by Ajay Patel
“Hi Vaishali, hey Rohit!” Vijay greeted them in casual American fashion in direct contrast to Vaishali’s more formal greeting. Vaishali immediately joined Shantiben as they walked into the kitchen to go over the lunch menu while Jayendrabhai rose to go upstairs to get ready for the arrival of their guests.
“How are you Veeral?” asked Rohit as he sat down near the stack of newspapers by Vijay in the bonus room. He called him Veeral, not because that was one of the annoying things that an older brother did to a younger brother, but rather because he was traditional and never understood why their parents had changed his younger brother’s name to simply accommodate the neighbors.
“I’m doing all right,” he answered. “How’s married life?”
“Great! When can I ask the same thing from you?” His parents had subcontracted to Rohit all matters related to imploring Vijay to get married.
Normally, Vijay would have pushed his request for information and answers aside. But the excitement of meeting Rina last night had left him with a desire to share his feelings with someone, even if it had to be Rohit. He leaned over to him, and quietly said “Don’t say anything to anyone, but I think I may have finally found her.”
This caught Rohit’s attention as the her no doubt referred to a woman that Vijay could see marrying. With a slight rise in his voice he asked, “Is she Indian?” Vijay nodded and Rohit released a breath of anxiety at the answer. He never did quite understand Vijay’s interest in Jennifer.
“Her name is Rina. She’s smart, funny, and unbelievably beautiful!” Vijay described her using broad strokes.
Rohit couldn’t be bothered with the big picture, interested more in the minutiae that was important to him and his parents. “Is she Gujarati?”
“I’m pretty sure she is,” responded Vijay with an indifferent shrug of his shoulders.
Rohit’s eyes lit up with even more excitement. Their parents would be so happy! “What gaam is she from?” he continued the questioning.
“You know, I think that topic came up while we were slow dancing,” said Vijay sarcastically. “When I asked her, she said Juicy Fruit.”
“No, I don’t mean gum, I mean gaam.” The joke had been wasted on Rohit. “You know. What village does she come from in Gujarat?” Vijay just shrugged his shoulders again, unable to give an answer. Undaunted at the lack of information, Rohit continued his due diligence. “What about her family? Do you know anything about them? Did you ask Amit’s parents if they knew them? If not, maybe mom and dad can find out about her family.” He was like a teenager driving a car for the first time, picking up speed as each question came out.
“It’s like I’ve always told you, what her parents do, the village she comes from and all that other stuff doesn’t matter to me. I just know that I really like her, and that doesn’t happen often. So when it does, I’m not going to let these outdated Indian cultural things get in my way,” said Vijay emphatically.
Rohit was about to mount his counter offensive to Vijay’s argument, but before he could start, the front doorbell rang.
“Saved by the bell,” sighed Vijay, who had heard too many lectures from his parents and other relatives. He should have known that he would hear it again from his brother once he opened up the subject.
Their guests had evidently arrived and their parents could already be heard chatting away. Vijay and Rohit walked towards the living room. As Vijay walked through the entryway, however, he stopped short. He looked past his uncle and his parents and rested his eyes on his cousin
from back east. At the same moment, she raised her eyes to meet his. “Shinki?” he addressed her in dumbfounded fashion. “Veeral?” she replied back in equal disbelief looking at Vijay. Sitting in his parents’ living room was his cousin Shinki. Vijay,
however, had already met her as Rina, the name her parents and friends had started calling her since the age of two, the woman he had just proposed to the night before.
9
Gentlemen, Start Your Mothers!
Vijay stood by the upstairs window, looking glum as Rina and Ghopal uncle drove away. There would be no second date. This was not to say that Vijay would never see her again. It’s just that it would no longer would be considered a “date” but rather a “family reunion.”
It was the end of the day and Rohit was slowly rocking the swing in the back yard reading an India Abroad newspaper. He looked up over the paper and seeing Vijay come through the back screen door, motioned for him to join him. Rohit had already figured out that their cousin Shinki was, by some strange circumstance, the woman Vijay had been describing to him as his new love interest that morning.
“How are you doing?” Rohit asked sympathetically.
“Let’s just say this wasn’t one of my better days,” sighed Vijay. He pulled out the section of the paper with the matrimonial listings and opened it up. “I think I’d have better luck if I just responded to some of these ads. See, here’s a good one,” he pointed at one. The advertisement invited alliances for an extremely beautiful Sindhi girl with a physician father, innocent divorce, and no issues. Evidently, caste was no bar and the only requirements were that the suitor speak English, have a college or better education, and be a green card holder or U.S. citizen.
“No, this is not a good one,” Rohit disapproved of the advertisement Vijay had pointed to. “She’s not even Gujarati!”
“So, what’s the big deal?” Vijay asked, indifferent. “In the end, we’re all Indian, right?”
