Wedding Bells

So much for the 'I'm-going-to-post-random-stuff-to-get-into-the-Ramadan-spirit' thing. Um. Excuses. I've been tired. I've been busy. I've been... really really tired. And admittedly, this was not such a great Ramadan for me, so far. It was really a slap in the face to be told we were already in the last 10 days o.o I'm usually much better, but this time I let it slip away :/ Insha'allah I'll get another year.

Anyhow, another reason why I didn't post was because I was waiting for a certain event, and... erm, it took some time. About a week or two after my last post, my cousins' babies were due. One was on time, the other was a whole week late. Then, because I had photos for the first, I wanted to have photos for the second, but alas, it hasn't happened. But whatever. Let me introduce to you...

Little Miss Japan: Sara

 Très adorable, non? And a week later (although he was due a day earlier), Little Mr Dubai was born. I have no pictures, nor have I a name, but I'm superdy excited all the same. I love it when our already huge family grows x) I love being an aunt a million times over.

I wonder if you remember this one? From ayyyges ago?

Anyhow, this isn't about my incredibly awesome perpetually expanding family. This is, as you may have guessed by the title, about marriage. And it may seem ... not that important, during this month, but I believe there's a hadith somewhere that says marriage is half your deen? In which case, this ia very relevant ^_^

I decided to do this post 'cause I had an Interesting Conversation with Linchy yesterday, and it also brought back to mind many things I've made Mental Notes about, to mention, but never got around to doing. Well, here it is.

So basically, 95% of my family has been hitched by semi-arranged marriage.

... okay, first, lemme make the distinctions here. Arranged marriage is when your family/parents pick who you're marrying, you don't get a say, it's just a done deal.

Semi-arranged is when your family/parents present you with potential spouse after potential spouse, but ultimately, you make the decision from who they present.

And, erm, love marriage, well, I guess that speaks for itself ^_^

Also, I don't think I'm going to be saying anything controversial, but JUST IN CASE, these opinions are MY OWN. I am not seeking to shove this down anyone's throat, kapisce?

Anyway. from what I know (and I rarely get to be overseas when there is a wedding in my family), we have one 'love' marriage in my family. A cousin of mine was the pretty girl walking home from school, her hubby-to-be was the handsome guy playing cricket along the road, they saw each other, sparks flew, and they approached the parents for a marriage, by way of doing it 'right'. 

It was not met well, initially, with her parents. But my dad (having been dubbed 'the cool uncle') stepped in and acted as her wali, they got hitched, and eventually her dad realised that his son-in-law wasn't such a bad guy. It's just the notion of a love marriage had all the wrong connotations.

But anyway, the rest of my family, from what I know, had semi-arranged marriages. You know, when people hear that phrase - any kind of 'arranged marriage' - the usual reaction is shockhorrordisgust. No really, today I heard snippets of a conversation where this guy pronounced his utmost digust for arranged marriages: 'I hate arranged marriages. They're [bad word] disgusting.'

Okay, so this is kind of understandable, and I agree when it comes specifically to arranged arranged marriages. No one should be forced to marry someone, everyone has the right to make their own decision, and I mean, it's haraam anyway, under Islam (so when you hear those horror stories about crazy Muslim families forcing their girls into marriages with people they don't know or didn't agree to - IT'S NOT ISLAM. OKAY?!).

But when arranged marriage is spoken about here, it usually encompasses semi-arranged too, and I'm here to defend that.

Let me go back to my extended family, in Sri Lanka. They live mostly in underdeveloped areas. The way they grew up, boys and girls do not mingle. Even if they go to co-ed schools, girls hang with girls, boys hang with boys, they barely socialise between them, unless they're related. Otherwise, they're just awkward.

It's partially a society thing, but also, for many - especially the 'villagers' of my dad's side - they're all just naturally shy. Girls especially, and boys sometimes when they have to interact with girls,  are just timid by nature. 

