A column (thanks, Fuerza Dulce) from the women’s magazine Marie-Claire on Anjali Mansukhani’s enthusiasm for arranged marriages (including her own), didn’t really start in what seemed like the best possible way:
By age 26, after attending more than 150 weddings, I was fast approaching my “expiration date.” (link)
“Expiration date” at age 26? That’s pretty young; personally, I think women get “expired” these days at around 27 or 28…
But it gets so much better. Anjali, a Bombayite, meets a guy who seems like Mr. Right — a New York based banker — and moves to his 40th story Manhattan apartment after three dates (and a marriage). Life there is blissfully happy:
While I craved privacy in India, the lack of neighbors and family dropping in left a shocking void every day as I ate breakfast and lunch alone. My husband worked late most evenings, and I sat in front of the TV, unable to call home because it would be 2 a.m. there.
After a few weeks, I learned that I’d married a “jetrosexual.” He had an exhausting travel schedule (four cities in four days). I joined the ranks of corporate wives who saw every show, opera, and ballet in town, just to fill the hours.
To make friends, I joined a gym, went to the library, and took Italian classes. I discovered that having an arranged marriage was a great icebreaker, and my social circle mushroomed each time I retold my story.
Marriage, I soon learned, wasn’t easy — especially to a modern man. My husband had acquired a mistress, and her name was BlackBerry. She had the power to stop discussions midsentence, her red signal lighting up his face in the way I only dreamed of doing. (link)
Such happiness. It really brightens your day.
Off to a great start, no doubt. But Anjali’s new life really takes off when she learns to name-drop consumer goods and lifestyle choices like a professional New Yorker:
As peers in India opted for motherhood and worked on post-baby waistlines, I took Spinning and pole dancing at the gym to work off exotic dinners of sweetbreads, foie gras, chocolate mousse. After reading about America’s obsession with Venti decaf skim mochas, I went to try one — but came back instead with a spiced chai latte. Amazingly, Starbucks was providing my childhood drink on every corner.
I found a job as a financial consultant. The New York Times in one hand, coffee in the other, I realized that my saris of bright pink, violet, and salmon were not exactly subway wear. Quickly, I succumbed to Levi’s and Ralph Lauren.
I started to realize that I just might have the best of both worlds. I marinated my Indian marriage in the flavors of Manhattan. I kept the sari and bought the Jimmy Choos. I made fabulous curries, seasoned with spices from Dean & Deluca. And after months of enjoying decidedly non-Indian experiences of seders, Saks, and sake, I felt confident enough to direct Indian guests to a hotel, occasionally throwing in a MetroCard.
I’m not hating, really I’m not. In fact, I’m thrilled she’s so happy — with those Jimmy Choos that she got from Bloomie’s, drinking Chai Tea Latte at Starbucks (which is just like the Chai in India, isn’t it?), before her pole-dancing class, where she’ll burn off the foie gras from the night before. Arranged marriage can be great that way.
It’s about time!
I’ve been the victim of all these conversations with non desi yogi women over the past 5 years where clearly after 5 minutes of their sleep inducing diatribes on the positive health benefits of ‘clean’ living from their 2 week trips around India in air-conditioned buses wearing indigenous brightly colored clothing, the lights go out in their eyes with the realization, he’s just a regular Indian guy, not my guru does take a toll of a brown man’s ego.
“Expiration date†at age 26? That’s pretty young; personally, I think women get “expired†these days at around 27 or 28… “
The new “expiry date” for well educated and career oriented desi women is 31…
Folks, just to be clear — that part of my post was meant to be a joke. I found the idea of an “expiration date” at age 26 so laughable that I didn’t think anyone would start to seriously debate it.
Yes, but more and more gyms in urban areas (esp. NYC) are offering pole dancing classes. I think there’s an article in the NYT about this from a few years ago, but they started as studio classes (i.e., the same as yoga or dance) and are beginning to be offered in more “mainstream” venues, but I don’t think they’re ubiquitous. Pole dancing is actually a wicked workout (really hard, imo).
Would we be SepiaDestiny, though, if we were not seriously arguing about ridiculous/laughable statements? 🙂
I guess, specially when no one is stuffing money down wherever for doing that..
