CHAPTER 2 - The Virgin
There are several more differences and one of the biggest one the related to sexual experience. I was 30 years old, working full time in London and I was one hundred percent virgin!! Yes, it must sound shocking but that is totally true. I did kiss and make out a few times, but I never had sex with anyone. Compare that to my British colleague, who confided with me that his first sexual encounter was when he was 15 years and now, he is 25 years old and doesn’t remember the number of girls he has been with! I wanted to worship him!!
I’m not saying that every teenager/youngster is a virgin back home, especially now when times are changing. But when I was in high school and college, sex was strictly off-limits. Added to that, my introvert nature didn’t help much. Also, there are loads of guys, my cousins, friends, who had their first sexual experience after getting married, which was around the 28 year mark. So right from hitting puberty until getting married, it was a long, long wait.
Hollywood wasn’t the right companion either. There was soo much sex shown in movies, it only made us more desperate and hungry for companionship! Movies like Basic Instinct, Showgirls, Sliver made things worse!! So, the only relief was self-pleasure!! My right-hand was my soul mate!!
When I moved to Britain, it was a shock for me to see people making out in the open. This is not a peck on the cheek or lips, but some serious lip-tongue-action. This one time, I was waiting at a bus stop in London and there was a coffee shop in front of me with a huge glass window. And behind it was a couple making out seriously, they were kissing passionately, tongues and all for about 15 minutes. Then when I was waiting in a queue to submit an application in my University, there was this young couple who were kissing and fondling and the guy kept putting his hands inside the girl’s trouser!! You will never ever see such kind of things in public in India. Even though we break the population record of the world, we still prefer to keep this behind closed doors.
My sad, lonely, sex-less life did have its moments though. My first kiss was with a neighbour girl when I was about fifteen, then it was with my Indian girlfriend when I was doing Masters in the UK and I was 24 years old. But yes, even having a girlfriend for about a year, I still was a virgin until the windfall which happened when I was 30 years.
If they made a movie on me, the apt title would be “The 30 year old virgin!!” When I think about it, it is really sad and I made a promise to myself that I will make it up now for all those years of abstinence! At the time of writing this, I am 33years old, almost 3 years after winning the lottery and it has been a whale of time!! Actually, we are skipping ahead, I will definitely come back to this later.
Sex is considered taboo in India. It is never spoken outwardly, people keep this within their bedroom doors. I know that some outgoing girls do talk about this when they get together and we boys lust about sex which is the constant topic of debate throughout our teenage and college years, but once we get girlfriends/wives, we do not talk about it anymore. It feels weird to mention how we had sex the night before and then introduce our partners to the same group of friends.
Fun fact, there are guys in India who do not know tight foreskin is an issue until they get married, try with their wives and get rushed to the emergency room -))))) Funny but sad, one of the basic necessities of mankind after air, water, food and sleep, is kept under the lids for about 30 years! Now you can understand our population explosion!! I know soo many of my friend’s wives who got pregnant within 3 months of getting married and they all were accidental pregnancies. After 30 years of abstinence, you get a legal go ahead with a girl, in a beautifully decorated bedroom with snacks and perfumed flowers, you are eventually going to run out of condoms!!
True story, this is the custom. You have heard about arranged marriages right. Parents fix this up and you go and marry the girl right away, without knowing much about her. And you know what, couples usually make it work. The divorce rate in India is relatively low compared to the rest of the world, plus when kids come into picture, people brave it even if it is a troubled marriage as they do not want their kids to grow up without both parents being together. I know that arranged marriage system is still widely prevalent, especially with the lower classes in India, but it is slightly different with the upper and educated classes. For the rich, it is totally different, I think they don’t even live in same planet as the rest of us. (I shouldn’t make fun of the rich, especially after the windfall!)
So for the educated / upper classes, we still have arranged marriages but it is not that bad. See problem is that girls usually are not that outgoing (especially in South part of India.) When in college, say around 17 years, if a girl has a boyfriend and her parents knew about this, it would be the end of the world for the girl. I am not saying it is like this with everyone, but looking at all my uncles and friend’s parents, they were all strict with their daughters and dating/boy-friends was not something which was taken casually. If they had friends, who were boys, then they need to be properly introduced to the parents, plus there is no concept of going out alone with a boy, it always should to be in a group consisting of girls as well.
Now, these are the rules set by parents, but it’s not like we never broke them!! We used to sneak out with girls and watch movies or go to restaurants with them. But our rebellion ended only there. Having sex or casually even talking about sex was a strict no-no. I have very few friends who broke that rule, especially girls who were bold and went all for it, but for me, I didn’t have the courage or the right partner.
I keep coming back and saying times are changing, it is a whole lot different now. I am talking about my experiences when I was a teenager and in junior college, which is like 15 years ago and my cousins/friends, who all had similar upbringing.
Sorry, I digress, but coming back to arranged marriages of the educated class, we do get some time to get to know the girl. First both the families meet, if like each other, they then move on to the girl/boy. And if everything is fine, the boy and girl get a green card for going out together and being alone. Again, the girl needs to be back home by 8PM, but yes, this is the first legal go-ahead for dating which we get.
Then they get engaged within 2-3 weeks and usually have about 6 months until they get married. Most people really have a whale of a time for these 6 months. They get to go to cinemas, restaurants, shopping by themselves, plus there will be several family get-togethers. Usually, the boy/girl get a little physical and sneak a kiss or two but still, most of them hold-out on sex until their wedding night.
And then comes the wedding, usually an average size wedding consists of about 2000 guests. Well if you consider it, our older generation never had 1 or 2 kids, the average is about half a dozen. My dad has 4 brothers and 3 sisters and my mom has 2 brothers and 3 sisters. So considering all of them and the extended family and their friends, it adds up.
So weddings are usually very grand, we spend quite a lot of money and there is always amazing food. If you get a chance, you should try and attend an Indian wedding, in India. Not the UK version as it is little abridged, plus the food is not the same.
After the wedding, there is a custom called the first three nights. This is the first time where the bride and groom spend the night together. For this, they choose a very good sized bedroom, sometimes this is in a lush hotel, they decorate it with flowers and perfume. Then there are various congratulatory sweets and a single glass of milk. Not sure what the complete story behind this is but it is like the first drink which the couple share, symbolic to the life which they are going to share hereafter!
So, strict no-sex, no-dating rule from parents goes out of the window and you are locked in this beautiful ro
om with the girl. And the weirdest part is that parents/relatives outside know/anticipate and even in some cases stay awake the whole night chit chatting with all their relatives who attend the wedding.
At least in our class, the girl and the boy date for about 6 months but in some lower classes, this happens so instantly that they get engaged, married within a week and then straight to the bedroom. This is what happened in the case of our grandparents. Our parents had a little time so it is better and its now up to us to continue the tradition.
Thankfully, we have got it much better, parents became more liberal and things aren’t that awkward anymore. And I am pretty sure, that for our generation and our children, it will be different. We still will be protective about our daughters, but I know for sure it will not be the same.