Vietnam: Women want more from marriage
HO CHI MINH CITY - Thirty-one year old Minh Huong, the team leader of the sales department in a
pharmaceutical company in Ho Chi Minh City, is eagerly waiting for her boyfriend to
return from America where he has been for the last seven years. She says he is the only
man who would accept her "just the way she is."While Minh Huong is committed to this
relationship, she is also relieved that divorce is a feasible option. "At least people can
end relationships in which they are unhappy," she says.Huong, however, is not the only
one who has started thinking this way. Like other traditional societies, Vietnamese
society too is in the throes of socio-economic and cultural changes. The shift to a market
economy in the early 1990s improved material life of the people in general.
Financial
independence, only a dream a decade ago, is now becoming a reality for many
Vietnamese women.More and more women in urban Vietnam are also discovering the
value of freedom in their relationships. Some feel that the new generation of Vietnamese
men, especially those who spend time in the West, are better equipped for equal
relationships. Others seek different options. Hong Anh, for instance, married an Indian
man, Hari Chathrattil, because as she says there is no way she would have put up with
the "ridiculous petty minded demands" that a Vietnamese man makes on his wife or
girlfriend.Twenty year-old Thu Ba, who married Sulma Warne, an Australian man,
enjoys the fact that she can express herself freely in the relationship. "I can share many
things with Sulma that I would not be able to with a Vietnamese man," she says. Ba's
work as a freelancer for WWF takes her away tom home, which she says would be a
big problem for a Vietnamese man.Open-mindedness is important in the list of qualities
that women, in Vietnam are seeking in men. Thu Ba's husband Chathrattil, who teaches
in a local college, was even asked by male students in his English class to explain why
some Vietnamese women preferred to marry foreigners. "When I suggested that it could
be because Vietnamese men were not trying to relate to changes in their women who
are increasingly becoming more confident, standing on their feet and refusing to be taken
for granted, the women in the class applauded and said 'tell them (the men) more,"' he
says.
An independent living arrangement is another requirement of many young
Vietnamese women. While men traditionally live with their parents even after they marry,
this custom is also gradually changing. In the past, economic constraints prevented
couples from setting up an independent establishment. But more and more Vietnamese
women are a part of the work force, and continue to hold their jobs even after they
marry and have children. The number of day-care centres, referred to as 'semi-boarding'
schools, that are springing up in the cities is evidence of this new phenomenon.At the
end of the day, if they do not get what they want from a man, more Vietnamese women
say they would rather stay single. And being over thirty and single is becoming more and
more acceptable. Most single women are comfortable with their status and living
arrangements. "Since we live with our families, we are not lonely," says Minh Hong, who
lives with her parents and enjoys the arrangement.Twenty nine-year old Bao An, who
works as a leading salesperson in a pharmaceutical company too is happy being single.
She and her two siblings moved from Vietnam's central province to Ho Chi Minh City in
1996 to have access to better education and good jobs.
Like many other women in the
city, Bao An rides a motorbike and Is undaunted by the fact that she has to function in a
male-dominated medical world.While she would like to have a boyfriend, Bao An is
against living together outside a marital situation.'The humiliation and social stigma I
would have to face if we didn't marry would be too painful to bear," she says.Keeping
this clanged position - and thinking - of women in mind, the National Assembly agreed
last month that the Marriage and Family law, passed in 1986, needed to be made more
specific and progressive, even while it continued to preserve the traditional and moral
values of Vietnamese society.After five days of deliberations, many fundamental
principles on marriage and family were adopted. These included "voluntary and
progressive" marriages, monogamy, spousal equality, lack of discrimination in the
treatment of sons and daughters and the right of a single woman to tear a child.
By Ritu Bhatia - The Independant (Bangladesh) - October 27, 2000.
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