Nur Ruzana Abdul Rahim
ENGL 101C, Section 14
Revise Draft #2
October 12, 2013
My Dream Marriage vs. Malay Traditional Marriage “Coming together is a beginning; keeping together is progress; working together is success.” This is a famous saying in Malay culture on how married life is supposed to be. When two people say, “I do”, they are meant to share their life together, stay loyal and trust each other. However, forming a new life by getting married is complicated because there are many version of marriage based on one's culture. I am a Malay and my family tradition is different from my dream marriage. The way I would like to conduct my courtship and marriage differs from the traditional Malay marriage culture in terms of the selection of the marriage partner, the position of both couples before getting married, and the roles of husband and wife in the marriage. First, the way I would like to conduct my courtship and marriage and my traditional way differ in the terms of how the marriage partner is selected. Marriage is a lifelong partnership, so the choice of a marriage partner is a critical decision. According to Malay tradition, for a woman to get married, the families will find potential candidates and let her know each of them before she makes a decision. For me, this is a good way since we, the girls, do not need effort to find the right man to be our husband and it is very applicable for girls who are shy to approach a man. However, there are drawbacks of this way. One of them is each family member that introduces the candidates, puts a hope on us to choose their candidates. In this situation, we might either choose the right man who is not a majority choice in our family and hurt the family members, or satisfy the family members by choosing the majority choice but not the right man for us. This way always ends up hurting one side of family members. That is why I would like to find my own courtship. No matter how long it would take for me to find the right man as long as there is no interference from anyone. I want an independent relationship so that we can do everything together. I know when I choose my own partnership I will not satisfy my family. However, I believe that I cannot satisfy everyone in my life and as long as I am not hurting anyone, they can accept my choice. It will take time for them to get along with him and for him to get along with my family. For me, when my partner tries his hard to be accepted by my family, it shows that he really serious with our relationship. Second, the way I would like to conduct my courtship and marriage and my traditional way differ in the term of what position both couples are in before they are getting married. Malay tradition believes that the perfect time to get married is after finishing study and getting a god job. At this time, both have stable life and enough experiences to enter a new phase of life, which is marriage. In order for a couple to gain more respect from others, the man must be in higher position than the woman in terms of level of education, career and salary. This is because the woman will have more authority than the man and Malay societies afraid of the wife have no respect for the husband because of his low position. Additionally, they believe that early marriages between immature youth will not last long.
However, for me, a marriage should be based on love. So no matter who has a higher position, the love between the couple will bring along respectfulness to each other. By comparison, I prefer an early marriage, even though both of the couple still study in college, they can get married provided that they are financially, mentally and physically ready. When teenagers get married, they grow up quickly. Maturity is not based on age but experience. When the teen couples get married, they have more responsibility. They will help each other to organize their life as a student and a married couple. For me, if they manage to stabilize