ENGAGEMENT RING: TWO OR THREE MONTHS SALARY RULE APPLIES?

As I was researching for a work-related project, I chanced upon this ‘three months salary rule.” I thought it is the same thing from the three-month rule that I encountered for the first time in a local movie starring Bea Alonzo and John Lloyd Cruz. When I continued reading, I realized that it is different from the three-month rule that I know of.

The three-month rule that the article was talking about involves buying of engagement rings. It is said that if you will propose marriage to your girlfriend, make sure that you are prepared to give her an engagement ring worth two or three months of your salary.

When considering buying an engagement ring, it is difficult to be practical, for the reason that an engagement ring is a representation of love and it is so intricate to put a value to a feeling that is invaluable. Some people believe that a ring mirrors your love and commitment. Hence, the bigger the diamond, the deeper must be your love. Usually the rule of thumb is that the engagement ring should cost around two to three month’s of your salary so it would naturally depend on how much you earn when deciding to purchase one.

Now, what is my take on the three months rule on purchasing an engagement ring? I believe that the rule is a fairy tale. I admit that there is specific set of amount or percentage on how much one should spend on an engagement ring. This decision varies from individual to individual. Somehow, like any huge purchases that you may have had, you begin with establishing a budget first before you begin to start looking. Once your budget is set and you have several options available which are within the boundaries of your established budget you will finally be able to make a wise decision on which ring is right for you and your significant other. Your ultimate goal is to make sure that the ring you purchased is just within your means and living standards.

Whatever engagement ring you prefer will always be a stunning symbol of your affection for each other, and a constant memento of a very special day. So never mind how much you spend on it, it’s your love that will always be priceless.

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LOVE IS A COMPROMISE

I have been in a relationship with several men for the past fifteen years. The longest relationship lasted for almost five years. We were already planning to get married. I thought that he’d be the one for me. He promised me that he will never leave me whatever happens. “Come what may”, he said. Later on, I have proven this to be wrong though. He fell out of love I guess. There is no way that I can win him back. He became emotionally detached to me. I have to confront him for this. He just said he does not love me the same way he felt for me four years ago. I was heartbroken. We parted ways and have never seen each other since then.

What I came to realize after this last failed relationship is that there is actually no blueprint to successful relationships. Love is negotiated in tender loving ways, where there is enough room for parties, what they would want and what they would need, what they could do and what their life would likely be. It is not business where in people negotiate to win. Love is when you are anxious about someone else’s circumstances as you are about your own.

Two years after the break up, I still think of him. I still have the “what if” feeling, regretful of the relationship. I am always thinking if I failed to make a compromise with him or if we did compromise, was I able to live up to the compromise agreement? Until now, tears fall in my eyes when I think of how we were when we’re together. It pains me to think that I have lost a good man. I secretly wish that he’d realize that he had lost a good woman, too and decides to come back to me. I am patiently waiting for his return and I don’t know how long it will take for him to find his way back to me.

One thing is certain when he comes back, I would know when to compromise for our love to flourish and endure all the hardships. I just hope that he will come back sooner than later. Until then, my love for him floats.

Are you willing to compromise in the name of love?

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YOUNGER FILIPINAS PREFER OLDER FOREIGNERS. WHY?

This is a reply to a discussion in a forum which I am currently moderating. The members were discussing why younger Filipinas prefer older foreigners. My reply to the discussion was a little late because I was busy with work and some things to do at home. Anyway, below was the reply that I posted in the forum.

Younger Filipinas prefer older foreigners because:

1. Financial Security. Older/retired foreigners have money coming from their retirement/pensions. It is wiser to marry or live with a man who has more mpney and financial stability.

2. Mortality rate. Older men die easily. These older foreigners are just waiting for their time to pass by. If they die, younger Filipinas could again remarry someone older or younger. They would go for older men to repeat the cycle or younger men to populate their species.

3. Company. Older foreigners have more time to stay in the house with their wives/girlfriends. They are more visible than younger foreigners because they don’t work most of the time. If the younger woman is the clingy type, she has her foreign husband/partner available to her anytime she wants to be cuddled.

4. Intelligence. Older foreigners are more knowledgeable and experienced a lot in life already. If the younger Filipina is eager to learn, she would choose an older foreigner in the belief that he can impart great knowledge to her about life and the world in general.

5. Procreation. Younger Filipinas who do not want to get pregnant will consider marrying an older foreigner because it would be harder for the foreigner to copulate if there is no Viagra available for him. I have a friend who is married to a foreigner 30 years her senior. They have sex once a month, and if she gets unlucky, there’ll be none at all. They don’t have children and she is still in her early 30s and they’ve been married for almost 10 years now.

6. Trust issues. Younger Filipinas would choose older foreigners because they are more trusting of their partners. They don’t usually scrutinize their partners of where and whom did they go out with. They don’t ask how the money was spent by their partners.

7. Generosity. Older foreigners are more generous of their money and time to younger Filipinas and her family. She can be a “bilmoko” (colloquial word for “bili mo ko” which has an English equivalent as “buy me this and that”) and the older foreigner is just happy to oblige. Showering her of material things like clothes, accessories and money are common among older foreigners to win their younger Filipina’s affection.

