The Kreung Tribe in Cambodia follows a weird sexual ritual that would surely sound bizarre. It is, however, considered liberating for the girls there.
The parents build a ‘love hut’ for their nine to 13-year-old daughters where they meet different boys for conversations. These meetings most of the times reach up to sexual intercourse but having sex doesn’t mean that they must marry each other. After having a number of such meetings, the girls are allowed to choose her partner.
While in most other areas in Cambodia it is traditionally frowned upon for women to smoke or drink, the Kreung girls take part just like the boys. They live simple lives surrounding simple survival traditions: food, shelter, love and sex.
When young girls reach puberty around ages 13-15 their fathers will build them a separate bamboo hut, away from the family home, so they can socialize and experiment with boys in privacy.
The Kreung people instill a strong message that sex before marriage is acceptable, encouraged, when young girls are trying to find the right man to marry. The girls are in charge. They invite the boys they want into their love hut to get down or sometimes, just talk without any sex.
The boys are not aggressive (they have been taught that their respectful behavior towards the girls will affect their families livestock and they take this very seriously) and let the girls call the shots.
In this culture, divorce is unheard of. The word “slut” is not even a thing. Girls can have multiple boyfriends at a time in their hut and there’s no jealous drunken brawl if she ends up choosing one boy over another. Sexual violence is rare. Rape is nonexistent.
Sure, unwanted pregnancy happens, but usually the suitor the girl chooses will raise the child as his own.
PNN
