Tridib da from next door got thrashed by his dad for trying to make out with a girl at the metro station. 'Making out' in this case probably just meant holding hands and giggling : enough at any rate to qualify for the Bengali notion of 'prem kora', which was serious offence at the age of sixteen. Some 'parar kaku' (self appointed neighborhood 'uncle') was of course around to spot and report the said offense to parents.
I was a mere wide-eyed twelve year old then, and I had already internalized the notion that casual contact with the opposite gender was something to be shied away from. 'prem kora' at an inappropriate age was not only debilitating to the moral fabric of the teenaged individual, but it also interfered with the eternally all-important activitity of studying for school exams. There's a time and occasion for everything. 'Fair enough', me thought. Socially enforced abstinence and gender apartheid meant that we didn't need prophyllactics or religiously sworn oaths to Redneck parents, to prevent teenage pregnancies. It's a different system from the West and we could even pretend it was superior.
I went to college at eighteen. My school had been meant for just boys, and my college, a science&technology institution, had very few women in it. I missed having women friends. I was cut off from access to the other half of humanity which I was sure had some cool people who'd be interesting to know too. Of course I had friends who had had 'affairs' by the time I reached my twenties. Probably some hot nervous sweaty making out in the back seats of movie halls. Maybe the richer kids from Delhi's upmarket schools were more demonstrative about it. There were people who were very openly frustrated with their virginity, some who made bets about when they'd lose it, some who were frustrated but seemed to be doing little about it except grumbling, one who actually made good his promise to lose his virginity by age 20. Of course when it came to matters of sex, different individuals had different approaches and it's hardly my concern here. But we didn't have canteen addas where men and women sat in chummy groups and shared ideas freely; or art and language classes where men and women could work together on something creative. I sorely missed the other perspective, in stead being exposed to a steady stream of myths, misconceptions, fantasies, phobias and longing : none that I could take too seriously or refute.
Around 20, also began another curious trend. Whenever I would return home to visit my family, a few odd female relatives would look at me meaningfully, wonder aloud whether I had a girl friend and giggle conspiratorially about it. Surprisingly it wasn't the young nubile cousins with boyfriends who started it, but the old hypertensive aunts well past their peak reproductive periods (no pun intended) with a missing tooth or two, who seemed to take maximum delight in such speculation. Was it their own repressed youth that made them so interested in matters of my generation? Or was I a sad loser in their eyes who needed some morale-boosting? I haven't been able to figure out their motives yet.
By the time I left the country at 23, my parents had also been assimilated into this conspiratorial fold and they seemed more than nosily interested in my social activities. The worst part was I was single all through and still getting to meet very few ladies. Thus it went in my early twenties. Another vacation, another aunt, another dreaded "prem tem hoyni?" question, to which I'd mumble some sheepish made-to-order response and be greeted with loud guffawing.
(Is there something about me that triggers an irrepressible urge in matrons to irritate me?)
One day I mustered the courage to say something different and honest : "ekhono serom bhabe cheshta korini" : "Haven't really been trying (to find someone) so far". More merriment. As if I was this alien from a planet with different mating habits. "People have to try to fall in love/ find partners?" everyone found this a quaint idea. Love was supposed to happen. Just like that, like in Hindi movies. Meet someone at college, pass around a secret note, dance around trees : old aunts happy. What I saw was a college with very few women around, the men trying hard on phone, on online forums, chats to socialize, talk to as many women as they could, 'propose' to them, be 'rejected' and relentlessly set their sights on another. If this wasn't trying, perhaps I could effortlessly solve my next research problem?
It became increasingly clear to me that after 18 I had a socially approved sexual identity, and after 25 it would probably cease to be my private business. What was taboo earlier would now be everybody's concern. So when I come back home these days and we go out to meet people on random family visits, I can't help the eerie feeling that I am being advertised when my mom proudly lists all my accomplishments to random people, the most significant of which seems to be that I got my degree from an IIT and now study in the US of A! Immediately, random person, (I am certainly afraid that it could be some nubile maiden's father), would also rile off names and addressses of random acquaintances who live in that great country, thereby seeking to establish who knows what kind of bond. Why it is getting to be such a major social occasion that our driver and dad's right hand man also mentions my glorious GRE score (!) to said random person, who by this time is waxing eloquent on my virtues without ever having spoken to me (and I am not much to look at).
