The woes of arranged marriages

Sometimes the pressure from parents and relatives forces women into arranged marriages. When young women clock a certain age, they are pestered to get marriage regardless the cost; family members begin a match making frenzy as a way of proving a point. At the end of the several women get trapped into marriages they dislike in order to get approval from their family and society. Beatrice Murekatete narrates of how she settled for an arranged marriage and how three months down the road, she seeks for a divorce. She said that six months after the loss of her mother, she was approached by her paternal aunts with a marriage proposal to a so called prominent man with a well established business, and good family background. “Since I was still grieving, I thought it would be the right thing for me; I didn’t know that it would turn out to be the gravest mistake of my life. The husband they had selected for me was already in love with someone else. On my wedding night he left me in the hotel room only to discover later that he spent the night with the alleged sweetheart of his life,” Murekatete gravely said. Murekatete was blinded by a magnificent wedding and could not see that she had begun the most tormenting journey of her life. “My wedding day was could have been selected for the wedding of the year since it was magnificent,” she said. “It was only after I was frequently beaten to the point where I got a miscarriage that I woke up from the nightmare and decided to seek for a divorce,” Murekatete said. There is a difference between an arranged marriage and a forced marriage. The latter refers to a marriage where one or both partners is married without his or her consent or against his or her will: The former refers to a marriage where a third party is involved—they decide the fate of a couple by selecting partners and curtailing the courtship process, in most cases with conditions attached. However, both marriages have almost the same effects. The best part of marriage is getting to know someone deeper and courtship is a vital stage that will alleviate a lot of unnecessary pain. Dorau20@yahoo.co.uk