Young women...

I keep thinking that every time, I read posts in this blog (and mind you, these are atleast 5 years old, if not more) nothing seems juvenile. I cant help but think, how mature we- as people were. Proud of us Sammy and Avu. Toast to us.

While a lot of my the-then friends worked up to becoming a good, Indian wife, we rebelled and fought for choices. Choices that we thought should NOT change our lives. Not even a teeny bit.

I still remember the heated arguments with my dad, sulking one moment and negotiating the next. Tonnes of years later, I am glad I did it. It just makes perfect sense. I am glad I did not end up like someone who hates herself. Equalism debates paid off.  :) 

"Is your son/daughter(s) settled in life?"

To attempt to answer this, one needs to know some theory behind this loaded question. Read: "Is your son/daughter having one and a half kid? Do they have a good job which gives enough salary to save atleast about 50% of what comes in, excluding the expenses? Do they have a home loan which is on the verge of completion? Do the kid/s go to a good school and are they dus bata dus students? Do you have any difference of opinions?" This is just the tip of the ice berg trust me! Unless it is a 'yes' to all the theory questions, you can say "Yes, my children are settled". Unfortunately these days, State Bank of India is not offering jobs to every child! If only that were the case, then the story would have been different.

What if one of them is still studying? Ans:" Tsk Tsk.. Pcch.. Poor you! It's OK, as soon as they finish you will be happy again. " Excuse me! Who's not happy now??
What if both are not living together? Ans: "Is their relationship alright? Is your SIL/DIL a good person?" I'm glad atleast one of them is suffering the distance when none of the others are! :)
What if one of them is studying and both are living together? I won't even bother to answer that. Clearly it is a route to disaster I am sure.

So much for 'settlement' in life... There's so much of gap between the immediate generation these days, that they fail to understand that the time has changed.

PS: The answers are all generic. There are special people who have different opinion on the subject and I am glad I belong to those families. :)

Marriage sounds claustrophobic???

Lot of 'single ready to mingle' kind of people that I meet these days have only one problem. They don't want to get married because they think if they do, they are going to lose out on their footloose and fancy free lifestyle.

It is only unfortunate that marriage is viewed more as cooking regularly, doing household stuff, taking more responsibilities either in terms of the partner or in terms of the 'dreaded' in-laws (No thanks to Saas- Bahu soaps!). If you think your life is not worth living anymore according to your terms, then I guess welcome to the world of marriage in soaps!!

Reality check: I've been married for two and a half years. The only thing that changed in my life is that I have a person who is ready to listen to me always and a person to share my views with. A person with who I have enough freedom to agree to disagree. Did I ever feel claustrophobic for being in a relationship?? I never thought about it that much. I still have my own space, pursue the same hobbies, am the same person.

I am sure there are a number of them who agree with this! Does it require effort? Or did I get plain lucky? I don't know!
So does marriage sound claustrophobic??For me: Nay- Been there, done that... :)

Committed With a 'K'

So, all these friends of mine keep coming to me and asking me how do you know? How did you decide? What do you really look for?

I've been putting off an answer for almost 5 months now. And I still don't have one. How do you know it's the right guy you've stumbled on?

The answer is, you don't, really.

I'm serious. How do I know for sure that my story is going to end with a "Happily Ever After"? I really don't. How do I know that we won't fight over smelly socks or Windows vs Linux? How do we know that we would love how the other person looks when they're 80 years old? Come to think of it, how do we even know that we're going to be 80?

We don't. We don't know a lot of things. And the more prepared we are to accept this uncertainity in life, the simpler it is for us.

It took me a long time to come to terms with this "truth". Fed as we have been on a diet of long blonde hair (who in India even has blonde hair except Amisha Patel in one of her ahem! phases?) and white horses that charge into the sunset. And stories of rings found inside fish and memories that enchant and love that transcends lifetimes.

I realized one morning that here is someone smart and sweet and sensitive, about as crazy as me and slightly more focussed in life. And I saw someone who I connected to and decided, I don't know about ever after, but right now looks pretty darn good... I'm not sure that I won't find someone "better" but who can define "better", really?

