Our family is cosmopolitan. My marriage is a union of Britain and Japan; my brother's wife is from Colombia; and my sister-in-law's husband is Italian. When cultures come together, life is never boring. But international marriages also need skillful dancers to master the steps of the "cultural compromise" tango. I'm still learning -- and my in-laws are picking up a few of the steps, too.
I had a tough introduction to married life. I became not just a wife, but a yome (daughter-in-law) with a shutome (mother-in-law). I got my first taste of nisetai-gekito, two families living -- and fighting -- under one roof.
Living with your in-laws is not just an issue for foreign wives in Japan. Every month, more than 100,000 copies of the popular "Yome vs. Shutome" are bought by Japanese wives who identify with their manga heroine's in-law problems.