My baby cousin at UCLA still hasn’t forgiven me for joining Facebook. His objection is not that I’m too old for it or that I lessen its “cool factor†with my elderly presence—he just hates the program and apparently I was the last person he knew and cared about, who was not on it. That had more to do with pragmatic causes than most anything else; I was happy on Friendster and consummately preferred it to MyAss or the more “globalâ€/Brazilian Orkut. I didn’t have time to maintain profiles on a plethora of time-sucks. And most relevant of all, I couldn’t be bothered to get an “alumni†email addy from either of the schools I managed to graduate from…and once upon a time, you needed such official stuff to participate in the Facebook-orgy.
Not anymore. And so a few of you began inviting me to join it and I pointedly ignored such requests…until one of you was Facebook-stalking a guy you thought was sooo cute.
“What’s his friendster link?â€, I asked.
“He’s not ON friendster…he’s only on Facebook!â€
“Well, then I can’t see him.â€
“But you just HAVE to see this one picture…I have a feeling you know his friend.â€
“You know how I’ve never been a bridesmaid?â€
“Yeah what does that have to do with anything??â€
“I’m signing up for this bullshit right now, so A) you best marry his ass and B) I best be in some sort of poufy outfit, twitching out of boredom on an altar in a year or three.â€
“Omg, whatever you want, just SIGN UP and so I did. But I didn’t bother uploading a pic or filling out my profile, not for a while. Then, I was asked to write something about social networking and I needed more information about FB, specifically a sense of how intuitive it was to use. I noticed, upon logging in, that I had been “poked†approximately 40 times. I also noticed that several of my far-flung friends were considerably more active and in touch on FB than they were on Fster. This puzzled me until I realized that they were destroying all of their free time defenestrating each other via “SuperPokeâ€, proving their music IQ via some guessing game which was far superior to the one on my iPod and playing Scrabble online via the hyper-addictive “Scrabulousâ€.
Well, I saw her Facebook…and now I’m a believer. I will happily eat the words which initially expressed indifference towards this program. The recent app explosion transformed FB for me, from a site to ignore to one which I am now constantly logged in to…which brings me to this post.
Now that I am spending a ton of time on there, my inner, dilettante-sociologist is hyper-stimulated. There’s so much to discover, like…
- How annoying today’s youths in high school are (incoherent and illiterate comments on group walls)
- How thousands of others also speak shitty Malayalam (via the Ende Malayalam Sucks group)
- How several of you first discovered SM! (via the SM Group, natch)
- How people are utilizing Web 2.0 to create support groups for Inter-desi relationships (!!!)
Here, read all about it. I’ll post the group’s “description” for you:
Aviyal Couples Type: Common Interest – Dating & RelationshipsDescription: This group (also a support group) is for all the desi people that are in a relationship (dating, engaged or married) where your partner is Indian but is from a different state in India or is from a different religion or caste. This type of relationship can’t be called interracial, so it can be called an ‘Aviyal Relationship’
For example: An Indian from Mumbai is in a relationship with an Indian from Bihar or an Indian from Tamil Nadu is in a relationship with an Indian from Kerala e.t.c or an Indian who is Hindu is in a relationship with an Indian who is a Christian or an Indian who is a Jain is in a relationship with an Indian who is a Brahmin e.t.c
* Aviyal – a south indian vegetable curry that has a mix of different vegetables. [Facebook]
I didn’t even realize there was a term for this situation—one I have been in for almost half of my dating life. While I tried valiantly to date Malayalee boys, “just to make it easier†on all 349 people who were potentially involved with such an alliance, I went to a college that had no Malayalee male undergrads and didn’t attend our local (read: more than 100 miles away) Syriac Orthodox church. I was far more likely to encounter Punjabi Sikh guys at U.C. Davis/Fresno/Modesto/Yuba City and predictably, that is what I often dated.
I had been making Aviyal all the way through college and I had been oblivious to it!
Whether by circumstance, i.e. being one of a handful of South Indians at a school dominated by Northies or by choice, i.e. just plain falling for someone, this is a cocktail we will see more and more of, no matter what our respective parents think of such emotional collisions. One of you, who comments regularly, is a Tamil married to a Punjabi; sometimes, the comments which inform me of this detail also contain other bits of information, which illustrate how challenging such a union is. I’m assuming both parties involved are probably Hindu, which makes things nominally easier, but when you add interreligious components to the conflict…sometimes, that is exactly what you get: conflict.