These are just the school days. Perhaps, if they got to uni, they'd 'mature' in such a way that they'd socialise more. But, the education system is really strict. If you're not a part of the 'cream of the crop' in the first round, well, that's it. You're out. And a lot of people don't make it to the uni stage. So there's very few places for you to actually meet someone and get to know each other inadvertently, on 'halal' grounds. 

In these circumstances, it is incredibly difficult to find your One True Love. Especially if you're of the Very Bashful, like most of my cousins. While some of them made it to further education, the majority, particularly the 'villagers' of my dad's side, didn't. The rest of their life is just building a family. But how's one supposed to do that if they can't find a person to start with?

Hence that 'brokering' business, where the families put their feelers out and look for who's available. They look at the photos, they ask around, and if someone seems okay, a meeting is organised. The eligible bachelors/bachelorettes converse in supervised conditions, and if they like, another meeting or two may be organised, and then, TRALALALA, THE WEDDING BELLS RING.

And it works for them. Trust me. Take my favourite cousin (mother of Little Mr Dubai). The whole meet and greet thing took place before we were there, but we were there for the nikaah (contract signing ceremony thing - on Western terms, it's sort of like a pre-nup engagement party). If you think it's awkward and weird and you don't understand how you can possibly just fall in love with a stranger, let me tell you that 

- well, doesn't that happen a lot anyway? You meet someone you didn't know before, and love blossoms after you get to know them. This is just a different, more controlled environment -

I've seen it with my own eyes. Oh my God, it was sort of sickening to watch her get lost in that lovey dovey delirium. Her man had to go to Dubai soon after, and they Skyped every night, and every day she just kept floating about waiting for every night, and I will not lie IwasojealousshehadallherattentiononhimwhereasIonlygettoseehereveryfewyearsIwantedhertodoteonME.
She had a special ring tone for him, and she made a Brangelina variation of their name, and it was just ewwwwww. 

But the point is, it worked for her. And for all the others. Like seriously. That's just how it is for them. I know my cousins, and I know that left to their own devices, they will flounder and end up forever alone. That's just the way it is there.

So when people diss semi-arranged marriages (usually under arranged), it really irks me because I personally know a whole bunch of happily-ever-afters that have resulted from them. Not just that, but who are they to just assume something like that is absolutely awful when they haven't experienced it?

At the same time, I was not brought up the way they were. I was born and raised here, in Oz. As it happens, I did go to co-ed schools, and although I've stuck to abstinence from dating and everything that can ensue from that, I have grown up socialising with guys (still awkwardly, though not that dramatically ^_^ ), and the thought of marrying someone I don't know, even if I've had meetings beforehand, just seems... crazy. Beyond comprehension o.o I mean, I've already said I doubt I can find myself a guy, but I've also thought about what would happen if by chance, I did find someone. would my parents be okay with that?

I mean, I know my dad played guardian for my cousin's love marriage, but I feel like he has a general soft spot for all the things from his village. If it was me and being here - I get the vibe that he'd find it dangerously Western and haraam.

Okay, my parents have an underlying, ingrained racism in them. My dad less than my mother, but it's a thing against Africans, and the way, for a while, the media used to portray them as thugs and stuff. My sister and I, having gone to a seriously multicultural school, were really defensive about this, so in some rather extreme ways of defiance, as a youngster, I used to say that I wouldn't mind marrying an African. Once, my dad actually took me up on this seriously. He said he wouldn't allow it, because an interracial marriage means me and the guy would have had to meet outside of parental supervision, so therefore, something haraam MUST have happened.

NO. This is absolute rubbish, just in case you didn't get that.

It's a traditional view amongst lots of ethnics - not all, but a lot - that 'love' marriages, like arranged to the Westerners, have all the negative connotations, of 'loose' children who do the hanky-panky outside of wedlock.

And so, I'd like to defend 'love marriages' here too. It's entirely possible for you to meet someone of the opposite gender, and do things 'right' - like my cousin - and just marry them before anything goes wrong. Why the heck not? Just becase you end up liking someone, it does not mean your physical bod goes out of control and does inappropriate things immediately. And by preventing two people who are in love from doing things the right way, you're only paving the way for haraam. Just sayin'.

