Disclaimer: This is NOT a plug for any website professing to make matrimonial alliances simpler and more efficacious (none of them claims happier or longer-lasting marriages).
I walked in on my father this morning to hear him advocating the convenience of Skype (this is no plug for Skype either) in forging matrimonial alliances. It was particularly impressive, considering that for the major part of his life personal computers were unknown in India and that he does not know how to use one. He has however, chatted with his grand children in the USA (where else?) via skype and thus knows what it can do for us.
Some things haven't changed, but some others have.
The view that marriage is considered a good thing - even necessary - for human happiness has not changed; the means of attaining that objective have. Parental view of marriage has not changed: it is a restraint (Tamil: "kaal kattu" - literally shackling one's legs) against "boys" of a certain age going "astray". How that restraint is placed on them has changed - albeit only superficially.
Parents here are rather attached to their sons as people in the West are attached to their Pension and 401K Plans. That's because the son IS their pension plan. At least amongst the vast middle class. Keeping track of the intimate details of the young man's daily life is the norm rather than the exception. Recently I was in receipt of a real-time update from the father of a young man of the latter's progress towards North America. The updates included when he reached a European midway point, what he did there (how he changed some currency, what he purchased, an aside on the extortionist prices in European airport cafeteria, etc. Mercifully, I was spared the details of his bowel movements). Tiger Moms might consider this as "involvement" in their offspring's' life and make a few millions describing it. We are not money minded. We are interested in our children's welfare, period.
Back to matrimonial advice involving Skype. The young man in question is apparently showing no great urgency to get his legs shackled despite having just landed himself a job overseas - a real job with "good prospects" and not one of those short-term body-shopping expeditions. His father cannot understand this lack of urgency. This is like a young man declining the car keys and a driving license when they are finally handed to him, after having chafed at the bits all his life to drive a car. Father is worried and wonders - as all parents at some point in their children's life do - if he already has a car on the side that the parents know nothing about. As an involved parent, ideally he would prefer to choose the "make and model". There is unexpressed fear that the son might be throwing his money on Taxis.......
The arrangement finally worked out between my father (Advisor-in-Chief and a comforting shoulder besides being the elder statesman of the family) and the father of the "boy" (they are always referred to as "boys". No wonder that eligible young women don't show much interest in them, preferring instead grown men) is that the father would short-list desirable young women after matching horoscopes and family circumstances. The young man would further prune the list whereupon a skype chat and email exchanges would be encouraged with one. My father blithely went on, "let them meet on Skype and finalise it", as if it were a business contract, unaware of the profound discomfiture the suggestion was causing to the father of the boy. Such an important decision, being left to the boy and the girl!
I must clarify here who a "desirable" girl is. It is someone who is not short, but not taller than the boy; well-educated, but not more than the boy; has a good job but not earning more than the boy. What is left unsaid is that she should be eternally grateful to the boy's family for having rescued her from life-long spinsterhood and be willing to find her happiness in catering to their every whim. She should be sociable but just so; subservient to the in-laws, but still stand up to the husband should he stray from the straight and the narrow; rid the boy of all bad habits his mother didn't succeed in eliminating; and not capable of replacing her mother-in-law in her husband's affections. How the planetary configuration of a horoscope ensures these requirements remains a mystery to me.
In the olden days personal references tried to ensure (and often failed) that the desired qualities were genuine and not faked. The reciprocal arrangement of matrimony between the girl's brother and the boys sister was practised where feasible - the fear of Mutually Assured Divorce was supposed to ensure the the pair of marriages was happy. In the days of Internet, Computer Horoscope Matching, Skype and Face Book, there are more effective ways of ensuring marital happiness, it appears.
I have heard of some wedding celebrations being streamed alive on the net for the benefit of key relatives and friends who could not be physically present. I reckon that such will be the norm in future rather than the exception. One can reasonably expect that in the near future the A to Z of matrimonial alliances will be concluded on the net, including a broadcast of the wedding celebrations.
