An Emirati Love Story

After the wedding in class, the students were teasing Sultan saying that his family is very rich.

"Miss, his father gave him 100,000 Dhms (about $27,000)!"

"No Miss", Sultan said.  "That isn't true.  He only gave me 75,000 Dhms, 25 goats, 25 sheep and 4 camels."  Oh is that all?

He then told me that the wedding cost 450,000 Dhms.  He had to buy so much gold and jewelry, gifts for he family, and there were 1000 guests!

It is traditional for the bride to get many expensive gifts such as diamond jewelry and gold.  Sultan said that all he got, as a present from his new wife, was a Rolex watch (which I got to try on) and a gold bracelet.  But apparently his family does have money. Sultan's father has a master's degree.  He was getting his PhD in politics and management in Egypt.  The government didn't like what his father was writing and they confiscated all his research and kicked him out of the country.

I asked him how he  met his bride and this is what he told me:

He said the family goes to her family and tells them their son wants to marry their daughter and they have to find out what the family wants in return...gold, money?

He only saw his wife one time to see if he wanted to marry her.  The second time he saw her was at the wedding ceremony.  It was her parents and Sultan.  The religious person (imam) asked her father if he gives her hand in marriage.  He said, "I do".  "Just like in the movies!" according to Sultan. Then the imam asked Sultan if he would like to marry her.  He said, "I do."  Then the imam went into a room where the bride was (no one can see her) and asked her from behind a screen if she agrees to marry.  She said "I do."  The idea behind this is that she agrees to marry freely without the pressure of her family there. 

They were not allowed to be alone together until after the big ceremony, which in this case was going to be for 6 whole months!  They could sit together with the family and basically just nod and smile at each other.  Awkward!

He said the father wasn't nice to him before the wedding.  I asked him why not.  He said maybe because he felt the same way he felt when his big sister and oldest of the family and first to get married got married.  He said he felt angry; jealous.  I asked him why.  Since families stay together until marriage, he felt like she was being taken away from him; that they were very close.  He said his father cried that day and even his sisters did too.

And that's the Emirati love story.