When cousins count as siblings

It's rare to have cousins in the same age bracket as you are. Hence, when you do get lucky to have them so, cherish them with all your heart. This, I learned as I grew up with a stream of cousins. The sister and I gravitated, as a natural recourse, to the ones who were closer to our ages. Till date, my fond memories of my childhood are of those unlimited chatter sessions about sundry things that appealed to us at different ages and stages, of the to-and-fro camping in each other's houses during holidays, and of the excitement and anticipation of meetings after a period of lull. Indeed, cousins are truly a treasured species of human relationships.

Ever wondered why cousins fare better than your immediate sibling?

You get the best of both the worlds with cousins. When you're together, there's fun guaranteed. And, when you tire of each other, you can go back to your own houses! You're willing to share and quell the feelings of envy or anger because somewhere you know that these emotions are transient; lasting for only as long as the meet itself. The compromises and adjustments are not permanent; you can have your favourite toy or dress back the minute the cousin(s) leave. There's never the "you always favour him/her" thrown at your own parent. You can simply walk up to the other parent, the aunt or the uncle, and viola, the verdict will most certainly be drawn in your favour! You even get pampered by the cousins' parents. The sibling rivalry gets a breather till you meet next time, so you willingly extend the otherwise rare courtesy and don't mind donning the mantle of magnanimity.

When I see R and S together, it fills me with joy and satisfaction that they would know what it is to grow up with siblings even if they don't have each other's company every waking minute. Fights are rare and few between them. It's another thing that they complement each other very well and can almost read each other's minds when it comes to most things. S, for me, is like a daughter from another mother's womb. And, so is R for my sister. It feels great to have the kids grow up together even if we cannot always stay close by.

I guess it works for the parents too to have cousins as playmates for their kids. They're connected by blood yet not entirely your responsibility too. If a few caveats are met, then quite a win-win, I'd say.

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Get married again!

Among all my posts, the most viewed and read would be the one on Band Baaja Bride, a reality show on NDTV Goodtimes. The show gives to-be-wed-couples a chance to have a dream wedding: right from getting personal care to having a designer bridal jewelry and attire. The show has completed five seasons since then and has improvised quite a bit with their format whilst keeping the original theme constant.

I've moved away from the idiot box for a long time now, thereby do not patronize any particular show but the shows on Goodtimes still compel me for a brief stopover on the rare occasion when I take a trip with the TV remote. This afternoon was one such time when I watched this show as they aired their closing episode of season 5. What was unique about the episode was that the couple to wed on screen were already married for a decade and wanted to celebrate their tenth wedding anniversary by renewing their vows, in their own words, to recreate the magic that seemed to have gone missing in the humdrum of routine life.

The idea in itself is not new as per Hindu tradition. There is a ceremony, called Shashtiabdapoorti, wherein a married couple renews their wedding vows as the husband turns sixty years of age. However, the point is, why wait until the man turns sixty? And, let's not get into the battle of 'why not when the wife turns sixty'? The crux is to take the essence of bringing back the spark in the couple's relationship.

Life is getting busier, faster, more stressful and the odds of the couple drifting apart much before that is a scary reality. Think about it, once the wedding euphoria slides off, the couple is faced with the daily pressure of balancing work and life like the hands on the clock; they meet very briefly during the every-day marathon. A few years into the marriage,  kids and a couple of EMIs thrown in, all the intimacy, romance and togetherness goes flying out of the window.

Isn't it then a great idea to review and take stock of the relationship every now and then? It doesn't have to be as dramatic as to appear on a tele-show or even anything grand. Simply, take a vacation to a place you've never been before. Do something you've never done together before, like say, scuba-diving or even a salsa class. Challenge your limits and break open that shell all over again. Re-discover that magic. And, it isn't a bad idea to get married all over again to mark a special anniversary.

Seriously, very few couples have their  actual wedding completely under their control and live up to it every moment. You can seize the opportunity to re-chart your wedding day that way you had imagined, buy new jewelry and clothes, look relaxed, have the natural glow on your face without the first-time anxiousness and revel in the comfort factor shared with the spouse in the true sense.

