New-age arranged marriages

Here's yet another post about marriages. It seems to me that I have given my unsolicited opinion about anything and everything regarding the topic over many posts in the past. That hasn't really stopped me now either. Wondering what I am talking about? You have some catching up to do!! Read these set of posts, and if you weren't bored enough, this one and this one and last but not the least, this one. And yes, they are all different posts (surprise, surprise).

Anyhow, this post is about how arranged marriages have come a long way since the days of our parents' generation. How the concept of the bride n groom sort of meeting at the wedding venue is no longer remotely true (I do know of a case where they did meet only like a day before the wedding.. but the amount of time they spent on the phone together, they might as well have been living together!) But it's how the concept has evolved. Now the arranged marriage has strictly become only a portal to meet someone. And while everything has graduated to going online, why not the marriage meeting-ground? It only makes sense. But once the people get introduced, it's as much a courtship as anything else outside of it.

No, the involved girl/guy do not take for granted that they will end up with any other person that they meet. No, it's not easy to convince someone to marry you even though they are meeting you with that end result in mind. And yes, the romance has to ring true. Yes for flowers, candy, jewelry, chivalry and whatever else that can woo the woman (ok, there are few not-so-diehard-romantics who claim that they don't need all of this, but trust me, almost everyone enjoys it). I mean, who doesn't want to be the center of someone else's universe (even if it is only for the courtship period)? As for the guys, of course they have their own criteria that the women have to fall over themselves to fulfill. And just because the parents convinced him to meet a girl, doesn't mean he wants to marry her. He'll meet her to shut his parents up, but the spark has to be a true one. Everyone wants the fairytale romance. The whisked-off-one's-feet feeling. No wonder "proposals" have become common in arranged-marriage scenarios. I first found it to be a little bizarre, but I have come to understand it now. The dates, the drinks, the visits to maybe multiple men/women were all sincere efforts (well, in most cases at least) to finally zero-in on the one "life-partner". And hence the proposal. The actual statement of the undercurrent running through the entire courtship period. The Will-you-marry-me? There's a bonus in all this. The woman definitely feels more special and that wins the guy brownie points. Go romance!!

To Priya and her beau who took the plunge. Congratulations!