When one of the only Malayalee girls I grew up with got married about a decade ago (she was a bit older than us…because I remember that even her younger brother was two years older than me), it caused quite a stir, since she, a Namboodiri, had fallen in love with a Mallu Christian she had met at school. This was the source of much discussion and concern, as our parents pondered whether this was a harbinger of their own future disappointment.
Years later, I felt compassion for her, once I realized what the “odds†were like…it’s difficult enough finding a match who is Malayalee, finding one who is Mallu and of the same faith narrows the pool considerably—especially when you take caste or in the case of Christianity, multiple denominations in to account. It may seem counterintuitive, since Kerala’s Christians comprise a disproportionate share of Malayalee Americans, but yes, it’s hard to find a suitable boy. My father never forgave the Catholic church for what they did in the 17th century, so the thought of me marrying one was inconceivable. MarThomites were out because they were anti-feminist-Mary-haters who shamelessly chose not to revere the dead. 😉
We were fiercely Orthodox and unlike many Malayalee couples, both of my parents were Orthodox; my mother didn’t “convert†to marry him. So for me, Orthodox it would have to be.
Do you have any idea how many single Orthodox Malayalee boys there are in America, who are over the age of 32?
Approximately two.
I have a Sikh friend who is a few years older than me, who is also single, because he’s rather Orthodox himself, and most Sikh girls he encounters want someone sans beard and turban. One of you posted a NYT Vows link recently, all because the groom was Muslim and the bride was Hindu and yes, I’ll admit my non-existent eyebrows rose heavenwards upon reading it, because that’s what I’m conditioned to do. We are marinating in aviyal, whether we know it or not (pass me the drumsticks, btw…and keep the arbi to your damned self).
I’ll probably end up in an “aviyalâ€-marriage of my own, so I confess that I’m partially motivated to explore this aspect of growing up in the diaspora, out of self-interest. But I also remember a certain thread where it was brought up quite a few times, so I know it’s on your mind, too, along with potheads on celluloid and Shah Rukh Khan-endorsed colorism. If you have your own thoughts to add about aviyal, sambar or rasam relationships, speak.
There are many mutinies within which we can participate; the struggles associated with dating “outside†of the precise group we were born in to, perhaps more than any other uprising, often involve the most upheaval and anguish, even if one’s intended is also a shade of Sepia.
Ha ha ha ha …excellent one ! Your own?
pravin, i don’t know if this is a tamil thing, or what, but my family (non-brahmin) is extremely religious on my mother’s side – the whole day is based around prayer, which is the first thing they do when they wake up. sometimes i find the rituals stifling, esp. for women – e.g. having your period in my family = sleeping on the floor, wetting my clothes myself, not touching anybody, not entering the pooja room, and of course, no temple. in this sense, most of my cousins are just as, if not more, religious than their parents. i rarely voice my disbelief in organised religion, but i am sure that if i did, my family would attribute it to my having been raised here. to some extent, i cannot disagree with that – a big turning point for me was when i realised that my mother not only does not know the meaning behind many of the rituals she performs, but also feels no need to explain the meaning behind practises she expects us to follow. on the other hand, this could be said of many hindus back in india, and i do have a few cousins who are not at all religious, and even atheist.
CaRG – i say go for it – one drink or dinner with the guy is a minumum investment for possible lowe. also, i sense a preference for aviyals – is that correct, and if so, why?
Curry and Rice Girl, I say go for it, but keep the window open for quick escape.
I’ve gotten to this whole entire party late, and I’m not really sure what the protocol is. First of all, I assumed that if you’re living anywhere other than India, Aviyal is pretty much your only option if you want to, you know, Buy Indian. But I didn’t grow up in a big Indian community, so I never dated desi. Now that I’ve more Indian friends from college or work or wherever, I’m starting to meet Indian guys that I could be interested in, but I’ve no idea what the dating scene is like. My signals are all scrambled!
