There was this man who was asked if he have loved his wife and he could not give a concrete answer. Instead he said that she's like air or water. You couldn't live without it, but most of the time, you're not conscious of its existence. There was this another man who leaves his house at 7 in the mornung then returns at 11 in the evening. Worse that this are those husbands that leave for the weekdays and will only return during the weekends. There are these couples who have couples of should I say unfortunate and tragicstories but they had not strucked me as the story of Mrs. Uemura did. Next would be the arrangement of marriages in India. For all of my life I had been hearing the whereabouts of arranged marriages and I had seen it as a negative thing. But these Indians do not see them as a bad nor negative thing, or if they see it as a bad, there is not a single thing they could do about it. My idea of arranged marriages is these upperclass men will be matched to other upperclass women. Basically they are maintaining a status quo. They want to remain or

should I say to be more powerful, they want to multiply their wealth, and they want to be socially influencial. You know, that idea of elites marrying another elites. That sort of things come to my mind whenever I hear about arranged marriages. Indians disproved my theory of arranged marriages. I really thought that it was the woman's family who decides if who will be the man whom the woman will be married with. But they have a different 'policy' with regards to arranged marriages. It is basically the man's family who chooses the woman, and if that woman does not pass their standards, she will be a big no-no for their son. The writer surely had many difficulties while she was having her fieldwork in India. Imagine her being surprised that these women had not met some members of the opposite sex for the longest time that they had been alive. Well,I was sort of surprised too. What I find interesting here is the matchmaking part. She was ofcourse very excited and anxious at first but as time passed by and the man's amily had not chosen the 'right one', she had finally losen her hopes. These two articles are very interesting that they had left a very huge impact on me. They really did. As for the first one, we could say that yes Japan is indeed a very developed country but how about their family ties? Do they still consider their families as their families or just merely plain people whom they have not even loved, at least for the couples that were interviewed. These could be one of the major problems of the first world countries. Strong family ties are being lost as the development of the society is going on. Families may not seem to notice it because they might be so used to it that they just result into ignoring the reality. If we were to compare it with the Philippine setting, there is indeed a huge difference. Yes we are still on that stage of being a developing country but our strong family ties are still there. And I think it will never be lost because we all know that Filipinos value their families that much. That is the reason behind us of being called as family-oriented country. It just makes me sad that people in Japan are so busy that they almost forget their families. Instead of having natural-will relationships with them, they are having rational-will relationships with them. I also noticed that women there are so powerless that they would not even dare to have a divorce even they really wanted to. There is also a high form of social control there like gossips. One had said that she if afraid of getting a divorce because it will surely spread in their community, and it will be a big shame for her. Also it was stated that those who are divorced are oftentimes not being accepted at work.

The last one would be the arraneged marriages in India. I also learned a lot after reading this one. I bet that if it ould be an outsider's perspective, he would think of it as a negative thing. But ofcourse Indians do not think that way. I also understand their point. They said that the parents are more capable of choosing the right partner, and it was successful for some who had sustained and maintained their marriage for the longest time. But how about those who are not even happy with their marriage? Oh, how unfortunate they were. I realized how lucky are we Filipinos for we are not experiencing the same setting as they are. If there is one thing that they would surely envious of us, and if ther is one thing that we must be proud of, is our freedom. We have the freedom the choose, to do what we want, to not do what we do not want. I realized how fortunate we are for having such freedom. Of course the Indians will have a different view about it. These two articles had executed the inequality that is still very dominant and rampant nowadays. It is inevitable yet if someone wanted to make a change, he surely can if he has the strong will to do so. These also showed different cultures of different nations. These differences are to teach us not to prejudge and have bad notions about them. As we all know, we are all different so who are we to judge another culture if it is weird and not like ours? We just have to respect them. These also showed how society shapes its people. People are the ones who built the society yet society is the one who is ruling over its people. Lastly, these articles showed how powerless women are, even nowadays.