So, are you game to renew your vows?

http://bit.ly/1AqTeIE

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Entangled in pronouns

Have you ever been enmeshed in the linguistic quagmire of "tum" and "aap"/ "nee" and "neenga"? Have you faced the confusion of whether to address a person as "tum" or "aap"? The question is relevant to the Indian language speaking audience which distinguishes the elderly and the young/peer-group with distinct second person pronouns. English speaking souls are saved from having such confusions, thereby. Remember the lines from the famous Dharmender starrer movie, Chupke Chupke? "Angrezi badi hi asabhya bhasha hai. Tum ke liye bhi you aur aap ke liye bhi you. Chote bade mein koi antar hi nahi.." Of course, if you don't know whether to address the person as aap or tum, English comes in handy :-) So, I'd say thank God for the Queen's language!

But, you may ask, if it is just the age of a person that determines the nature of the pronoun bestowed upon him/her, then why should it be such a rocket science to address someone? Well, you see, it is a little complicated. Apart from the age factor, there is the factor of acquaintance level, i.e. how well you know the person and also how in the first place you came about to know the person and the social/personal equation with the person.

When my husband's friends addressed me as "neenga", in the beginning, I found it very odd. Odd, because, firstly I was not used to being addressed so, and secondly, it felt odd coming from people who are around the same age as I am. Perhaps, the role of second level acquaintance played a part here. Getting to know a person first hand is different from being introduced to as the so and so's wife, I reasoned. However, when I reflect upon the recent friendships (my contemporaries) that I have developed in my apartment complex, I find to my surprise that  many of them address me as "neenga" or "aap". It makes me wonder if perhaps, the city-culture places a part too??

In Mumbai, the city I grew up in, people do not bother to get enmeshed in the nitty gritties of the lingo with atleast the contemporaries . The "aap" quickly comes down to "tum" or even "tu" (which may sound harsh or crude to the ears of someone who is used to speaking and hearing the purer form of the language) depending on the level of interaction and comfort factor. So, a friend is always "tum" or "tu" and never "aap". This is ,of course, my observation and I could be wrong. And, this is perhaps the reason for my ignorance or naivety in this matter.

The second factor-the social/personal equation with the person- is particularly applicable to the husband-wife relationship. I am not sure how relevant or true it is in today's world because I can only speak for myself and the small circle of friends and acquaintances I am familiar with. As far as I know, there are still many women who address their husbands as "aap" or "neenga". Note that here the seniority of the husband in terms of age is not (just) the factor that warrants the conferment of the "respectful pronoun" but the social status viz-a-viz the wife. The "aap" or "neenga" contains the respect quotient too, you see.

In the olden times, the husband used to actually be years older to the wife and also the couple never got the chance to interact freely with one another to reach the same wave-length as the other, emotionally and intellectually. Also, they were bound by social constraints that automatically bestowed the husband with a higher status. Things have changed quite a bit from then. There are a number of marriages that happen without the need for parental intervention in seeking the partner. Even in case of alliances that fructify with the help of the elders in the family, the couple in most average families are given a chance to get to know one another or they stay in a nuclear set-up after marriage to enable the intimacy to develop. The age-gap between the couple has also come down drastically, in some cases, the wife also being the older person. So, I see no reason for the wife to address the husband as "aap" :-) In my opinion, respect for a person cannot be packaged into something so frivolous; it cannot be judged by the way one addresses another. Also, in any relationship, especially marriage, the respect has to be mutual for it to thrive. So, how is that, a husband has the leeway to not address his wife as "aap" or "neenga"?

I faced this problem of tum and aap in my early days of marriage. I had always addressed the husband as "nee" (tum) from the very first meeting. I never understood the need to change the pronoun to "neenga" (aap) after marriage, hence, never did (the disapproving looks from some of the elderly community notwithstanding).  So, it was always tum as far as the husband was concerned. And, as far as in-laws were concerned, I spent the first few months in the painful endeavour of constructing sentences that avoided the direct alluding of the husband as "tum" in front of them. Soon, and naturally so, the mind got tired of the game and couldn't keep up the levels. I then chucked the hypocrisy out of the window and found to my relief that the in-laws were quite cool about the fact.

