“Beti, Are You Married?”

I was trying to find chane ki daal, split-chickpeas, in the second aisle of my neighbourhood Indian-Pakistani grocery store when a woman with a basket full of frozen shami-kebabs approached me.

 “Beti, do you know where I can find the paneer?” she said.

“Sure aunty, let me get it for you,” I replied.

After asking me about what I put in my hair to keep it healthy and where my parents are from, she got right to the point and asked me the question I knew was coming: “Are you married?” This is a question every South-Asian woman in her mid-twenties is asked; whether she is at a family gathering, waiting to get on a subway, or at the grocery store, there is always someone present and ready to inquire about her relationship status. A kind of cultural outreach program, the sole goal is ensuring that all single women find a “suitable” match, which is often defined by strangers who know little to nothing about the women they are trying to get married.

I have recently leaned in to these inquiries; I engage in conversations with the people who approach me and ask them why they think I would be a good match for *insert name of man*. I have moved past the anger and exhaustion of being in constant, unwanted, and unsolicited Live Tinder situations. In the West, most people would never approach someone they don’t know and pry into their personal life; they would never set loved ones up on dates with complete strangers. But that’s the thing about culturally specific traditions and the people who follow them; they are guided by a need to belong to a community, to be part of something that extends further than their microcosm. Similarly, I sometimes agree to go along with this matchmaking because it allows me to stay in touch with a community and culture that was largely left behind when I moved to Canada.

When I was twelve and visiting Pakistan, Nani, my grandmother, organized a wedding for one of my dolls. The colour-scheme for the gudiya ki shaadi was red, and my mom made my sister and me maroon lehengas with green flowers on them. My aunt stitched a gharara, shirt, and dupatta for my doll, and a sherwani for the groom, who we had purchased from a toy store the night before. This wasn’t a rare occasion; my cousins who lived in Karachi had similar celebrations for their Barbies a few years before. We decorated the entrance of my grandparents’ house with flowers and lights, and my uncle bought special handmade straw trays to fill with presents for the “bride” and mittai for the rest of us. We had a mehendi ceremony where we performed dances we had rehearsed a few days before the big event. Biryani was served from a large steel pot at the reception, and I got to bring both the bride and the groom back with me to Toronto. This was what I initially thought marriage was all about, a big party, after which everything would be the same as it was before. Until my aunt hugged me at the airport and told me she was excited to dance at my wedding one day and watch me leave with the groom in a car covered in red roses. She said she would read the prayer for protection as we drove away, and I asked her what I would need protection from.

Whether you are from a South-Asian community or not, you hear whispers of marriages that end badly, of women who stay in abusive relationships for the sake of the children, of a divorce rate that is always rising. I grew up in a predominantly Pakistani neighbourhood in Mississauga where women often came over to our house to ask my mom for advice. My mom had adapted to life in Canada well, she had a stable job, and she wasn’t afraid to step in as a surrogate family member for women who had left most of their family behind when they immigrated. They would ring our doorbell at all hours of the day asking her for a recipe, a way to make money from home, or advice on how to help their son quit smoking. Some of their questions were easy to answer, but there were hard ones as well: My husband is cheating on me and won’t give me a divorce, what should I do? For the hard questions, she asked me to Google resources and passed along contact information for professionals. I used to sit at the top of the stairs and listen to my mom’s conversations with these women; I watched her shoulders rise in anxiety for hours after they left.

It’s important to recognize that I approach the rishta tradition from a place of privilege. I’m financially independent, my immediate family supports my decisions, and I feel safe enough that I can be honest with the men I’m introduced to. My judgement of, or unwillingness to embrace the rishta culture is a luxury, which is why my analysis of it is also a close look at my own biases. There are a lot of thoughtful, well-balanced individuals who want to be set up on dates and meet their future husband or wife by following these practices. They appreciate the family and community support, but that doesn’t mean they are more or less evolved, more or less Canadian or Pakistani than I am.

There is a constant internal conflict between the part of me that wants to follow traditions and the part that just wants to be left alone in my private bubble.

The ideology of this culture stems from a deeply rooted fear of what would happen if women didn’t get married, of how the community-based lifestyle in South-Asian culture would disintegrate if women “end up alone.” Personally, I don’t think the intent behind this matchmaking is necessarily malicious; it ultimately comes from a place of genuinely wanting to help these young, or not so young, women “sort out” their lives, but it exerts undue pressure on them instead. It assumes that even in a world where gender roles are slowly becoming extinct, as they should, humans are meant to exist as couples, that their survival depends on it. Women who are the head of a household—mothers, grandmothers, and older sisters—usually have the sole responsibility of finding rishtas. While both men and women are expected to get married, the priority is to find a match for the women first because they have the additional responsibility of reproducing. In many ways, trying to get a man married is a celebration of all the other goals he has already achieved such as finishing his education and getting a good job. Though things have gradually changed, and women are now also encouraged to achieve those same goals, their “success” in life is still dependent on their marital status.