But I feel like you guys already know that, so I don't have much to say on it.

And I know this is long, but I'm going to answer the other question from the Anon about Why I Wouldn't Mind Getting Married Young:

1. I donno, there just seems to be something awkward about getting married old. Personally. To me. It just feels like something better done young.
2. I like the idea of working your life out together with someone, rather than establishing a very independant lifestyle and then having to readjust it to make it work with someone else. I like the idea of finding someone to share the same vision of what you want in the future from the early stages, and then making it happen together. "Love does not consist in gazing at each other, but in looking outward together in the same direction." (Antoine de Saint-Exupery)
3. I want to be a young mother. Kids are energetic. I would also like to be at a certain peak in my own energy when raising them. Also, the younger you have them, the smaller the age gap is between you, and the better chance you have of relating to them as they grow up. And you can hopefully end up being a young grandmother, and you may even get to be a great-grandmother...! ^_^
4. You know how people like to travel the world and do lots of crazy 'independant' stuff before they get 'tied down' to marriage? I worry that if I travel the world and all the jazz before marriage, my heart will never be content staying put again. I don't want to be constantly plagued with wanderlust when I attempt to raise a family. So going back to the young mother thing, I would rather get married, have the kids, have them grow up to be adults, the whole shebang, and then still be young enough to take on the world with my man, and I won't have any official reason to have to stay put. Also: I hate it when people think of marriage as that 'tied down' thing, like it's some kind of imprisonment. Honestly, if that's how you view marriage, if you really do follow through with it, I pity the person you end up with.
5. Like I said before, I've kept away from dating and all that for all my school life. I will not lie, while I'm not very crush-crazy, it is still a bit hard watching everyone else get swept away by their whirlwind romances... psh, yeah right. I'm actually happy to be away from all the angst -_-' But, a lot of us abstain for so long, and some may feel that way, so why should they have to prolong their loveless life? Why shouldn't they take the first shot at a romance, the halal way, as soon as possible?
6. Finally, if the right person presents himself/herself, why shouldn't we get married straight away? Why should we have to wait, unnecessarily so? WHAT IS THE POINT?!

That's it.

Okay, I can actually talk more on this topic, on a lot of other angles, but I think this is long enough, and I'm tired. Hope your lives are happy, and if you want to share how marriage works in your religion/culture, feel free to share :)

Peace in,
Laila

Where I respond to an Anon

C'est ma vacance. Or the NIPS: Non-Instructional Period of Study.

I felt like I ought to write something while I can, but I didn't know what, exactly. It's the halfway point of the year. I was thinking of maybe summing up the highlights/happenings of the year so far:

1. Well, there was the formal.

2. Before that, I got my senior jumper, you know, the one where you put on a nickname? I really really wanted to have my surname on it, like a soccer player or something, but then, that's what my sister did when she was in year 12, and she kept alternating between: 'D'aw, look at you, trying to be like me' and 'Don't copy me, stupid'. Both of them hurt my ego. Why do we have to have the same surname? WHY? (That was rhetorical.) So yeah, I ended up with 'Nemo', which is what my little sister used to call me when she was still learning to talk. Hm.

3. My grades. My grades. I've had 100%s all year in English and Legal. In History, I've had A+s, one a perfect score, one off by one mark. In French.... hahaha. Haha. French. Well, I haven't failed it. It's been a mix of Bs and As. Haha. French.

4. Oh, two weeks ago, I went with three of my friends to Melbourne's Amnesty International/Welcome to Australia 'Walk Together' event, in support of refugees and asylum seekers. It was fun. I felt proactive. Some guy came up and said he was a journalist and asked for a photo. We were all like, yokay, sure thing dude. We did not ask what paper, we did not ask for a name. Only later it occurred to us that he could have been a creeper. I like to think not. Eh. C'est la vie.