I knew a dog enthusiast who actually used to go in for "arranged matings" for his pets. Once he thought his dog needed a partner he would advertise in the papers with the required specs. Some other pet owner would respond to this matrimonial and bring their dog-of-opposite-gender along. The canine lovers would be shut off in a room for some time to give them the necessary privacy, and then again separated, taken away by respective owners. A few such arranged birds-&-bees encounters and adorable pups would be born, everybody - owners and dogs- would be happy. Sometimes I wonder if such arranged screwings would be a better and less hypocritical idea than arranged marriages. Maybe the indulgent auntyjis would be happier?
There seems to be a formula to it. Create social conditions and narrow peaked moral barriers to restrict our normal mating tendencies. Then seemingly paradoxically enough, create copious pressure on these unfortunate crushed souls to find a mate quickly and propagate the species. There is however monstrous method to it. Sex is intrinsically linked to power politics, and controlling the individual's sex instinct is the basic strategy of any draconian /patriarchal/ absolutist society, that seeks to preserve its set norms and mores through controlling that which should be a matter of ultimate personal choice. So first handicap the individual's normal capacity to find and select a suitable mate, then delude him with an urgent compulsion to mate and reproduce, and try and force a choice on him , that is satisfactory and suitable to everyone's interests. Even the Vedic patriarchs enjoin upon us to observe the formula - garhasthya after brahmacharya.
Of course it could be argued that every system has its own merits and demerits. Human relationships after all are not all about sex. The Indian system does provide some amount of security and stability where the capitalist West exposes all players to ruthless Darwinian competition. Let alone the decadent West for a while. The Marias and Gonds of Chhattisgarh have this initiation ceremony called 'ghotul', where young people of both sexes are allowed to congregate and mix freely and choose their mates. Tribal elders or matriarchs do not interfere or supervise as ebony belles clad in kneelength leaf skirts choose their lovers with spontaneous grace. Sigh.
Meanwhile the TV jingles, the lovesick Hindi movie tunes, the suggestively paunchy auntyjis all impress upon us the idea of our karmic garhasthya duties. And we are a beaten, battered, compliant lot all too eager to fall in.
ps : This is written entirely from a male perspective and that doesn't necessarily trivialize the possibly graver problems women have to face.
I went to college at eighteen. My school had been meant for just boys, and my college, a science&technology institution, had very few women in it. I missed having women friends. I was cut off from access to the other half of humanity which I was sure had some cool people who'd be interesting to know too. Of course I had friends who had had 'affairs' by the time I reached my twenties. Probably some hot nervous sweaty making out in the back seats of movie halls. Maybe the richer kids from Delhi's upmarket schools were more demonstrative about it. There were people who were very openly frustrated with their virginity, some who made bets about when they'd lose it, some who were frustrated but seemed to be doing little about it except grumbling, one who actually made good his promise to lose his virginity by age 20. Of course when it came to matters of sex, different individuals had different approaches and it's hardly my concern here. But we didn't have canteen addas where men and women sat in chummy groups and shared ideas freely; or art and language classes where men and women could work together on something creative. I sorely missed the other perspective, in stead being exposed to a steady stream of myths, misconceptions, fantasies, phobias and longing : none that I could take too seriously or refute.
Around 20, also began another curious trend. Whenever I would return home to visit my family, a few odd female relatives would look at me meaningfully, wonder aloud whether I had a girl friend and giggle conspiratorially about it. Surprisingly it wasn't the young nubile cousins with boyfriends who started it, but the old hypertensive aunts well past their peak reproductive periods (no pun intended) with a missing tooth or two, who seemed to take maximum delight in such speculation. Was it their own repressed youth that made them so interested in matters of my generation? Or was I a sad loser in their eyes who needed some morale-boosting? I haven't been able to figure out their motives yet.
By the time I left the country at 23, my parents had also been assimilated into this conspiratorial fold and they seemed more than nosily interested in my social activities. The worst part was I was single all through and still getting to meet very few ladies. Thus it went in my early twenties. Another vacation, another aunt, another dreaded "prem tem hoyni?" question, to which I'd mumble some sheepish made-to-order response and be greeted with loud guffawing.
