I Better Be Worth A Lion Or Two

This past weekend I went to a (friend’s) Kikuyu wedding. (Kikuyus are the most populous tribe in Kenya). I have only been to one wedding in the States, so I didn’t really know what to expect, especially being here in Kenya. The ceremony itself was actually not too different from an American wedding other than the language difference. Flowers, worship, bridesmaids, groomsman, music, pastor, kissing, rings, honeymoon ect… were all a part of the ceremony. The cultural traditions surrounding marriage and the family were what made the wedding distinctively African, Kenyan, and Kikuyu. Bride price and dowry are an important part of marriage and my Kenyan friends were surprised when I told them that we don’t have such in the U.S. Most Westerners, like myself, misunderstand this tradition. Fortunately I have some close friends who I can talk to openly about marriage, polygny, divorce, bride price, ect… Bride price always seemed to me like putting a price tag on a woman. I couldn’t quite comprehend how a woman could value eight cows, an animal that people eat. I usually joke that my family better get a lion, an elephant, some camels, and a variety of other animals if I marry a Kenyan man, cause I’m certainly not worth cows. But there is more behind this custom. Yes, in some ways a woman is “bought” from her family. However, traditionally, it is as though a newlywed woman is being adopted into her husband’s family. She takes on the name and in rural areas a home is build for the couple on the husband’s family’s land. The dowry (the amount paid or animals/products given on wedding day or before) and the bride price (the amount that can be paid after the wedding day) are a gift for the parents and other family members who have spent X amount of years raising the woman, feeding her (hopefully) and educating her (hopefully) and now “see her off” into another family. Dowry and bride price are a way for the man to show that he is able and willing to provide for his wife, who was once provided for by the parents and other relatives. It is a somewhat complex custom, so I just accept it as different, not good or bad.