Virtual Ramblings

Scene: A table of for four at my workplace cafeteria.

People Involved:
Yours truly: sitting at the end of the table [usual preference]
A good friend: My coworker, good friend and a lunch buddy.
Guy1 [Lets call him Tom]: A reasonable young guy, looks like just out of college, may be an year of work experience max.
Guy2 [Lets call him Dick]: A guy in his mid twenties, neither too young, nor to old confused age I guess.
Guy3 [Lets call him Harry]: A late twenties guy, looks like a north Indian, and speaks like one.

And the fun began.
Me and my friend hurriedly walked into the café, I had been the culprit delaying lunch by about half an hour, you know the usual work pressures. So we walk up to surprisingly empty table in our busy café, and comfortably seat ourselves in the remote end. Somehow I have developed liking for the corner seats and tend to choose the ones in the far most table. As usual we opened our lunch boxes [yep we are fortunate ones who get lunch from home], and began with usual discussion about the project, and whos doing what badly, the usual suspicions as to whats gonna happen to our company, and throwing in the subject of movies once in a while.
Tom and Dick, seeing the empty place walk up to the table and make them comfortable, conversing with each other in hindi, and then a third guy Harry walks in and squeezes himself in between the other two.

Tom [to Dick]: Look Harry looks so concerned, he has began the hunt you know, now he is all tensed..

Tom [to Harry]: hey don’t worry too much about this, Dick can help you with this, btw you should decide on your specs first …

[Read it as, got to decide the specifications, the term used in the cubeland to indicate the requirements for any product/software]

Dick: Yeah you should first find out what you want, just “homely” is not good enough to find what you want.
Dick: I think you should go for a north Indian girl, South Indians are very forward.

*me thinks, Dick must have watched Chak De on Sony last week, talking about forwards..*

Dick Continues… South Indian girls are really well educated, earning well, and also mostly employed in a high paying corporate job. They are self sufficient and know they can live independently.

*me thinks Ah!, Ideal for me, but why “South Indians” and I look up to my friend who can’t stop smiling*

Dick Continues…Now a days you know girls directly ask, do you know basic cooking in the first meeting itself, so its better to employee a cook than marry one.

*me thinks ok at least he thinks wives are not mere cooks*

Harry: Surprised and a little worried by now, oh really? So we should know how to cook?

Dick: yep all IT couples in Bangalore, share the cooking job, if the guy reaches home early he will cut the vegetables by the time wife reaches home, and wife fine tunes them before cooking them

*me thinks, another tech word, fine tuning..job terms in conversations like this make them hilarious.. wow this guy is funny.. but good he wants to help his wife.*

Dick: That’s why you should marry a north Indian girl.. They are excellent managers you know, they take care of both work and home easily, you need not worry a bit.

*me thinks, so here comes the true color*
Tom [who was listening silently so far ], yeah that is the reason why I said, “You should decide on the specs”.

Dick [citing an example], you know my friend was telling this case, one girl who was exactly of the type we want, put up her profile on a matrimony site, and within a week there was a line, so such girls are totally out of reach

Tom: May be you should put up your profile too, some or the other will match your config spec

[Read config spec as the set of rules we define in the clear case to chose a particular version of the file in the vob]

*me thinks this was the limit, config spec hahha I need a break*

My friend was done, so we walked off before I could hear any more c**p

The other day I was going through my daily routine of reading the newspaper, and this article, a pure example of the yellow journalism we are subjected to, caught my eye. This was yet another celebrity gossip about a relationship going kaput, what was interesting though was the reason cited. Apparently the demand for prenuptial agreement did not go down well with the male and his family. Now the word “prenuptial” is almost unheard of when it comes to normal middle class families like us, this part of the new age marriage made me think a little.

Some time back I was interested in a speculation made by a person in media, he thought soon people will begin to demand medical examination results and HIV test results before agreeing for the marriage, which I kind of felt looked very practical, though totally against my belief of blind trust in relationship. Prenuptial agreements too appear to me as a step in a negative direction when it comes to marriage, when a couple begin their journey through the sanctity of marriage, should they really think about how they should handle a possible divorce?, at the beginning of such an important phase in life should one really worry about the money matters?. Or does it really indicate the lack of confidence in both the parties who are entering into the relationships.

As I said previously on one of my posts, most of us men are not prepared in the true sense when it comes to marriage, I think most of us learn the hard way as when we are required to learn, or just act on upon a adamant belief that we cannot do anything wrong, the same goes with the new age brides as well, I feel we think a lot less before committing to some things, and marriage or other relationships too have become a part of our actions. I do not think this is wrong, because that’s a phase of evolution our society is going through. So now when we are asked to do some risk mitigation, why does it hurt?. We are so used to this term when it comes to corporate world, every possible risk has mitigation plan, so in a country where number of arranged marriages are still high, isn’t failure in a relationship a huge risk and a high probable one, well may not be, but what’s wrong in having a mitigation plan, what’s wrong if a person or both in some cases want to decide well upfront how they are going to handle assets in case of a failed marriage.