However, I do hope that the marriage itself will become private, a matter between a man and his wife.
I walked in on my father this morning to hear him advocating the convenience of Skype (this is no plug for Skype either) in forging matrimonial alliances. It was particularly impressive, considering that for the major part of his life personal computers were unknown in India and that he does not know how to use one. He has however, chatted with his grand children in the USA (where else?) via skype and thus knows what it can do for us.
Some things haven't changed, but some others have.
The view that marriage is considered a good thing - even necessary - for human happiness has not changed; the means of attaining that objective have. Parental view of marriage has not changed: it is a restraint (Tamil: "kaal kattu" - literally shackling one's legs) against "boys" of a certain age going "astray". How that restraint is placed on them has changed - albeit only superficially.
Parents here are rather attached to their sons as people in the West are attached to their Pension and 401K Plans. That's because the son IS their pension plan. At least amongst the vast middle class. Keeping track of the intimate details of the young man's daily life is the norm rather than the exception. Recently I was in receipt of a real-time update from the father of a young man of the latter's progress towards North America. The updates included when he reached a European midway point, what he did there (how he changed some currency, what he purchased, an aside on the extortionist prices in European airport cafeteria, etc. Mercifully, I was spared the details of his bowel movements). Tiger Moms might consider this as "involvement" in their offspring's' life and make a few millions describing it. We are not money minded. We are interested in our children's welfare, period.
Back to matrimonial advice involving Skype. The young man in question is apparently showing no great urgency to get his legs shackled despite having just landed himself a job overseas - a real job with "good prospects" and not one of those short-term body-shopping expeditions. His father cannot understand this lack of urgency. This is like a young man declining the car keys and a driving license when they are finally handed to him, after having chafed at the bits all his life to drive a car. Father is worried and wonders - as all parents at some point in their children's life do - if he already has a car on the side that the parents know nothing about. As an involved parent, ideally he would prefer to choose the "make and model". There is unexpressed fear that the son might be throwing his money on Taxis.......
The arrangement finally worked out between my father (Advisor-in-Chief and a comforting shoulder besides being the elder statesman of the family) and the father of the "boy" (they are always referred to as "boys". No wonder that eligible young women don't show much interest in them, preferring instead grown men) is that the father would short-list desirable young women after matching horoscopes and family circumstances. The young man would further prune the list whereupon a skype chat and email exchanges would be encouraged with one. My father blithely went on, "let them meet on Skype and finalise it", as if it were a business contract, unaware of the profound discomfiture the suggestion was causing to the father of the boy. Such an important decision, being left to the boy and the girl!
I must clarify here who a "desirable" girl is. It is someone who is not short, but not taller than the boy; well-educated, but not more than the boy; has a good job but not earning more than the boy. What is left unsaid is that she should be eternally grateful to the boy's family for having rescued her from life-long spinsterhood and be willing to find her happiness in catering to their every whim. She should be sociable but just so; subservient to the in-laws, but still stand up to the husband should he stray from the straight and the narrow; rid the boy of all bad habits his mother didn't succeed in eliminating; and not capable of replacing her mother-in-law in her husband's affections. How the planetary configuration of a horoscope ensures these requirements remains a mystery to me.
In the olden days personal references tried to ensure (and often failed) that the desired qualities were genuine and not faked. The reciprocal arrangement of matrimony between the girl's brother and the boys sister was practised where feasible - the fear of Mutually Assured Divorce was supposed to ensure the the pair of marriages was happy. In the days of Internet, Computer Horoscope Matching, Skype and Face Book, there are more effective ways of ensuring marital happiness, it appears.
I have heard of some wedding celebrations being streamed alive on the net for the benefit of key relatives and friends who could not be physically present. I reckon that such will be the norm in future rather than the exception. One can reasonably expect that in the near future the A to Z of matrimonial alliances will be concluded on the net, including a broadcast of the wedding celebrations.
However, I do hope that the marriage itself will become private, a matter between a man and his wife.
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