Why Many of My Cousins are Single with No Kids
One of my guilty pleasures is the Indian Matchmaking show on Netflix. Not only is it entertaining, but also the people featured look a bit more like me than say the ladies of The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills. Culturally, as a South Asian, I’m more able to relate.
Most viewers think it’s pretty comedic how the matchmaker, Sima Aunty, shames and chides her clients into being more accepting and less fussy.
The parents are obviously paying her a big fee to find a match (perhaps in this case Netflix) and isn’t it her job to give the customers what they want?
I find it crazy that she keeps asking both the boys and girls to be flexible and compromise. That they can’t get 100% of what they desire and should be happy with 60% or 70%. That’s like getting ripped off by a contractor who promises you marble floors, but uses ceramic tiles instead.
Well I guess it does make sense that in an arranged marriage especially, compromise is key. As Sima professes, love comes later. It’s almost like love can be manufactured?
In the arranged marriages I’ve seen, I’ve never observed that happening unless there was already a spark between the pair. One of my aunties definitely had a crush on my handsome uncle and he found her very pretty and captivating too. Well she was DDG (drop dead gorgeous). Even as a 5 year old I could see sparks fly.
Compared to the type of matchmaking my female cousins and I have endured, Sima Aunty’s version looks a whole lot more palatable. We may even have had better success with her as the clients are given space to date a while before deciding. Unlike our poor mothers or aunts who had zero say in their future partner.
With Sima, the girls actually get a biodata to peruse and they could even state their preferences like age, height, looks and personality traits, prior to agreeing to a date. Unheard of in our circles.
In our case, the girls don’t have any say and it literally feels like a meat market. There is blatant colourism and it’s only the mother of the boy who gets a photo of the potential girl to peruse. So demeaning.
I can’t believe I actually subjected myself to this sexist humiliation. Some of my cousins had more dignity and wisely refused. Some just went to keep nagging at bay and get a free meal.
I guess that’s why I felt like I got some of my power back when I rejected the suitors in the end. I didn’t go in with the mean intention of rejecting them, but the conversations I had on the blind dates really put me off. Lots of red flags and alarm bells. I just shouldn’t have agreed to any of it in the first place.
Why did I though? It wasn’t my parents who were pressurising me, but these requests came from the community I’m from. And by community I mean various aunties not actually related to me. Basically they wanted a sweet soft spoken daughter in law who would look after them and produce grandchildren.
They only want girls from the same ethnic group. It’s no wonder we have so many genetic health issues. They desire to keep the wealth within the community and don’t want the ethnic group and it’s culture to die out. To be honest they kinda have a superiority complex about our ethnic group as well.
My female cousins who married went against the grain and married outside this group. But their marriages were delayed by years. They had to wait for their parents to finally relent.
The temple for instance should be a place of worship, but it’s also a place for bored aunties to network, gossip and arrange more marriages. It’s why I avoid social functions these days, aware I’m fodder for gossip.
I guess I gave those arranged blind dates (although in one case the mother of the boy was there too) a shot due to the societal pressure that you have to get married by 30.
I had my own pressure. I wanted to be a young mum like my own mum at 24 and at 26 it felt like time was running out for me. I just adored children and wanted to have 5. But alas.
Another factor? Single women were cruelly stereotyped. As kids, we actually had a popular card game in the 70’s called Old Maid and no one wanted that card. If you ended up with it you loose. Unmarried women had such a raw deal.
Growing up no one spoke about marriage. It was never on the radar and we were only told to focus on school and exams to score top marks and get into the best schools, which were usually all girls’ schools.
Even the principal of our secondary school would often warn us that we are not to be seen holding hands with boys while in our school uniforms and being a disgrace to our school.
The common refrain from our teachers was no relationships and no getting pregnant. We were also shown the horrific anti-abortion film The Silent Scream to traumatise us even further.
At home no one ever spoke of relationships or dating. You could be 26 and have never dated. And if you didn’t date you’d never even know what you should look out for. It’s why my friend whose father was very strict about her dating allows her own daughter to date at 16.
Life was confined to excelling in exams to get into university and a prestigious vocation.
Our society is very status conscious. It’s hard to have a healthy self esteem, unless you’re in one of the revered occupations, namely, doctor, lawyer or engineer. Or a high sounding job title with a high salary.
Due to lack of practise we became very awkward with the opposite gender. We are also not taught our worth or that we have value as individuals. Or that it’s perfectly ok to be single and independent. That you may even thrive that way. Yes. A sexist world.
Witnessing the lack of compatibility and strife in arranged marriages of our parents, most of us would rather stay single.
Those of us who did get married? It wasn’t arranged and it was usually the cousins who didn’t go to an all girls’ school and as a result were not awkward with boys. Mostly they rebelled and persisted with the boy they chose outside the community. The boy they fell for. Love marriages.
From the marriages I’ve seen, both arranged and love marriages, women always get a raw deal. They do a lot more of the household chores.It’s very lopsided and sexist. In this context, to be single and free is far more desirable.
If marriage is a good thing, why are there so many divorces?
I often feel couples want the wedding more than the marriage itself. All the wedding photos on Instagram creating major FOMO.
If marriage wasn’t a requisite for having children, there wouldn’t be so many people who are tragically childless by circumstance.
For the Millennials, Gen Z and Alpha, I hope they never get pressured into marriage. I hope they have the option I never had. To freeze their eggs so they don’t have to rush any decision, and have a baby on their own or with their best friend if they so desire.
Or if they don’t want kids, that’s fine too. I would never want them to be pressured by society’s norms. It’s good to see that norms are changing and women are knowing their worth more and more.