I hate this phrase: “I marinated my Indian marriage in the flavors of Manhattan.”
I admire a woman who is proud of her arranged marriage, but I can’t stand her writing style. Its like she’s taken something and watered it down and chick-litted it up. Yesterday, my parents celebrated their 30th wedding anniversary; which means 30 years ago my mother walked around a fire 7 times with a man she’d met only 12 days earlier. To be honest, I still don’t get it. I admire my mother’s commitment to her marriage. Do I think I could do the same thing? Honestly, no.
But there in lies the question… don’t you feel that the concept of “arranged marriage” has changed pretty dramatically over the past 100 years? My Nani didn’t even know who she was marrying until they took the cloth down during her marriage ceremony. My mother had the “privilege” of turning down a suitor before settling on my father. She met him 4 times over 12 days and they got married. My cousin married a wonderful guy that she had been introduced to and dated for a couple months before deciding that he was “the one.”
So what truly qualifies as an arranged marriage these days? Obviously Anjali’s marriage is one, but what else?
Read the article, sounds silly, contrived and vapid, not unlike the blog posts of the eM on the Compulsive Confessor,who was covered here a few weeks ago, but even more dull and boring. What is so path breaking or interesting about buying into consumer culture, marrying some random guy, and living in NYC? Agree with Nala about not all marriages in India being arranged, my parents met in college, fell in love and got married and this was more than 30 years ago and a good number of their friends had so called “love marriages” as well. So while not the norm, marrying someone you liked and had met on your own, was not all that uncommon even 30 years ago..
innocence? look, that crap pisses me off. you know why? i’m tired of listening to relatives talking about what sluts western women are and how honorable arranged marriage with someone you barely know is.
Besides, haven’t any of you seen Monsoon wedding? I mean Jeez.
brought back beautiful wives from India who would have never looked twice at them here.
I thought looks weren’t supposed to matter.
I admire a woman who is proud of her arranged marriage,
I don’t. I see someone who’s trying to rationalize it by all the money she can wipe her ass with.
HMF, let me clarify…
I admire a woman who is proud of her marriage. If it was arranged and it works for her… then I don’t have a problem with it. Would I get an arranged marriage… nope. but it works for some people and I’m not going to knock them for it.
That’s fine, but I don’t see it as genuine pride.
I skimmed the article, but I didn’t get a sense of what part of India she says she is from.
What I don’t get:
1.) How could she have a PDA and still claim her only knowledge of sex was that it was a sin?
2.) Even the lady that used to come to wash my grandparents dishes had a washing machine at home. That was in the pind. This chick is totally acting like a wannabe Pindu.
Women in India are way more modern and competent than this woman gives them credit for. She has tried to expound the values of arranged marriage and tradition, but it says marginalized the woman who are independent(financially and otherwise) and living their lives happily in India. Not to mention how much pre-martial sex everyone is having up in that piece!
Meenaskhi,
I think she’s from Bombay, or at least the meeting occurred in Bombay. From the article:
“Sporting funky eyeglasses and a sharp blazer in Mumbai’s 100-degree heat, he spoke with an American accent that I found knee-knockingly sexy.”
If she is from Bombay, she is straight up lying. Those things PERHAPS could have been believable if she had lived on the outskirts of Moga, Punjab or something. But Bombay? There is a reason this article is on msn.com.
I’d love to hear her husband’s perspective “How I Married a Dominatrix from Mumbai-and she can’t even cook pav bhaji!” In the next issue of Maxim magazine!
Women in India are way more modern and competent than this woman gives them credit for.
I sense this too. Most of the women I speak to living in India (in age range of 20-23) want absolutely nothing to do with arranged marriages, but know they have no chioce but to succumb. Attending 150 marriages by age 26!?!? If all goes as planned I won’t have to attend that many weddings as long as I live.
Not to mention how much pre-martial sex everyone is having up in that piece!
Just play it safe, and assume every woman you meet (DBD or ABD or IBD or CBD or whatever) has been ridden more than the Saddle Ranch Bull.
Does anyone else think this guy is getting it on with some American lady and married the average looking DBD so that he can have a stable marriage for his corporate image? The way she describes his lifestyle, he seems like a guy who is a go getter and it is just not in the corporate world.