I went through some of the older posts on here, like is it skanky to sleep with someone on the first date, but damn, this is confusing! Can’t someone make like a Desi Dating Guide?
to each his/her own…
Okay , forgive the aunty-like question but :
Isn’t sleeping on the first date generally not considered a great idea anywhere and thats not a particularly desi taboo?
Yes, PGW, thank you! The link actually calls it ‘pannirantu’, which is a slightly variant but still acceptable transliteration, I suppose. But how would you coin a word for ‘lord of the twelve disciples’?
some people consider sleeping with someone before marriage “skanky”. best not to judge (i think).
Unfortunately yes. I have been warned that this sort of humor could severely hamper my personal life. 🙂
I am not a whore..I am not a whore…I dont care what society says…I am not a whore!
WHAT?! Ak, did you mean doing your own laundry?
Runa, I’m with Puli, that I think it’s just a choice. But let’s say you don’t on the first date, when do you?
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p>Also, my signals are totally crossed, because until this B’wood party, I’d never seen guys who were so happy to dance with other guys for a majority of the night (outside of Dupont)! When hanging out in a non-party setting, I didn’t really know how to read the other usual signals either. And what constitutes a date? Is the first date when you guys hang out in a group, or one-on-one? What if you’ve already hung out one-on-one, but on sort of a half-date? Aack!!
Good god, Jeet, Runa said “anywhere”, not “anywhore”! Calm down. 🙂 Nobody’s judging you!
runa aunty, i am shaking my head. please refer to the relevant posts on both SM and ANNA’s blog.
pingpong, thank you for saving me the effort of saying it again 😉
No preference really. Anyone nice, open minded with similar ideas will do. It is just that the non-aviyals (not all, but most so far) I tend to meet want me to pick their religion/language/way of life or make snide remarks about “the other side” or say how I don’t know specific things (such as history/recipes etc) because I am half something else. And the fact that I am product of aviyal relationship – I am unwilling to choose, I love both my parents and what they bring to the table, I like the multiple identities. Plus I haven’t met an aviyal product in the US yet, so I am curious is all.
True that – I wasn’t being judgy and all if it came out that way.And I guess its different for everyone.
What if you do sleep with someone on the first date and end up disliking them intensely when you get to know them better? Does that cause regret ? I mean, doesn’t waiting till you know and like someone reduce the risk of post-coital regret? But again I guess it depends on your risk affinity which is different for everyone …
whats that?
What if you do sleep with someone on the first date and end up disliking them intensely when you get to know them better? Does that cause regret ? I mean, doesn’t waiting till you know and like someone reduce the risk of post-coital regret?
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p>Well, I guess that depends on what sex means to you. If it’s something you enjoy and are able to separate it from needing to be in a commited relationship type of thing, then it’s a whole different perspective. If the sex is just one part of the whole dating package, and you end up not liking the person, then you move on from the person the same way you would have even if you’d just spent a couple weeks getting to know them.
Also, what about the flip side of your question? What if you meet someone, REALLY like them, and then it turns out that they are truly horrific in bed, with very little scope of improvement? Or they’re into things that you will never be into?
(sorry, I don’t know how to do the quoted-text-thingy yet!)
isn’t it a bit of a coyote ugly moment? 🙂 Just kidding. Runa, I think this varies more based on your preferences/attitudes towards sex more generally.
Aadarshini, if you’re confused I think it’s worth asking to clarify what you’re doing. If you’re hanging out in a group — at the beginning of anything — I wouldn’t call it a date (personally).
does everybody here eat a burger with their hands, or do they cut it up with a fork and knife? what about a hot roast beef sandwich on a nice hero?
do your friends who aren’t indian eat that with their hands? there’s just something about eating with my hands that makes the food feel satisfying… my family’s mallu and we always buy gongura pickle. i wonder where i could get a plant.
no, i’m supposed to wet my sheet and my clothes in the bath so that i have washed away the ‘taboo’ of my period before i allow anybody else to touch them for washing. i also remember being forced to take pills (a form of birth control, i suppose) to prevent my period before special occasion – e.g. weddings or pujas.
