A cross-cultural marriage is an adventure I'd recommend

Anushka Asthana has a great piece on (her own) mixed-race marriage in The Observer. Here's the point that I found especially poignant:

So it is undoubtedly true that getting married highlighted the differences between us. Because before that, it had been about me and him and sometimes our parents. But now he has found himself not just my husband, but a fully fledged member of the Asthana (and Bahel) family. And I'm sure there is a risk that could bring along some difficulties. But the truth is that while our cultural backgrounds are hugely important to our lives, they don't come close to defining us. In fact, I'd say there are more ways in which Toby and I are similar than our racial backgrounds make us different.

That, too, has been my experience. Our cultural differences were never really apparent while Kyle and I were still dating as graduate students. As we became more serious about our relationship, got engaged and then married, family members got thrown in our life and that brought out differences that neither of us had been really aware of before. I'm not talking about anything BAD. Just different. Like daring to put tomatoes in your mostly-lettuce salad. If my father knew we did this, he would probably disown me.


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