International Marriage
International Marriage
Fate Brought Couple Together
Jon & Harumi
When a young New Zealand man experienced the scenic wonders of Norway in the early 1960’s, little did he know it would set the stage for his future son’s marriage to a Japanese woman almost 40 years later.
Fast forward to 1989 when the man’s youngest son, Jon, answered a penfriend advert from a Norwegian girl called Magni. Jon’s enthusiasm for Norway – fostered by his father’s experience there – led the two to become close friends. Then, in 1995, Magni introduced Jon to a Japanese girl called Harumi and the pair soon formed a purely platonic relationship as penfriends. But when Jon was working in the UK in 1997 & 1998, their friendship began to take on a more romantic edge – despite the fact they had never met.
The death of Jon’s father in 1998 and his mother in 1999 led him to resign and return home to Auckland where, not wanting to return to work immediately, he took off on a 4-month backpacking adventure around Asia. When he landed in Tokyo in July 1999, Jon and Harumi finally met for the first time.
The attraction was strong and two weeks later the pair announced their new relationship to Harumi’s parents. Jon returned to NZ, and after a few trips back and forth to each others countries including 6 months Harumi lived in NZ in 2001, Jon moved to Japan in March 2002 and they married the following year.
“Harumi’s parents had a lot of trouble accepting me, I think partly because they were worried their daughter may leave Japan, and whether I could support her wherever we lived,” Jon recalls. But this all changed after the couple held their wedding ceremony in Auckland in 2004, and he now enjoys a good relationship with them.
Harumi says the main difficulties of living together at the start were that she had to take more responsibility for her foreign partner and cope with pressure from her parents. Jon says commitment and sheer bloody-minded determination were crucial to overcoming these challenges. “Also, pretending you don’t have a Plan B makes you much more determined to make sure Plan A works.”
“Every day we are teachers and students,” Jon says about the highlights of a mixed relationship. “We learn and teach each other about our respective cultures, countries and languages – it is incredibly stimulating. With a same-culture relationship you only have to learn about your partner’s personality, but in an international relationship you also have to learn about a whole new culture, which makes every day like the “Discovery Channel.” It is almost like going back to school all over again.”
“With two cultures, two countries and two languages, we have double the flexibility of same-culture couples,” says Jon, who now works as a writer. “We have houses in two countries, as well as double the opportunities available for future children’s education, holidays, investing and eventual retirement – it is great!”