So, where does all this leave me? Now, am quite used to the way of functioning of the pronouns in this part of the world and I resort to "aap" mostly all the time, even when it sounds ridiculous to be addressing a friend who I see day after day in the park, so. The only hitch is of the old habit which comes in the way and I fumble and flounder at times alternating between "tum" and "aap" in a breadth of conversation. And, what better way to end the confusion and discomfort than to switch to the Queen's language? At these times, I sing a silent "Jai Ho" to English in my mind.

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The self is fragile

First impressions and appearances can be deceptive many a times. It has happened a few times when I thought I had sized-up the person well and s/he turned out to be completely different. So much for my sizing up skills! The person in question here is someone who was in a very senior position in one of the companies I worked in. The first day he came in to meet us, I was charmed by the way he spoke and the way he carried himself. He looked like a man of authority, who spoke well and who also knew his business very well. I was quite impressed.
 

Only as days went by, did his real self came peeling off like a badly done paint of a wall. He was downright arrogant with people who stood up for themselves or who had the guts to say no to his face. He couldn't take disagreements gracefully. I was for one among the people who rubbed him in the wrong way. This was my third job and by now I was far from the eager over-enthusiast who'd bend backwards to please my mentors/seniors in the greed of getting noticed and appreciated for the sincerity and hard work. I truly understood how the corporate world functioned and knew how to just do my stuff and stay clear from getting stuck in yucky politics and the quick-sand of "being in the good books" of the senior management. Sure, I was still sincere and worked hard but there were no stars in my eyes of hogging the lime-light for this quality alone.

Anyway, I digress. It is sometimes comical to see a person of such stature and position stooping so low as to play child-like games of being miffed because someone had the guts to say no (for genuine and personal reasons) for a request that was not even related to work. And go to the lengths of ignoring or talking to the employee in a condescending tone in public. Why the arrogance and the superiority complex? Or is it some insecurity within that saw a small disagreement as a matter of loss and win? Shows what ego can do to a person. Education and exposure to the world in general does not really guarantee a humble attitude. It is quite rare to meet accomplished people who are also genuinely humble and gracious while dealing with people from the lower ranks.

And then, isn't it difficult for many or most of us to refrain from showing off our knowledge and maybe superiority in the company of people who we think do not quite meet the mark of our high selves? Little or more, this bloated sense of self is present in all of us. Whether we choose to mask it or wear it on our sleeves depends, perhaps, more on our basic nature and the environment we grew up in. This "I" is so fragile and it takes very little for anyone to cause damage to it.

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Of friends and friendship

I was browsing through my e-mails the other day and pop on the side chat-bar a very familiar name goes green. I am torn between opening up the chat box and typing an enthusiastic HI and keeping a check on my friendly hormones that are threatening to spill onto the keyboard. It's been really long since we chatted or spoke over the phone. Whatever little updates I keep getting about her is from the good old Facebook. She seems to be a busy person, what with one morning in the US and the other evening in Vienna. Lovely pictures of her family used to be a part of her regular updates but since a few months they have ominously been replaced with travel and work updates. My heart is jumping to ask her how she is REALLY doing and what has she been up to these days? Is all OK?? But it has been really really long since we had a heart-to-heart talk and I am unsure if the warmth we shared is still alive in the hearts (hers...). Amidst the tug-of-war between heart and mind, I type a hesitant HI. Pause..5 minutes..10 minutes..No reply. I am about to type again but a tiny voice pops in my head and says, ah! you are imagining things. Of course all must be well. Remember the FB status? She must be busy now. I close the chat-box and try to concentrate on other things. Now, this friend was once a really good friend of mine. We shared a great rapport and a lot of common things. Things got busy, life got busy, we still managed to touch base with odd phone calls and wishing each other on B'days and anniversaries. Then slowly, the odd phone call was replaced by sms and then it was just the FB. 

