Crossing Cultures In Marriage
By Chaplain B. Allen Vaughan

I grew up in a small town in rural Missouri with a population of around 11,000 people, and then went to a small, church-affiliated college in Arkansas. In 1990, right after my graduation from college, I embarked upon one of the most significant adventures in my young adult life. I decided to become a missionary for my church. Our training was conducted in Atlanta and New York City. I was accepted into the mission program and sent to the Philippines for a year and six months.

In the span of only three short months, I went from the life of a college student in rural America, to the life of a missionary in the Philippines. I lived in Manila, along with 10 million other people, who spoke a different language, walked in overcrowded streets, rode in smoke-belching, noisy public modes of transportation and breathed in the choking pollution of the most densely populated city in the world.
 
I soon came to discover the beauty of the Philippines and ingenuity of the Filipino people, but I had to go through what most first-time world travelers experience as “culture shock.” In order to adapt to my new surroundings, I began to develop certain cross-cultural skills. These skills have come in handy on many occasions since my days as a missionary, and particularly in my cross-cultural marriage to one especially beautiful Filipina who became my wife.
 
I have come to believe that every marriage is a “cross-cultural” marriage, no matter where either partner in the couple grew up. You may have married your high school sweetheart from your hometown, or you may be married to someone who grew up in a completely different part of the world.
 
The truth is, culture is defined by more than skin color and language. More than likely, you were raised in a family that has a slightly different set of values than your spouse’s family. These differences in values are most evident when it comes to spending or saving money, raising children, methods of discipline or religious beliefs.

The way we view the world and interpret events as we see them, is colored by the family culture in which we were raised. When you sit down to discuss challenging issues, and discover the differences you have with your spouse, it may seem at times that you both are from two different cultures.

Your spouse may not be “wrong” or “unreasonable.” He or she may just be viewing the issue from a different perspective, which is influenced by how we were raised. Work at trying to understand where your spouse is coming from and learn his or her “culture.” You may be surprised by what a difference it will make when you get past the “culture shock” and start to develop cross-cultural skills in your marriage. May you be blessed.

Good column. My wife is from Thailand, a culture which is even more perplexing to most Americans than Philippines. One thing I have learned to NOT do when trying to understand where she's coming from is to refrain from asking "Why?" It's not a fair question and not really relevant. If she sees the world differently from me, I just have to accept that and to accept her without asking "Why." The "why" is because that's what she's used to from her background, and there's no need for her to justify Thai culture to me (and vice versa).

We have melded our diverse world views very nicely over the years and really have no cultural conflicts. The main sticking point is language (though her English is beginning to approach perfection, that wasn't always the case.) One of us would "hear" what the other did not intend to "say", and without knowing there was a miscommunication, one of us would get our feelings hurt. We now have come to recognize this when it happens; with love & trust -- knowing that neither of us would intentionally hurt the other -- if we say something that appears hurtful, that's a trigger to revisit the conversation and try to see where the misunderstanding lies. It took a while for us to figure this out and we always get a good laugh when we compare what we thought we heard to what was actually meant.

Over the past 37 years since I met my not-American wife, I have frequently relied on the process of reflection and self examination to understand why I believe and express what I do. By doing so, I am able to better explain to my wife the inscrutable and irrational behaviors of her strange American husband. This is a mutual process and through it I have come to have a more complete understanding of her native culture. So, asking the question "WHY?" has been good for us. That is, Why do we do and say the things we do?

I agree with John on one point: The more I am separated from American culture, the more I ask why they (Americans back home) do what they do. After living in Thailand for 2 years, I became so mellow & de-stressed, I really started to see how stressed, hurried, self-absorbed & materialistic many/most Americans really are. My time in Japan is only reinforcing that. Americans have this pervading attitude: "Our country, right or wrong!" that is horribly off-putting and incomprehensible to non-Americans, almost humorous if you can take a step back from it. But every time I go back to the States, I become more & more convinced that that's NOT where I want to spend my retirement years. I love our country (I'm retired Navy) but the "me me" attitude, and culture of entitlement (from both the rich and the poor), the casual flinging about of wealth that most of the world will never know, I find hard to be around.