To all those friends of mine who can't make up their minds... You can't be too logical to think about marriage and come to a decision. Sometimes, its better to just let go...

Entry Fee Not Required

Top 5

5 Reasons why an Arranged Marriage is better than a Louve Marriage:
1. You don't have to guage each crush for 'potential'
2. You can leave all sorting, filtering and scanning to The Parents
3. You get a lot of stuff if you use your 'injured feelings' to your advantage
4. You get to hear your parents praise you to strangers the way you never heard them, ever...
5. You get to hear of/meet a variety of characters and write a blog about them :P

5 Reasons why "Meeting the Match" is better than a date:
1. You don't have to worry about looking fat because you'll wear Indian clothes.
2. Colour co-ordination of jewelry, makeup or accessories is not expected.
3. You don't have to worry about striking intelligent conversation.
4. You can look at the floor and think "what a moron" and appear to be shy.
5. You can avoid all conversation by pretending to be shy and then say you didn't get to talk to the guy at all...

5 Reasons why you would want to give the guy a chance:
1. He smiles nervously instead of condenscendingly
2. He asks you about yourself instead of telling you about himself
3. His plans for the future are not set in stone
4. He expects you to have a career instead of 'allowing' it
5. The agenda of his trip is not bride hunting and you're not in queue

5 Signs you should run away from the guy ASAP:
1. He has 'multiple options' and wants to get 'committed' within a timeline
2. He's pushing 30 and getting desperate or worse still, pursuing a 'Green Card'
3. He gives you the creeps for no apparent reason
4. All conversation halts if you go quiet
5. He thinks he's being practical but makes you feel like a piece of furniture he's adding to the house...

5 Ways to make the guy run away from you:
1. Smile shyly and say (while playing with dupatta), I don't know how to talk to boys, I never did...
2. Tell him you hope to have a large family
3. Let the words, "my last boyfriend" innocently slip ;-)
4. Let him realize you're smarter than he is...
5. Tell him you want to pursue {insert eccentric career of choice}

5 Tips for effective 'Guy Hunting':
1. Stay away from guys pushing 30. They're probably so set in their ways they would expect you to make all changes
2. Stay away from guys who have no female influence in their life
3. Stay away from families who ask over the phone "Is your daughter good looking?"
4. Beware of those who look a little too good (not just looks, the whole deal put together)
5. Trust your instincts. If you think you should dump coffee on someones head and run away, you probably should...

Chemistry In Marriage

After having come up with the "perfection" post and after reading Xai's latest I cannot help but relate arranged marriages with the most fundamental principle in chemistry we all learn- The Octet Rule which says that atoms tend to pair in such a way that they attain 8 electrons in the valence shell thereby achieving maximum stability.

At the end of the day,marriage is about attaining stability,both emotional and financial.It is this need for stability that still keeps the concept of an arranged marriage alive.It is this need for stability that makes your parents regard you as HALF A COUPLE(Xai's Post). No matter how qualified we are,no matter how much we earn somewhere deep down,we know that our parents know best afterall and thereby marry the "perfect" guy who comes our way than wait for a knight in shining armour to sweep us off our feet. As for the parents,they believe that it is only the "perfect" girls and boys who can provide the stability to their children.

However,there are too many perfect guys and too many perfect girls and hence the market continues.........

What Works

Someone left a comment on this blog talking about the things about the marriage market that work. And I thought my reply deserves a separate post. (Congratulations you! you've earned yourself a specially written post from The Goddess herself!)

The trouble with arranged marriages has never really been the fundamentals. The more time I spend looking at arranged marriages that work, the more I realize that. Family, upbringing and values form a large part of the reason two people decide that they can comfortably live with each other. Other things are looks, education and finances. Arranged marriages do not fail you in any of these.

Lets face it, if we didn't derive comfort from having a partner from a similar background, we would have long since married that extra special friend from school, college or work who we got along with brilliantly. We do care, and hence arranged marriages are not for social morons alone.

