May 30 2008
Engagement Nightmare
I thought I would share this because it will no doubt happen to someone else. I’m a physician and I grew up watching the same Bollywood movies as other Desi kids. Assuming that as long as I worked hard someday my Raj/Rahul/Prem would show up and he would be a wonderful person. I did the 16 Monday Fast for Lord Shiva to get a good husband. I did every other puja any Pandit would recommend. I figured in the end it would be worth it. It never crossed my mind that some people out there may not have the strength of character I assumed everyone has.
A guy, we’ll call him Bob (his family changed their Indian names because his father claimed that he could not get a job as an engineer in the 1980s with an Indian name in the Bay Area). He is a surgical resident at the hospital where I did my residency. After I finished residency he asked a mutual friend to introduce us. When we met things seemed great. We are both religious, we enjoy a lot of the same things, we are both in the military, we worked well as a team. He claimed that the first time he saw me in the hospital 6 months earlier he went home and begged Lord Balaji to be able to marry me. Within weeks he was discussing wedding planning. In 2 months our parents met. Thats when the trouble started. His father (we’ll call him Roger) didn’t let Bob speak. Roger Uncle explained to me the plans for our lives down to how we would spend our spare time. Roger Uncle kept saying how success was all about knowing what you have that the competition doesnt and capitalizing on it. Later I would understand what that meant. A wedding date was set, but my parents were worried. Roger Uncle kept reminding my parents that I am not a Tamil Brahmin and they would have preferred a Tamil Brahmin girl. But since I am a doctor and I owned my own house I would be acceptable.
Bob is an only child so I just chalked it all up to that. A few weeks later Bob tried to tell his parents that he would like to make his own plans for his upcoming vacation time and his father denied the request then called my father threatening him since he assumed it was my fault that his son spoke up. He said, “Tell you daughter there are plenty of elligible girls in the LA area who will readily marry Bob so she had better behave herself.” I didn’t tell Bob about it because I didn’t want to make trouble. Meanwhile I had been accepted into fellowship at UCLA and Bob was still applying. Roger Uncle demanded that I write to my soon to be boss asking that he write a letter on behalf of Bob. Usually fellowship programs try not to separate married/engaged couples. I was more than happy to do it (even if Roger Uncle hadn’t called my parents 10 times and me 20 times demanding it). Later I would find that this was the only reason Roger Uncle let Bob date me.
Both sets of parents live in the Bay Area. So Roger Uncle and Vicky Aunty (her name was changed too) went to visit my parents. As he walked around the house Roger Uncle said to my father, “This house is worth what 2million dollars?” My Dad just shrugged. Roger Uncle said, “My son will like this house.” They then proceeded to make sure the house would be going to me and not my younger sister.
When Bob got the job at UCLA we were both very happy. He proposed and we decided to have him give me the ring in the temple. It wouldn’t have been the actual engagment ceremony but just us and a few friends. He invited several of his non-Indian friends to the local temple giving them directions a few days in advance. He came to my work to pick me up and as we were heading to the temple his parents called a forbade him (they had known for several days about the plan but waited until the last minute) from putting the ring on my finger. They said he would go to hell if he did. Bob then made some excuse about wanting his parents there. I couldn’t figure out why in the past 4 days of planning, and inviting his friends he didn’t realize that his parents would not be there.
A week later Roger Uncle sent me an email to dump me on behalf of the family. That evening Roger Uncle called me and yelled at me for 2 hours telling me what an awful person I am. The next day Bob called and said he wanted us to stay together. I told him he could walk away right then without any hard feelings because I didn’t expect him to fight his parents. But he put his hand on a statue of Lord Balaji and swore that he loved me and would marry me no matter what his parents did. He said he knew his parents would do this with any girl (I didn’t know at the time that he had been engaged the year before to a Tamil Brahmin girl his parents picked but that when Roger Uncle met her mother they got in a huge fight and the engagement was ended). The next several months were miserable with Roger Uncle calling Bob on a daily basis and yelling at him saying he would be cursed by God for being with me. Roger Uncle would call me every other day to yell at me. Even when I called him on father’s day to wish him a happy father’s day it turned into him screaming at me about how evil I am. He would call my father several times a week to yell at him. Finally Roger Uncle said I could marry Bob only if I promised not to sell my home when I started fellowship in LA. I tried to explain to him that I could not find a tenant to cover my mortgage and that I could not afford rent in LA if I were still paying my mortgage. He told Bob that he was afraid I would sell the home and give the money to my parents so they wouldn’t get any of it. His mother said any girl wanting to marry him should be willing to bring at least $150,000 to the marriage. Roger Uncle was harassing my family and me on a daily basis.
