what’s the diff?

When I first started dating Beau, I shocked quite a number of my friends. First, they didn’t know him from Adam (given the fact that I’ve always dated men in my circle of friends), second… they think it’s just bizzare to date somebody you met online. My girl friends were the toughest bunch, and the ones with the longest list of questions. But their questions were fairly answerable, until they got to the ultimate question…

“Do you share the same religion?”

See, in Indonesia it’s somewhat very harmful to date outside your religious beliefs. Nobody says it bluntly, but it is silently understood that dating a Muslim guy is a no-no to a Christian girl… and vice versa. Afterall, the government won’t let cross-religion marriage to happen anyway. It’s in the law. So to me, when you marry outside your beliefs… you’re an automatic outlaw. How very Romeo and Juliet!

I smiled to my friends when I was about to answer that question.

“No.”

Right there and then, similar comments were thrown.

“Are you sure?” – this is the most popular one.
“Well… if it’s not serious..” – second most popular one.
“How about your parents? Do they know?”
“Don’t throw yourself into a situation that you can’t handle…”

I only smiled and give them the most diplomatic answer.

“We’ll see what happens”

Honestly, I was worried. Beau spent his adult life abroad, where religious background was not the main thing to worry about. But he is now here, returning to his roots, living with his family and is now dating me. What would his parents say? I spent a night wondering about this… about how to bring this up to him.

But before I can say anything, Beau brought the subject up. Suffice to say we’re ok with the differences. He’s going to keep his beliefs, and I’m going to keep mine. Parents? No problem. They’re cool.

Society? That’s another story.

See, I don’t get this whole religion thing. I thought people meant it when they formed the UN, wanting world peace and helping the unfortunates. I thought the world have to unite. What could be more logical than uniting through marriage?

It seems to me like… why do we watch people signing peace pacts on TV, while we can have a similar thing in our own household, 24/7?

To me, religious difference is wonderful. Beau and I talked about this in our most recent chat session. Beau, I didn’t include the thing about government regulations here.. because it’s just not polite… hehehehe…

beau: im so lucky to have you too bebe
belle: again… how did we get into this…
belle:
beau: it’s been arranged by God, beb
beau: so that we can meet, love each other, get married, have kids, get old and fat…and die happily
belle: funny how God arranged this to happen. two different persons who worship Him in different ways…
belle: i guess it’s beautiful
beau: yes
beau: that’s the beauty of his creation darling

I’m one of those pessimist who thinks that there is NO WAY we can achieve world peace. But now I think, if people see inter-religion relationship like we do…

the impossible is at hand…