Originally posted by kirei_na_me
That is the starting point of many disagreements between my husband and me. He believes it's our money rather than his money, but I guess I just have a hard time adjusting to that.
I had the same problem, but in the reverse situation as I am the man. Japanese cannot conceive marriage as just a love thing where money stays separate. My wife sometimes tell me : "We are married but we still have separate bank accounts or count our money separately. What does it mean to be married then ? We could just be boyfriend-girlfriend". That's the kind of comment that infuriates me as I hear "marriage= money".

My parents have a prenuptial agreement and so did I (eventhough my wife couldn't really understand what it was about, but as it was a condition for getting married she accepted). The conception of marriage is so different in Japan and the West that it almost mean opposite things and leads to many misunderstandings. That's what I've been explaining in this thread.

I can't imagine marriage as a business in our epoch, but Japanese can't imagine it not being a business to raise children. Maybe that's why Japanese have such strong corporate loyalty. A company is like a second family ; you can't divorce it. It's not socially acceptable.

If we look deeper into Japanese culture, we realise that even words like "kyaku-san" means "client, customer" (at work) or "guest" (at home)". Japanese feel the relationship is the same. The words "family" 家族 and "house" 家 are also in direct relation in Japan. "Kazoku" (=family) literaly means "bound by the house" in kanji. Often Japanese speaking English would say things like "My house is not rich" when they mean "family", which is a proof that it is one same thing in their minds.