Rohit put the paper down in anticipation of providing a lengthy explanation. Fortunately, Rohit did not go so far back as to start with maharajas, kingdoms and British rule, but instead began with the basic premise that each region in India was remarkably different from the other regions in India. “Just because we’re all Indian doesn’t mean we’re all carbon copy alike. If, for example, you’re from Tamil-Nadu, Rajastan, or Punjab, you have differences in languages, customs, foods and sometimes even religion from the people of Gujarat. It can get to a point when you might as well marry an American because they’re no more different than Indians from other regions. That is why you want commonality.”
Vijay actually understood the premise behind the argument, having heard it before from his parents. How marrying someone who was Indian and Gujarati made it much more likely that there would be more similarity in beliefs and culture and therefore fewer disagreements and greater harmony down the road of marriage. What he did not understand, however, were the specifics. At what level did the differences start to become significant? “Tell me something,” he asked Rohit naively. “What does all this gaam stuff you keep mentioning have to do with anything? If someone is from a different gaam, is that like marrying someone from a different region?”
“No, that’s not it exactly. Knowing which gaam you’re from is Gujarati specific and was traditionally more of a social status kind of thing about the village you were from. It is like the Beverly Hills 90201 zip code mentality,” Rocky was trying very hard to break down complex Gujarati sociological concepts into bite sized pieces for Vijay. “Of course, with everyone moving around now it’s not nearly as important.”
“Then why were you and mom and dad asking about it all the time when you got married?” Vijay asked, curious.
Rohit gave the swing a kick as he tried to figure out how to translate the answer into English. “You know how both mom and dad have the same last name, right?” he started.
Vijay nodded, recalling how when he was young all his friends freaked out when they found out that his parents had Patel as their same last name even before they had gotten married. The running joke he heard growing up was whether, if his parents got divorced, they would still be considered brother and sister.
“And you know how every time one of our non-Indian friends has met someone named Patel, they always think that they’re related to us?” Rohit continued.
Vijay nodded again. “Yeah, I always have to tell them that it’s just a very common Gujarati name, like
Smith or Lee.”
“Well, because there are so many people in Gujarat with Patel as their last name, one basic way to help make sure you’re not marrying someone you’re related to is by marrying someone who’s not from your specific gaam,” explained Rohit.
“Let me guess,” Vijay said with a sigh, as the importance of this information dawned on him, “Rina is from our gaam, isn’t she?”
“Yes, probably,” Rohit said with a shrug.
At that moment Shantiben walked outside to join them. “What are you two boys talking about?” she asked approaching.
“Oh, Rohit was helping me find the perfect Gujarati wife. You know how he is. So picky, even when it comes to the person that I’m supposed to marry,” Vijay joked weakly. Rohit moved off the swing to make room for their mother, leaving them to find Vaishali.
“So,” she said, putting her hands together expectantly, looking up at him after joining him on the swing like a child expecting some surprise. “With all this talk, is there someone that we should be knowing about? Have you found some Gujarati girl?” she emphasized the Gujarati part hoping somehow by doing so that it increased the chances of Vijay answering in the affirmative.
Vijay let out a sigh and shrugged his shoulders. “No. Not anyone that I really like. Not yet.”
“Vijay!” she responded as would a child not getting the surprise that was expected. She then continued in more aggressive fashion feeling that her window of matrimonial opportunity with him that had temporarily opened might be closed unless she moved quickly, “You are not getting any younger now! We should start looking seriously if you are having interest and haven’t met anybody,” Shantiben marched through rapidly, like an infantryman trying to capture as much marital territory now that the first line of defense had temporarily been broken down.
“Don’t start!” Vijay shook his head stubbornly, setting up new bunkers. “I’m not like Rohit! There’s no way that I’m going off to India to find my wife in a week before I supposedly get too old!”
She took in his answer, blinked, paused for a moment, and then laughed. “Beta, I know you’re not like Rohit. You two boys could not be more different! Believe me, I am knowing this,” she said while rubbing her forehead, as if the headaches that had come from their fighting while growing up as children had resurfaced. “Just like Rohit wanted to go to India for his traditional wife, I am also knowing you want an Indian wife who is westernized, from Amrika.”
Vijay said with a sigh, “I just want to find a nice girl who can make me happy.”
“If that is what you are wanting, you must begin looking seriously. The longer you are waiting, the fewer girls there will be left,” she said, shaking her finger at him as if that would drive the point further home.
Vijay thought for a minute and realized what his mother was saying did make a lot of sense. His going to weddings and finding fewer and fewer single Indian friends had worried him.
There was silence and the swing had come to a rest, twitching slightly in response to their slightest movements. “I don’t know what I can do,” he said quietly after some silence. “Even though I haven’t really been thinking about getting married, I’ve still been looking. But there’s no one that I like.”
“Papa and I can be helping,” she, too, responded softly now, realizing victory was close at hand if she played her cards right. “But you have to decide if you are being ready about marriage. That’s what looking seriously means. If good girl comes, you are being ready to marry,” she repeated to drive the point home.
Vijay gave the ground a kick, starting the swing in motion again. There was silence all around them except for the slight clicking noise the chains supporting the swing made as they shifted to and fro. Vijay felt lonely; he had been feeling that way for some time now. He realized that these feelings might be an indication that he was ready to get married. He did want someone to share his life with. Yes, Vijay thought to himself, if he found the right woman, he could see himself married. But finding that right woman—that was the hard part.