There are coming of age stories we read about in classic literature, like Catcher in the Rye, To Kill a Mockingbird, and Lord of the Flies, but this is a coming of age story that hasn’t been documented nearly enough. Much like the classics, there is a great internal and external battle that takes place, and the stakes are just as high. My conversation with a seemingly harmless stranger in the grocery store started with me trying to help her; it led to her calling me once every day for two weeks in an attempt to set me up with her son. All she knew about me is that I’m polite to strangers, that I apply coconut oil in my hair every other night, and that my parents are from Karachi. By engaging in conversation with her and answering her questions about my relationship status, I was contradicting my deeper feelings about this practice. Why did I keep talking to her? Why did I give her my number if I didn’t want to meet her son? There is a constant internal conflict between the part of me that wants to follow traditions and the part that just wants to be left alone in my private bubble.

As an immigrant who came to Canada when I was three, I am constantly trying to reconcile the cultural differences between the East and the West. One of my greatest fears, in a world that is currently spilling over with things to fear, is losing that connection to my roots. On a day-to-day basis, I cook Pakistani meals for my family, I wear one of my mom’s many shawls when I leave the house, and I repeat my name over and over again until people pronounce it correctly. I make a conscious effort to remind myself, and everyone around me, that I represent a hyphenated identity. As a result, I have always felt more connected to the community-based, family-oriented lifestyle in Pakistan than the one focused on individuality in Canada. The struggle is trying to pick and choose the parts of culture, whether it’s Canadian or Pakistani, I can live with. It’s trying to work past the hegemonic view that “modern” ways of life in the West are the right ones, while also being critical of entrenched patriarchal ideas in the East.

I had my first encounter with these matchmaking practices two years ago. The day after my mom was diagnosed with cancer, family friends, neighbours we had never spoken to, and relatives we only met once a year at Eid all called my mom to stress the importance of getting my sister and me married before her condition got worse. Without an in-depth understanding of the emotional and physical repercussions of her diagnosis, the knee-jerk community reaction was to help in the only way they knew how. In their minds, marriage was the only way we would get stability in our lives. Some of them even told us it would “make us so busy we would forget our loss.” Losing our mom, and taking care of her while she was sick, was trauma that would take us off the “normal” course of life; they just wanted to make it easier for us to maintain some normalcy.

... but ultimately it came down to one key conclusion: regardless of all of this, we should get married when we want, if we want, to whomever we want.

My mom sat down with my sister and me when the calls started coming in to explain why people were reacting this way. She started with a detailed explanation of marriage as the nucleus of societies across the world, then a short history of the importance of marriage in Pakistan, but ultimately it came down to one key conclusion: regardless of all of this, we should get married when we want, if we want, to whomever we want. She wanted us to stay in touch with the cultural practices that made sense to us as women who grew up in Canada, but who were born in Karachi. As someone who helped a lot of friends and family members get through challenges in their relationships, she wanted us to be prepared for this life-altering decision. My mom’s marriage was arranged, but not forced. There’s a clear distinction between the two; however, it was always assumed she would get married. Though she never regretted her decision, she wanted us to have a choice; she wanted us to escape the long list of complications that arise during this process.

I had just put chicken on the stove to make karhai gosht for my family when the doorbell rang. My hands smelled like yogurt and lemon, I was wearing my dad’s old jeans, and my hair was in a tight bun on top of my head, which is my regular cooking uniform. My dad’s cousin and her husband greeted me with hugs and a Tupperware container full of her famous eggplant bhujia. It had only been a couple of weeks since I came back from Pakistan where we had buried my mom. Family and friends were visiting almost every day to offer condolences. After making small talk for a few minutes, Aunty K pulled out her phone and read from a list containing names of men and their occupations, all potential suitors for me. She said she had spent months compiling this list and convincing these families that I am the daughter-in-law they are looking for.

Hardware engineer: saw you at wedding last year but wants wife who wears a hijab.

Doctor: wants to have 5 children.

IT expert: loves nihari.

Accountant: looking for a “fit wife,” would be interesting in meeting you and your sister to decide who would be a better match.

As she read from her list, I made a list of my own:

1) Peek through window before opening door.

2) Don’t tell people I enjoy cooking.

3) Don’t tell people I love children.

4) Don’t go to weddings.

5) Don’t leave the house unless I have to.

