IMRIY PERRY SYIEMLIEH

Introducing the Family

We got married in 1998 – me this foreign white guy that really was not so foreign (I grew up in Mawlai till the age of 13) about me …. Her family knew mine, because really we grew up across the street from each other. Actually I would have played with her older sister. So there we are, in Khasi land me always not quite fitting in yet really being from the area, she young and susceptible to her families desires..

We had the ‘Christian Wedding’ hosted by my wife’s family. Her family, likely, somehow expected me to take her back to Canada for good and not come back, except for a visit. Little did they know that Shillong feels more like home than Canada to me….. Anyhow we did go to Canada so ‘that I could show Valariena the way I lived’; maybe not such a good idea. I had to work hard and she was all alone in many ways, in a foreign country. After a year we came back to Mawlai (Shillong) to more or less settle down. There have been many good times and many struggles but here we are going on in this Matrilineal society where some think they should change it – MENS CHALLENGE.

Some say Khasi women should not marry outside the tribe, saying the culture will fall apart etc. They fail to see that within their own culture the Khasi’s always had a system for marriage outside their tribe. If a man married a woman outside the tribe, they have a special ‘TANG JAIT” ceremony, to make a new clan for the children, if a woman marries outside the tribe the children automatically become part of her clan. It is the people within who are destroying their culture from within, as well as Khasi male and females, who marry outside their tribe, live in Khasi land, but fail to live the Khasi way.

We cannot all follow everything, but when you see people who convert/become Christian or are second or third generations Christian deciding what Khasi culture is and should be, we have problems. Always and anytime, it is my belief, that anything done with self soul searching and deliberation, is not wrong, even leaving your culture behind. But you can’t have it both ways. So many converted left most of their culture behind and now think they want to come back to the culture and hang on to it – but what are they hanging on to or going back to, their interpretation of it or what it really is. I am not saying one cannot covert and not be Khasi, in fact many who have not converted are also not living the culture – modernization and globalization maybe the ultimate cause.

When we got married Valariena and her family suggested she take my last name – I did not refuse, but suggested not!! I felt that if we were to live in a culture that followed a certain system we should do our best to hold to its traditions, and I was not afraid to be a part of the system. Some feel that the system should be changed and that it should be patrilineal/patriarchal. My feeling is that people don’t know enough about their own culture they want certain things to change, but not others. I think if we improve as human beings within what we are born into, we can make it work.

One concept is distribution of land, in Khasi culture the land goes to the youngest daughter to be the steward of it. This means she is not the sole and only owner she just becomes the manager and caretaker of all that is from the family, including the burdens and responsibilities. Many have taken this to mean that the youngest daughter owns the land and can do what ever she wants. On the other hand many an older brothers, mothers and mother in-laws have taken advantage and not allowed their youngest sister or daughter to be empowered and live her own rightful life with her new husband.

Right or wrong this is the system, there are others who think the law should change to ‘Equitable distribution of property’ . I wonder if they even think before they speak – how one can keep breaking the property up equally, generation to generation. Soon the grandchildren and great great grandchildren (even the children in the poorer landless families) will be sitting on one square foot of land and planting what??? A couple beans??

What a better way to start a blog than to introduce our new son - name to come - In the next few days I will first Introduce my family and then I hope in the following weeks, months and years to put down some of the unique circumstances that we live in. I am a Canadian born in North East India. I lived in Canada during my high school, University and some of my adult life - living a bit different life to most in Canada. So here I am back in 'India' which does not really feel like India, that is if there is a way India should feel. What I mean is that I live in the North East Hills of India, which little resembles the stereotype most would have of India.

So here is our Son - and hope you join us in the next few days to introduce the whole family.