Marivi Soliven: Mail Order Bride

Mail order brides is like present day Tinder, however the difference is rather than being able to match with someone 1-100 miles away it could be continents away and more times than not the person choosing you is wealthy and advanced in years. The novel, The Mango Bride, by Marivi Soliven is about two women named Beverly and Amparo, that unknowingly come from the same family due to secrecy. They have different reasons for coming to the United States, Beverly being a mail order bride due to her mother saying she wanted her to have a better life rather than living in poverty, while Amparo got banished to the United States from Manila by her family due to dishonor. Their unlikely chance of meeting one another was the doing of Beverly’s false,
abusive mail ordered marriage. Mail order brides are incredibly popular in countries with less money and resources due to the want for more opportunity for a wealthier and/or better lifestyle. Nevertheless, they tend not to know the consequences and dangers of going through this change of lifestyle, only thinking of the benefits in it.
Women, typically, in countries with less money and resources tend to search for more opportunities to move up in social classes searching for a better life than the one they currently have.
The theme of women marrying or dating into money has been seen throughout this novel, from Señora Concha, Tita Carina, the women at Tita Carina’s party, Lisa, and, eventually, Beverley. While it was not said if Senora Concha’s husband was white, all of those men that the women were married/dating were rich, older, and white. Mateo had pointed this out to Amparo during the party, “Look around, that’s the template for couples...the white guys are at least a decade older than their Filipina dates” (Soliven, 87). It is a template for these women, you can have a better life with a white, rich, and older man. Their money meant the women have access to necessities such as clothes, food, shelter etc. However, it would not simply be a few things here and there, it meant luxurious living! Clothes and jewelry that could equal the amount of a years rent, there would be no worry of going hungry, and even a mansion that could fill 2 other families inside. These better lifestyles are the ones multitudes of people could only imagine in their dreams, if you lived in anything less you would take any opportunity to live that dream. Nevertheless, there are some cases where these women decide to become like Lisa and Beverly, mail order brides, and they tend to leave their homes and everything they know for
someone else which can lead to possible dangers.
These women do not recognize there are consequences and possible dangers such as dehumanization and abuse to their decision of becoming a mail order bride.
A consequence to joining these websites is you are talking to them through letters, Skype, phone calls, emails, or any other forms of communication, expect for face to face within the first few months. There are times where both partners may not even speak the same language as the other, which can cause slight problems. You may believe you know someone just though communication such as that, but, once you marry them, they can change instantly. For example, Beverley had told Marcela that her boyfriend Josiah was coming to Manila in October. Beverly said, “‘...first weekend of October…we’ve been writing to each other since January’” (182). By October, they would be writing to each other for a solid ten months without actually meeting face to face. Meaning in October would be their official first meeting. Then, ten days later Josiah would take Beverley to Oakland to get married and live together, leaving behind everything she once knew. Josiah would then beat her for another six years. His justification for it was that she owed him! He got her a green card to stay there which cost him some money. They further had a daughter together that he treated with lots of love, yet treated Beverley horribly. Being new in a country you are familiar means you do not know there are resources available to you that could protect you or help
your situation. Furthermore, he not only caused physical damage on her, but mentally as well. Dehumanizing her culture by calling them animals, taking her hard earned money from work, controlling what she eats (which cannot be from her culture either), not allowing her to have friends, etc. These are consequences to marrying just anyone that we have not fully gotten to interact with and learning about who they are further. While this is also true, there are also possible benefits to these kinds of marriages.