This could be a leaf out of anybody's life book. Do you remember your friends from school or college?. Are you in touch with at least one friend from school/college? In-touch, as in, truly know what is happening with one another, not the Facebook updates that are for all to see. I have bitter sweet memories of friends and friendships from the days of school and college. The close bond of friendship I managed to form with a handful are neither from school or college. We met at the after-college classes and stuck together since then. It doesn't, however, stop me from marvelling at how this bond forms and develops and changes over time. People change. Situations change. Relationships change. This is an universal truth. No matter how you bond with one person today, there is no guarantee that the bond will remain the same 2, 5, or 10 years from now. This classic rule applies, among others in varying degrees, to friendships too- one of the most important, beautiful yet very fragile relationships. It may evolve, become better, go to the next level, blossom, flower or even stagnate or perish altogether. Life is ever-changing, time ever-demanding. Communication has never been so easy. Never so impersonal too. It takes more effort these days to give your time, space and energy towards any relationship. The standard approach does not and will not work if you care more for some relationships than others.

It feels good to hide under the cliches like "oh! we connect like we never disconnected so, it doesn't matter if we do not talk frequently"..and so on. But, really? is it so?. At least, with me, given my not so outspoken nature, I falter in asking personal questions if the silence between has stretched a little too long. For me, it does matter if you can connect in ways other than the Facebook or Twitter or through Fwds in an email. The frequency may vary and a lapse of few months is OK but when the lull stretches a little too long, individual lives take over and the urgency to connect is put on the back burner and is slowly "forgotten". Reasons like "been caught up with life" are used with higher dosage and sometimes as an excuse too.

Friends from school and college bond with one another during the span of the course like there is no tomorrow and part with each other with promises of staying in touch. Some manage to do so despite distances and in-between crossing personal and professional milestones. Time is sometimes stolen and squeezed out to fulfill a commitment made years ago- of maintaining the relationship, no matter what. But, many fall wayward intentionally or unintentionally. The great times of camaraderie becomes a part of nostalgia, reminisced wistfully, yet the will and effort to re-kindle it lacks the fire.

So, what makes one go at lengths to remain friends with the other? why do some friends remain so for generations while some wither with time?

Like any other relationship, friendship also needs to grow. There has to be something in it for each of the persons concerned with it. When one person stops growing or grows in a direction that clashes with the growth of the other, the relation is endangered. Sooner or later, the relationship breaks under the weight of the opposing forces.





It also requires the mutual commitment to keep it going. If only one person shares the weight of keeping the relationship alive, it will not survive for too long.






Adversity is test of human relationships for it is only during the hard times does the real person emerge. But if one shuts himself inside, not letting even his close friend see the pain and the hurt, he loses an important aspect of the other person's friendship. He denies his friend the trust, confidence and faith and the chance to survive the mettle of friendship. The friend feels betrayed for he suddenly finds himself out of the life of someone he had considered to be close to him.

One also needs to a part of the others' journey in life, however different it may be. If not in every small event, at least in totality.

Are you still reading? Yes, you!..OK, you may wake up now. The sermon's over. Have you learnt your lessons? What lessons you ask??? ..sigh! I know...that was a longish post with a lot of "gyan" thrown in. It's the beginning of another week and if you are like me, you would be mourning the toughest day of the week-Monday.  So, if I have lost you in between, I will understand.

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Pay cut

Do you cut your maid's salary if she does not show up for work? If yes, what is the leeway you allow?
How many days of paid leave does she get in a month?
Do you also cut her pay if you go on a vacation?

Recently my maid complained to me about my neighbour who cut her pay because the neighbour went on a vacation and she saw no reason to pay the maid because there was no work. To me, it struck as meanness. I mean if you were working in an organization and you had to forgo your wages for even public holidays how would it feel? And such labourers do not even get benefits like a medical insurance or provident fund or pension. In that sense, they are far less privileged.

She is a reliable and efficient maid. I have generally been lucky in this matter so far. Touchwood. She seldom remains absent from work although she had mentioned about her 2 days per month off condition before joining work. I had no problems with this condition provided she gave me prior notice. Of that she has remained good to her word. I.e. she gives me ample prior notice and also she does not remain absent just to claim her 2 day off in a month. I am really thankful for her sincerity.