I don’t care for arranged marriages, but the Namesake did a better job showing us the good side of arranged marriges with the older couple than I read in this account. All we see is some lady who feels lucky to have married some good looking rich guy where she can live a nice comfortable life in the US.
I disagree with the lady that arranged marriages somehow have better in-law harmony. I doubt it. I have seen no correlation in real life.
All I know is that Indian girls are VERY materialistic/classConscious. Moreso, in a way, than other ethnic-groups! What’s the first question that Indian girls ask? “What do you do?” and not “What do you think about…?”. White girls, OTOH, don’t start with the $$$ questions.
What could explain Madhuri Dixit, who was literally worshipped in India (there were Madhuri Dixit temples in India), to marrying a cardiologist in LA? She was a Goddess in India to a nobody in USA?
If you get on these social networking sites, I see some HOT Indian girls, and they’re going to marry some not-so-attractive Indian guys without much of a personality (i.e. no hobbies, no views, spoiled).
All I know is that Indian girls are VERY materialistic/classConscious.
While I don’t dispute this in the least, many of them are just trained to think and act this way, by their own mothers and fathers none-the-less.
doesnt everyone have hobbies and views?
thats depressing. that assumption would fit well with my assumption that im completely alone in the world.
svr said:
Sadly I fear many Indian men feel the way you do..which is an incredible shame. Many respectable, intelligent, virtuous women in their early thirties have tried hard to find someone to settle down with in the U.S. but to now avail. It’s sad to think that despite our best efforts (going online, meeting people through friends, going to Indian conventions), many of us come up empty, and the world judges us for it.
How about this story for the next issue of Marie Claire? Young woman from India marries an American-based Indian who owns a donut shop. The work side by side, hours are long, and the work is less than ideal. No time for shopping at Barney’s or heading to the gym, but they somehow manage to run a business and raise a family, go to temple occasionally, and live an American dream that is no less real than the crass one described in the article.
Nah – it won’t sell.
dude! live and let live. vapidity or the absence thereof is a societal construct.
why spill bile yaar. make love not hate.
The work side by side, hours are long, and the work is less than ideal.
Nah – it won’t sell.
Of course it would sell! In the fantasy novel section. “Lords of the (donut) Ring.”
Just wanted to add that her marriage doesn’t sound very happy to me. She seems to find solace in the material things around her, but the real thing that makes marriages click–quality time with her new husband–seem to be lacking. How long can that go on?
I do think Anjali both perpetuates a stereotype about Indian women (sheltered, recluse, bound to tradition), particularly when she uses phrases like “proud of my ancient culture” or whatever nonsense it is. I have cousins from much less metropolitan places than Mumbai who are more cosmopolitan in their views than how she presents herself.
I feel like many arranged marriages are moving towards the “yenta model.” It’s matchmaking but with longer “tester” periods of time, but the community/family pressure is still there (although you can turn someone down).
It’s matchmaking but with longer “tester” periods of time, but the community/family pressure is still there (although you can turn someone down).
But Camille, don’t you think the “tester” periods of time are just for show and severly limited (to maybe a single conversation), and the “turning someone down” is usually met with a caustic attitude of “you can’t be so picky” especially for the womenfolk, I’m guessing, correct?
The perpetrators of this system need to have the truth told directly to their face, on this systems inherent flaw. A first step is for the actual victims of it, to stop defending it! As the author here already has.
i wouldnt mind an arranged marriage….i dont know why people have such a negative attitude towards it…people seem to be assuming a lot.
I should qualify my observations are limited to urban middle class Indians (in India and the DBDs here). I have seen a lot of my friends have what would be purely love marriages – with and without parents initial consents, across castes religion etc. Of those who are going what can be called the arranged marriage route, most have known their spouses for at least 6 months if not a year before tying the knot. Which means a lot of dates and countless hours on the phone but with the knowledge of the parents and probably no pre marital sex. I also know of plenty of people who have called the marriage off before the date despite being engaged. Getting out of it after 3 dates is no biggie at all. Does this apply to everyone, not really but as women are getting educated and self sufficient, this trend is increasing. Thus arranged marriages among such people just means that they were introduced with the intent of marriage on their minds.