CaRG – if i were a guy, i would date you and not judge! sometimes i thought it was a bit boring that my parents have such similar backgrounds – a bit of heterogeneity would have been nice. who the hell have you been meeting? i suggest you show up at the next SM meet-up – seems like you might find somebody more like-minded than you have so far…
but sometimes it’s easier to separate the physical and the relationship aspects – e.g. the physical was fun in and of itself, and not a cause for regert per se if the relationship side doesn’t work out
Well, for example, there is a letter for ‘bh’…with that letter, you write ‘bhindi’ or ‘bharna’ (to fill) for example…but people tend to pronounce those words like ‘pindi’ or ‘parna’ (but with a tone).
Think of the word for daughter…’dhee’…there is a letter for ‘dh’, which you use when you write the word…but most people pronounce it as ‘tee’ (with a tone).
Another example is ‘bhabhi’..most people say ‘pabi’. But when written in Gurmukhi, you still write it as ‘bhabhi’, i.e you use the letter for ‘bh’, not ‘p’.
Even the name ‘Dhillon’ for example, is written as ‘Dhillon’ (there is a letter for ‘Dh’) but pronounced ‘Tillon’.
Camille, would you agree?
Amitabh, I’d agree on “bhabhi” and “Dhillon,” but I think the pronunciation must vary by dialect, because I’m scratching my head (having heard “Dhillon” as “Tillon” and “Dhillon” and definitely having heard “didi” pronounced with the soft d). Some of the tonal differences may come from how people use things like udak (sp?) and other “modifiers” (like the vowels and “small” n sounds).
Hmmm…good point.Never thought about that coz it never happened to me 🙂
My question was more about the fact that I have observed this kind of taboo to first date sex even among non-desi Americans .For example, if you followed the Scott Peterson case, a big hoo-haa was made in the media of the fact that Amber slept with Scott on their first date … with the subtext that only skanks do that. Now there was nothing desi about that case. So Adarshini, I was curious as to why that came up in a question about dating desi
As for the quoted text thingy check out the FAQs 🙂
ak,
I am in the boondocks – in South Carolina for now, at least till Dec.
So really a small selection pool if any.
And I am not able to take a break during the SM meet-ups in DC or NYC 🙁 But I will try harder next time to be there.
Maybe once in six months there will be a South SM meet-up in Atlanta or something? (Hint hint) Or if Mutineers will put people like me at their humble abodes, I’d be willing to make the 7-14 hour drive (being a poor grad student and all)
CaRG, you can crash at my place if you’d like to come to NYC, so long as you are not a crazy kleptomaniac, arsonist, or otherwise unsafe around other people (but I doubt it). 😉 I think the idea of an Atlanta-based meet up is much better/easier altogether, though.
Runa,
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p>Hemm. I guess not so much in my city in my age group? But there’s a whole spectrum on this in every part of the population, and we’re both commenting on what we see.
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p>Camille, I’m not confused about what we’re doing — he’s definitely expressed interest. I just don’t know the next steps, and what will get me a reputation ; ) It’s my first foray into the desi scene, and I’d rather not have it bring me notoriety.
Thanks Camille.
I have parental units in NJ so NYC meetups will be easier to attend, but really don’t know anyone in DC anymore even though I lived there for six months interning in early 03.
The link’s spelling is more correct than mine, in the sense that irantu will fetch higher marks in a Tamil examination than rendu. The latter is what you will hear outside an examination.
The word you provided in Post 494, panniruvarisamy is good enough. It contains panniruvar for twelve and samy for lord. It only misses out `disciples’. But this last is a serious defect; as pinpong explained in Post 499, titles frequently miss out references that an insider could supply.
Aadarshini, I say dont’ worry about the “desi dating norms” — I find that they really vary by person and subcommunity. There aren’t many norms that are different from the standard non-desi ones. Sometimes people get nervous/weird about things (e.g. girls who date their b/f’s for 3+ years but actively hide it from their parents, or guys who date girls but say that they could never be with them long term because of caste/religion/pre-marital sex together, etc.), but I really think that speaks to issues of maturity and are not often unique to the desi community. The only thing I have noticed is that it’s sometimes frustrating to try to keep things from the clucking tongues of aunties if you’re dating in a desi community in which gossip spreads fast.
Is that the Punjabi tonal way of saying paratha? Or do they refer to completely different items of food?
hmm…ive never attempted to dry hump a stranger on the dance floor. is that because i dont drink? how many would you need to get in my to turn me into a d!ck?
