Jessica Wynn

The Mesuo practice what's called oxia.

Translated, it means walking marriages.

So a woman and man decide by mutual consent to be together, but they don't ever live together.

They don't merge finances, and there's no formal contract.

The man literally walks to the woman's house at night and goes back to his own family home each morning.

Yeah, I don't know if they're sneaking in and out of windows like my high school boyfriend, but it's just how normal life works for them.

Just like...

Well, that's us putting our Western high school idea into it.

I mean, I think it's less walk of shame and more of just their marital commute.

Right.

And anthropologists call it something closer to serial monogamy.

You know, it can be short term or lifelong.

And the relationship can end if either person decides it's over.

And what's interesting to me is there's relatively little social drama around all of this.

Children are raised entirely in the mother's household, so the primary male figure in a child's life is usually the maternal uncle, not the biological father.

The father can be involved by agreement, but he's not the central paternal presence.

you're just the guy who comes over after they go to bed.

I think it's hard for a lot of people, even close to them, to wrap their mind around it.

The Masuo aren't frozen in time, and they're under real pressure from the state government.

Yeah, pretty much.