A non-desi friend of mine sent me this article, and said that, after reading it, it helped him better understand what arranged marriages were like. I thought, “Oh man – now I have to read this.” I share the sentiment with a commenter from above: if it worked for this girl, and she’s happy with it, then that’s fine, but I don’t think it’s for me. Even if I weren’t pucca in love before I got married, there needs to be something to build the relationship off of – not just me getting wet hearing his accent like the author of the article. I see my own parents as a great example of an arranged marriage that worked out well. They met a few times, barely knew each other, got married and tried building a life together in a new country. Now they have this (sometimes super icky) adorable relationship – they’re each other’s best friends and are totally in love. My father in his early 50’s talks to his wife on the phone as if he’s talking to his girlfriend. It doesn’t seem like the article’s author has much to offer in terms of experiences she’s sharing with her husband. She married a baller and now can buy Jimmy Choos to keep her company while he’s off doing his own thing (which he’s been doing for a while before he married her). She’s acclimated to life in the US and to being in an arranged marriage, but hasn’t shared how her Amreekan-Desi husband has “marinated” his arranged marriage into his own Amreekee life. It seems like it’s business as usual for him (except now he’s married and has someone at home to regularly have sex with) and she’s just kind of there, but trying to make herself feel better about it.
I also agree that if she was living in Mumbai there is no way she couldn’t have known anything about sexual relations. It is possible that she could have thought it was sinful having grown up going to Catholic schools, and very possible that she was a virgin when she got married, but they get HBO everywhere now, dangit. Come on.
I can never understand females and this article proves it so – you want to have sex before marriage then go for it, you don’t want arranged marriage then go find love, you don’t want to get on the wrong side of you family coz of love marriage then don’t fall in love, you want to do what you want to do then do it why bother about family and great traditions. Its all so simple and these females always complicate such simple issues as sex and marriage. Maybe if you bring in family and career then things can become complicated ?
i wouldnt mind an arranged marriage….
I’d rather have an arrainged one night stands. why can’t the aunties and uncles swing that.
Which means a lot of dates and countless hours on the phone but with the knowledge of the parents and probably no pre marital sex.
Wait a minute, if there’s dating and possibility of premarital sex, then it’s about as unarranged as it could possibly be. Arrainged just doesn’t mean the parents “set you up and let you go.”
Does she actually say this? I guess I missed that part, when I skimmed through the article. I grew up in Bombay in the late 80’s, early nineties, we were not as innocent and simple as she proclaims to be regarding matters sexual, and no we didn’t need HBO to enlighten us either.
some of my friends did that. meet a bunch of grls throught he aunti ji network. talk to them. they ask the aunti i’s if they can talk alone for a bit. go off, and sh@g in a car. come back, and say “they dont think it will work out”. shy repressed indian boys suddenly oversexed through the auntie ji network.
Parents are still quite a bit more involved than if you were purely dating and getting out of it still means dealing with families. Also, you don’t get involved unless you are in the marriage mindset. Thus practicalities are dealt with early on. Shortlisting based on criteria that the parents care about is also done early on and usually by parents. It’s not the traditional arranged marriage the wy you think of it but it’s also not exactly dating as in the US.
I find the ultimate irony in her (new?) last name: Mansukhani — peace of mind.
Peace of mind, indeed!
It might just be my immediate circle that exists in India, but if there’s any instance of the male & female actually leaving the house and going out without parental supervision, then it’s definitely outside the realm of “arranged.”
Sure, it might not be dating in a traditional western sense, but it’s usually not what the parents had in mind.
No worries Payal…. i know you didn’t mean to hate, everyone has a right to their opinion 😉
I am sure arranged marriages have been evolving in India, especially in urban settings. Some ten years ago, three young people (two women and one man) I know, then in their twenties, made their own choices, all of which involved some sort of departure from the orthodox norm, and then voluntarily sought the approval of their parents, which was given freely in two instances and with some reluctance in the third. All three marriages have lasted, and are happy marriages.