I believe in giving a freehand to my maids. I give them all the instructions right at the beginning of their employment and supervise discreetly for a few days later. If found satisfactory, I do not hover around daily to prompt them in their daily duties. I suck at such supervision. It makes me uncomfortable and fear it would make the other person too. Anything amiss is pointed out the next day with a gentle reminder and again I back off. Again, my maids have been faithful and probably also grateful for this gesture.

When it comes to cutting the wages, I generally do not resort to it unless the leave has been too long or very frequent and/or the quality of work has been compromised far too often. I strongly believe and this belief comes from the practice that is followed at my parents' home too that the people working for us need to be treated with more respect and consideration than is generally meted out to them. After all they come from a lower strata of the society and depend on our wages to run their household, their kids' education, etc. They are far less fortunate in terms of material worth than we are. Cutting pay for something beyond their control would be the meanest way to get even with them. Of course, there are counterpoints that present age maids cannot be relied on, they are in fact better off than they actually pretend to be, they resort to cutting corners on a sly, so on and forth. While there is an amount of truth to each of these points, the penalization should be used judiciously and not on absolute terms.

And on a lighter note, isn't it prudent to cut ego than wages especially when good and reliable maids are becoming endangered species at a rate faster than the tigers or maybe the girl-child (I am being mean here) in India?

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Because....

Because I don’t speak,
Doesn’t mean I lack the courage
Because I don’t ask,
Doesn’t mean I don’t understand
Because I don’t cry,
Doesn’t mean I am not hurt
Because I don’t pry,
Doesn’t mean I am not concerned


I have a heart that feels,
I have a mind that thinks,
I am compassionate, so I know,
What can be said is best unsaid
I am just and fair,
But I am not perfect for all I care


I may not be the way you want me to be
Yet I am a soul, pray, don’t ignore me!

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Goodbye!

How does one say it? The heart is squeezed, voice is choked and eyes are misty. It is perhaps the last time of shared space. Suddenly there seems so much to talk about. So much to share; so much to laugh. You wish for one more year, one more month, one more day, one more moment of togetherness. You look back at the time that has whizzed past, caressing memories fondly, cherishing each laugh, each tear, the despair, the cheer, the harmless digs at one another, the said and the unsaid.

Promises to keep in touch are made. Hugs and best wishes exchanged. Bridges are crossed. Amends are made; forgiveness asked and given. Final moments are dragged on, almost as if waiting for the heavens to reverse it. Familiar hang-outs are revisited and the endless tales recaptured and bound in memory.

There is never an easy way to say goodbye. It is never easy to let go. Yet we say it. Life is about moving on and not stopping still. We are allowed to carry our baggage with us yet it is wise to de-clutter once in a while to take only the fragrance to enrich newer experiences.

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Marriage-an overrated concept?

R’ mom’s post on women’s web about marriage being an overrated institution and Hip Hop Grandma’s comment to that has certainly touched a chord in many of us evoking strong responses. (Warning-long post ahead)

The basis of many age-old customs and practices has become questionable in the light of changing time; so is the case with marriage, which is fast losing the sacred status it had once assumed. Hence the question of it being overrated arises. I don’t know whether it is overrated or underrated. I only know that everyone wants to get married-whether to conform to the societal norms or otherwise. It is like the saying-“shaadi ka laddoo-khaye woh pachtaye, na khaye woh pachtaye”. Even the utterly feminist (read men-basher) does marry. I think it is got to do with the perception of marriage. It is seen as the biggest milestone, only second to parenthood, in one’s life-especially that of a woman. No one really prepares you for the dynamics of marriage. It is rarely the “happily ever after” story. Also, today is the age of extremes. It is either my way or the highway. There are no in-between solutions to a debate.

My colleague S got married to A, her boyfriend of two years. S is a bubbly and vivacious girl who speaks her mind and likes her freedom. A is more of an introvert. Initially, they lived as a couple separately from A’s parents who also happened to live in the same town. Due to some reasons, A decided that they should be staying with his parents (obviously S’s opinion was overridden). S was somehow never herself with her in-laws. As I understood from our conversations, it was not as though A’s parents mistreated her or made her uncomfortable. She simply could not “adjust” to live amicably with an older generation. Many times she suggested to A that they could live close to his parents yet live separately as a couple. A, however, for reasons I don’t know, never agreed to it. S and I later parted ways and I came to know of her divorce through another common friend.