I still had faith in Bob. If not in Bob then in Lord Balaji. Unfortunately a few months later Bob sent me a text message to end our relationship. What I couldn’t understand is why someone who is 29 years old cannot stand up for themselves. He would tell me how his parents have been mentally abusive to him his entire life. He swore he didn’t agree with the comments about money. So why not stand up for what you believe in? If you watch an injustice and do nothing about it you might as well condone it. He and I never fought except for the ring exchange incident.
They claim to be religious, but none of their actions were those of God Fearing people. Just because they sponsor a monthly puja in the temple does not make them religious. I consider myself to be religious, but I try to make a part of my daily life and how I treat people. When I take care of kids in the hospital I see it as a form of puja.
The other day someone told me they saw his Ad on Shaadi.com and as I read it I could hear Roger Uncle’s words. I thought I would share it with people so maybe someone else can be spared what I went through.
** Sorry, personal profile omitted by Kismate **
. The picture grabbed my attention since I could sort of determine from the fuzziness of the picture that the guy was cute. The profile screen name also grabbed my attention because it had a hint of romance. The screen name was Ek Piyar..or one love…. based on the profile, the guy seemed romantic. Since I was intrigued, I tried to rpely back to Ek Piyar’s message. Unfortunately, after several days went by, I didn’t hear anything back. I started the process again. This time I decided to spend some time on Shaadi.com. While perusing the profiles on Shaadi, I came across Ek Piyar’s profile and was amazed. I figured that I should try one more time and see if I could get a hold of Ek Piyar. Guess what, Ek Piyar and I exchanged phone numbers and talked over the phone. Our first conversation over the phone seemed great. Ek Piyar seemed like a smart cookie. Since he had to wake up early the next morning we ended our phone conversation. Several days later, I called Ek Piyar. Unfortunately, he was at the hospital working so we didn’t have a chance to talk. About a month passed by and for some reason, Ek Piyar and I never chatted that is until the Matri Convention. One day, my girlfriend’s mom mentioned the Matri Convention to her. Matri is a Convention geared towards individuals who are looking to find the one. Although I was a little hesitant to go to the Convention since it was a little hesistant to go to the Convention since it was being held in New Jersey, it was going to be pricey and its essentially a “find your hubby or find your wifey conference. I focused on the positives of the Convention. If I attended the conference it would mean at least the physical attraction element would be easier to discover as opposed to on shaadi.com or India Match. Shaadi.com or India Match, a person only is truly able to discover if they are physically attracted to someone after numerous phone conversations and then meeting up the individuals. Matri gathers everyone at one location so this aspect of physical attraction is easier since you get to see everyone in person and get to have live conversations. My girlfriend and I walked into Matri and registered and then sat down at a table. While we were waiting, guess who also showed up at our table…Ek Piyar. It seemed so strange to see him there especially since NJ is a long way from Arizona and California and we had flakey conversations on India Match and shaadi.com and it just seemed like what are the odds that the guy I spoke to would be at a conference in New Jersey. Anyways, after I met Ek Piyar, I definitely liked what I saw in the looks department…. But looks are one thing, as for his personality, I still had to get to know him. The whole point of Matri is to get to know individuals that you don’t already know. So Ek Piyar and I both had brief conversations with one another and then tried to get to know others. After a while, my girlfriend told me that Ek Piyar sat down with her because he was done networking and felt that I was working the room. The next day I felt far worse about Ek Piyar especially since it seemed like he had a harem of women who were interested in him. As the conference was about to end, all Matri attendees were supposed to pick their top choices of who they wanted to spend five minutes with at the conference and talk. Prior to this, Ek Piyar told me that he wasn’t going to pick me because he lost interest…just kidding, he figured that he already had my phone number and he was going to be coming out to LA the following weekend so we would get to know each other then. Apparently, Ek Piyar told me that he was coming to LA to see another girl that weekend and if I was interested, he and I should also meet up. To be quite honest,when Ek Piyar told me this, I was initially really turned off. He seemed like Pimp daddy trying to get to know as many girls as possible. After a while I thought about it and realized that I was a hypocrite. Ek Piyar was blatantly honest with me and told me why he was coming to LA. Nevertheless, in the back of my head it kind of sucks when someone is honest with you when you yourself feel like you’re the bomb and have alot of qualities to offer…more so then alot of indian girls. Ek Piyar came into town one week after the Matri conference. he already made plans with the other LA girl for Friday night….Ek Piyar later told me the LA girl was boring. Ek Piyar did want to spend Saturday night with me, unfortunately I had to work. On Sunday, Ek Piyar agreed to meet up for lunch before he headed out to Arizona 3 hours later. Conversation at lunch seemed to be really flowing, there weren’t any dull moments. I even showed Ek Piyar around the beach from the car. By the time I showed Ek Piyar the beach it was time for him to go. I wanted to spend more time with him. We ended our hangout with both of us on the same page. I decided that Ek Piyar wasn’t a creep for coming to see another girl and incidentally seeing me in LA. We both wanted to spend more time with each other so I planned a road trip to Arizona to see him. 