5. On Saturday, I went to Monkey Pina's house. We made pizzas, like, with the outside oven and everything. 'Twas fun. And for some bizarre reason, she had this Gossip Girl card game-y thing, so we decided to play it. Um. Lesson of the Day: We're not Gossip Girls. Well, it was funny, anyhow x)

6. Huh, did I mention I turned 18? In May, of course. Fun, fun, fun.

7. My sister and I are not completely made up yet, but we're sort've talking. I gave her one of my Ferrero Rochers. 

8. MY COUSINS' BABIES ARE DUE THIS MONTH. SQUEE.

Okay, now I'm going to get to the part where I respond to l'Anon's request....

"...can you make a post about your aims for year 12 in terms of your atar, blah blah, and also about the top 5 things you want to do in the future, accompanied by the top 5 uni courses and uni as well?"

Ohwait, hold up guys. I'm going to do something uber creepy and maybe disturbing, but um, bear with me.

OhmyGod. OhmyGod. I just did the most awkward thing. OhmyGod.

I just... I just...

OhmyGod.

I... just watched a video on birth. I mean, not on birth, but of birth. A woman giving birth. OhmyGod.

*inhales, exhales*

Okay, to answer one of your questions, dear Anon, the uni course I planned to take was Midwifery. I wanted to do it at Monash. But, despite my many fluffy reasons behind why I want to be a midwife, recently it occurred to me that - well, to put it frankly - birth is not a fluffy thing. It can be bloody, from what I've heard, excruciating, and, well, pretty darn ugly. And I thought to myself, can I handle this?

In order to figure out how I would know, I asked a family friend who's taking the course. She told me the key to this answer is in Youtube. 'Type in birth videos'. I'd been meaning to do it, but I either forgot, or procrastinated, because, really, giving birth - actual birth, not a movie thing - seems like such a personal thing. Furby told me that if they're putting it on Youtube, clearly they don't mind people seeing. But honestly, it just feels invasive. And, of course, I was scared. I was scared that I couldn't handle it, and where would that leave me? I have, really, no other career path in mind, besides writing, but that's not something I can depend on, and I don't even know if I want to make it a career.

But I just did it, people. Right now. I watched a video. Just the one, for now, but apparently I have to watch multiple ones. However, the fact of the matter is, I watched it, and I didn't puke. So there. Midwifery (at Monash, hopefully) is still on. If not Monash, then Deakin. If not there, well, I donno.

Okay, so let me back track. Aims of year 12. My ATAR. For those of you who don't know, it's the Big Final Score, or, technically, ranking. I may or may not have mentioned it before, but generally speaking, 80+ is pretty darn excellent, 60 to 70 is a bit average, and below that... well, on the Asian scale, it's pretty bad. Though, I guess, on the Asian scale, anything below 80 is bad.

My aim? I want a 90+.  The highest possible score you can ever get is 99.95, which is obviously what my mother expects of me (NOT. She expects 99.99. She doesn't believe me when I say that rank does not exist), but I don't think so. But a 90+ in general? Yes please.  If you want me to get specific in terms of scores for my individual grades, well. I finished Methods last year and got a 30 (scales up to 36). I finished Literature last year and got a 41 (scales up to 42). For English and Legal, I'm aiming for above 40 as well, as high as possible. For History, I'm not entirely sure, but I can settle for 35+. For French, I really want a 30+ as well, but I donno. I can't quite grasp how good I am at it, and what my competition is like. So yeah :/

My other goals for year 12 include: make friends. Okay, not like that. More like, ensure that the friendships I have are strong enough to survive post-high school. I love my friends dearly, and I'm also co-dependant, and I donno how I'm going to survive the real world, and I NEED THESE PEOPLE. AND I LOVE THEM AND CAN'T SEE MY LIFE AHEAD WITHOUT THEM. Also, this may sound odd, but I'd like to 'take back' my Muslim friends. Sad fact (for me): I don't have any close Muslim school friends. Mainly because my original class in high school had no Muslims, and the ones from primary school kind of slipped away. But as much as I love my non-Muslim friends, there are things about me that they just wouldn't understand, and I have a feeling the differences are going to become more apparent when we're out of high school. It's not that I think they'll stop being my friends, but I feel like I need people that I can relate to more, who'll understand aspects of my life more. So I'm working on getting my old Muslim friends back. It's not hard, 'cause we're all still on good terms. Just not... close terms. Hm.