(Is there something about me that triggers an irrepressible urge in matrons to irritate me?)
One day I mustered the courage to say something different and honest : "ekhono serom bhabe cheshta korini" : "Haven't really been trying (to find someone) so far". More merriment. As if I was this alien from a planet with different mating habits. "People have to try to fall in love/ find partners?" everyone found this a quaint idea. Love was supposed to happen. Just like that, like in Hindi movies. Meet someone at college, pass around a secret note, dance around trees : old aunts happy. What I saw was a college with very few women around, the men trying hard on phone, on online forums, chats to socialize, talk to as many women as they could, 'propose' to them, be 'rejected' and relentlessly set their sights on another. If this wasn't trying, perhaps I could effortlessly solve my next research problem?
It became increasingly clear to me that after 18 I had a socially approved sexual identity, and after 25 it would probably cease to be my private business. What was taboo earlier would now be everybody's concern. So when I come back home these days and we go out to meet people on random family visits, I can't help the eerie feeling that I am being advertised when my mom proudly lists all my accomplishments to random people, the most significant of which seems to be that I got my degree from an IIT and now study in the US of A! Immediately, random person, (I am certainly afraid that it could be some nubile maiden's father), would also rile off names and addressses of random acquaintances who live in that great country, thereby seeking to establish who knows what kind of bond. Why it is getting to be such a major social occasion that our driver and dad's right hand man also mentions my glorious GRE score (!) to said random person, who by this time is waxing eloquent on my virtues without ever having spoken to me (and I am not much to look at).
I knew a dog enthusiast who actually used to go in for "arranged matings" for his pets. Once he thought his dog needed a partner he would advertise in the papers with the required specs. Some other pet owner would respond to this matrimonial and bring their dog-of-opposite-gender along. The canine lovers would be shut off in a room for some time to give them the necessary privacy, and then again separated, taken away by respective owners. A few such arranged birds-&-bees encounters and adorable pups would be born, everybody - owners and dogs- would be happy. Sometimes I wonder if such arranged screwings would be a better and less hypocritical idea than arranged marriages. Maybe the indulgent auntyjis would be happier?
There seems to be a formula to it. Create social conditions and narrow peaked moral barriers to restrict our normal mating tendencies. Then seemingly paradoxically enough, create copious pressure on these unfortunate crushed souls to find a mate quickly and propagate the species. There is however monstrous method to it. Sex is intrinsically linked to power politics, and controlling the individual's sex instinct is the basic strategy of any draconian /patriarchal/ absolutist society, that seeks to preserve its set norms and mores through controlling that which should be a matter of ultimate personal choice. So first handicap the individual's normal capacity to find and select a suitable mate, then delude him with an urgent compulsion to mate and reproduce, and try and force a choice on him , that is satisfactory and suitable to everyone's interests. Even the Vedic patriarchs enjoin upon us to observe the formula - garhasthya after brahmacharya.
Of course it could be argued that every system has its own merits and demerits. Human relationships after all are not all about sex. The Indian system does provide some amount of security and stability where the capitalist West exposes all players to ruthless Darwinian competition. Let alone the decadent West for a while. The Marias and Gonds of Chhattisgarh have this initiation ceremony called 'ghotul', where young people of both sexes are allowed to congregate and mix freely and choose their mates. Tribal elders or matriarchs do not interfere or supervise as ebony belles clad in kneelength leaf skirts choose their lovers with spontaneous grace. Sigh.
Meanwhile the TV jingles, the lovesick Hindi movie tunes, the suggestively paunchy auntyjis all impress upon us the idea of our karmic garhasthya duties. And we are a beaten, battered, compliant lot all too eager to fall in.
ps : This is written entirely from a male perspective and that doesn't necessarily trivialize the possibly graver problems women have to face.
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2 comments:
A very revealing commentary on the sexual atmosphere that the Indian male finds himself in. The humour is classy, just as always with Kinjal's works :) - Basu.
thanks Basu for reading and commenting. I'm sure a lot of us can relate to it.
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