To be or KNOT to be!!

Many people marry for the wrong reasons, among them 1) to overcome loneliness, 2) to escape an unhappy parental home, 3) because they think that everyone is expected to marry, 4) because only "losers" who can't find someone to marry stay single, 5) out of a need to parent, or be parented by another person, 6) because they got pregnant, 7) because "we fell in love," ... and on goes the list.

- Bruce Fisher and Robert Alberti

So what exactly are the RIGHT reasons then?? Or are there any?

This February, when my Cousin Sister, Bindhya was getting married, we all grabbed the occasion at hand and flew down to Kerala to partake in our First wedding experience. Yup, having lived my entire life span of 23 years in this hot humid wonderful country (Doofai), we (i.e. my sister, brother and me) never had the opportunity to be a part of a Keralite Wedding!

And so, we all went down for my Cousin's wedding she happens to be Appa’s Sister's Daughter. It was really quite wonderful… It was a Jhat Mangni Pat Byah thingy, (a quick affair, decided within a span of 20 days)... but nevertheless good fun... got to meet lots of our relatives and family friends and stuff... :) Wore beautiful outfits, tried looking good (LOL) and ATE lots and lots of Sweets... :) Once back from the short trip, the one question every1 asked me was “Found someone interesting???” I was baffled for a while… Is that why I went down, to find some one interesting?? And here I thought I went to attend my cousins wedding… Okay! Agreed that you CAN find someone interesting at any time and definitely at any place but… nahhh I didn’t find any1 interesting, was tooo engrossed with all the gold and Food LOL...

Very often, Appa gets mails that’s read, “We liked the girl’s profile. The boy is in excellent job in Bangalore is a non vegetarian. Girl must relocate to Bangalore and must eat Non vegetarian food.” The message was signed by Mr. XXX, “the boy’s father.” How courteous isn’t it?

But we have got worse, there was a time when Appa logged on to the computer at home and got a message that asked, abstaining from any preface, what the date, time, and location of my birth were. Presumably to be sent across to establish how astrologically harmonious a match I would be with a Hindu suitor, the e-mail was dismayingly hasty.

My Poor Appa and Mama have been fielding (pardon that… IPL in the air) with these mails for a while now, having supposedly completed, all the necessary thresholds required to get married, after having crossed the above mentioned thresholds , there is no legitimate reason, why a girl, and Indian Hindu Malayali girl should remain UNMARRIED. Let me explain what the thresholds are; Schooling (Check), Degree (Check)… Well then it’s time to get married! But Hey, Wait I got my masters degree and I work as well… It’s high time you get MARRIED!! LOL!

My parents, in a very earnest bid to secure my eternal happiness; have been trying to marry me off without further delay! At home, My Poor Appa is up at night on arranged-marriage Websites (http://www.shaadi.com/, http://www.bharatmatrimoy.com/, http://www.me4maary.com/, http://www.jeevansathi.com/ and what not?) Far from being a novel approach to matrimony, these sites are a natural extension of how things have been done in India for eons and eons. Even after the explosion of the country’s famously vibrant press, Indians are coupling up via matrimonial ads in national papers and the above mentioned sites. (“Match sought for Malayali Menon girl, white complexion, homely, and god fearing” etc.).

And the result of my Appa’s nightly browsing—strange e-mails from boys’ fathers/mothers/sisters/etc and stranger photographs (Captioned as Flower, beauty and what not??) It has become so much a part of my life that I’ve lost sight of how BIZZARRE it once seemed.

Nope, I will not say I am against the idea of getting married, nope, I am not! Everyone needs a life partner, someone who she/he can call his own. Still, for years, I didn’t want to get married the way they show in some of the movies. The guy meets the girl through a newspaper ad his parents had taken out and lo and behold… they are very happily married, with babies. I had a sense of romantic adventure in me to find my own partner, but over the years I have grown to understand, “Yeh, mere bas ki baat nahin hai… so I rather just let my parents do the dirty work, at least they ill be happy I didn’t decide to marry a NON Hindu or non Malayali per se… Right?? At times I can’t seem to digest the strangeness and peculiarity of the Whole Scenario… I mean is that the ONLY thing???

Anyway, Thanks to our recent Kerala trip, all/most relatives, family friends etc have now armed themselves with my JANAM KUNDALI (horoscope) and are all set to get me married of... lol... or so they think... :) Lets SEE how that goes!