Finally, I want to do something Big as an Art Vice-Captain for the school. I was given a responsibility, I want to make sure it's fulfilled in the best way possible. I don't want to be the one that leaves everyone with the complaint of 'they never do anything, those captains'. I'm not sure exactly what I'm going to do yet, but I'm working on it.

So that's high school :)

Okay, onwards, life goals and blah blah. Erm. Well, truthfully, I don't really have any specific goals for the future. I'm afraid of expectations. I hate it when you plan something or want something and expect it to happen and then it doesn't... it's just.... slap. Ouch. Burn.

I don't have a 'top five uni courses' list, for that matter, either. As I mentioned, I only have Midwifery, because it's the only career path I want. If it was just to study for the fun of it, I'd probably go down the artsy path, Literature maybe, or Criminology. But it's not career stuff, you know? Just learning for the sake of learning. 

For life in general... well. Ehm. There are sort-of plans I like to entertain in my mind, but nothing really solid, you know? Some depend on chance, others depend on the money I have. Like, I always thought that as soon as I finished high school, I could go back to Sri Lanka and spend time there. Heck, maybe even to Dubai, and stay with my cousin for a while. I also wanted to go to the FIFA World Cup next year, in Brazil, but I mean, pshhh. Yeah right. Those dreams were in the time when the Financial Crisis was still open to the possibility of getting our money back in the immediate future. That's no longer the case. So I don't think travelling is in the immediate future...

... although... *blushes* I also liked the idea of getting married soonish too, and I have my reasons for this that I don't feel like explaining now but if you really want to know I might find it in me to explain that in another post ANYWAY, the point is, in theory, I could get married soon, and *blushes* for the honeymoon, I'd love to go on Hajj. Ohwow. What a dream. But, erm, I haven't the slightest idea how I'm supposed to get myself a guy, and as much as I understand semi-arranged marriages, I don't think it'll work for me. I feel like I was brought up too differently to be able to adjust to that, but again, I'm too awkward (and not very attractive) to land myself a guy, so marriage in the immediate future? Not likely.

AND I WANT TO GO ON A ROAD TRIP. How much fun would that be? Just me and my friends, in a jeep, backpacking around Australia, sleeping under the stars or in tents or in caravan parks, living simply, minimum money and technology, maximum adventure. Donno if that would ever happen, but gosh, it would be awesome, would it not?

Okay, lemme just get down to it and be realistic. Um, these are not grand goals or anything, but here is the List of 5 Plausible Things I'm Going to Try and Do When School is Over:

1. Start a book club. With my friends. Wouldn't that be fun? But everyone's all like we'reinVCEnotimetodoit now. But afterwards: no excuses.

2. Get a proper, steady job as a tutor. Not the sort of casual thing I'm doing now. Make money to make some of the dreamy stuff come true, or at least, ease the burden of the Financial Crisis.

3. Work on my stories. The novel ones. Not because I want it published or anything, just because I want to.

4. Oh, volunteer/join the St John's Ambulance thing? I forgot what it's called, exactly, but I want to get trained in all that emergency first aid stuff.

5. Attend more Islamic classes. I attend one, now, but I think I need more.  

Hey, bonus one: 6. Learn how to make fancy pretty cakes, like my sister. I love cake ♥

Okay. That's it. Questions answered. For the record, Anon, you didn't word anything badly, nor are you really creepy, I'm just paranoid. It feels weird to have someone who's been there from the start that I haven't known about o.O 

Anyhow, also, you guys, if you have any other suggestions as to what I should write about, feel free to say so. I can't say for sure I'll answer immediately in the future, but I'll keep it in mind ^_^ Cheers. 

Peace in,
Laila