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Meat Market

My site stats often lead to interesting reads around the web and even occasional inspiration for a post. Here is something I ran into recently : Desi Dating a Meat Market in which the author writes of her challenges in finding a desi man to date (maybe marry ?)

With each guy I talked to, I felt that there was always another woman there that they would rather be taking to and spending time with. It's that whole mentality that there's always something better out there. It was hard getting a guys attention and getting them to remember me without being too aggressive.

She is describing a scene at a Netip conference but it could very well be any other place where a bunch of single desis have congregated socially. The boys have come to expect nothing short of "super-model gorgeous" when it comes to a girls they will date. Whether these liaisons will lead to marriage is a whole different question - often a question they have little interest in to begin. I suspect quite often dating does not lead to matrimony - which would explain the large number of very attractive women in the dating pool and equally generous number of regular looking women who are married.

The prospects of a desi girl who is reasonably attractive but not in the league of stunningly beautiful have the worst of all worlds when they decide they can (or must) find someone to marry by way of dating. If the desi guy is halfway presentable, can string a couple of coherent sentences together and manage to hold a decent job he won't "give her the time of day" because he has many better looking women to choose from. There are no "super-model gorgeous" desi males in the desi dating pool so the girls just can't afford to be super selective.

So the "good looking" or "fairly attractive" desi girls will not having desi boys beating a path to her doorstep to take her out on a date. Arranged marriage is a definitely an option to consider and if not, she might want to wait for an act of God to connect her to the man she was meant to spend the rest of her life with. An abiding faith in fairytales and romanctic chick-flicks goes a long way in making the wait bearable.

Now, if these gorgeous desi women are looking to get hitched, chances are that they will be disappointed too. Thanks to their looks, they will continue to be very popular and eagerly sought out in the dating pool but be considered largely unsuitable for matrimony. While they may not lack for dates, the wedding mandap may be some ways away.

There is I believe a happy medium - a desi woman who is not too abrasive but just a little pushy so she is able to wrest a desi man's attention from everyone else who is competing for it, hot enough to date but not too hot to marry and bring home to Mommy, independent enough to not turn into a clingy appendage of her husband but not his equal or better, talented enough to show off to his family and friends but not so talented that it wins her praise and accolades from the world outside. It is a delicately balanced concoction of attributes that gives a desi woman the winning edge in the meat market.

I wish I had words of wisdom for this sister but I sadly do not.


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