Secret of a Walking Marriage Custom Unveiled

Details
Created on Friday, 16 February 2007 23:34
Published on Friday, 16 February 2007 23:29
Hits: 3920
It was American writer, botanist and longtime resident of Yunnan Joseph Rock who once wrote that the last peaceful place on the planet, the last place where war has never existed, where people live in harmony, is Lugu Lake. The lake is home to the {ln:mosuo \'Mosuo} minority, one of China\'s 56 ethnic groups, hidden in the shadows of the Xiaoliang Mountains. Twenty - or even ten - years ago, the average Chinese would have had little desire to visit the remote area, bordering Sichuan and Yunnan. But in recent years, the lake has seen an influx in tourists, enduring tenuous train trips and bus rides for a glimpse at this unique matriarchal culture. And its famous selling point: zouhun (走婚).

walking marriageWalking Marriage

The Allure of Zouhun

Some 40,000 ethnic Mosuo live in the Lugu Lake area in Sichuan Province. Since Mosuo people are governed through a matriarchic system, people also call the Lugu Lake women\'s land. 　

Men live a very idle life there. They don\'t do any farm or household work but play cards and Mahjong all day long. Women are the main work force in the house and they also do most of the farm work. 　

It is the practice of zouhun - walking marriage - that makes this community marketable as a lakeside love haven. Mosuo people do not formally marry. Rather, they carry a special "walking marriage" custom. A man and a woman can get to know each other by singing love songs or contacting each other in their daily life activities. If they fall in love, the woman might give the man a scarf woven by her as a gift. When night falls, the man will visit his lover\'s house with a piece of fat meat. When he arrives in front of the woman\'s house, he will throw the meat to the dog to eat so that it won\'t warning people of his arrival. Then he will go into the woman\'s house through the window. Before dawn, the man will leave the woman\'s house. If the two still want to keep in touch, the man can come again.


If the woman does not like the man any more, she won\'t open the door when the man comes next time, and the two will find their new lovers again. The man does not take any family responsibilities. The woman will raise the child and control the family properties.

If the woman has found a new boyfriend and her old boyfriend happens to knock at her door, the woman will tell him to come next time. The man will not feel upset by the woman\'s refusal. To Mosuo people, men and women have the freedom to choose their lover and their relations are not subject to power or money.


They never formalize the arrangement to create a new family group, although (contrary to stereotypes of a free love Shangri-la) some couples remain committed to each other their entire lives and often have many children together. In fact, the two never share common property - all property is inherited by women. A child will grow up in the mother\'s family home, alongside siblings and maternal uncles. Male influences in childhood come from maternal male relatives, rather than the child\'s father. From birth to death, the offspring remains in the home of his/her mother. Neither males nor females of Mosuo culture enjoy sexual privileges nor total power in household economic affairs.

Anthropologists have noted Lugu Lake as an oddity in the study of human society. According to many scholars, the Mosuo have done away with the problem of sexual harassment, burglary, murder, rape, and the majority of criminal offenses, domestic disputes between mother in laws and daughter in laws, the suffering of the aging, and individual desires for economic gain. Hence their language has no words for war, rape, or murder.

Powered by Bullraider.com