What troubles me is the way we have turned a beautiful concept into a market. It should be about meeting someone, concentrating on knowing him for himself and then deciding if you would like to be married to him without worrying about background issues. However, reality far from it. Today, a girl cannot really be any more sure of a guy she meets in the marriage market than of someone she meets, say at work or in a pub.

The reason is simple. The focus has moved from investigating a person who would keep your child happy, to seeking perfection. (For more on perfection, refer to avu's post). It shouldn't matter whether the boy is a rocket scientist or a chef unless your daughter does. It shouldn't matter whether the girl is a sari clad, temple circumabulating supermodel looker or not. But it does. And this is what I have been trying to say in the last 50 odd posts.

Arranged marriages are probably the best bet we have for ensuring that the gene pool stays intact and we get people from diverse yet similar backgrounds get to meet. But we've reduced it to a Kumbh Mela which just a cattle market at the end of it all...

AUNTYGIRI

If you are over 21 years of age(25 for guys),single and happen to attend any family/social gathering,you are subjected to what is called AUNTYGIRI.

AUNTYGIRI is the question-answer,gossip,information relay and conclusion assumption system carried out by our dear auntys who are more often than not "good friends" of ur mothers',2nd,3rd,4th and so on upto nth cousins of ur parents and the helpful and caring(read snoopy) neighbours.

Actually,AUNTYGIRI exists at every phase of life.It probably starts from the sack race days in school and goes on for the rest of your life.It is an intermittent phenomenon that is very severe during festivals,board exams,entrance exams and campus placements but reaches its peak during the marriage season.The auntys cannot tolerate the single status and try their best either to talk your parents into getting you married or try to find the "reasons" behind you being single.

One aunty recently told me that "no matter how many degrees you have,you will end up cleaning soiled diapers,so why don't you just get married"

A TYPICAL AUNTY CONCLUSION
Aunty One:Do u know,that she is 24 and her parents have no intentions of getting her married.

Aunty Two:They must be trying,but are not revealing it.

Aunty One: But why? Do you think she had an affair?

Aunty Two: Maybe,she looks like she is that type(i seriously don't understand how u can "look" like that!).

YET ANOTHER ONE
Aunty One: Have u seen Mrs.Xs daughter in Mrs.Ys party yesterday

Aunty Two:I missed the party at Mrs.Ys place(poor thing the newly bought diamond earrings went unflaunted).But y do u ask?

Aunty One:She is dark and also a bit fat.I am sure she weighs more than my daughter and doesn't look half as good

Aunty Two: Maybe thats y she is not married in spite of being 24

THE AUNTY HALL OF FAME
All the K serial women are born auntys
All the PVCs of la la land are auntys in the making(refer to PVC in my blog)

THE BEST AUNTY SO FAR
I don't think anyone can beat Nadira Babbar as Aishwarya Rai's mother in Bride and Prejudice

In Pursuit Of "PERFECTION"

Arranged marriages are all about finding "perfection".Parents want their kids to be regarded as "perfect" and look for "perfect" matches.Perfection is no longer an attribute but a name given to a set of specifications which every prospective(brahmin) bride and groom must have

THE "PERFECT" BRIDE:
1. Is either an engineer or a doctor.Second preference goes to the commerce girls.Everyone likes to say that their daughter or daughter-in-law is a software professional,or works for an mnc or an international bank. I am yet to see families accept girls who are MAC make up artists.

2.Must be docile and extremely feminine.As a result most of the girls are taught either music or dance and a mention of anything like Tai Chi or kalaripayattu brings the roof down.

3. And here comes the age old requirement: Must have a complexion that is between very fair and slightly wheatish.

4. Must be willing to uproot herself from any place and any job and move to where her husband will be.

5.And the miscellaneous things like knowing the various sahastranamams and ashtotrams



THE "PERFECT" GROOM
1. Again,is either an engineer or a doctor.IITans score lots of brownie points.Must work in a fortune 500 company and have equally qualified siblings. I am yet to hear about brahmin guys who are Michelin 3 star chefs or footwear designers(refer to the post titled Talking about impact to know the consequences of considering marriage to a chef or a designer)

2. Should not smoke and must not eat non veg



As long as the quest for "perfection" continues,aranged marriages continue to be far more entertaining than the K soaps and the circus goes on

She Did

She worked very hard to find the right husband, I must say. She went to temples, she went to engineering college, she learned to cook and sew and tell funny jokes. And she learnt to flutter her eyelashes just so.