P, another close friend of mine, separated from her husband of 10 years, after two kids. We had somehow grown apart from each other by the time this happened and hence I do not know the entire story. However, I can make an educated guess. Theirs was a love marriage and they lived separately as a couple. P was-is a social butterfly who thrives on meeting other people. She had, a couple of years ago, landed herself with the job of an event manager-a role that fit her personality to perfection. She became a social figure in no time, meeting great legends from the entertainment field. Her work demanded a lot of time from her but she wasn’t complaining. She was clearly having a blast. Her husband, six years older to her, was a businessman and perhaps a typical husband who although wanted his wife to work, also didn’t want her to be away for long periods of time from home. I think this was the bone of contention in their marriage leading to the inevitable, 10 long years of togetherness and young kids notwithstanding.


In both the cases, the women in question are the epitome of a modern day woman. Neither faced any serious abuse or ill-treatment at the hands of their in-laws. Yet, the marriages fell apart. These days, divorce is not a taboo-at least with urban middle class families. If things do not work out to one’s expectation, the couple-both or either of them- does not hesitate to call it a day. On one hand there are scenarios where the couple jumps the gun at the first issue and on the other there instances where the woman is urged to put up despite serious compatibility issues.


Any relationship calls for compromises if it has to be nurtured. It is only when it comes to marriage that these compromises or adjustments are blown out of proportion. Here the gender bias is confused with the type of compromises involved. We have been-and are to a large extent even today- a patriarchal society. It cannot be denied that, in India, a woman is married into the boy’s family but the vice-versa is not true. It is still “expected” of the woman to call her acquired parents as “amma” and “appa” but the man is “not expected” to do so. If they do (I do know of some men who address their parents-in-laws as amma and appa. Of course their number is far less than the ones who do not feel comfortable doing so.), they are “appreciated” while if they don’t, they are “understood”. Why isn’t the same discomfort that can be felt by the woman understood? If the husband does not feel like visiting his in-laws, it is OK but if the situation is the other way round, the wife is made to feel guilty for being selfish and is asked to come along nevertheless. These are considered minor issues and the mind is asked to be conditioned to “ignore” such things. Unfortunately, again, only the woman is expected to condition her mind and ignore.

I feel this is a period of transition where the women have risen in protest to the old ways of society. Till the time men continue to have the upper hand in terms of compromises and adjustments, there will be extremities. Eventually hope, faith and trust will be restored to this age-old institution called marriage. I do hope it happens.

P.S.- After reading the comments on my post above, I got the feeling that perhaps I have not come across I way I intended to. I was merely stating that there are instances where people jump the gun at the first instance of discomfort in a marriage and there are cases where women are made to go through hell in the name of adjustment and family honour. Both are uncalled for. Here, the debate was if marriage will lose its significance and its very existence in future. Hence my take is- in a relationship there is some amount of give and take and if we want to safe-guard this insitution, we (as a couple) need to work on the relationship while valuing each other's rights.

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The choice to be..

There is a common phenomenon to put a label/tag to everything one (especially women I think) does. Working or non-working, full-time mother, SAHM, …? full-time mother? This one stumps me; as though one can be a part-time mother. You are either a mother or not. Period. As I said, these tags seem to haunt women more than men. we have to somehow squeeze ourselves into one of the recognized labels. Any ambiguity, and a new tag is coined. For instance, being a mother is not sufficient enough for people, so, viola! a new term- SAHM is coined to emphasize that you also stay at home.

People have certain expectations, strangely not from themselves but from others. Women's liberation fanatics have sadly taken this battle to the other extreme-you HAVE to be working to qualify yourself to be called liberated-else you are the cow slaving for the man. If you do not hold a job, you are probably dull enough or lack the confidence to manage home and work. The concept of choice just escapes the cranium of these nutcases. Liberation for me would mean the freedom of CHOICE that a woman should have in life.