Prenuptial agreements are not completely unheard off in Hindu religion, may be it was never about the money matters, but most of the verses that are sung as a part a marriage ceremony are nothing but prenuptial agreements, I agree its more in the form of the oath we take, but still it is an agreement, it’s a promise made by the groom to the bride and to the entire society. “Dharma cha, artha cha, kama cha, nathi charami”, this is the agreement/oath the groom takes in a hindu marriage which means

“ I , to perform the Purushartha of the human life in this form am taking or accepting he as my wife. She is already oered to the cosmic mind and cosmic will and to the eternal truth. (meaning this marriage is only to the continuation of the evolution.) I will not tress pass her in the performance of Dharma - all such acts that aid the evolution, Artha-all acts that allows to create utilities of life,(money earning is one such act that creates the utilities of the life, and the artha is not merely money or paper currency) and Kama- all such desires that come across in the life of us.( the Kama in the purview of the Sages is not only sex but the whole range of the desires.)”

[You can read the rest of the explanation here]

So isn’t this an agreement we commit upon?, may be in ages where the social commitment was of atmost importance this was more than enough, but as per todays society may be we need some legal agreements to just bring in the sense of commitment what is expected in marriage.

This is the point which made me think not so great about these agreements, I mean if the idea was to make sure people are more committed, and have a little sense of fear making them work hard to make the relationship work, probably I would have accepted the new age agreements with whole heart, but it appears as if these agreements are more to ensure none of the parties involved are in total loss in case it breaks, I feel that should not be the attitude when one approaches a marriage.

May be money does this to people, when lot of it is involved, the attachment to money is much more than to the loved one, and one fears that they might loose both at one go, and hence they want to safeguard at least one of the two, as they cannot [or may not ] be sure if they can permanently hold on to the other person, they take the easier route of safeguarding the one thing which they easily can, that’s money.

I am still not distinctively opinionated in this regard, I am being torn between the practical sense the subject makes to me, and also the negative vibes this brings into marriage. The absolute sense the risk mitigation brought by it to the table and the complete opposition it does to my beliefs of total trust in a relation.

Am I the only one who feels confused?, what do you guys think?, prenuptial agreements a possibility in Indian marriages soon?

Every day, different people we meet can give you so much information, more importantly so much thoughts to wonder about. Same with two people I meet almost everyday, they are my coworkers, and both married, and both with  one kid too. As we share the same mode of transport to get to work, I get to see them very closely and observe.

Let me start with one of them, he is late into 30’s, must have got married at a late age, and he does care a lot about his wife. I have seen him get a call everyday as soon as he reaches half way to office, thats when his wife would have reached her workplace, its her “got there safely” call, every single day he tells her that, we are on our way, and promises her he will call back once he reaches office. Its the same story in the evening as well, he will call her to let her know that he has left the office, and would be at home at such and such a time. He also admits that he calls once in the afternoon after his lunch to update he has finished his lunch, and also ensure if she has done with hers. The interesting thing, is to hear his tone when he speaks to her, I don’t think I have seen a person more polite  and respectful then him when on phone with his wife.

The second of them must be in early thirties, who must have got married in his late 20’s. He is generally a little mean and rude when he speaks normally, and he almost never gets call from his wife, but when he does get it, we can easily make it is from his house because, he becomes extra rude and extra mean. We all have, jokingly how he can speak to them in such a tone, but he continues to speak that way. He speaks to the point, and makes sure they would think thrice before calling him up again. In a way totally opposite to the first person.

First person sounds all so romantic, but the truth is when he speaks normally otherwise he is not that polite, nor so respectful either, and somehow I have a doubt he fakes the politeness a little too much, so when we tease him about this, he always says I don’t know about all this as I am not marries, and he claims that it requires to be like this, in a relationship, to keep the other one happy.

Speaking of the second person, he says openly that the only way to dominate a relation is to claim the dominance before the other person has chance to think about it. He says the right way to speak to one’s wife is to make sure, they do not get the idea of possible weakness, and try to be as unapproachable as possible. He is not all that mean to others, and not that rude to others on phone, still he kind of fakes dominance over phone.

When I get to see extreme actions such as this, what makes me wonder is that, is this faking really required?, how stupid the respective wives must be to not recognize that their partners are faking?, I am sure they would have known, but they must be behaving as they haven’t found out. In a way faking, that they do not know their husbands are faking.

How difficult is it to remain honest in marriages?, do one need to resort to these tactics?, I know the obvious answer is no, but then still why does it happen in so many cases, why do one go out of their way to please others? or in some cases please themselves.

Simple things like these can say a lot about one’s marriage, I get a feeling that most people tend to live a pseudo relationship, where each one knows the truth, but never want to show the fact that they know. When did we become this, when?