What Makes People Engage in Cross Cultural Relations

Many times when I used to start another topic of intercultural relations, a thought came to me that of course almost whatever I write about is applied to any union. It is just that cross cultural marriages have that "twist". Today I'd like to analyse what made me and my husband to engage in one of such, why didn't we prefer staying within our zone of comfort, he - in India, me - in Kazakhstan, then marry a person of the same nationality, religion, with the same mentality? The answer is "I have no idea!" 

No, seriously, we both had no intentions of marrying a foreigner ever in our life. Yes, we did have foreign friends in the Internet before, but that was just pure communication: few comments, few likes... Something happened in our case, and we proceeded further.

First, of course, we simply liked talking to each other a lot, exchange messages, share insights of our lives. Then it became a necessity for me to hear his voice and see him at least for few seconds, at least few times a week. I used to be sad when we couldn't chat for long periods of time, when he was away with his family on vacations, when I was away with my family for a weekend... It felt like that. Like I needed him in my life, he needed me too.

Second, it felt exotic, unusual, exciting, romantic to be in the multicultural relations. I dreamt of my handsome Indian boy, his land, possessing such a rich culture. You may call it curiosity or feeling of novelty, unexplored - it also played role in us becoming interested in our relations.

Third as soon as we felt special about all the happening, we both didn't want to lose it, because we felt comfortable when we were together, we had similar views, interests and so on. We knew things were not easy in the beginning and they would be more difficulties ahead, but we were determined and weren't afraid. We felt strong.
Fourth, for us it didn't feel weird to be married to a person whose cultural background is different from another one's. This can be called "open mindness" of some sort. However I shall note here that it doesn't happen in all the cases, especially when a partner is quite conservative or is not ready to adjust for another partner's' culture much. In my case I was lucky to find an Indian man who although was brought up and lived in India, had a different, not-so-traditional thinking what helped me a lot on the initial stages of adaptation.
Just to add to the question: during the course of two years of being employed in his company my D discovered how many of his colleagues from other countries ARE in cross cultural marriages! Like German-Russian, German-Indian, Indian-Ukrainian, and perhaps, many more. The world is uniting in spite of anything.
I am sure that intercultural relations which are valued and taken care of will evolve into strong bond between the partners. Sometimes we also forget what it took us to be together as things seem to have been the way they are always. At such time it is important to recollect how you started your cross cultural journey and why and remember that love brought you to each other across the distance. Cherish it.

From Russian Soups to Chilly Paneer - Russian Wife in India

♨This will be interesting for me to look back and see how well I, a girl who spent 23 years of her life in her native country, realigned herself for new settings in just 4 years. It quite amazes me but time flew so fast I now perhaps won't be able to recollect those impressions as they were.
Every country has its unique "taste", so does India, one of the most savoury countries in the world. The food of Indian subcontinent is definitely something to pay attention to, to discuss, to love or to ... dislike. Take it or leave it. Nonetheless if you are a permanently living in India foreign wife, you will have hard time adjusting to Indian food if you cannot stand spices. I was lucky (as well as my D) to be one of those foreign wives to teach my taste buds to like spicy and oily table. The first meal I had here was an omelet we bought at the bus station cafe when we arrived from Delhi. It was yumm, but it had some little green rings of some vegetable in it - green chillies! I had to dig them out from the omelet following a timely advice by my D.

On my first day in the city I was settled in a paying guest (called PG here) facility with some Indian girls. That evening I was hungry and the girls helped to fetch some rice, it looked great, all vegetarian, and I digged into it and had two-three spoons at once... When after a while I realized that my tongue as well as ears were on fire! It was so spicy and felt like it burned all the insides.
The days later my D was taking me to the university canteen where I tried Indian paneer with gravy, which I enjoyed a lot however fighting with chillies in it too. But I started liking Indian food almost straight away and after a while couldn't imagine my meal without pickles or green chillies (I got ya!). See my old post.
The food transition for a Russian girl used to tasty but rather plain Russian soups, minimum salt  and pepper in her dishes, went smoothly. The only thing is that after some time I start missing my country's cuisine very much. In those cases I cook something rather Russian like soup or simply take a piece of bread and put butter on it and eat with tea or coffee. My tongue still craves for "simple" taste without any spices added.
A peculiar thing is that Indians like to eat fruits (grapes, watermelon, papaya, apples) with black salt and black pepper. After I tried it that way several times and my throat didn't thank me, I simply made a point that I prefer a pure taste of the fruits.
Another challenge for me at times (though I don't cook much) is to make a dish which meets my Indian husband's taste. He likes Russian food a lot especially the one prepared by my mom, but I know that he expects me to cook Indian style at least a little bit. As I am a rather independent person I asked Indian food cooking tips from my in-laws very rarely, choosing Internet as my teacher. I believe I managed to make something resembling Punjabi kidney beans and channa (chickpea) and even tried to make South Indian dosas and vadas! Otherwise almost whatever I cook turns out to be of a mixed Indo-Russian taste, I can't help it. Here is what Russian I tried to cook in India, not much but it made me happy:
Taste of Dacha - vegetables in a pan, my Mom's recipe.
Cooking the Crescents - Russian dish vareniki with potato.
Apple Pie - called Sharlotka in Russian.

Which Language? Intercultural Couples' Communication

I love everything related to language and literature, and it wasn't at all surprising when I chose to become a philologist, a person who loves "word", just like my Mom. Different types of language, be it spoken, written, body, sign, help us to convey and ... connect.
I remember when we had one of the general linguistics lessons in the university, we came to the subject of language families. That was when I  discovered the variety of languages which exist. I took particular interest as I recollect now in Indo-European family which is the largest, and looked through the line-listing of the languages of India ... Oh my! How many of them were there I couldn't remember and pronounce their names at all, and only  few months later I myself was put into that language environment.                                                                
To tell the truth I wanted to be ready before I reached India, and started learning Hindi in my city. I did it because I was curious and inspired by love. It also happens that both the partners have the same native language they can use in all areas of their lives, but what to do when your native languages are different? I will not touch here the situation when partners live in a country which puts its own linguistic demands on both.
Our own experience is such - my husband's mother tongue is Hindi and my is Russian.
In our case comes the universal medium - English language. We chose this way because my Indian boy couldn't speak Russian at all that time, and I still hadn't developed my Hindi speaking skills.
We have Indo-Russian families who have different approach to this problem. In one family a wife speaks Russian, while husband speaks both, Russian and Hindi. English is not used at home much.
Two other families have both the parents speaking both the languages, depending on a situation, and I consider this to be an ideal variant, and that's how I'd like our communication to be.
One more "method" of communication I  got to know in the university was that some multilingual families learn and involve a third language like Esperanto  for daily communication. 
Okay, we still speak English with each other, but I in my turn learnt quite enough Hindi to watch TV and movies and understand what people say, and converse when I need it (let me boast more - read and write); my D also can speak Russian a little, knows alphabet and can write. In modern India though English is more than enough to feel yourself comfortable, and there is no obligation for foreigners residing here to learn Hindi in order to get good job or lift their social status.
However, at times it is not easy to make a person who speaks your own language to understand you. It is double fold difficult when you and your partner are using different language systems, because language also represents culture, it bears its concepts, and knowledge which have been accumulating for centuries! In many ways if intercultural couples don't at least try to learn each other's native languages, they miss on understanding their partner's inner world, his or her mentality, ways of life he or she chooses, and many other small things which are in fact important for a successful cultural blend :) But if you try may be the reaction of your loved one can be as such:

Dear friends, what is your opinion on this topic? Is it important for you that your partner speaks your language? Or do you think that love can break any language barriers?