So, what do you do at home? Even if I am just hatching eggs and day-dreaming all day, how should it matter to anyone? After all the pay-packet that I might have earned otherwise will anyway not flow into the other’s house. It is so annoying when an innocuous question such as “so, what do you do?” has to be answered carefully so as to justify your being at home and not working outside of home. The “working” tag is so narrow that it just cannot be extended to the home. For some reasons, the grass is never green on this side.

A is a friend who worked far away from home even before marriage; so in that sense very independently managed herself, got married to the person of her choice, lived apart from her hubby for some years due to career compulsions and then worked into having a co-existing career and marital life. Peers may probably envy her life and wished it were them. The parent-generation is a proud clan.

I have no issues with this. I would have felt the same.

However, consider this scenario: A studies hard to get into engineering, studies and gets placed in a prestigious company. She quits realizing it is not her cup of tea and decides to pursue arts instead. Further, she does not have a regular job but freelances as a hobby. Will anyone say they are proud of her? Will anyone want to trade places? Someone who is not successful in the conventional manner is not a bright person. Someone who probably wants and works towards having a well-kept house, a happy-married life, be a SAHM by choice is a non-ambitious person-a loser who probably lacks the skills to have a career.

Why does a job/career HAVE to be a choice for modern day women? Why can’t she just have a choice to do what she wants and still be respected for that?

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The marriage saga

When my parents began to look out for a match for me, we decided to go online. My parents were keen on getting the horoscopes matched and I was keen that I should have a major role in deciding who I should spend the rest of my life with. Hence the decision was a favored one for both parties. This was the easy part. I was not in anyway prepared for the rickety ride I was to embark upon.

With tingling excitement and dreams of a young bride-to-be in the quest of her dream man, I went about setting up my profile on one of the leading portals. I carefully worded the “About me” and “Looking for” columns. Then, I began to sift through profiles to shortlist the ones that interested me. One way to get an insight into a person’s personality is through the way he or she writes. I cannot say it’s foolproof. Yet it is a beginning nevertheless. Soon, I began to see a common factor in most of the profiles. The “looking for” column more often than not resembled one another. Tall, fair, slim, good-looking, professionally qualified, career-oriented at the same time domestically-trained (I thought they were talking about dogs), fun-loving, interest in music an added advantage, adjustable (a belt would have been a more appropriate choice I thought), needs to be working (what if she quit after marriage I wondered).

One look at these ads and my initial enthusiasm plummeted. I was a total no-no in the marriage market I understood. To begin with, I am dark as per Indian standards. Secondly, having a master’s degree in commerce and a being a German language expert, I realized sadly, did not amount to professional qualification with some ads going one step even further as to list out the degrees acceptable to them. BEs, MBAs, CAs ruled the charts. At first I was furious that in this era one could have such chauvinistic expectations. The men that posted such criteria were quite ordinary in terms of education and looks. Such double standards! My anger slowly gave way to resentment and cynicism. Not to mention the corrosion of my self-esteem which took a beating each time I encountered one of these prospects.

Some of the men I interacted with over email seemed fine till the time I mentioned the words horoscope and parents. They disappeared from the face of the earth the very next instant. Most of these were NRIs who I presumed were just having their share of fun. Some were downright MCPs who believed that the wife’s place is just to “manage” the house with no say in whatsoever more significant in life. I too had certain expectations of my future husband and rejected many on various grounds (some flimsy but mostly valid) but as time passed and I grew older, “well-wishers” around advised me (some subtly, others bluntly) to lower my standards or risk the chance of spinsterhood.

I slowly realized that the marriage market is just that- a market where you need to market/sell yourself properly. No room for reason or emotions. How ironical! I thought marriage is about emotional bonding amongst other things. To cut an already long story short, before I got drowned into a whirlpool of cynicism and negativity towards marriages and particularly arranged ones, I met my husband who thankfully is not one of the jerks mentioned above. Nope, I did not compromise and “settle down”. All’s well that ends well but I sure hope the scenario changes. I’m already noticing that the tables are turning in favour of women. Jai ho!

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