And she went on a diet and she lost weight, and bought the prettiest of saris. And thought to herself, I am quite a smartie to be doing all this.

Did it work? I do not know. But a good husband she did get.

Talking About Impact......................

Here are a few very well known 20% dialogues which i thought are worth a mention

"Mere jeete jee yeh shaadi nahi ho sakti..........to?kab jaa rahe hain aap?"

"Ab desh bhi aazaad hai, toh aapki beti kyon nahi?"

"main tumhe mere jaaydaad se bedakhal kar doonga"

"Tum paida hote hi mar kyon nahi gayee"

"Ab hum samaaj mein sar nahi utha sakte".............................................................................................................

NEW AUTHOR SPEAKS

First of all, congratulations Marriage Market you are the blog that lived inspite of Xai trying her best to close you.




I must say that reading Marriage Market entertained and enlightened me. I got to know about the whole arranged marriage fuss and about Dus Bata Dus(my favourite part in the blog). A recent conversation with Xai convinced her that it is the 'right time' for me to be involved with Marriage Market.



Having been rejected by an American university thereby putting off Ms for six more months , staying at home after 6 years of unrestricted living and having relatives and auntys while away their time discussing my marriage(Even the finer details like the budget for sarees etc..) makes me the perfect contributor to this blog.



So,here I am all set to post everything about this circus and exult "arranged marriage zindabad" for this is where 80% of the Indian roads end.

Avanija

New Author

I never thought I'd share this blog with someone, but it's been fun and therupatic to share my experiences on this blog. I just have not been able to bring myself to let this blog die. So I'm passing it on to a new author who's a dear friend.

Hope she can keep the masses entertained as much as I did. :-)

~ Xai

I do believe in...

... fate.

This blog is now re-closed.

I Hereby Declare

That I no longer believe in arranged marriages.

This blog is closed.

Today's Realization

Almost all guys want a wife who has a job. Very few want one with a career...

I was home today. And I happened to watch bits of an 80's telugu movie. Something about a woman who was brazen enough to leave husband and family to go "modelling". The only scene I saw was one where the guys father holds his head in his hand and says, "I'm sorry for making you marry this monster".

I know, thats how all 80's movies were. They were mostly about getting women "under control". But it startles me to think that this is how we still think... In movies, anyway.

So I was talking to this friend of mine about someone I met and didn't like and I said, "Look, this guy want's a wife who works. So he's not a total loser". And my friend said, he wants a wife who will support him. That is her primary job. And suddenly, it became clear. Yes. He wanted (and will surely get) a wife who has a job but not necessarily a career.

And as I understood, things became easier. It's easier to understand the guy. And understand what's wrong and understand why I didn't like him and understand how I escaped the mistake that would screw a lifetime.

And you realize that no career is not really no career. It runs deeper than that...

Position Vacant

Only those capable of outdazzling by miles need apply...

Brahman

That's what the Vedas call the all pervasive force that is the universe. Brahman is out of the scope of the understanding of an ordinary mortal, they say. And define not what Brahman is; rather what Brahman is not. Not this, not this, not this either, they say.

What's this to do with The Circus you might ask.

Well, because that's how half the guys get described by girls (or perhaps girls too, I'm not privy to locker room talk).

Not too bad, it starts. Height, not bad. Job, could be worse. Not too boring. Not very orthodox, not very strict (read allows wife to wear jeans) not overly mommy mommy, not too fat (or tondu), not very talkitive, not very arrogant (though he might act like knight out to rescue damsel from a life of drudgery), not... well, any girl can complete that list.

And while trying to explain this to my bhai, I made the connection today. Is this why they call them Pati-Parmeshwar? :P

www.telugumatrimony.com

Have you seen even a few pics and profiles?

It's a scary world out there....