I sat with her for almost two hours listening to her pitch these men, followed by another hour being lectured on the importance of getting my dad married. “You will all move on in your lives and he will be alone. What kind of children strand their aging father?” My karhai gosht was overcooked, and I had to meet at least two of the men on her list of 19 to appease her for a little while, and so that I could at least say I tried. One of them collected bobby pins as a hobby, the other repeatedly sent me articles on “How To Lose Weight Quickly.” I met these men partly so that I would have an excuse for why I never want to experience one of those exhausting pitch sessions again, and partly out of curiosity. If so many people are willingly participating in this tradition, and so many others are committed to keeping it alive, there might be more to it than I thought.

Was I wrong about this whole matchmaking process? Could I meet a really great guy and suddenly be open to the idea of marriage? The reality is that a lot of people have arranged marriages in the Pakistani community here in Canada, and a lot of those people are quite happy in their marriages. How these young women cope with the scrutiny and have the patience to go through one painful date after another is still a mystery to me. I don’t see the appeal of dating even outside this matchmaking culture, but within it the pressures are a lot higher. There is no such thing as a casual meeting; every encounter involves a string of communication between both respective families.

On one hand, there is an overwhelming feeling of inadequacy; your shortcomings are shared in detail with this stranger and his family even before you meet them. Your behaviour is analyzed, and the data is kept on file, so if things don’t work out with this guy, the information can be circulated. On the other hand, it gives people a chance to connect with someone they would never approach on their own or wouldn’t otherwise have encountered. These days, the emphasis is no longer on arranged marriage among immigrants in Canada; the main goal is that people get married.

Regardless of the outcome, it is flattering that anyone would think I’m a good match for their son/nephew/grandson/brother etc. I hardly ever brush my hair, I sleep a maximum of 4 hours every night, I almost always wear clothes I find in my dad’s closet, and I get emotionally invested in the problems of anyone I have a conversation with for longer than ten minutes. It is comforting to know that though I haven’t met a man who wants to be in a long-term relationship with me, aunties think I’m definitely worth the commitment.

My first ever crush was this guy in my grade eight homeroom. I told him I liked him right after our swimming lesson at the community centre next to our school. I wore a pink cotton blouse with paisleys on it and a French braid in my hair. He laughed for a few minutes and then told me I look like an elephant. There were several other similar experiences after that before I came to terms with the fact that I’m just not good at choosing men. In theory, being set up with someone should have been a better option for me, but it came with trauma of its own.

I didn’t know when I put on my cousin's white kurta. When was the last time I brushed my teeth? Outside the room, there were family members waiting for me to come out so that we could bathe Ami's body and do all the pre-burial rituals. As her eldest daughter, I was responsible for taking the lead. There was a heaviness in my limbs. I felt like I couldn’t carry my weight, how would I be able to carry hers? When it was all over, I could only remember the smell of the orange detergent we had used. The smell clung to my skin even after I showered twice. As they carried my mom away in a steel coffin, a woman pulled me aside to tell me about her son who also lives in Mississauga.

For me, the problem is about more than a few uncomfortable encounters with men my grandmother brings over to my house. It is larger than serving tea to complete strangers and answering questions about past relationships, my opinions on religion, and why I don't like to wear makeup. The problem is that though I sometimes surrender to this part of my culture out of respect for where I come from, I associate this chapter in my life with anxiety and a powerful feeling of loss for the contentment I felt before I was exposed to its invasive nature.

Once every few months, I wear my mother’s gharara and heavy dupatta, and finish writing a short story in our drawing room.

I turned 26 a few weeks ago, and though birthdays are supposed to be celebrations, for many people in my life this is cause for concern. My mom was pregnant with my older brother at this age and my grandmother had several children. When I pull out my mom’s wedding dress from the suitcase in the basement where she left it for me, or go to the bank locker and tie her intricately designed gold necklace around my neck, I feel guilty for not getting married when she was alive. I feel guilty for never being able to fulfill the dream that every mother has for her daughter. I allow the idealist hidden somewhere inside me to imagine meeting a guy with a great sense of humour who loves poetry, Pakistani music, and TV shows about female detectives. This feeling passes quickly though. Once every few months, I wear my mother’s gharara and heavy dupatta, and finish writing a short story in our drawing room. For now, this is the only kind of party I’m hosting in this outfit.

In a few years, aunties will stop approaching me; my extended family and friends will come to the conclusion that I am a lost cause. Everyone will give up and I can go back to watching the Cary Grant, Raj Kapoor, and Humphrey Bogart movies I grew up watching with my mom. The men in this world speak in witty, well-crafted lines, they dress in well-tailored suits, they spontaneously break out in dance, and, most importantly, they write letters. When I want a break from these movies, I can engage in a casual relationship, the kind where introverts look at each other’s Instagram stories for a few months, and then quietly move on. When someone asks me why I’m single and accuses me of failing my culture in this significant way, I will refer them to this essay.