8. Father figure. They see older foreigners as a father figure. As a father figure, they expect that they will be treated with kindness as what fathers do to their daughters.

Of course, we can not discount the fact that some younger Filipinas marry older foreigners because of pure love and affection. Now, that is noble and uplifting to know that some can still give unconditional love to unsuspecting older foreigners.

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SINGLE BLESSEDNESS

I wonder if I am meant to be with someone I can share the rest of my life with. I kept myself busy with paper works. I forgot to date even though someone asks me to. I become oblivious of the fact that I desperately need someone to hold hands with. I can’t remember the last time I kissed or have been kissed. My parents constantly urge me to get married. How can I tell them that my chance of getting married is hanging at the edge of a cliff?

Later I got to thinking about relationships. There are those that open you up to something new and exotic, those that are old and familiar, and those that bring up lots of questions, those that bring you somewhere unexpected, those that bring you far from where you started, and those that bring you back. But the most exciting, challenging and significant relationship of all is the one you have with yourself. And if you can find someone to love, well, that’s just fabulous.

However, part of me has always felt that life has no real meaning until you get to share it with somebody. Maybe that’s what I’m afraid of: my life finally taking meaning or suddenly becoming void of it. Maybe I’ll share my life with somebody… maybe not. But the truth is when I think back of my loneliest moments, there was usually somebody sitting there next to me.

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UNREQUITED LOVE

I’ve found almost everything ever written about love to be true. Shakespeare once said “Journeys end in lovers meeting, every wise man’s son doth know.” What an extraordinary thought. Personally, I have not experienced anything remotely close to that, but I am more than willing to believe Shakespeare had. I suppose I think about love more than anyone really should. I am constantly amazed by its sheer power to alter and define our lives. It was Shakespeare who also said “love is blind” from his play The Merchant of Venice. Now that is something I know to be true. For some quite inexplicably, love fades; for others love is simply lost. But then of course love can also be found, even if just for the night or a brief moment. And then, there’s another kind of love: the cruelest kind, the one that almost kills its victims. It’s called unrequited love. Of that kind of love I am an expert.

I am a victim of the one sided affair. I am the cursed of the loved ones. I am the unloved one, the walking wounded. The handicapped without the advantage of a great parking space! I have willingly loved that man for over six miserable years! The absolute worst years of my life! The worst Christmas’, the worst Birthday’s, New Years Eve’s brought in by tears. These years that I have been in love have been the darkest days of my life. All because I’ve been cursed by being in love with a man who does not and will not love me back. Oh God, just the thought of him! Heart pounding! Throat thickening! Absolutely can’t swallow! All the usual symptoms, can you imagine that?

I have been waiting for him to come back to me and love me again assuming that he did love me. I have known him when I was young. I thought that I had the best time of my life with him merely because I opened myself to the possibility of a long term relationship for the first time. I allowed myself to dream that we’ll be living and building a family together. Well, he left without saying goodbye and we lost communication. It was a short-lived romance after all but it consumed almost of my adult years. I have been into serious relationships after him but my heart longs for someone from the past. I can never give myself fully to any one because he still has my heart. Then one day he found me through a social networking. He’s been in my network of friends but he never shows interest on me. I felt that he is just near but yet so far away. At last! He decided to write me. I was happy that he took notice of me. I can’t help myself and ask him why he left so suddenly. I was expecting that he would redeem himself by giving me an explanation which however worst or whimsical it may be I will most probably believe anyhow but nothing prepared me to receive a response so rudely delivered. No explanation was made. He just gave me a dismissive statement. My heart shrunk into disbelief of how rude he has become. I realized I don’t know him at all. He is someone I just can’t - someone who self-evidently can’t be mine. I’ve opened Pandora’s box, and there was trouble inside. I was shaken. I cried for a while because I was hurt. I see the dream I built dismounts and crumbles from the pedestal I put it in.

In the nutshell, I understand feeling as small and as insignificant as humanly possible and how it can actually ache in places you didn’t know you had inside you. And it doesn’t matter how many new haircuts you get, or diets you try, or gyms you join, or how many glasses of liquor you drink with your girlfriends… you still go to bed every night going over every detail and wonder what you did wrong or how you could have misunderstood. And how in the hell for that brief moment you could think that you were that happy. Sometimes you can even convince yourself that he’ll see the light and show up at your door because you’re hoping you’re wrong. And every time he does something that tells you he’s no good, you ignore it. And every time he comes through and surprises you, he wins you over, and you lose that argument with yourself, that he’s not for you. After all that, however long all that may be, you’ll go somewhere new. You’ll meet people who make you feel worthwhile again. Little pieces of your soul will finally come back. And all that fuzzy stuff, those years of your life that you wasted, that will eventually begin to fade. It gives you a sense of confidence, that despite being at the end of a rapidly fraying rope for as long as you can imagine, there is a sunshine at the end of the tunnel and that, there is no misery (no matter how miserable it may make you feel at that particular moment) that lasts forever! The demons that are caught up inside your head… the ones that are lurking in the corner, no matter how many people you are with, or how much fun you are “supposedly” having… just fade away!

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