Want to marry before you are 25 and move out? It will cost you

Illustration: TBS

One might be under the illusion that love and affection are all that's needed to start a married life, just like we were when we embarked upon a new adventure in unchartered territory. 

No doubt, we were a bit wet behind the ears. 

After all, when we tied the knot back in December 2021, we both were just around 24 – an age no longer considered suitable for marriage by many, even in a third-world country like ours given the current socio-economic conditions. 

But of course, it didn't take us much time to come to terms with reality, leaving behind what is called "the honeymoon period" and accepting the idea of the ever-burgeoning romance as simply an afterthought. 

We moved out of our respective mess and relative's house in Dhaka city (our families live in our hometowns) to live on our own in March 2022 – that's one month after the international upheaval: Russia's invasion of Ukraine. 

In the months to come, we would be forced to realise its cruel reeling effects on our lives in Dhaka. 

The war-induced inflation bulldozed our budgets – meaning we had to pay cripplingly more money than initially calculated for nearly every necessity. 'Home economics' was rearing its ugly head indeed.  

Our budgets did not amount to much in the first place. Still, we consider ourselves lucky that we could start to lead our lives as working journalists – owing to our academic background in Mass Communication and Journalism. 

We both had completed our Bachelor's degrees in late 2021 - a month before tying the knot. And last year, we were in pursuit of our Master's degrees apart from working in the newspaper. So, of course, our budget was stretched very, very thin. 

We felt lucky amid the surging inflationary challenges to make a home in these uncertain times. Because we also witnessed many of our friends – with master's degrees in other disciplines and of the same age group – still searching for a job. The job market experienced a grave blow and the fresh graduates were the ones shouldering the brunt of it all. 

Back to our limited budget. The challenges began right from our lookout for a safe haven. 

It's really very difficult to find a good place in a decent neighbourhood to live in Dhaka if your budget doesn't exceed at least Tk20,000; that too when you are willing to reside right at the centre of the city.

So, we had to keep walking and walking, from one alley to another in the Moghbazar-Mouchak-Malibagh vicinity, making the fictional treasure-hunting stories merely a joke compared to what a gargantuan task it really is to find a two-room flat for just a husband and a wife.

As it turned out, getting a flat is much easier in this city for bachelors than for newlyweds with a limited income. 

So, at one point, we even contemplated giving up, before finally stumbling upon a flat that wouldn't cost us more than Tk18,000, including all the bills and service charges. 

But a flat is just an empty space. One must fill it with all their necessities, and so did we. 

First, we went for the most basic of furniture, which included a bed, an almirah, a reading table, and two chairs. Rest assured, we bargained for the most moderate price, seeking the best possible product at that price range.

And the result: a bed and beddings cost us Tk20,000, an almirah for Tk12,000, a reading table Tk5,000, and two chairs for Tk600 each. 

We skipped the idea of buying a dining table though, as we felt that it was okay for us to eat simply on the bed or the floor. 

As newspaper employees, we also had the supply of enough papers to not ponder over tablecloths either. Believe us, nothing is more fitting than eating on a piece of paper which has your name and work printed on it. 

We also decided not to buy a dressing table. For the time being, a wall mirror seemed enough, and more appropriate too. This "mirror, mirror, on the wall" cost us Tk1,500.  

Also, buying a sofa set to attend to guests was a big luxury. Hence, we went for a mattress, on which we could seat the guests as well as make them a bed in case they wished to stay over (not that we wished the same, though). 

The mattress, along with a few cushions, cost us Tk5,000.

Now, once the furniture portion was done, we shifted our focus to kitchen appliances. 

First and foremost, we needed a double burner automatic gas stove that cost us Tk3,500. But as there was no gas connection in our flat, we also had to buy LPG cylinders. The cylinder and the first filling cost us Tk3,400. 

The silver lining: the high price of gas at least provided us with enough justifications to not feel guilty about the times we felt too lazy to cook ourselves and simply eat out.

Then we went for the basic utensils, ranging from spoons and knives to frying pans and cooking pots. These must-have utensils took away another Tk4,000 from our pocket. 

And not to forget the water purifier as well. One of us, however, was a big proponent of buying bottles of five litres of water daily instead of spending too much money at one go for a purifier. 

But he was soon shut up by the "lady of the house", who threatened by saying, "It's a better idea to just stop drinking water forever than throwing Tk80 on water every day."

And hence, we too finally reached a detente, following the footsteps of Iran and Saudi Arabia, and settled for a purifier priced at Tk3,500. 

Behind toilet accessories, we spent Tk1,500. It was probably the best Tk 1,500 we had ever spent in our life, as the local plastic shopkeeper ensured us at least 20 times that every single product he was selling us was made with "virgin materials" only. 

We also had to buy two fans and four LED bulbs, for the two rooms, corridor and the washroom. Each fan was worth Tk3,000, and the total price of the bulbs was Tk1,000. 

Meanwhile, we bought a wifi router worth Tk2,000 and then spent another Tk800 for the internet connection.

It's a pity because the internet service provider had initially promised us that we would not even have to pay a single penny for the connection. But it later turned out that the catch lay in the money to be paid as an "advanced first month's bill". 

Now let's address the elephant in the room. In a family, no matter how big or small, a refrigerator is probably the second most important element besides the family members themselves. 

And so, we too could not help but buy a refrigerator. But the thing is, buying a very big and expensive refrigerator was out of our reach, and it also wasn't a good idea to go for any refrigerator we came across, because we might not afford to replace it with a better one anytime soon. 

As a result, we had to do a lot of brainstorming on which refrigerator would be a good bargain for us. Perhaps we didn't even give this much thought to whether we should really get married so early in our lives. 

After much research and sleepless nights, we finally came to an agreement that we would be satisfied with a 217-litre, non-frost refrigerator with a copper condenser worth Tk36,000.

One thing we can say with certainty from our experience of buying the refrigerator: we are now truly capable of perceiving what the word "satisfaction" means. 

And ever since we bought the refrigerator, nothing tasted more tasty and refreshing than the cold water and ice produced by it. 

By the way, we also had a desire to buy a Smart TV, because it had been our dream for a long time (since we started dating in the second year of university) that we would have movie nights on a big screen when we would finally live together. 

But thanks to the budget shortage, we had to scrap this plan for the time being. Our parents were very eager to help us out though and showed interest in simply "loaning" us some money that we were free to repay at will, without any interest.  

But from our end, that was a big no. Because we both firmly believe that taking a loan is a trap. 

Once you take a loan for something, there is no coming back. You will have to take a new loan to repay the previous one, and the cycle will go on and on forever. 

We might have taken a huge risk by early marriage, which our friends often term "child marriage", but in no way could we afford to double down on that risk.

So, we ended our "buying spree" at the expense of around Tk1.25 lakh. No doubt, it was far from over; we still needed a lot of other things to decorate our life, a married one we mean. 

But the road ahead is one of caution. Going forward, we now have to laser focus on "maintaining" this life – as we had already spent a hefty chunk of our savings to start our married life.

And mind you, maintaining a married life is no easy task. 

"It is easier to win freedom than to preserve it." Rings a bell, right?