Dear Debs, Some more thoughts on Egyptian marriage

Submitted by Straight_Talk_Luigi (United States), Feb 23, 2009 at 13:41

Welcome back Debs!

First of all, let me just thank you for your response earlier. That was most kind.

I realize this is a message for Isis, and she has been giving you some good advice in the earlier thread. Isis has been on here now for about 8 months and let me just say a couple of things about that:

1) In my view, Isis is a lot stronger than the average person on here. She was able to get herself out of an awful situation with her ex-husband and has been able to move on with life. Sadly, some of our other readers have been unable to, and some I fear have gone back to their men out of desperation.

2) Isis took several years to interact with her man and used nearly every precautionary measure you can think of. While I am very glad she did that and did not rush into things like a lot of people on here have done (myself included), none of this can ultimately confirm a "happy" marriage.

There simply is no substitute for meeting and spending time with someone in the flesh, and there's good reason why the both of us want you to put the breaks on this.

What I can tell you from my own investigation and experiences, Debs, is that any man or woman, whether it's a Western man next door or someone across the globe who wants a quick, rushed marriage is up to no good. They obviously want something, whether its a visa, money, bragging rights to a good-looking woman, or whatever, but it's NOT true love.

The main difference I see between your situation and Isis's is that Isis's man did not seem to talk about marriage right away. Your man has already opened up that can of worms after meeting you just a couple of times? That in of itself would certainly scare me.

I actually had a Russian woman once who told me she loved me in the second e-mail! I had sent her two messages and a dated picture of myself. Can true matriomonial love be based on things like that? I think not.

Listen, Debs, I realize you want to find love. Who doesn't? And it's pretty clear to me that you are geninuely seeking. But the reality is, a lot of people out there are looking for someone just like you to take advantage of. Your situation as you told us about earlier is exactly what these men look for. Someone who is hurting, maybe even desperate and who is not terribly experienced with distance, international, on-line dating. That's why so many divorced women fall prey to these men.

I can understand if you are sick and tired of English or Western men. The truth is that their selfish, arrogant behaviour is what (at least in part) drives women to such desperate measures in the first place.

Ask yourself what brought you on here on in the first place, or perhaps better yet, why you are looking for advice on-line? It's perfectly normal for you to feel uncertain about this, and it's just your feminine intuition picking up on male garbage.

Look, Debs, this guy is thinking "quick marraige" all the way. I know it does not seem like he's a bad guy now, but believe me, ALL these relationships start off nice. See, you're looking to learn about him and his culture which is the wise move because you understand that cultural differences are going to be unavoidable in marriage (they always are). But he does not seem to care at all, either because

1) He's not that serious about you

2) He wants to marry you for some other reason besides love.

3) He expects you to submit to whatever he wants and adopt his way of life, therefore, discussing differences with you is irrelevant because you will just end up doing for him what he wants. I'm sure it does not seem like that now, but a lot of these guys wait until after marriage to make their move.

Perhaps you have seen the post written above these comments by Dr. Pipes, Debs? About how the second the women lands in the Middle East she is cocoered into their culture by intimidation? That is actually true, but it's not the norm in international relationships. From Russian women and American men to Moroccan men and English woman, it take months even years for the true nature of the relationship to reveal it self. I would encourage you to read my conversations with reader sash. Marriage is hardly the finish line; in many cases, it's only the beginning.

See, I appreciate the fact that you want to wait a year or so before getting married, and hey , it's a lot more realization than others have had, myself included, so give yourself credit, Debs. And I know that none of this is easy to hear. I know you've already invested signifcant time and money and resources into this, but even if you take your time like Isis said, I see you either exposing this fellow for what he is or ending up in another disaster.

Debs, I want you to know that true love seekers like yourself deserve better than this man. It is because you are geninue that you need to be careful, whethter you are seeing someone back home or in Egypt.

-Luigi

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