I think it’s the same thing, PG, but it’s spelled with an “n” (parantha) because it has a a 1/2 n sound when spelled in Gurmukhi. [I use the phrase “1/2 n” or “1/4 n” because characters that denote an “N” sound require a vowel sound afterwards, whereas “fractional” N sounds don’t]
i think you are really desi. you used the word calculus in that sentence.
would be an awesome name for a dance track by The Party Dicks, which would be an awesome name for a rock band.
I am not sure about your hypothesis that drinking beyond a threshold could turn you into a dick. If you don’t habitually drink, you don’t have good data for behavior beyond usual limits (which could be zero). I have seen people who are obnoxious when sober become very calm and quiet when seriously drunk, in some dream world of their own, probably just on this side of alcohol poisoning. I have also seen a guy who could apparently turn 350 ml of beer into 2 Imperial gallons of retch. Ethanol can be unpredictable that way.
Many Rajasthani Hindus also eat together from a communal thali. Try aloo ka paratha with fresh malai sometime. Kathi rolls are great, particularly in Calcutta and the ones here in Manhattan might taste close but six bucks for four little potato turds wrapped inside a solitary paratha is just not done. Sorry Brown that’s why I mentioned Punjab Deli. Good food as well as good value. I don’t mind paying serious money for food but it must justify the price.
Camille,
Dahi + Jaggery was a prasad combo that my mother would shove in my mouth the morning of a test/exam. The maudlin self-sacrifice shown in your namesake film was at the center of the plot of many a Hindi movies I grew up watching.
my question being: I have never behaved in such a manner. I am hypothesizing thats because I have never drank. I am asking, how much would i need to drink to turn into one of these @ssh0les?
This is making me too nostalgic. What I would give for a chicken doner right now.
i cant do the communal plate thing cause i dont want ‘yechel’. i dont nkow what the word for that is.
since the topic is aviyal, just wanted to let you all know that i’m off to eat some uppuma and mint chutney, with sakkara pongal 🙂 it’s a holiday today, so my mom is in a cooking sort of mood.
Puli 542 I am hypothesizing thats because I have never drank. I am asking, how much would i need to drink to turn into one of these @ssh0les
Three martinis should do it, Puli!
Didn’t we have a long and involved discussion on ‘yechel’ aka jhootha a while ago ?I can’t remember the post .Wouldn’t the angrezi equivalent be “double-dipping” ( like George in Seinfeld) ??
I found eating from the (Bohri) “thaal” is actually a great experience.( my closest friend in the des is Bohri and the food is yummy! ) There is an etiquette to it( eat with only top portion of fingers, sip from the end of your spoon..etc) so that its not really ‘yechel’ – but given the stringent standards in some households probably would be considered so anyway
i always wondered why james bond wasnt more of a d!ck. how many does he put down?
If I feel comfortable enough, I wouldn’t mind help organizing an informal SM meetup a few months from now in Atlanta.
The soft ‘d’ as in ‘dena’ (to give) is different…the sound changes I was talking about involve only the aspirated sounds like ‘bh’, ‘dh’, ‘gh’, etc.
my best friend thinks i wouldnt be doing that at any martini level. he thinks “my brain just isnt wired like that”
anyone find that families in india think your a sl*t (for the grls), or have another grlfriend (for the guys) just cause your an american? where does this perception come from?
also, does anyone just automatically determine your personality and personal philosophy based on your ethnicity in an avial relationship? is that normal?
If I am not interviewing somewhere in Idaho or South Dakota, I’ll be there.
Hari,
I think a desi version of a shawarma joint is not a bad idea.
Puliogre,
I find it very interesting like chachaji mentioned in some other post to learn of perceived DBD issues from an ABD lens. I don’t mean any disrespect. The circles I grew up in India had no issues with dating, I think you can’t generalize and it is different from different people. My mom and dad had a love marriage in the 70s which doesn’t mean no one has problems with love marriages. Things atleast in big cities are changing rapidly and it is really not the same as what a lot of parents of abd kids left behind.
a lot of why im on this site is to get different views such as this. A lot of my knowledge of how things are supposed to work comes from advice from my parents.