KXB, thanks for highlighting the class aspect of the story. But then there will also be the second generation, won’t there. He will go to Penn Wharton and Yale Law, get himself both an MBA and a JD, make partner at 30, then get himself a wife who will have plenty of time for Barney’s, pole dancing and the gym. There’s a bit of the “ABD marries DBD” in the story too. (BTW, is your America-based donut-shop owner ABD or DBD? :))
No, but maybe someone like Robbie Clipper Sethi could turn it into a short story, for, oh, say, the Atlantic Monthly? 🙂
Whenever topics of arranged marriage come up, people always comment on what they must be like for the bride. What about the groom? I know of a few men who have suffered greatly in arranged marriages with women they never grew to love but stayed with because of a sense of duty and pressure from family, society, etc.
I liked the article for what it was; a light-hearted, comic view of her personal experience. And I get the feeling from the article that her and her husband do share “chemistry”, a bond and a great fondness for one another. I didn’t get the “lonely” vibe from it at all.
I found myself even feeling a tad jealous.
Being that most people in India are not living modern cosmopolitan lives, most marriages are arranged there, even in Mumbai. Love marriages are still a minority.
thats cause dudes arent supposed to complain. they are supposed to work in high paying soul less jobs. pretend to like these jobs so they are interesting for the grl, and basicaly be an atm.
and basicaly be an atm.
at least atms let you keep $20 in the bank.
How can modern woman or man is unable to find suitable spouse? They must lack something to judge people around them. Thanks to relatives – they able to get a spouse. BTW how does it work for other things, such as friends, dress choice, food, and cleaners etc. I guess their parents play a great role to choose their friends for them too ;).
I married for love after long courtship. My other cousins and siblings have arranged marriages. Some are happy and some are miserable. For me I can’t let anybody to make the most important decision of my life, IF it had to be a mistake at least it is mine. But I’m deliriously happy and last I check my hubby too have no qualms about it.
I hated this article and loved Amardeep’s take on it. NB: I only read through the first dozen comments because I’m being destroyed by work, but after skimming what I could during my seven-minute lunch break, I had to comment. Is it hating? I don’t think so, but whatever. She sounded like a pneumatic fool– and her approval of Starsucks Chai Tea Crappe proves it.
I cant stand “Pole Dancing” as a work out!! It is a typical “time to celebrate women hood” activity.
“HE HE HE, see how sexy and cute I am by dancing on this pole? HE HE HE HE, look at my hello kitty gym bag, HE HE HE”
Yea this article is bull shi#! Jeans to work as a financial consultant, Chia at Starbucks tasting like normal Indian Chia, this women on a stripper pole, it seems like a episode of “Sex and the City”.
“Mr. Big had become the most feared type of sexual, a jetrosexual”
Yes, I did once rent a season of “Sex and the City” on DVD.
She sounded like a pneumatic fool–
A pneumatic fool whose path many other women will no doubt foolishly follow, unfortunately.
hey….at least shes honest as to what she wants in life. “I want a tall rich guy to buy me things”. a lot of grls will want this, but will loudly talk about other things…i admire honesty about vapidity (as opposed to being vapid and talking deep to feel better about oneself)
I see some here are offended at the thought of an Indian woman pole dancing.
What exactly is wrong with celebrating womanhood or female sexuality and toning up at the same time?
Maybe y’all are just jealous that your wives/gfs don’t have a new dance to show you come evening? (or you don’t have a new dance to show your man?)
Sour grapes.
I think a few of you are just jealous that this woman seems HAPPY and content with her life and her mate.
With all the complaints that she shallow or whatever, what are any of US doing that is so damn deep and meaningful???
my english is not very happy with me nowadays so I thought I will look up the dictionary
according to dictionary pneumatic means inflated air ( i.e. Ms Mansukhani has a lot of ego ), of or relating to the spritual ( i.e. Ms Mansukhani is religious ) having a well-proportioned feminine figure ( i.e. Ms is in good shape )
hey….at least shes honest as to what she wants in life. “I want a tall rich guy to buy me things”.
I dunno, part of me thinks it was more of a self-resolution. “I’m gonna have to be with a guy, he might as well be tall and rich and buy me things.”
But yes, I do appreciate honesty. As long as she’s got no problem if the husband wants her on call 24/7 for p&ssy payments, she can be as empty and honest about it as she wants.
what are any of US doing that is so damn deep and meaningful???
I just bought an iPhone.