He let out a sigh, looked over to his mother, and said, “So, do you think you can help me find someone?”
And so it all began.
MAKING ARRANGEMENTS
1
Looking for Ms. Perfect
“If you want us to help you find a wife, there are some things you have to do to help us,” his father requested from Vijay at the dinner table a week after he had agreed to allow his parents to help him in the search for a wife. Vijay had spent the whole week thinking over the idea and could see no downside to it. “First, you need to describe to us what you are looking for.”
Vijay took a moment to respond, remembering when Amit had asked him the very same question during Amit’s wedding. “I don’t need the perfect person. Just the perfect person for me,” he offered what he thought was a clever answer to the question.
His parents, however, were not very impressed. “Please to be helping us out more,” Shantiben implored him, “We need to be knowing what you want so that we show you girls that you will be liking.”
“But mom,” he said exasperated, “If I even don’t know who I’m looking for how can I tell you?”
“Let’s do this differently,” Jayendrabhai interrupted with a calm voice. Based on years of working as an engineer, he applied a methodical approach to get the answers he needed. “We understand you cannot exactly describe the girl to us. But even still, there must be some limits. Tell me,” he picked an easy first category, “How short can she be? Would it be all right if the girl was less than five feet tall?”
Vijay, who himself stood five feet ten inches tall, didn’t want someone too short. He answered immediately, “She has to at least be five feet tall or she’ll look like my daughter!”
“I agree, now we are starting somewhere,” said Jayendrabhai. He motioned to Shantiben who wrote this fact down. Evidently it would be her job to record all of the characteristics Vijay was looking for as his father culled them out.
“How tall can she be?” Jayendrabhai wanted to close the loop on the other end.
Vijay again was able to respond. “I don’t want anyone taller than me.”
“And do not forget the high heels,” Shantiben chipped in, not to be left out of the loop.
“Ok,” said Vijay with a grin. “No one over five feet seven inches.” Not that this was a limiting factor. Most every Indian woman he knew was much shorter.
After several more questions, just as a victim described his assailant to a police sketch artist, Vijay began to describe his ideal wife to his parents. And although at first it did not seem possible to put down on paper the characteristics of this ideal woman, with the proper questioning, she began to take form.
“She has to be thin, correct?” Vijay’s father continued, asking the question leadingly.
“Slender. I don’t want anyone who’s heavier than me,” Vijay agreed. He always had assumed that all of the Indian women he would meet would be petite just like all his friends and he were. But, he thought to himself, it couldn’t hurt to put it down on paper just to be safe.
“Okay, how about education? I am assuming you want at least someone who has graduated from college, correct?” Jayendrabhai asked leadingly again.
Vijay agreed. “She would have to be smart and someone who I could talk to for hours. You know what I mean.”
“College educated, minimum,” said his father dryly, not caring to know what Vijay meant. “I’m telling you, nowadays it takes two incomes for you to make it. Let’s try to find you someone with a good job, maybe a pharmacist.”
Vijay didn’t want to narrow the search too much. “I just want someone who’s interesting. I don’t care what she does, whether she’s a doctor or an artist.” The mention of artist made Jayendrabhai cringe as he mentally calculated the second income that would come from such a wife.
After a few more questions and certain additional compromises between Vijay and his parents, it was over. It hadn’t
seemed possible, but he had been able to provide his parents a rough sketch of who he was looking for. While the details of his dream woman were still very hazy—they seemed to have only narrowed the search to women who were not as heavy as him and who had less facial hair—his parents nonetheless felt as though they were well armed to go searching for another daughter-in-law. Vijay, however, felt as though he had only been an impressionist when describing his ideal woman. He had painted broad characteristics and traits rather than specific details about the woman herself. He thought to himself, any number of women could be the woman that he had described, however, only one would be the right one. His search, hopefully, would lead him to that one right woman.
2
Looking Good on Paper, it’s all Bio-Debatable
Vijay awoke the next morning to the sound of his parents talking in the kitchen below his bedroom. He rose from the bed and slowly walked down the stairs to join them. Jayendrabhai and Shantiben were sitting at the kitchen table sipping their morning cup of chai and shifting through papers.
“What’re you doing?” he asked them half-awake. “Are you looking for a new job, dad?” Vijay was looking at all of the sheets of paper from across the room while pouring himself a cup of chai by the stove. They looked very similar to resumes.
“No, we are actually trying to make your bio-data based on the information you gave us yesterday,” responded Jayendrabhai matterof-factly. Vijay stopped in mid pour and snapped out of his groggy state. Seeing the puzzled and wary look on Vijay’s face, he explained that a bio-data was like a resume, but it was used more to describe a person and not their job experience. It was these bio-datas that were first exchanged and started the process. If there then was interest in what they read, they could take it to the next level to see if there was any interest in what they heard by telephone and then to the final level to see if there was any interest in what they saw by meeting in person.
